Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
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User:Klaksonn and Category:Wikipedians who support Hezbollah

Today I noticed that Klaksonn (talk • contribs) recreated Category:Wikipedians who support Hezbollah and Template:User_Hezbollah (as Template:User_Hezbollah 2) for the fourth time (since April 2) today which I speedily deleted again. I blocked him for a week, only to relent because I was concerned that I may have overreacted since he hasn't of yet re-added it to his userpage. However, his downright hostility towards me (for example: he has previously accused me of being racist and having double standards merely because I was Australian) and other editors as well as total disregard for policy has exhausted my patience. Now that he has threatened to have me de-opped, I hereby ask other administrators to review his behaviour and send him a strong message that we will not continue to tolerate such inflammatory displays on user pages or his incivility. --  Netsnipe  ►  19:25, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

You told him on the 2nd to take it to deletion review and not to recreate it. He did it anyway. He also seems quite incivil on the talk page. I don't feel you were in error anywhere on this one. IrishGuy ^talk 20:15, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Recreated category per "Likud Wikipedians", "Yisrael Beytenu Wikipedians", "Kadima Wikipedians" and so on.. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 20:28, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

By the way, I didn't recreate the category for the last time today, as you sadly claim. I recreated it weeks ago and no one seemed to have a problem with it. I bet you knew that. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 20:41, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Your rationale is irrelevant. WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS isn't a valid argument. You were asked to seek deletion review rather than constantly recreating. You chose to recreate anyway...while making personal attacks and calling Netsnipe a racist. IrishGuy ^talk 20:53, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the above is a valid arguement. My rationale is very relevant. Other categories exist, I don't see why the one I created is inappropriate. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 21:05, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

I also see you're making it personal by trying to get me blocked for 3RR, reverting edits to an article I created. Very low. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 21:09, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

He just broke the 3RR rule. As I have reverted him, someone else should block him. He was warned, he did it anyway. IrishGuy ^talk 21:07, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

How am I "making it personal"? I don't even know you. I read this report and looked at your edit history. IrishGuy ^talk 21:11, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

For the record, it is 5 reverts now. IrishGuy ^talk 21:13, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Reverts to an article I created. I have provided sources, one of which from an American governmental organization, saying IC is one of the finest educational insitutions in the world. I find it normal for this to provoke some jealousy. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 21:15, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

The Wikipedia:Three-revert rule applies to all articles, whether or not you created them. --Iamunknown 21:17, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

When one editor was about to break this rule, IrishGuy somehow intervened to get ME blocked for 3RR. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 21:19, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

I blocked Klaksonn for thirty-six hours for edit-warring. Feel free to continue discussing the Hezbollah template matter, though. -- tariqabjotu 21:33, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

It has also been the case that Klaksonn has been incivil to me in the past, committing a breach of WP:NPA by calling me a racist, and telling me to "Buzz off", after I nominated the template he has recreated, for the first time. Myself, Netsnipe and Klaksonn were in quite a heated debare which resulted in Netsnipe blocking Klaksonn for 24 hours.In this case, and bearing in mind this user has previously been blocked for longer, and warned to behave himself when he came back (which he obviously has NO intention of doing, I would ask these previous blocks to be taken into consideration and for the present 36 hour block to be severely extended. I see no other way of keeping this user under control. Thor Malmjursson 01:10, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Not all of Kalksonn's contributions are inappropriate. I don't think they warrant an indefblock yet. --Iamunknown 01:25, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I am not asking for an indef, but surely his past incivility, bad manners, behaviour and downright disregard for rules and procedures should be enough to get him more than one and a half days "time out". Thor Malmjursson 02:00, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

So why exactly is this category not allowed? The Behnam 02:20, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

The initial reason the template and associated category were nominated (in the case of my nomination, for speedy (as devisive and inflammatory)) is that Hezbollah is generally viewed almost worldwide as a terrorist organisation involved in illegal activities. In my estimation, if someone were to create [[Category: Wikipedians who support Al-Qaeda]], [[Category:Wikipeidans who would like to be suicide bombers]], [[Category:Wikipedians who smoke dope]] or [[Category:Wikipedians with pedophilic tendencies]], they would all get the same treatment. The activity they support is illegal, and therefore could be devisive. Could also start a war with someone creating [[Category:Wikipedians who do not support Hezbollah]]. In short, devisive, inflammatory and plain wrong. Wikipedia is not a battleground! Thor Malmjursson 02:48, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree, though it is a slippery slope in both directions. If expressing support for Hezbollah is not acceptable, what political opinion statements are next? Why not scrap all of them anyway? They don't serve the project, but they can negatively affect it. True? The Behnam 02:55, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

False debate on it's face. This stuff comes up almost exclusively in regard to a couple of contentious geo-political problems. No one complains ' He has the i'm a democrat' userbox, or the GOP userbox, or the Labour party box. No, people complain when someone's got a terrorist group, and then people scream outrage because they secretly support that terrorist group too, but are smart enough to not advertise it. When it's pointed out that blowign up 3 year olds is generally reviled, they scream 'then get rid of all userboxes, you're repressing my freedom'. No, we're going with widespread consensus that 99% of userboxes are fine, and 1% need to be examined and possibly removed. the "I support suicide bombers who blame everything on jews instead of their own lack of self-accountability" Userboxes should be removed and deleted. The 'I support a major party in the politics of my own nation' boxes are fine. No one's complaining about the 'This user is a member of Fatah' Userbox; it's a legit party. (Is there such a box?) ThuranX 03:01, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

That's as naked a POV statement as I've ever heard. A terrorist isn't just someone you don't like. Established Zionist groups started out as blatantly terrorist organizations, for instance, and arguably much of what Israel still does is state terrorism -- the Israelis regularly blow up 3-year-old children too, use collective punishment, etc. In fact, the early Zionist groups in Palestine were often more blatantly terrorist than Hizb'Allah is now. Face it, you either allow people to profess faith for liberation movements, or you don't. I personally am against all poitical identification as very unencyclopedic -- the pursuit of knowledge should not be politicized any more than it already is by nature. But it seems to be popular on wikipedia, and tolerated. If it's tolerated for one, it must be tolerated for all. If this user has introduced this in a hostile fashion, that should not be tolerated, but the idea behind the addition of such a category is no different than any other political movement.Larry Dunn 20:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Fatah is a legit party!? 68.248.83.41 03:08, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, I'd say it is about as 'legit' as Hamas. Perhaps Hamas is more legitimate from the perspective of political legitimacy, considering the vote. Oh wait, does 'legit' mean acceptable to Israel & friends? I suppose that Fatah is legitimate under that assumption. The Behnam 03:22, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

More so than Hamas, which has lot more ties to terrorism than Fatah. Even Hamas is more legit than Hezbollah. Both have participated in free elections, both are starting to get major recognition as political parties, not terrorist groups. ThuranX 04:10, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

The user in question was obviously being hostile and as such should be properly dealt with. However, with regards to the larger matter at hand, I have to disagree with some of the users above. Hezbollah is in fact represented in the Lebanese Parliament and as such it does not seem entirely inappropriate for users to believe that category's or infoboxes should be created in "support" or stating their membership in this organization.--Jersey Devil 03:20, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Jersey Devil, in respect of Klaksonn's behaviour, Hostile is to Understatement, as "Minor tremor" is to the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906! Thor Malmjursson 03:35, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Question one: how do userboxes supporting even relatively non-controversial political parties benefit the encyclopedia?
Question two: how much time is spent arguing over what does or does not cross the line into the unacceptable?
Of course, I'm not arguing for "fair treatment" of this userbox (userboxes don't have rights) which should be deleted either way. But it's time to delete them all. Not userfy, but delete and remove. If some users leave Wikipedia as a result…great. Experience shows that these are often the very same editors who causes other problems in the pursuit of these same opinions; those who are not will accept the removal of contentious material with grace and an eye towards moving forward.
Wikipedia is not a forum for self-expression, national, political, religious or otherwise. When new editors visit another editor's userpage and see it filled with that editor's opinions, they got the wrong idea, and who can blame them? It's our collective responsibility for allowing it.Proabivouac 04:44, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Ban userboxes is your solution? Throw a hissy fit and get rid of userboxes. and then say 'well, anyone who goes wasn't worth keeping?' I think you'll find we'll lose hundreds of editors, who will see that as a major step towards thoroughly anonymizing their hobby. You will not just lose problem editors, you'll lose good editors who like that they can be themselves in their wikipedia presence while helping the project. Once Userboxes are gone, the next logical step will be the elimination of almost all text oon userpages, because someone will see identification of rival college enrollment as offensive, rival careers as belittling, and lists of on wiki accomplishments as elitist. We'll have to switch to numbered ID's, adn then we hit reducto ad nauseum. No one on this project (or nearly zero, there might be three or four odd ducks) wants to have a user number, and not name. Userboxes are fine in the vast majority, those supporting terrorist groups, pedophilia (also under discussion on AN/I), and other anti-social, often criminal behaviors need to go. This 'eliminate em all if I can't have my 'kill all the XYZ's' box is childish. ThuranX 11:39, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I believe you meant reductio ad absurdum? —²¹⁰physicq (c) 03:07, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but ... nauseum, absurdum... either way, the point's the same. Taken too far, everything gets stupid. (and probably sickeningly so.) thanks. ThuranX 03:29, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Re-read my comment; I was specifically addressing userboxes supporting political parties. We can recognize three categories of userboxes: those which are helpful (e.g., identifying subject expertise, language fluency, admin status, etc.), those which are useless but benign (probably the majority,) and those which are useless and cause pointless strife. The third of these should be eliminated, because there is no compelling argument to keep them.Proabivouac 01:33, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Regardless of the vitriol and insult throwing above, fact is that 1) userboxes are not the goal of the wikipedia project. 2) Editors are offended by userboxes saying that a user supports hezbollah, myself for one. I consider myself a moderate, and I consider myself to have an open mind in terms of userboxes. However, Hezbollah is on at least 6 country's designated terrorist organization lists. Hezbollah has a long and well-documented history of conducting terrorist acts. It is polemic, it is designed to incite and inflame, and it is offensive to me as Jewish editor, that someone would be allowed to have a userbox in support of a group that has advocated, quote: ""If we searched the entire world for a person more cowardly, despicable, weak and feeble in psyche, mind, ideology and religion, we would not find anyone like the Jew." and "“if they (Jews) all gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide.”" ⇒ SWATJester ^{On Belay!} 10:04, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, you know, you're discriminating againt, um, his culture.Proabivouac 11:29, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

It's sad to see Hezbollah, a legitimate resistance movement, being compared to crackheads, pedophiles and actual terrorits, when someone like "Thor Malmjursson" is allowed to have a userpage this disturbingly repulsive. This is a sad day. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 17:38, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Compared to actual terrorists.....you mean like the 6 countries that have designated either part or all of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization? Or the European Parliment declaration 2 years ago that recognized "clear evidence" or "terrorist activities" by Hezbollah? Or the AMIA Bombing, the worst terrorist incident in Argentine history, carried out by Hezbollah? Sure. That's legitimate. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 17:52, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

And yet again, I come under attack... or rather, my choice of design does...Maybe it would be better if I blank my page. Thor Malmjursson 22:10, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

We can argue here 'till the end of life on earth but saying that is generally viewed almost worldwide as a terrorist organisation involved in illegal activities is erroneous (read Hizbollah article) as one might argue the same thing about the U.S. administration. I followed User:Embargo's case for a long time and eventhough i blocked him for a 24h period (for relating his Hezbollah supporting userbox to Israeli massacres- according to him) i never supported admins' actions toward him forbiding him to use any userbox mentioning Hezbollah. If your motto, guys, is NPOV than apply it thru and be fair. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 22:46, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

FayssalF, I agree that userboxes supporting the U.S. administration, or any other political party, should be deleted.Proabivouac 19:03, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

All controversial userboxes should be removed outright. Hizbollah is a great resistance organization which mitigates the terrorism committed by the IDF and similar organizations. Hizbollah also has charities and many other things. Not allowing someone to express admiration for Hizbollah is akin to not allowing a userbox that says "this user supports the red cross and UNICEF". All userboxes which say "This user supports Israel's right to exist" or any other similar polemic hate speech should be immediately removed, no questions asked.--Kirby♥time 20:46, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Um...how exactly is "This user supports Israel's right to exist" hate speech? IrishGuy ^talk 20:48, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Because it implicitly considers Palestinians, the true owners of the land, subhuman and not worthy of having their needs tended to.--Kirby♥time 20:54, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

That sentence in no way calls anyone subhuman nor does it say Palestinians are not worthy of having their needs tended to. That sentence, your example, isn't even remotely hate speech. IrishGuy ^talk 21:20, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I see it as no different than someone with a userbox stating "This user supports segregation" or "This user supports Apartheid", both of which are unacceptable. Saying that "This User supports Israel's right to exist" is racist, derogatory, and not conducive to a positive editing atmosphere here on wikipedia.--Kirby♥time 21:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

You think it is racist to support Israel's right to exist? That isn't even remotely racist. We actually have an article on racism maybe you should read it. IrishGuy ^talk 21:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it is very racist (along with the whole of zionism) because it favors Jews over other races. Also, it is very offensive that you say it is not racist. Zionism is racism, pure and simple. You ask me to read the racism article; that's funny, seeing how I was about to ask you to read it.--Kirby♥time 21:54, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Instead you link to an article with all manner of tags about the article not being neutral. Saying you support Israel's right to exist isn't racist. IrishGuy ^talk 21:57, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

"determine[d] that Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination"--Kirby♥time 22:04, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Nice that you leave out the detail that it was revoked in 1991. IrishGuy ^talk 22:09, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, so for 16 years, it is considered racism, and then suddenly, bloop! it's not racism anymore. Is this a joke? And ultimately, a substantial part of the world considers it a form of racism. Wikipedia should not cater to zionists.--Kirby♥time 22:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

But getting back to the matter at hand, there are only SIX countries that consider Hizbollah a terrorist organization:

List of entities officially designating Hezbollah as "terrorist"

Entity	Part(s) designated as terrorist	Reference
United States	The entire organization Hezbollah
Canada	The entire organization Hezbollah
Israel	The entire organization Hezbollah
United Kingdom	The Hezbollah External Security Organization
Netherlands	The entire organization Hezbollah
Australia	The Hezbollah External Security Organization

Compare that to how many countries consider Zionism to be racism:

(25) Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Brunei Darussalam, Cuba, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Mali, Mauritania, North Korea, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, United Arab Emirates, Vietnam, Yemen.

--Kirby♥time 22:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The UN rescinded the resolution with a vote of 111 to 25 (with 13 abstentions). Obviously, the majority of nations do not agree that Zionism is racism. Regardless, supporting Israel's right to exist isn't the same as being a zionist. IrishGuy ^talk 22:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

And the majority of nations do not agree that Hizbollah is terrorist. Either allow them both, or deny them both. And supporting Israel's right to exist is a form of zionism. That's the whole thesis of zionism. That would be like saying "Saying that blacks are inferior isn't the same as being racist".--Kirby♥time 22:28, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Wrong. You were earlier arguing that Zionism is the belief in the superiority of Jews. Supporting the existence of Israel isn't the same as believing in the superiority of Jews. IrishGuy ^talk 22:49, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Diyarbakir

• Diyarbakir (talk · contribs)
• Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not a battleground

User had been tagging random cities with "Category:Kurdistan" [1] [2]. When the categories were removed as per WP:V and WP:NPOV [s]he reverted them back with an edit summary "revert anti-kurd edit". [3] [4]

I do not believe [s]he is a new user given the nature of the edits. Being as inactive as [s]he is, his/her ability to notice such category removals is also suspicious. Especially on articles where [s]he has no edits which may involve WP:HA.

Although registering as far back as 13 September 2006, user has fewer than 100 edits of which most seems to be voting (keepinging kurdistan), categorizing (adding Kurdistan) or reverting (restoring Kurdistan).

-- Cat ^chi? 15:05, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Without making a comment on the sockpuppet issue (I think I side with you on that, it feels like an established editor) I must point out that those are not 'random cities' but cities that are in the region commonly known as Kurdistan... seems obvious they should be tagged as such. I'm not going to wade into this dispute (I honestly think I'm the only uninvolved editor on the entire 'pedia in regards to the kurdistan wars) but you may want to let the edits stand. -M^ask? 17:09, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

This isn't a content dispute. The user avoids discussion and merely reverts without relying on any kind of sources nor discussion. Entire contribution seems to be revering. Users with similar edit patterns have been banned before such as User:Diyako who also has a history of sockpuppets. WP:V suggests that I should be able to "verify" these issues without relying on someones personal belief system. I have every reason to remove anything that can't be "verifiable" unless evidence to the contrary (verifiable info) is provided. -- Cat ^chi? 17:23, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Diyarbakir could be sourced to Turkish Kurdistan specifically, and the 11 provinces the Kurds have in Turkey at The parent Kurdistan page over at GlobalSecurity.org fairly easily. Right wing think tank or not, they do do exhaustive research. -M^ask? 17:37, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

The issue is User:Diyarbakir's user conduct. This is ANB/I not the articles/categories talk page. Please take your content related arguments there. Your argument is not inline with Wikipedia:Categorization#Some general guidelines #8 -- Cat ^chi? 18:22, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

It really is. Your argument is that the user is a policy-breaking sock. I'm pointing out that the actions were inline with policy and as such the sock cant be rightfully classed as abusive unless the owners been banned. Want to try again? We can start the conversation over now that we know where each others coming from :) -M^ask? 18:45, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I have said all I have to say. This isn't a content discussion, instead it is a request of admin review. Admin's will decide weather or not to take action. Smudging it with a content dispute is disruptive IMHO. -- Cat ^chi? 19:25, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

So now you're accusing AKMask of being "disruptive", for pointing out that the user you've accused of being "suspicious" hasn't made any abusive edits? -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 20:09, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I consider revert wars disruptive yes, thats what Diyarbakir is doing. Locating CfD on 10th edit is more than enough to suspect Diyarbakir to be a sockpuppet. As for AKMask, I do not recall making an accusation. If it looked that way please disregard. That was not the intention. -- Cat ^chi? 23:11, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Would an administrator comment on the edit behavior of this user? -- Cat ^chi? 12:17, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not paid enough to get involved. Speaking as an Admin, & having looked not only at Diyarbakir's edits, but also such fora including Category talk: Kurdistan (discussion stalled since February, page protected) & Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Kurdistan, that's my comment on this entire conflict -- Diyarbakir, you & Kurdistan. -- llywrch 22:07, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I am also a volunteer. I see no point in this post. -- Cat ^chi? 17:19, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

My point is simple: no warnings, no discussion of this matter on Diyarbakir's Talk page or on the pages I linked to. Add to that silence the fact that some parts of Turkey are considered part of Kurdistan (I'm too lazy to find a cite, but Category:Kurdistan appears to have one or two), & there's enough bad faith for everyone to have a helping. Getting people to settle on which authority to use to justify putting a category tag on some Turkish provinces would be a good place to start -- not coming here & complaining about another editor's contributions. Asking an Admin to get involved at this stage is the equivalent of asking someone to do your homework. Need I say more? -- llywrch 21:07, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Note: this was concurrently on Wikipedia:Community sanction noticeboard#Diyarbakir . -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 03:49, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I have posted this at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Diyarbakir and found some interesting additional evidence. -- Cat ^chi? 13:55, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Since at this time you're the only person who's posted to that page, there are no checkuser results to consider. There's just your complaint that after you'd filed an MfD on Portal:Kurdistan and CfDs on Kurdistan categories, Diyarbakir (who's been adding Category:Kurdistan tags) opposed the deletions. How is his/her consistent support of Kurdistan topics any more abusive than your consistent attempts to delete them from Wikipedia? -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 20:30, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I also note that you filed WP:RFARB#Category:Kurdistan earlier this month, only to have it declined as a content dispute. "Category:Kurdistan" also underlies your present complaint, forum-shopped to these two noticeboards. Please stop trying to use disciplinary procedures as leverage in your content dispute.

