User talk:Tony Sidaway

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npa

I'm getting rather pessimistic with WP - it reminds me the tower of Babel. Or maybe I'm too much wiki-stressed these days. Thanks. MATIA 16:05, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Keep the article hidden?

Salutations, Tony! As the most recent Admin to address Page Protection issues listed in the Edit History of Winter Soldier Investigation, I'm coming to you for a little advice and assistance. The article is blanked and protected yet again. User:Duk assures me that he has no interest in the article, other than to address a possible copyvio issue -- coincidentally as a film about this event is being re-released this month for the first time in 30 years.

Duk, an Admin, removed a portion of text from the article and recommended that the whole article be reverted practically to it's stub form from a year ago. He then requested opinions from others on the Talk page. I gave my opinion, he disagreed, and the discussion became quite snippity and unproductive after that. He then engaged in a revert war over the article, despite my attempts to appease him with re-writes of the text he removed. He then blanked the whole article, replaced it with a "copyvio" tag, and page protected it. Having copyright material in an article is unacceptable, but so is completely blanking an otherwise good article indefinitely (and I know it can be months before anyone looks into the matter). As near as I can tell, the issue revolves around the following paragraph:

(from the Wikipedia article)

Another revelation of the Winter Soldier Investigation was that servicemen participating in these illegal missions into neutral countries were required to never reveal information on their location or activities. As verified by news investigations conducted by Detroit Free Press and others, they removed all U.S. related accouterments from their garments and identification and had instructions not to reveal their true identity if caught. On some missions the servicemen toted Russian-made weaponry and wore the uniforms used by their North Vietnamese enemy. The Pentagon would continue to deny any knowledge of such operations for another several months.

(from Gerald Nicosia's 700 page book Home to War, page 89)

The American military's credibility had already been severely damaged by the 1968 Tet Offensive and the perennial failure of Vietnamization, but Winter Soldier took that challenge a quantum leap farther, questioning the morality of America’s superpower status and habitual interventionist politics. One of the points brought out at Winter Soldier, and verified in subsequent news stories, was that servicemen participating in these illegal missions were often required to sign papers in which they promised never to tell the true location and nature of their activities. When they went out on the missions, they wore uniforms stripped of all American insignia and personal identification tags, and if caught in Laos they were under no circumstances to reveal their true identity; but even if they did, the United States would not acknowledge them as its soldiers. On certain missions the Americans even dressed in North Vietnamese Army uniforms and carried the Russian weapons commonly used by the NVA. In effect, the American government was attempting to turn a generation of young men into liars in order to cover up its own misconduct—--or, to put it more charitably, to hide the gap between its stated foreign policy goals and the Realpolitik it practiced.

If I understand Duk's contention correctly, the article's paragraph is a copyright violation because it was "derived" from Nicosia's book. I only have a layman's understanding of Copyright Law, but the article paragraph appears fine to me in that the basic facts (illegal missions were conducted; identities concealed) are presented, while Nicosia's conclusions and opinions are omitted. Regardless, I'm not asking you to be a copyright attorney -- I'm simply hoping for assistance in recovering the baby that was thrown out with the bathwater. Any help would be greatly appreciated. 165.247.202.215 18:51, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

The problem is, apparently, that copyrighted text was inserted into the article, and then only paraphrased during editing. This makes the paraphrase a derived work, which is subject to copyright. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:02, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

I just discovered that you had already been commenting on this very issue as I was typing my request to you. I'm trying to play catch-up now, while researching just what happened. The questionable material first appeared September 17, 2004 with this [1] edit by 209.86.253.61. This appears to be a major edit, including the addition of several paragraphs from Nicosia's book. The citation "As noted by author Gerald Nicosia in his authoritative history of the Vietnam Veterans Movement Home to War,..." is also introduced in this edit, along with quotation marks and offsetting of the passages. With the notable exception of the paragraph mentioned above. I'm guessing there was no larcenous intent here. The book was quoted, a proper citation with quotations and offsetting was made, and one of the paragraphs was juggled out of the cited section during formatting and editing. I'm still looking at the other edits from that period.

Am I understanding correctly that the procedure now is to delete everything subsequent to the introduction of the copyright protected material? 165.247.202.215 19:40, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, that's all that needs to be done. Provided the first tainted version can be correctly identified the article can be cleaned up in this way in a few minutes. I'm as anxious as you are to get this article back up and running. The only worry would be over misguided people trying to help by restoring tainted text from their own offline copies, but we have to live with the possibility of copyright violations being injected into any article, it isn't unique to this one. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:46, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

I would appreciate your comments after reading the most recent addition to Talk:Winter_Soldier_Investigation. Thank you. 165.247.204.56 17:32, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Well, it's hard, but it had to be done. Now the article can be edited and, as long as copyright isn't violated, rebuilt. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:22, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Per instructions at WP:CP, I have rewritten the article's text at Winter Soldier Investigation/Temp. Rather than try to rewrite the offending paragraph, I have omitted it (and it's header) completely. Pending verification that all "copyvio versions" have been deleted by a sysop, may this temp page be moved to the article page? What is the procedure for doing so? 165.247.204.56 20:07, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

It depends what you've done. If you've used any material from the deleted revisions, it's no good because we cannot use it under the GFDL. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 20:48, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Easily 80% of the present text is "material from the deleted revisions" or very close to it. I refer to original edit contributions, properly cited excerpts and public domain material (such as the actual testimony quotes of the veterans), as well as typical article constructs such as external links and bibliographies. I avoided reinserting obviously derivative work, as well some I suspect might have been derivative. When you say, "If you've used any material from the deleted revisions..." I assume you mean material in violation of copyright. Not ANY material. Am I understanding correctly? 165.247.204.56 21:19, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

The thing is that we can't use any material extracted from the deleted revisions, not because of the tainting from the copyright violation, but because using such deleted material is contrary to our license. The original editors own that material and it's fine if they themselves add them back. If you add them back, however, you're breaking our license. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 16:08, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

Re: Unprotects

Yeah, I went through the category page. I hate long protections. Btw, I noticed your own work on removing long protected pages. Well, done. But I was intrigued by your comment "This wiki now has a max temp protection period of 3 days and still hasn't exploded!". I fully support that policy (unless in very special circumstances, I guess, when sorting things out on talk takes longer), but is this a new policy of some sorts, or just something you decided to try out and see how it goes? Shanes 23:06, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Just a test. Not policy. I wanted to see how low it could go before things started getting bad. Well, I'm very surprised that I got it so low. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 10:17, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Please re-protect Avram. It's been vandalized many times since it was unprotected. Thanks. freestylefrappe 03:50, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Done. Boy. that guy is determined! --Tony Sidaway^Talk 10:17, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Can I ask you to re-protect Urban75 as well? Your removal of U75-related board nonsense from the Talk page has already been reverted by the same guy who was responsible for the recent sockpuppets and general vandalism, and now he's re-reverted the main page to one of his old edits again.

