Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
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Apparent personal attacks

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Resolved

 – This has largely devolved into a back and forth series of accusations with few supporting diffs. There's really little likelihood of any administrative action being undertaken at this point, and the continued drama need not be played out here. That said, a RfC/U has been suggested, and that is likely the best venue for those wishing to continue this unseemly affair. Thank you all for your participation and time. — Ched :  ?  08:54, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

---

Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

This editor continues to use abrasive language when addressing other editors and discussing sources. I believe that he should be warned to avoid personal attacks. Below are examples, which are representative of his general communication with other editors.

• To myself:
  • If you are dyslexic or poor vision or have another disability, it may help for you to identify yourself so that people cut you more slack when you (without fault) make mistakes....17:29, 4 August 2011 (UTC)[1]
  • [I asked him not to make personal attacks.][2]
  • ...for persons with similar vision without a large screen, the rate of error must be much higher. I admire the King of Sweden for his public poise and good humor about his dyslexia. I certainly meant you no insult. Is it not possible that I am seriously concerned? Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:52, 4 August 2011 (UTC)[3]

• At User talk:Peter G Werner:
  • ...For everything else, you were plagiarizing the SPUSA pamphlet and duplicitously citing Drucker.... Kiefer.Wolfowitz 12:25, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[4]

• About Donald Busky, author of Democratic Socialism: A global survey (Praeger Publishing, 2000)
  • It's time for T4D to recognize that the UFO did not arrive as Busky predicted.
  • ...is no need to cite Busky. Busky was a partisan hack and incompetent academic, who had difficulty writing English. Unfortunately, T4D followed Busky and wrote a wildly inaccurate and partisan history of the American left, one wishes naively. WP does not require that bullshit from herbalists or phrenologists be reported in its medical articles, balanced with other views. WP should remove bullshit from its political articles, also. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 16:25, 24 July 2011 (UTC)[5]

• He was brought to WP:WQA previously[6] but sees the fact that no action was taken against him to be a vindication.

TFD (talk) 22:56, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

TFD is apparently using AN/I to be disruptive and waste peoples time. It's not the first time. --OpenFuture (talk) 23:18, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I honestly don't see anything wrong with the quotes above. Maybe I'm missing context? -- Atama頭 16:51, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

TFD omited my introduction, where I identified myself as a person with poor vision who has a large screen. I have previously complained about having trouble reading on the talk page of the economics sidebar, also, to explaiin why I could not write edit summaries (after long section headings)

At times, I write more bluntly than others, usually after AGF and my patience have been exhausted.

In this case, TFD and I have had many interactions, where I have objected to a section he has written (using Busky) which I have replaced with an accurate and properly referenced (with inline citations with page references to highest quality, most reliable sources. You can see that my sections have remained, with minor copyright editing by others, where TFD's is gone. This fact, visible on American Left and other articles speaks for itself.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:29, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately, "notice that I got my own way!" is not automatically a justification for whatever behaviour achieved that. This whole set of issues has been dragged round various noticeboards for quite some time now, which is not an ideal way of handling it. I don't think there's any one single incident that is egregious enough to require administrator intervention. It's more an ongoing pattern of low level disruption; a case of "doesn't play well with others". Kiefer seems to be stepping up his use of accusations of plagiarism and copyvio - I'm unsure if he understands the difference between the two - when he disagrees with content on political grounds. Another example of this has been raised on Kiefer's talk page by Rd232 recently. Kiefer is not above a bit of edit warring to get his way, and added to the snide personal remarks, it's not a pretty picture - there's also been disruption related to several RfAs. I've asked Worm That Turned to have a look at this section and comment, as he has a fair bit of experience dealing with problem users, and has had to give Kiefer a warning over some of this before. Some firm advice on this sort of behaviour - and perhaps mentoring - might very well solve the problem. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 13:19, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, I've bumped into Keifer a few times, at least twice when he was in disagreement with one of my mentees. During my interactions, I've found that he certainly has the ability to be reasonable and was relatively surprised at this notice. Indeed, I don't see anything that requires immediate administrator attention in TFDs comments above. However, having reviewed Kiefer's contributions in depth, I have seen a pattern that does cause me some concern. A couple of examples, general incivility and significantly changing comments long after the original comment with an edit summary of "ce".

When I couple this pattern with the fact I've had to warn Kiefer recently, which he did not take kindly to, I would personally recommend than an RFC/U is more appropriate, where concerned parties could deal with their issues, rather than causing unnecessary drama here at AN/I. Worm^TT · (talk) 14:03, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Demiurge1000 has been harassing other editors for some time, with personal attacks. This time, he is repeating an attack on my good faith with an unsubstantiated charge about my political views. His behavior is well known, and this noticeboard's acquiescence to his harassment and condoning of his personal attacks suggests a double standard for administrators.

TFD has made similar attacks on my good faith and unsubstantiated charges about my political views also. You can look at the history of the articles to see that he wrote egregiously biased histories (I believe because of good faith use of an unreliable source and lack of knowledge of this rather specialized history). Look at what I have written and check my sources, and find one error of scholarship or misrepresentation.

Worm, deal with Demiurge1000's repeated personal attacks on me and Malleus, if you want me to care about your opinion. Would you please quote also the revised text regarding Tim's personal attack, which was kinder.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 15:08, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, Kiefer, because everyone who dares to even disagree with you is making a personal attack against you. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 15:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Strange Passerby, perhaps you missed Demiurge1000's saying that I was tagging copyright violations because of my politics? AGFing,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 15:27, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Strange Passerby made similar personal attacks on me last month, but his hypocritical AGF violations were condoned by the administrator-rich "community".  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 16:44, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the revised text, you did indeed update it, 4 days later, again with the edit summary "ce". It was unclear that the comment had been edited, as you didn't use the community standard <del> and <ins>, which again I have issue with. The thread was also close to being archived, meaning that your edit kept it open longer. I see you've posted a long explanation of your improvements below and I should point out that my delving into your edits was regarding your interactions with other editors, not your content contributions.

I feel I should re-iterate. Having investigated, my opinion is that there is some cause for concern, but nothing actionable. An RfC/U would be more appropriate than hashing things out on AN/I. Worm^TT · (talk) 18:31, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Let me get this straight: You are upset that I edited my comment to be more civil (with a lazy edit summary). However, you were participating in that discussion which contained personal attacks against me, and failed to stop others from personal attacks or to notify me. And you complain that the RfA discussion-club stayed open for business? And you haven't yet apologized for your failure to notify me, or your failure to enforce NPA/AGF when your buddies are attacking me behind my back.

Here again, you have condoned or acquiesced to personal attacks, above all by Demiurge1000, and BLP violations by The_Four_Deuces, and you soliloquize about the best way to handle me?

Either grow a spine, Worm, and deal with Demiurge1000 and TFD, or slither away.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:51, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Just out of interest, who added the "Discussion of K.W." heading into that WT:RFA section you link to above? --Demiurge1000 (talk) 19:24, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Kiefer, I'm trying to reduce the unnecessary escalation of the situation here and suggesting a less "drama" inducing venue, where any issues can be properly discussed. You were indeed editting the comment to be more civil, but you were doing it in a manner that was against community norms by going further than just retraction, to suppression. I'm astounded that you are demanding apologies for anything (per WP:Apology) let alone for me failing to do things that I have done to a level I thought sufficient (I told the participents to drop it, which they then did) or was not required to do.

I would like to see these personal attacks that I am condoning or acquiescing to at this venue - as far as I'm concerned the conversation has been polite, do you happen to have diffs? I'm also delighted to hear I have buddies here on Wikipedia, I must remember to extend my Christmas card list. Worm^TT · (talk) 20:57, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I labelled violations of AGF and NPA at the discussion, as you (having cited it at your last posting here) should know. I am waiting for your actions about NPA/AGF/BLP violations noted above, Worm.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 21:05, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I see, I misinterpreted that there were personal attacks at this forum. I'm afraid you will be waiting a while Kiefer, I'm about to sign off, but I will investigate further in the morning. However, I refuse to be goaded into an action that I do not see as necessary. As you should know, I'm not obliged to take any action on anything that I do not see a requirement to take action on - I do not intend to start handing out blocks just because I'm an admin - if I think a quiet word will have the same effect, then that's what I do. You should know that, I spoke to you about going past 3RR rather than blocking, which some admins would have done on sight. In the case referenced, I felt a simple "drop it" would be sufficient, and as far as I'm concerned it was.

By the way Kiefer, I notice that you've tried to make this into a content dispute, a BLP issue, an interaction issue with Demiurge, a political issue (even rallying the troops stating it was a political issue [7][8]) and an issue with me being "spineless" because I have not lived up to a non-existent duty of care. This does not change what I've said, I see enough of a pattern that I'd endorse an RfC/U, should anyone feel strongly enough to raise one. Worm^TT · (talk) 21:23, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Worm, it is a content dispute and it is a dispute about standards. The two histories presented are incompatible, so at most one can be correct. I ask that you take American Left seriously, as I tried to help you take your bacon festival article seriously, at least so you would improve as an editor. Cannot you see similar problems with your bacon-festival article and TFD's American Left article?

TFD made repeated BLP violations in stating that Elliot Abrams is a member of SDUSA (leaving aside the Iran-Contra smear by TFD); ditto with Chavez. Perhaps the smear against SDUSA is lost on you and other other editors? Is there anybody here who read a newspaper in the 1980s, who could help?

There has been an interaction problem with Demiurge, with me and more severely and one-sidedly with Malleus. You all have failed to deal with it, despite a serious of personal attacks at RfAs. True or false? All of you have just watched as Malleus was baited by an administrator, many times.

Carrite and Lihaas have experience dealing with contentious political issues. Carrite originally made similar complaints about my politics, which he has since withdrawn. Carrite knows the most about the content (of all the editors on Wikipedia), so you should rely on him for guidance.

Lihaas and I previously were attacked as "neo-Nazis" and "fascists" by a disruptive editor, and as "writing a propaganda piece for Sweden Democrats" last year by another administrator. He has some perspective on being attacked for alleged political motivations, and he has done more political editing than any editor known to me on WP. So yes, I value Lihaas's input just as I value Carrite's input.

You came at the beck and call of Demiurge1000, who violated AGF and NPA by alleging political motivation. You have done nothing: You are shirking from your duty of enforcing the rules fairly, firmly and impartially, so as to command respect. And you complain that I alerted Carrite and Lihaas about this discussion? *LOL*  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 22:10, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Kiefer, having slept on the matter and woken up with fresh eyes, I've looked back through the conversation at WT:RFA as requested, and I see nothing wrong with my behaviour there. You were indeed being discussed, by a candidate who had just had a failed RfA and an unproductive encounter with you. I do not see that he violated AGF nor NPA. Strange Passerby did violate AGF, but I'm certain he'd comment that AGF is not a suicide pact (or something similar), and since I have no idea of the history between you, I again do not see it as actionable. Since you are accusing these editors of violating AGF and NPA at the related discussion, did you happen to notify them? Here, on ANI and unlike WT:RFA, that IS a requirement. My comment to "let it go" ended the conversation completely and I am happy that I acted correctly in this matter. I welcome review by uninvolved parties, and can provide diffs on request.

As for this ANI notice, it is labelled "Apparent personal attacks" and I have commented specifically on behavioural issues. I have made no comment regarding political issues, nor content issues. Feel free to read back and confirm. I have not investigated any of the articles you have pointed to, because I do not wish to be sidetracked from the issue raised here, which is your behaviour. For example, as a Brit born in the 1980s, I am unlikely to know or care who Elliot Abrams is and why being a member of SDUSA is a smear. As a wikipedia editor, I am interested, but only to the point that it affects my work at wikipedia. Again, I fail to see how this smear is related to your behavioural issues - and as such it appears to me that you are attempting to deflect a comment regarding your behaviour into a content issue.

I'm going to re-iterate my main point. This is the wrong venue for this discussion, an RfC/U is more appropriate. You have not addressed this point, more heat than light is occuring - and I strongly urge any uninvolved editor who happens to agree with this point of view to shut this thread down as there is nothing requiring administrator attention.

Finally, regarding Demiurge - I am willing to investigate further, but considering the fact that he has helped me with adoptees and the fact that you appear unable to assume good faith regarding my opinions, I feel that anything I do will be assigned motivations that do not exist. Do remember that I have not editted any of the political articles you are discussing, nor their talk pages. If you have seen something at any of these venues which requires my attention, then pass me a diff and I will investigate further, but just because others act inappropriately does not give you free reign to do act inappropriately. Worm^TT · (talk) 07:59, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

You came at the beck and call of your master, and did his bidding. You overlook and refuse to criticize your master's misbehavior, particularly his allegations of bad-faith and political bias. Despite your having come when he range your bell (as he rang for others), you criticized me for asking a handful of people to look at this.

At the RfA discussion, I was accused of opposing the candidate and criticizing the article because I didn't like the book covered by his article. That is an AGF violation, which I've spelled out before.

You don't know enough to understand the issues, and you lack the curiosity to deal with BLP and NPOV violations by TFD, who proposed dropping Elliot Abrams and Iran-Contra in the paragraph on SDUSA.

You have not edited political articles would be an understatement. You have written about bacon, and I tried to help you write better there, because I had overestimated you and considered this a good investment of time.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 17:33, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I see that you have lost all good faith regarding my involvement. I understand that an ANI must be very stressful and I hope that after this has finished and you've had a little time to reflect on what I've said you'll see that this comment was out of line. Either way, my position remains the same and I hope this thread can be brought to a close soon. Worm^TT · (talk) 17:39, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I never questioned your faithfulness, only your behavior. I agree that this discussion is best ended now.17:44, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• Comment Non-admin. - I've bumped heads with both of these editors from time to time, since all of us write a fair amount on matters relating to the socialist movement. I think that both are good editors that have the best interests of the Wikipedia project at heart. This is actually more or less a manifestation of factional social democratic politics being played out here here — K. Wolf dove into a contentious party history and revamped it. He did outstanding work but he was a bit of the proverbial bull in china shop while he was doing it and that rubbed a couple people wrong. TFD has had his ox gored by the bull in the china shop a couple times now, I'm guessing... K. Wolf is extremely talented but he needs to run up CONSTRUCTION banners when he dives in with a jackhammer and to work on his people skills and to work at achieving consensus.

As I understand it, this current tiff relates to use of a particular book by TFD and K. Wolf's dismissal of its content as biased and erroneous. K. Wolf is not shy about telling a person what he thinks about something, and the fur flies. I don't own the Don Busky book so I'm not going to opine on whether it is or is not a suitable source. He is or was both a political science professor and a political activist. K. Wolf thinks the book a polemic, TFD a reliable source. Under official WP policy, if it's published by a so-called "reliable" publisher things are supposed to be in, even if they are erroneous. This is one of the single worst pieces of original WP doctrine on sources and it is (fortunately) not followed by anyone — editors do decide whether information is erroneous and don't feel obligated to pump published error onto WP pages. This is as it should be. In the case of a disagreement, the official doctrine should triumph. Nobody here cares much about that, wrong forum and so on. This is my advice for Deuces and K. Wolf.

As for the incivility complaint — yes, K. Wolf was a bit out of line. No, it was not so far beyond the pale that it should be actionable. No, it never should have been brought to ANI. Yes, K. Wolf should apologize, if he hasn't already. Going forward, I would advise the two to self-impose an interaction ban. Do not communicate with one another and if there is dialog on a talk page, keep it focused and civil. Do not work on the same pieces simultaneously. Do not "stalk" the ongoing work of the other. I'd further advise both of them to concern themselves less with party history and more with writing biographies, which are less contentious. Anyway, that's my two cents. Carry on. Carrite (talk) 15:49, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi Carrite! About Busky, I believe that it is a terrible book about the history of American socialism, on many levels, including basic scholarship. It may well be a bad (but not disgraceful) popular history of other socialist movements, for all I know. Judith was unimpressed when she examined its treatment of Mitterand, but she did not throw the book across the room in horror. In general, Sassoon's book is the standard work on social democracy/socialism worldwide.

An interaction ban would be possible if you would become editor of American Left and act upon proposals between TFD and myself. I would consider your making such a proposal

However, it seems to me to set a bad precedent, both encouraging the rushing to noticeboards and failure to deal with problems like adults. Are we trying to write an honest, truthful encyclopedia or not? Nobody seems yet to have noticed the severity of the disagreement between the old version of the article and the current one---and this nonchalance may reflect nonchalance about the whole purpose of the encyclopedia. I have yet to hear one admission that Busky has a lot of errors.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 19:39, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

K. Wolf, this is wrong venue so I'm going to be brief. You need to retreat here, Wikipedia rules are pretty clear that the "reliable publisher" trumps the "reasonable critique of content." The correct procedure is to find another reliable source that contradicts the first source and then balance those two. If Deuces wants Busky, you can't be hacking it away because you disagree with him, no matter how shitty Busky's scholarship. It needs to stay in until there is some sort of consensus that it needs to go. You've also got a couple people that you need to apologize to, in my opinion. Take the rhetoric down a few pegs, we're all friends here. Carrite (talk) 23:58, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Carrite, Let us work rather for honest and intelligent consensus, as we have done on other articles.

I don't apologize cravenly. I apologize when I have done wrong. In this case I have been insulted by and attacked by persons who haven't bothered even to read the articles or the sources.

We are not all friends here. In particular, my friends and my colleagues care about the truth. I count you as a friend.

Sincerely,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 01:17, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

SPA

Comment: I also want to add my voice to this complaint. User:Kiefer Wolfowitz has been way out of line in his interactions with me, making numerous unfounded accusations of plagiarism toward me, both on my Talk page and at Talk:Socialist Party of America. In fact, I am hereby requesting that I be allowed to remove (or have admins remove) any and all accusations of plagiarism against me. These attacks on my reputation as an editor are unfounded and should not be on the record. In general, his interactions with me have been exceedingly uncivil, and began about a month ago with his leaving a high-level block warning calling me out for "disruptive editing" for additions I made to the Socialist Party of America article in 2006! Peter G Werner (talk) 21:19, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi Peter. I have previously stated that you of course should remove whatever you want at your own user page, of course, as is your right. There is a problem with your 4 edits using the SPUSA's history. If somebody can delete the history using those edits, lifted phrasing "democratic centralism", then I would bless the removal of my then moot comments.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 22:17, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It is quite clear that the "bot" you were running did not demonstrate "plagiarism" at all, unless you define paraphrasing a source as "plagiarism". You have used this accusation as an excuse to remove edits that disagreed with your interpretation of Socialist Party history and cited sources that you did not approve of. I think your edits were uncalled for, but more than anything, your attacks on my reputation are way out of line and something I will not allow to stand. I will not consider this case closed until these attacks are removed. I will give several days for third parties to respond, after which point, if there are no rules-based objections from other editors, I will remove all mention of "plagiarism" in connection with my name. Peter G Werner (talk) 02:57, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi Peter,

your AGF violations and personal attacks alleging (without substantiation or evidence) a political bias must stop. If you remove these latest attacks, I would accept that implicit apology.

I suggest that we ask SandyGeorgia whether she thinks that the extensive paraphrasing is a problem. She seemed to be concerned about such paraphrasing at RfAs lately.

Sincerely,

Hi Kiefer. I request that you formally withdraw all of your accusations about Peter, without requiring any conditions upon him or anyone else. Only your unreserved agreement is required; you need take no other steps. Thank you. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 03:27, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Is this a joke? "I need take no other steps" indeed.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 06:22, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Error and Correction

collapsing insertion of most of the content of an article - please discuss content disputes elsewhere, this board is for requests for administrator action

This is the state of American Left when I started my clean-up: Main article: Social Democrats, USA The Shachtmanites, called the Realignment Caucus, in the SP-SDF argued that since organized labor supported the Democratic Party, they should join the Democratic Party and transform it into a left-wing party, with the Republicans becoming a right-wing party. Further, they argued that they should support the War in Vietnam to stop Communist expansion. In 1972, they supported Senator Henry Jackson for the Democratic presidential nomination, and re-named the party Social Democrats USA (SDUSA), dropping the term "socialist". While they retained membership in the Socialist International, they supported Jimmy Carter in the 1976 election and had moved sufficiently right by 1980, that many of their members served in the Reagan administration. Main article: Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee Although Michael Harrington, who came to lead the Coalition Caucus, agreed to work within the Democratic Party, he broke with the Shachtmanites over support of the War in Vietnam, urging peace negotiations, although not an immediate withdrawal. He led his caucus out of the SD-SDF to form the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC), which became a member of the Socialist International. Here is what I have written, which has also been edited by Judith and by Carrite (the latter more at the SPA article) and perhaps by TFD: In 1972, the Socialist Party of America voted to rename itself as Social Democrats, USA (SDUSA) by a vote of 73 to 34 at its December Convention; its National Chairmen were Bayard Rustin, a peace and civil-rights leader, and Charles S. Zimmerman, an officer of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILGWU). In 1973, Michael Harrington resigned from SDUSA and founded the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC), which attracted many of his followers from the former Socialist Party. The same year, David McReynolds and others from the pacifist and immediate-withdrawal wing of the former Socialist Party formed the Socialist Party, USA. When the SPA became SDUSA, the majority had 22 of 33 votes on the (January 1973) national committee of SDUSA. Two minority caucuses of SDUSA became associated with two other socialist organizations, each of which was founded later in 1973. Many members of Michael Harrington's ("Coalition") caucus, with 8 of 33 seats on the 1973 SDUSA national committee, joined Harrington's DSOC. Many members of the Debs caucus, with 2 of 33 seats on SDUSA's 1973 national committee, joined the Socialist Party of the United States (SPUSA). The Socialist Party of America changed its name to Social Democrats, USA (SDUSA) in 1972. In electoral politics, SDUSA's National Co-Chairman Bayard Rustin stated that its goal was to transform the Democratic Party into a social-democratic party. SDUSA sponsored a conferences that featured discussions and debates over proposed resolutions, some of which were adopted as organizational statements. For these conferences, SDUSA invited a range of academic, political, and labor-union leaders. These meetings also functioned as reunions for political activists and intellectuals, some of whom worked together for decades. Many SDUSA members served as organizational leaders, especially in labor unions. Rustin served as President of the A. Philip Randolph Institute, and was succeeded by Norman Hill. Tom Kahn served as Director of International Affairs for the AFL–CIO. Sandra Feldman served as President of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). Rachelle Horowitz served as Political Director for the AFT and serves on the board for the National Democratic Institute. Other members of SDUSA specialized in international politics. Penn Kemble served as the Acting Director of the U.S. Information Agency in the Presidency of Bill Clinton. After having served as the U.S. Representative to the U.N.'s Committee on human rights during the first Reagan Administration, Carl Gershman has served as the President of the National Endowment for Democracy. Bruce McColm served as Freedom House's executive director. Main article: Democratic Socialists of America Michael Harrington resigned from Social Democrats, USA early in 1973. He rejected the SDUSA (majority Socialist Party) position on the Vietnam War, which demanded an end to bombings and a negotiated peace settlement. Harrington called rather for an immediate cease fire and immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces from Vietnam. Even before the December 1972 convention, Michael Harrington had resigned as an Honorary Chairperson of the Socialist Party. In the early spring of 1973, he resigned his membership in SDUSA. That same year, Harrington and his supporters formed the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC). At its start, DSOC had 840 members, of which 2 percent served on its national board; approximately 200 had been members of Social Democrats, USA or its predecessors whose membership was then 1,800, according to a 1973 profile of Harrington. DSOC became a member of the Socialist International. DSOC supported progressive Democrats, including DSOC member Congressman Ron Dellums, and worked to help network activists in the Democratic Party and in labor unions. With roughly six thousand members, it is the largest contemporary democratic-socialist or social-democratic organization in the United States. In 1982 DSOC established the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) upon merging with the New American Movement, an organization of democratic socialists mostly from the New Left. Its high-profile members included Congressman Major Owens and William Winpisinger, President of the International Association of Machinists.

