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Requests for comment

Talk:Mukokuseki#RfC on using the wording "stereotypically Western characteristics" in the lead

(Initiated 92 days ago on 11 April 2024) ☆SuperNinja2☆ TALK! 09:41, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

See Talk:Mukokuseki#Close Plz 5/21/2024 Orchastrattor (talk) 20:34, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

RFA2024, Phase II discussions

Hi! Closers are requested for the following three discussion:

• (Initiated 70 days ago on 2 May 2024) Administrator recall
• (Initiated 68 days ago on 5 May 2024) Designated RfA monitors
• (Initiated 68 days ago on 5 May 2024) Reminder of civility norms at RfA

Many thanks in advance! theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 04:27, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... reminder of civility norms. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:24, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

 Partly done reminder of civility norms. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:40, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

If re-requesting closure at WP:AN isn't necessary, then how about different various closers for cerain section(s)? I don't mind one or two closers for one part or another or more. --George Ho (talk) 17:39, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

During Phase I of RFA2024, we had ended up having multiple closers for different RFCs, even the non-obvious ones. I think different people closing subparts of this should be acceptable Soni (talk) 09:22, 28 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Weather#Discussion -- New Proposal for layout of Tornadoes of YYYY articles

(Initiated 63 days ago on 10 May 2024) RFC outcome is fairly clear (very clear majority consensus), however, a non WikiProject Weather person should close it. I was the RFC proposer, so I am classified too involved to close. There were three “points” in the RFC, and editors supported/opposed the points individually. Point one and three had 3-to-1 consensus’ and point two had a 2-to-1 consensus. Just need a non WP:Weather person to do the closure. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 14:39, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Were notifications made to the talk pages of the affected articles and MOS:LAYOUT? voorts (talk/contributions) 21:05, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

 Done Closed (for now). I missed this comment above by voorts while closing, WeatherWriter, could you clarify if the talk pages were notified? I'm not sure what is usually done if the RFC is not advertised broadly elsewhere. Soni (talk) 21:52, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

(Courtesy pings: Voorts and Soni). The two most recent pages affected (Tornadoes of 2024 and Tornadoes of 2023) were talk page notified. The discussion started over 2 months ago, so if I recall correctly, 2023/2024 were the only articles actually changed at that point in time. An IP-user changed several articles (2011-2022) after the discussion was started. I may have that timeline wrong, but either way, the 2023 article and 2024 article have way more views than any other article, with 2024 actually having over 100k views in the last 30 days. Notifying those, even if 2010-2022 had already been changed would have still caught the same editors as 2023/2024 notifications along with WP:Weather talk page, which was also notified. Even a check on Talk:Tornadoes of 2024 showed it was viewed over 7,000 times (not the article, the talk page). I think it was broadly notified. Plus, it was an RFC, which notified non-tornado editors as well. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 22:08, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, the two talk page notifications is good for me. Soni (talk) 23:07, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

• Also, MOSLAYOUT was not notified. I finally found the original discussion in the WikiProject Weather archives (Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Weather/Archive 3#Need for a standard that will make "Tornadoes in year" pages less U.S.-centric). There wasn't a real consensus at the time to change any article except the Tornadoes of 2024 article. 2023's article was changed for a "here is what a completed article" looks like vs the 2024 article, which is obviously still in construction due to 2024 being the current year. Months later (it looks like 8 days before this discussion started) the IP user notified the WP:Weather talk page about planning to change previous year layouts (pre-2023 ones) (Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Weather/Archive 4#Tornadoes of XXXX - Article format of 2022 and earlier). So my timeline was a little wrong, but even looking at the IP-users notification, editors started not liking the format which was used on 2023/2024's article. To me, pre-2022 didn't even have a consensus to be changed, which is why all the 1946-2010 articles weren't changed and this discussion was started. Hopefully that clears up the timeline. That let me dust off the old memory as well (lol). So the two articles with actual consensus to change were notified, as well as the place where they new layout format was discussed/gained consensus in the first place. MOSLAYOUT was not notified for that discussion nor this one. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 22:22, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks. That seems like sufficient notification. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:05, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Fun in a Chinese Laundry#RfC on "Selected excerpts" section

(Initiated 49 days ago on 23 May 2024) Would benefit from a neutral close to avoid unnecessary drama. – Reidgreg (talk) 16:14, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Talk:FCSB#RfC about the Court Decisions