Finally, I notice that you have never posted to User talk:Diyarbakir (history), either to try settling your dispute with him/her before bringing it here, or to notify him/her of your bringing this complaint. See the top of this page: "As a courtesy, you should inform other users if they are mentioned in a posting." Here you are in the wrong, Cool Cat. Please take more care with your own behavior. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 21:40, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

You are welcome to file an RfAr case. Please stop this nonsense. That very "evidence" you point out had been filed by Moby Dick. Arbcom actually reviewed that allegedly disruptive noms mentioned in your evidence. I do not see the point of you posting replies to me since you are not even listening. Also you can post this on one location. -- Cat ^chi? 21:45, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Diyarbakir = Moby Dick confirmed with the checkuser. Hence I formally request users block as per every remedy on the RFAR case on Moby Dick namely: #Moby Dick banned from certain articles, #Moby Dick prohibited from harassing Cool Cat or Megaman Zero, and #Moby Dick may be blocked for continuing to harass. Blocks shoud be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Moby Dick#Log of blocks and bans. -- Cat ^chi? 21:45, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Diyarbakir is now indefinitely blocked as a sockpuppet per the checkuser and arbitration cases (block log). --KFP (talk | contribs) 22:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Misou inappropriate violations

Misou (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log)

Multiple warnings (not from myself) on the User's talk page. Seems to be a repeated pattern, the warnings don't seem to do much good. Warnings related to policies: WP:HARASS, WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA, WP:WQ.

Please see also Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive229#Possible_Tendentious_editing_by_User:Steve_Dufour_and_User:Misou

Relevant troublesome DIFFs:

1. WP:HARASS (revealing user's personal info) - [5]
2. poison dripping off your teeth now again - [6],
3. knucklehead like Touretzky - [7],
4. You might want to spill some cold water in your face as you must be dreaming - [8],
5. PFUI (name of editor) - [9],
6. so obviously tainted by anti-Scientology POVs that I could puke - [10],
7. If this is all you have to contribute to my request you might as well shut up - [11]
8. Propaganda shit removed. disrelated material goes. Bye2 - [12]
9. Whoever put this in there should be sued by the Scientologists for libel. How blind can you be to leave this in so long? - [13]
10. (Undid revision 120657435 by F.Obstruso. WP:VANDAL!!! You should get shot from water pistols by the partisan squad.) - [14]

Yours, Smee 17:28, 23 April 2007 (UTC).

And these:

1. This was constructive editing until you - Mr. Know-it-all - showed up here. Don't you have enough problems at home? [15]
2. PS, and your WP:OR statements should go where the sun never shines [16]

I have made an effort not only to warn the user for each violation, but to be civil myself (although he says that I am "cynical"). --Tilman 17:40, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

User blocked for a week. I'm not a big fan of abusive editors who think they can game the system. EVula // talk // ☯ // 17:43, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I am particularly disturbed by the editor's behavior cited in reason #1. In the edit summary block he calls out another editor by what he believes to be their real name. He received this information from one Barbara Schwarz, another editor that was banned indefinitely partially because she attempted to do the same thing. Whether or not Ms. Schwarz is a reliable source of information isn't even relevant, but Misou's reporting of what he believes to be the personal information about another editor should be harshly punished. Vivaldi (talk) 04:10, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I have witnessed that almost all the Anti-Scientologists have coloured Misou's discussion's page (See Misou talk page archive) with anti-User propaganda and this was done almost in sequence. Is that all the ambition of some Wikipedia admins to blindly favour such tactics ? --Jpierreg 10:29, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

One week block too long?

An editor, on Misou's talk page, has raised a concern with the length of time for the block. Anyone else want to weigh in? I think it was reasonable, considering the full knowledge the editor had that their behavior was disruptive (specifically, not only had they been warned several times, but they actively engaged the warning editors and responded to the warnings, eliminating any doubt that they could have missed them). EVula // talk // ☯ // 20:37, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I do not support uncivilized comments. However, this does not appear to be a clear cut case of uncivil remarks. Tilman and Misou seem to have diametrically opposed viewpoints. While I do not condone Misou's choice of words, I also feel that Tilman helps set the tone, and thus encourages Misou to react rather than respond. His comments are often blunt, matter of fact and curt. While perhaps technically WP:CIVIL, they do little to encourage compromise and discussion. These two will probably never see eye to eye and be best friends, but I believe that Tilman does very little to reduce the tension.

Immediately after one of the remarks was made, Tilman posted a warning on Misou's page. While perhaps technically proper (I don't know), I felt that it did little to reduce tension. I posted on both users' pages. On Tilman's I posted that I felt it would be better if he let someone else 'warn', rather than giving the appearance of being righteous and increasing tension. On Misou's page, I posted that he was out of line and not helping himself. However, I did not intend to be counted as one of multiple users warning him as I feel that is overstating it.

I have not been on wiki long enough to know what punishment fits what crime. You have my overall views on these two and you are welcome to apply them in whatever manner you see is just. -Peace in God. Lsi john 20:54, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Misou has indeed used uncivilized wording in some of his heated edits and responses, making it difficult to defend him, however after reading through the cited violations above, some appear to be a bit overstated. Whether they all qualify for wp:civil is for someone else to decide, however I do recommend reading the history around them before making a long-term decision. Lsi john 21:43, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I did not realize that this block came from ANI so I had posted on Misou's talk page and I thank EVula for bringing up my concern here. Irrespective of warnings or discussions, this is Misou's 1st block, right? Then I think 24-hours would have sufficed and, for a stern warning, 48-hours as a maximum. And yes, Misou has risen to bait on occasion but, rather than over-analyze, can we just give him a more reasonable block and move on? That is all. Thanks. --Justanother 22:19, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm an analyst. I analyze and analyze... But, I agree that a week was harsh. -Peace in God. Lsi john 22:52, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

To those questioning the length of the block, please look at some of the past discussions about these issues in Misou's archives. User talk:Misou/Archive/Archive-Apr2007 User talk:Misou/section index Anynobody 00:34, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I think the length of the block was appropriate considering the frequent instances of violation of wikipedia editing policy. It was fair and just.--Fahrenheit451 01:23, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Having observed much of the above unfold as it happened, I feel this block (and its length) is appropriate. Robertissimo 05:15, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Block is inappropriate and reflects taking "side" to anti-editors Misou might be temperamental but be bold and WP:IAR still apply. Overdoing it should be penalized with a 24hr block or 48hrs maximum, if repeated (which it is not). CSI LA 02:33, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Block is appropriate for user who continually abuses the system and repeatedly disregards the policies and guidelines of Wikipedia. His contempt for Wikipedia and its editors is repeatedly shown in his comments and edit summaries. Vivaldi (talk) 04:10, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

IAR has no bearing on civility; I suggest you re-read the policy before throwing it into a debate about someone's behavior.
Also, please assume good faith; I'm not taking sides in any "side" in anything. EVula // talk // ☯ // 04:55, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• Support one week block - per Robertissimo, Fahrenheit451, Vivaldi, and Anynobody. In my opinion, the blocking admin hasd acted correctly and appropriately. There appears to be more than uncivil behavior to justify such a block; specifically the violation of privacy concern with regards to editors' names. The uncivil behavior cited has often occured. Orsini 13:21, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• This looks valid to me, I endorse the block. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 13:23, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• Throwing myself against the lions here, but I reject the length of the block as inappropriate for a first violation. As a note, I find it unfair and uncivil to come along afterwards (with Misou not even able to comment here) and list out allegedly harmful past acts which have no meaning for the current block - as some editors do it here. That looks like kicking the one already on the ground and marks the quality of treatment Misou got when s/he was still here. COFS 03:50, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

  The editor got by without any previous blocks by slipping through the cracks. Given the technicality, I see no reason why we should blindly enforce such a narrow-minded process of blocks. Misou had been warned numerous times to become more civil, and he never did. To blindly hold to some arbitrary notion of block duration is silly, in my opinion. EVula // talk // ☯ // 08:14, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

  My opinion is that "slipping through the cracks" is a rather arbitrary assessment of what happened. How do you know that s/he would not have stopped once warned properly by non-involved editors or an Admin? COFS 21:56, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

  Uh, possibly because he didn't stop after being warned? Strikes me as pretty strong evidence... EVula // talk // ☯ // 22:04, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

User:Jeanclauduc

Jeanclauduc (talk · contribs · block log) has stated that he's Jean-Claude Ducasse, CTO of MDS International [17]. He's been involved in edit warring in both MDS International (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) and a company he's in legal disputes with, MDS America (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). His English appears to be poor, so someone fluent in French would be helpful in determining if he's even trying to understand the cautions and warnings he's received, and what he means by his many comments that make little sense. Language problems aside, he's repeatedly made legal threats against editors and Wikipedia [18] [19] [20] [21].

MDS International is currently full-protected, and there is a COI/N. Ronz 15:52, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I'll try that. But please guys keep calm and don't escalate the issue further. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 15:59, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

This guy seems rightly pissed off at (what was) the contents of the article, which looked like a concerted smear campaign against the company, based on an anonymous attack site and original research. Though he is talking about lawyers, there are other editors whose edits are of concern. 76.109.17.236 (talk · contribs) and WizardOfWor (talk · contribs) seem to be making some troubling edits, as well as most of the warnings. It seems Jeanclauduc is not the only one with a conflict of interest. -- zzuuzz^(talk) 16:31, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

While waiting for Jean Claude's response to my message, i share teh same opinion w/ zzuuzz. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 16:40, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree, if Jeanclauduc backs down and explains himself. The article is protected in a version that he should be happy with. --Ronz 17:03, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I am much more concerned about the edits of WizardOfWor (talk · contribs) and 76.109.17.236 (talk · contribs) than those of Jean. I am not sure how much you are aware of the implication of the information posted at the article on wikipedia. But, i'll wait and see. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 17:25, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but I thought it was priority to get help with Jeanclauduc's legal threats and poor English. Sorry if my focus on him was inappropriate. --Ronz 18:01, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

No worries. Hoping to hear from his concerns first as he's the claiming party. We'll deal w/ the rest later on. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 18:07, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Many thanks for your help on this, Fayssal. It's a little hard to get to the root of this when both sides apparently have an agenda and I can't make heads or tails out of some of the statements. One other question: can you find a corresponding article on fr.wikipedia.org? I'm afraid that my high school French from 20 years ago did not get me very far. Kuru ^talk 01:04, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I couldn't find any article on MDS International in the French Wikipedia. EdJohnston 01:31, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Nothing except the Tunisian political party Mouvement des Démocrates Socialistes. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 13:06, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Update

I received a message from User:Jeanclauduc but i needed some more clarifications. So probably i'll get answers this afternoon. I also contacted admin BD2412 who is an intellectual property lawyer to have his opinion. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 13:11, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

72.19.4.235 (talk · contribs · block log) claims to be Kirk Kirkpatrick, CEO MDS America [22]. --Ronz 20:01, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

All our attempted diplomacy, including the asisstance of French-speaking admin FayssalF, seem to have led to a further legal threat from Jean-Claude Ducasse, or a person claiming to be him. I have proposed to the other editors at Talk:MDS International that we nominate that article for deletion. The war between MDS America and MDS International should go take place in a courtroom somewhere, and not vex us any further here at Wikipedia. If the legal problems are ever solved, I'd favor recreating both articles. If you disagree, please join the discussion at Talk:MDS International. See also a report on MDS International at the conflict of interest noticeboard. EdJohnston 23:48, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

User:Rbj

User:Rbj has been chronically incivil and insulting toward anyone who disagrees with him at Talk:Intelligent design. This is after multiple recent warnings there and at his talk page and a block 1 month ago for personal attacks there. People at Talk ID are becoming exasperated and Rbj just doesn't seem to get it, so would some admins here take a look at his history and recent comments there and his talk page and take whatever action is warranted and that will get him to participate positively. Odd nature 21:41, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I took a careful look at the relevant edit history. The problem is that Rbj is strongly opinionated but also highly intelligent and committed to NPOV. He tends to lash out too strongly against those who disagree with him. The recent edit does not merit a block because, as Rbj defended himself, he attacked the opinion as "made-up" rather than attacking the person as a "liar", which he has done in the past. I'm not going to take action, but the most that could be done is a warning against personal attacks, including labeling opinions as POV, with a block to follow if the warning goes unheeded. YechielMan 02:03, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Whether he's actually committed to NPOV is not the issue (and neither is it a given), his civility is. He's been warned many times already and blocked once as well and is still is at it. Something more needs to be done please. Odd nature 19:00, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

And he doesn't let up. Looks like his current target is User:Orangemarlin. But, since I won't touch him, and other admins seem uncertain, perhaps you should elaborate clearly on what it is you think needs to happen. — coelacan — 20:01, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I think a topic ban is in order here. Failing that, a 48 block seems justified since the 24 hour one didn't make an impression. Odd nature 16:34, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

neither do you let up. do the rules not apply to you, 151? r b-j 22:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

This is perennial. Doesn't seem to be related to the ID page, but this recent alteration of another's user page was pretty incivil. Over on Talk:ID, calling other editors' work "dog-shit" and brandishing the "you guys think your own shit don't stink" line again. And waving around the threat of meatpuppetry again. And calling another editors' arguments "bullshit". I didn't dig any further than that. No, he's not pleasant to work with. I've had too many disagreements with him in the past to step in, myself. I'm would not be able to act as a disinterested party. But I agree you shouldn't have to put up with this... — coelacan — 02:20, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Coelacan, you again are not being honest. here is what i said: "you don't let reason and self-examination prevail so people like Gnixon or Morphh have to go get more editors from the outside to help push back this blatent POV editing" and then 151 (now know as Odd Nature) says: "so it doesn't matter how many meat puppets people like Gnixon or Morphh recruit from the outside" (which isn't even true, all Gnixon did is put it on a comment noticeboard for the Science and Religion projects which is getting a 3rd opinion) and now you falsely accuse me of soliciting or threatening meatpuppetry. is being untruthful of someone else considered by you to be civil? BTW, Coelacan has attacked me before (when he was an admin wannabe) and it was reversed by Jimbo. Coelacan does not have his nose clean. r b-j 22:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

He's continuing to be incivil and attack others: [23][24][25] Would someone please make an effort here to get him to stop. Odd nature 16:32, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

boo-hoo-hoo, 151 would like to inject his POV into an article about a contentious topic without opposition. 151 would like to claim any opinion of his as fact and have that canonized into a Wikipedia article and wants no one to get in the way. he's not the only one. if he were, there wouldn't be much of a problem. i am frustrated with repeated misrepresentations of me, my positions, Wikipedia policy, and the facts, and have these guys hide being WP:CIVIL. they are not civil and to come here and call the kettle black is something akin to hypocrisy. r b-j 22:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

r-b-j, I strongly encourage you to take a more civil tone. What's it hurt? Why not try to work civilly with people? I asked Jimbo for a clarification myself at the time, and he very clearly stated that you aren't under any form of special protection. Just ease off the cursing, and quit accusing everyone that disagrees with you of every form of wrongdoing in the book. There is absolutely no need for this to end badly. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 22:06, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

i never said, nor implied that i was ever under any special protection. i am saying that Coelacan is wrong regarding his previous experience with me. and that Jimbo has clearly repudiated him (do you need me to find the link?). what Coelacan did then is what he did here right now, he attributed some other person's action to me. at that time he accused me of leveling a legal threat against Wikipedia (and got me blocked indefinitely when i did nothing of the sort) and Jimbo said no way. that's all i said and meant to say. i do not invoke Jimbo as if he is my personal protector or anything, but regarding this thing with Coelacan, regarding User:Karmafist, and regarding my right to disappear (after Karma was banned, i decided to come back), Jimbo has acted completely correctly as i could see it and in all three cases, against either mistaken or abusive admins. r b-j 22:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Tobacco Litigation

Resolved

This article was AFD'd at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tobacco Litigation as a news article. Myself and two other editors identified it as a blatant copyvio. User:BuickCenturyDriver then closed the AFD and redirected the article to Tobacco Lawsuits but left the copyvio in the article history at Tobacco Litigation. User:BuickCenturyDriver does not appear to be an administrator, so could not have deleted the history in any event.

1. - Can someone delete the copyvios from the article history?
2. - I'm a little rusty on AFD closing rules. Who is entitled to close an AFD? Who is entitled to close one early? Are normal users permitted to do either of those things? If they are, should they not close AFDs that require actions upon closing that only an administrator can perform?

exolon 16:12, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• Anybody can close a unanimous AFD (though they may not want to WP:SNOW it), and anybody can close one that's been withdrawn by the nom (as long as nobody else has taken the nom's position in the interim). It's generally not a good idea for non-admins to close ones requiring admin action, for the reasons you've already noted. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 16:44, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the info - the copyvios are still in the history so that still needs doing. exolon 18:00, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• Sorted. Guy (Help!) 19:38, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Actually someone else redirected, but I closed it. This is resolved. BuickCenturydriver (Honk, contribs) 22:03, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Odd one

Stephen Pate - sdpate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - has emailed OTRS (ticket 857097) to complain that the article Disability rights in Prince Edward Island is his own work and he revokes the license to use it; as we know, you can't revoke the grant of license so that's a non-starter. He's been blocked for blanking it. Two things come from this, though.

First, I encourage others to review that user's contributions. They appear to present a particular slant on Canadian politics (read: POV).

Second, the article on disability rights in Prince Edward Island seems rather odd. The subject rather specific, there is no link to the Prince Edward Island article, there is no indication that disability rights on PEI are in any way different to those in the rest of Canada, and the citations make it appear as if the entire thing is original research. Much as I hate to remove something when the author makes a baseless and ridiculous request, it does look a lot as if deletion might be merited for that article. Guy (Help!) 19:33, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Someone's nominated it for deletion.

However, someone may want to help Stephan with the GFDL as he has now written on his user talk page:

The article Disability Rights on Prince Edward Island was written in April 2007 by Stephen Pate. Stephen Pate is the exclusive copyright owner of this work. The author has forbidden its publication, copying, use or modification by anyone, including Wikipedia and its agents.

Continued wrongful use of this article may result in civil penalties of any jurisdiction in North America and Europe being imposed on Wikipedia and any independent editors who violate the copyright. Please take heed of this notice.Sdpate 18:28, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Just pointing it out. --Ali'i 19:51, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

These he has emailed me with to point out the continued media pressure (?) he'll keep on the 'pedia if we dont delete it: http://www.theguardian.pe.ca/index.cfm?sid=24649&sc=110 and http://peidisabilityalert.blogspot.com/2007/04/news-flash-wikipedia-editor-may-be.html -M^ask? 20:44, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

A bit of background I know of: This week's signpost contains an article about an editing conflict in which this user was involved. He was most upset that the article was written by a protagonist in the conflict, and tagged it as {{pov}}. I reverted this change on the grounds that it was a newspaper article not an encyclopaedia article; however I think it is not generally a good idea to go writing Signpost articles about issues in which you are yourself involved. Sam Blacketer 22:05, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

"Continued wrongful use of this article may result in civil penalties of any jurisdiction in North America and Europe being imposed on Wikipedia and any independent editors who violate the copyright." Blocking Sdpate for legal threat. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 22:42, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Too late, Naconkantari got to it first. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 22:45, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• I nominated it for deletion, because while ANI can get the guy blocked, it probably won't delete the article except under extraordinary circumstances. Nardman1 22:57, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

The attempt to revoke the GFDL is obviously invalid, but the article is clearly not going to survive AfD. Any objection to my speedying the thing and saving us 5 more days of aggravation? Before anyone says this would set a bad precedent, I know it's been quietly done several times before. Newyorkbrad 23:01, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Do it, if it is a notable subject someone else will decide to write about it. It has absolutely no incoming links from mainspace. If someone wants to make pointy-headed, vaguely-threatening, GFDL positions then just be rid of their GFDL contributions. SchmuckyTheCat 23:10, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• I really hate to give in to somebody who is being such a pain, but really, really--is keeping this article worth it? Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 03:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

US DOJ - Moved from AIV

• 149.101.1.121 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) - Vandal briefly stopped after second warning ... then once he saw that he wasn't being blocked (see previous report below), he started up again here with repetitive, redundant multiple links.