He's not going to take it to Urban75 because he's been banned from Urban75 and is just using Wikipedia to insult various people and spread rumours about the admins there, in particular the editor. There's a reference to the sockpuppetting on WP:ANI. --Fridgemagnet 16:45, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

And he's at it again; see both page and talk, reverting people, removing talk comments and reinstating the old rubbish. Oh, and adding stuff about the board being censored by "liberal capitalists". --Fridgemagnet 21:20, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

Harassment?

Well, Tony, I've been breaking from Wikipedia, or I would have notice this earlier. If you think this RfA is harassment, feel free to try and get me banned or de-sysoped, or whatever you have in mind. Of course, you probably didn't see the 100 or so articles Maoririder created that were speedy deleted for having no content (i.e. "Sports Watch" It's a watch made in Taiwan). You know where he came up with that? He took it off his wrist, saw that it said "sports watch" and "made in Taiwan" and wrote an article. He's tying up a bunch of us who should be fixing vandalism and whatnot, doing repetitive tasks that he's too lazy or apathetic to do himself, and if you think that a bunch of garbage articles that add nothing but clutter make this a better encyclopedia, than you and I have very different views of the project. He refuses to put any effort into his work, and expects others to clean up after him. As for the articles you cited that didn't exist before, they certainly aren't testimony to the greatness of Wikipedia, but rather to the generosity of people like Lucky 6.9, who clean up after problems like Maoririder. If you'll notice, most of those signed on for the RfAr were those who cleaned up after him. You might also note that this only went ahead after an RfC failed because Maoririder refused to be involved. Wikipedia is not a baby-sitting service; and Maoririder has added nothing of any value. I see no need to shelter him from the consequences of his refusal to communicate or move beyond his general apathy. With respect, Scimitar ^parley 19:55, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Sorry but I really don't see what the problem is. You call him "lazy or apathetic" because he writes very short stubs, and you call others who edit the same article "generous"; this seems to me to entirely miss the point of having a wiki. Wikis are supposed to have multiple editors. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 20:04, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, but those expanding onto his articles are trying to tutor him to do it himself, since they have other things to do. Show me, Tony, just one instance where an article comprised of the sentence "It's a school" or "It's a bakery" is helpful. They aren't. They are disruptive. Maoririder is disruptive.--Scimitar ^parley 20:25, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

A couple of home truths:

• Nobody is forced to edit any article on Wikipedia.
• An article correctly identifying a school is not disruptive.

I'm utterly flummoxed by your evident inability, or perhaps outright refusal, to recognise these as facts. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 20:41, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

If articles correctly identifying schools and bakeries aren't disruptive, than why do they get deleted? And speaking of flummoxed, I'm still confused as to how you can regard illustrating basic conventions "The title is bolded at the start of the article. . . " "Expand boxes belong on talk pages, not in the article mainspace" and such as harassment. And perhaps I've been a bit unclear myself. My problem isn't with a few such articles, but when half of new pages (and I wish this is was an exaggeration) are taken up by such nano-stubs from one user, it makes it difficult to do New Pages patrol, as well as diluting overall quality in Wikipedia. As for your rationale that nobody is forced to edit, that's true. Nobody is. Nobody is forced to do vandal patrol either, but without it this project would collapse into an unusable mess, and it certainly doesn't hurt to give those doing the job some support, despite the fact that they aren't forced to do it.--Scimitar ^parley 21:15, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

You misunderstand my statements on this matter. I referred to the RfC, which contained statements saying "It's unclear if Maoririder is a kid or perhaps mentally retarded" as harassment. In fact I find the tone utterly impossible to condone and I think the person who wrote those words should be subject to the most severe discipline.

You claim that the overall quality of Wikipedia is being "diluted" and it's hard to do new pages patrol because of the work of one editor. I disagree with this and regard Maoririder's contributions as valuable, not to mention groundbreaking work. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 21:36, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

The retarded comment was a mistake by whoever wrote it, but I chalk it up more to frustration than anything else. As for the value of Maoririder's contributions, I'm afraid we'll have to agree to disagree, since I honestly think that the encyclopedia's a better place without them.--Scimitar ^parley 21:47, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

I am a rabid inclusionist and I think that Wikipedia's "rules" should be treated more like guidelines instead of dicta to be enforced with an iron fist. It is meant to be a people's encyclopedia and as such should be tolerant of the diversity amongst people, reflected in an eclectic mix of styles and formats in its articles. The principle should be that if any piece of information is not defamatory, malicious, absolutely false or directly harmful, it should be allowed. This includes one-sentence articles, directory-like information such as telephone numbers of establishments, reasonable predictions of the future and such like. If you look at references such as the Encyclopedia Brittanica, you will find lots of one-liners too. There should also be a tolerance of POV statements, as long as opposing views are expressed side-by-side.

For example, someone may write, "Andy Warhol was the undisputed artistic genius of his era", whereas someone else may feel, "Andy Warhol was a no-talent whore", and yet another may be of the opinion that "Andy Warhol was an artist of average skill". All these 3 sentences should be permitted to co-exist within a single paragraph to reflect the non-concordance of assessment that exists in the real world. Surely Wikipedia has a largesse of spirit enough to accommodate all views. Why the obsessive insistence on making it an encyclopedia of "excellence"? It should be a reference work which celebrates human diversity and the freedom of expression.Groyn88 06:35, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Hey

You may not remember me or the fact that I opposed your candidacy for adminship. But I just wanted to let you know you are among the admins I most respect now.

By the way, what's up with the "currently on wikibreak" message? You don't seem to be on wikibreak. Taco Deposit | Talk-o to Taco 06:28, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

Well, I meant to go on wikibreak some months ago, but somehow it didn't happen. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 11:48, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

Subpage protection - thanks!