(Initiated 44 days ago on 28 May 2024)

Apparently badly filed RfC. Needs admin closure. tgeorgescu (talk) 20:45, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2024 review/Phase II/Discussion-only period#Early close

(Initiated 42 days ago on 31 May 2024) Since it's an injunctive discussion, I was hoping someone could step in and close after I withdrew my own. Thanks! theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 07:26, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics#RfC: Indian PM Counting

(Initiated 41 days ago on 31 May 2024) Hey, please close this RfC on Indian PM counting. There have been no comments for 18 days. GrabUp - Talk 15:33, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Circumcision#Ethics in lead RfC

(Initiated 40 days ago on 2 June 2024) Please close this RfC; discussion has halted for some time now. This is a persistent issue that needs final closure. Prcc27 (talk) 00:35, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Sutherland_Springs_church_shooting#RfC:_Motherfuckers_or_not

(Initiated 36 days ago on 5 June 2024) Need help with a neutral close. -- GreenC 21:25, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... TW 03:45, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Donald Trump#RfC: Should consensus 22 (not calling Trump a "liar" in Wikipedia's voice) be cancelled?

(Initiated 32 days ago on 9 June 2024) - Controversial issue needs experienced closer. ―Mandruss ☎ 10:17, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 02:21, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Deletion discussions

XFD backlog

V	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Total
CfD	0	0	12	6	18
TfD	0	0	5	6	11
MfD	0	0	0	0	0
FfD	0	0	0	7	7
RfD	0	0	4	0	4
AfD	0	0	0	0	0

Wikipedia:Templates_for_discussion/Log/2024_June_22#Template:Edit_semi-protected

(Initiated 50 days ago on 22 May 2024) Hasn't had anything new for a while, templates are template-protected. mwwv ^converse∫_edits 15:01, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 June 12#IRC +10414

(Initiated 46 days ago on 26 May 2024) This RfD has been open for over a month. SevenSpheres (talk) 20:17, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Other types of closing requests

Talk: 1997 Pacific hurricane season#Proposed merge of Tropical Storm Ignacio (1997) into 1997 Pacific hurricane season

(Initiated 139 days ago on 23 February 2024) Discusion ran its course. 166.198.21.97 (talk) 00:15, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

{{not done}} per #1 yellow ball near the top of this page. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. ^{put'er there} 05:46, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

I fail to see how this is an obvious decision, with the sources presented by the opposer and a neutral. 166.198.21.97 (talk) 11:14, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Notifying_Wikiprojects_and_WP:CANVASS

(Initiated 45 days ago on 28 May 2024) Latest comment: 3 days ago, 79 comments, 37 people in discussion. Closing statement may be helpful for future discussions. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:29, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Srebrenica massacre#Requested_move_2_June_2024

(Initiated 40 days ago on 2 June 2024), Tom B (talk) 09:51, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Is pv-magazine.com reliable?

(Initiated 10 days ago on 1 July 2024) A discussion about taking a source off the spam blacklist. Probably needs a formal close for it to be actionable. –Novem Linguae (talk) 22:58, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 01:22, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

 Done Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 01:45, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Loss of more and more and more established editors and administrators.

It has come to my attention that Wikipedia is slowly falling apart and will eventually crash. We are losing more established editors and admins faster than we can gain. I believe something needs to be done. User talk:Fastily has been driven from Wikipedia due its declining mentality. Any thoughts? Forgive me is I posted this on the wrong page.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 10:09, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Nuke it from orbit? We are all very replaceable, despite what we may think. New editors will happily take our places. They'll just have to start all over again from scratch, I suppose. Doc talk 10:25, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Fastily's departure was far more complex than that. Editors & admins come & go, it's how it's worked for the 6+ years I've been here. GiantSnowman 10:35, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Editors are not light bulbs. If the reward for years of volunteer service is to leave with your feelings hurt, that's poor return and may explain the "death spiral".--Wehwalt (talk) 10:39, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Exactly.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 10:41, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

It's been in a perpetual "death spiral" since day one. The sky is always falling. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy to those who see it like that. What more can be done? Just give up? That's probably not the best way to solve a problem. Not everybody always gets what they want. A "kinder, gentler" Wikipedia? A gold watch for your service. Doc talk 10:49, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Not day one, more like 2007.