Discussion at ANI

I worked hard (with the help of Carrite and others) to find reliable sources, to respond to the just concerns of TFD, and to writing a NPOV description of the two larger organizations, DSOC/DSA and SDUSA. I don't deserve the personal attacks and questions of my good faith and allegations about my politics, particularly about those who apparently are clueless about this history and haven't made any attempts to educate themselves or contribute to this set of articles.

None of you have yet dealt with the BLP violation of stating that Elliot Abrams and Linda Chavez be members of SDUSA, which again is not a random charge but a partisan lie.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 16:30, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Lil confused as to who posted the original complaint but it seems KW's accuser is indulging in NPA himself. WP:BOOMERANG,\ no?? The actual content of dispute is not relevant here, thats more for the talk page. the key being the accuser blackens/libels someone with the tag that the pot calling the kettle black has just shown. Best case to dismiss, otherwise BOOMERANG on the accuser.

and pol accusation for KW dont hold much water as he was well-reserved at Sweden elections last year (and that was HIGHLY political)Lihaas (talk) 18:01, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Examples of NPA and unsubstantiated allegations of political bias by User:The_Four_Deuces: "K.F wants to focus the article on the 1960s and present the article from the point of view of the Social Democrats USA".  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:18, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Speaking of interaction bans

I would accept a joint interaction ban with Demiurge1000.

This noticeboard and the administrator cadre has tolerated Demiurge1000's personal attacks and baiting of Malleus for too long also: Demiurge1000 should be cautioned that further harassment of Malleus, particularly insulting and baiting him at RfAs and his user page, must end, and he should be urged to accept a one-sided interaction ban.

Sincerely,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 19:54, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Insulting and baiting Malleus at RfAs? The last time I responded to Malleus at an RfA was nearly two weeks ago, where I asked him this. Does that constitute "insulting and baiting"?

I haven't posted on Malleus' talk page since I was informed that this was a request for me not to do so. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 20:07, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi Demiurge1000,

I have acknowledged some of your good works several times (for example with a clear and NPOV posting at the RS-noticeboard); thus, I do accept that you have often and usually been constructive. However, we have had enough negative interactions, that distract others and serve little purpose, and so I do think that we would be better off with a voluntary ban. Perhaps you would just consider it and I shall do the same, and hope that we avoid negative exchanges. We don't need a formal agreement. I won't be the first to comment on you.

Regarding your interaction with Malleus, I do remember your mocking his Latin formulation of his previous user name and your mentioning several times the folllowing: his unsuccessful RfAs, your analysis of why they were unsuccessful, and further your commenting on his psychology to explain some behavior. If you can admit that such behaviors have occurred at least twice, then I trust that you can agree that more restraint is needed and I would wish you to voluntarily (and perhaps silently) agreeing to refrain from commenting on Malleus (under usual circumstances, and if WP policy require a comment, that you do so with the greatest restraint).

I may be biased in remembering your annoying MF, obviously, but I of course would urge similar restraint on him if I witnessed your being mistreated. Sincerely,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 20:34, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Distraction; belong elsewhere. WP:NOTTHEM.  Chzz  ►  22:11, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Chzz, you are quoting a blocking guideline at ANI? Consider WP:Boomerang, which does not suggest servility.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 00:49, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, you've not done so thus far, therefore I would have little cause for optimism about that. Malleus seems to have a robust attitude towards interactions with other editors, so I'm not sure that a quip about mis-spelling his user name would cause him much angst. (You must have a very good memory - I dimly recall making some such comment, but I imagine it would've been months and months ago.) He regularly makes assertions about other editors' aims and maturity and excessive focus on adminship, so I don't think it inappropriate to mention his own repeated attempts in that direction, and the community's concensus on them (certainly no analysis needed there.) However, it's possible I've misinterpreted his apparent eagerness for forthright exchange of opinions, perhaps encouraged by his willingness to follow an outburst like this only half an hour later with an apparently good-humoured comment like this. Anyway, it seems he doesn't want me posting on his talk page, so that should calm things a little.

Regarding yourself, I don't see that requesting an interaction ban with every editor that has concerns about your behaviour, is an acceptable approach to editing. I have concerns about your posting more than fifty times on someone's RfA and then edit-warring over their userpage to remove information they chose to put on it, while firing off warning templates at anyone that got in your way. I have concerns about your refusal to withdraw your very serious accusations against Peter, especially when the initial motivation behind the accusations seemed to be a particular political phrase to which you had a personal objection. I have concerns that you subsequently made a similar accusation against another editor; a very longstanding and experienced editor who believes that your accusation of copyvio against him was the result of your POV - again on a political article. I think it's entirely reasonable for me to raise such concerns when they arise; a number of other editors agree with me. However, I will defer to Worm's (and Chzz's) greater wisdom on this, and do so in a more appropriate forum. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 22:50, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Demiurge1000,

You are the first person whom I've asked for a voluntary interaction ban. Your defensiveness that I ask for a ban for everybody I disagree with is bizarre.

Peter has asked that my criticisms be removed, and I have asked that his 4 edits be removed at the same time. He did lift phrases from the SPUSA pamphlet which introduced severe POV/RS and probable BLP problems. I recognized his extensive borrowing because of "democratic centralism" slander---"a particular phrase" about which you still seem ignorant.

You are hardly in a position to judge my intentions when you cannot remember your own insults of MF from even a few months ago. You would do better to examine copyvio/paraphrasing/etc. problems that I identified than to speculate, sputter, and fatuously cluck about my political motivations.

You can read the longstanding and respected editor's account of his cut-and-paste operation on my talk page. His edits then are not now compliant with contemporary WP policy, and so they should be either removed or rewritten if WP wishes to avoid liability. I have done my share.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 00:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

That would be me. And try as I might to not care post-retirement, I can't entirely find it amusing that you continue to try to use allegations of copyright abuse to achieve your editing goals. Skipping over your initial attempt to speedy delete an entire article because a section of it which you don't like supposedly has copyright issues, you posted at Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2011 August 4 about my sourced quotations from an academic article at Freedom in the World *after* the conversation on your user talk page where I objected to this nonsense and where another editor also said he saw no copyright issues. And 2 days later you have the ineffable to cheek to add, at Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2011 August 4, the claim "The problem is revealed by WP's standard software for investigating copyright-violation" (i.e. toolserver duplicate detector). Yes, quotes from a source appear in both the Wikipedia article and in the source in identical form... shocking, just shocking, good thing you ran it through the duplicate detector... Frankly, this nonsense is disruptive enough, and prima facie bad faith enough, that it might well be blockable in itself, even if there aren't other issues like it. PS Kiefer also canvassed two editors to join this ANI thread (Lihaas and another, at c 3pm 6 Aug). Rd232 ^talk 01:28, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Please review the WP policies on paraphrasing, plagiarism, and extensive copying. You cannot just quote paragraphs of a copyrighted text, roughly a page, into your short article. It is too extensive, and lacks the reworking and independent thought needed to avoid copyright infringement.

We have already discussed my invited Lihaas & Carrite to join us, as we have discussed Demiurge1000's inviting you, Peter, and Worm.

I placed the first tag in the section that you had cut and paste, and my understanding has been that only that section would be deleted.

My editing goal was to reduce the damage you did to Wikipedia. I know enough statistics and politics to recognize nonsense, even parroted nonsense.

RD232 objected to my tagging and accused me of bad-faith, politically motivated tagging on my talk page, earlier. Speaking of blocking: The plebes can get blocked for violating AGF and NPA, RD232, but what about you? Kiefer.Wolfowitz 01:45, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

The Freedom in the World issue has been resolved by User:Moonriddengirl (and the background of how the mess came about is noted at User_talk:Moonriddengirl#Question, if anyone cares). For the rest, AGF is not a suicide pact, and I don't think I made any personal attacks. If your concern about a copyright problem was indeed genuine, then you made just about every mistake I can think of to make it look like bad faith. Either way, learn from the experience, and don't do it again. (I've learned something BTW; if you do something messy and provisional with the intention of sorting it out soon... don't forget about sorting it out.) cheers, Rd232 ^talk 15:54, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your good will and kind words. Regarding copyright problems, you certainly underestimate me, Sir: There are more errors waiting to be made. Best regards,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 17:23, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Can I just note at this point, I am not at all attached to the phrase "democratic centralism" being used anywhere in that article. However, I am very resolute that no "plagiarism" took place in my additions to this article and I want these accusations off of the Talk page. Peter G Werner (talk) 03:03, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Friend, remove your recent AGF violations and recent aspersions on my politics, about which you know epsilon, on this page.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 03:15, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Please be reassured, the phrase "democratic centralism" is only important to Kiefer, and most of the rest of us have absolutely no idea what political viewpoint he may or may not be pushing. Nor do we want to know! That two-word phrasing apparently being notable enough for its own Wikipedia article gives any uninterested bystander a very quick insight as to whether a passage utilising only those two words in common, is a "copyright violation". --Demiurge1000 (talk) 03:12, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

It's an important concept in Leninism, but in a democratic socialist context would be a harsh charge against an organization. My only usage of the term was to report that during the late 1960s breakup of the organization, the Harrington faction accused the Shachtman faction of "democratic centralism". That is the extent of what I added, and was not trying to push any kind of POV that any faction actually is or was "democratic centralist". But KW here has flown off of the handle that 5 years ago I made mention of it in this article. Peter G Werner (talk) 03:23, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Was anybody listening?

It was "a harsh charge", to say the least, and it was also false.

Besides the "democratic centralism" slander, there were a half-dozen more partisan falsehoods, which were taken out of the SPUSA "history", which are conveniently listed on the talk page of the article for all to see.

And Peter, to get this straight, did you learn about democratic centralism recently (in which case you were paraphrasing and parroting things outside your understanding) or was your error intentional?

Peter,

To get this straight, somehow you knew enough to remove "Stalinist" from "Stalinist democratic-centralism" from the SPUSA "history", but you went ahead and parroted "democratic centralism" and a half dozen other biased falsehoods, despite knowing that the your "reliable" source described Michael Harrington, Bayard Rustin, Tom Kahn, etc. as Stalinist? Is that your explanation?

All of you "Wikipedians", do you begin to have a clue why I was concerned about this editor? Involved editorsWorm, Demiurge1000, Strangepasserby (who cares), do you begin to understand why you should have read something before shooting off your mouths here?

Shall we go through each of the other parroted falsehoods or grossly partisan mischaracterizations that Peter introduced? There are about 5 more.

Similarly, Peter, please explain what you were doing citing Drucker's biography of Shachtman as your only other source for all these biased falsehoods.

Sincerely,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 04:49, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Rd232's comments iright above this already seem like not being AGF. comment on editor not on content, everyone

Now lets hold hands and sing kumbaya. World Peace!Lihaas (talk) 20:18, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Rd232 violated AGF and made another personal attack based on unsubstantiated allegations about my politics at User talk:Moonriddengirl#Question,

• "the decoration of the section with POV tags is indicative of their real complaint, I think."

ignoring repeated requests to stop his misbehavior by me and other editors.

Shall policy be enforced even against a seraph (the highest in the angelic hierarchy) for once, or will again an administrator enable him, by serving another a dish of peaches and sweet cream, which I understand is traditional when ruling class enjoys itself.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 21:57, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Kiefer, I'm not the one who keeps mixing up POV issues with copyright; even in your recent remarks elsewhere, you commingle these two issues. Not once in our discussions have I addressed the issue of POV because, being retired, at this point I don't care. Your insistence on intertwining these issues is one of the factors which raised doubts about AGF (which lest we forget is an Assumption of Good Faith, not a Blind Belief in Good Faith).

Your aggressive and persistent accusations of copyright infringement already forced me into more post-retirement engagement than I wanted. If I were not retired, I would pursue the question of whether you make a habit of using copyright accusations in this manner (a manner which, good faith or not, is certainly not conducive to collaboration). However, I am retired, so whatever statements I made that bothered you, consider them withdrawn. For the avoidance of doubt, this is a statement that whatever appearance of bad faith there was, was just an appearance. (This is not that far from what I said above, before Lihaas piped up.) Rd232 ^talk 23:08, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for withdrawing some remarks.

You wrote that my commingling NPOV and source-usage (copyright/paraphrase) concerns reduced the credibility of my good faith. Please consider the possiblity that some articles on Wikipedia have 2 or more errors, and that some articles have both NPOV and source-usage problems. If such articles exist, please consider that I may have found some.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 07:23, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

I've just noted the edit summaries you've used for some of your recent edits (sample: "Rd232 violated AGF and made personal attacks based on unsubstantiated allegations about my politics at User talk:Moonriddengirl#Question, ignoring repeated requests to stop his misbehavior by me and other editors." [9]). This is certainly misleading, and quite possibly a personal attack, in an edit summary. Don't do that. Rd232 ^talk 23:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that was a personal attack but rather an accurate description of behavior. You haven't removed your previous personal attacks and AGF violations. Nevertheless, I am sorry for using your user name in the edit summary.

Moonriddengirl's clean-up of the possible copyright problem(s), which she judged to be minor, I have reduced some of the damage of using the unreliable POV-pushing article by Giannone, by using reliable high quality sources cited and cherry picked by Giannone.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 02:17, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

• A lot of this would be easily solved if an admin just grew a pair and blocked KW; in the words of ArbCom in a very recently closed case,

Wikipedia is a serious educational and scholarly project founded on the principles of collaboration and consensus. All participants are expected to conduct themselves according to the standards of collegiality and professionalism appropriate to such a setting. The standards of collegiality expected of all contributors to Wikimedia projects are set forth in the Wikimedia Foundation Resolution on Openness, which urges editors to "promote openness and collaboration", "treat new editors with patience, kindness, and respect", "work with colleagues to reduce contention and promote a friendlier, more collaborative culture", and "work with colleagues to [...] discourage disruptive and hostile behavior".

• KW repeatedly refuses to accept he may even be wrong, and has repeatedly accused others of violating AGF and NPA when he himself engages in the exact same behaviour while making these claims. It is, to me, absolutely astounding that someone who is so – for want of a better term – "disruptive and hostile" as he is should be allowed to continue editing, article contributions aside. Now watch, because I am 100% certain this comment will be characterised as in bad faith and a personal attack. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 01:35, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Strange Passerby,

Please review how much influence your complaints about me have had!

If your past complaints and calls for blocking have been ignored, it may be time to reassess your standing in the community.

Would you explain where I have been wrong? Where is one article I tagged that has not been extensively rewritten (e.g. by me) or deleted? Where is the NPOV violation in one article I've written? I agree that I have trouble understanding what goes through your mind, and should redouble my efforts to be patient and return kindness for malice.

Finally, avoid sexist terminology like "grow a pair", particularly when addressing editors sporting the Livestrong user box.

 Kiefer.Wolfowitz 02:17, 8 August 2011 (UTC) 04:53, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

This user strongly supports testicular cancer awareness.

Worm castings

Kiefer, there are five principles on which Wikipedia is founded. Pointing to the second pillar (NPOV) where you have repeatedly violated the fourth (Civility) is a distraction. Worm^TT · (talk) 07:51, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Worm, you have not said a word about all the attacks against me, and you certainly have done a thing to enforce your precious civility to stop your buddies from attacking me.

Can you focus on undoing such partisanship without distraction?  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 07:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Diffs Kiefer! I've asked you above for diffs of these attacks, and then I will investigate. I refuse to investigate "generally" because almost any outcome will be regarded by you as biased. I'm tired of your accusations of me acting on behalf of other people. Worm^TT · (talk) 08:02, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

I have not made accusations, Worm. You already acknowledged that you came when Demiurge1000 asked you.

His and others' attacks on me have gone all the while, during which time you did nothing.

You accused me of canvassing despite your having been summoned, by Demiurge1000, along with Peter G Werner, Rd232, etc.

In short, your behavior here has been hypocritical. And it has not just been one bad decision, but partisanship carried on, despite warnings, for days. Such sustained behavior is revealing.

You should be tired and have a lot of other ill feelings as a results of such behavior. It's only natural.

Evolution has evolved humans, who are social beings, to feel bad when they been caught helping their clique by hurting the tribe.

 Kiefer.Wolfowitz 08:18, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Very well Kiefer. I wanted to leave this thread alone and have made that quite clear. But if you're demanding apologies from me, then I will spell out the problems for you. Perhaps the reason that other administrators have not commented is the way you have turned on everyone who does comment.

• There is a difference between how Demiurge contacted me and how you contacted other people. Firstly, I was already aware of this thread, as I have your page watchlisted. Secondly, Demiurge came to me as an admin that he trusted, I do not see that as unreasonable. Thirdly, he declared immediately that he had contacted me within this thread. On the other hand, you contacted two people, alledging the thread was politically motivated, and did not declare that on this thread, nor why you contacted those people in particular.
• You accused me of WP:MEATPUPPETry. Specifically here. I don't know if you realise, but that is a personal attack, and within this community quite an unpleasant one. I note that you had even been told by your "buddy" (a term I only use because he did in the title) that the comment was not a good one.
• I have not seen these personal attacks by Demiurge, nor by any one else who you seem to think is my "buddy". I have already explained myself regarding the incident at WT:RFA, and if you want to take that further then find a neutral admin to review my actions. Stop repeatedly accusing me of "not doing anything" in situations that I am unaware of.
• Every comment I wrote above was dealing solely with your behaviour and you have attempted to deflect this issue with political issues, copyright issues, other content issues and other people's behaviour. Yet you refuse to accept any responsibility yourself. Under dispute resolution, the best way to deal with a person acting in this way is through an RfC/U.
• Your unwillingness to provide diffs means that your vague handwavy comments about violations of AGF, NPA and civility are in themselves unpleasant and unhelpful.
• There are other issues, which I have not dealt with here, because I am focussing on your behaviour.

Only this week, I explained to another user that I would speak up if I saw editors looking down on other editors. In that case, I was talking about admins acting as other user's betters, yet the disdain I've seen from you in the past 24 hours has disgusted me. We are a community here, one that is working to build an encyclopedia together. I am exceptionally proud to be a member of said community, just as I am exceptionally proud of my good articles, and my hard work with many more problematic members of the community. Just because political articles about the USA are important to you does not mean they are important to everyone. Worm^TT · (talk) 08:51, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Wrong Venue & Motion to close

I have said this a few times above, but there is no administrator action required here and this thread should be closed. I said previously that issues should be dealt with at an RfC/U, should any parties wish to take that route - after the disdain Kiefer has treated me with and the accusations of WP:MEATPUPPETry, I will be writing up an RfC/U myself. As such I see no point in this thread remaining open and propose that it is closed by an uninvolved administrator. Worm^TT · (talk) 07:51, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

I've wasted enough time responding to your complaints.

Demiurge1000's asked you to intervene, as you have acknowledged before. Since your arrival, you have just criticized me and spinelessly failed to enforce your precious policies against your caller or your other buddies.

You can see that this page has been monitored during the last days by some of the most distinguished administrators on Wikipedia, and none of them have applauded you. In fact, this idiotic ANI has only attracted the people with whom I've already had conflicts or some of my fellow editors.

Your complaints have turned into threats and harassment.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 08:07, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

• Support closure as proposer. Worm^TT · (talk) 07:51, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose Peter G Werner has some questions to answer and Worm/Demiurge1000/Strange_Passerby have some apologies to make.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 08:12, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

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

Edit Warring w/ Sockpuppets

User2005 has been banned for using two sockpuppets to undo my edits on Shirley Rosario, Steve Badger, Tiffany Michelle and many other poker articles. These accounts have also been used to give the appearance of consensus in a previous ANI about poker articles.

I ask that user2005 either be permanently blocked, permanently blocked from editing poker articles or permanently blocked from reverting my edits. DegenFarang (talk) 14:02, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

He's been blocked for three days, not banned. There is a difference.

For any observers, HelloAnnyong has issued the block in question. This discussion seems to be for the period following this block. It seems kind of harsh to not give the user a chance to comment, however. CycloneGU (talk) 14:20, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

My mistake i see 'banned' and 'blocked' used interchangeably. Yes he is blocked for three days and I would like action taken to prevent him from causing problems like this in the future. At the very least I think he should be blocked from reverting my edits. He created two sockpuppets and cultivated the accounts over more than 18 months simply to undo my edits.