Protection was performed by me. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 21:07, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Thank you so much! -- Thorpe ^talk 16:04, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

John Vanbrugh

The personal tastes of one or two editors of a particular articleare important, but during two periods of protection and even now, none of them offers any discussion. Those editors say they dislike the template's presence because of how it looks, but give little solid reasoning for why this one article must be an exception. The style of the template is open for discussion, but making biographical entries look coherent as well as adding important meta-data to the articles is the higher goal. -- Netoholic @ 17:58, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Sure, but it's not about the template, it's about the way you get into these eternal ding-dong battles. Try to understand why you're being opposed, then do whatever it takes to make the opposition go away. If that means persuading people, or being persuaded yourself, all the better. Slamming revert after revert isn't convincing anybody. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 18:05, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Incidently, a clear act of edit warring/WP:POINT/vandalism was performed by one of those editors opposing infoboxes when he made this edit. Who's side do you really want to take on this? And one of the editors directly reverting me, User:Rivarez, is a sock puppet of Wik/Gzornenplatz/NoPuzzleStranger. -- Netoholic @ 18:07, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

So the only guy in step is you, right? --Tony Sidaway^Talk 18:52, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Edit warring? Hardly. I added some fields, when it was pointed out that it was better not to change it while it was on TFD I decided I'd wait. There are *lots* of people who think the box is dreadful and useless... You can't claim that all of us are sockpuppets, Netoholic. Can't you just accept that many people disagree and that it's not some troll conspiracy? --Gmaxwell 22:30, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

western sahara

and we already had this debate on the french wikipedia :-(.... ant

i must have missed many episodes

I had listed 4-5 examples of personal attacks against me on WP:ANI, and now the whole section is gone? +MATIA ☎ 20:50, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Oh it all became ridiculous so I deleted it. Look, there's a thing called Wikipedia:Resolving disputes. Read it and follow the suggestions. This business of screaming about how horrible somebody else is doesn't work. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 21:47, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm not screaming anything Tony. But I do believe that it was unfair to be treated the same way as the one who attacked me. Thanks for your answer. +MATIA ☎ 21:54, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

List of tier 1 internet service providers

Thanks for setting the protection on List of Tier 1 Internet Service Providers --68.57.130.138 23:30, 30 September 2005 (UTC) AKA Somitho

Terri Schiavo again

Thrice it was suggested that FA page be closed along with unlocking the Terri Schiavo page. Plz do this as well. Marskell 00:25, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

History of the Internet

Unprotecting History of the Internet seems to have been a bad move. Barbiero went back to inserting his personal Original Research POV there. Not content with that, he completely discarded the entire PARC Universal Packet article, including a long list of references, etc which were given nowhere else. He then created a long list of errors by inserting some of the PUP material directly into Xerox Network Services - a fairly different, although related, protocol family. Finally, he went to Routing Information Protocol, and through his lack of knowledge, deleted some correct material, and introduced several more errors.

I do not have the time or energy to carefully filter out all the errors this person introduces. About 20% of his material is useful/interesting, but it's simply overwhelmed by the errors, personal original research, etc, etc. Noel (talk) 01:41, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

*sigh*, what Noel is talking about with PARC Universal Packet and Xerox Network Services was not a deletion but a merge. As the pre-merge article stated, XNC is PUP with minor changes and a unified transport protocol. They are not really seperate systems, XNC being a second version of PUP. The articles duplicated each other to an extent, and I felt were better served as a unified article, merging them so as to describe XNC primarly and identify where it differed from the earlier PUP. Noel has a right to disagree with the merge, but not to make accusations of vandelisim.

I'm still waiting on Noel to tell me exactly what in History of the Internet he thinks is in error, or is original research. Since I've cited and discussed everything but the minor changes to the page. Please hold off on re-protecting the page until Noel makes it clear exactly what his objections are. I have said I am willing to enter mediation over this if he will do so. --John R. Barberio ^{talk, contribs 13:13, 1 October 2005 (UTC)}

Catholic Traditionalist

I despair of reaching a consensus. We all agree on a basic definition but this person has a shopping list of crackpot views of what this consists of, which are irrelavent to the informal term used by the Church. This person has a very strong PoV axe. It is his and his PoV alone that will guide this article. Look for yourself (If you dare!) Talk:Traditionalist Catholic Dominick 12:24, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

You need more eyes, more opinions. That way you will make a consensus that will outweigh minority views. Try asking for opinions on Talk:Catholicism. Explain the conflict in neutral terms. Also try Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Religion. The more people you get, the less weight such isolated views will tend to have. I know it must seem frustrating, but as an administrator I'm not possessed of special powers of judgement. My opinion alone on an article may easily be wrong. Instead we rely on consensus to decide questions like this. This can sometimes be wrong, too, but it's a bit more reliable. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 14:23, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice! I think I shall do just that! Dominick 14:27, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

Pardon me it turned nasty today. I am not going to engage in any more discussion with Mr. Anonymous. I will continue to edit this page when the protection is lifted. Dominick 18:57, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

RE: Homosexuality in Singapore

HOW? Have you seen Groyn88 at any time responding constructively to the discussion? Nobody wanted to touch that article. I did. And you still hasn't provided a sufficient justification for your threat to revert my edits and protect the page. --Miborovsky 22:16, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

You haven't got to the point at which I said I might have to intervene in that manner, and I've decided to perform some edits myself so I would have to ask someone else to make that decision. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:22, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cool Cat/Wiki-politics

Wikipedia:Miscellaneous deletion/Cool Cat/Wiki-politics

Fadix VfDed something in my userpage. What do you think? --Cool Cat ^Talk 23:11, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

No strong feelings either way. I think if it upsets people it's probably better off deleted. Put any factual evidence into your arbitration case. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:20, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Then I would ask you to counsel User:Cool Cat to request its deletion himself. — Davenbelle 03:41, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

RoyBoy RfA

THANKS!!!

THANKS!!!