See this graph of the number of active editors. Once some people started looking at the encyclopedia as something to skew toward their notion of the "ethical" (or the useful?) by taking out various stuff they don't like, its decay began. Look at Jimbo Wales' talk page for the past few weeks for how thoroughly and absolutely this decay will end. It is not merely that there won't be any editors - there won't be any content judged acceptable for them to edit, and no permission for them to do so (except via reviewer) even if they could. Wnt (talk) 14:24, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

As can been seen from my own talkpage, I'm feeling it myself. When even your "colleagues" can't read worth shit, take un-necessary potshots, lie, and refuse to live up to their word, how do we expect anyone else to? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 10:50, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Not to say that this isn't a phenomenon of concern, but this example is problematic. The image-oriented Fastily has (demonstratively) shut down participation at en-WP and moved his focus to Commons, which isn't exactly losing him to the project. I'm far more concerned with the oppressive mentality against some of the sometimes prickly but extraordinarily useful content creators: Malleus, Kiefer Wolfowitz, Richard Norton, etc. That's a far more dangerous phenomenon affecting the longterm health of the project than a janitor or two moving from here to there, in my opinion. Carrite (talk) 19:34, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia is an unnecessarily frustrating and nasty place. Top of that list is that the bad guys so often prevail at articles and battles, or just keep wandering and hurting people as long as they are clever toknow how to mis-use the system. It would take about 6 policy changes to 70% fix that. North8000 (talk) 10:52, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I find that Wikipedia seems a much nicer community if you simply take some of the most dramatic noticeboards off your watchlist. Try a month's holiday from ANI, AN, AN/C etc. and you will feel better for it. The fact that these notice boards have been plagued and polluted by an off-wiki coordinated travelling circus is a problem that we should take seriously, and look at how we can improve policies to ensure obvious external manipulation for soap-boxing and lobbying does not seriously corrupt our consensus process. --Fæ (talk) 11:01, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Excellent advice! Until your friend is on those boards. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:08, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I thought of several when I wrote this, one returned with an Easter egg tree, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 05:55, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

You would give P.T. Barnum a run for his money when it comes to promotion. Congratulations. Doc talk 06:04, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Fæ, with all due respect, I think your statement here is actually an example of the very problem to which you are alluding. Critics of Wikipedia are not generally popular around here, but if there is a genuine problem with off-wiki sites that needs to be addressed, you should be starting an RFC/U or requesting that ArbCom start a case, instead of constantly making snippy remarks. If there is anything to your suggestion that "our consensus process" can be disrupted by a handful of editors who frequent off-site discussion boards where the discussions are publicly viewable, I wonder how that process is disrupted by those who hang out on the many un-logged IRC channels or who contact each other through email. It must be a very fragile process indeed. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 16:05, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't think this is the right place to hold such a discussion. Some editors may feel this way, and general consensus may say it's not the best place to be, but for us to be replaced one day, we need to give off a good impression to the new wave of editors. We need to remember that this is a project that we should contribute to in our own spare time and we are supposed to enjoy it. If you don't enjoy being here, obviously something is wrong and you either need to take a break, or leave for good. (note: this is just my own opinion and I am not suggesting anybody should GTFO or anything. MrLittleIrish^(talk) 11:15, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Well said. This thread is going nowhere and should be closed. Doc talk 11:20, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Yep - if there's a problem, just sweep it under the rug. Just remember, when the house falls down - that rug won't matter too much now will it? — Ched :  ?  11:28, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Responding to Mr little irish ....or fix the problems, which starts with discussions like this. North8000 (talk) 11:29, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I think this is a great discussion to have and I recommend it should stay open for at least a couple of hours. I want to here what more the community has to say. I feel for Fastily. The point I opened this discussion is because of mainly civility issues editors are getting emotionally hurt and it would make perfect sense why they would no longer want to edit it. It's amazing to see how little things that could be easily fixed and it's blown way out of proportion here.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 11:36, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Responding to North8000. The problem is people (not naming a single editor, new or old) are contributing here like it's a job. This is supposed to be an enjoyment for ourselves and the general public looking for information. The project should not cause stress. Yes, we all disagree every now and again, but over time, the amount of petty arguments that have developed are beyond me. If you're not having fun, you're here for the wrong reasons. This is not a job. MrLittleIrish^(talk) 11:39, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Are you saying that because it's not a job and editors are free to leave, that folks should not try to recognize and fix problems? That is contrary to how volunteer organizations and volunteer everythings succeed. And contrary to what got Wikipedia to where it is today