• Note: This IP matches the mask (149.101.0.0/16) in my special IP list which is marked as: "United States Department of Justice - See Wikipedia:Sensitive IP addresses for important information before blocking" HBC AIV helperbot3 22:58, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• - despite two warnings continues to add repetitive, redundant multiple links at Harvey Awards. -- Tenebrae 19:00, 25 April 2007 (UTC) ^{(Moved by bot)}
• Note: This IP matches the mask (149.101.0.0/16) in my special IP list which is marked as: "United States Department of Justice - See Wikipedia:Sensitive IP addresses for important information before blocking" HBC AIV helperbot2 19:01, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

No edits since recent warnings - leave on file for a short while and then delete. Ian Cairns 19:26, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I've moved this thread from admin intervention against vandalism, as it may warrant a little more discussion than tends to happen there. – Luna Santin (talk) 23:28, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

What separates someone at the USDOJ (a huge cabinet level agency with tens of thousands of employees) vandalizing comic book articles from someone at some other employer? This isn't a situation that needs special handling just because the IP is from a special place. SchmuckyTheCat 23:32, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Public relations? --Iamunknown 23:43, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

No discussion needed, I think. They were warned, no edits for a few hours, you can move on to your next victim :) --kingboyk 23:33, 25 April 2007 (UTC) (e/c)

Not sure what the above comment means. The user stopped for a while, and when he saw nothing was happening to him, he simply started up again. I guess he's gone home for the night, but it doesn't seem right to keep having to rv his vandalism -- I could wind up a 3RR that way. --Tenebrae 23:40, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

3RR doesn't apply if you are fighting vandalism. As it's a shared IP, we consider the vandalism warning enough; we don't block as "punishment", we block to prevent damage. As it's stopped, that's the of the matter. If it resumes, and you spot it, please feel free to drop another note here. --kingboyk 00:22, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Once again, if anybody blocks that IP, someone needs to notify ComCom immediately. Sean William 00:14, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, absolutely. But assuming it's stopped now, there's no reason to block. --kingboyk 00:22, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I've reverted today's offerings from the same IP address. There may be good edits in there, but I'm not going to wade through 37 edits picking and choosing. I suppose two days in a row rules out "bring your child to the office day" ? Shenme 18:31, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

We really do need help here, DoJ or no. This obsessive anon-IP doesn't respond to our entreaties nor our warnings. He will stop for several hours or a day, and then start right back up again. Please. Can't something be done? --Tenebrae 03:52, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I've semi-protected Harvey Award. Now I'm contemplating putting up a semi-protection notice that reads "this article has been sem-protected to prevent an anonymous vandal at the United States Department of Justice from defacing the article." Does shame work with such people? ··coelacan 04:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Although, hell, maybe "shame" isn't the right idea in the first place. What if they really do have OCD? I really haven't seen anything like this. ··coelacan 04:05, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Glock 19 slow motion edit war about Virginia Tech Massacre link

Resolved

 – Clear consensus to remove on the talk page. Page was protected. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 23:29, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

There's a slow motion edit war in progress at Glock 19 over including or not including a section mentioning that a Glock 19 handgun was the primary gun used by the killer in the Virginia Tech Massacre. Talk page seems to be running majority but not consensus against (gun is notable in massacre, but massacre isn't notable from gun's standpoint), with a significant vocal minority arguing that the massacre is notable from the gun's standpoint. Multiple people on both sides are reverting it back and forth several times a day, each staying under 3RR but collectively up to about 10RR yesterday and about 6 today, on each side, if I counted right.

Talk page discussion has been ranging from reasonable to hot and cold running slander. I asked people to calm the discussion down and it failed miserably.

Could we have an uninvolved impartial admin review? I have a personal bias on which is the correct answer and don't want to touch any special buttons on this case. Thanks. Georgewilliamherbert 01:06, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• This came up before with the Beretta Cx4 Storm and Dawson College shooting, settled on not mentioning it in the gun article. There I would have actually not minded mentioning it, but Glock 19 has appeared in so many more places that it's not closely associated the way, say a Mannlicher-Carcano is with Oswald. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 01:22, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Not to mention that by that standard, nearly ever U.S. police shooting would have to mention it, since Glock 19's are in use by a SIGNIFICANT number of offices and departments. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 03:44, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

This discussion is also closely related to the Walther P22 edit war, it being the other handgun carried by Cho, which surprisingly enough has seemingly reached a more stable position, albeit one of non-consensus. Unlike in the Glock 19 article, this discussion has fallen more closely to a 50:50 split, with no clear consensus. A potential compromise has been proposed, to mention the Va Tech Massacre in only a See also section, and this has reached a semi-stable stasis in just the last 24 hours. As a former participant in the Glock 19 and Walther P22 debates, as well as in the earlier Cx4 debate, Dawson College, and several other shooting debates, I have intentionally tried to keep out of latest parts of the two recent discussions by not responding to potentially slanderous comments, although I did post an RfC on the Walther P22 page to try and take some of the heat away from the article itself. It seems to have helped the article reach the previously-mentioned semi-stasis. 3RR blocks have also helped calm some of the more vocal participants. Being that both sides are extremely vocal and convinced that their position is somehow the only one, I don't believe that a full mention, nor a complete non-mention, will ultimately work on either of the two articles. Yaf 04:20, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

If I understand correctly from other past edits, the Gun guys have strongly objected to any mentions of "Pop Culture" references, and this is pretty much echoed as a what Wikipedia is not) (see this talk page discussion as an example. Pretty much, gun pages should be about the gun itself, not a trivia repository about every little media apperance and infamous shooting escapade.--293.xx.xxx.xx 11:11, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Just as I posted this, I had to look at the Walther PPK, and sure enough, there is a little Pop Culture blurb about James Bond. At least the Walther_P99 has a model that is officially licensed as an offical James Bond merchendise. Well, there goes my "Pop Culture Bad!!" arguement. --293.xx.xxx.xx 11:17, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I would argue that there's a slight difference, as the Walther has been associated with Bond for around fifty years. When I was involved in the Cx4 discussion, my question was whether it will remain significant - if you were discussing the issue five, ten, twenty years down the road, will people remember that the Dawson College (or Virginia Tech) weapons were particular ones? The Walther PPK in particular is remembered as Bond's gun; I personally doubt the Glock 19 or Walther P22 will be remembered as the Virginia Tech guns. I think it would be helpful for the future for the Firearms Wikigroup to work on guidelines of some sort in regards to what is significant enough for inclusion. And with all this said, I'm going to try to stay out of the rest of the discussion, since I have family in that region and cannot consider myself as holding an NPOV on the topic. The Dark 16:30, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

293.xxx, us "gun guys" only generally want pop culture sections when it's about a significant cultural icon: James Bond's classic suaveness came partially from his having a PPK, he didn't need a big honking american M1911 .45. Bond's PPK is a significant cultural icon that is remembered by millions around the world. In one year, who will remember that Cho used a Glock 19, or a Walther P22? It is completely irrelevant to the information of the gun, exactly which criminal events it was used in. When the gun itself is particularly notable, for instance, debate over the Barret M82 series of .50 anti-material rifles in "crime", then it may be worth including. However, there is no particular big debate over the Glock 19's usage in crime: it's quite literally ubiquitous around the world by police forces, militaries, private citizens, and criminals. Most people couldn't even tell you what a Glock 19 looks like, but they are going to tell the world it is important to know that this particular shooter used it in this particular shooting? ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 16:41, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I've fully protected the article because there's ongoing reverts to the article. This needs to be worked out with consensus and people are a bit too worked up at the moment for that. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 19:08, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Night ggyr: there is quite clear consensus on the talk page that it should not be includable. I don't dispute your protection, due to the edit warring, but I've restored the version without the "see also" link, per the article's talk page. At last check, I noticed an almost 3:1 preference on the glock article to exclude the reference. This is not the Walther article, where there is no consensus yet: the thoughts of the community on this topic are quite clear, and it is only a few disruptive editors who keep messing with it. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 19:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

For the record, it is 14 editors against, to 5 editors for inclusion. That's pretty clear consensus to me. Accordingly, I've removed the sentence, and left a comment on the article talk that consensus HAS been reached, and further attempts to disrupt the article will not be looked upon kindly. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 20:00, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I suggest you reread what Yaf had to say. For all intents and purposes, the Glock19 and P22 discussions are one in the same. There is no consensus in the P22 article and the only reason you had a consensus on the Glock19 is because not everyone cared to post in there. The Keep voters from the P22 could just as easily post keep comments in the Glock19 page and there goes your presumed consensus. Take the two pages as a whole, that is what they are. Alyeska 22:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

No, for all intents and purposes, the discussions are not the same. The reason there was a consensus on the Glock 19 article is because there WAS one. I did get a laugh out of the allegation that we should take the sum of the Glock 19 article keep votes and the .22 walther keep votes and make that apply specifically to the Glock 19 article though. I shouldn't have to point out Alyeska, that despite your repeated incivility and personal attacks on the glock 19 article, there is a clear consensus: 14 to 5, in favor of deletion. You are not above wikipedia's policies regarding community consensus, even if you yawn when told to follow our civility policies. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 23:16, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Ironically, since the Walther P22 article is split 50:50 down the middle, combining it with the Glock 19 article still wouldn't change the consensus: it would still be heavily in favor of excluding the information as irrelevant. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 23:18, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

No, I suggested you take all votes, not just keep and remove. I was commenting that all the keep voters from P22 could easily post in the Glock19 page and suddenly the consensus disappears. Its the same argument being made by largely the same people about the same basic topic. Unless of course you disagree that Cho used both pistols in the same massacre. As to the claims of incivility. I was making factual comments. He was making commentary that had nothing to do with the subject at hand. He was manufacturing proof against me. If you would read a little deeper you will note he accused me of refusing to support non-American related gun incidents. I told him I was more then willing to support non-American incidents, if I knew of any. He didn't even post a single example outside of Port Arthur, which I also said I would support. Game Junkie was making false accusations at me about my bias as well as making commentary that was designed to distract from the subject at hand. And I love some of your links. Since when is red herring a personal insult? If you read up on that, its a logical fallacy. Not my fault that exposing someones logical fallacies might seem insulting, but the truth isn't biased. However, that has nothing to do with this discussion and I wonder why you brought it up. As it stands, I am supporting taking ALL (ok, all valid votes) votes from both P22 and Glock19 into account. The subject between them is identical. You do that and your claimed consensus for the Glock19 disappears. As I previously commented on, this is something that Yaf has also commented on. Alyeska 23:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

And in response, all the "remove" votes from P22 could post in the Glock 19 page, and it would be different. As to Cho using both pistols, that is irrelevant to the Glock 19 and P22 articles (though it may be relevant to the VT shootings article). Again, factual comments do not excuse incivility, on your part, or on the part of others, who themselves were out of line as well (but not repeatedly, as you were). You seem to be missing that the P22 and Glock 19 articles are two seperate, disparate articles. Nothing prevents the information from being on one article, but not the other, other than consensus to do so. Let me reiterate: the two articles are about two different subjects: they fire different chamberings, are made by different companies, are in use by different countries, and are completely different firearms. So why would any consensus be combined between the two? Notice, I'm not arguing the opposite: that the Glock 19 consensus should be applied to the P22 page. That's just as inappropriate. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 00:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Different articles, exact same subject. The dispute you "resolved" in Glock19 is the exact same dispute in the P22. It is possible to make the same argument across multiple pages. Your splitting hairs right here. All I am asking is you take into account all interested parties, not everyone in the P22 article necessarily considered that the issue would be repeated in the Glock19 thread. Alyeska 00:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Weapon articles have long had to deal with trivial cataloging of every appearance they've made in fiction; the guideline that's been settled on is that we should only mention incidents where they've become iconic, thus, AK-47 has a section on its broad cultural significance (even included on a flag), Walther PPK mentions the cultural icon of James bond (intimately associated with it across several movies) and F-14 mentions Top Gun, a massively popular movie that basically starred the plane as another main character. There hasn't been any such iconic association between the gun and the incident, in the way the Ford Bronco is associated with OJ Simpson or Oswald's Carcano is with the shooting. If it becomes a matter of significance, then it's worth mentioning, otherwise it's trivia, and we avoid cataloging trivia for its own sake. Wikipedia is not an index. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 00:08, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Especially see lack of serious media coverage of the gun models. They're being mentioned in passing; with prior massacres where the gun is somehow a part focus of the coverage, you see stories on the guns, people talking about them a lot, etc. All the media coverage here is mentioning the facts of what was used, and leaving it at that. The coverage, the pundits, the politicians, nobody seems to much care what model of gun was used, other than for the historical record. That seems sort of not-notable from the guns' perspective. Georgewilliamherbert 00:47, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Put another way, people wanting to learn more about the Virginia Tech shootings may conceivably be interested in what kinds of firearms were used, so it makes sense to link in that direction. However, people wanting to learn more about a particular firearm are unlikely to be asking "what crimes has this weapon been used in?", so it doesn't make sense to link in that direction. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 02:46, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Jefferson Anderson reverted my User page & blanked other pages of mine

Is that allowed? I in the past have been punished for doing that to my own page. Also Jefferson Anderson has blanked other of my pages. Can something be done to retrieve the material? Please help? Sincerely --Mattisse 01:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC):

Please someone stop User:Jefferson Anderson from blanking portions of my user page, please. May I have my pages protected until I get a rest. I do not know what is still missing. There is material that I need that I can no longer find. Is there help for this? --Mattisse 01:55, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Matisse, please stop forum shopping. Users have already removed the speedy deletion tags. Regards, Iamunknown 02:19, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Ah, I don't think it's forum shopping, is it? Mattisse is just worried about what might happen overnight. I don't think protection is necessary, because I hope no admin would speedy these pages (WP:MFD is the correct venue, although I'm don't expect they'd be deleted). — coelacan — 02:46, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Since you have directly characterised my comment unfavourably in your edit summary, coelacan, I feel the need to explain: I did not intend to WP:BITE anyone. I don't know the history between these two users, all I see is a big black box on every single one of Mattisse's subpages characterising Jefferson Anderson unfavourably, and I can imagine that Mr Anderson might feel like he is currently wearing a scarlet letter and is being disparaged; whatever rift has come between them is not likely to go away because of such actions. Furthermore, forum shopping to WP:VPT, here, multiple other editor's talk pages is likely further to drive a wedge. I would appreciate your assumption of good faith on my part and not characterise me as something that I am not. Thank you, Iamunknown 02:57, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I haven't characterized you as anything. If you were biting, it would likely be inadvertent, since as far as I know, you aren't a jerk. It's your choice to be offended if you want to, but I didn't intend it that way. — coelacan — 03:11, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry. I was not intentionally forum shopping. I do not know about these various process of deletion. All I know that information was being removed from my user page by Jefferson Anderson. I received no responds from anyone I asked except Thatcher131 who said that it was not happening. I have managed to restore some. of it. Is that called forum shopping, trying to get a response from some one? Please, I would like to do the right thing here, but I have been harassed for many months and I am very tired and at this point I do not know what to do and can't think clearly anymore as I am frightened. Sorry to have irritated you. Sincerely, --Mattisse 03:21, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it's not necessary to raise the issue in so many places. One message right here on WP:ANI would be enough. Now you know. — coelacan — 03:27, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

No, I understand now. And I apologize to both of you for getting all indignant. I guess I just saw what appeared to be a major rift between you and Mr Anderson and, while I don't know the background behind it, I wish it were not there. I don't assume that I am alone, and I should probably just mind my own business now. I apologize. --Iamunknown 03:23, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

It's cool. I don't think either of us intended to WP:ABF with the other. — coelacan — 03:27, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Can someone please clear this up for me... so if the user retires he is allowed to blank his talk page?--Dacium 03:47, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

User:Jayjg and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/United States military aid to Israel

• DRV discussion now at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2007 April 26. -- ChrisO 18:48, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to request that another administrator review Jayjg's behaviour in this matter.