I'll tell you right now what he is going to say. He's going to deny the sockpuppets were his and spew multiple paragraphs of ad hominem attacks about me and try to change the subject. DegenFarang (talk) 17:11, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

That would be unwise. Right now the editor is facing a 3 day block for behavior that often leads to indefinite blocks. I'll leave a reminder of this on their user talk page. -- Atama頭 18:56, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Exactly as I predicted, he has gone straight back to edit warring the same articles he was blocked for creating sock puppets to edit. He needs to be, at the very least, blocked from reverting my edits. DegenFarang (talk) 04:17, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree with CycloneGU on this matter, we should wait with making conclusions until we hear 2005's side of the story. From my point of view, all this drama evolved from DegenFarang deciding to remove references to poker-babes.com from pages about poker, which seems to be his biggest involvement in poker articles, actually his biggest involvement in editing whatsoever, while 2005 has been writing and maintaining poker articles for years. I edit articles about poker a lot as well, so I cannot and won't pretend to be impartial on this matter, but I'd hate to lose a prolific editor over an escalated WP:RS dispute. Rymatz (talk) 13:32, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Another way to say that is that it all started when me and 2005 had a disagreement about content. However only one of us created two sockpuppets and cultivated them over 18+ months in an attempt to win the dispute. DegenFarang (talk) 15:07, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Quoted from one of the three admins who denied the unblock request of one of the sockpuppets: "The claim that the three accounts are operated by three independent people is an insult to the intelligence of anyone who has spent a couple of minutes looking at their editing histories. In my six years on Wikipedia I have never heard a WP:DUCK quack anything like so loudly. Probable sockpuppets, but certainly either that or meatpuppets, and it doesn't matter which. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:48, 5 August 2011 (UTC)"

I hope somebody will make the decision to permanently block him. He is denying everything and will not change his ways upon returning. He should be indefinitely blocked until he takes responsibility for what he has done and agrees not to do it again. DegenFarang (talk) 07:00, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

• I note that I have lifted all three blocks since they were not supported by technical evidence.
  I cannot rule out that the editors have communicated off-wiki, maybe coordinated to get an upper hand in the dispute. However, seeing that the alleged sock accounts have edited before and were not created to help in an edit war, and were never notified or warned about our editing standards, an indefinite block was excessive and not constructive.
  Amalthea 19:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Five other administrators disagreed with you. Don't you guys care about consensus when making decisions? DegenFarang (talk) 01:05, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Amalthea is a checkuser and therefore has a greater insight into this than the administrators who declined to reverse the questionable decision of the attending administrator at WP:SPI/2005. FYI, I was the one asked Amalthea to investigate this situation and take any steps they felt appropriate; and after reviewing the technical evidence, endorse these unblocks. –xeno^talk 03:56, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

What is this 'technical evidence'? IP addresses? That is laughably easy to get around. And as stated by two administrators even if these aren't the same people they are certainly meatpuppets. The edit summaries for the three accounts included identical wording, punctuation and syntax on multiple occasions. I don't see how much more obvious it can be. As one admin stated, 'The claim that the three accounts are operated by three independent people is an insult to the intelligence of anyone who has spent a couple of minutes looking at their editing histories." DegenFarang (talk) 04:05, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Could you provide a few examples of "identical wording, punctuation and syntax" in edit summaries? –xeno^talk 04:12, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I can't find the examples I had before but just take a look at this and this. How much more obvious can it be? Accounts were opened during an edit war in early 2010. Have been almost entirely inactive since then. Then out of nowhere in late July of this year they tag team each other on opposite days reverting my edits on a small group of really obscure articles DegenFarang (talk) 04:46, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Please provide specific evidence or strike your claims. I am no fan of User:2005 or his approach to editing, but these are clearly not sockpuppets. There may be MEAT, there may be tag-team behaviour, but abuse of multiple accounts it is not. Not from what I can see, anyway. –xeno^talk 04:52, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

What is the difference if they are sockpuppets or meatpuppets? Those two accounts clearly work together they already admitted they 'know each other'. According to the other administrators sockpuppetry and meatpuppetry are treated the same way and it doesn't matter which one it is. DegenFarang (talk) 04:57, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

WP:DUCK - Concrete evidence should not be needed in this instance. DegenFarang (talk) 04:59, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

There is a big difference. Working from the premise that this is not sockpuppetry, then indefinitely blocking Paige and Takeover is a disproportionate response. (see Wikipedia:Blocking policy#Education and warnings). I concur with Amalthea that the next step here should be for all involved to stop edit warring and seek a resolution of the underlying dispute; I understand there is a discussion ongoing at the Poker project talk page. –xeno^talk 14:07, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

As noted above, the sock block of me and those other accounts was not appropriate. While assuming good faith on the part of the blocking admin, this waste of everyone's time was due to DegenFarang's ongoing stalking of me, which part of his enormous history of spamming, BLP vandalism, talk page threats/abuse, insulting administrators, and in general deliberately stating falsehoods and mischaracterizing events. It is a breakdown in the admin level of the Wikipedia that he and his IP have not been banned permanently. Maybe I should start a new section to finally address this, but I'm going to make a subsection for transparency sake. If an admin wants to make it a section unto itself, fine by me. 2005 (talk) 02:05, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• Um, as the blocking admin I guess I'll comment. As I stated on the SPI case page, I blocked those accounts on behavioral grounds. I thought the evidence here was fairly strong, but if the CU shows that they're entirely unrelated, then that's fine, and I'll apologize for the error. I remain fairly convinced, however, that the accounts are at least working together in some capacity, but I suppose meatpuppetry here is another issue altogether. — HelloAnnyong ^{(say whaaat?!)} 04:12, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
  • One of the sockpuppets first said in his unblock request that he didn't know who the other sockpuppet was. When I challenged him about the accounts being created within a day of each other he changed his edit summary and admitted he lied about not knowing the other sock - and said they are friends with very similar views and interests. Those two accounts working in tandem here is not a possibility, it is guaranteed. He admitted "they know each other" and they tag-teamed me reverting my edits on multiple articles over an extended period of time. DegenFarang (talk) 04:22, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
    • Also at a previous ANI where I was complaining about one of the socks, the other sock came into the discussion and said "i happened upon this page after seeing good references removed from another article' - no attempt was made to back up 'her' friend whom I was complaining about, no acknowledgement was made that they know each other and my specific complaints were not addressed by this sock. It was worded as an attempt to add neutral and passing support to the validity of the reference in question. This makes is blatantly obvious the accounts were being used together to create a false consensus and were sock or meatpupets. If you review the edit histories and the things the accounts go crazy about (poker-babes.com references and the Shirley Rosario and Steve Badger articles) there is really nobody else it could be than user2005 as 95% of the edits on those articles and about that reference were done by 2005 - and 2005 is the 3rd editor who is warring with me on those articles. As another administrator said, I've never seen a WP:DUCK quack so loud. DegenFarang (talk) 04:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Permanently banning User:DegenFarang

I had the misfortune of picking up User:DegenFarang when as part of my regular editing dutues in the gambling/poker section of the Wikipedia I removed some spam he added from this anonymous, poor quality site. In specific, in January 2009 he repeatedly removed a link to the Hollywood Reporter and added a link to the poor quality site, alleged that the canceled movie about the poker player Amarillo Slim would be released that year. Long story short, there were never any plans to release a movie that year, no movie was released, and the poor quality site was wrong. But DegenFarang would not let it go, and sad to say, I didn't let him have his way soon enough. He then removed an external link on that page to Poker-babes.com, which was added by User:Jhortman four years earlier. He somehow transfered his anger to that link and me somehow and was off to the races. Since switching from an IP to DegenFarang, his edit history is 95% BLP vandalism, contentious editing, stating deliberate untruths that mischaracterize events, stalking (including "admin shopping" nuisance ANI threads), making threats against a variety of users, and asserting repeatedly that he would ignore all rules at any point he wanted to. He has been given at least four literal "final warnings" from administarors, plus at least two more that are essentially final warnings. The process however has broken down, and he just takes his one day bannings and returns not only to his exact same behavoir, but he accelerates it. The time has come to final ban him and his IP permanently. This should occur for any one of the follow actions:

BLP Vandalism -- he should have been instantly permanently banned for changing the college major of a BLP from electrical engineering to thieving scumbaggery. he should have been banned for his repeated vandalism of the John Roberts article in January/February 2009, where he calls the Supreme Court Justice an "asshat" and labeling that edit as reverting vandalism. The four days going back from here reveal DegenFarang's first one day block for tendatious editing, and his wasting many editors time with his fanatical refusal to accept that other editors have the right to their opinions too. More recently he was blocked for similar behavoir on the Dominique Strauss-Kahn article. Even though DegenFarang edits only rarely in article space there are other examples but these are all egregious examples of disruption that should not be tolerated and at least the first two should have lead to a permanent ban.

Spamming -- is noted above, but relatively minor since he gave up trying to spam that site after no one at a reliable sources noticeboard thread found any merit in it. I believe all the current links to this site are dead and should be removed, but I don't want to do it as it would surely lead to another flurry of retalion of some sort from him.

Ignore all rules always -- He refuses to learn policies and guidelines, no matter if three people think one way, he can ignore all rules, he even repeatedly he only recognizes ignore all rules, again here, including insisting he can ignore policy, and a rant ridiculing everything. There is more of this including a recent restatement around the last time he was banned for a day.

Ridicule of administrators -- "administrator of any intelligence" and refers to an admin as twice incompetent. Here he refers to one of his many admin warnings as fearmongering.

Making up things -- he has frequently made untrue statements regarding consensus, agreements and facts. He has repeatedly asserted that I have added hundreds of links to a website. He repeats this falsehood in every ANI-type thread he starts. I have added some links to this site, but so have a dozen other editors, including several admins with 50,000+ edits between them, and the total number at its peak was 60 links to this site. His assertion of consensus favoring him when there is no such thing is also inolerable.

His final warnings -- One, two, three, and a fourth "final warning". Is that a recod for "final" warnings? I don't know but there are many more warnings. After a recent two day block, he was warned threatening posts on talk pages is not tolerated... but if you look at his history since then he has made many such abusive, threatening posts.

I could go on, but I feel like I need a bath after this much. I've wasted a huge amount of time on this nonsense that could have went into productive editing, so have other editors, admins and otherwise. I've cut down my editing 90% because I don't want this stalker folwing me around to any new articles to mess with them too. The bottom line is he has gotten several final warnings, and was warned recently to not be abusive in talk pages and he has made many such abusive posts in the past two weeks. No more one day blocks where he pretends to be reasonable to be reinstated. He needs to be banned now, permanently. 2005 (talk) 02:05, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't edit much anymore, but I was surprised when I logged in the other night to see that DegenFarang is still allowed to edit here. I had several run-ins with him a couple of years ago where he tried to threaten and intimidate me when I disagreed with his edits, but I just thought that eventually his behavior would pay off with a permanent block. Given the list of misbehavior above, I'm left wondering just what exactly does someone have to do here before they get permanently blocked anyway? Rray (talk) 03:20, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

It happened on one of your edits.[10] I suspect that pesky bug. Doc talk 04:45, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• 90% of that is more than 18 months old and I've done nothing wrong at present. Your anger stems from me just having you blocked for using sock/meat puppets to revert my edits. You on the other hand, just received an explicit warning from an administrator not to revert my edits without consensus. Yet the first then you did upon being unblocked, after removing the warning from your talk page, was roll back all of the edits I made while you were blocked.
  I ask that 2005 be given instructions never again to revert my edits and that he be indefinitely blocked if he ignores the instructions. I think a temporary block is also in order for ignoring the warning that was just posted on his talk page. DegenFarang (talk) 05:35, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
  • And I'd like a pizza. Pepperoni and mushroom with bacon. Chop-chop, I ain't got all night. HalfShadow 05:41, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
  • I did not warn 2005 to stop revert you. I asked you both to stop edit warring. You both ignored me. Amalthea 13:31, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm delurking after 18+ months of not editing as I heard there was pizza and I still keep a curious eye on my watchlists and have watched this clusterf unfold over the past two weeks-ish. A cursory look at Special:Contributions/DegenFarang show that this user has been very focused (and is indeed the instigator of edit wars) on removing the same ELs from multiple poker articles, claiming that they are spam when they have been reaffirmed as recently as last week on this noticeboard to be not spam [11], especially for the main articles that he is edit warring about, Shirley Rosario and Steve Badger. The links he advocate to remove are the very blogs that the article subjects either have contributed several articles or owned the site, or both. This has been going on for years and is the reason why I have these articles and his talkpage on my watchlist. He also has recently stripped down the Shirley Rosario article and CSD'd it [12] (though he knows it survived DRV in 2010 -- he submitted that DRV.) The SPI case he filed a day or two after he returned from an indef which was lifted after he promised to not threaten and escalate [13], a promise he immediately broke: [14], [15]. After getting newbie users (who should've just been minnowed) blocked, he dances on their user page: [16], [17], even after being told to not post there twice [18] [19]. Far far beyond the pale is editing a user's unblock request: [20]. best, --guyzero | talk 10:03, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

LOL if there was any doubt about the meatpuppetry/sockpuppetry, let this be your answer: all one needs to do is look at this post (I've only ever seen 2005 post like that in my life) and the fact that the account hasn't been used since March of 2010 - then suddenly it reverts me on Shirley Rosario after 2005 was warned not to revert my edits w/out consensus and did it anyway, then I reported it here and the most obvious sock/meatpuppet in the history of obvious sock/meatpuppets comes and rolls me back and posts this here. I can't believe he has the audacity to do this when his sockpuppetry is already under the microscope. I think this is deserving of a lifetime ban on all accounts. DegenFarang (talk) 11:30, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I'll just point out that it does seem mildly suspicious that an account (guyzero) comes back after sixteen months of inactivity, and their first edit is to continue an edit war, and their third is to post this stuff above. *cough* — HelloAnnyong ^{(say whaaat?!)} 13:29, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree. The one follows from the other, but yes, I tend to think that he was alerted to the situation by someone.
Nonetheless, the heart of the conflict is the appropriateness of the external links and references, and the approach to editing by the editors involved. That's what needs to be resolved.
There's now a discussion at WT:POKER about the usage these links, and I am hopeful that this will help resolve the dispute here, without needing to block anyone.
Amalthea 14:40, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the appropriateness of the external links and references is something that can and should be discussed, but that doesn't address User:DegenFarang's disruptive editing. Both can and should be addressed. Rray (talk) 15:09, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Will this madness never end? Amalthea, do you know he has falsely claimed I am "familiar with" you? He has asserted several editors are my sockpuppets, without any evidence (which there is none because it is absolutely false), I'd have to stay up 24 hours a day to accomplish all the editing these other editors have done... in areas that I have never shown the slightest interest in. Please don't focus on the minor incident. That is why there has been this breakdown in the admin process. Degenfarang's individual behavoir is a part of longterm abusiveness where he has shown contempt for all wikipedia policies and editors. He accussed the many editors reverting him in the John Roberts article of being conspiring Republicans, and so on. Abusive activity is 95% of his edits. While he is out admin shopping all over the place now, the real issue is simple: will someone stand up and say that it is acceptable to call the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court an "asshat" in his article, or to say another man majored in "thieving scumbaggery" in college? Anyone want to say a person who does that is welcome ignore all rules and do whatever the hell he pleases on the Wikipedia? Ban him, permanently, as he should have been long before now. Those two edits alone bring shame on the Wikipedia, and make a joke of its good citizen policies. 2005 (talk) 01:34, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not connected to or in touch with any editor from this site, the article subjects, the poker industry, etc. and did not receive an "alert" to come and make my post above. Prior to my hiatus, I editing across a wide spectrum of subjects including vand patrol, etc. I stated truthfully what brought me here and while I can understand that me delurking after an extended time is "curious", I ask that you assume good faith in my explanation that I was hoping to aid this conversation by giving another view (along with links) on DegenFarang's years-long behavior issue around these specific links and article subjects. I've interacted with DegenFarang in the past on these very articles [21]. I'll repeat that I was not alerted to come here. Does it not fail the common sense test that someone would dig my name out of the distant past and contact me? I agree that my hitting undo last night on one of the problem articles was not a good decision and apologize for contributing to the escalation, my perception at the time was that I was restoring this article to the sourced consensus version, but I should not have done it.

I believe I've provided links above that describe an unacceptably disruptive battleground mentality from DegenFarang, including links to offenses that I believe to be blockable (such as editing a users unblock request.) My suggestion for the battleground issues is for this user to permanently, voluntarily steer clear from his dispute locus, which are Shirley Rosario, Steve Badger and the ELs of their poker blogs. I respectfully ask that administrators check my note and links above, that I felt strong enough about to delurk and write, and please review this situation in whole. thank you and kind regards, --guyzero | talk 21:28, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

This drama-fest needs at one thing clarified in the sub-title: if this is a ban discussion of DenenFarang, that's one thing (I have no opinion on either of the warring editors). But unless something fundamental has changed, WP does not "permanently ban" any IP addresses. Jus' sayin'... Doc talk 03:38, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

User2005 continues use of sock and meat puppets

All of the associated accounts are back and attempting to create the impression they are different people and trying to build the impression of consensus in multiple discussions. Here, here, here and here. Something really needs to be done. It is obvious this user has not learned from this experience. He continues to make claims such as 'you are the only one who disagrees' when in fact he is the only one who disagrees with me, I just have the integrity to only use one account. DegenFarang (talk) 05:12, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

ClaudioSantos, socks, eugenics, and euthanasia.

I'm not keen to start a thread on the drama-board, but this is probably the best place for it as it's not purely 3RR or purely socky...
ClaudioSantos (talk · contribs) has a long history [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] of editwarring on subjects related to euthanasia, eugenics &c. Unfortunately, several blocks seem to have caused only one change to editing patterns; they now appear to be using an IP address in order to get around 3RR. For instance, compare these two edits to these two. And on talkpages, including the RfC on Talk:Planned Parenthood, 192.172.14.99 has turned up to provide one of the few voices in support of ClaudioSantos' mission to emphasise ties between Planned Parenthood and eugenics - right on the boundary of ClaudioSantos' topic ban from "Euthanasia and related topics, broadly construed". There are many more examples in Special:Contributions/192.172.14.99. This kind of socking, editwarring, and votestacking is very unhelpful. ClaudioSantos has surely been reminded of the rules many times, and been given many extra chances. What's the best way to deal with this? I fear that another week's block would merely allows other editors to be productive for a week before the disruption resumes again. bobrayner (talk) 16:17, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

"Right on the boundary" is generous. The lead of Planned Parenthood notes their use of abortion, and here's an opinionated source that says, "Abortion is merely prenatal euthanasia, as euthanasia is postnatal abortion". Jesanj (talk) 16:28, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Wouldn't this put him afoul of the community-placed 1RR general sanction on abortion? Between that and the apparent attempt at end-running the topic ban, it looks to me like ClaudioSantos is earning the heavy end of the hammer. --Alan the Roving Ambassador (User:N5iln) (talk) 16:57, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

This is harassment and false accusations of bad faith on alleged use of a sockpuppet. I am not editing warring as I have constrained me to discuss the thing in the talk page about the inclution/exclution of a see-also link at Planned Parenthood linking to Eugenics in the United States. I was also commenting as a RfC was called. This is an abusive use of the ANI in order to force a point of view through excluding an user. It is proverbial the Jesanj efforts to imply that abortion is euthanasia, a point of view that surely he will not include at those articles, but solely in order to extend the ban for me. -- ClaudioSantos¿?

As I pointed out on my talk page, the only mention of abortion in our euthanasia article mentions that one definition of euthanasia "specifically discounts fetuses in order to distinguish between abortions and euthanasia". The mainstream doesn't equate the two, our articles don't either at this moment, and until ClaudioSantos expresses the same view or tries to modify our articles in an attempt to equate the two, I don't see that the topic ban is being violated. (Other admins can feel free to disagree with me on that point.) Eugenics has an even shakier tie to euthanasia, I see almost no connection between the two topics. On the other hand, if there is actual socking that is going on, regardless of any topic bans that shouldn't be allowed, though that should be proven before action is taken. As to the violation of 1RR, I haven't looked into that yet, that might also be sanctionable. -- Atama頭 17:06, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I have no opinion on the RfC and underlying content dispute (I think both parties have made at least some valid points), but the edit warring on Eugenics in the United States in not tolerable. I have fully-protected the article for 3 days. I have also blocked 192.172.14.99 (talk · contribs · block log) for edit warring (they were very specifically warned by me here). — Satori Son 17:20, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Also, I do not believe that ClaudioSantos has edited using that 192.172.14.99 anon account. That address geolocates to Farmington, Michigan, US, whereas ClaudioSantos appears to be editing from South America. — Satori Son 17:28, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I already explicity sais that I am not that IP. And I am not using any sockpuppet to votestacking. Those are solely bad faith assumptions. And I also have to notice here that I am not involved in the claimed edit warring on Eugenics in the United States where I have not edited since days ago. -- ClaudioSantos¿? 17:36, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I looked at Planned Parenthood, I only see 1 revert in 24 hours, which is not a violation of the general sanction. -- Atama頭 17:45, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Just FYI, 192.172.14.99 (talk) is a U.S. Army IP address, registered to the USAISC. It's likely shared by a number of users, although recent activity seems to focus on attacking Planned Parenthood. I suspect that blocks of this IP will involve collateral damage, as there are probably multiple users connecting through it, and so semiprotection of specific target pages might be a better approach if problems recur. Just my 2 cents, and to be clear, I am involved in the dispute at Planned Parenthood. MastCell ^Talk 19:01, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Concur that semi-protection of the article is likely the best approach. And I retract my earlier comments regarding ClaudioSantos; it appears that the episode is still too fresh in too many people's minds, mine included. I'll put the RFPP in now, unless someone else already has. --Alan the Roving Ambassador (User:N5iln) (talk) 19:08, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I disagree with semi-protection, and support the 72 hour block on the IP. The only active disruption caused by anonymous editors is from this single IP. I'm not worried about collateral damage because this IP has been consistent for the past 3 days, so I wouldn't be too concerned if it is blocked for the next 3 days. If another IP appears to continue where this last one left off, then semi-protection would be warranted, but we normally don't protect an article because of disruption from a single account. -- Atama頭 19:15, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Yup, just block the disruptive user and move on. causa sui (talk) 22:11, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree with the IP-block, but a warning to ClaudioSantos to keep a bit more distance from his topic block seems appropriate to me. Just play it on the safe side, Claudio. Night of the Big Wind _talk 23:29, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

There was a discussion on the admin's talk page who enacted the community sanction, in which he judged that abortion was not a related topic. I concur with that, and I was the author of the community sanction.