Left the best till last... really wanted to say thanks to you most of all. With your sysop support, comments and personal experience I feel trully deserving and up to the task of admin. Much appreciated... and it made me forget entirely about the oppose votes. :"D– RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 23:15, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

I wasn't an admin when first we met--far from it. When I interacted with you, I gained a lot of confidence and felt that my contributions were appreciated. I also liked the way you addressed the issues. I am surprised that I made it to admin before you did. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 23:32, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

Urdu language

How can one establish consensus with a loon who will not discuss, will not give cites and uses anonIPs and sockpuppet accounts to get his way? I think you're taking the wrong tack here. Zora 02:01, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Trust me, things will work out okay. I have to work through the whole process before I can say whether or not I agree with you. Sysops have formidable powers so we don't use them lightly. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 14:41, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I don't understand, why did you switch and protect the Biased version on this page?? That is not right--JusticeLaw 19:38, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I don't know which version is biased; however there was overwhelming support for a particular version so I switched to that one. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:45, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree with User:JusticeLaw, the wrong version has been protected. I am also requesting this page to be reverted to the last version. The current version has unnecessary information with cities and such without much Urdu text support. That version was protected anonmously before, it is not fair to keep protecting that version.--64.241.37.140 00:50, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Please take this discussion to Talk:Urdu language. Make your case there. Notice that a straw poll on the versions drew four votes of support for the current version and none for the version that you favor. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 00:55, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

I just recently viewed the Urdu page and realized that a protection was switched to a version. I also viewed the poll present on the discussion page. I don't believe sufficient time was given and the only people who knew there was a poll were the ones looking for it to be changed. Please return the other version as it contains a more accurate presentation. I believe the problem most people are having is with the History section which seems POV, if that last version was returned without the last few paragraphs of the history section everyone would be happy. Reading from these last few posts here I can see that people are dissatisfied, please return the last version. Thanks --StephenCox 04:27, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Stephen, could you help me to solve a problem with your user page? It carries a barnstar apparently awarded by Anonymous editor (talk · contribs) for "countless hours of work on SouthAsia-related articles". But there is no record of you putting in countless hours on anything. In fact, the user page itself was created in a single edit by you today at 04:10, just 17 minutes before your comment above. One minute later, you put the sole edit on your talk page. I can find no record of User:Anonymous editor awarding anyone a barnstar for work on South Asia-related articles--the focus of his awards seems to be Islam, with one or two awards for work on Middle East and fighting vandalism. Moreover, your first edit seems to have been just six days ago. What's up? --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:12, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Sorry for the late reply, had been away for some time. To answer your question: Fredrick is a colleague of mine and prior to establishing usernames at Wikipedia we were editting with anon IPs. I had to make a username when the problem at Urdu language could not be resolved, I requested him to do the same. I don't know who the others are. As for my user page, I wanted to give it a cool look. I had seen this star symbol on a user's page so I copied the programming text for it. If you find it offensive or inappropriate you are welcome to change it. --StephenCox 06:28, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Sorry to butt in, but i see the Urdu page is on protection. Please unprotect this page, I don't see any apparent reason for protection. There are clear mistakes I find on this page.--Frederick24 02:16, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Hi, Frederick. I see you started editing Wikipedia about the same time as StephenCox. And in the same article, too! Small world, eh? --Tony Sidaway^Talk 02:21, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Hi Tony,

The above person/people continues to, surprise, revert the Urdu article. I restored it this morning, and within 12 minutes it was anonymously reverted again. I have never blocked anyone before, and would like to ask your advice on how to procede.

Other than a bit of copy editing, and harmonizing the article with the list of languages by native speaking population, I haven't been involved in the creation of this article.

Last night I invited JusticeLaw to join the discussion on the Talk page rather than continuing this edit war.

My reading of wiki blocking policy is that it is appropriate to indefinitely block anonymous IP addresses, but wanted to verify with you first. Of the two anon editors today, 70.177.166.200 is involved entirely with the Urdu article and related issues. However, 205.188.117.14 has edited many other articles, much of which appears to be useful copy editing.

What I thought might be appropriate to do is to indefinitely block any anon IP address that continues to revert the article immediately; to place a warning on a sockpuppet user page that reverts the article and to block it if it reverts a second time; and to hold a vote on the Urdu talk page if JusticeLaw refuses to stop reverting and join the discussion in a constructive manner. However, I don't want to be rash, or to block other people who might be using the same anon IP address.

Could you advise a newbie admin?

Thanks, kwami 20:36, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

P.S. Thank you for your support on my admin nomination!

Merging

Hi, I know you agree with me that articles which can be merged don't belong on Afd, so you might be interested in this conversation between the creator of the Miami-Dade elementary school articles and the person who nominated them all for deletion, both of whom would have been happy for them to be listified instead of deleted. Kappa 02:16, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank for instilling some form of hope Tony, I feel that lately many Wikipedians are forgetting the true purpose of the project that was Wikipedia. I only hope that eventually this will change and the ignorance of the authoritarian attitude of many will be drowned out by the intellect that is exemplary of yourself. Again thanks for your support and good luck! Piecraft 12:12, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

• I would like to echo User:Piecraft's gratitude for your moderate and well-balanced stance in Wikipedia, Tony. Too many deletionists wield Wiki's guidelines like the Old Testament and use them as a buttress for indulging their tyrannical tendencies. It takes a lot less work and unfairly reaps loads more malicious satisfaction to delete information that someone else painstakingly added. I'm referring in particular to the article Homosexuality in Singapore. Thanks for restoring some much-needed equilibrium to the topic.Groyn88 16:51, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Arbitration votes

Well, at least I'm consistent. ;-) Thanks! Jayjg ^(talk) 19:05, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

The Black Dahlia Murder

IN RE: to unprotection due to lack of "substantiative discussion".

The anonymous user who continuously reverts the changes refuses discussion. He continues to instigate a POV/revert war with personal attacks and has been doing this non-stop for close to a month. I have sent an e-mail to this person's IP provider (likely a network in Poland or the Netherlands) along with Wikipedia about what's going on. Why hasn't his IP been blocked by now? Danteferno 17:02, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Доверяй, но проверяй.

I babelfished this, on the Cool Cat proposed principle 4, "Stalking", and it said "Entrust, but check". Could you put an English translation in brackets? I'm pretty sure most English speakers wouldn't understand the Russian. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 00:26, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, I would have, except that someone deleted it. It is the original form of the phrase popularized by Ronald Reagan, "trust, but verify." ➥the Epopt 02:05, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Ah now I look at it, the words do have some symmetry, like a proverb. Thanks. --Tony Sidaway^Talk

Transliterated: doveryay, no proveryay." ➥the Epopt 13:32, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

I missed this and have not found it; care to point me at it? — Davenbelle 03:44, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

It's in the history of the proposed decision. Fred Bauder erased it in his vote to close. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 03:52, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. Too bad it's gone, I like it in this context. — Davenbelle 03:59, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Re: Barnstar

No I did not give user:StephenCox a barnstar. Maybe he gave one to himself? I removed it anyhow but he might try to insert it later. --a.n.o.n.y.m ^t 22:05, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

thank you and can i ask you something...