Jayjg undid the actions of another administrator here, and imposed his own decision on the afd result. His actual decision may have been technically correct. However, I don't believe Jayjg should have been the person to close this afd, given his editing history on articles relating to Israel. CJCurrie 05:07, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

How can you "merge" when the article is deleted, which would be a violation of the GFDL? hbdragon88 05:12, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes it would be. --Iamunknown 05:18, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Even as such submission relative to the GFDL is often made, it's not, IMHO, as a matter of law, quite right. One may, of course, effect a page history merge, such that the revision history of the antecedent page may be safely deleted, but, as I recapitulated here, such merge is disfavored as exorbitantly time-consuming and generally unnecessary. The GFDL, though, does not require that a substantive revision history be kept; that is, a revision history that enumerates only those who are principal contributors but does not offer individual diffs to the contributions of each suffices (were the latter substantive history required for GFDL compliance, the transwiki of content from Wikipedia to, say, Wikibooks would be a bit unwieldy [or perhaps technically impossible]). It is only, AFAIK, for policy reasons—largely good ones, IMHO—that we proscribe merge-and-delete closures. (This comment is, of course, entirely irrelevant to the instant situation or, really, to anything we do here, but I think it necessary to point out that (I believe) that we are not compelled to do things as we do.) Joe 18:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I just posed a question for Jayjg at Doc's page, WjBscribe at Jayjg's page, maybe we should wait for further comments until we hear from em? --Iamunknown 05:14, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Ah, I'd just noticed this myself and asked Jayjg to comment on it. It does seem very irregular. Better let him know that the matter has been raised here as well. WjBscribe 05:16, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Jayjg has a long history of activism here with respect to Israeli issues. Fred Bauder 05:21, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• If the action was technically correct, a "tsk" is called for. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 05:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Upon whom? --Iamunknown 06:01, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
    • Well Jayjg's close cannot be correct because it goes against GDFL. We can't merge deleted content... WjBscribe 06:03, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, for what it's worth, I don't think Jayjg or Doc's close was correct, I don't see any consensus there on anything. Still, Doc closed it as he did, and isn't that what DRV's for, rather than to reverse the close unilaterally while calling it "nonsense"? Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 06:07, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

It should probably be taken to DRV, but as the delete/merge issue, the easy way to do handle that is to have it as a redirect with the edits in the history and then merge anything over. Still, this looks like it should go to DRV for now. I do have trouble seeing Doc's close given what the AfD looks like. JoshuaZ 06:10, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I was hoping to be able to suggest that we wait to hear from both of them, but if we must I would suggest undeleting it and taking it to DRV, as that what should have been done had Jayjg not reversed Doc's actions. --Iamunknown 06:12, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Sent to DRV. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 06:23, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Should it be history-only undeleted during the DRV? I'm not terribly comfortable doing that since I listed it, but it might be helpful for those commenting to be able to see history. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 06:26, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

As was already noted, Jayjg was right to correct the mistake (I hope unintentional). If anyone, it is not he who needs to be admonished. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 06:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

What mistake? Jayjg disagreed with the other admin and undid his decision. His decision might have been right or wrong (I have no idea since I have not reviewed the votes Given the discussion, it seems to me that the majority voted for merging the information to other articles-whether that majority formed a consensus needs more experience which I don't have). His decision I think was right and was done in complete good faith but he should have stated his point through DRV but it was not respectful. --Aminz 06:42, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I fail to see where it was noted and I strongly dispute the statement. I think it was plain wrong. --Iamunknown 06:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Note that it was marked as a "minor" change, too. -- ChrisO 12:04, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Hi fellows! I just restored the AfD back to Doc's closed version and the article as well, but I left the DRV header up there, so people visiting the article could comment. I've a problem though; I'm rather ignorant when it comes to templates and have no idea how to get the DRV header to reflect that the article is not, in fact, deleted. Any assistance on this would be both welcomed and appreciated! Thanks in advance! Cheers gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 07:06, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Fixed. (It's {{delrev}}, by the way.) Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 07:13, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Ah, excellent. Thanks a lot to Seraphimblade for the help in getting the correct tag on the article! gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 07:22, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I added the AFD result template to Talk:United States military aid to Israel. --Timeshifter 08:42, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I note many of the same editors who voted for "delete" of this article were involved in possibly illegally deleting another article about Israel. This one: Accusations against Israel of war crimes during the Al-Aqsa Intifada (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). The closing admin comment on that page was "No consensus. Keep, with strong encouragement to merge with Al-Aqsa Intifada on the basis of Wikipedia:Content forking. Jayjg has so messed up the naming and the redirecting of the article. The talk page is under a different name than the article name. See: Talk:Allegations against Israel of war crimes during the Al-Aqsa Intifada. Every attempt to stop the possibly illegal deletion of that article was reverted by the same tag-team crew of editors. I thought the problem was more a problem with the name. I thought "war crimes" was too strong for all the various alleged human rights violations. So I tried undeleting the article and changing the name to Alleged human rights violations by Israel during Al-Aqsa Intifada. But Jayjg again deleted the page, and redirected again to al-Aqsa Intifada. I have since decided that there are even better names. See my request for help at: Wikipedia:WikiProject Arab-Israeli conflict#Requests for NPOV help. Specific articles. Some possible names modeled after other article names. Names such as "Human rights in the Palestinian territories," or "Human rights under Israeli occupation," or "Human rights in Israeli-controlled territories" Tewfik initiated the AFD for the article. Same as for United States military aid to Israel. Jayjg backed up the deletion attempts on both articles. It now seems that both attempts at deletion violated wikipedia guidelines. Neither article had a consensus to delete. I personally think both articles are content forks, not POV forks. Both articles have too much material to be dealt with well in a few paragraphs in another article.--Timeshifter 09:55, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

There's no such thing as an "illegal" deletion, only an improper one. I'm not going to pass judgment about whether the deletions you highlighted above were improper or not, but you're certainly right in saying that there are some very questionable things going on in the Arab-Israeli-related articles. As Fred Bauder rightly says, Jayjg has a long history of partisan activism in this area and it's not the first time he's acted in this way ([26]). A lot of the problems here appear to result from the activities of a clique of political activists; the same names come up over and over again. -- ChrisO 12:04, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

It's disappointing that some people appear to have taken a deletionist line on this. I've proposed a possible solution to the issue on DRV, which would establish a consistent series of articles on bilateral US military relations - see [27] for details. -- ChrisO 12:04, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

It has been noted that Jayjg has a history of partisan activism in this area. The question is to what extent he is permitted to use his admin privilages to support his POV. Is reversing the closure of an already closed deletion debate permitted? ابو علي (Abu Ali) 13:57, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I'll just note that some of the most bitter denunciations of Jayjg's preferred area of editing comes from (some of the) people who have been guilty of egregious POV-pushing in the same area themselves. My suggestion is that everyone in this thread just simmer down until Jay has had a chance to comment. I think that's fair to ask. IronDuke 14:10, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree that we Jay should explain his actions here. But I must point out that the only "bitter denunciations" I have seen here were the adhomeniam attacks in IronDuke's preceeding comment. ابو علي (Abu Ali) 15:24, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

There is no ad hominem when no specific person is targeted. IronDuke is absolutely 100% correct: Quite a large number of the people who consistently attack Jayjg are people who have their own, opposing biases. And yet, of course, they are never wrong themselves, it's always "administrator abuse", or "illegal editing", or something or the other. It's always "jayjg is pushing his POV", never "Jayjg is reverting other's POV pushings". The fact is, Abu ali, you don't know whether Jayjg was using his admin privileges to support his POV or not: that is an assumption you are making, and as we're already discussing logical fallacy here, the assumption is ungrounded because you don't know what is going on in Jayjg's brain. Lets all just stop "assuming" things already, unless it's "good faith". That's the ONLY thing we should be assuming at the moment: it seems many of Jayjg's critics are forgetting that. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 16:32, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I think this is more a question of Jayjg's judgment rather than his good faith. I don't doubt that Jayjg believed that he was acting in good faith. The real issue here is whether his actions were well judged. Let's confine the discussion to that issue, rather than straying into assumptions about his motives. -- ChrisO 18:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

That's what I'm saying: He believed he was acting in good faith, so therefore we should treat him in good faith. I'm only commenting as per above based on comments that don't treat him in good faith. I'm not touching the issue whether his actions were "well judged or not" because I frankly don't know enough. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 19:08, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• I've been away sleeping and working while all this blew up. I find the whole thing really quite baffling. I've asked jayig for an explanation of his actions: [28]. I most resent having my considered decision rolled back as 'nonsense' by a fellow. I'd have been happy to discuss the close with him and review any mistake I might have made. He only had to ask.--Doc^g 16:53, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I think CJCurrie should have spoken to Jay before bringing it here, or better still, should have left it for Jayjg and Doc Glasgow to sort out between them. We should wait to hear what Jay has to say before throwing any more stones. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:54, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I see no harm in discussing the issue publicly. It's preferable to let the community review this properly rather than rely on backroom deals. Nor should Jayjg's actions be off-limits to public discussion, particularly as this seems to be a recurrent pattern of behaviour on his part. There's no code of admin omertà and nor should there be. IMO, CJCurrie acted completely properly in bringing here. It's the best way of getting the input of people without axes to grind. -- ChrisO 18:32, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

It's the sound of axes busily grinding that makes me say CJCurrie should have raised it with Jay directly. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 21:12, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Again, there is an assumption of "back room deals". This should have been worked out between Doc and Jay first. Doesn't stop CJCurrie from bringing it up for public debate, but this is the Administrator noticeboard: this is not deletion review. CJCurrie was not personally harmed by an admin's action: he's got no standing to bring an "investigation" against Jayjg. CJCurrie's appropriate action was to bring this up at DRV, not here. The only person with standing to bring a complaint here is Doc, IMHO. If I'm not clear enough, let me be more so: if you have a problem with a deletion, you go to deletion review. That's what it is there for. Not here.⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 19:08, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't much care what happens to the article (otherwise I'd be commenting in the DRV). But I don't think CJCurrie can be faulted for bringing this up here. Someone who disagreed with Doc's closing should take it to DRV, that's obvious. But Jayjg's overruling was so surprising that it's not obvious to take to DRV. It looks like the beginning of a wheel war, and that's a valid topic of discussion at ANI. I don't want to see users chastized for bringing up an issue that concerns them. It's not always obvious to every user what is the proper discussion area for every topic. Rather than saying someone has "no standing" to raise a topic, I'd rather users feel welcome to bring anything into the sunshine without being scolded for it. And I certainly don't accept the notion that only certain people can raise certain issues. — coelacan — 20:38, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Very well put coelacan!! I couldn't agree with you more. MetsFan76 22:02, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

User talk pages communication can hardly be seen as "backroom deals," more like the first step. I also note that this article seems strikingly similar in many respects to the Military equipment of Israel entry I authored a few months ago (although, I do think there is room for a United States military aid to Israel one; maybe not in its current from, but as an encyclopedic subject). El_C 18:51, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Ordinarily I'd agree, but there's too much POV-pushing, cliquery and outright bullying associated with Arab-Israeli topics on Wikipedia to make that approach a satisfactory one. This sort of thing seems to be a recurring, maybe even systemic, issue. In this particular case, admin powers appear to have been used in a brusque, unilateral and aggressive fashion in an immensely controversial topic area - not for the first time. No backroom deal is going to resolve the bad feeling that causes (it's not as if Doc was the only person involved - for the record, I'm wholly uninvolved in this incident). The only real solution here is for everyone (not just Jayjg) to de-escalate, act more thoughtfully and be restrained in using admin powers. Otherwise we're going to be back here yet again in the future with more of the same sort of complaints. -- ChrisO 19:19, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

ChrisO, do you really think it is appropriate to quote a misleadingly titled AN/I post which spends as much, if not more time discussing your alleged improper use of admin tools, in order to make whatever implication? It may not have been your intent, but it seems that this whole thing has gone in a "jump on Jay" direction, with much of the chorus resounding from those in content-disputes with Jay, or who are otherwise not speaking from the most neutral of positions. Tewfik^Talk 02:51, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

If I may, but "jump on Jay"???? Jay's actions were completely out of line and he was called out on them. That's how it works for any other editor here. Why should Jay get treated any differently? MetsFan76 03:03, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I couldn't agree more. We're supposed to be accountable, after all. As I recall, Tewfik, didn't you call me out for my actions on AN/I a while back? That's how it works. -- ChrisO 08:04, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

ChrisO, that seems to me to be the fault of the people involved with editing Arab-Israeli topics moreso than the administrators getting involved. I won't attempt to hide my POV on this: I believe that Israeli and Middle Eastern related articles are systemically attacked by certain editors pushing either a pro-Arab or anti-Israeli (depending on the article) POV. I also believe that when they are called out on their POV pushing by appropriate admin action, their immediate response is "This is just POV bias pushing by zionist admins trying to hate on Arabs." I've seen too many incidents where editors have been attacked and accused of things like "working for mossad" or being "cover ups for the Jews". Granted, there have been issues from the other direction as well, but much of this seems a case to me where you have a very loud, very vocal interest group pushing a POV, and then claiming that anyone who disagrees with them is biased, any admins involved are abusing their powers, etc. etc. It's disruptive, and now it is starting to find its way onto AN/I, which should be a bastion against such disruptive editing, and I'm sick of it. I'm not excusing anything that Jayjg may have done because I'm not that familiar with it, I'm just simply pointing out that you're right: there IS a systemic issue, and that all complaints against administrators in middle eastern topics, specifically arab-israeli topics, should be taken with a hefty grain of salt, and the claims advanced by editors on such topics be vetted before being assumed at face value. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 19:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I agree 100%. I don't think I'd disagree with a single word you've said, actually. But there's also a danger that admins involved in controversial topics can end up in a siege mentality and thinking that they're the last line of defence against a rabble of POV-pushers. I should know - I've been there myself as a veteran editor of Balkans articles, dealing with aggressive Serbian, Croatian, Albanian, Macedonian and Greek editors for nearly four years now. In the end, I came to believe that the way to deal with that sort of thing was to gain the trust of the mainstream editors on both sides by being fair, being willing to look at both sides of an argument, insisting on the use of reliable sources and being restrained in using admin tools (and deferring to other admins where it could be seen as improper for me to use my tools). It seems to have worked; I now get editors from the various sides regularly asking me for assistance in resolving issues. The bottom line is that one needs to build trust rather than stoke confrontation. -- ChrisO 20:05, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Agreed, SlimVirgin. I wish, however, that in the first place the conocerned administrator consulted the closing admin then, if the two were unable to reach an agreement and considered the disagreement based upon personal opinions but upon policy, taken it to DRV. --Iamunknown 03:55, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

There should also be a United States military aid to Colombia, of course. El_C 19:02, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

You might be interested in my proposal at [29]. I've been trolling Jane's for relevant info and will have a go at creating US-Israel military relations as a prototype for a "US-<foo> military relations" series of articles covering a standardised range of topics including military aid. I'd be interested to know your thoughts on this suggestion. -- ChrisO 19:19, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I think it would be very useful to have these sort of subarticles when the main -Relations article becomes too lengthy. El_C 20:30, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Jayjg has responded here [30] and here [31] ابو علي (Abu Ali) 22:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Requesting temporary block of IP 74.123.39.201

Resolved

 – Or seems to be? – Luna Santin (talk) 18:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Some user using this IP 74.123.39.201 has attracted warning messages from various users( See User talk:74.123.39.201). All edits are to Islam related articles and cannot always be termed vandalism. In fact in the case of Medina he/she has actually undone vandalism by another editor. However this user is being uncooperative by removing tags and making unwanted, sometimes haphazard edits. He/she has been ignoring warnings. A temporary block on the IP may be necessary to get them to the discussion table. --Deepak D'Souza (talk • contribs) 05:24, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• I reviewed their edit history. Warned repeatedly for vandalism. Removing tags from pages with no explanation whatsoever. Inserting various verses of the Qu'ran into articles. No dialog with anyone whatsoever. Behaviour continued after last warn. I've given them a 24-hour block - Alison ☺ 05:33, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Some sock puppet accusers are more equal than others

If I were to do this on someone else's talk page, I'd be banned. This editor? Above the wiki law judging from his/her posting history [32]. I'm not the first to get this sort of harassment on my talk pages.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Piperdown (talk • contribs)

Just a simple question I asked, based on your editing history. Your retort was as I expected.--MONGO 06:31, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

That simple question is not generally tolerated from those of us who aren't playing ball with the corruption here. I'd be banned for it, you won't be. Checkuser me, and allow me the same leeway to request checkusers on editors who I know are sockpuppets without me being banned for doing so. Ain't gonna happen.Piperdown 06:58, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

What corruption is that?--MONGO 07:01, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

This question looks to me like it's a badly worded question, buit one which needs to be asked (in a nicer way). The wording What's your real account (the bold there I put in for emphissis) looks to me like an uncivil way to ask the question. Od Mishehu 07:36, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

If you don't like the question, don't answer it. If you don't want questions like that, you should really attempt to be more like a new user, it isn't hard to do so. --Deskana (fry that thing!) 11:25, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Wow... the words being uttered here quite surprise me.... Apparently, it has become wrong for new wikipedians to know what they're doing. Some people actually DO READ all the rules and guidelines. Thats what they're there for. So that we don't get too many inexperienced people needing constant. A person who complied with guidelines and made himself familiar with policies before editing is now a sock puppet accusent? MONGO, you really shouldn't bang up people's edit history just to say they're a sock puppet. Has he been disruptive? Has he shown any signs of being disruptive? Try to be a bit more civil, and don't go up to random user accusing them of sock puppetry with no valid proof. Perhaps if you had asked the question in a more polite manner, such as... "Your knowledge of wikipedia, seems to be quite profound, as based on your first edit here. Any reason why?". Instead of instigating someone and spiting them for the response that you deem as inappropriate simply based on the phrasing of the question you asked them in the first place, remain civil, and don't BITE. Floria L 23:07, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

WP:SPADE--MONGO 07:11, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Floria, I think Piperdown's remark above concerning "the corruption here" is indeed disruptive, as is this AN/I. MONGO was not WP:BITE, and neither was my comment here [33], one month ago and unrelated to MONGO's concerns. --Mantanmoreland 14:45, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Systematic wikilinking of years

Earthelemental99 (talk · contribs) is wikilinking all years in articles en masse, appearing to start from letter Z. While it was disputed area in the past, I believe that WP:DATE still discourages that practice. Should we take an action? Duja► 10:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Doing any other Bobblewik-like things? - David Gerard 10:57, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

AFAICT, no. Just wikilinking every year in sight, including references, image captions etc. Duja► 11:04, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Just rollback and warn whenever necessary. Sole year linking had previously been discussed (see various Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers) archives), and while there isn't consensus to remove on sight, it became agreed they should only be relevant in the context (e.g. 2004 in sports). This is highly inconsistent with that, and is likely done by an unauthorized bot. Michaelas¹⁰ 11:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Rolled back and warned in mildest terms I managed to come upon. Huh, most of his previous activity was changing British spellings to American... Duja► 14:16, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Just to be clear: Bobblewik was delinking years (and being rolled back). Thincat 13:40, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

He's still doing it. JuJube 20:32, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

He is still delinking years, but not enmasse. And why shouldn't he delink years if there is no context? David D. (Talk) 20:36, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

He's not delinking years, he is linking them. JuJube 23:32, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

He/she is now reverting all the edits that Duja made. Strange. -- _Hdt83 ^Chat 03:30, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Rolled back and warned in strongest possible terms. I'm sorry that it included a bit of collateral damage, but it's difficult to separate trees from the forest. Let someone please take an eye on him, as I won't be around during the next 5 days. Duja► 07:56, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I've tossed a 24 hours block, and will put an eye on him afterwards. It's getting ridiculous. Michaelas¹⁰ 09:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

IP: 58.178.194.136

I'm a little concerned that the block on this IP was a little hasty and even undeserved. They have only made four edits total. The first edit they made is that of the typical new user/IP who doesn't really understand policy yet, but they were warned with a level two warning for it. It was deserved and the situation was handled appropriately. Their next edit was combined vandalism/spelling fix with an edit summary of only describing a spelling fix, but their edit directly after that deleted the vandalism in their previous edit. So, while they did vandalize the page and tried to hide it, they obviously realized they should delete it. Their fourth edit was to contest the block (though their excuse is, admittedly, rather lame).