If he's being disruptive by article standards, that's actionable, but the sanction only covers so much. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:06, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

ClaudioSantos (talk) has been blocked for edit warring and is asking for a review of that block on their talk page. — Satori Son 18:03, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Could we get some eyes on Talk:Planned_Parenthood#Emphasis_on_eugenics? It's a big mess and has exhibited some questionable behavior e.g. accusing other editors of white washing the article. Falcon8765 ^(TALK) 18:05, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Hounded by an admin for the past six months

I apologize in advance for the length of the post, it attempts to recount events over the duration of six months. To get right into it: User:Fainites does not like me very much. For the past six months, every single discussion I get involved in invariably results in User:Fainites following me there and, under the pretext of acting as the self-proclaimed "mediator", opposes me in every single issue of every single discussion. This happens every time, sooner or later, and if necessary I can provide diffs to that effect. You can imagine how its like being followed for six months, entering into discussions, only to have an actual admin arrive to invariably place his weight against you. This person, this admin, has thoroughly soured the Free Encyclopedia for me, and he won't let alone. In all my years on Wikipedia I've never experienced something like this, wherever I turn - the same person is there to harass me. I feel as though this person considers me something of a hobby of his.

Recently he has stepped up the campaign to get rid of me for good. Up until I've met this person, the worst I've got a was a brief block at times when I go overboard and revert someone 4 times or something. Now I have my own "personal evaluation admin", that, while following me around on the Balkans articles, has seen it as his right and duty to evaluate me and my character as he can read it over the keyboard. Of course, being biased against me he sees everything I write as hostile in some way, and probably likes to "fill in the blanks" as it were. This has resulted, in two of these discussions I've spoken of, in an effective one month block, and now another six-month block. These are topic bans on the Balkans, to be exact, but as Fainites knows all too well, I don't edit anywhere other than in the volatile Balkans articles. So I imagine this fact is quite helpful in effectively blocking me while not seeming all that harsh. The ban was placed by the one admin who should not have placed it, Fainites, who is more personally involved and biased in this issue than any other admin I could name - strongly opposing my position on two simultaneous discussions.

Of course, being an admin, the man is very skilled in hiding his personal resentment behind standard Wiki banter. Oh he will (and has) provide a long list of supposed "reasons" for his actions, and when he's done you'll think I'm the Antichrist. But the fact is, aside from not being very friendly - I've done nothing particularly worthy of note. Its just his personal "psychological evaluation", the same one that drives him to follow me and make sure nothing I support gets through, and a cherry-picked selection of everything not-particularly-nice I ever did.

Wikipedia has turned into a bitter, unfriendly place for me because of this person, his hounding, his calculated sanctions and effective smear campaign (as you can imagine, if an admin arrives on a heated talkpage and eventually labels you as "aggressive" and "rude" - you are aggressive and rude, even if he only imagines you are, and the frustration makes you more aggravated in truth.) For the first time in five years, and after tens of thousands of edits, I am considering leaving Wikipedia. Not because I no longer think Wikipedia is an excellent place, I still do, but because I am being prevented from editing and participating like any other Wikipedian. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 20:17, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Just to say the topic ban was under ARBMAC]Fainites ^barleyscribs 20:36, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

DIREKTOR is accusing you of not being "uninvolved". Is that the case? Theresa Knott | Sort that Knee! 20:41, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

After reading this, all the things going in my head make it seem like you two need to be sanctioned from making contact or something. Rainbow Dash !xmcuvg2MH 20:40, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

At first sight, I do share a concern that Fainite's content involvement in the Mihalovic mediation, which clearly extended to regularly expressing his personal opinions on content matters in disagreement with Direktor, constitutes a degree of involvement that may be incompatible with enacting Arbmac sanctions against him. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:40, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Having now checked the closely related Talk:Serbia_under_German_occupation, where Fainites' role was definitely that of a fellow editor involved in content debate, not that of an uninvolved administrator, I'd now strongly tend towards saying he shouldn't have taken Arbmac action here. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:59, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

There are, then, two seperate issues which need to be considered here:

• Was Fainites "involved" with regard to WP:INVOLVED with these topics?
• Does the substance of the ban still apply to DIREKTOR.

The second of these points is very important as well, and we shouldn't gloss over it. That is, even if we determine that Fainites was involved, and should not have enacted the ban, we also need to determine if the facts of the case justify the ban anyways; if so it should not invalidate the ban. I am VERY concerned with DIREKTOR's statement "These are topic bans on the Balkans, to be exact, but as Fainites knows all too well, I don't edit anywhere other than in the volatile Balkans articles." If DIRECKTOR's only purpose at Wikipedia is to push a point of view in controversial articles, and serves no other purpose at Wikipedia, I am not sure the ban is unjustified. --Jayron32 21:05, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, there's nothing wrong with having an editing profile concentrated on the politics of a certain region. That doesn't automatically mean you're a POV-pusher. From what I've seen over the years, my impression is he's certainly opinionated, but so are 99% of all other editors in the area, and his commitment to quality sourcing and academic integrity is well above the average – the issue is that his opinions tend to be minority positions, against the more typical entrenched "national" viewpoints. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:11, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

@FP, I would agree this is a very opinionated area. However, I don't quite agree Direktors opinions are "tend to be minority opinions against the more typical, entrenched national viewpoints". Certainly there is a lot of nationalist POV pushing on these pages from various sides (more than two) but this issue is not about "DIREKTOR -v- the nationalists". Fainites ^barleyscribs 06:42, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

(EC)- I think that you make a very good point there. If DIREKTOR is only here to push a POV then of course the topic ban is appropriate. However his statement alone (whilst concerning) is not evidence enough of POV pushing. Theresa Knott | Sort that Knee! 21:16, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

• Dealing with the "involved" issue, no I am not involved in content as such. I do not write content. I make occasional suggestions based on talkpage discussions and matters of that kind, such as suggesting a variety of solutions to the naming issues for Serbia under German occupation. I do express views on sourcing issues as described below. I have no personal POV on any Balkans matters. I don't care who were the goodies or baddies in any of the various wars. (By saying I don't care I don't mean accurate articles aren't important - just that it means nothing to me personally). However, in endeavouring to assist constructive and collaborative editing on these pages, WP policies on sourcing have to be applied. Having edited in areas myself that are rife with relentless POV pushers, I know how frustrating it is when there is no admin assistance except for drive by all-round wrist slaps. There are areas like this where an admin needs to understand what is going on to be effective. This is not about WP:CIV and WP:NPA. Anybody passing can deal with that. The problems are far more long term. My role for some months has been to endeavour to create a situation on various Balkans pages where actual source based discussion can take place without constant revert wars and the refighting of old battles. Protecting pages from edit-warring, and starting and "mediating" discussions on refined issues has been quite successful in a number of cases, particularly long-term repetitive disputes over symbolic and nationalist flash points like info-boxes, article names and the ethnic make-up or nationality of various famous Croats/Serbs'Bosniaks etc. My hope was that more serious editors would be encouraged to come back and edit as many of the articles are in a parlous state and show signs of past edit wars and nationalist POV pushing. Over time it became apparent that nationalist SPA's and IP's were one problem, but long term, tendentious, POV pushing another. Rightly or wrongly I took the view that this was also a matter appropriate for admin attention. I have by now read or have available to me a number of the mainstream, most cited works and become familiar with the revisionist approaches pushed by the various "sides". There are particular revisionist sources used and also the process of "cherry-picking" bits of reliable sources. I have attempted in various discussions to pin editors down to the provision of sources to support their claims and to the refining of what the argument is actually about. Otherwise the same old arguments go on and on and on. Serbia under German occupation has been through bad-tempered renaming disputes about 5 times already this year. Draza Mihailovich was in mediation for well over a year. It stalled and people just gave up. It is now producing results. The talkpages are so dishearteningly repetitive over years it makes you despair. From time to time on talkpages where an argument is going nowhere I attempt to summarise where a dispute has got to and what the issues now are. When people stop talking and start reverting I protect the page and re-start a discussion. When editors make sweeping claims about sources I do check the sources to see if their claims are accurate. When editors are arguing with no or inadequate sources I sometimes post a quote on an issue from a mainstream source or reinforce a request for sources. If editors relentlessly pursue tendentious arguments I try and bring the discussion back on track with reference to sources. I have added relevent chunks from what sources I have to the specially created quotations page. I have had discussions in which information from sources I have on revisionist history has been discussed. I can see why at first this may look like involvement. I do not however edit content except for copy-editing or putting in what I understand to be an agreed position after discussion on a talkpage. (In fact my lack of content editing in the last 6 months is quite dramatic compared to my earlier activities.) I do not get involved in content on these articles because if I did I could not be an admin - which in my view was what the area needed.

I realise this may all sound a little headmistressy. If the community in general should decide that admins can't "admin about" in sourcing issues and talkpage discussions in difficult areas like this in this way - then so be it. I'll go back to content editing. I don't mind. I do think however that it is an area that needs careful consideration as there are other areas apart from the endless Balkans wars where this issue arises - ie what is meant by "involvement" when trying to effectively admin in complex and difficult areas to enable collaborative editing. I suspect there are plenty of grey and borderline areas here. Fainites ^barleyscribs 22:13, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Characterizing Fainites' activities related the Balkans articles as "hounding" seems grossly inaccurate and unfair. I've been attempting to moderate a discussion related to additions to the Draža Mihailović article and have found Fainites' contributions to be helpful and even-handed. I have cautioned DIREKTOR several times for personal attacks and disruption [28]. Having tried hard to work with Direktor to no avail, I have to agree with Fainites topic ban. I think it is a moderate action that may just contribute to greater peace for those articles. Sunray (talk) 23:11, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

In the interest of full disclosure, I have been involved in the Mihailovic article since a little while before the mediation began, and since, and have interacted with DIREKTOR in a number of venues. I see no reason to put forth my opinions now about his actions here, but will be happy to elaborate if anyone is curious. I would suggest that before making any judgments about Fainites's actions that others unfamiliar with the issues take a quick look through Talk:Draža_Mihailović and associated archives, the the mediation talk pages and associated archives, as well as the archives here for prior issues relating to DIREKTOR and his interaction with other editors. I know it's a lot of material to check, but we've been at this a very long time. And for what it is worth, leaving aside the issue of whether or not Fainites should have issued a topic ban, I think that Fainites's actions regardless of his relative level of involvement have been even handed, very useful in moving us forward on the Mihailovic as well as the Serbia under German occupation, where I have been lurking but have had little involvement. These kinds of articles are a very difficult space to work in, and I commend both Sunray and Fainites on their efforts. --Nuujinn (talk) 00:01, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Fainites is indeed involved "in content as such". I cannot see how someone can voice his opinion over and over again, on content issues, and yet claim he is "uninvolved". E.g., to post the most recent example, in a discussion on which version of text to adopt in the article [29], user Fainites supports Proposal no.1 (while I support Proposal no.2). Or practically every single post in the Talk:Serbia under German occupation. Its strange to see an "uninvolved" user somehow always eventually voicing his opposition to whatever I propose. Who are we kidding? Fainites is a user that is involved with me and others in the Draža Mihailović debate - directly and in content discussions. In fact, as I said, I cannot recall a single solitary issue (content-related or not) where he has not voiced an opinion contrary to mine. Its not that I would deny someone the right to hold an opposing opinion, however strangely uniform his disagreement, its that this person can block me for six months under ARBCOM on a whim, by writing an "essay" or two, or I should say manifesto, on how I'm supposedly not a very nice person and he really does not like me. If there is one user out there that should not be administering sanctions over Talk:Draža Mihailović issues, its the one that participates in the discussion - and opposes the position of the person he sanctioned on two active discussions.

User:Nuujinn, unsurprisingly, is the user who wrote the version of the text that Fainites likes. I and another user disagree, but I suppose with ARBCOM applying one refuses to agree to the "admin version" on one's own peril. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 00:24, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Direktor, WP:INVOLVED refers to "current or past conflicts with an editor (or editors), and disputes on topics..." For this section of the policy to apply, Fainites would have to have been in a dispute with you. The diff you presented, above, simply shows Fainites expressing an opinion. The fact that his opinion may be different than yours doesn't make it a dispute. What conflicts, or disputes related to topics, have you had with Fainites? Sunray (talk) 02:50, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

This is where taking diffs in isolation is difficult. The diff produced by DIREKTOR above does not show me "voicing an opinion over and over again". DIREKTOR also "liked" and agreed with the majority of Nuujinn's draft as far as it went but wanted to add a lot more detailed information on a particular issue. I was suggesting the use of Nuujinn's draft and a more modest, summarised expansion of additional information. Nuujinn had suggested a more detailed treatment of the additional issue on the Chetniks page rather than the Mihailovic page. In relation to the point about reflection of historians views, the issue about Karchmar had been discussed at great length after DIREKTOR made an extreme statement about the historians reliability which he then completely failed to source despite repeated requests, eventually posting a nationalist blog on his talkpage. Mostly what I did was ask DIREKTOR and another editor to provide sources to support his claims and challenge his interpretation of sourcing policies particularly the oft repeated proposal that editors should analyse the primary sources used by historians with different interpretations in order to decide which is the most relaible. The mediator considered the discussion about Karchmar to be at an end. On the naming of the Serbia under German occupation article I made a number of suggestions for participants to consider ranging from looking to see how the issue of description of occuped countries was dealt with in relation to Norway, to suggesting 3 articles, one on the territory, one on the civilian administration and one on the military administration - which DIREKTOR approved of. Again, mostly what I did was ask DIREKTOR to source his assertions. Other editors had sourced their proposals as to what the "entity" was called. I also checked out the sources produced by another editor which DIREKTOR claimed were a product of "quote mining" or "quote fishing". I was eventually able to help resolve part of the issue by providing a better description of the phrase "puppet state" which was causing so much trouble amongst the editors, which DIREKTOR agreed with after doing his own researches. Following this, agreement was reached on the name. I then made a variety of suggestions for the lead sentences based on the talkpage discussions, one of which was eventually agreed by all. I also try to stop editors derailing discussions by personalising the issues. DIREKTOR is not the only offender in this regard - just one of the most prolific. Perhaps I should also say at this point that I do not accept at all the suggestion by DIREKTOR that this is all about him or getting at him or opposing his views. A careful reading of the discussion pages will not show this - but they are very very lengthy. detailed and repetitive. That's one of the problems. Fainites ^barleyscribs 05:42, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Just as a matter of interest,hereis an exampleon the Ivo Andric page which doesn't involve Direktor at all. This was an attempt to find a solution to a slow motion edit war about Andric'c ethnicity etc etc. The discussion also spilled onto some infobox disputes.Fainites ^barleyscribs 15:24, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Proposal: Ceasing of any contact between the involved parties.

After reading every comment by the involved parties, I think that the two should cease any form of contact/stalking/etc from now on. It's clearly obvious that if you're not going to play nice, then fuck it and don't play at all. Rainbow Dash !xmcuvg2MH 02:53, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Rainbow, I think that presence of User:Fainites was very helpful and constructive when article Serbia under German occupation is in question. DIREKTOR trying for months to edit this article in accordance with his personal opinion disregarding any source that I presented to him (while DIREKTOR himself either did not provided sources for his claims either sources that he recalled in fact spoke against his opinion). User:Fainites only tried to mediate dispute between me and DIREKTOR and I do not think that he was sided against DIREKTOR. For example, during renaming disputes, Fainites tried to find such name of the article that would be also acceptable for DIREKTOR. So, I would like to know what exactly would mean that "any contact between the involved parties" should be ceased? Is that mean that DIREKTOR would be free to edit article Serbia under German occupation as he wish and that no admin will be present there to evaluate his edits, his claims and, most importantly,his sources? I think that presence of an admin is very important there, and user:Fainites would be best for that job since he is familiar with the subject. Of course, presence and mediation of other admins there is welcomed too. I am tired of presenting sources on talk page to be welcomed by DIREKTOR's repeated posts in which he completely disregards any source or argument that I presented and only repeat same things from his previous post over and over like that I did not said anything. He also constantly reverting my edits there, including removal of POV tags that I added, and due to the fact that I do not want to be involved in constant revert warring, I was forced to let DIREKTOR to edit this article in accordance with his POV, no matter that his edits are to high degree unsupported by the sources. Other users that edited this article have simply abandoned the subject because they were unable to argue with DIREKTOR. I certainly doubt that one article should be written in accordance with POV of a single user who is more aggressive than others and who trying to impose his POV by all possible means. One more thing, somebody presented opinion that DIREKTOR's approach is "opposed to national approach to Balkans history". Due to the fact that he is from Croatia, I did not noticed that his approach opposed "national approach to Croatian history". Most of his POV disputes are related to Serbian history: Serbia under German occupation, Chetniks, Draža Mihajlović. All in all, presence and mediation of an admin is very needed when DIREKTOR's involvement related to these articles is in question. PANONIAN 06:00, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Rainbow Dash I don't want to be rude here but you don't seem to have understood anything that is going on. Fainites is an admin who is trying to prevent edit warring and talk page conflict on some of the Balkans articles. In order to do that he has banned DIREKTOR from editing those pages. He has done that under an arbitration committee ruling that states that any uninvolved admin can impose any sanction they see fit for editors of these articles. This ruling came about because the Balkans have been edit warred over for years by people with very strongly held opinions who's aim is to skew the articles to reflect their POV. DIREKTOR is arguing that Fainites had no right to ban him because he is not an uninvolved admin. He has brought the issue here so that other admins can assess the fairness of the ban and possibly overturn it. The discussions above centre on what "uninvolved" means exactly. Does expressing an opinion on a talk page make an admin "involved" even if that admin never edits the actual article?

Now as I see it there are several possible outcomes here:

1. We decide that Fainites was not right to impose the ban and lift it. Obviously this is what DIREKTOR wants. We could even sanction Fainites in some way such as banning Fainites from editing Balkans articles.
2. We decide that Fainites' was not right to impose the ban because he is involved in the articles, tell him not to do it again but decide that DIREKTOR was editing disruptively and that the ban needs to stay in place. Essentially what would happen is that Fainites ban would simply be replaced by some other, truly uninvolved admin here setting the ban instead.
3. We decide that Fainites is not involved in the articles and had every right to set the ban, and the ban needs to stay. This is what Fainites is arguing for by saying that discussing sources on a talk page does not make an admin involved.

Note that the issue here is essentially - what is appropriate for an admin to do in a situation like this. Is following an editor about stalking? Does expressing an opinion on a talk page count as involved? In short this is a bigger and more important issue than your proposed ban on contact could ever deal with. Theresa Knott | Sort that Knee! 07:08, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Comment by semi-involved NSU: (& apologies for TLDR that follows) I invite all the commenters to first read the Fainites's explanation for the ban Direktor's talk page, and then verify these assertions against e.g. Talk:Serbia under German occupation and Talk:Draža Mihailović before jumping in to conclusions. Also, check the Fainites's posts at User talk:DIREKTOR.

Throughout the last 6 months, Fainites has been acting as a mediator in these disputes, where DIREKTOR was the primary instigator. Every time Direktor crossed the line, Fainites politely and patiently explained to him where is the problem in his behavior. Every time Direktor made a repeating, bold and condescending assertion, Fainites just asked for sources. It is NOT, as DIREKTOR tries to present, "a neutral poor Direktor defending the truth against a bunch of POV-pushers"; (yes, that indeed was the situation that he faced often -- but not this time). He was systematically opposing, filibustering, complaining, and insulting several good-faith contributors who tried to improve the articles. No one of the involved in those debates, to my best knowledge, had a particular POV to push, or an axe to grind. There certainly was a difference on opinion, but Direktor cannot stand a difference in opinion. This is where the Direktor's attitude "my way or no way" showed up naked.

@Future Perfect: I'm familiar with WP:ARBMAC and your role there, and I know mostly what your involvement was. I know that there were, rightful, complaints against ARBCOM imposing your admin-topic-ban in the area. I assure you that, in this case, Fainites's role was similar, but even more restrained -- he has never displayed any POV in this area, and tried to arrange a consensus. But with Direktor, consensus is simply impossible.

I think that Direktor's heart is in the right place, and I consider him sort of acquaintance. I joked on his talk page several times [30]. But he simply cannot cooperate with others. We have witnessed his appearance at ANI about once a month in past years: and no, not all of it was just him defending Balkanic POV_pushing: it was just his self-applied role, which he played oh so well. But not this time: Fainites got into the heart of the matter, and I consider the sanction well-deserved and well thought out. To know Direktor's ways, you must spend some time in the debate with him. No, I don't think Fainites qualifies as an "involved" admin here. Even if he does, the end result is about right, in my opinion: when someone cannot edit according to WP:CIV and WP:CONSENSUS despite several attempts to make him correct his ways, he must be shown the door. No such user (talk) 07:48, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

...and, sure enough, his first edit to article space was in defiance of the topic ban. That just shows his inability to play by the rules. No such user (talk) 08:57, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

"Sure enough" indeed. I did not notice it yet, Nsu, and read about for the first time on the article talkpage after I posted, and thanks for doing your best. I'm sure the fact that we were in disagreement on Talk:Serbia under German occupation had no effect on your appearance here, just as Nuujinn's posts have nothing to do with me being the one who opposes his proposals. Its hardly surprising that users like PANONIAN, Nsu, and Nuujinn who, alongside Fainites, are currently in disagreement with me on two talkpages, would support my getting out of their hair for good (with all my annoying sources and such). And this is something all these fine gentlemen neglected to point out.

I'm putting my faith on the good sense and impartiality of Wikipedians who might, if they wish, simply read through Fainites' posts on Talk:Serbia under German occupation or Talk:Draža Mihailović/ethnic conflict drafts to determine whether he is indeed involved in those current discussions up to his proverbial elbows, and whether he did in fact oppose my proposals in virtually every discussed issue that was up for discussion. As for him following me to every serious discussion I got involved in since I met him, that is just plain obvious, a brief glance at my history will suffice. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 15:36, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

But you said above that you only edit Balkans related pages. It's not as if you were followed to a completely unrelated area of Wikipedia because you don't edit unrelated areas. Plus a number of people have stated that your editing style is problematic. It is perfectly reasonable and accepted practice for an admin to look over your contributions list given that people appear to be having trouble editing with you. Theresa Knott | Sort that Knee! 18:53, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Balkans pages are certainly not so small an area of Wikipedia that I might bump into one user over and over again every time. And indeed, Fainites is the only user I've met on all the discussions I've been part of. I arrive, he soon arrives, and sure enough in time voices his opposition to whatever it may be I support. Its the same pattern every time. And if you review the pages I've mentioned above, you'll note that all these users, Fainites included, are currently engaged in active disputes with me and would certainly like nothing better than to make their lives easier by getting rid of the main "adversary" in one stroke. They are hardly objective judges of my character.