hello, i want to thank you for your help with the Michael Crook article. i don't reallt care too much one way or the other, i just find it humerous that he comes back to his page 20 times a day to change it.

i do have a question, tho. if he continues to do this all the time, can't he be banned? or locked for longer than a few days? thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.189.57.190 (talk • contribs) 22:13, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

He's using lots of different IP numbers. Probably from an open proxy list. It's difficult to block them. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 03:51, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Wik trolling issue

If you could examine the practicality of permanently blocking the above banned editor's IP range/s it would be appreciated. He is now actively and contemptuously subverting the 3RR and multiple admin bans by simply creating new sockpuppets as fast as admins can ban them. So far today he is responsible for 51 reverts of Sealand and Empire of Atlantium. --Gene_poole 04:24, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Not sure we have his IP. I've protected those two pages. I suggest you raise this on User talk:David Gerard; he may know what to do in cases like this. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 04:35, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll take it up with David Gerard tomrrow. I'm now making it my personal crusade to root out Wik once and for all -something that should have happened a long time ago. In the meantime, please protect Template:Sealans_table as he's now started vandalising that too. --Gene_poole 07:05, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Tony, I thought you might like to hear that my interest in Sealand dates from this. — Davenbelle 07:10, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Systemwars.com

Hi Tony, Someone has deleted this again without a VFD or explaination.Gateman1997 06:23, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Got it. I have created the page on my userpage now until such time as they deem it worthy of being in the general encyclopedia. Also they've started a content review on VFU.Gateman1997 01:05, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

E-mail

Tony, that's a terrific idea! My account here is currently tied in to my work address. This will free up my work IP and I won't have to worry about my home IP getting hammered. Thanks!! - Lucky 6.9 20:47, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Hi

Have you actually looked at the article that you and geogre have repeatedly deleted?

• 00:34, 5 October 2005 Fvw deleted "Systemwars.com" (deleteagain)
• 23:40, 4 October 2005 Fvw deleted "Systemwars.com" (recreation of an AfDed * 20:10, 4 October 2005 Geogre deleted "Systemwars.com" (VfU has not agreed to undeletion. Previously properly deleted. Recreations are speedy deletes. Go to VfU)
• 15:56, 4 October 2005 Geogre deleted "Systemwars.com" (Recreation of a previously VfD'd article, therefore speedy delete.)
• 04:14, 4 October 2005 Fvw deleted "Systemwars.com" (deleteagain)

I myself wrote that article. I am telling you that the article is the product of my own mind, that it is in no way a copy, reproduction or recreation of the article deleted in June.

Why do you persist in falsely claiming that you are deleting an article that has been recreated? Why do you cling so mindlessly to this blatant falsehood?

I listed it on AfD, yet you closed the debate with that falsehood. What on earth do you think you are doing? I refuse to believe that you intentionally lie, but how can I possibly reconcile you repeated blatantly false statements with an assumption of good faith? --Tony Sidaway^Talk 00:43, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

The page is substantially identical in that it describes the same topic which was shot down both on AfD and VfU. --fvw* 00:48, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Nice try, no banana. The CSD says "substantially identical copy". That you falsely claim that it's substantially identical doesn't help if it isn't a copy, which it wasn't. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 01:27, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Sorry about all of this, Tony. I tried to back you and got reamed for it. I truly didn't realize that it was you who'd written it. - Lucky 6.9 08:05, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Parochial?

I hope you weren't calling me parochial [2]. I try not to lecture and though I'm sure my politics seem far right by European standards, I'm more a centrist as far as American politics go.--MONGO 08:16, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I know you are. I was nastier than I should have been. I was trying to get across the message that seeking a balance between two sides in any one political system isn't going to produce a neutral encyclopedia--I should have pointed out that if we instead chose as a benchmark the political spectrum of, say, Switzerland or the United Kingdom, or Nigeria, producing a balance between their political views in our writing would clearly not produce a neutral encyclopedia, and (which is less obvious to many of us) this also applies to the US political spectrum.

I think you and I both grasp that neutrality isn't about that kind of balance, but about sticking to the facts and writing about them. Some of the facts relevant to the US context are facts about opinions, and Republican opinion, no less than Democratic opinion, is a very relevant fact in the context of US politics. But that doesn't mean that we should, say, give equal time to creationist critiques of evolution in our article on that subject, or for that matter introduce a secessionist view of Lincoln's career as US President in the article on that US politician whose terms were riven by national division and civil war. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 14:05, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Ah, so you were responding to me then...anyhoo, I agree...the chances of us achieving absolute neutrality is unlikely. I'll let you stay on the "MONGO no kill list" Ha:)!MONGO 19:39, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Actually I was commenting on the anonymous guy. I'm sorry it looked ambiguous. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:49, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Deletion reform

Tony, I'm droping you this not because, despite your partisanship in the 'notability wars', you seem to me one of the deeper thinkers round here. Afd will soon be statistically irrelevant - I agree. In terms of notability, that means the inclusionists 'win'. (Probably not my instincts - but so what?). However, I'm concerned that the need for deletion reform is being masked by the notability sideshow. A little research: on 2nd Oct, Snowspinner terminated 16 afd's for invalidity on notability. That's 16 of 130 that day. (I couldn't find many/any more nominations that concerned notability). Of that 16, and as Snowspinner's edit summaries also indicate, at least 4-5 could have been nominated on other grounds: OR, verifiability, (another 4 failed WP:MUSIC or WP:BIO - but I suppose they are still about notability). I think my point is obvious, at least 80% of vfd's are not really about notability, so that if the deletion process doesn't upscale, then the hoaxes, unverified, will get in, in their droves. I think that matters. Increased speedies (which will be the result) will be even more arbitrary and unscrutinised than afd.