They were not warned at all for the second case of vandalism, let alone given a warning level of three/four where it states they can actually be blocked for disruptive edits. They were just blocked for "repeated abuse of editing privileges" yet they haven't technically shown this, nor had they been properly warned for it, meaning, they could have very well not known that they could be blocked for it. I just think the block was hasty and a little mis-directed. I think this is a user who could easily learn the error of their ways (as is evident by them deleting their vandalism) if they are given guidance. --pIrish ^{talk, contribs} 14:01, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

What follows is not representative of anyone else's thinking; it is only my opinion. It's a 31 hour block. They can potentially find guidance when the block expires. They won't do that, though, as evidenced by the blatant lie in their unblock request. They vandalized at 12:24 and 12:30, and undid one of those at 12:34. They were blocked at 12:39. This block very likely prevented further vandalism, as that vandalize-and-revert pattern is usually not the end of a vandalism cycle, only a test phase. It is possible that they would have stopped after a level-4 warning; many vandals do. But I'm not going to lose any sleep over them getting the message with a 31 hour block. That's just me. We'll see what others think. — coelacan — 14:38, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

If you are not going to bother with the whole levels approach then why bother at all. Really the guy vandalised once. Then a second time, probably saw the warnings and took the second one down. Then you ban him. This is unbeliable level of WP:BITE. 31 hours is far to excessive. I would have chucked something like 1 hour at him just so they learn to knock it off if he had done something again after a level 4.--Dacium 03:26, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I guess I'm not so much contesting the block as I am concerned that they were blocked without even receiving a level three or four warning, thus, they didn't necessarily know their actions could potentially cause them to be blocked. Maybe I'm just a softie, but I think they have a right to, at the very least, receive a level three warning first before being blocked so they've at least got the knowledge that they could be blocked. After that, they've really got no excuse for their behavior. I know over at AIV, they often won't block someone until they've at least received a final warning. This person didn't even get a level three. If I were to report them over at AIV, would they still have been blocked? I'm honestly just curious at this point. --pIrish ^{talk, contribs} 14:51, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I probably wouldn't have blocked yet in this particular case. Level-2 and level-3 warnings are complete wastes of time, but a level-4 warning stops some people and is thus a preventative measure. I will point out though that strictly speaking, not a single warning is necessary if the vandalism is egregious and fast. The major concern is "is this ongoing" rather than "does the vandal know they might be blocked?" And to be honest I cannot imagine anyone not knowing that they can be blocked. The kid has surely used forums or chans or blog comment sections and learned that crap like this can result in blocking. Wikipedia is actually pretty generous; 31 hours is a rather short time. In any case, if you're concerned about this block, the best place to bring it up first is User talk:Atlant, rather than here. — coelacan — 15:03, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. That's really all I was curious about. Sorry if I didn't bring it up on their page first. In the past, when I've brought concerns up on individual talk pages, I've had my concerns brushed off and not had my questions answered. However, I've always gotten detailed and informative responses from here so that's the biggest reason I came here first. Also, I wanted varied responses, of course the admin will defend their block, so I wanted responses from someone not directly involved, which is exactly what I got. Thanks again for taking the time to answer my questions. --pIrish ^{talk, contribs} 15:11, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Actaully in my experience admins do not necessarily defend blocks if you question them. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 15:27, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

"I guess I'm not so much contesting the block as I am concerned that they were blocked without even receiving a level three or four warning, thus, they didn't necessarily know their actions could potentially cause them to be blocked." And we care why? If they know their vandalisms will get them blocked, and they somehow care, then that's a good thing, but you have no evidence or proof that they would suddenly flip over to making valid edits; I on the other hand have four edits showing that he has never made one. 31 hours is nothing, he can wait a day. Nothing is lost by him. If he truly wanted to be a valid editor, then he will happily sit in the penalty box, instead of thinking, "Wow, they stopped me from editing for adding "parrots like to eat dick" to an article? I'll NEVER add my ultraintelligent, well-referenced additions to this encyclopedia!" Please. --Golbez 15:33, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Your tone here is rather condescending and I don't appreciate it. Please treat me with respect and answer my questions in an appropriate manner as coelacan has done. I am not 10 years old; I deserve to be spoken to like an adult. Technically, they didn't necessarily know that they would get him blocked because he wasn't left with a warning that told him this. You really shouldn't make the assumption that he does know this because there is always a chance that he doesn't. Also, one of those edits removed their previous vandalism. Sure, they may have just vandalized again (and probably would have), but where's the proof that they would? This edit, without an incidence of vandalism after, is technically a valid edit. He also corrected spelling (really he changed from the British to the American spelling), but I won't really bring that one up since it was coupled with an edit of vandalism. --pIrish 16:06, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I apologize for my tone, but we really, really need to stop coddling vandals here. No, we don't need to work our way up the test template hierarchy, that usually just wastes the time of admins and the integrity of the encyclopedia. There's nothing wrong with giving a clue-bat hit to someone who has made nothing but vandal edits. Please tell me why we should care if he knew he would get blocked. Usually, when I do bad things on a website, I probably expect to eventually be stopped from what I'm doing. Same thing with real life. Common sense. I don't see why we can't expect that from newbies. --Golbez 16:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Yikes man, ever hear of Assuming good faith? This user made some very, very obvious test edits. And undid one of them! How did he even end up blocked? He tested. Was warned. He then made a combined good/bad edit. My assumption here is that he then read the warning and took out the bad. This is WP:BITE at its worst-case-scenario. -M^ask? 16:46, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

My main reason for responding to this was to respond to the line, "they didn't necessarily know their actions could potentially cause them to be blocked," and why this matters. You do bad things, you get hit with a stick. And I see that he vandalized after receiving his first warning, so I think your view of the facts may be incorrect. 12:24: vandalized. 12:26: first warning. 12:30: vandalized. 12:34: removed vandalism. 12:40: second warning. But I can see what you mean, he may not have gotten the "you have a message!" until after he vandalized.

Assuming good faith means assuming good faith with their edits; it doesn't mean assuming that someone will stop being a vandal just because they got a warning. It doesn't mean assuming good faith that they are only a vandal because they don't know there are consequences to their actions. There's a vast difference between someone making a good-faith test or copyvio, and someone adding "parrots like to eat dicks lol". That's not good faith, and I won't assume it is. It was their responsibility to figure out that such activity is frowned upon.

I have, however, roped myself into defending the block - personally, I would have probably not blocked after seeing his self-revision, nor after the first edit. Again, my main reason for entering this conversation was to challenge the assertion that vandals would stop vandalizing if they thought they were going to be blocked. (It's issues like these that are causing me to use more warnings as of late, which is a very good thing, but only in situations where I see any good faith at all; where I don't, they go into the corner after multiple hits.) --Golbez 17:01, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Is it possible that the new-message bar didn't come up for the anon in question (see bugzilla:9213)? --ais523 17:22, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

That's certainly possible, but if so then the same thing would happen even for level-4 warnings and they're going to get blocked anyway. I'm not sure there's anything for admins to do differently in the meantime. — coelacan — 21:19, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Wikignosis block for legal threat

Resolved

 – But question of disruption may remain DES ^(talk) 16:28, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I've just blocked WikiGnosis (talk · contribs) for continuing to make legal threats. The latest was this edit which used a cutesy rhyming thing to try and get around the whole NLT issue. Specifically, the user had been repeatedly warned about legal threats (see his/her talk page, plus an item on Durova (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)'s talk) so he/she described a behavior someone was doing as "starts with L, rhymes with bible". I've read this as a legal threat, and invite scrutiny of the block. I've counseled the user on his/her talk page to review WP:NLT and appeal once he/she is willing to commit to abiding by WP:NLT. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 14:35, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Support. Good job. Chilling effects are bad. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 16:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Upon further review, the user had been going around deleting ANYTHING potentially critical claiming Jimbo Wales authorizes him to. This includes things that wouldn't even fall under the scope of WP:BLP. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 16:45, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

For example [34] and [35]. Also, after checking some of his edits, I seem to recall having run across his name on AN/I before. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 16:48, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Update: The user doesn't appear to be interested in appealing the block, and has characterized being blocked for WP:NLT as a joke. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 02:09, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok, status change, the user would now like to appeal the unblock. If anyone has a chance to check it out, it's here. Thanks! - CHAIRBOY (☎) 02:31, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

You block him for making legal threats and the one edit you provide is merely him asking questions? There is no way that edit is a legal threat. I fully agree that it is a "travesty of interpretation of "legal threats" rule". Having said that you really just need to provide more links to his edits because he is obviously a trouble maker, but if you are going to ban him at least make it so it can stick because that reason is pretty much a joke considering what he posted.--Dacium 03:18, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

"I hope that this page becomes the laughing-stock of the non-Wikipedia "real" world. I have no desire to work within such a dysfunctional community." I denied based on that sentence. John Reaves (talk) 04:30, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

You really need to go back on that. The reason he made that statement was because of the way he was banned. If we agree he didn't make legal threat, then he wouldn't have been banned and he probably wouldn't have felt that way. And what does that comment have to do with the ban he was contesting anyway?--Dacium 15:13, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

These appear to be the two main "legal threats":

"I'm very confused about how things work on Wikipedia. It appears that it's okay to call other people names that are in no way "nice", but if someone mentions that this sort of behavior could be considered (I won't say the word, but it starts with the letter "L" and it rhymes with "Bible"), that is an "indef blockable" offense? Are you taking sides in the matter, and challenging only the after-the-fact "legal threats"? Or, have you been equal in counseling restraint among those who use inflammatory labels to malign other users?" (diff)

"The words "stalker", "terrorist", and "criminal" have been used above to describe Daniel Brandt. If these are true statements, why haven't law enforcement authorities been notified to prosecute Brandt on charges? If it's because these statements are untrue, then that's libel, folks. You're not doing Wikipedia any favors by libeling someone, or conversely, you're not doing the world any favors by typing on Wikipedia while you should be contacting the FBI. Make up your minds." (diff)

I don't agree that these were legal threats, at least not as I understand the term "legal threats", any more than the Wikipedia policies against defamation or copyright violations are "legal threats", or than an admin's warning not to link to pirated "warez" or other blatant copyvios would be a "legal threat". A statement about the law, or about what actions break the law, is not a threat to sue or file charges; it says nothing about the writer's own intentions.

See also User talk:Chairboy#WikiGnosis block. -- Not trying to "wikilawyer", Ben ^TALK/_HIST 04:36, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

WP:NLT#Legal complaints: A polite, coherent complaint in cases of copyright infringement or attacks is not a "legal threat".

Apply this to the above texts by WikiGnosis. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 07:18, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

View WikiGnosis's contributions. Nearly half of his entire contribution set says "Removing negative material per Jimbo Wales": misapplying the WP:BLP policy to remove ANY negative material, sometimes material that's not even negative (For instance, a person having cancer is apparently negative to him, as is a football player owning a restaurant after retiring from football). The argument that these statements are tantamount to libel, consistent with his prior accusation of libel, and disruptive editing, warrants a legal threat block. I close with a reiteration of one of his statements You're not doing Wikipedia any favors by libeling someone. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 11:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I reiterate in turn, Swatjester: "A polite, coherent complaint [...] is not a 'legal threat'". Stating that one is deleting material from an article about a living person (not oneself), because it was defamatory to the subject, is giving a reason in line with WP:BLP, a policy we have from Jimbo and the WMF legal counsel -- and citing that reason is not a "legal threat". If the concern's misplaced in a particular case, that's an error, but still not a threat. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 15:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The editor has now accused the admin who reviewed and denied the unblock request of disrupting Wikipedia to make a point in this edit. This does not seem to be an editor operating in good faith, Ben. In regards to your concerns above, accusing someone of libel (which this user _has_ done) is a direct legal threat. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 14:52, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I seriously don't know why it isn't clear to you that neither of those posts is a legal threat. Accusing someone of libel is not a legal threat, it is at best a personal attack. If he said he was going to take legal action, sue etc. then it would be a legal threat but what he said clearly isn't.--Dacium 15:09, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The user was blocked for violating WP:NLT when, as far as he (or I or some others) could see, he hadn't violated it. He has responded with comments including: "I hope that this page becomes the laughing-stock of the non-Wikipedia 'real' world" and referring to this as "a dysfunctional community." His response has been cited back to him as the reason for declining an unblock. I think he's got a justified complaint. Following WP:BLP should not be a blockable offense, he had not violated WP:NLT (as the quoted sentence makes explicit), and to keep him blocked because he thinks the block's reasoning laughable (or Wikipedia dysfunctional) seems a bit pointy to me as well. Criticism of Wikipedia, its admins, or their actions is not good reason to keep someone blocked, and issuing blocks or declining unblocks for bad reasons seems to me capricious, irresponsible, and disruptive of the trust which is the foundation of any voluntary community. I myself find this incident terribly disappointing. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 15:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

With the utmost respect, your disappointment is secondary to our responsibility to protect editors from legal threats. You and I disagree on whether or not repeated accusations to the effect of "you are libeling" is a legal threat, but to characterize that as a capricious, irresponsible, and disruptive seems to be going a bit over the top. The block is not because he's critical, it's because he's made repeated oblique legal threats, something that is not tolerated. I believe you've constructed a straw man argument by suggesting that criticism of admins is why he was blocked, and I hope you'll reconsider. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 15:45, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that WikiGnosis has been "polite" or "coherent", but I don't see that he's made any legal threats either. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:52, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Akhilleus. The post in question may have been trolling but I don't see a legal threat. Saying "these statements may be libelous" is no a de facto legal threat- particularly as you can't sue for the libel of someone else. I think we need to be a bit sharper on identifying legal threats, "I will sue you", "I am thinking of suing you", "withdraw that comment or I will sue you", "I am taking legal advice" type comments may all be legal threats. But I'm not convinced a legal threat was made here. In particular WikiGnosis seems to have valid concerns about the thread he refers to- Daniel Brandt (a real, living person, whatever Wikipedians may think of him) was described with very strong labels and had actions attributed to him that were in fact done by third parties. Advice to be cautious was appropriate. That said, I am unfamiliar with WikiGnosis- if he's generally around to cause trouble and has a history of trolling, I'm fine with the block. But I see no legal threat- covert or otherwise. WjBscribe 16:04, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok, then I'll unblock. If the user is trolling, I'd prefer a separate block that reflects that, but consensus seems to be leaning towards the text in question not being a legal threat. I appreciate the feedback, folks. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 16:08, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the aboe quotes are legal threats. i have seen others say things like "If you add that satemtn to the articel it is libel" and no one calls it a leagal threat. it my be uncivil, it may be impolite, and it may be disruptive. I haven't reviewed WikiGnosis's contributions in detail. From the above descriptions, a case could be made that he is editing disruptively. But I simply fot see "You are libeling person X" or even 'You are libeling me" as a legal threat, unless there is at least an implication of "and I will sue if you don't stop". Saying that soemone else might take legal action is not IMO a leagel threat, at least unless there is an implication that the parson saying (writing) this will urge the third party to do so. I think that the blocks for violation of WP:NLT should be lifted. if anyone wants to argue for a block for disruption, or other improiper actions, that will be another discussion, or perhaps an RFC might be the way to go. DES ^(talk) 16:06, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I now see at least three editors who don't think this block is warrented, at least not for the reason given. I urge the blocking admin to undo the block, before someone else does. DES ^(talk) 16:11, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I've already unblocked, you may have missed my 16:08 message above. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 16:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I did miss it, but I've seen it now. The matter is over for me, unless you want my assistance in dealing with trolling or disruption on the part of this user, which i will provide if you wish. DES ^(talk) 16:26, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Note another discussion below, different people, identical issue: #Legal threat from User:Kelly Martin. Do we need to hold a workshop on what does or does not constitute a legal threat? -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 17:11, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Irregardless, Wikignosis should be blocked for disruptive editing: if the legal threat block is lifted, I will lay a temp reblock for disruptive editing (indef would not be called for, though longer than normal would be appropriate given the user's history of being brought up here). By the way, I'm sure this workshop would go over the concept of a chilling effect, no? ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 20:15, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Um, the block was lifted by the blocking admin. And now you've blocked him again. I think this was somewhat premature; WikiGnosis hasn't been the most civil of users, but you have to remember that he was mistakenly blocked as a sockpuppet of JB196. I don't really see the reason for this block. --Akhilleus (talk) 20:21, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

A one-week block for civility? After being blocked indefinitely? I'm afraid we are going to effectively run off WikiGnosis and, while my interaction with the editor has not been the best, I don't want that to happen. Other users are much less civil and don't get a one-week block. I don't endorse it. --Iamunknown 20:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Swatjester, can I possibly be reading you right? You're blocking him now for issues prior to the block that was just lifted, not for anything he's done since that block? How is that preventative and not punitive? How do you know what he has or has not learned from the experience of the first block? I don't think this is how blocks are supposed to be used. It's quite possible someone could go through all our histories to find some flaw in our past behavior that we were never blocked for back then, and block us for it now, but that too would be punitive not preventative -- it wouldn't be directed at stopping present misbehavior. Neither is the block you've just imposed. You've pointed to no present misbehavior which must be stopped. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 22:25, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

To a point where we run off WikiGnosis? It's reality check time: WikiGnosis is a classic instance of disruptive editing. I lifted an indef block on this probable JB196 sockpuppet/meatpuppet as a gesture of good faith because this editor claimed to want to participate at Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination. Instead of going there the user immediately came to my user page with a rude post, then followed up with resumption of the account's old borderline legal threat language about the Daniel Brandt situation and insulted the project when another sysop reblocked. This account's main contribution to the project has been to misapply WP:BLP. New users don't behave this way. This is obviously a returning sockpuppet of someone who's already banned. Durova^Charge! 22:21, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The "JB196 sockpuppet" accusation was retracted. If you want to revisit that issue, or make a new accusation, please present new evidence. In any case, that was not the basis offered for the present block.

"borderline legal threat language about the Daniel Brandt situation" -- the two passages discussed held no such threat; they made a valid point about accusations of crime ("stalker", "terrorist", "criminal") against a living person, that if false these are defamatory and in violation of WP:BLP. As WP:NLT#Legal complaints states explicitly, such a complaint is not a "legal threat". And why are we revisiting this issue, when this too was retracted?

"This is obviously a returning sockpuppet of someone who's already banned." This may be obvious to you; it is not obvious to me. In the absence of some clear showing, let's consider this username's edits on their own merit, shall we? WP:BLP is supposed to be followed, and this user appears to be trying to do that. If he's doing it wrong, then show him where and how he's doing it wrong. Simply blocking him for trying to discourage defamation seems to me a very bad public message to send. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 22:42, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Please revert a monobook

Resolved

 – Or seems to be? – Luna Santin (talk) 18:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Pupster's account is working now, so I guess it is fine again. He dropped me a note that his school's computers are setup to not use javascript properly, so he expects this to be the reason. Anyway, his account is working now. Valentinian ^{T / C} 23:04, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

User:Pupster21 seems to be having a streak of bad luck with his monobook (User:Pupster21/monobook.js). This is the second time he's tried to add a script and trashed his ability to log in doing so. See WP:VPT. We confirmed last time that it is indeed the same person posting from Pupster210 and he only uses this account when his monobook is fried. Could somebody please revert it? Valentinian ^{T / C} 16:27, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

sure, I just blanked it. alphachimp 16:29, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Much appreciated. Thanks! Valentinian ^{T / C} 16:29, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Ha Ha Ha. You hopefully won't get another of these, for I got my script now without frying my monobook! Thanks! --Pupster21 Talk To Me 23:46, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

69.67.229.50 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

Resolved

 – Blocked. – Luna Santin (talk) 18:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Seems to be using the sandbox as a platform to soapbox, and is clearly violating WP:BLP, should something be done?--VectorPotential^Talk 16:38, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• It would be nice if someone else could deal with this--VectorPotential^Talk 16:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Blocked. – Luna Santin (talk) 18:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Rollback abuse at WP:FAR

Resolved

 – And by "resolved", I mean "this is already being discussed elsewhere and doesn't actually warrant our immediate attention." EVula // talk // ☯ // 18:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I hope this doesn't get escalated, but here's the situation. A Featured Article was submitted to FAR. Various comments were made, and the issues were resolved. Then, 2 weeks later, unbelievably, User:Marskell advances the article from FAR to FARC. I contested the unnecessarily hasty move, and then moved it back to FAR. He then rolled back my edit without any explanation or reply, abusing the rollback button. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-04-26 16:56Z

"Rollback abuse"? What is that? And what do you mean "escalated"? Are you threatening to wheel war?

Marskell was just maintaining WP:FAR, like he has done for months, with little or no thanks. The discussion of Great Lakes Storm of 1913 has been going on for over two weeks, and some points would appear to still need to be addressed, so the decision needs to be made whether to leave the review open, or close the review speedily, or move it to the next stage of review, which is FARC. Rather than "escalating" this storm in a teacup by bringing it here, why not discuss with Marskell at User talk:Marskell if you have a problem with what he has done, or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review if you think there is a problem with the process, or at Wikipedia:Featured article review/Great Lakes Storm of 1913 if you disagree with his substantive comments on the article? -- ALoan (Talk) 17:26, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Way to assume good faith there... "Rollback abuse" is a very common term, meaning that someone is using the rollback button for nonvandalism, without explanation. As for "escalated", I meant that I didn't want anyone to waste too much time on this; why did you assume I meant that I was going to wheel war??? First, Marskell doesn't own WP:FAR, so he can't just use rollback as he pleases. Second, the FAR discussion has not "been going on for over 2 weeks", it lasted a day or two, and has sat unedited for 2 weeks. I've already discussed it at the FAR page. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-04-26 17:31Z

Perhaps we could all just assume the assumption of good faith, eh? I have no idea what "escalated" means in this context. You complain about a rolling back and say that the situation may be escalated, but leave us to guess how. Edit/reversion/wheel war? Blocking? Opening an arbitration case?