This is a typical attempt to win an argument, or at least make it "simpler", by banning the opponent in a content dispute. The only difference is that the opposing party this time includes an ARBMAC-empowered admin with a long-standing grudge and bias. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 19:16, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I do indeed tend to arrive on Balkans pages where there is edit warring or arguments getting out of control. (For example Ivo Andric link above, Serbs of Croatia talkpage about the infobox, Serbs of Bosnia and Herzogvina, infobox again, Croats, on Emir Kusturica ethnicity/nationality. A number of these discussions do not involve Direktor at all or only minimally and uncontroversially. Direktor tends to be involved in articles involving WWII, particularly the activites of the Chetniks and Tito. My first major activity was on Yugoslav Front where the battle was over putting the Chetniks in the Axis or Allies belligerents column and they sometimes ended up in both as a consequence of edit warring. I suggested a third column. This activity grew over time - partly as a consequence of various editors realising I was prepared to look at and take action in Balkans disputes. If you look at my talkpage you will see that a variety of editors, including Direktor, have asked for my assistance over particular issues and on particular pages. I also learned that if you stop an unproductive argument on one page, for example over whether to put a genocidal fascist into the infobox to represent a people, some editors will go and carry on essentially the same argument on another article talkpage.Fainites ^barleyscribs 19:46, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

You were not invited to participate in the discussions I am referring to, certainly not by myself, and please don't attempt to imply that. Your sphere of interest on Balkans articles is more elegantly described as "articles where User:DIREKTOR has engaged in a discussion", and your activity there as "opposing User:DIREKTOR's position". Exceptions to the first "rule" are few and brief, and to the second - non-existent. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 20:20, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Butting in for a moment here...since when does ANY discussion on Wikipedia require an "invitation"? The very nature of Wikipedia is of collaboration, restricted only when editors demonstrate an inability to contribute constructively (e.g. vandalism, blatant promotional editing, WP:COI, and so on). While there are some areas and discussions most editors should (and do) approach only with great fear and trembling, I'm unaware of ANY areas, discussions or noticeboards on the en-wiki which are accessible only by invitation of others. I'd recommend discarding any notion to the contrary, unless I can be proven wrong in this. --Alan the Roving Ambassador (User:N5iln) (talk) 20:30, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Please note I am involved in this matter, but I believe that DIREKTOR's conception of collaboration with other editors is somewhat lacking, see [31] for one example. I think he means well, but in my experience he will only work with those with whom he agrees. --Nuujinn (talk) 21:08, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

@Alan the Roving Ambassador. Of course discussions do not require an invitation, certainly not, why would you even think I'm suggesting that? Fainites' post implied he entered the talkpage discussions and followed me around for six months on invitation by others, even myself. I merely pointed out that was not the case. The reason I posted this thread was that I have been followed to every discussion I got involved in, opposed on every single issue, hindered, threatened, and finally blocked for seven months by a user who has abused his administrator privileges and harbours an admitted animosity towards me. I am appealing to the community for a review of the situation.

@Nuujinn. Yes, you are very much involved. If I do get banned for good your version of the text will be entered into the article, concluding a month-long discussion and dispute in your favour. To that end, you are hard at work trying to find cherry-picked "shocking" quotations to make certain Fainites, who (openly) supports your version, does indeed get rid of me. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 21:23, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It's regrettable that behavioral issues sometimes conclusively determine the outcome of content disputes which are being worked on in good faith, but that does not invalidate our necessity to act upon the behavioral issues.

I have not seen a good refutation of the claims that there are valid behavioral issues underlying Fainites actions, nor good suport that he was in fact involved or acting in bad faith or to win a content dispute when he issued the ban. Perhaps the evidence exists, but what is being posted here is discussion, not diffs.

I understand your opinion that this is what happened, DIREKTOR. I believe that you believe so in good faith. But you need to provide actual evidence (diffs, etc) to convince uninvolved admins.

Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:42, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I dare say its often unclear whether behavioural issues cause content disputes, or disputes behavioural issues. Being harassed and frustrated by one and the same admin wherever you turn, for months on end, can have its impact on behaviour I assure you, particularly towards the user and the editors with whom he has found common ground in this. I shall do so to the best of my ability tomorrow (its almost midnight CET), its quite the project as you can imagine. Regards --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 21:50, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Direktor, I don't see evidence from you that you have been "harassed" by Fainites. His interventions seem to be entirely in keeping with an administrative role. On the other hand, I do see evidence from Fainites and several other editors that you have repeatedly expressed strong opinions and, when asked by other editors, have failed to provide sources to back up your claims. You have often carried on discussion long past the point where it is constructive or useful. There seems to be little doubt that you have been disruptive. Sunray (talk) 20:19, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

La goutte de pluie's personal agenda

There is this problem with this editor La goutte de pluie and this has been going from months on pages related to Singaporean politicians/politics, in particular those related to PAP (People's Action Party). The precise affected pages are Teo Ser Luck, Tin Pei Ling and Vivian Balakrishnan. I really do not know what is her problem and I seriously believe she should have her tools removed as she is unable to do neutral edits on their pages.

The incident I need to pinpoint is currently happening on Singaporean general election 2011 where La goutte de pluie is back to her old ways of editing of the subheading related to Vivian Balakrishnan. For some reason, she seems rather persistent to change the subheading from "Balakrishnan accuses SDP of "suppressing video" to "Balakrishnan accuses SDP of "gay agenda". This happened because of what happened at Vivian Balakrishnan's page earlier, where La goutte de pluie had wikilink words like "agenda" to gay agenda" and the idiom "come out of the closet" to "coming out of the closet". I had spotted it and removed it because I did not feel it was right to insinuate instead of letting readers judge by themselves when they can simply read up the references. She went back to revert it several times. It wasn't until User_talk:Zhanzhao who intervened that the matter got settled.

When I checked on the Singaporean general election 2011 page in early July, I spotted the same wikiwords insinuating gay issues and subheading "addressing "gay agenda". I then edited the subheading to a more neutral tone to fit the issue which surfaced from a video and removed the inappropriate wikiwords. However La goutte de pluie just couldn't accept and again started another reverting war regarding the subheading. Zhanzhao had more or less settled it in the Talk section and now it's August and once again, La goutte de pluie has started reverting back.

The other issues :

1. Page Protection Violation on Teo Ser Luck by User/EditorElle which resulted after a dispute with her for adding trivia matter and attempting to support it with a less-than-convincing reference. She attempts to add it back again after the issue was finally over.

2. La goutte de pluie's ilogical edits on Tin Pei Ling page which has caused the page to appear more like a tabloid page, packed with trivia quotes. She also seems to hate her so much that she bothered to upload the image here and another on Tin Pei Ling's page which I have requested it to be checked and removed.

I would like to clarify I am not a sockpuppet. I was on the IP 218.186.16.x and now am usually on the IP add 202.156.13.x. The dynamic IP also tends to flip between 2 from time to time. This clarification is here just in case you confuse me with the other anonymous IP users on Vivian Balakrishnan's page (which added his photo). I am not related to those IPs in any manner.202.156.13.11 (talk) 21:46, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

User notified. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 21:51, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, this is a chronic problem with this admin. I almost blocked her a few weeks ago after she violated 3RR on Teo Ser Luck. There were some calls for an RFC/U and desysopping at that time since she edited through full protection to continue her edit war on this topc. I'd support a topic ban on singaporean politics at a minimum. This problem is not going away by ignoring it. Toddst1 (talk) 22:02, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I suppose the question is - what administrative action does the original poster want? A topic ban requires a community discussion, removal of tools requires a request to Arbcom, and we'd probably want an RFC/U first. Has the admin in question done anything actually blockable? Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:38, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

If true, wouldn't the "edited through full protection" claimed by Toddst1 be immediately blockable? (Unless it is something admins don't immediately recognize because of the ability to edit still being present) If such changes weren't reverted immediately after discovering the accident, then what is the point of 'full protection'? -- Avanu (talk) 17:55, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

That as I said, was a mistake. I posted on Toddst's talk page, saying his protection was a mistake, that the anonymous users involved were reluctant to engage in discussion and use the talk pages; most dispute blocks expire within 72-96 hours (as is the norm and the policy -- do not issue protections of excessive lengths) -- Toddst, who is an active admin, didn't reply to me within 72-96 hours, so I thought he had seen my proposal to restore the disputed edit if the IPs didn't use the talk pages within that time. And they didn't -- in general, they only reverted when their desired version was not on the page, never checking the talk pages when their desired revision was in place; they did not understand policy nor were they willing to engage in compromise in discussion, whereas I was seeking compromise and understanding with every step. It was my expectation that within that time protection would be over. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 18:14, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Response

My personal agenda, if I have one, is in protecting Wikipedia from conflict of interest agents that have descended upon the article lately; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Geneva2011, where an absurd amount of sockpuppetry and anonymous IPs -- some which trace back to government institutions and ministry addresses -- do various things like remove various criticisms without explanation, add in promotional material of their own (for various ministries or programmes). The Young PAP by the way, have long been suspected by the Singaporean internet community of being hired trolls. It is very clear for example, that User:Eggsauto99 and others are "public relations managers" -- note the high-resolution official photos uploaded, and constant reversion to their favoured language, blatantly taken from government websites -- I would simply like for these editors to declare their affiliation and their COIs.

We have good evidence that these users are part of a government-endorsed smear campaign, by trying to include the accusations of "gay agenda" on opposition politicians' articles, but deleting all mentions of such accusations from politicians who made them, i.e. Vivian Balakrishnan. It is a terrible twist on BLP policy when homophobic accusers are allowed to escape "scot free" while their accusations are freely piled on on their victims' articles. See: contributions of one such user to Vincent Wijeysingha, where this user tried to add material accusing Wijeysingha of having a gay agenda (to scare off religious voters) at the same time his proven sockpuppet removed "gay agenda" material from his employer's article (this diff accessible to administrators only).

That Vivian Balakrishnan accused a Singaporean opposition politician of having a gay agenda is well-known issue among Singaporeans (shown by any google search). To reduce the summary of his actions (as titles are supposed to do) to "suppressing video" is nothing more than a government-supported attempt at whitewashing the article. I would like to draw attention to the matter I am drafting an RFC about this; the only reason why no one pays attention is because most editors hail from the United States. If a Congressman or a US government entity were doing this, there would be immense uproar: see Wikipedia:Requests for comment/United States Congress.

elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 22:45, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Regardless of anything else, citing a random-uploaders prob (c) YouTube clip, and posting WP:OR in an article, with this edit is against many policies; do you accept that, or do we need to explain it?  Chzz  ►  23:40, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

It's not against policy to cite a television interview by Channel 5 (Singapore). In fact, I kept it as a reference, without the link, if only to avoid potential copyright problems (but even then, fair use can be claimed for keeping a referenced link). There's nothing wrong with using Youtube videos as a source, if they are not self-published sources. Since when was a television interview a self-published source? YouTube is merely a host. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 01:31, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

La goutte de pluie, it seems evident from your own statement just above that you have too much COI in this general issue to use admin tools in this area. If people need to be blocked, or articles protected, or edits made on protected pages, you really should let other admins do it. If the troll situation is as bad as you say, the most helpful thing you could do is to use your experience to bring the various COI editors and sockpuppets to community attention in the appropriate places, instead of dealing with them personally, just as you would if you did not have admin tools. DGG ( talk ) 00:22, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I have used my tools in this very sparingly, precisely for the concerns stated. I have repeatedly made pleas on various noticeboards, but usually people are a) new to the dispute b) do not realise I am an already an administrator trying to fight a long-term problem (for example, posting to the COI board generally brings a very specific block or remedy, and does not solve the sockpuppetry problem). I was about to make an RFC for this reason, to draw greater attention to this problem.

I do not think I have a COI, unless you take the IPs' word that being LGBT somehow is an inherent COI. My biggest ambition is to make the editors involve learn that a) they cannot make COI edits with impunity b) they should declare their conflict of interest c) some basic respect for the project. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 01:38, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

• I have been invited to comment here by the complaining IP editor on my talk page. I have made my views known previously at the first ANI link he provides above. I have no doubt that La goutte de pluie has a major COI in this area and would be well served laying off these pages, but the same goes for the countless IPs (more likely one user who's been socking; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Geneva2011/Archive) — this is not a one-way street. The IP editor himself has a COI and POV in this area and should likewise be sanctioned here; this to me is a WP:BOOMERANG case. Both sides are strongly at fault. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 00:33, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't think the link has proven that I am a sockpuppet or part of the government conspiracy that La goutte de pluie has been insisting is happening.202.156.13.11 (talk) 00:44, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Probably not as I'd like it to, because CheckUsers don't like linking accounts to IP addresses. So, it really is impossible to tell unless I take your word for it, which I'm sorry to say I'm not prepared to.

At this moment, I would strongly support a ban for both La goutte de pluie and the IP editor, certainly at the very least from interacting with each other; and in the longer run a topic ban from Singapore politics. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 00:47, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Get someone to check then. I am not afraid. Kindly advise why I should be banned then. I do not see how this is fair. You have semi-protected Tin Pei Ling page and Vivian Balakrishnan page to deter IP editors from editing on several occasions and each time La goutte de pluie would go back to revert back to her edits. As I have have pointed out earlier, the problem with her edits lies with her POV which can never be kept neutral. I would also like to point out I am constantly updating Singaporean presidential election, 2011 at the moment but once again La goutte de pluie feels the need to question the anonymous editors on the page. Is there a need to declare government conspiracy on every single politician talk page and threaten semi-protection each time I do an edit on someone's page?202.156.13.11 (talk) 01:08, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

These issues would be easily solved by getting an account, but you have refused to do so. What is my POV/COI, may I ask? The only reason I use semi-protection -- and I have used it sparingly -- is to prevent abusive sock/meatpuppetry when it is especially rampant on some articles, as your allies are wont to do. Get an account. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 01:38, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps some ground rules would help. These are standard for all admins and all articles:-

• You can't admin and edit in the same article

  An admin may not semi or protect an article where they are editing the article. If the page is being vandalised, take it to RFPP

  An admin may not edit through protection to put their own preferred version in an article, and the admin who protected it may not edit the article AT ALL while it is protected.

  If you think a user is a sock, make a sockpuppet investigation request

Elle, if you breach these rules, you are likely to end up without your admin tools.

At the same time, it does sound as if the area could do with more eyes to help achieve neutrality. Any volunteers? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Elen of the Roads (talk • contribs)

I don't actually think your "ground rules" match current practice. Simple non-controversial admin actions such as anti-Vandalism work (including routine semiprotection, vandal blocks, obvious sock blocks etc.) have always been exempt from "involvement" rules. What admins need to avoid is using their admin status to further their own position in a content dispute; where there is no content dispute -- e.g. with vandals or banned users --, involvement problems don't come into play. Fut.Perf. ☼ 11:06, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I thought we could take it as read that normally editors would not have a problem with an otherwise involved admin dealing with a vandal who replaced the entire lede with the word 'penis' 5 times. However, this is not your standard vandalism, is it. What we have here is an admin reverting content edits and insisting that they are vandalism by agents of the government, I think the instruction to post a request at RFPP is one that the community would expect as de minimis to avoid the appearance of bias. Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:38, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I do think if the users in question end up using sockpuppets and rapidly switching IPs ten times in a row to circumvent 3RR, then anti-IP-hopping action can be taken. In the past, these users' IPs were blocked for using open proxies, and would, despite my requested entreaties, refuse to use the talk page. None of this would occur if the users in question would stick to one IP (the hopping is far from accidental) or use accounts. Some of this action is probably coordinated from the YPAP messageboard (now hidden). elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 13:48, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

At the same time, I've always waited for other administrators to come in, i.e. hence my posts at ANI and the COI noticeboard, but the intervening admins treat it as a matter of routine, rather than looking at the overall pattern, so it is quite frequent that they simply block the latest incarnation and mark the issue as "resolved". Sometimes, they issue a rangeblock, but they do not at all address the continuing pattern that government-backed resources are being used to push a certain COI on Wikipedia, and thus many IP ranges are open to these editors' use. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 13:55, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

La goutte de pluie, I see you do not accept that this edit is a problematic effort, and thus unfortunately it seems I do need to explain this very important point of policies;

The point of 'verifiability' is, so that the reader is able to check the facts. If the referenced material is not available (such as, a TV show that was broadcast once, not published), it is not verifiable.

Occasionally, a television station will provide archives, or the broadcast could be available on media such as DVD, or they might have an official YouTube channel.

That is not the case here. The YouTube video was uploaded by a random-person-on-the-internet; we have no evidence to suggest it is free of copyright. That is covered in WP:LINKVIO.

I have no idea what you mean by "fair use can be claimed for keeping a referenced link"; frankly, that makes no sense to me.  Chzz  ►  12:26, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

In addition, your demands above, that users get an account, are totally inappropriate. This is the encyc. that anyone can edit; registration is not required.  Chzz  ►  12:52, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

That video was actually linked via Temasek Review and Google News; plus CNA does actually archive all its news shows. Considering it was an interview with Lee Hsien Loong, you know, the Prime Minister of Singapore. If you are using a video as a source (albeit a primary one) and are not transcluding it in the actual article, it is not violation on our part to simply cite it (as opposed to transcluding any of its content in the article). elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 13:48, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It is a violation of our copyright policies to link to a site that contains a copyvio - that includes in a citiation. This is one of the reasons why YouTube citations are often removed on sight. The question is - is this particular upload part of CNA's archive, or was it uploaded by some random who had recorded it off their tv? Elen of the Roads (talk) 14:00, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

That video does have an arguable claim for fair use though. It is less than 5-10% of the entire work (the episode). YouTube videos have been used as verifiable sources for various articles (see Christine O'Donnell and "I'm not a witch"), and very short clips from interviews and parodies are cited. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 20:39, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

No, you see that's a complete misunderstanding of what the copyright policy says. The YouTube clip is a copyvio. We cannot link to copyvios. Non-copyvio videos can be a source - the organisation I work for hosts an entire set of videos on YouTube. Those are not copyvios. Those could be linked to if they provided a source for something. None of the Christine O'Donnell clips are copyvios because they are genuine transformative fair use. Ripping off the first 10 minutes of a 50 minute programme is not fair use, it is a copyvio. Elen of the Roads (talk) 23:17, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but I already amended my citation to not include a YouTube link, just to be sure. I would have clipped the entire clip to a 20-second-statement if necessary, but there is nothing wrong with the citation itself. It still is a reliable source. My beef with the IP is that he was out to game the system; he did not actually care about the spirit of the policy he cited; he did not try to change material to comply with policy (i.e. simply removing the link, rather than the entire reference), rather he cherrypicked policy to push a POV. We do after all, have Template:Cite video. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 23:28, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I had removed it because of copyrights and because it was totally redundant towards bulding up her page. I find it most absurd that you argued for it to be placed there just because "It's a comment made by the revered and mighty PM Lee. How can that not justify an inclusion? ". PM Lee made remarks on overseas politicians. Why don't you try to add it on their pages?202.156.13.245 (talk) 21:37, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Temasek

Should we really be using this "Temasek Review" as a reference? It's 'about' page says it is an internet socio-political blog, and their tagline is An Online Community Of Daft Singaporean Noises.

Currently, the article in question has a whole section dedicated to this purported "Cooling-off day controversy" - as I understand it, it's about a controversial comment posted on Tin Pei Ling's Facebook page, and the question of who posted it, with Tin saying it wasn't her, but an admin. The ref we use from Temasek declares this a lie, because on an election declaration, Tin filled in "moderator" as herself. This seems like tabloid pap, and I don't think it belongs on Wikipedia; at the least, it seems WP:UNDUE, and weakly-sourced for a strong BLP claim.

I apologize in advance, as I do realise this is a content concern, not normally for ANI; but given the above, it seems specific and apposite as an example, in relation to the actual complaint. Plus, of course, as a BLP issue it deserves our consideration.  Chzz  ►  15:10, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

No, we shouldn't, imo, and this has previously been reaffirmed at WP:RSN. It's been my experience that La goutte de pluie insists this and another anti-government site, The Online Citizen, are legitimate reliable sources, although this has been rejected in the past at RSN. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 15:14, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Do you have a link to the RSN discussion? So far, what we have here is a lot of pebbles going down a mountain, rather than a single clear offence that is by itself sufficient for any action. As such, an RFC/U followed by an RfAR if required, is looking like the correct way to go. Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:48, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

electronic Singapore press sources at RS/N (drive-by link) 71.234.215.133 (talk) 17:04, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It's a supplementary source, which is supported by a primary source taken from a government website -- the election forms themselves are public. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 18:08, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Could you please explain which policy/guideline applies to use of such a 'supplementary source'? Or do you accept it is OR?  Chzz  ►  18:22, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

The rationale given to avoid using these 2 sources are rightly explained in the RSN link. Especially with many of the articles there written by "Anonymous", reliability and verifiability is a big issue. Even when they claim to have a board of editors overseeing the content. The forms are indeed validly linked. However its the reported controversy surrounding the alleged offence on which the forms are based that is the point of contention here, specifically the accusation made by the blog, that is in contention here. As I recall, the incident was also reported by the mainstream press, so those sources are preferred. DanS76 (talk) 18:25, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, DanS76, but - the mainstream covers that posted on FB and that the police are investigating re. 'cooling off' but... they don't talk of this form, and the ""Tin Pei Ling is the ONLY approved moderator of her Facebook".

Again, sincere apologies for fixating on this example, but if we could establish the actual problem with that one case, which La goutte de pluie seems to say isn't problematic, perhaps we could make progress.

Maybe we cannot, and maybe an RFC/U is necessary; I admit it looks likely. But if we can avoid it, by getting somewhere re. the specifics, that'd be better. Right now, I think La goutte de pluie is misunderstanding several important policies; I was hoping through some discussion they might agree voluntarily to stepping away from this, from avoiding WP:INVOLVED, to adhere carefully to RS/V/BLP, and so forth.  Chzz  ►  18:40, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Anonymity is a necessity because of the government's reputation of prosecuting political opponents. (I'd like to remind everyone that the press freedom of Singapore has an international rank of 154....i.e. very very bad.) I see no reason why the references from both sides of the dispute should not be included. The "mainstream press" has a well-known pro-government bias. Normally TR sources have borderline issues, but if they file an Exposé supported by verifiable sources, then I believe it deserves to be reported, as an important check on the mainstream press. That's the problem with sources in Singapore -- all sources in Singapore have issues. Fann Sim is a professional journalist hired by Yahoo (who by the way, writes very professional articles), who, on the topic of Teo Ser Luck, reported what everyone was thinking, but journalists working in Singapore Press Holdings were more reluctant to say. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 18:37, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I sympathize to some extent but, frankly, that is not Wikipedia's problem. If there are no RS, there are no RS, and we cannot fall back on user-generated content. You can't make the rules.