For those who feel that the people picture is irrelevant, look at the end result The end result is that 90% of articles are 90% in good shape, 10% of it (including near every article on a contentious topic) is an absolute uninformative mess, and that it has plateaued out regarding fixing those areas. You don't have to argue the straw man of whether or not the sky is falling to simply understand that it has some serious problems that require fixing. North8000 (talk) 11:42, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Going off of what you're saying, who would want to edit this place of they got harassed for every little thing they do? You notion the fact that we are all replaceable which sounds so horrifying wrong in so many ways. It would say to indicate no one cares about each in the first place and if person disappears from the project, another will replace them and all is good. This brings me to my second point is the editor that will replace this established editor will most of e time have zero experience. That statement you made would be grounds to push me from Wikipedia because you basically reinforced the fact that we don't care for each other or support each other.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 11:54, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary break -losing editors

I agree, those are very handsome lampshades. What kind of leather did you say they were made of again?--Wehwalt (talk) 11:45, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I think I know what you're getting at, but have no idea why. Doc talk 11:55, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I suggest that the articles are not worth the human cost.--Wehwalt (talk) 11:56, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

That's what I thought. Not a good metaphor. There is no "human cost" on this project compared to what you're alluding to. Seriously. Doc talk 12:03, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

. And no, there is no organized campaign to murder. That don't make what goes on here trivial, or right.--Wehwalt (talk) 12:07, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)x3Most of Wikipedia editors are human with about 45% of them vandals where about 50% turn to good faith editing. A portion of those editors work really hard and establishes good credit and becomes well known among the community. Here comes this asshole of a new editor finds a minor mistake this user made blows it up into a major issue when it really isn't and posts it on ANI and there goes this well established user's credit. What's more, this manipulative user manages to turn the ANI discussion in his favor and really discredits the established editor. Imagine how that editor feels right now.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 12:24, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

How do you determine these numbers? My impression is just the opposite: 10% are in good shape, 80% are two-line stubs (which is probably an exaggeration, but this is my imrpression anyway), and 10% are an absolute uninformative mess. Has any research been done.--Ymblanter (talk) 11:48, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I was thinking of built articles, I was sort of ignoring stubs, so, with that context on mine, we may both be right.North8000 (talk) 11:52, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

If this isn't the right place, what is the right place? I agree with Ched, sweeping it under the rug won't make it go away. --SPhilbrick(Talk) 11:49, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

FFS - I wasn't suggesting silencing anyone. Let's analyze all the shortcomings of the project in this thread. Doc talk 11:55, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)x3All due respect Mr. Little irish, and indeed you do bring a very relevant topic to the table - but I offer you this. MANY people take this project VERY seriously. They have invested untold hours, days, weeks .. no YEARS into providing the very best they could. When a new users walks in, and can call someone with 5 or 10 years tenure onto the carpet to be chastised for either a mistake - or some misunderstanding - then yes, it's no longer fun. Since we are on an admin. board, and discussing this because of an admin. I'll offer this. Truly good admins. do not always consider this fun. Truely good admins. do not want to block. Truely good admins. take every step they can to protect the project first. Trulely good admins. actually care about the editors. EVEN the ones that find fault with at every chance they get. What is the result. Civility policy my blue butt. That is a tool that manipulative people play to goad honest hard working people into getting sanctions. Swap out the civility policy for one of honesty, integrity, and consistency ... and maybe we could turn this 500 mph train-wreck that's headed for a cliff around. Just IMHO. — Ched :  ?  11:56, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• Right on, Ched. A VOA, that's one thing, but every other block (or even unblock--I had a big one not too long ago) is agonizing to some extent. At the time of my RfA some whippersnapper (actually the latest incarnation of a troll, I think) stirred up the shit pot, and got another hot-headed (more experienced) editor involved in a back and forth--and I was supposed to hypothetically decided in a test question on my RfA. I was unwilling to block though I did not approve of the disruptor's edits. So, I get two "opposes"--one from each one--and I guess I was lucky that it didn't spread more. But that's the kind of thing that easily happens: the pot gets stirred, and every jackass you ever offended gets in on it. There's two in this very thread who have gotten on my case and who no doubt will pounce next time I get dragged to the board, but I think I can take the project seriously enough to not take that so seriously, as contradictory as it may sound. Drmies (talk) 16:40, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)This is an issue that needs to be talked about. I believe it's because or civility policies are under enforced and ridiculous ANI threads about such minuscule things that are blown way out of proportion. If you in disagreement don't see how that hurts an editor then I don't know what will. Sweeping it under the rug won't make it go away but tackling the problem will so, I propose we tackle this problem.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 12:01, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately, for some people, their idea of fun includes: ganging up, rumours, attacks, vandalism, treating others like shit - and while they're likely to do that sometimes in real life, it's even easier in the online world as they never have to face up to it. When that concept of fun interferes with the neurotypical meaning of fun, there's problems (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 12:09, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