Anyway, no-one has died - perhaps rolling you back without explanation was poor form; on the other hand, perhaps pressing the big red button marked "ANI" was too. I have suggested plenty of more appropriate venues to discuss the substantive issues above. -- ALoan (Talk) 17:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Hey, I wrote WP:AAGF, I know how to do it :P — BRIAN0918 • 2007-04-26 22:07Z

You asked to talk, so come back and talk. I've apologized on the review—you're right, I shouldn't have used rollback. I was planning to comment immediately and then we tripped over each other commenting on the page. Marskell 17:18, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Er, what were you coming here to ask for, Brian? TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:23, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

A third opinion, someone to watch WP:FAR in case it does escalate for some reason (such as if he rolled back again without explanation). — BRIAN0918 • 2007-04-26 17:34Z

Plenty of people are watching. -- ALoan (Talk) 17:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Brian, I did explain. Within fifteen minutes. You brought it here within five. I mean c'mon. I'm sitting here talking to you. Marskell 17:41, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Block of User:CINEGroup

I just blocked him for 24 hours for WP:3RR violations on Walther P22. But as he has already accused me of being involved in the editing dispute (I am not) and wikistalking I thought I'd bring it here for review. The diffs for the 3RR violation are on his talk page. I'll be honest, this kid is getting on my last nerve. Dina 18:29, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Hmm. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Ispy1981&diff=prev&oldid=112994770

BTW, that post was made by an anon user, who later went by 69.132.199.100 or CineWorld. Notice anything similar? Addendum: 69.132.199.100 was blocked for 6 months by NewYorkBrad. --Ispy1981 18:35, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• Supporting the block and counting. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 18:55, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Block of 71.217.39.122

This user keeps creating unnecessary articles for the Grand Theft Auto topics (despite WP:FICT) and is constantly getting aggrivated towards other users including myself. This user is determined to do what he wants and keeps reverting back to the appropriately deleted material and I've recently noticed that he is commiting vandalism on other unrelated articles too. .:Alex:. 18:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• You're replacing the prod tags. This is bad (tm). Use AfD. I already talked to the editor about his nasty message on his own talk page, but there's nothing really wrong with anything else he's done so far. JuJube 20:26, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Sock/meatpuppet theatre

Currently, there is a push on by several editors to include mention of an album by Lee Nysted in the article on Matt Walker (drummer), who purportedly played on said album. This is a continuation of a situation begun at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Lee Nysted Experience, during which Mr. Nysted, backed up by several other editors, attempted to argue that through virtue of a large presence on Google , he and his music were notable and should be included in the encyclopedia. At the time, it was noted that a lot of places sell the album, there are many mentions of it on sites that generally allow user-submitted information (much of which involved a press release), and various other techniques that, IMO, looked a lot like search-engine result inflation. (Links such as this, where mention of a song and links to Nysted’s album can be found in the comments section of an unrelated blog, for example.)

The AFD led to a checkuser case, discussed at AN, which came back with a positive result. He and several socks were blocked, but Nysted then went on and was unblocked with a promise to behave himself. He then went on and started a short campaign against the CheckUser system, discussed again at AN, that resulted, in early March, with his being indef-blocked once again.

Now, we have several users who have surfaced and are trying to get Nysted’s album noted on the aforementioned Matt Walker’s page. These users, notably including 67.186.123.21 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · http · block user · block log), 63.93.197.67 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · http · block user · block log), and 12.35.96.66 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) – two of which resolve to A.G. Edwards, an investment firm that Nysted has previously claimed association with (and, in fact, I’ve managed to find correlating evidence to, on the second page of this PDF). 67.186.123.21 (which resolves to Lake Forest, IL) has signed at various times as “WebmasterSD,” who has now registered an account. A look through the discussion at Talk:Matt Walker (drummer) will give an indication of how this discussion has gone. The editors and IPs have argued that a discography should not be concerned with notability (despite the disc not being mentioned on Walker’s own page, according to one editor), have declared editors who have previously interacted with Nysted as not being neutral and failed to assume good faith, have suggested that all the editors against Nysted are part of some mysterious MySpace cabal, and generally conducted themselves much as Nysted and his supporters have in the past (as indicated in this deleted rant. WebmasterSD has also commented numerous times that he “practices law in Illinois,” which I suggest is an attempt at a chilling effect on the discussion.

Previous ANI discussions of this current wave are here and here.

I bring this to the attention of the noticeboard because, while I have just filed a checkuser request, I suspect it may come back inconclusive because of the company IPs involved. It may require an uninvolved admin or two to look through the evidence as to whether this is in fact sock/meatpuppetry and to make some decisions regarding how to deal with the editors involved. Thanks. Tony Fox (arf!) 18:55, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• I too would urge at least a couple of admins to look into this as well, preferably some who have no previous interaction with Nysted or related content. I've been dealing with this since yesterday and apparently the fact that I previously had interaction with Nysted (lifted an autoblock; discussed AFD canvassing by another editor related to Mario Party articles), semi-protected the article, and opened an RFC makes me not an objective party here. I'd welcome another set of eyes here and review of my actions at Matt Walker (drummer) if need be.--Isotope23 19:16, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Unless there's more going on than meets the eye, this seems like nothing more complicated than self-promotion and block evasion. --Akhilleus (talk) 19:31, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

You are right... it's not complicated (the A.G. Edwards IPs are at the very least clear meatpuppetry and quite possibly block evasion as well; the other IP editor quite likely knows Nysted), but given the fact that it is being claimed that I'm not objective and that I have some sort of axe to grind here I'd appreciate another admin taking a look and taking whatever action they feel is appropriate.--Isotope23 19:47, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I've indef blocked WebmasterSD and given the IPs 24 hour blocks. They're all sockpuppets or meatpuppets of Nysted, and since he's been indef blocked already, this is block evasion. --Akhilleus (talk) 19:44, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Quick work. Thank you. Tony Fox (arf!) 20:10, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Yup, good call. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 21:40, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Er, error please? Except for one critical error in your case and in your judgment call here: People from around the world are buying and listening to music created by Nysted and Walker (286,000 so far.) Now Nysted is releasing a second album (soon.) Will you continue to block evidence of notable people playing together on albums because you feel a need to do it "for the doing it sake?" You are all involved and all have distinct bias as to the way you think. Even in the face of reality, you choose to live in a vacuum. Block the world? Hardly. All of us, in the entertainment industry, have access to unlimited IP sites and proxies. It might be wise to negotiate as it says in the policy guidelines before congratulations are in order?

By the way? Nysted is in Aruba. I doubt if he has actually ever seen any of this. That is irony isn't it? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 67.186.123.21 (talk) 21:28, 27 April 2007 (UTC).

Feeding Trolls via defcon Template

I am posting this here to get some community input on this. I know there is no oiffical policy preventing naming specific disruptive editors in the DEFCON meter, but I find it in bad taste. I have asked editors to not do so, however several of them believe it appropriate to add the specific vandals name to the highly visible DEFCON meter. My arguments against it are 1.) the defcon meter is highly visible, so chances the vandal will know he is getting attention are high. 2.) just egging the vandal on with "notoriety" will not encourage them to quit. I however am posting this question here to get some community input. If the community deems it appropriate to include specific vandal names in the template, then I will drop the matter. Until then, I believe it will cause more trouble than good. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:02, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree, in the spirit of WP:DENY. I mean, the best option would be to just delete the thing, but unfortunately people like it. – Steel 19:05, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I sort of like the Defcon template in general, but I agree, individual vandals should never be named on it. Dina 19:13, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Chrislk02 ..denying them is the best answer and we dont want to motivate the vandals, the names of vandals shouldn't be added to the Defcon..--Cometstyles 19:16, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I would support the deletion of the DEFCON templates.↔NMajdan•talk 19:24, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I am getting to that point. When it gets elevated to level 1 or 2 because of socks, or vandals, that just empowers them. However, it is highly debated and I doubt it would pass a TFD. All I am asking is for input on never including specific vandal names. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:27, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Of course we should never use vandal's names on the defcon template. It does more good then harm normally, but when you add in names that opens up a can of worms.--Wizardman 19:30, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I would support an MFD on the defcon templates, although I'm aware the likely result is "no consensus". But I think that we can muster a consensus that particular vandals should not be named. That can only make things worse. — coelacan — 19:46, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I am not saying we should add specific usernames to the defcon, however Real96 left a message their saying about disruptive socks causing trouble and it was then at level 2, that was appropriate but I dont think it is necessary to specify certain names.Tellyaddict 20:05, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

{{Wdefcon}} getting deleted won't be happening (it was just speedily deleted and then restored, with a big brouhaha about it, the other day). I don't think that its mere existence goes against WP:DENY, but naming them most certainly does. 20:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Well yeah, it shouldn't have been speedied. I don't think that precludes an MFD discussion though. — coelacan — 21:21, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I think it's silly to send it through TfD again; it's already survived four times. As near as I can tell, arguments for its deletion range in variety from "I don't like it" to unfounded speculation that the vandals are actually coordinating their attacks because of the template. At most, we'll get another "no consensus" result. I think we've all got better things to do with our time. EVula // talk // ☯ // 21:44, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree, Chris. I've seen this in action recently with a high-profile sock and, yes, WP:DENY works. Naming them only empowers and encourages them - Alison ☺ 20:52, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Please take this discussion to the talk page. We are NOT discussing this silly thing here. Unless you want an administrator to delete it, this has nothing to do with admins.--Doc^g 21:42, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

• I'd be up for deleting the whole thing, but agree that naming individuals on it is definitely a bad idea. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 23:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
  • I agree that template talk:wdefcon is the place for this discussion now. ^☈coelacan 00:53, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
    • The only reason I brought it up here is I had users question my serious requests that they not post vandal names on the thing. I wanted to make sure that i was making the right request, and wanted some input from other editors and administrators. I am fairly sure had I posted this on the defcon talk page I would have gotten minimal input from editors experienced in dealing with trolls. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 13:47, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
• Whilst I appreciate the sentiment and support the removal of names from the template, I don't think half measures are appropriate here. Let's just delete the silly thing. It's an attractive nuisance and we're fools for hosting it and permitted it to be maintained. --Tony Sidaway 13:55, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Image:Omar3.jpg

Max Thayer (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has continually uploaded the image Image:Omar3.jpg after it has been deleted, and has done so under the same faulty rationale. The user has been warned in the past to stop uploading images with bogus fair use claims. Could someone please handle this? Part Deux 19:20, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Done--Wizardman 19:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Pagemove and miscellaneous vandalism at FCCLA

Resolved

 – Fixed --WinHunter ^(talk) 19:42, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Had quite a bit of vandalism, including pagemove vandalism, at the Family,_Career,_and_Community_Leaders_of_America page--right now it's pointed to Future Cooking and Cleaning Ladies of America. As an anon user I don't have the access to straighten up the mess. 65.185.203.89 19:33, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I can't either, as a non-admin, as the user vandalized the redirect. I'll put a db tag on it, but it's the best I can do right now. Admin help asked for, and, seeing this is clearly a return user, someone please block the vandal. Part Deux 19:38, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I will try to fix this after I stop laughing. — coelacan — 19:39, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

It's fixed. --WinHunter ^(talk) 19:40, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I've semiprotected the page for two days. Shadow1 (talk) 19:40, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Seeing as how pagemoves are only possible for users with an autoconfirmed flag, how does sprotection stop this from happening again?--VectorPotential^Talk 19:44, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Good point. I've applied move=sysop protection as well. — coelacan — 19:48, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

You two are fast. I sent the vandals to their rooms with no dinner. — coelacan — 19:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Just as long as you weren't giggling while you did so. Ruins the "evil admin" reputation. ;) 65.185.203.89 21:20, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Threatening (possibly criminal) post

This one is scary, as it is signed MS 13--a major crime gang. I don't know how Wikipedia wants to handle this sort of thing; a "please don't vandalize" reply seems insufficient, so I'm bringing it here. [[36]]

--67.101.110.49 22:49, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I plonked a {{bv}} tag on their page. We don't get many criminal gangs down here on the farm, so I'm not particularly scared ;) --kingboyk 23:38, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

You may not see gangs on the farm, but they really do exist in Los Angeles, where this radio host is, and they murder people. MS-13 is especially notorious, and since this radio host is currently being sued for "hate speech" against a school catering to Mexican and Central American immigrants (see Academia Semillas del Pueblo), and MS-13 is a gang run by LA-based Central Americans, I think that post has to be taken as a serious threat. 67.101.110.49 23:52, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

You can see the IP, it's 24.4.218.226, and if you want to call the police and let them know about it, you can. ╶╴coelacan╶╴ 23:57, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Oh I see, sorry, I thought it was whether or not to tag their talk page that was the issue. In that case, I'd recommend contacting the foundation. --kingboyk 00:12, 27 April 2007 (UTC) No need, you have the IP address. You can contact the radio station perhaps? --kingboyk 00:13, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

$ whois 24.4.218.226
Comcast Cable Communications, Inc. EASTERNSHORE-1 (NET-24-0-0-0-1)
                                  24.0.0.0 - 24.15.255.255
Comcast Cable Communications BAYAREA-9 (NET-24-4-0-0-1)
                                  24.4.0.0 - 24.5.255.255

# ARIN WHOIS database, last updated 2007-04-25 19:10

...if it helps. --kingboyk 00:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Its almost certainly somebody playing at being a Mara, its one thing to make a claim and another to actually be a member of that gang and it doesnt sound likely that a real mara would do such simple vandalsim. But they certainly are very real. I would strongly advise you to ignore this, SqueakBox 00:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Thank you both. Yes, it is probable that the vandal is just another immature blowhard, like 99.9% of Wikipedia vandals. But because McIntyre is someone who could conceivably be a target (one of the Wikipedia articles mentions that he's received threats related to that "Academia..." school controversy), I can't shake the possibility that this post might be of interest to some law enforcement agency or another, though I'm not sure which one. 67.101.110.49 01:04, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Vandals are vandals. Sometimes people think the anonymity thing takes them off scott free. I can tell you with a certain degree of certainty that this ip is probably from Everret, Massachusetts and just some kid playing around think he's hot stuff. I wouldn't be too concerned. There have been far worse cases on here where one gentlement threatened the life of another that he actually knew personally. Yanksox 02:12, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The IP is Berkely, California. ··coelacan 03:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism- User:70.16.23.188 and The Junkies

Resolved··coelacan 03:21, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Requested this page be semi-protected and this user blocked because of consistent vandalism and threats to continue to revert this page to an unnacceptable state. I was told that apparently this is a content dispute but I hardly see renaming the link for basketball to "African Roundball", "el sporto de los negroes", and insinuating that these hosts perform felation on eachother as a legitimate content dispute. Please semi-protect this page and block this user so that this article can be fully cleaned-up. Thank you. --Angrymansr 01:11, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Done, but next time you'll get faster results at WP:AIV. ^☈coelacan 01:35, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

That page was where I filed my original complaint, and was sent here to explain. Thanks--Angrymansr 01:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Wild. It was so obvious. Sorry about that. ^☈coelacan 02:33, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Coral Springs Christian Academy

Resolved··coelacan 03:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't even know where to begin; this article is a vandal magnet. I suspect User:JoeMcCool06 is producing sockpuppets and the IP vandalism is probably due to a dynamic IP so I was at a lost to try to combat this problem by myself.--JEF 03:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Next time you see something like this, WP:RFPP is what you want. ··coelacan 03:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Anti-Catholic soapboxing and disruption by User:The Anonymous One

User:The Anonymous One has been here a short time and has accumulated an impressive collection of admonitions and "final" warnings from myself and a plethora of other editors.

His general modus operandi is to post anti-Catholic soapboxing comments on the Humanities Ref Desk. He has also along the way managed to insult Islam too (see my warning on his talk page).

His responses to my warnings clearly indicates that this user cannot see that his editing is disruptive or offensive, rendering the chances of improvement of behaviour minimal.

I have suggested to him that he does not post on any religious topic, as he's incapable of avoiding giving offence, but he has ignored this and, indeed, reposted deleted objectionable posts about Catholicism on the Ref Desk.

Admin attention will be gratefully welcomed. --Dweller 08:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly concur with Dweller. As I have said repeatedly, the questions posed by this user are incidental to the manifesto he pursues at quite tedious length, usually on the Humanities Desk. It is soapboxing of the worst kind. Clio the Muse 08:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Re the above, this comment [37] was particularly offensive.--Mantanmoreland 14:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

please review this block

All that is a problem, and I've no doubt that the user is past the point of WP:POINT. What bothers me even more is the injection of original research into articles, and I warned them for this back on the 16th. I've now blocked for 31 hours for repeated NOR violation, specifically citing end times. Please review this block, and feel free to undo or adjust it if I am afk and not answering. ··coelacan 08:55, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Support block (obviously). I'll be happy to continue keeping an eye on this user if/when he returns. --Dweller 11:32, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I definitely support this block. I spent a long time reading through this user's contributions (so-called), and it's really quite a body of bad work with bad intentions. --TotoBaggins 12:13, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Support the block: The fellow attempts to tie up the Reference Desks with polemics, and he inserts polemics into article? Oh, this is not good and not a good sign for a productive wiki-life at all. Utgard Loki 12:36, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Problem with Daniel Lyons stub.

The user Socal dan2000 - Talk - contribs - keeps adding nonsense - to the Daniel Lyons Stub. SO far I reverted his edits twice and I am wary that a third edit would break the 3RR rule. I have also added three warnings too his talk page. In his edit summary(s) he claims he is Daniel Lyons (the author) - if he is then he is not following the guidlines in WP:AUTO. However I strongly suspect that he isn't Daniel Lyons the author - and just someone else called Daniel Lyons. -- Rehnn83 ^Talk 09:54, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I just reverted his third 'R'. Anchoress 09:56, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Clear nonsense/vanalism with WP:BLP issues thrown in. 3RR does not apply here. Go to it!--Doc^g 09:58, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the Clarification Doc - Rehnn83 ^Talk 11:27, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

DRV sockery

There's been quite the flood of new accounts posting to this DRV in the last few hours. Something to keep an eye on. WarpstarRider 10:46, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

No worries. They've been clearly identified and I seriously doubt the closing admin will pay them any attention. · j e r s y k o talk · 12:51, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Confusing...

Sgthenno (talk · contribs), 63336AQA (talk · contribs), and 217.205.250.160. Is it just me or is something really weird going on in here...? --Kzrulzuall ^{Talk• Contribs} 11:02, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Bunch of school kids being stupid by the look of it.--Dacium 15:36, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Considering that the user's only contributions to date have been editing that page for spamvertising purposes, with nothing else to the project, it's pretty blatant and inappropriate for the User namespace. I've speedied that page per CSD G11. --Kinu ^t/_c 19:30, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Baronetcies articles

Sockpuppetry on Sir William Arbuthnot, 2nd Baronet AfD

David Lauder has just !voted on this AfD, despite earlier !voting from IP 81.151.246.175. This IP has previously edited the Morham article, and the only other contributors to that article were David Lauder and a bot. The IP is a British Telecom in the London area, as can be seen here. David Lauder uses a British Telecom IP, as can be seen here. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 15:05, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I deny this bonkers charge. I live in Scotland and if you look at the map shown for the location of one of the IP addresses you will see they suggest the stretch of coastline between Edinburgh and Newcastle! (Second last pointer, above). I have no doubt British Telecom service more people than myself and on similar IPs; and probably they have a central server. Yes, I set up the article on Morham and I am pleased indeed that someone has added something intelligent to it. Must it always be me? The complainant is a very consistant supporter of User:Vintagekits, and my personal feeling is that these people do not act at all in WP:Good faith. If they really have a seriously worthwhile complaint about the vast amount of effort I have contributed to Wikipedia I would be interested to see it. But I do not see going around making every attempt to eliminate from Wikipedia those they have taken a dislike to as a legitimate occupation. My work and any comments is there for all to see and evaluate. David Lauder 19:19, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm afraid there's more evidence to prove your use of IPs to try and !votestack in discussions. How about this one in another AfD you were involved in? Or how about this one in a discussion involving honorific prefixes you were involved in? There's also another edit from that IP pushing the POV you're always trying to push.