The journalist isn't important. If the most-respected journalist in the world writes on her facebook page, it's not a reliable source for news.

La goutte de pluie, can you think of a way forward here, other than RFC/U, to resolve these issues?  Chzz  ►  18:49, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

But I argue that it is not user-generated content, given that TR already has a journalistic reputation, and that government censors pay a lot of attention to it, and has repeatedly tried to bully it into submission (by restricting its donations). The New Paper is not any less tabloidy than Temasek Review, if not more, and yet it is also treated as a reliable source. Surely it cannot be worse than MoveOn.org (which AFAIK, is also a verifiable source) or sources from well-known activist organisations. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 19:50, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

My gosh, La goutte de pluie, you are not still fixated on that satire piece by Fann Simm, are you.... Yes, I call it that, because I doubt a serious news piece would include these lines "Teo Ser Luck transformed himself into somewhat of an overaged, over-enthusiastic cheerleader during one of the PAP rallies by yelling all the names of six-man Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC team. The Senior Parliamentary Secretary for the Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports saved the best for last when he shouted for the estimated 1,000-crowd to chant his own name. The response was, er, less than encouraging.". Or in any case, it should not be taken seriously as was done in your edit here [32]. Which was already discussed to death in the subject's talk page. I think what we have here is a general confusion about what is/is not acceptable as a reliable source, on top of everything being discussed here.DanS76 (talk) 19:00, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Articles and blog posts from well-known journalists, despite scathing language, are frequently accepted as sources (see The Guardian, Huffington Post, The Register, etc. etc.) Furthermore, I reported as an opinion, rather than as a fact. The most important thing is editorial discretion, which Yahoo News! Singapore clearly has (after all, the tagline of their series is "Fit to Post"). elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 19:46, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

A wildly uninvolved editor

The only reason I have seen this is because I was following my posting to this board. As far as I know, I have never interacted with anyone posting in this section beyond the drive-by link I supplied earlier.

Having said this, I think User:La goutte de pluie's actions have been beyond the bounds of a WP Admin. "elle" has been involved in edit warring, page protection violation, source protection argument, primary sourcing...

Editors must trust the Administrators as they are Administrators, yet I do not trust the Administrator as an editor. Wrap your brain around this as you will. 71.234.215.133 (talk) 19:52, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Sorry I don't get what's so controversial about reverting blatant copyright violations taken verbatim from government websites, especially when socks are involved. The edit through protection was a mistake, as I explained above. It has been my constant and every desire to have civil collaboration with every editor involved; however when there are anonymous editors editing on the behalf of an employer, whose interests are a higher priority than that of a project (the very definition of a conflict of interest) I cannot help my suspicion. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 20:10, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Is there a way forward avoiding RFC/U and following

Maybe we can avoid this getting messy simply by restating policy and asking Elle to confirm that she is fully signed up to it. Elle, would you be amenable to confirming that you understand and agree to stick to the following

Involvement (lifted from WP:ADMIN

• Conflict of interest, non-neutrality, or content dispute – Administrators should not use their tools to advantage, or in a content dispute (or article) where they are a party (or significant editor), or where a significant conflict of interest is likely to exist. With few specific exceptions (like obvious vandalism) where tool use is allowed by any admin, administrators should ensure they are reasonably neutral parties when they use the tools.
• Involvement is generally construed very broadly by the community, to include current or past conflicts with an editor (or editors), and disputes on topics, regardless of the nature, age, or outcome of the dispute.
• it is still best practice in cases where an administrator may be seen to be involved to pass the matter to another administrator via the relevant noticeboards.

Copyright (from WP:LINKVIO)

• If you know or reasonably suspect that an external Web site is carrying a work in violation of the creator's copyright, do not link to that copy of the work. Knowingly and intentionally directing others to a site that violates copyright has been considered a form of contributory infringement in the United States (Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry [1]). Linking to a page that illegally distributes someone else's work sheds a bad light on Wikipedia and its editors.

Reliable sources (from WP:USERG)

• Some news outlets host interactive columns they call blogs, and these may be acceptable as sources so long as the writers are professional journalists or are professionals in the field on which they write AND (emphasis mine) the blog is subject to the news outlet's full editorial control. Posts left by readers may never be used as sources. Self-published material may be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications. Self-published sources should never be used as third-party sources about living persons, even if the author is a well-known professional researcher or writer

If you can agree to the above, and agree to take any disagreements over sources to WP:RS/N and seek wider consensus, then I believe the community will be reassured.Elen of the Roads (talk) 20:03, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I am of course agreeable to all of this. I would also like for the community would pay more attention to the matter at hand. That has been my every desire -- my approach so far has been to wait several days to see if anyone would intervene -- posting on noticeboards if necessary. Can I ask the community to notice:

• Pay attention to the entire issue, especially the COI involved:
• Notice that long-term abuse, and widespread IP-hopping is involved

Other Singaporean administrators have been inactive. I have been taking it to other noticeboards, but what happens is that intervening administrators issue short-term remedies and then I am left at a loss when perpetrators switch to a different IP range, hit a different article (after it has been semi-protected by an intervening admin) or try a new way to game the system. It has been my every desire to avoid using the tools in an involved manner. In the rare cases where I do use my tools in the area, it generally has been to follow-up on another administrator's similar, but incomplete action.

The IPs involved have a very interesting conception of "abusing the tools" -- being queer, or posting one's suspicions on a talk page -- count as guilty for these IPs. At one time, the IP constantly reverted my additions to an article talk page (see the page history of Talk:Teo Ser Luck), and I saw it as uncontroversial to reinstate my own comments.

My suspicion is that if this were a matter concerning Western politics, there would be widespread attention quite quickly. More vigilant (and complete!) eyes is what I ask for. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 20:23, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Does it really matter that other administrators be Singaporean to be eligible to intervene? In fact, by getting non-Singaporean administrators involved, the likelyhood of COI is greately reduced, as they can remain more objective. And Elle, although you do make use of the talk pages, there have been cases when you dont and basically ignore discussions when editing. I.e.this edit when I had already for a discussion of the content on the talk pages. Plus the edit history basically shows an war in progress. And its not that other administrators have not taken action. They have been issuing warnings to both the IP and Elle, but both sides are choosing to ignore the warnings. Would you have them take punitive action immediately ratther than engage you in dialogue?Zhanzhao (talk) 20:57, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Wait what? I waited for a reply from the intervening IP on that talk page for weeks...which never came. I made two reverts, one was because the reversion by the IP was given without explanation, and the second time was with my own explanation. Upon getting reverted once more, I promptly ceased.

It seems to me that the IP simply has no interest in the project, other than that of his employer's. All that matters for that IP is to ensure that his/her employer is not associated with the remarks he himself made. I consider this especially grievous, since the accusation was splattered all over Vincent Wijeysingha's page by accounts linked to the government (User:Alverya was declared a "likely" sock of User:Geneva2011, and both edited from government IPs). elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 21:13, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

The call for discussion was made to any and all editors who were making the changes/revisions that I asked to be settled in Talk before another edit war occurs. Which it did again. That includes both the IP AND you, Elle. If you had responded earlier, and not now, only the IP would have been guilty of not following protocol. As it is, both you and the IP are basically just warring with each other and reverting the exact same changes repeatedly, which if occuring within 24 hrs would have been an outright 3RRR matter. As it is, its still a 3RRR in spirit. As an admin, pardon the cliche, with great power comes great responsibility to do what is right. This is not the first time the issue is raised to you. Zhanzhao (talk) 21:54, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

There was a gap of 2-3 weeks in which the IP never returned to discussion, satisfied that the right version had been reinstated, and never responded to my arguments. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 21:59, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) x some,

It sounds very much as though you are saying the ends justify the means; that you believe it acceptable for an admin to disregard policy, guidelines, consensus and due process because of exceptional circumstances. It is not.

I am sure that a number of us here sympathize with your concerns over freedom of the press in Singa. However, that is not, will never be, an excuse for disregarding WP:V, WP:BLP, WP:INVOLVED and other policy/guidelines. You cannot make claims, without proof. You cannot make accusations such as "socking" without launching an SPI.

Right now, here, we are teetering on the brink of requesting formal procedures toward sanctions, to enforce regard for established guidelines.

We're trying to find a way to avoid it. You'll need to make considerable concessions; perhaps agreeing to not edit any articles in this area for some time. You'll also need to accept that the aforementioned policies are not to be disregarded "because you think it is RIGHT".  Chzz  ►  22:01, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

My concern is actually not actually who "is right"; my gravest concern is WP:COI; I simply want these IPs to follow policy and I would prefer that the project not gain a reputation with government astroturfers that Wikipedia is an open hunting ground, or that criticisms can be removed with impunity. I disagree with a topic ban, if only because a) the users involved are anonymous b) too little attention is paid in this area. I have been very reluctant to use my tools but I will become even more so.

I am quite puzzled by the idea that I am making claims without proof. Users have generally agreed with me, that socks are involved; the SPI was launched by Strange Passerby after it happened after the nth time; I have in fact, posted previous evidence and proof on ANI before. I believe there is also "if it quacks like a duck" principle; initially, in the very early days of the dispute, and because CheckUser would be excessive (especially since it is likely only to catch registered users), I did not file an SPI report. SPI is not very good at identifying links between unregistered IPs.

I have never "disregarded" any policies and I have always considered the issues involved "carefully". For example, when a like to an interview used as a reference reverted by an anonymous user (linked in pattern to those with a likely COI and those who wish to game the system) on the grounds of "no Youtube videos" allowed; I have always double-checked policy to see if there are any grounds for such a removal. YouTube videos are frequently removed because a) of the fear of SPS b) of the fear of infringing copyright. I also read up regularly on fair use case law. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 22:14, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

So basically you assumed consensus after a period of inactivity to enter your edit which restarted the edit war. Even though there was already a Talk topic on the area of conflict. I would like to point out that this is almost the exact same pattern of behaviour that got you into the last ANI report, the only difference being that instead of editing through a protected page, you edited in spite of an existing Talk topic that specifically requested input from the warring parties (you included, as yoi were very actively defending your edit), changing what was a safer wording (which was taking directly from the source) to something you SYNTHESISED. Do you see the problem yet? Zhanzhao (talk) 22:11, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Hold on, where did I synthesise anything? My summary was taken straight from news sources. One of the headlines from the mainstream press (TodayOnline) was: "PAP: Will Wijeysingha pursue gay agenda? SDP: No, we will not". I cited this repeatedly (in addition to other mainstream mentions that Balakrishnan basically had a tiff with the SDP over an alleged gay agenda).

I disagree that it was "a safer wording" -- it is something that I believe is being used to whitewash the topic in favour of an employer. I actually don't really care what the title says or "the Truth" -- it is in the intention of the anonymous editing that concerns me most. For example, look at the history of Vivian Balakrishnan/deleted revisions (the original article was deleted because of six-year-old foundational copyvio issues) and look at the unexplained removals from likely government employee User:Eggsauto99 (and his related socks), where similar removals took place in order to whitewash articles that put his employer in a bad light. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 22:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

For the others -- you should take a look at the insertions of User:Geneva2011/ User:Eggsauto99 (among his IP allies) regarding text and photos taken verbatim from government sources, or from high-resolution privileged perspectives that betray being a government employee. This, in addition to occasional WHOIS of IPs contributing to socking occasionally turning up government ministries (I have cited the specific instances before in past reports), creates a very strong suspicion of COI. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 22:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Q what do you mean by "SPS" in the above?  Chzz  ►  22:19, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Self-published sources. SPS depends on author, the publishing organisation and editorial discretion; it is not a question of format. YouTube is frequently used to make SPS, but is not always used to make SPS. The IP who reverted me in that instance was out to game the system and cherrypick policy (oh Youtube videos are looked down upon! revert) without looking at the spirit of the policy or guideline, which in this case, is to inhibit the use of SPS. We can reference television interviews which have been broadcast; in fact, sources do this all the time. Under the fair use case law that I have seen, I never seen where already-broadcast news reports have been treated as unpublished material, and the use of citations of interviews and excerpts is supported by fair use case law.elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 22:27, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

You cannot reference something that cannot be verified. A broadcast TV interview is, often, not verifiable. Your 'evidence' of a person uploading it to YouTube, apart from almost certainly being a copyright violation, is not a reliable source.  Chzz  ►  22:33, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Where is this supported by policy? There are tons of authoritative guides on how to cite TV interviews. The archives are physically accessible in Singaporean archives and libraries. (We have a National Archives of all past news broadcasts and publications, you know, and SPH is owned by the government.) In any case, even if the link to the video was problematic (which I removed as a concession, but I consider our link to it, fair use), its citation is not.

Some example articles where YouTube links to interviews are used without objection:

• Barack Obama
• Christine O'Donnell
• Milton Friedman
• Bob McDonnell
• Virginia gubernatorial election, 2009

Use for cases of critique or commentary, use for informational purposes, and nonfringing market share strengthen a claim for fair use. (The uploader is a press freedom watchdog organisation)elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 22:44, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I checked Barack_Obama, and saw uploads from users "BarackObamadotcom" and "MoxNewsDotCom". Those are, apparently, official channels. I did not check the others.  Chzz  ►  03:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

If you revisit the source, you will see that the question was targeted at just one party member (individual) asking if he will pursue his "agenda" in the political arena, and the SDP (party) was only asked "about their position on their matter", to quote the article. And yet, you arrived at "Balakrishnan accuses the SDP of a "gay agenda"." Where its the whole party itself rather than the person being "accused". I'd like to further point out that the term "accused" was only used with the act of suppressing a videos in the related issue, not in the context of how that one member was questioned. Accused is a strong, and potentially non-neutral word, that should be used carefully.

Yes, Elle, this is a case of SYNTHESIS. What you call "whitewash", I call "safer wording", or insurance against prevent embellishment and exaggeration. Zhanzhao (talk) 22:54, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It is certainly whitewashing if performed by editors with a likely conflict of interest. That fact concerns me the most.

Zhanzhao, the press source still basically says Vivian Balakrishnan (as spokesman for the PAP -- it is common to use synecdoche in the news) accused the SDP of having a gay agenda. That is their summary -- which they cannot make lightly -- and since we were talking about summaries, this supports my argument to summarise it that way. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 23:04, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

You still don't get it. You are trying to explain that your summary says its SDP the party being accused, but the actual source only has one of the SDP members being questioned, while the party was only asked about their position or stance on the matter. I think you are starting to get confused yourself when you try to lump everything together, so thats why, with this case being a good example, it might be necessary to stick to the source wording rather than attempt to do a misleading summary. This could have been trashed out in talk instead of being discussed here. Hence the need for protocol. Zhanzhao (talk) 23:12, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, and the source interpreted this as the entire party being accused. I believe it is correct to use this source's interpretation to support what is clearly obvious to everyone: Balakrishnan accused an SDP politician (and the party he represents) of having a gay agenda. That a press source made this interpretation should be sufficient evidence. The claim that Balakrishnan made his initial "suppressing remark" without consciously trying to insinuate that the SDP had a gay agenda, is a fringe claim and should not be factored in titling the summary. Plenty of press sources make this interpretation, and no press sources make any opposing interpretations.

I am afraid Zhanzhao, what what you are doing is synthesis in itself. The idea then, that based "strictly on their original remarks" that it was possible, however unlikely, that Balakrishnan asked his "question" innocently is an original research statement unsupported by press sources. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 23:22, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

The press did not make any such intepretation. 2 different questions were asked, one to the party member, one to the party. The article mentioned them together because it was from the same interview and on a related issue, but the 2 specific questions (and their targets )were still left separate. This is the exact quote ofrom the article

"The issue is not Wijeysingha's sexual orientation. That is a matter for him," said the team from Holland-Bukit Timah GRC in a joint statement. Rather, "the video raises the question on whether Wijeysingha will now pursue this cause in the political arena and what is the SDP's position on the matter".

You on the other hand, are trying to combine the 2 into a singular sentence that was very misleading, as explained above. which lead to the claim that it was the party that was being accused directly. This should have been discussed on the talk pages, but if you really wish to continue to justify your attempt at SYNTHESIS here, be my guest. Zhanzhao (talk) 23:39, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

The headline was "PAP: Will Wijeysingha pursue gay agenda? SDP: No, we will not". How can that seriously be "two specific questions"? I would appreciate if you do not make bad faith accusations.

• The mainstream press referred to this accusation (otherwise why would the SDP have to defend itself against a phantom accusation of a gay agenda?)
• Temasek Review, Alex Au, and opposition press sources abundantly refer to this interpretation
• According to the Economist: "Social-networking sites filled up with the rebukes of Singaporeans disgusted at the PAP tactic."
• According to a New Zealand website: "Vivian Balakrishnan, on the SDP’s Vincent Wijeysingha. Balakrishnan via his Facebook and the media began what can only be described as a smear campaign, accusing SDP of having “a gay agenda”."

At some point, it really is a matter of semantics. If not "Balakrishnan accuses the SDP of having a gay agenda", then we can be inspired by The Economist's words. How about "Balakrishnan and the SDP's gay agenda", but that would assume the SDP actually has one. So then I would use "alleged gay agenda", and then "alleged by whom"? A mysterious person who is not Balakrishnan? I think we can use some NPOV and good common sense. In any case, I really would like if you took back the statement that I am a person who goes around sythesising original arguments to articles. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 23:52, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I am afraid I am unable to take back my statement as you still do not see the problem. For the umtempth time, according to the source, 2 different questions were mentioned. One to the individual, one to the party. The problem is that the individual party member did not give his answer (If he did, I may have missed it so correct me if I am wrong here since it was not mentioned in the same article). Instead, it was the party who attempted to answer both questions together. "Let me state categorically, we are not pursuing the gay agenda and none of our Members of Parliament will," said Dr Chee(SDP Secretary General).". Problem is they were not asked if they had such an agenda,, just their position on their member's agenda. They assumed that the party itself was being questioned. The news report had no choice but to report it as it was. Just because the SDP chose to answer the question in that manner does not change the fact that the original question about the agenda was not directed at them. I.e. If I asked a person if he was from Singapore, and he answered that he was poor. Would I stand accused of calling him poor, even though he was the one that answered the question different from what I expected? As for the other points you mentioned, I just explained the mainsteam media bit, other admins already questioned the reliability of some of the sources, and the economist does not say what the tactic was or how it is evidence of the SDP being accused. Until you are able to objectively read what is being said without jumping to your own conclusions, or discern objective writeups from subjective ones, its quite difficult to continue editing like this. Zhanzhao (talk) 00:11, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Your explanation does not change the headline or the newspaper's succinct summary, and it is not OR to use an existing headline. Furthermore, I have already given you a source which echoes what everyone else was thinking: Balakrishnan was making a thinly-veiled accusation. The Economist uses very good prose -- how explicit does it have to be in order for a reader to link "the PAP tactic" with the accusation at hand? I am saying even if we do not call it an accusation of a gay agenda, it is Balakrishnan hinting that the SDP has some sort of agenda (oh by the way, it's a gay one) and I think it's fairly ridiculous to reject the title in light of three different sources basically supporting that in some way or other, Balakrishnan was adopting coercive tactics towards the SDP, associating it with "gay agenda". If there is a problem, it is not one of OR. I would really really really appreciate it if you would then accuse me of something else other than being a someone who would freely violate WP:SYNTH. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 01:33, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Pretty interesting you should say that, because imo, you just did. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 01:35, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I employed heavy reliance on sources in that addition. Can you explicitly point out which statements are OR? elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 02:11, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Motion for topic ban on La goutte de pluie relating to Singaporean politics

Taking all the above into account; the fact that La goutte de pluie (hereafter "Elle" or "Lgdp") has misused her admin tools while WP:INVOLVED; the fact that Lgdp has edited through page protection to restore her preferred version of an article' the fact that she has repeatedly ignored WP:RSN advice and included unreliable sources and original research; and that she has failed to and refused to recognise her inappropriate actions in doing so;

I hereby move for an indefinite topic ban on La goutte de pluie (talk · contribs) on all articles relating to Singapore politics, broadly construed. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 01:28, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• Support as proposer. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 01:28, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose - I've been looking at the evidence so far and don't see a justification for a topic ban. As far as editing through a page protection, is there evidence of whether the edits were reverted or an apology was made? -- Avanu (talk) 02:24, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
  • Let me try to wrap my head around this. You're perfectly happy for a page listing what admins have "done wrong" to exist, but when it comes to actually sanctioning them for doing wrong, you're against it? Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 02:54, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm ok with sanctioning someone, but I want to be clear it is warranted. The same is true with the other debate. Also, I would tend to err in favor of speech being allowed in userspace (versus mainspace). I tend to dislike topic bans, because I think they are harder to enforce than just a simple block or removal of power, etc. Suppose someone is topic banned from editing about hot dogs, and they edit a page about processed meat, or a page about sausage? violation or not? -- Avanu (talk) 03:31, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Gosh, Strange Passerby. I am unaware of where I have repeatedly ignored WP:RSN advice -- I have constantly listened to advice, but while Temasek Review is indeed a blog, it is a significant and notable one and can be cited in certain circumstances. When I have done so, I have been careful. Citing a TV interview is hardly using an unreliable source. Where I have been notified, I have corrected or made a compromise.

I have tried to use my tools very cautiously, and only in very blatant cases; my default mode of action is to post on a noticeboard or wait for intervention. I am unaware of where I have violated WP:INVOLVED since the last notice; the one case that I remember was an IP involved as a copyvio sock where other copyvio socks had been already been blocked by other admins -- I would also like for the community to note the circumstances where page protection was mistakenly edited through (most protections do not last more than 4 days, and I explicitly petitioned for discussion in multiple fora). elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 02:10, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

La goutte de pluie, did you revert your edits when you edited through page protection? If not, why, and what was your action instead, and how do you justify it? -- Avanu (talk) 02:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

See my request to Toddst1 here-- after 3-4 days, he never replied and I thought he saw my message. When it was first brought to ANI I was initially puzzled -- especially since I thought I had notified Toddst beforehand -- but after realising I had mistakenly edited through protection I wanted to wait to see if he agreed or not. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 04:03, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. La goutte de pluie makes positive (adding & updating content) & negative (breaching WP:OR) contributions to Singapore-related articles; the negatives are not on a scale where a ban is justified, and most of the time is dealt with swiftly by other editors.