One important step in tackling a problem is a clear articulation of the problem. I'm reading some heartfelt concerns, but if an outsider asked me to summarize the problem, and cite examples, I wouldn't be able to. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sphilbrick (talk • contribs) 12:11, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @cyber - But that's the thing Cyber. "Civility" is such a subjective thing. BY POLICY, editor A can say "I feel it was a mistake for you to waste your efforts on such an article which is clearly worthless. (acceptable under policy as writen) .. editor B responds: "Kiss my royal ass" BZZZZ ... wrong answer. And because people are demanding "civility" - a 25 year old admin. trying to do what he thinks is right ends up telling a 60 year old scholar to go sit in the naughty corner. Do you really think that's gonna work so well? — Ched :  ?  12:13, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(Responding to the unsigned comment). Well, the problem is that the environment is too aggressive here, and contributors and especially admins wear out very quickly. In many cases, nobody replaces them, in other cases, the replacement is much less qualified than the outgoing manpower. This the editor retention problem which is being discussed for years.--Ymblanter (talk) 12:16, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)WP:CIVILITY is no doubt a dynamic concept and I'm sure that all of us in this discussion known the general picture of civility and most of the admins know when the line of civility is crossed.

I wouldn't focus just on civility. For me it is frustration realizing that it is impossible to fix the articles that most need fixing....contentious articles. And that the problem is easily 70% fixed by tweaking some policies, but that such is unlikely to ever be accomplished. North8000 (talk) 12:20, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Plus obvious uncivil behavior is easily reigned in. Once the nasty person has mastered wikilawyering, they become near-invincible and impossible to reign in. North8000 (talk) 12:23, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

It's not only about civility. Making the project welcoming to Randy in Boise makes it unattractive to lots of other people. Tom Harrison ^Talk 12:34, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(ec) What's obvious to you and I might not be obvious to others. See, it'd be so much simpler if we could block for simple douchebaggery - that would cover sketchy and deceptive editing as well as personal conduct. But with a decade of inertia, it's harder and harder to shift policies in ways that might be obviously beneficial (there's that word again). It's a huge project, there should be room for everyone who's willing to put in the work and the time into discussion - but it doesn't always work that way, and we need to fix that. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 12:37, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• Also @Cyber - I think you make some very very good points here. And indeed civility is not the only issue. A thread like this begins and 30 people rush to say their piece because it's been on their mind for ages - but it all goes down so quick that few actually read the entire thing. And who said what first? Who is talking to who? There is often a rush to judgment that has to be revisited - and rehashed over and over again. There's quantity vs. quality. Privacy vs. transparentcy. Admins. bickering amongst themselves is also not a good thing. It doesn't provide a unified and consistant view - and that would confuse anyone. (but anything we say has to be in front of everyone - we have no private room to discuss things.) But perhaps it's the age of the project too. There are some editors here that have been here for years now. They know each other, and what to expect from each other. But each new person is an unknown. People get paranoid and wonder ... is that so-and-so with a new name? Small disagreements fester and become long term grudges until the pot boils over. People have come to know each other and broken off into their own little cabals. Some that struggle for some percieved power, when at the end of the day - it's one individual behind a keyboard. That can get lonely, and it's easy to think "I'm all by myself, how can I ever deal with them?" The closest thing we have to an "authority" is Arbcom. And yet they are just volunteers too. And who tells them when they are right and wrong? Yep, there's lots to work through if this project is going to survive, and I do hope it survives. — Ched :  ?  12:59, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• True. If I had to guess how much longer Wikipedia would survive, I'd give it 5-10 years. After that Wikipedia will be total chaos. I'm going to head over to village pump in hopes of fixing some of these issues.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 13:08, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• There's a difficulty in distinguishing between natural turnover and a death spiral. Wikipedia has been in decline for the past few years, the rate of new anything (articles, editors, admins, edits) have declined. The foundation is aware of this and is working to increase editor numbers through twee methods, be it wikilove or a friendly teahouse helpdesk. It's easy to see friends leave and draw the conclusion that the good editors are leaving, but in this very thread we have editors who've been here 6 years, and editors who've been here for just one. Editors who have tens of thousands of edits and others who have a few hundred. What am I saying? People come, people stay, people go. It's worth worrying about trends, but not individual cases. It is always sad when an editor leaves, especially when one who has put so much in, but if they push through the demoralised zone, they'll end up hating wikipedia, and that's not good. I know I'll leave one day, I'll probably do it quietly - there's only so much one person can do. Worm^TT · (talk) 13:13, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