My plea is, that we should leave aside notability (on which there will be no consensus) and get the best brains working on the rest of the problem. Any other proposal will be problematic, and for from ideal, but we need to find something better than the status-quo. I noted Radiant's musings, and your constructive response, and I've started some of my own thinking here. But is it possible to take this debate somewhere with a clear ban on notability discussions (in that forum anyway)? --Doc (?) 11:48, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Verifiability is mostly a cleanup issue. The worst cases (suspected hoaxes) should be treated in the same way as copyvios. A countdown list. You pop a suspected hoax article into a "completely unverifiable" page and, if nobody does emergency cleanup on it within say 30 days providing references, it gets deleted. We can ditch AfD completely if we have a system like this. I've advocated this several times on Wikipedia and on wikien-l, and I think it will come one day, but I don't want to spend energy on what would be, at present, a single person campaign. I'll wait until everybody else is convinced that AfD is an irrelevent encrustation and inadequate to the task of dealing with the articles that we agree are probably deletable--the completely unverifiable. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 13:49, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I can some sense in this. But copyvios are generally binary, it is or it isn't: verifiability, inherent POV, forks, hoaxes and near nonsense will often need more discussion. A website may seem to verify something, but is it reliable? What about claims to verification that aren't googleable? I think your system could work, but if my maths is correct, it may start with 100+ articles listed per day (would that upscale?)- and you still need something like an afd discussion when the issues become contested. --Doc (?) 15:58, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Actually copyvios can be hazy too. Googlability isn't the issue. If someone gives a book, especially one with an ISBN, then that is good enough. The article does not to be verified to remain on Wikipedia, merely verifiable. Verification is the task of the reader/editor, and references are provided for that purpose. Someone suspecting that a verifiable article is a hoax can check the reference to see if it supports the article. If not, the reference is removed. If none of the references check out the article can be listed as a possible hoax. Details of failed verifications go on the talk page and remain when the article is deleted, as documentation of the hoax attempt. Little or no discussion would be involved; I think we'd most likely get around 10 hoaxes of this order per day. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 16:23, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

That's actually the fist coherent articulation of eventualism I have encountered. I'll need to think about it. We have thousands of unreferenced articles as it stands. I suppose POV forks can simply be redirected. I'm not sure what you'd do with inherently POV titles ('list of crap countries') - you'd need a mechanism for that. Perhaps it would be instructive to break down the 130 nominations into 'types' and see how various ideas would be eqipped to deal with the various problems which people think merit deletion....but that sounds like a major project. Anyway, you've given me some food for thought. --Doc (?) 17:56, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Sockpuppet

I'm sorry to disturb you but someone (REX, Theathenae or Matia.gr) is using a sockpuppet on Arvanites while they are blocked. The sockpuppet is Thrakiotis (Special:Contributions/Thrakiotis). GrandfatherJoe 16:29, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Advise me

Tony, please advise me. I don't know what to do about Talk:Arvanites. I have provided all the sources anyone could want: Britannica, UNESCO, Ethnologue, Encarta etc ant MATIA and Theathenae simply refuse to accept what they say in favour of a rather novel, but inaccurate, theory of their own. They simply refuse to co-operate. Do you think that you could talk them into accepting Wikipedia:Mediation, because when I proposed it, they refused. It's an endless cycle (a rather short verion can be found here). I say something and prove it and they reject it without saying why. When I requested for Comment about a month ago it wasn't answered. Not very suprising really, given that everyone, including the UN, avoids Balkan ethnic disputes like the plague. I just don't know what do do. REX 18:42, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

• It's a difficult one. I think the key here would be to be patient and listen. Do you know why it is that they are so wedded to their theory, and what their objection is to your sources? Would they be amenable to a version of the article that described the origin as debatable and gave both versions? You've all been arguing loudly and behaving abominably, so it may take a long time for everybody to calm down, but if you treat people with respect they are more likely to do the same to you. So again, be very patient. Show that you're not going to edit war, and make sure that other editors are clear that you intend to avoid further edit warring, but stand your ground in the talk page. At the same time, examine criticism of your points and don't be afraid to admit it if someone makes a good counter to a point you have made. The only way out of this is for a version to be written that everybody can live with, and the only way to that is for all parties to act reasonably. Start by making sure that you act reasonably and then wait patiently for others to respond to that. Maybe others who are now repelled by the fighting will change their minds and get involved. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 19:03, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I see, that sounds like good advice. I'll prop the question to them again calmly and rationally and see what happens. REX 19:12, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

INJUSTICE

Greetings. Please check WP:ANI. Thanks. +MATIA ☎ 19:21, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

The correct links is Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#INJUSTICE.+MATIA ☎ 19:43, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I protest ! ! !

Tony, I protest about Thrakiotis (talk · contribs) to be new editor (I guess you know WHY!)! Find someone other, or I'll consider this as a POV pushing ! ! ! Regards. Bomac 20:08, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean by this. I don't select who edits Wikipedia. I've warned that user that his one edit to date in the circumstances may make him look like a sock puppet. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 20:22, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Well then, sorry. I understood you wrongly. Case closed. Regards. Bomac 20:32, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Re:Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Maoririder/Evidence

Hello, could you please explain your context in the link above. I, as well as many other editors tried to steer Maoririder in the right direction, but he continued on a juvenile path of actions, similiar to a small child or a mentally retarded person. At first glance, I considered your words to be a veiled attack at me, but i'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt if I have misunderstood the meaning of your comment. Karmafist 21:09, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Never mind, entering response now. Karmafist 21:18, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I found your comments completely unacceptable. I don't find maoririder's activities to be a major problem with Wikipedia. He's adding some information to Wikipedia but he doesn't seem to be good at learning how to do so. Since he's patently editing in good faith, the continued attacks on him are utterly beyond my comprehension. It seems like sadism for the sake of it. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 21:19, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Good faith is not the issue, the issue is abiding by the same rules everyone else at Wikipedia has to follow. If you take a look at that talk page, users have told him the same thing several times, very simple things, that he refuses to follow despite the fact that he says he will. How many chances does he get? Can he just ignore encyclopedic standards because of potential age or psychological disability? I have worked with several developmentally disabled people who have been able to integrate themselves to the best of their abilities into the society. Wikipedia is a micro-society, and from what i've seen of Maoririder's edits, he has not even tried to integrate himself into this society, he just says he will and ignores what he just heard.

I find your comments insulting not just because of your violations of WP:NPA against me, but because I consider them to be hypocritical since you have done very little, if any "babysitting" of Maoririder before making these comments. I didn't see you try to help teach him the ropes, and I have not checked your contribs, but assuming from the rest of your talk page, I assume that you didn't try to elaborate on many of his micro-stubs, if any. Karmafist 22:43, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Coolcat final decision reached

The arbitration committee has reacheda final decision in the Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Coolcat, Davenbelle and Stereotek case. As one of coolcat's mentors, I suggest you create a mentorship page, such as Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Coolcat, Davenbelle and Stereotek/mentorship. →Raul654 23:26, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Please see: User talk:Raul654#User:Cool Cat decision. — Davenbelle 02:58, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

moved to: Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Coolcat, Davenbelle and Stereotek. — Davenbelle 04:32, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Bug 550

Hi Tony, I was wondering if you had any further thoughts on the various ideas here? I personally think it is a very important idea, but maybe we need to build a community consensus before it could be implemented, should we start a centralised discussion somewhere and try and gain some support? thanks Martin 10:52, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Technically it's easy, but I felt overwhelmed by the potential political pitfalls. I'm not good at managing radical change. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 17:59, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

People are open to change if you deal with their concerns; this failed 56 - 20, then I re-did it - dealing with concerns - and it passed 98 - 6. Plus I'm feeling pretty reckless.