I assume it's just coincidence that the IP edited Morham, an article that's only ever been edited by you and a bot? I assume it's just coincidence that the IP supported the retention of the article about your close friend User:Kittybrewster? The duck test says otherwise. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 19:57, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately the evidence does appear fairly conclusive that you voted twice in that AFD, David Lauder. I would counsel you not to do so again. In fact, I'd recommend that everyone involved be on their best behaviour. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 03:22, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I have now looked again at this and the BT evidence shows that the posts to which you refer could have been made by anyone within their 81.128.0.0 to 81.159.255.255 ranges. I have no interest in the other subjects which are associated with the "fairly conculsive evidence" you refer to.David Lauder 13:53, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

David, please note that Matthew Brown (User:Morven), who commented above, is a member of the arbitration committee and has checkuser access, meaning he can examine the server logs to determine which IPs you have edited from while logged in to your account. Unless he wishes to clarify that he was speaking as an ordinary editor and looking only at the comments in this thread, I believe it is safe to assume that the "evidence" to which he refers is the checkuser report of your recent contributions. I don't care whether you admit what you have been caught doing, or just go away quietly. However, people are watching, and if you do this again you are likely to be blocked for disruption. Thatcher131 14:49, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. Is there conclusive evidence somewhere of me actually being disruptive on Wikipedia? David Lauder 16:51, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I just came across this worrying edit.[38] The editor who actually made the edit defended himself by saying that it was a hurried cut and paste, but I notice there was time to change the target's name. I feel this is sufficent to initaite an RfCU. -Will Beback · † · 10:12, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

But who was this edit by? I assume you are not blaming me?David Lauder 13:53, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, this was the result of a checkuser showing it to be very likely indeed that the IP edits and David Lauder (talk · contribs) edits before and after the IP edits were from the same person. I would note that there has been much in the way of dubious behavior during this AFD from other users as well. I'd encourage all users to keep behaviour civil and avoid sockpuppeting, meatpuppeting, encouraging your friends to come vote, harassing other contributors, etc etc. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 20:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I think the contribs of Vintagekits (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) bears some examination. He appears to be quite forthright in opinions and have a particular dislike for kittybrewster (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). See, for example, Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography/A-class review/Sir Norman Stronge, 8th Baronet. --kingboyk 13:31, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

• He already has a proven sockpuppet- User:DownDaRoad- this account is blocked indefinitely. Astrotrain 14:09, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

• • Comment. I am almost flattered to be the subject of so much passion. But I have initiated (I hope) a request for an IPCheck at Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser#Vintagekits. - Kittybrewster (talk) 17:50, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
    • After having found one instance of sockpuppeting on this AFD, I'd checked pretty much everyone else. Nobody else is doing it in such a blatant way. However, a lot of new accounts or long-dormant accounts have contributed; I suspect a call to action on an external site. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 21:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Ganging up

I would draw to your attention the developing scenario whereby User:Vintagekits and his chum 303 are leading the pack in a variety of attacks against User:Kittybrewster who is a gentleman and a scholar and has contributed countless hours of industry to Wikipedia. Regardless of Kittybrewster's obvious standing in the world, the Sir William Arbuthnot, 2nd Baronet article has now been put up for deletion: in my opinion a clear exercise in spite. (See [[39]]) Those who support the article are sneered and jeered at. David Lauder 11:15, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Just pointing out the obvious sockpuppetry, like when you !voted twice yesterday David. As for the countless hours of industry contributed to Wikipedia, see WP:COIN. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 11:21, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Unproved, and irelevant to my complaint. I am concerned that you deride the efforts of others. Sir William has always declared anything under WP:COIN. David Lauder 11:25, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

If you see WP:COIN you'll see that's not true. Perhaps I should also mention User:Counter-revolutionary, who was made personal attacks against a number of people commenting on the AfD? One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 11:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Please address your own activities here. David Lauder 13:53, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I have no intention of addressing your attempt at mudslinging given you have provided absolutely no evidence. This is not the first time you have tried such a tactic against an editor, for example see here. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 18:00, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

There are no limits to complaints on these noticeboards as far as I know. I have given an exceptional example in one AfD. Another is the AfD on the Auditor of the Exchequer in Scotland, Robert Arbuthnot (auditor). Any administrator taking a few minutes to look at these two AfD's alone will get a very clear taste of what you are about. David Lauder 18:59, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Note that related issues are also being discussed at Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Arbuthnot_family__.28history.7CWatchlist_this_article.7Cunwatch.29_.5Bwatchlist.3F.5D. (It would appear that the discussion there is rather more constructive, btw). --kingboyk 15:40, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Novosoft Handy Backup

If anyone has a minute, I'd like for someone else to take a look at the Novosoft Handy Backup page. An anonymous user showed up today and changed the address from handybackup.com to handybackup.net. These are two different companies. As far as I've been able to tell, the company that uses handybackup.com was the original company, and the company that uses handybackup.net is a company that pirated the original software and design and is selling it as its own. The anon's first edit was to blank the talk page...which had also mentioned the difference between the two companies. I know I could still change the address back again without violating 3rr, but I'd like someone else to look into it in case the information I've found about these companies is incorrect. --OnoremDil 11:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Heh. I guess that's one way to take care of it. Thanks. --OnoremDil 11:51, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

User juggling accounts/IP address to evade 3RR

After I warned 202.169.207.211 (talk · contribs) that they were close to violating 3RR in Talk:The Edge (radio station), ([40] [41]), I noticed that Asasinz (talk · contribs) reverted my edit ([42]). And then I received a warning from Bhowden (talk · contribs) on my talk page ([43]).

It's more than odd that three users were working to preserve a nonsense edit and appears to be a case of a user sockpuppeting to get around 3RR. For further evidence:

• [44] by Bhowden (talk · contribs)
• [45] by Asasinz (talk · contribs)
• [46] by 202.169.220.108 (talk · contribs) (same IP range, and edit summary pretty much in the same language as this edit.)

At the very least, the user needs to stop the sockpuppetry. Ytny (talk) 12:50, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

User:Clohnyn

Does anyone disagree with me if I say that I believe that Clohnyn (talk · contribs) is a sock related to Encyclopedia Dramatica? The first contributions were to nominate Wookiepedia for deletion, comparing it to ED as a rationale. Another AFD nomination of (here) was a vicious attack on the subject. User has not been warned yet, but the editing pattern does not look typical for a newbie. Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:35, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and closed the AFD debates, as it was clear that this account's only purpose was to cause disruption. Revert me if anyone thinks I'm wrong. I'll block the account in a minute; a review would be much appreciated. (It hasn't edited in a while, though.) Sean William 13:53, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Support block- tendentious editing at best, trolling at worse. But why do we have an article about Wookieepedia? WjBscribe 13:58, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I think its crazy harsh. Some someone AFD's two articles, does a few minor edits, result is instant ban? Why not just warn him for disruptive AFD'ing if you think they are obvious keeps. If you actually think this is werth a ban why are you not checkuser to find the other accounts and boot them aswell - i think because the ban wouldn't stick at all because its almost baseless. Having said that you probably did the right thing, unless he contests. --Dacium 15:26, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Support ban, this stuff happens all the time. Yawn. 75.62.7.22 15:33, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

He looks like a sockpuppet of a nice chap I met last week. Support block. – Steel 15:34, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

User: Moomoo24

This person was given a final warning before. Today he vandalized the page for Kenny McCormick, as you can see here. Tweeks Coffee 15:59, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Blocked as a vandal only account. WP:AIAV is a good place to get quick action on something like this. Thanks. · j e r s y k o talk · 16:08, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Legal threat from User:Kelly Martin

I'm archiving this - there's no constructive edits being made here now. -- Nick ^t 17:11, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

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

---

In a recent RFA discussion, Kelly Martin made a clear legal threat against Lankybugger: "Please refrain from using false information in an attempt to defame the character of other editors; such acts are potentially illegal and certainly uncivil. You would be well-advised to ensure that the facts fit your rhetoric before spouting it forth next time." [47] Note that "illegal" was wikilinked to our article on "libel." As a former administrator, Kelly Martin knows full well that this is unacceptable behavior. According to our policy, "Users who make legal threats will typically be blocked from editing indefinitely, while legal threats are outstanding." Crotalus horridus 16:09, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

• I don't see a "legal threat" here, just an informative notice about legal issues. - Crockspot 16:49, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

It's not a legal threat- she doesn't say she proposes to take any action. It does demonstrate a complete misunderstanding by her of the law of defamation, but that's another matter. In her place I would just have called Lankybugger's post wrong as I have seen her support candidates on a number of occasions. WjBscribe 16:13, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

If she had called Lankybugger's post wrong and pointed this out civilly, citing examples, that would have been perfectly acceptable. You're correct that it "demonstrate[s] a complete misunderstanding by her of the law of defamation" (not all false statements are libel or slander; they have to fall into certain categories, and this doesn't), but it generally doesn't matter if a legal threat has any merit or not, just that it was issued. If Daniel Brandt had made a statement of similar tone and similar ignorance of the actual law, no one would hesitate in declaring it a clear legal threat. We should expect higher, not lower, standards of long-time editors. Crotalus horridus 16:20, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Agree that if it were anybody else they would get at least a severe talking to. --kingboyk 16:24, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm giving Kelly Martin notice of this discussion. Newyorkbrad 16:16, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Please note (and i am sure my opinion on this matter has little merit due to my previous run ins with Kelly), she also, when referring to lanky bugger said, "I do not consider further discussion with the likes of you worthy of my time or attention. Kindly do not defile my talk page with your presence again." and removed his comments called as trolling. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 16:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Everything else notwithstanding, merely linking "illegal" to libel does not ipso facto connstitute a legal threat. A legal threat would have been "such acts are potentially illegal and I will take appropriate action to redress that illegality" or something along those lines. -- Avi 16:21, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Saying something is illegal isn't the same as making a legal threat. --Deskana (fry that thing!) 16:22, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I've recently discussed this on another forum, and I agree with everyone else - it's not a legal threat to call something libel, if that were the case then we wouldn't be able to handle any BLP complaints on-wiki. Put another way: calling it libel would not be a legal threat, and libel is illegal, so calling it illegal is not a legal threat. Saying she would sue you over it, however, WOULD be a legal threat. The difference? One is a statement that usually means they are trying to help - "This stairway in your store is unsafe and could cause legal problems!" The other is a statement of malice - "I am going to sue you because this stairway is unsafe." I might thank the first person - - and throw the second person out of my store until such time as they are not a legal threat to me. --Golbez 16:25, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I couldn't say it any better. It's routine to comment on one's thoughts of legality-- it's unacceptable to threaten legal action. alphachimp 16:26, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I would like to hear K.Martin's positionon this before giving any opinion. CMummert · talk 16:24, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Agree with above that this doesn't constitute a legal threat. That said, some of the shenanigans going on at WP:RFA right now are starting to get a bit ridiculous.--Isotope23 16:26, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Couldn't we just give Crotalus notice of the community policy that editors should avoid acting like a silly sausage? If he escalates this, his general probation can be invoked. --Tony Sidaway 16:27, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with croatalus concern, and think discounting it because he had a previous arbitration case is innapropriate. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 16:29, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm here to build an encyclopedia. Kelly Martin is here to cause trouble for other editors; of her last 500 edits, only a handful are to actual articles, and most of these are minor; her primary activity is arguing with other people on noticeboards and policy pages. I was under the impression that building an encyclopedia was what we were here for, not threatening other users. *** Crotalus *** 16:35, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

If you feel that way file an RFC. I have to say I was tempted to do so myself but concluded it wouldn't be worth the trouble. --kingboyk 16:40, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the statement was a legal threat, but it does seem like it intended to intimidate. Kelly should have responded in a more constructive manner. ChazBeckett 16:29, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree this is not a legal threat. It is uncivil in my opnion, and it may be incorrect (I havent't reveiwed the exchange enough to see if the satement is even arguably lible), but such a statement, accurate or not, polite or not, is not a legal therat unless there is an explicit or clearly implied threat to take legal action. Just as saying 'Posting page X is violation of copyright law" is not a leagal threat, but saying "Delete page X or you'll hear from my lawyer" is. DES ^(talk) 16:34, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Nothing to see here? What's the fuss? Can't we point out libel any more? --Doc^g 16:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. Kelly handled a clearly false and libellous personal attack in an appropriate manner. Another editor came here to try to get her blocked, on false pretenses, for doing making legal threats. That editor is on general probation and would do well to avoid such activities (and that's a threat). --Tony Sidaway 16:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

You may not be aware of how substantially American libel law differs from British libel law. Under American law (which is all that matters on en:Wikipedia), any libel claim would be dismissed immediately as frivolous. Furthermore, we have an approved procedure for removing actionable libel, and threatening other users is not included there. I also consider it highly inappropriate to use general probation as a club to win arguments. Are you trying to drive me back off of Wikipedia? This discussion is starting to lean me in that direction. I'm starting to get the impression that who you are is more important than what you do when it comes to administrative sanctions. Kelly Martin is the nobility so she can break any rule in the book; I'm just a peon (and on probation!) so I can't even follow the rules without censure. I was under the impression that Wikipedia was supposed to have only one God King and otherwise operate in an egalitarian fashion. Apparently, I was wrong. *** Crotalus *** 16:53, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Kelly's comments below that this is a storm in a teacup. However, labelling what were possibly uncivil and mistaken comments by Lankybugger as a "libellous personal attack" is a gross misrepresentation of what occurred, regardless of the motives of the editor who raised the issue here. Will (aka Wimt) 16:49, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Oh, please. It's not a legal threat. It was merely a statement that making false statements about other Wikipedians is potentially actionable as libel, and in any case quite uncivil (which I hope everyone here agrees with). The circumstances under which such statements would actually be actionable as libel are likely limited, but as I am aware of at least one case where a Wikipedian did in fact make false and defamatory statements about another Wikipedian in a manner which may actually be actionable libel per se, the statement is not categorically false, as some here have asserted. In any case, I certainly did not threaten to sue anyone. Only someone who already had an axe to grind would interpret my comments as a legal threat. I consider this discussion to be a waste of my time, and I will not dignify it with further commentary. Stop wasting everyone's time with crap like this and go write an encyclopedia already. Kelly Martin (talk) 16:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I'd have to second Kelly's points here...this looks like much to do about nothing.--MONGO 16:44, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't see why it is necessary to say that something is "potentially actionable" except to intimidate with the possibility of such action. It's similar to but not as severe as the classic "Its possible that you might fall and break your leg when you walk outside this morning." I don't think there is any need for admin action here, and I'm not following that RFA, but it does appear that K. Martin could easily be more civil. CMummert · talk 16:48, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Agreed, it would have been much better had Kelly said something along the lines of "That's not true. See this diff." Would have avoided the whole mess and still made it clear that false statement were being made. ChazBeckett 16:52, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

For the record, I do not consider the comment I was responding to in the original context to be actionable libel. It is, however, false and defamatory, and I believe such comments are prohibited by Wikipedia's civility policies. The editor in question proceeded to argue on my talk page that he was entitled to use lies for rhetorical purpose in community discussions, at which point I informed him that I wanted no further truck with him (and have removed all subsequent communications from him unanswered). I take lying very seriously, and wish that the Wikipedia community felt the same way. Unfortunately, it does seem that prevarication for political effect is accepted practice here. Truly, a sad thing. Kelly Martin (talk) 16:50, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Lying about someone is potentially libelous. If you're temporarily unaware enough of your surroundings to need to be told this, then you're not bright enough to edit Wikipedia. If you're temporarily unaware enough of your surroundings to need to be told this and then complain to WP:ANI, then you're too querulous to edit Wikipedia. However, I do hope all these conditions are temporary and you can get on with the claimed encyclopedia writing rather than trying to blacken past adversaries' names on WP:ANI in a ludicrously trivial manner. And enabling behaviour toward such trivial querulousness is a waste of everyone's time. Newyorkbrad, I'm looking at you - David Gerard 16:57, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Can someone please provide me with a list of which editors the rules don't apply to? Obviously we all know that's true of Jimbo, and I guess that's OK, since he did found the place. But what other editors have carte blanche to violate WP:CIVIL on a routine basis? David, Tony, Kelly... any others? If some people have a privileged position on Wikipedia, I'd at least like to know who they are. *** Crotalus *** 17:06, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

since no one seems to be pointing out the elephant in the room, the similarities between this discussion and the WikiGnosis discussion should be pointed out. Neither user did anything wrong and it seems to be a laughably broad interpretation of no legal threats. hombre de haha 16:58, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

That does look worryingly similar. And the guy was blocked. Yikes! --Tony Sidaway 17:11, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

There does seem to be the tendency that the same sorts of statements get considered "legal threats" when made by somebody who's disliked, but not if made by somebody who's liked. *Dan T.* 17:12, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

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

Possible block for 212.101.17.44

Hi, I am having an issue on the Yoseikan Budo article. A user at this IP address is continuously deleting a link, due to what the major editor of the article, User:Mateo2006, and I believe to be a political conflict the user has with the organisation who's link they are deleting. The assumption is that they are an ex member of the organisation, or just unhappy that other Yoseikan Budo organisation exists. Either way it is purely subjective and they are expressing their own opinion by deleting the link. The link they are deleting clearly belongs on the page, for example, if you do a Google search for Yoseikan Budo, it is the first entry! Regards, Grahamwild 16:26, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I will warn him to steer clear of WP:3RR. He's used up his three reverts, so if he does it again, you can consider reporting it to WP:AN3 (notwithstanding the fact that 24 hours have passed). I hope this solves the problem. YechielMan 18:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Being the subject of a discussion on this page is not a punishment

This is a general response to comments I have seen this past week by several editors; I don't think it's necessary to provide diffs, and I don't want to single any one editor out from the rest.

I have noticed lately that more and more people speak as if starting a discussion about a user on this page is some sort of disciplinary action in itself, even if no block or other admin action is ever taken. I disagree. Posting to AN/I is the right thing to do if you feel a wider discussion of an incident is warranted and the potential need for admin tools is not so remote that discussion here is pointless. It's especially useful if direct communication with an editor has broken down. Being discussed here does not reflect poorly on an editor, and if their conduct has been appropriate it is common to see others come to their defense.