  If you have me in mind as an example of an editor who is around for a year, I changed the account last year, but was editing since early 2007.--Ymblanter (talk) 13:34, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

  I think my point still stands either way, indeed the original poster hasn't been here a year... Worm^TT · (talk) 13:38, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• I would hate to see you go and hate it more if you didn't at least tell me. If you were to leave you would killing a big part of WP:ADOPT and Wikipedia.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 13:21, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• Ha, that's very kind of you to say, but misses my point. I'd say no one here is essential, least of all me - but no fear, I'm not near burnout yet! Worm^TT · (talk) 13:28, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• We all come and go that's true but, we go when an editor just as established replaces us. Now we go because we burn out too quickly and those that replace us, are not experienced enough yet. There is no editor experienced enough yet to replace you when you burn out.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 14:14, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Coming back, "full circle" to the subject that was being discussed. Is there any empirical evidence that the project is in decline? The loss of any one contributor can be seen as problematic but is it indicative of any overall trend? or simply reflective of the eventual cycle of burnout? FWiW Bzuk (talk) 13:45, 18 April 2012 (UTC).

You know, this sort of sky-is-falling comment happens all the time, almost always in response to a resignation manifesto from a friend or being on the receiving end of some rudeness. The editor then assumes that because one person leaves, that we have an overall problem. I wonder whether any of you would be interested in the actual facts, which are these:

Number of users active in a given month

Number of users	December 2010	December 2011
Making >5 edits this month	34,055	34,000
Making >100 edits this month	3,478	3,490

As you can see, it's pretty much steady. Notice, please, that these are all the kind of "established editors" that the OP is concerned about: not people who made their fifth-ever or 100th-ever edit that month, but people who made five edits or 100 edits just during that month. Overall, I think there's still a minor downward trend, but it's minor: it goes up one or two percent this month, and maybe down one or two or three percent the next. (There is a non-trivial seasonal pattern as well.)

I admit that this is significantly fewer active editors than we had five years ago—back when vandalism had to be reverted by hand (anyone else remember those pre-Cluebot days?), back before Facebook provided an outlet for a certain class of users, back when Windows Vista was new, back when our American university students were still in middle school—but that was a long time ago. When you look at the recent past, our editor base has pretty much achieved an equilibrium. WhatamIdoing (talk) 13:49, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks WhatamIdoing, but I think (/hope!) you have your columns and row labels mixed up. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 13:52, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I really hope you've got that table the wrong way around ... --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:53, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I did; I've fixed it. (Let's not think about how many edit conflicts I've had today...) WhatamIdoing (talk) 13:55, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Note, that number is, within error margins, stable. Could you add the number of articles-to-maintain to those numbers? Total number of edits per minute? How many of these are article-edits? How many of the edits-per-minute pertain mainspace? --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 14:06, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't know where to get all of those numbers, but a quick search suggests that (for those two months) we saw approximately a 10% increase in the total number of articles, a 10% decrease in the number of new articles created, and a 10% decrease in the number of edits made (to any page, including by bots and unregistered users). Someone else may be able to find the precise numbers that you'd like. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:24, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Anyways, that we are talking about negative spirals may be a better indication that people are not generally happy with Wikipedia than the real numbers are. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:56, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)The point what I am trying to make here is that experienced editors are retiring way before they plan to because of the problems we are facing here and the number may say one thing about our editors but it doesn't talk about their experience in my opinion.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Limited Access} 14:14, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Decline in number of active admins