A word of advice for La goutte de pluie: Your intransigence is digging yourself into a deeper and deeper hole. I understand and admire your zeal in trying to prevent government-linked accounts from making COI edits and copyright violations, but you are losing the battle of wits against them by overplaying your hand. You misused your admin tools and were warned about it, in addition to being advised by multiple admins to keep in line with WP:RS, WP:LINKVIO and WP:OR. Instead of heeding community advice, you keep making exceptions for yourself, blaming the Singapore's lack of free press, which is really utterly irrelevant in Wikipedia. In fact, in most of the controversial articles you have been involved in, I noticed that most of the negative information on the subject you wished to add can readily be sourced from reliable internet news sites (like Yahoo! News). Your refusal to humbly accept other admins' courteous advice is making you look arrogant, and is probably what led to this topic ban proposal.

Your attitude has brought you on the verge of being topic-banned, which can only be good news for the government-linked COI and CCI violators. See what I'm saying? Sometimes you have to take a step back before you can move forward. — Yk ʏк yƙ  talk ~ contrib 02:57, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• • I'm sorry if I seemed arrogant. I am simply trying to explain my individual actions, and how I had carefully considered policy each time. In fact, initially -- having returned from a long break, I assumed many of the policies of 2006 were still in place, and then independent websites had less issues in being used as sources, albeit with the knowledge they were potentially partisan. With time, I used an assortment of different sources to give different positions on the same issue. I want to emphasise that I do take advice very seriously -- I am simply explaining my own position. I in fact intended to take many things to the RSN noticeboard, especially to challenge the idea that TR and TOC, etc. should never be cited (to me, they are comparable to such activist sites as MoveOn.org, which are citable), rather than argue endlessly about sourcing on talk pages, but due to real life, I simply did not have time to. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 04:03, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• Support but only to a temporary topic ban. She has been a good editor in other areas, and the election fevour may still be in the air, sitting on the sidelines for a while would allow her to cool off. But if possible, her admin tools in these same areas should be withheld for a much longer period than the topic ban jist in case. On our part we other admins and editors must pay more attention to the legitimate complaints that she makes rwgarding NPOV edits made by the IPs and take action on her behalf more actively. StrangePasserby and Todd are 2 that attempted to help her before, and their lack of COI made their action more objective based, which should be continued. Can I suggest that some senior admin be designated as her "conteoller/advisor" in a more permanant basis for the duration? By having an objective admin step in for legitimate concerns we are maintaining the neutrality of wikipedia while also making Elle tone down on her over-enthusiasm in this area if she has to ask properly and make convincing arguments to get action taken rather than herself making drastic and possibly COI action in the edits and administrative tool usage. Zhanzhao (talk) 08:36, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
• Support - the user has been disrupting that area since they returned - seems to think he is defending against some conspiracy that hasn't been an issue till he showed up. As a clear political activist and a single purpose account in regard to attacking the opposition politicians using dubious picture uploads, youtube links and blog citations, (all of them living people and BLP articles) a topic ban is a very good idea. Off2riorob (talk) 08:38, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
  • For what it's worth, Rob, she's "attacking" the government politicians, not the opposition. Not that it makes a difference, of course; either way her actions are questionable at best. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 11:14, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
  • Whoa, what? Single purpose account? elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 15:40, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
• I'll hate doing this but Support – disruption would be blockable, when we get to discuss it, we could do the final decision. We shouldn't start something too big. ~~Ebe123~~ ^talk_Contribs 13:02, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
• I was planning to support this, as I have very definite feelings about admins using their power or prestige in matters involving COI, but looking over the discussion, I think she now understands, and no further purpose would be served by a formal restriction. DGG ( talk ) 21:39, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikistalking by anonymous editors

Can I ask for some intervention against wikistalking here by one of the anonymous IP ranges. For example, I just noticed this IP reversed the uncontroversial revert I made (I had removed agenda-pushing linkspam from The Clinton Chronicles). I am not sure what interest user:220.255.1.100 had in The Clinton Chronicles except to stalk my contributions. This is just one case out of many. In cases like these, I would see it fit to block on sight, since I would deem this incontroversial. In the past, when I have referred this other noticeboards, they taken very narrow remedies, and the editors involved are free to switch to some other IP range; I would like some help in dealing with these anonymous editors as a whole. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 03:38, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

wouldn't semi-protection deal with it? I can see in context of this discussion that you'd rather not apply it yourself, but just let me know on or off wiki and I'll do it for you, in anything unrelated to singapore politics at least. I just did it for this one. I'd also block, but if they switch to other ip ranges, what would that accomplish? DGG ( talk ) 20:52, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I would like some help (a more aggressive CheckUser) or perhaps some way of separating the IPs in question. I am definitely not in favour of WP:OUTING any individuals, but given that Eggsauto99 and Geneva2011 were in all likelihood, editing on behalf of some organisation, I would like help in determining what that organisation is. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 01:04, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

No, semi-protection wouldn't solve it either, given that switching to another article is also easy, but thanks. elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (be free) 01:06, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

User:Siouxsherat

This user's user page looks like a clear violation of wp:user pages. However, I don't have experience dealing with user page issues, so I thought I'd bring this to the group's attention for further instruction. The user in question went so far as to add his user page to the "External links" section of the Sarcoidosis article. It's been removed, so it's not an issue, but it does help illustrate that the user is using his user page as a personal blog rather than to further the project. Rklawton (talk) 14:22, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Agreed it looks like WP:UP#Excessive unrelated content, particularly WP:UP#PROMO. I'm paring it down and will inform the user of what I've done and why. I've already blanked the phone numbers and email addresses; I doubt it's worth oversighting them as the user put them there herself. Tonywalton ^Talk 14:36, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

@Rklawton: No offense, but your first edit to his her talk page was about this ANI thread; it should have been a note regarding WP:UPNOT and then wait for his her response. Sends a better "welcome to WP" vibe rather than what ANI offers. --64.85.217.47 (talk) 14:42, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

::: Given that the user calls themselves "Susan Elizabeth" that's more than likely "her" talkpage and response Tonywalton ^Talk 15:24, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree with the IP editor, here... Perhaps a kind note explaining that their userpage might just fall afoul of WP:UP or even a templated message (we have {{uw-userpage}}) would have been better courses of action. However, now it's done; let's see how and if Siouxsherat responds. The extrema ratio, in these cases, is WP:MFD... Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 14:54, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I've now boldly removed most of it, with a fairly long and hopefully kind note on their talkpage explaining about WP:UP#PROMO and WP:UP#USERBIO and inviting them to become a contributor with due regard to WP:OR and WP:NPOV particularly with regard to their own medical condition. Please don't flag as resolved yet until we either hear nothing at all or get some feedback from User:Siouxsherat. Tonywalton ^Talk 15:24, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. I'll add the uw-userpage template suggestion to wp:user pages where it would be most useful. Rklawton (talk) 16:49, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It was I who removed the link to User:Siouxsherat from both Sarcoidosis and Sarcoid. In both cases my edit summary read "rv: that is an internal link pretending to be external, and articles should never link to any userspace pages". I did want to add a template to User talk:Siouxsherat, but didn't, because I couldn't find a suitable one at WP:TUSER. --Redrose64 (talk) 16:56, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Communication is essential in situations like this. If there is no suitable template, write an appropriate message using your own words. If you can't think of how to explain your actions before you start acting, then it is probably best to either leave the action to someone else or (preferably) to seek assistance from a more experienced user before acting. That way everyone has an opportunity to learn. However, do not depend on templates for communication; think of how most people feel when receiving form letters and no actual specific personal message. Risker (talk) 17:09, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Depends what the infraction is, of course. If this had simply been the 17th attempt to use a userpage to promote Vic's Viagra Shack a simple "you have been blocked for spamming" would probably have sufficed. This wasn't... Cheers, Tonywalton ^Talk 18:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

When I revert edits of other users, I don't always template them; often I consider that the edit summary is enough, especially if there were only one or two instances. If they then repeat the behaviour, or have done it several times already, then I'll reach for the template box. In my experience, templating a user may provoke them, see WP:DNIV. In this case, there were 13 edits, but I considered it to be two instances because the user was clearly working out the link syntax on a trial-and-error basis (three of the 13 edits were self-reverts, which are always permitted, AFAIK). I suppose that I could have issued a {{subst:uw-test1}}. --Redrose64 (talk) 19:15, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

New users don't always know to look for the edit summaries. If there's been other intervening edits, it won't show up on a watchlist. If you need to say something, I find using the talkpage is mor reliable. Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:11, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Outside of the more general discussion Siouxsherat has asked for the original page to be provided to her as she's put a lot of work into it and it may be useful elsewhere within the Sarc community.

I've done so at User:Siouxsherat/Old User Page, effectively a sandbox. Tonywalton ^Talk 23:10, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure user page rules apply to sandboxes, too. What Siouxsherat‎ created has nothing to do with Wikipedia and shouldn't be hosted by Wikipedia even if it's useful to some other group for some other reason - no matter how much work as put into it. I suggest giving Siouxsherat‎ time to copy her work and removing the sandbox page, too). Rklawton (talk) 12:50, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Here I would agree with you. Since this user has 16 article edits in 2 years, and appears to be a (good intentioned) SPA, no leeway is available to her. WP:User pages#On others' user pages states "Users with a strong editing record and/or most of their contribution edits outside their user space should be given a little more leeway in this regard than users whose edits consist solely or mostly of user space edits or promotional-style activity," so that would not apply here. Also, she has stated the page is of use to people with similar disabilities; this suggests she may be using WP as a webhost. Since an admin has reinstated her userpage on a subpage, I would suggest giving her a week or so to transfer it to a Word document (or something) and then delete it. Ideally, the same admin would do this (Tonywalton), as is usually par for the course. That's just how I see it. (Same IP user as 64.85.xxx.xx above) --64.85.215.50 (talk) 16:34, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Twinkle Abuse to POV Push by User:Truthsort

I believe User:Truthsort twice abused the use of Twinkle [33], [34] by unfairly and inappropriately using it as a tool solely to further the editor's clear political bias, which even a cursory review of the user's talk page [35], [36], [37], [38], [39], [40], [41], [42] and edit history [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49] instantly reveals. This also provides evidence of a clear and persistent pattern with this editor.

It is also worth noting that while this editor expressed BLP concerns about the use of "Controversy" sections as related to this article [50]- the subject of which, the editor clearly supports - the same User:Truthsort also contributes to those very same sections, indeed "Criticisms & Controversy" sections, in other articles about subjects whom the editor clearly politically opposes [51]. The cynical hypocrisy and transparent double standard are indefensible.

Per the rules of ANI, I did attempt to rationally engage this editor in a discussion about the perceived misuse of Twinkle [52], but my efforts were rewarded with this [53], which simple demonstrates User:Truthsort's non-responsiveness, uncivility and failure to AGF, but also appears to bolster the core validity of the Twinkle abuse complaint.

Agenda pushers in this forum are a great enough problem, but when they are also given the advantage of tools not available to all users, the problems they present grow exponentially. Regardless of one's personal politics and/or biases, failing to adhere to the guidelines established by the policies here, ultimately threatens the very credibility of this project. Thanks for your review of this matter. The actions of this editor, coupled with the arrogance when approached regarding those actions, seem to very strongly suggest that because of this editor's continuous campaign of political POV pushing, User:Truthsort is a very poor candidate for, and poor representative of, a special privilege like Twinkle. 208.127.239.5 (talk) 02:28, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

The first paragraph does not prove any wrong doing or any POV pushing. As far as the second paragraph goes, you will see that I said they were generally not appropriate for BLP's. In the case of Lamborn it should not be added. I do not believe his opposition to NPR would qualify as a controversy. The voicemails he sent to the Barths, which happened in 2007, were not even added into the article until a few days ago and it appeared to receive a minimal amount of local coverage. The only thing that would be controversial is his recent comment. Now, compare that to Chris Matthews who has said some things that have received national controversy. It is more reasonable that a section like that would be in the Matthews article. Your talk page comment was reverted because it was nothing but a baseless rant. You did not bother to read my edit summaries citing that the info listed under the section was not all controversial. The info that was removed was undue weight. Simply put, the IP address did not give any valid argument for this ANI. Truthsort (talk) 08:25, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

The first paragraph certainly does prove POV pushing. You deliberately removed sourced quotes and materials that not only provided balance in explaining the other side, but also discussed why his actions were controversial. So for you to suggest there was no controversy is, once again, unsupported by the facts that were presented – and that you misused Twinkle to remove. What allows you to so arrogantly think that you are the final arbiter of what is and is not controversial? It frankly astounds me. One is rarely confronted with that degree of blatant hubris.

As to the second paragraph, once again, how dare you insert your “belief” (see:opinion) that opposition to NPR is not a controversy. Did you offer a source to substantiate that view? No, of course you didn't. Once again, your hubris is so off the charts that you don’t even see it when it’s presented to you. As for your attack on Chris Matthews, as a broadcaster with a show, that's pretty low hanging fruit. In these days of non-news broadcasters, people on both sides can easily be accused of that. But to suggest that a sitting legislator has never engaged in behavior or supported legislation that is controversial is so laughably ridiculous on it’s face that it doesn’t even merit a serious response, but I’ll give it the obvious one: if a sitting legislator has never voted on legislation that someone can find controversial – then that legislator has never voted. Nor ever taken a position. On anything.

As for your response regarding what I did and did not “bother to read”, your arrogance – and misinformation – only continues. To the contrary, of course I read your comment. It was simply more of you trying to peddle your POV and impose your narrow view as other editors were trying to impose balance. And your claim of undue weight is utter unsupportable drivel, as the section referenced was only a subsection – one of five – in an article that contains FIVE LARGER sections. So your explanations are clearly just weak excuses to attempt to cover and justify your behavior – which is already well-documented as nothing more than naked POV pushing.

Finally, your revert and comment on your talk page about the legitimate concerns I raised, speaks volumes about your character, in a far more damning way than anything anyone else could have written. You are clearly ill-suited for Twinkle privileges. 208.127.239.5 (talk) 21:24, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

IP, I looked at Truthsort's edits and find no evidence that they constitute Twinkle abuse. Reverting content disputes with twinkle's vandalism button is considered twinkle abuse, but reverting genuine content disputes using a unique and descriptive edit summary explaining the edit (which is the case here) is generally acceptable practice. I don't think there's anything for admins to do here, this is a content dispute with no actionable behavior from either party. Sailsbystars (talk) 12:42, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

If you are correct that "reverting content disputes with Twinkle's vandalism button is considered twinkle abuse" and I believe you are, then you have ample evidence of twinkle abuse and actionable behavior. The content that was removed was reliably sourced - by more than one source, in fact - and provided much-needed balance, so it could not constitute vandalism under any circumstance, regardless of whatever equivocating or arbitrary excuse the editor listed in the edit summary as the "justification". But under no circumstance, did the material rise to the level of removal by Twinkle. That alone constitutes - and defines - Twinkle abuse. 208.127.239.5 (talk) 21:24, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I would like to point out that the IP address has been blocked for edit warring. Truthsort (talk) 03:46, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Cdccyber

User:Cdccyber created the article Desktop Cyber in 2008 which is up for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Desktop Cyber. The user !voted in the AfD saying that after two established editors edited the article, the notability was removed when there was no notability to begin with in the first version of the article. The member said, "No notability left after editing by Yworo, Orangemike. The article has been sufficiently crippled that it no longer has any value. The link to the GPL sources of the emulator and the link to the Usenet article announcing the release have been repeatedly removed. This article describes only an emulator of the first supercomputer developed by Seymour Cray. It fails on the following criteria: it provides no significant coverage; is not reliable as the original author has a conflict of interest and is obviously not independent of the subject; the article is self promoting and has no verifiable content." on AfD. He then went on to give me a mocking barnstar on my talk page that says "Joe is the greatest advocate of article deletions. He really knows what is notable for Wikipedia and what should be purged. He currently advocates 11 pages to be deleted. Go on Joe - delete it all, just leave all the porn in place." Joe Chill (talk) 03:16, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

What administrative action are you looking for? Have you notified the other editor of this thread? Jclemens (talk) 06:38, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) User notified--Shirt58 (talk) 11:13, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't know what administrative action I want. That is for an actual admin to decide. He insulted me and has a single purpose account that was only started to promote his product. Joe Chill (talk) 14:10, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I've run across cdccyber myself recently, with less-than-amiable interaction. See the discussion at WP:COIN#Desktop CYBER. I'd say there are definite WP:COI and WP:OWN problems with both the article and the editor, the combination of which has led to this discussion instead of limiting the examination to just the article Discussion page or COIN. And while I don't usually have a problem with sarcasm, his message to Joe Chill borders on WP:NPA. --Alan the Roving Ambassador (User:N5iln) (talk) 16:24, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I have been keeping an eye on Cdccyber (talk · message · contribs · page moves · edit summaries · count · api · logs · block log · email)due to his single-mindedness over the "proper" WP:ALLCAPS rendition of Cyber and associated interactions. He was resistant to the ideas that discussion was warranted for changing Cyber to CYBER and that Wikipedia community standards have more relevance than CDC's (the manufacturer's) marketing department.

I anticipate that he will soon cool down and see the light, but bringing this to ANI does not help, IMO. —EncMstr (talk) 17:54, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

There has been more issues and discussions than I thought there was. If nothing else worked, how does this not help? I've seen members banned just because their account was created to promote their product. This drama is outrageous when members like him would have normally been banned by now. Joe Chill (talk) 18:15, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Desktop Cyber has been overlooked for 3.6 years and now, even its author is on record agreeing with its deletion and, indirectly, with recent edits (even if sarcastically). That is a big improvement in attitude. The ANI process is easily seen as an even bigger hammer than the efforts several editors have made to try to bring the editor to more productive efforts. —EncMstr (talk) 19:30, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Suicide threat Trolling with mass suicide threats

Here. I'm not notifying the user. — Yk ʏк yƙ  talk ~ contrib 03:55, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

They're just trolling, see [54]. --Bongwarrior (talk) 04:01, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I sorta suspected it. Needs admin intervention anyway I guess. — Yk ʏк yƙ  talk ~ contrib 04:09, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Lots of deletions - right or wrong?

User:Nikkimaria (talk) (contributions) shows a series of "rm" and "rc" deletions of old and new {{trivia}} tagged sections, with no meaningful edit summaries, or generally following the suggestions in WP:TRIVIA and WP:Handling_trivia#Practical_steps, and with no discussion after being reverted. I noticed it at Dirty Work (1998 film) (talk) (history), where the deletions included cited content. I reverted with edit summary advice to reread WP:TRIVIA, was reverted; then I commented at the editor's Talk page, refreshed a 4-year-old old discussion at article Talk, and reverted. At this moment, no discussion response yet. I find such runs of deletions, as opposed to tagging with {{citation needed}} or discussion, to be against the spirit of the Five Pillars, and as such, undesirable. --Lexein (talk) 06:26, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Has the user failed to respond to an attempt to dialogue? While I share your concerns about wholesale deletion of likely salvageable (or even perfectly OK, just tagged...) material, the first obligation with any dispute is to try and solve it with the person you believe to be doing things incorrectly. Given the divergence in the backgrounds of the articles listed in the contributions, I would question whether the editor had the background in each topic to effectively judge the importance of "trivia" in those fields, but absent any failure to listen to community input, I don't see anything actionable here. Have you notified this editor you posted here? Jclemens (talk) 06:35, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

To answer in order, I'd say, yes the editor didn't respond, but perhaps they had already quit for the day. Yes, I notified on the user's Talk page of the ANI, and then I noticed that the user had stopped editing (perhaps for the day) about an hour before I compiled my concerns here. The volume of deletions had alarmed me to the point of wanting immediate admin review to slow things down a bit. One straight-up error was the editor's treatment of BRD as "boldly repeat deletion", rather than "bold, revert, discuss, as I did state on their talk page before I reverted. The editor had, during their revert, integrated one unsourced part of one trivia item into the article's cast list ("Stern offered part").

But I guess I see your point about nothing actionable. I suppose it's up to me to march along behind and selectively review and revert dozens of deletions. Oh, wait, that would be stalking! It's bitterly just disappointing that even now, while editors are leaving, deletionists still have free reign. --Lexein (talk) 09:52, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

struckthrough for tone --Lexein (talk) 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that the (uncited) phrase "Contrary to popular belief, Artie Lange and Norm Macdonald had not met prior to the production of this film, however they have become close friends in the years since" doesn't need to be in that article, for example. Looking at Nikkimaria's removals of trivia section, most (and I say most, not all) appear to be correct to me. The first two I looked at, for example, were removing copyright violations, and another one moved cited information into other sections of the article. As Nikkimaria said, just because something can be cited doesn't mean it is important enough to be in an article (see, for example, what they removed from J. C. Bamford - that was just a case of editors adding anything with tangental connection to the subject into the article). Black Kite (t) (c) 12:22, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• I agree with sentence (1), and the deletion of the "dog-napping films" item. I still think the Rickles/Macdonald item has merit, and am trying to source it, as it is relevant to production. --Lexein (talk) 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Oh, and leaving a note that says "As a non-contributor to the article, your undiscussed deletion is not welcome." on another editor's page would appear to me to be a bad idea, especially as it suggests some WP:OWN issues - I note this has come up before. Black Kite (t) (c) 12:35, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• I try not to WP:OWN, but unhelpfully summarized deletions always seems to be the dang go to action, where, IMHO, other guidelines like "find sources", helpful edit summaries, trivia integration, and pillars like discussion should prevail. The 3RR issue was less about OWN than other quite obvious things, and I was cleared at 3RR. --Lexein (talk) 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

• Lexein, the phrases "inclusionist" and "deletionist" usually refer to articles as a whole, not to disputes over article content. In this case, the content hasn't been deleted, as it is still there in the article history. The common sense approach when there is a dispute over article content is to copy the disputed content to the talk page and discuss it there. Whether this is done by the person removing it or the person wanting to add it doesn't matter. The important thing is that you take it to the talk page to discuss it. And if there are copyright violations, those should be removed in a separate edit as combining different types of edit can make it difficult for other editors to work out which bits are trivia and which are copyright violations. Personally, when I remove a large chunk of text that has been around for a long time I try and leave a note on the article talk page with a link to the diff showing the removal, so later editors can get an idea of the changes made. Carcharoth (talk) 12:40, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

but sometimes they do refer to article content--those who are deletionist about separate trivia articles generally think just the same about trivia sections. And there has been the bad faith practice of merging an article to a section of another article, either as a result in AfD or just a simple merge, and then rapidly or slowly removing all the content. /This is effectively deleting the article. We have the safeguard of a community discussion before the deletion of an article, but the same effect can be achieved beneath the radar by destructive editing. There is also the practice of trying to delete an article or remove a section because one item in it is in error. That can be a very quiet operation. I think people regularly doing these things consistently do need to be looked at, and here is a good place to call attention to it. In my experience, at least a quarter of them are, at the least, careless. DGG ( talk ) 17:08, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• I concur with the broader definition of deletionism (both articles, and content). Long ago, in two unrelated articles, I experienced pretty gross content decimation with unhelpful or blank edit summaries and resentful "discussion." --Lexein (talk) 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

The problem is that trivia sections vary from completely uncited dumping-grounds where people have thrown in random observations about anything vaguely to do with the subject, to well-researched cited sections with relevant information that is useful and educational. The latter shouldn't really be described as trivia sections, they're better than that; and the former just need ruthlessly pruning. This is why "useful" trivia is better moved into the relevant part of the body of the article. As I said above, I don't think all of Nikkimaria's removals were completely correct, but many (copyright problems, dubious uncited statements, and sections of the first type I mentioned above) were pretty much spot on. Some were arguable, and some were partly right; the section causing the particular disagreement above contained some useful information, but some uncited irrelvant stuff. Black Kite (t) (c) 17:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• I agree with this, and prefer its tone, over mine (above). --Lexein (talk) 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

The irony of trivia sections is that they are precisely what drew me to Wikipedia as a resource, lo thee many years ago. Regardless of WP:NIME arguments, well-done trivia sections are something that attracts some readers, who may later become editors, and maybe even serve the community in some capacity. Jclemens (talk) 23:00, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• I would restate your point without the word trivia - instead, I come to an encyclopedia for rich information, not only the raw, dull, recitation of the minimum facts, but some of the subtleties associated with the real world events or objects being discussed in the article. In Glass, I want to know that it's a common misconception that glass is viscous. As editors, IMHO, we can't presume to arbitrarily declare facts trivial without understanding the context in which they are not trivial. Put another way, all facts, out of context, are trivia.
• Real encyclopedias tend not to use the word "trivia" - instead, the content is carefully integrated, hidden in plain sight. So I've gone through and integrated and sourced everything I thought significant. No dog-napping, or Lange/Macdonald friendship.
• Though I still would like to see better edit summaries and distinct edits for distinct purposes, based on the comments above I see that I needn't have worried, and should have taken other amelioration steps first. --Lexein (talk) 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Disruptive editor?