The reason I approached you is 2 fold, 1) you command a lot of respect, 2) The issue isn't quite as simple as it might appear on the surface, and from your comments you seem to understand the technical issues (your comment no. 25).

I will make Wikipedia:Blocking policy proposal to try and build some sort of consensus, but can I first confirm that the idea is, in a nutshell, that we have an extra form of blocking, whereby an IP addess can be blocked, but logged in users can still edit from that IP. thanks - Martin 09:47, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Well at present there are two forms of blocking--one by username, the other by IP. The IP blocks lock out everybody, even logged-in users. The objection to this strategy is that we don't need to block logged-in users with this kind of block because they can be blocked by username if they need to be, whereas at present they're lumped in with the anonymous edits on that IP.

The kind of situation where this is a real pain is where a number of editors are using a school or office proxy. People complain to us that they're being treated like vandals even though they're trying to do good edits.

One idea would be to say "okay, let's just apply IP blocks to non-logged-in users." Anyone else can just edit on through the block.

The objection to this is that the unscrupulous vandal will simply make a new account and continue. So some people suggested that the block could be modified to disable new accounts. My objection to that is that it's short-sighted. Already some vandals stockpile accounts well in advance of a vandal spree. The only people who would be caught by this would be editors who normally edited without logging in, and wanted to continue after making a new account after their IP was blocked.

And it's at that point that I have to admit that I don't know what the solution is. Perhaps account creation on blocked IPs should be subject to manual approval by an administrator. That would be feasible, but it's more work than I'd originally anticipated, and moving to an account approval system has political ramifications from which I shy away. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 10:08, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for such an interesting reply, 2 points, 1) We would surely keep the current method of blocking (i.e. total IP block) as well as the new kind, this would enable us to deal with most situations where vandals would just create a user account after having their IP blocked (i.e. we would still block the IP, registered and all). Basically the only situations where we would use the new kind of blocking is where we otherwise can't block permanently at all (e.g. AOL, schools etc.). This would mean that although the problem would still exist of vandals just making a user acount - at the moment we can't block them at all!

2) Even if there is a problem of vandals just making user accounts, surely that is better than the free-for-all that exists currently. Martin 15:09, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

p.s. Can you think of a good name for this kind of block? maybe anonymous block or semi block? Martin 15:20, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your support

Thank you very much for your support on my nomination for adminship. Now that I have been made an admin, I will do my best to live up to the truest you and the community have placed in me. If you ever see my doing something you think is incorrect or questionable, or does not live up to the standards that should be expected of an admin, please let me know. DES ^(talk) 15:23, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

My Chemical Romance

I appreciate your intercession in the growing problem on the My Chemical Romance and Gerard Way entries. However, I do question the usefulness of the discussion if I am the only one participating. I have been monitoring those entries for months now without thanks, yet now all that is pointed out is that which I've done wrong. With this most recent incident, I was asked to present reasoning for my edits, which I did. What followed was little in the way of helpful reply and an insistance on reverting to the opposition's edits. There was no debate. It has been quite frustrating, and I am now quite galled that I've been 'tattled' on. The fact of the matter is that I am quite disillusioned with the whole project. My initial work was met with no welcoming arms and now I'm painted as some sort of unreasonable ogre. Despite years of friendship with the band in question (a fact I conceal, and work hard to not have color my edits) and their thanks for removing the slander and innaccuracies, I fear I shall most likely be abandoning these entries pending the resolution of this matter. Hinklethedink 06:41, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Oh don't worry about Mike Garcia's threats. He tends to view anyone who disagrees with him as some kind of vandal. I do think that it's just fine to use the language that I suggested in the article, because I don't think it will date. I made the suggestion as a way of answering your concerns while also answering Mike's belief, which I think is reasonable, that the article should refer to the forthcoming live album, about which we already have an article.

I think if you can relax and not worry about your contributions being "edited mercilessly and redistributed at will", you'll find that Wikipedia can be fun. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 07:09, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

I've no problems with "edited mercilessly and redistributed at will." I just don't want to get banned for my troubles. Anyway, we'll see how it all plays out. Thanks for the head check. Hinklethedink 07:23, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I see now. Well relaxing will help. I can see that you're trying to improve Wikipedia. Some of your interactions seem a bit tetchy, but I understand that you must be frustrated. Well, if you encounter more problems you're welcome to come and explain, and I'll do my best to make things better. Don't worry about getting banned. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 07:43, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Neolithic (wik)

Tony ... @ the article (you misread the article's history) ... the vadalism (eg., a sentence change that would make it different than the reference) was one occurance, Neolithic is reverting to a non-NPOV verions .... these are in the other edits that Neolithic has made. JDR 20:02, 7 October 2005 (UTC) (PS., He still hasn't removed the sockpuppet notice on his user page.)

Look at the edit, not the editor. We mustn't revert from a good version to a bad one just because the person who performed the good edit was someone we don't like. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 20:12, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

user:Wik is indefinitely banned! If this is a sockpuppet, wik is editing this article .... and, then, are you are saying ... ignore agreed to rules and policies?!?! JDR 21:18, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Right you are. If it's wik, then he shouldn't be editing. Has this possibility been discussed on WP:ANI? --Tony Sidaway^Talk 04:46, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Remind me again . . .