In the end, admin action is warranted only in a minority of the situations discussed on this page, but the discussion is helpful in most of them. The editor who is being discussed can learn whether their actions have consensus, and the person posting a complaint can find out if nobody else agrees with them. CMummert · talk 17:16, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Seconded. Although it helps to realise that most of the complaints about people here are groundless, and to try to distinguish one's complaint in a manner that it will be taken seriously - this page is huge as is, and it's easy to get lost in the noise - David Gerard 17:22, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

True, it is not a punishment yet ... but that is an interesting idea. "As punishment for your misdeeds, you must read WP:AN/I. Two archives' worth should do it." I think it would fit somewhere between an administrative warning and outright ban. :-) --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 17:29, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I see many discussions on this page that should be handled through our established dispute resolution processes. I think it would be better if we encouraged editors to avoid notices here about anything except actionable disruption (giving examples), and to seek to resolve their differences without running to the admins. --Tony Sidaway 17:32, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I'd rather people come here to ask for help when it's a simple issue, than for people to avoid coming when it's a complicated issue. Let's not discourage people from posting here: there's enough manpower to deal with everything. YechielMan 18:27, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, thank you for saying that, YechielMan. Better for us to hear it than not. Encourage more use of the {{resolved}} tag to let other admins know when something's wrapped up, and the volume won't seem like as big a deal. ··coelacan 21:11, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

User:Bus stop and content relating to Bob Dylan

If this is the wrong place to post this, my apologies. The above user has been blocked for violating the three-revert rule at least twice now for removing content relating to the comparatively-well documented Christian conversion of Bob Dylan. He has used such statements as "Christians consider it a triumph to convert a Jew to Christ" in his edit summary to his 04:02 25 April 2007 edit to Talk:Bob Dylan, and has given elsewhere his reason for such edits as ensuring "[h]is (Bob Dylan's) Jewish heritage doesn't go out the window." All this for the addition of a few comments regarding Dylan's Christian conversion, which has been documented in such sources as the New York Times and Encyclopedia Britannica. Given this user's history of such action, I was wondering if it might be possible to bar him/her from editing the Bob Dylan, List of converts to Christianity, and possibly List of Messianic Jews and Hebrew Christians pages, as they seem to be the ones where the content s/he objects to is contained, and let him continue to edit the remainder of wikipedia which doesn't have this content he seems to find so much difficulty with. John Carter 17:24, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

You'll be wanting that Community Noticeboard thingy - WP:CN I think. -- Nick ^t 17:26, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Kurdistan

• 88.239.85.185 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))

User has made a legal threat and hence violated Wikipedia:No legal threats. Admin intervention is requested. -- Cat ^chi? 17:56, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

He was blocked a half hour before you made this notice. Maybe 31 hours is a bit short, but it is an IP. --Golbez 18:08, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

That's just silly vandalism. Cat, use WP:AIV in such cases.--Doc^g 18:15, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps, I was concerned of a Wikipedia:No legal threats violation and wanted a second opinion which I got. Thanks. -- Cat ^chi? 18:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Wizofdahood = vandal only

Wizofdahood (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) - see own user page edit. Andy Mabbett 18:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I forwarded this to WP:AIV, which has a backlog 20 names long now. YechielMan 18:17, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Indef blocked. User WP:AIV for such things.--Doc^g 18:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Anonymous user making silly threats

Resolved

• An anonymous user is making posts to the talk pages of Dragon Ball Z and Wikipedia:WikiProject Anime and manga saying that he'll delete all anime and manga articles in three days unless his demands are met. Looks like slightly-more-ballsy-than-usual trolling, but it's worth keeping an eye on. JuJube 18:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I removed the trolling on Dragon Ball Z, but left it on Wikipedia:WikiProject Anime and manga since some editors had already commented there. I've warned the IP about trolling as well.--Isotope23 19:00, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Now he's taken it upon his own authority to revoke User:GunnarRene's Barnstar because he has a mean stupid doo doo head. Funny is funny, but disruptive is disruptive. JuJube 19:12, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The user was blocked for ten days. IrishGuy ^talk 19:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

206.219.74.132: Ongoing Vandalism

An anonymous user at IP address 206.219.74.132 has been vandalizing pages for several months but has yet to be blocked. I think it might be time. C1k3 19:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

== User:BiH ==

BiH (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has continually damaging the work of others by removing reliable source, ignoring warning and leaving strange summary of editing. It seems that user edits articles based on his subjective opinions and not reliable source. Could someone please handle this? Graciella 19:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

From Thatcher131 to Mattisse - is this a fair AGF proposal? Request feedback please!

The letter in its entirety, published with Thatcher's permission was sent to me by him to settle Jefferson Anderson's and Rosencoment's disquiet. I want to know if this is fair proposal. I admit I am hard to deal with at times, but I do not lie and I am an excellent editor with over 18,000 mainspace edits in less than a year -- no bots but real edits. If I accept his offer, I will be abandon my ediing history:

Mattisse, I have to ask you to do something which may be very difficult, and that is to drop your pursuit of old grudges and move forward without them.

First, in looking over your history, I don't think you have been entirely honest about your background here. You state repeatedly that you only had sockpuppet problems at the very beginning and they were your grandchildren. That accounts for User:Teek and so forth in July. But it does not account for the sockpuppets uncovered by Rdsmith4 in September as noted on your talk page. You did not object, that I can find, and you apparently worked out an unblock arrangement with Rdsmith by e-mail. These accounts were used in a disruptive manner in the Starwood matter.

Second, I am concerned that your recent behavior is more of the same. User:BackMaun was suspected as a sockpuppet of yours based on behavior. A recent checkuser shows that you don't. However, the IP pattern indicates that you use a cable modem from one computer, and BackMaun and some other sockpuppets use a dial-up connection from a different computer but in the same city. One explanation is it is completely a coincidence that you live in the same city as someone with enmity toward Jefferson Anderson. Another explanation is that you have a new PC but kept your old one, and figured out how to keep the two sides of your editing separated. With the additional evidence that in February you and BackMaun used the same IP sometimes, I'm afraid the sockpuppet argument looks stronger than the coincidence argument.

At this point I want to acknowledge that you had the misfortune to run into Hanuman Das, who was not only abusive, but a clever enough user of sockpuppets that it took a long time before he got caught. Unfortunately, you answered sockpuppet use with sockpuppet use in September, and got caught first. This is definitely a case of two wrongs don't make a right; but also please appreciate that Hanuman Das has been indefinitely banned and you were given a second chance.

Also, you need to understand that Jefferson Anderson was never shown to be related to Hanuman Das and socks. There was a lot of confusion at the time of the Starwood matter, and Anderson was abusive toward you as well as Paul Pigman and Kathryn NicDhàna and did use the sockpuppet Frater Xyzzy, but he does not appear to be related to Hanuman/Ekajati et al. By blocking Frater but allowing Anderson to edit, he has also been given a second chance. (He was allowed off the Starwood case not because he did no wrong, but because his abuse was directed at Paul and Kathryn over Celtic Paganism, and seemed to be a separate abuse issue from Hanuman's abuse of them and you over Starwood.)

I also want to acknowledge that many of the normal wikipedia assistance systems broke down in your case. The AMA was not very effective as your advocate, and Jefferson Anderson's advocate was thinking more like a personal lawyer (to get Anderson off the hook no matter what he actually did) rather than acitng with the best interests of wikipedia in mind. This is a recurring problem with the AMA, and is an effective argument that almost got the AMA deleted. Perhaps they will be able to reform, perhaps not. The bottom line is that they are untrained volunteers, they are under no obligation (other than their own moral compass) to take a case or to finish what they started, and there is (as yet) no apparent method to ask ineffective advocates to leave the organization. It is unfortunate that your negative experience with Hanuman was compounded by ineffective AMA assistance.

Now, to move forward, there are two possibilities.

Let's say for the sake of argument that you are not related at all to BackMaun. I'm afraid, then, that you have the misfortune of living in the same city as someone with a deep grudge against Jefferson Anderson, and there will always be suspicions against you, not only by Rosencomet but by others with no involvement in neopaganism-related articles. If you want to continue editing as Mattisse, you will have to let go of your past hurts and grudges. Your obvious hostility toward Rosencomet and Jefferson Anderson only fuels suspicion that new accounts which attack them are your sockpuppets. Eventually, no amount of negative checkuser data will be able to override the presumption that "if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is probably a duck." You will have to let go of your negative emotions and demonstrate by your actions and edits that you have moved on. Certainly you should not ignore new abuse by Rosencomet or Jefferson Anderson, but forgive, or at least ignore, past problems, as you would like your past problems to be forgiven or ignored.

Or, you could abandon the Mattisse acount while it is still in good standing and open a new account, like Jefferson Anderson claims to have done. Edit some other articles for a while, and if you eventually return to articles edited by Rosencomet, or someone who you suspect is the former Jefferson Anderson, then treat them with the respect you would treat any other editor.

If, on the other hand, you are responsible for BackMaun, then it is even more important for you to stop targeting his contributions and let go of your old grudge. This is probably your last chance, and if you continue to act out against Rosencomet or Anderson's new account, you will end up being banned as a disruptive editor. Please understand that I am not asking you to tolerate new abuse, but you can't respond to abuse with abuse, and you need to put old abuse behind you and not make it the basis for current action. You may want to try mentorship, or an informal buddy system of some kind so you have someone to share your concerns with who can help you decide what action to take when you get into conflict.

I hope these comments are helpful. I am going to ask Rosencomet to stay away from you for a week, as a show of good faith, to see how you intend to respond and move forward. Anderson has already declared an intention to stay away as well. This should give you some breathing room to decide how to proceed.

Thatcher131

Comments from Mattisse

• I am not interested in editing neopagan articles and neve have been. My original concern was the link spam butg I abandoned that and since early fall of 2006 have not to my knowledge edited a neopagan article. My real interest is in writing and copy editing.

• I would be giving up an excellent editing history of article creation and copy writing with over 22,000 edits since last May when I started on Wikipedia and Jefferson Anderson would be giving up about a month's worth of edit wars.

• I have never been uncivil or rude to Rosencomet. Rather I have made some apologetic posts as well as some light hearted posts to him.

• I cannot fathom why anyone would think that I am obsessed with neopagan articles and need to "restrain" myself from editing them. I have no interest in them and do not edit the same articles as Rosencoment.

• Reasons for some animosity I might feel for Jefferson Anderson:
• Suspected sock puppets/Jefferson Anderson Suspected sock puppets

Additional information

-- Organised sockpuppet ring focused on this page and offshoots (among others) --

User:Ekajati -- (It is suspected that this User:Ekajati has used one or more accounts abusively.See list of confirmed sockpuppets and has been banned from Wikipedia indefinately,)

These sockpuppets include frequent commentors on this page: User:Ekajati, User:Hanuman Das and User:999. This was discovered during ths Starwood Arbitration.

See

• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Starwood
• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Starwood/Evidence
• Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Starwood/Workshop
• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Starwood/Proposed decision

Sincerely, Mattisse

• See also Sockpuppetry related to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration.2FStarwood

Please give me real feedback. I know I am not perfect but I do try very hard to do good -- although slipping up at times. I do not want to leave Wikipedia!

Sincerely, Mattisse 17:59, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Thatcher131 is an excellent editor, admin, and arbcom clerk, and knows precisely what he is talking about. Don't fixate on the "new account" suggestion; I strongly support his first suggestion, of letting go of past grudges and moving on. If you're not interested in the articles themselves, just concerned about spam - leave the articles alone, and let someone else worry about the spam. Really, there are over 200 participants in WikiProject Spam, over 1000 administrators, thousands upon thousands of well meaning editors. If any one aspect of the Wikipedia is causing such a problem, let it go, the Wikipedia will not collapse. Honest. There are many other places you can help equally well, that hopefully won't lead you to abandoning the project, or even your account. --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 20:55, 27 April 2007 (UTC) By the way, I'm not up on the whole problem, and of course can't look into your heart and know about whether you are bearing grudges or not, but I looked at your recent mainspace contributions, and when a long time contributor makes edits like this, there is something seriously wrong. If you can take a few steps back and drink a nice cup of tea, that would be very good. --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 21:12, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I have several things to say, and will try not to take too much space. First, in answer to the question posed: yes, this is a fair proposal. It is incredible that Mattisse seems unable to read the first, and presumably Thatcher's preferred, proposal to Mattisse, to: "let go of your past hurts and grudges", "let go of your negative emotions and demonstrate by your actions and edits that you have moved on", and "forgive, or at least ignore, past problems, as you would like your past problems to be forgiven or ignored".

We've heard this advice before; it's as old as the written word and human wisdom itself. But it seems to be something Mattisse will not even consider. On the contrary, she has spent yesterday and today in great part tagging the names of individuals who were blocked over two months ago with unsigned sockpuppet tags in IMO a provocative manner, filling User:Thatcher131 and User:Fred Bauder's talk pages with some of the most disrespectful and uncivil language I've seen in Wikipedia (especially in speaking with administrators and arbitrators), and ramping up to this misplaced complaint. (I say misplaced, because it doesn't seem to have anything to do with the stated purposes at the top of this page.) Some of that material is posted below; "letting go", I'm afraid, is not part of Mattisse's plans.

Nor is taking responsibility for her actions. She has not accepted responsibility for a single one of the eighteen known sockpuppets attributed to her that operated from May 2006 until they were blocked in September 2006. She has never stated flatly that she has no connection to User:BackMaun, User:Alien666, or User:RasputinJSvengali though asked to repeatedly, but just insists she's insulted at the suggestion, in spite of the evidence Thatcher discusses in the e-mail that I am thankful she has published publically above. She and her socks have made dozens and dozens of edits to the same articles I have created or substantially contributed to (mostly related to Neo-Paganism, consciousness exploration, and world music) beginning hardly a week after I began editing in August, and stalked both my contributions and Jefferson Anderson's, even created fake articles and attributed them to me, yet still insists she has no interest in them and does not edit them. She has insulted me and Jefferson Anderson repeatedly, along with Fred Bauder and SilkTork and others, yet still insists she has never been uncivil or rude. A review of her posts over the last few days on User Talk:Fred Bauder and User Talk:Thatcher131 will settle that (for my part, I'm not crazy about lines like "reducing me to Rosencomet's level").

Thatcher has exercised, in my opinion, the patience of a saint. Had I the ability, I would have blocked Mattisse long ago, especially in light of the fact that User:Ekajati was blocked indefinitly for similar and less extensive behavior. At least a temporary block for incivility would have been in order. But Thatcher chose to keep trying, on and off Wiki, with compromise proposals to everyone involved, at the expense I'm sure of hours and hours of thought, work, and stress. If he made any mistake, it was in suggesting the second solution; what value to Wikipedia would there be to encourage User:Mattisse to continue this behavior under a different alias? His hopes that a fresh start might be accompanied by a better attitude shows more faith in human nature than I can muster in this case. Rosencomet 22:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

And I'd say that as one of the prime antagonists and a relentless self-promoter whose mass spamming of your own sites essentially kicked off this mess in your zeal to continue, Rosencomet, you're in no moral position to be passing judgment or dishing out advice here. You ought to follow the advice you so blandly gave in your first paragraph to passive-aggressively continue to get your licks in. --Calton | Talk 22:54, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia harrassment at John Robinson

Don't know if this has been reported or not, but over at John Robinson, there seems to be a rather wild edit-war that's been continuing off-and-on for at least a couple months. Briefly put, it seems that certain users are trying to get a Wikipedia editor (User:Hephaestos) added to the disambig page, along with his full name and photo. To me, this seems incredibly counter to Wikipedia policies. The users so far that I've noticed on the history page who are reverting to the link-and-picture version are: 165.155.200.144 (twice), Charles Montgomery (twice), and Brent Harding. For an example diff, see here --Action Jackson IV 21:15, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

For the record, the IP is Mike Garcia avoiding his block. This edit illustrates that fact. IrishGuy ^talk 21:29, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Account Devoshane77 used purely for Vandalism

Resolved··coelacan 21:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

It is my opinion that the account Devoshane77 ^{Talk, Contribs} is being used purely for vandalism. I first spotted the problem when editing Seth MacFarlane. I went to his talk page to add {{subst:uw-vandalism1}} and noticed a comment about his edits on Jar Jar Binks that appeared to be vandalism. I reviewed his other contributions (reverting where appropiate) and they all appeared to be vandalism. I have got up to the stage where he has recieved 4 warnings on his talk page. He has also vandalised my talk page which I have reverted. -- Rehnn83 ^Talk 21:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Please make a report at WP:AIV for this kind of thing in the future. ··coelacan 21:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Will do - and thanks for the feedback on my talk page -- Rehnn83 ^Talk 21:39, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Michaelbusch (talk · contribs) on Wolf 359

The above user removed a good image from Celestia that had the star with the disturbing edit summery of "No Celestia!". - Patricknoddy^{TALK (reply here)|HISTORY} 21:27, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps I over-reacted, but there have been a large number of cases of editors posting Celestia renderings in place of less pretty, but scientifically valid, images (in this case, a star chart). Celestia is a good plotting utility, but nothing else. That said, Patricknoddy's reaction seems somewhat extreme to me. I am confused. I do not understand why removing inaccuracy is a bad thing. Michaelbusch 21:34, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

It wasn't inaccurate. - Patricknoddy^{TALK (reply here)|HISTORY} 21:35, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't get the point of this thread. – Steel 21:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The point is the Michaelbusch removed a really good photo of Wolf 359 from the article under the basis that it was from a "inaccurate" program. - Patricknoddy^{TALK (reply here)|HISTORY} 21:40, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

And what do you expect admins to do? Try the talk page of the article in question. - auburnpilot talk 21:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Side note: let's not forget the WP:3RR. - auburnpilot talk 21:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Patricknoddy has reverted four times in short order, and as the content he was reverting was clearly not vandalism I have blocked him for 24 hours per WP:3RR. Michaelbusch has reverted only three times, so is not blocked. Michaelbusch's conduct is little better than Patricknoddy's; his edit warring over this trivial matter, and the silly "No Celestia!" edit summary, does not paint him in a favourable light. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 21:58, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't provide any educational value. The star chart provides the star's position in the sky. The celestia image... looks pretty? There's nothing to indicate that it's accurate besides your word, and the star texture is simply a generic one applied to many stars by the program. There is also nothing indicating what the background stars are or what direction the viewport is pointing towards, which would be the only educational value in it. In any case, it's a content dispute, and should be taken to WP:DR, not here. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 21:51, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

It seems Patricknoddy has been blocked for 3RR. This has been a productive thread after all. – Steel 21:54, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Well I'll be damned. There was something for admins to do...good block by Finlay McWalter. - auburnpilot talk 21:58, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

User:DDRG and Asahi Shimbun

There was an earlier discussion about DDRG's edits to this article, but I'm not sure where it is. In any case, the end result of talk page discussion was that DDRG would find more sources to support his changes, as there were concerns about reliability. No new sources were ever forthcoming, but he has begun reverting back to his version again, claiming false consensus, or simply undoing revisions. He's also gaming 3RR to boot. MSJapan 22:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

While he has just violated 3RR, I still feel that this situation requires outside intervention in order to effect any sort of long-term solution. MSJapan 22:48, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Richard Gere

There is an ongoing dispute at the entry on Richard Gere. The question is whether to include false accusations about Mr Gere's sexual behaviour. Those favouring inclusion argue that the false rumour has achieved the status of "urban legend" and is therefore notable. Those opposing inclusion argue that false accusations violate WP:BLP, that the material is not notable in relation to Gere (who has never made mention of the accusations), that including the material is insensitive, and that the material is non-encyclopaedic. Editors who wish to include this material cannot see how this material is insensitive or violates BLP. Intervention from administrators may be necessary to prevent further BLP violations. FNMF 22:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard is a rather more suitable venue than this for discussing WP:BLP matters. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 22:25, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

User:Battman14

This user has used profanity towards me after warning this user that repetitive vandalism of WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2008 is not appreciated, and could lead to being blocked. His response was "Fuck U A$$HOLE". This will remain on my talk page for a few days before I remove it. Socby19 22:25, 27 April 2007 (UTC)Socby19

A67 (talk · contribs)

This editor has been continuously uploading images without sources, and has been restoring images removed by OrphanBot and by me. I have politely tried to warn them, but they continue alas.

— superbfc [ talk | cont ] — 21:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)