User:JordoCo (talk) (contributions) seems to carry our very large numbers of edits, roughly one every two minutes, in daily sessions lasting several hours. A few of these edits improve the articles but most do not. Typically the edits introduce excessive and inappropriate wikilinks. He has been asked by myself and another user to slow down and be more careful, which he hasn't done despite saying he will. His pattern of behaviour isn't quite vandalism but it's certainly disruptive. I would be grateful for administrator assistance here. --Harumphy (talk) 07:41, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

And here I was about to award him some kind of barnstar for his incremental improvements making lasting contributions to professional audio articles. Can you post a diff showing at least one edit that you thought unhelpful? Binksternet (talk) 10:44, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

OK, here's a diff of his in the article Professional audio: [[55]]. The sentence draws a distinction between professional audio and consumer audio. The latter term relates to almost any consumer use of audio, e.g. sitting at home listening to a CD. In his first attempt to edit this he put in a link to home studio. I reverted this and pointed out in my edit summary that the term relates to all home listening. The term 'home studio' is entirely irrelevant here. He ignores the clue and sticks in a link to project studio instead, which is just as irrelevant as the one I weeded out earlier. Just look at the number of ill-considered rapid-fire edits he's making across countless articles and you will see that a barnstar is the last thing he deserves.--Harumphy (talk) 13:39, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

If you look at his talk page and his diffs, you'll see that we've reverted almost everything he has done. A few edits may be incremental improvement, but most are overlinking, insertion of grammatical errors, mangling of meaning, etc. We can AGF, but if he won't slow down and read what he has written, he will remain a disruptive pain. Dicklyon (talk) 17:49, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to disagree with Binksternet by stating that the majority of edits that have been performed link wikis back to one another, which wiki sorely needs. For instance, [[Digital-S] picked at random, as an example, is a digital recording format and no where does digital recording appear in the enter into the wiki. I find that many wikis are incomplete and discuss details from other wikis that are not even liked to one another. In the case of consumer audio vs. professional audio, there is quite a distinction. Home studio redirects to Home recording which without the advent of the price reduction of Professional audio, would be no Home studio. As far as "home listening" goes, where is it in the article? Harumphy, I do appreciate your concern.--JordoCo (talk) 12:56, 7 August 2011 (EST)

That sentence is there to convey a single idea: the difference between professional audio and consumer audio. If you want to add something to the article about home studios, fine, but don't just throw links over the wall into the article and expect someone else to tidy them up for you.--Harumphy (talk) 17:21, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

User repeatedly deleting speedy deletion templates on autobiography

Amithasurendar (talk · contribs) is repeatedly deleting speedy deletion templates from his autobiographical article Surendar Bhookya (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Grateful for administrator intervention with this. Prioryman (talk) 11:41, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

"Speedy deletion" is something which should not be re-added -- use AfD if speedy deletion is contested. Cheers. Collect (talk) 11:54, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

It wasn't being contested, the template was simply being removed without any discussion, which an article creator isn't allowed to do. Prioryman (talk) 11:56, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I've speedied it; it was an extremely obvious case indeed. And somebody else seems to have blocked the editor. Fut.Perf. ☼ 11:59, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Aren't you thinking of proposed deletions? It was my understanding that only admins should be removing speedy tags. Яehevkor ✉ 12:19, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Actually, any editor besides the original author can contest and remove a speedy tag, though it's good form to explain why in the edit summary or on the talk page. — Satori Son 12:44, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant to leave a message here an hour ago, but I guess I forgot to click save before I went off to dinner. I blocked Amithasurendar for 3 hours, and left the deletion decision to another admin (though I would also have deleted it). To clarify to the people above, the author of the article was the one removing the template, which is specifically not allowed. Any other editor may do so if they think the tag is in error. And just to be clear what we were talking about, the article was one sentence, that said something like "Surendar Bhookya is a student at School Y", with three "references" that all linked to social networking sites. I did, however, let the author know that if there was some form of notability, I would be happy to help them after the block is done. Qwyrxian (talk) 12:55, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Note: while the template has a space for a creator to explain his demurral, it is not intuitively obvious that this is "official procedure" and it is also clear that removal of a tag is, ipso facto, a demurral about the tag. IMO, it is better to allow an AfD (which might well have a "snow delete") than to expect editors to know the vagaries of the rules which allow everyone else to remove the tag. I rather suspect this would have been the case, although the entire article and edit history was gone before I could look at it. Cheers. Collect (talk) 12:59, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

An AfD would have been a colossal waste of time in this case. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:07, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

The current template says "If this template does not meet the criteria for speedy deletion, or you intend to fix it, please remove this notice, but do not remove this notice from pages that you have created yourself. If you created this page, and you disagree with its proposed speedy deletion, clicking the button below will take you to the talk page where you will find a pre-formatted place to explain why you believe this template should not be deleted." That's hardly leaving the rules vague. —C.Fred (talk) 13:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Experience here seems to confirm the general rule that people often do not read past the first sentence, even with bold face. What I think the tendency is to do with a notice about something unpleasant is to look at enough to see the general import, and then get angry (or upset, depending on the person) The template was recently rewritten to make it clearer, but it also made it more complicated. The real advantage of getting people to post their objections on the talk page is that they can give a reason, not just object. Then, if the article must be deleted anyway, as is usually the case, the deleting admin can explain to them more precisely what they misunderstood. (or, sometimes, realize there's no point in trying). DGG ( talk ) 16:58, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

WoodMuncher (talk · contribs) : Sockpuppet

archive top|Should be at WP:SPI. Non-Admin Closure (Non-administrator comment) ~~Ebe123~~ ^talk_Contribs 13:08, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Not sure if this is the best place but I was reluctant to open a sockpuppety case as it could be one of several well known blocked users. Same behaviour as the recently blocked TheBlackGumper (talk · contribs), same as Caiboshtank (talk · contribs). Looks like duck to me. --HighKing (talk) 12:28, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) This should be at WP:SPI I am closing this. ~~Ebe123~~ ^talk_Contribs 13:08, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Undo non-admin closure which I'm sure was done in good faith. ebe123, to open an SPI you need to know who the sockmaster is. HighKing is posting here to see if anyone can figure who the underlying socker is. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:11, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I've opened an SPI case, I suspect it's probably Caiboshtank. --HighKing (talk) 17:56, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Tragically, another of many socks to come, until the British Isles is left alone. GoodDay (talk) 21:45, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Continued edit warring to insert personal opinions at 2011 Tottenham riots

Resolved

 – Blocked

IP user User:98.28.172.69 is continually editing 2011 Tottenham riots to add the same racially charged personal opinions to a very newsworthy and sensitive article. He has done this eight times now and shows now signs of stopping despite warnings from multiple editors. Although his addition includes a reference, the cited article does not come close to supporting his original research. Would appreciate an admin taking a look. Thanks, Palltrast (talk) 15:14, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Nevermind, I see User:OwenX has already blocked the IP. Thanks for the swift work. Palltrast (talk) 15:16, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, let me re-open this request. I misread the block log - OwenX's block was from May of this year. The IP is not blocked and is continuing to post their personal opinions to 2011 Tottenham riots. This is now 9 times, I think, so at the least has exceeded WP:3RR. Would appreciate a further opinion. Thanks, Palltrast (talk) 15:23, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

WP:AIV would be more suitable for action against vandalism. GiantSnowman 15:25, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Its not vandalism, its WP:POV-pushing. Which is why I reported it here. WP:AIV is clear that it should only be used for reports of vandalism. Thanks, Palltrast (talk) 15:28, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Blocked for 72h for clear edit-warring/3RR. Black Kite (t) (c) 15:34, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

J Greb

J Greb is an admin that is reverting my edits on List of Batman television series characters#Henchmen because he doesn't believe my sources, despite the fact I'm a huge fan of the series. I corrected some factual errors, and he reverted them back to the edits with factually incorrect content. Somebody tell him to stop.--76.236.0.168 (talk) 19:37, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Choosing a random diff. I see this one. I'm not sure the changes in question are needed there. Is Napier the Joker? That's the only stark one I can see, but the two Wikilinks are fine as they were IMO.

I have a bigger concern over edit warring here, however. Asking us to "tell him to stop" suggests that you intend to keep putting it in as correct information. At this point, I'd go to the article talk page for the article in question in disputed cases and propose the change for comment. CycloneGU (talk) 19:41, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree with J Greb. I only looked at one of your edits, but in that edit you changed many character names that have been in the article for quite some time. If you make such a big change, you should be prepared to provide sources that support those changes. Joe Chill (talk) 19:43, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Look at the individual edits, guys.--76.236.0.168 (talk) 19:44, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

• "Guys"--this is not an all-male coterie, you know. I can't speak for myself, but there are plenty of ladies around here. Drmies (talk) 20:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Geez, chill out dude, that's in no way sexist. Our very own article states that you guys "is the most common plural form of you in the U.S." Professor Fluffykins (talk) 22:07, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Napier is the Joker only in the 1989 Batman movie and nowhere else. Whoever put Jack Napier's name on that page put incorrect info on the page. Also, I've watched every single episode of the 1960s Batman TV series.--76.236.0.168 (talk) 19:48, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

That appears to be incorrect. While I'm ordinarily loath to us ImDB as a reliable source, the character info for "Jack Napier" starts with the 1989 movie and progresses to include Batman Forever and several episodes of the '80s animated series. If there's another reliable source out there to either confirm or reject that, it should be brought forward. And as a final point, using one's exceptional appreciation of a given series (I'm putting it that way to avoid the connotations of the term "fan") as a source for an article on Wikipedia is one definition of original research. --Alan the Roving Ambassador (User:N5iln) (talk) 19:59, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Having had a look in The official Batman Batbook, Napier is never mentioned, only the Joker. Not a 100% proof as it is easier to proof that a name is used as to proof that a name hasn't been used in a series.Cst17 (talk) 21:21, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

The long and the short there is "It needs to be sourced". Eisner looks to be a good source which is already used on one of the pages in question. - J Greb (talk) 21:56, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Also, FDR's name is spelled incorrectly on that page.--76.236.0.168 (talk) 19:49, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

You did not notify the other editor as you are required to do, so I have done it for you. Please also note that posting about this issue at multiple locations is considered forum shopping. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 19:52, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

76.236.0.168, this is not a matter that requires admin intervention. Read WP:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle for how Wikipedia works. You have been BOLD, he has reverted, now you have to discuss on the article talk page to reach a WP:Consensus. If you can't, use WP:Dispute resolution. Also, the fact that you have watched these episodes is not enough, that is called original research - you have to cite a reliable published source for changes like this. JohnCD (talk) 20:00, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

It is possible to cite a film or episode as a primary source for something that happened in the film: "in Batman Forever it is revealed that...." kind of thing. What you can't do is say "I have watched all 160 episodes and Batman always turns left out of the Batcave" as evidence, because that is Original Research. Elen of the Roads (talk) 20:16, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Nope, they didn't. And now they are starting to do what they should have been doing with the edit sumaries: explain the edits.

And that's the big issue here, the IP has gone on a run without bothering to indicate in any way, shape, or form why the changes were made. This includes removal of information. When they actually started to explain it it was "I've watched the shows", citing IMDb, and focusing on the credits. This doesn't cover anything else that was changed, even though they kept going back to their preferred last edit that covers more than changes to actor and character names.

JohnCD, FWIW, I'll take show and film credits as reliable if they are reasonable accessible and they link actor to character. In this case, the show isn't readily available for for a through vetting. If it were, or the position from the get go was "I'm working directly from a VHS home tape while updating the cast and credits", I'd see little issue with it. However, the explanation is resting on "from memory", which isn't reliable nor verifiable.

- J Greb (talk) 20:26, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

To be honest, the edits by 76.236.0.168 make more sense as one would expect. There were some typos, and Breeland Rice is credited under this name in the series, but sometimes credited as Breland Rice. I think it's good to discuss the Joker/Napier matter on Talk Pages and go through the edits to see what's correct and can be supported by independent references. Cst17 (talk) 21:26, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

If its being noted in the edit summary or backstopped with something like The Official Batman Batbook or Batman: The Complete History, all well and good. But just done, along with things that are removals, large changes, or apparent "to taste" edits its a problem.

As for the actor names... that presents a problem with correct linkings. If an article already exists and the actor has/had a tenancy for name variation, we should be using what we have. If its a red link and, again, the actor is know to have used multiple names, using 1 red link helps clarify if an article is really needed.

- J Greb (talk) 21:56, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I am checking the edits by 76.236.0.168 with The Official Batman Batbook. Some are correct, some seem to originate from misreading credits. It think it was good to reverse the edits as they were not sourced, or sourced by not realible (imdb) sources. But on the other hand 76.236.0.168 has helped us to identify some misspellings. Cst17 (talk) 22:14, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

True on the last part, but it is very hard reverse only some of what was being done due to the manner in which it was done. And flat reversals on their part with cries of "Don't revert me, I'm right." doesn't help. Also on the upside, this at least got the attention of editors willing to explain the changes they're making. - J Greb (talk) 22:56, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Soapboxing, disruptive comments at ITN

Resolved

• Lihaas (talk · contribs)

Lihaas is a regular contributor to WP:ITN/C. I've never noticed an issue with soapboxing there before. However, they recently seem to have begun leaving disruptive comments, for some reason. I first noticed a comment where they essentially suggested that 30 US soldiers killed in a helicopter crash 'got what was coming to them' because they killed Bin Laden.[56] The comment was removed by an administrator, but they later re-added it.[57] They also left a comment calling the UK a "police state [that] is always killing and perpetrating sanctioned terrorism."[58] They've suggested that myself,[59] Jaguar,[60] and HJ Mitchell[61] (we had all addressed his comments in some way) of opposing them only because we personally don't agree with them. This has continued after multiple requests that they stop soapboxing, so I can only assume that they're trying to make a point. In any case, I feel that Lihaas's behavior of inflammatory soapboxing is disruptive enough to warrant administrator intervention. Thank you, Swarm ^{u | t} 22:33, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I hadn't seen the latest comments, but that's unquestionably disruptive editing, and it's certainly not tolerable at ITN, which is usually relatively peaceful. I think a ban from ITN is in order, but I will wait for the block to expire before proposing it. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:43, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

User:Pants onSquire

Pants onSquire (talk · contribs) Has declared themselves a vandal and has posted a blocked template on their User page, even though they are not blocked. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 23:36, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Yeah. I give up. I'm a vandal. Really hard to make obvious, dirty vandal edits on Wikipedia these days. Pants onSquire (talk) 23:38, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I thought putting a delete tag on an administrator that I like to mess with would be enough....all the edits I've made have been unconstructive. Go check out the history, dude. Pants onSquire (talk) 23:39, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

How original... – ukexpat (talk) 02:04, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Blocked indefinitely. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:42, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Block evasion User:FAIZGUEVARRA / WP:DUCK : Possible IP range block?

Hello,

It seems that User:FAIZGUEVARRA is contributing under anonymous IP's to vandalize (again) Algeria related articles : Special:Contributions/41.200.2.59 Special:Contributions/41.200.24.188 Special:Contributions/41.200.5.45.

Previous cases : [62] [63] [64] [65]

SP case : Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/FAIZGUEVARRA/Archive

Thanks to intervene, maybe by blocking the IP range as it was done before.

Omar-Toons (talk) 23:42, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

edit: add this one: Special:Contributions/41.200.0.223 --Omar-Toons (talk) 01:06, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

+1: Special:Contributions/41.200.7.73 --Omar-Toons (talk) 03:26, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

• This guy seems to vandalize in short bursts, 30-60 edits over a week or so each time. Check out this rangecontribs result. Unfortunately it will take a /18 to cover all his Algeria-based IPs. How about blocking 41.200.0.0/18 (block range · block log (global) · WHOIS (partial)) right now for two weeks, and doing that again each time he comes back? The range block would be anon-only so it would not bother any registered editors. EdJohnston (talk) 03:53, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Backlog at AN3

Could someone please have a look at WP:AN3? Some of the reports there have been there for quite a while without action. Yes, including the one I filed. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 00:22, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Agree. I have already been flamed by reported user 208.127.239.5 and no administrator action has been taken. ANDROS¹³³⁷_TALK 01:22, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Still nothing, NO ACTION on any of those recent reports and it's been the better part of a day. Gee, and I'd always heard that 3rr was supposed to be a bright line. You break it, you get blocked. I guess those edit warriors can see what a fucking joke that is. I suppose now the admin who finally deals with them will say he can't block now because the reports are too stale. Sure is a good thing we have these noticeboards so you can get some admin help when you need it. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 08:37, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

User:Peridon - speedy deletions

User:Peridon seems to annoy several people, see e.g. User talk:Peridon/Archives/2010/January. He delete a WP:SIA page that I created, claiming WP:CSD#A10, but this was not met at all, I asked him to revert

• User_talk:Peridon/Archives/2011/July#Bahara.2C_India
• User_talk:Peridon#2nd_request_Bahara.2C_India

But he is not reverting. He should revert and put it into a regular deletion process. Bogdan Nagachop (talk) 01:19, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

WP:DRV is that way. T. Canens (talk) 01:42, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

User:Medboy1and User:Melissamohammed53 tag-team editing

Medboy1 (talk · contribs) and Melissamohammed53 (talk · contribs) are tag-teaming on several articles, removing sourced material and at least in one case, violating BLP. Meboy1 proclaims his purpose for being here on his User page. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 01:46, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Medboy's stated purpose is "I am interested in correcting information that is biased and is unfair to people or businesses." I've suggested to him that he needs to use the talk page to explain his concerns with the articles such as Live blood analysis and wait for discussion and consensus before changing the articles.

I also agree that there is a lot of overlap between the two editors. I don't see a smoking gun of sockpuppetry; however, I wouldn't say that either of them have been faultless in their edits. I'm keeping an eye on the situation. —C.Fred (talk) 01:52, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

I doubt if they're sock puppets, more likely meat puppets. I looked for a "Melissa Mohammed" on Google, but couldn't find anything informative concerning the issues they're both editing. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 01:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Both accounts are  Confirmed as the same person. I have indefinitely blocked Melissamohammed53 and gave a warning to Medboy1 not to do it again. –MuZemike 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Herp Derp

User:Snakeboyhiss IS User:Kagome 85

How do I know this?

1: At the end of the Plot she impersonates me by saying Thank you. Sean

2: For what she said to User:Katieh5584 I'm 23 years old (which is my age) by the way. e-mail me, Blackmagic1234@gmail.com (which is a old dead email I gave up using because of User:Kagome 85 constant stalking.)

--142.163.114.153 (talk) 02:51, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

• This was already blocked at least 1 month ago. (And we need possible RevDel/Oversight here.) - Penwhale | ^{dance in the air and follow his steps} 07:35, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Harassment by User:Viriditas

User http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Viriditas has repeatedly harassed me on my talk page. Firstly he has accused me of being a sockpuppet without providing any evidence to back up this claim. After I provided an extensive explanation of my time on Wikipedia he proceeded to question the value of my contributions to Wikipedia as a whole. I then proceeded to tell him that it was not his place to question whether my edits were valuable and I asked him to stop posting on my talk page unless he had anything further to say about sockpuppetry. Despite this request he has continued to post on my talk page and ask rhetorical questions about the value of my contributions on Wikipedia. This whole incident began after I expressed an opinion on the ongoing Requested Move at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Climatic_Research_Unit_email_controversy#Requested_Move . I have never had any contact with this user prior to my entrance into the discussion on the Requested Move, and it appears that he is posting on my talk page in an attempt to intimidate me out of making further contributions to said Requested Move. Vietminh (talk) 05:27, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Vietminh has not informed Viriditas of this report. Vietminh's editing history is slightly odd. There was an inital gap of several months between creating it and making the first edit. These edits amongst others are odd.[66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75] He has also admitted to editing as 174.114.87.236 (talk · contribs). The editing on the named account did suddenly change about three weeks ago.[76] Mathsci (talk) 07:41, 8 August 2011 (UTC)