. . . how we were stalking Maoririder and how he is a genuine good-faith contributer

• [3]
• [4]

I'm hoping you'll withdraw your comments at his arbitration.--Scimitar ^parley 20:23, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

It is idiocy like this that truly disgusts me about the persecution of Maoririder. Do you intend to build an entire case around one single personal attack made by an editor who has been tormented beyond reason? --Tony Sidaway^Talk 20:48, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Tormented beyond reason?!?! I suppose I should expect no less from someon who sees a "Bad Jokes and Other Deleted Nonsense" vote as a keep. I'm sorry for wasting your time.--Scimitar ^parley 21:40, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

That was uncalled for. I'm sorry, I'm a little frustrated. I've spent the last hour cleaning up after another one of his sockpuppets, and I have little patience for comments like "idiocy" and "truly disgusts".--Scimitar ^parley 21:49, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

What precisely was he doing wrong when the RfC was launched? The list of policies violated seemed somewhat scarce, listing only WP:NOT. That simply isn't a RfC offence, let alone one for arbcom. And, in case you didn't know, sock puppets are not forbidden either. I've used sock puppets myself, for purposes that served the wiki and evaded people who would have hounded me. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 23:46, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Statement

Hello Tony, I saw your statement. I must say that I find the fact that you took the time to make that statement and intend to take the time to help us solve this dispute awfully nice of you. Is it possible for me to change my statement as well and request rejection of the case, or to withdraw the case completely? If you think that this dispute can be solved without arbitration, I probably should attempt something like that. You are right when you say that this is a trivial dispute. I mean we have been arguing since June over just two sentences! I'm beginning to feel that requesting arbitration was a mistake. It all happened so quickly, I had just edited the article and then five minutes later I find that Theathenae had reverted my edits and put the vandalism warning notice on my talk page. Vindictively, I revert his edits and put the same notice on his talk page. This scenario repeated itself a few times and then frustrated as I was, I petitioned for arbitration. It was more of an impulse than a conclusion, which had emerged for careful consideration of the pros and cons of such an act. I want you to know that I am prepared to listen to you and take your advice, because this dispute is taking up so much of my time on Wikipedia. I took your advice on approaching MATIA and asking for his co-operation, I received no positive answer. Theathenae seems to have disappeared over the last few days since your block; I can't seem to be able to get in touch with him. Since the edit war has calmed down and the disputing parties of this case have placed a few more hundred lines of rubbish on the administrators noticeboard, I'm assuming that the present is not the appropriate time to worry about the dispute, but should be a period of calming down and reflection on what precisely should be done, and how to go about it, but I don't know. Regards, REX 22:55, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

A pat on the back...

Gidday Tony, Just thought I would leave you a short note to say how much I admire the way you have been trying (for sooo long) to get kids to play nice on the Khmer Rouge article. Unfortunately, things still don't seem to be progressing much and the article is pretty poor considered from either the Kissinger or Ieng Sary point of view. I have some ideas for a solution but I'm still a neonatal Wikipedian - so I shall wait until my ears have dried before putting them forward. Again, well done. Paxse 04:26, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. Don't forget to have fun and edit lots of things. If you need advice or help, don't hesitate to ask, and see you around! --Tony Sidaway^Talk 04:41, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Abstract RfC process question

Hi, I feel like things have gotten a little too messy for me to follow elsewhere. I hope you don't mind my appearance here. I'd like to ask you, leaving aside any specificities and the question of feasibility, while also using a very narrow definition of vandalism, would it be your ideal that every persistant disagreement went through the RfC process? Or, perhaps, if every persistant disagreement involving two logged-in users did so? Jkelly 23:06, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Persistent disagreements don't need to go to RfC at all; they can be worked around by normal processes such as WP:FAITH, WP:CIVIL, etc on talk pages. If the differences are serious in nature--that is, they impact their work on the wiki, the parties could choose from the whole range of remedies in the dispute resolution process. I've got some very longstanding and strong differences of opinion with some other editors, and I've found ways to resolve them in a way that prevents friction on the wiki. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 23:21, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Your message

One is [5] (yes, all the way back to July). I've also asked for help at project pages and other Wikipedia pages (e.g., [6]).

Aside from anything else, though, including the dubious nature of the "Evidence of trying and failing to resolve the dispute", I had in fact stopped reverting before the RfC.

Your comments in reply to your previous interlocutor suggest that the lack of any real attempt to resolve the issues by those bringing the RfC is something that you take seriously (as have I when I've commented on RfCs against other editors).

(By the way, if you'd really like to discuss this one-to-one, I have my e-mail address enabled.) --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 10:50, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

1. The editors in question were also reverting corrections to links (such as Platinum for record certification and links to redirects), to grammar and spelling, as well as to MoS and naming-convention issues. Also, it wasn't a choice between MoS and clear, informative, unbiased writing, as the writing was (and mostly remains in these articles) unclear, repetitive, and biased.
2. Do I take it that, with regard to the RfC, you're not interested in the correctness of process as long as it gets the result you think is correct? Doesn't that conflict with your attitude to reverting?
3. You may well reject the claim that the problem was caused by failure of the community to come to help me; as that's not a claim that I made, I'd be happy to reject it too. What I do think is that there's a tremendous amount of self-righteos hypocrisy, some of it with more than a tinge of vindictiveness unconnected to this affair, on the part of those who ignored my requests for help, but have been very quick to leap onto this RfC. It's of course much easier to criticise than to be constructive, but it seems to me to be at least unseemly that some have made their choice so obvious. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 21:26, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Iraqi insurgency

Clearly you feel this should not be featured, and I'd say your view won't be unique, but when we have a process by which articles can lose their featured status, a unilateral summary removal is not really appropriate. I listed it on WP:FARC with a copy of the comment you left on the talk page. By the look of votes so far it will be demoted, but this way there is an impetus for people to improve it. Its listing is here. Worldtraveller 14:54, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Your recent comments to Mel

You've made a serious allegation against Mel, and as one who was there, I saw nothing to back up what you claim. You need to either present some evidence to support it, or withdraw it and apologize to Mel. Oh, and WP:FAITH. FeloniousMonk 23:15, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

I'm not going to play games. You know exactly which allegation I'm talking about. The one where you accuse him of being dishonest [7]. There's no evidence for what you allege. Not only do you cross the line on WP:FAITH in making it, but WP:CIVIL as well. Again, an apology is in order. Along with a restatement of your assumption of Mel's good faith, I'm willing to chalk it up to tensions running high. Otherwise, accusing a fellow admin of being dishonest is a pretty serious form of personal attack, and one I'm not inclined to overlook. FeloniousMonk 01:52, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Tom G. Palmer

Did someone request that this article be unprotected? --Ryan Delaney ^talk 23:35, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

No, but I don't like protected pages. Nobody can edit them. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 00:50, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Don't oppose the clique

They will bury you. Just plant your garden and be happy. --Anittas 23:48, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Unprotecting pages

You unprotected the Mujahedeen page, dt lack of discussion - trouble is that our "warriors" do not want to discuss in the first place. See the edit summaries which are full of Farsi obscenities. Refdoc 01:00, 11 October 2005 (UTC)