Article growth

There's lots of charts here, which do show that the project has dropped in the past 4 years, even if there's not an overall decline. Active admins have declined, per the graph on the right, as has the rate of recruitment of new ones. Article growth has dropped, per the graph one the left. There's definitely a decline, and like I say, it's something that the foundation is looking at. I personally don't see it as a "death spiral" just yet, but it could get that way. Who knows? Worm^TT · (talk) 13:59, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

My own view (for what it's worth) is that the reason we've seen a slow-down is not anything to do with any bad atmosphere or animosity among Wikipedia editors, but simply a transition from start-up to steady-state. The encyclopaedia will never be complete, but studies show Wikipedia is already far more comprehensive in its breadth and depth of content than any traditional encyclopaedia. Essentially we've taken all the easy pickings and it's now much harder to find reliable content on subject matter that the typical editor is interested in that hasn't already been added to the project. The subjects that are left tend to be those that require specific expertise or a good deal of research, which leads editors to a choice of (a) leaving or taking a break, (b) putting in quite a bit more effort, (c) heading to an article they perceive as somewhat biased and trying to neutralise it. Those that have chosen option (c) obviously get into conflicts as a result and unsurprisingly don't like the grief it creates, but that's an indication that the project is alive and well, far from dying a death. waggers (talk) 14:00, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Not true. From April 12 to April 16, I ran across the following notable topics which need articles just in the course of ordinary editing and Refdesk answering:

• Phytobenzoar
• Antinutritive
• Gastrectasia
• Ascorbic acid oxidase
• Bangladesh National Women Lawyers' Association
• Centre for Equality and Inclusion
• Brodatz Texture

The reason why we don't see the incompleteness is that some people make a point of taking out every redlink because they think it "looks bad" to admit we don't cover everything in the world. Wnt (talk) 14:32, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Three of the above had articles already; I added the redirects. Phytobezoar is partially covered in bezoar but I will write an article on it specifically. I have a free picture somewhere if I can find it -- Samir 06:16, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Gastrectasia as defined as distension of the stomach is best dealt with on Wiktionary as it is little more than a dicdef, but I've redirected to gastric antral vascular ectasia as an accepted alternative name for GAVE. -- Samir 07:12, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

D'oh! I should have spotted the bezoar misspelling and searched better for articles to redirect to. Still, we haven't run out of work to do. Thanks for doing some of it! Wnt (talk) 19:46, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

I didn't say there's nothing left to do, or that we have a complete, finished encyclopaedia. What I said was that there's now less content that's easy to add without doing lots of additional research. A few years ago I could add content using sources I had at my fingertips and on subjects I know well; to create the articles listed above I'd have to to a fair bit more work. waggers (talk) 10:38, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

The way that I would describe it, in terms of the end effect on the project, is that, due to solvable problems, the project has plateaued out at a level which at a much lower level than what it realistically attainable. North8000 (talk) 14:17, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

As with many of the others I also feel that Wikipedia is in rapid decline. Just in the last few months we have lost more than a dozen prolific editors and more leave every day. The bottom line is that Wikipedia is not a fun and friendly place to edit. There is too much drama, too many battles being fought over petty things, the horrors of the admin process are legendary, and the list goes on. Wikipedia was founded on some good principles but as time goes on those principles are being twisted and distorted. Non administrators are looked at as being non trustworthy, administrators act as though they are infallible. We pick and choose when to and not to enforce policy based on whether its our friend or not. Regardless of what the numbers show Wikipedia is in a downward spiral and its almost to the point were it won't be stoppable. We need to start working together and stop fighting, the teahouse is a joke, if you are a new user you don't even know its there. If we want to be serious about its use it should be linked from the left hand links or the main page. Same with the article creation process. Having them buried in the bowels of the pedia don't do us any good. 138.162.8.58 (talk) 14:26, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• Users come and go - the wheels are still going round - its absolutely normal. - let the good , and the not so good, go in peace, and welcome the new. Youreallycan 16:23, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Is anybody willing (and having the stats) and add the numbers of GAs, FAs, and FLs in the left graph? This would actually show if we improve the quality of the articles (which is only counting). mabdul 16:24, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I hope this is just one of those glitchy patches. There are so many things which can add up to create problems, and there are so many different types of people in here, and so many ways of looking at things. BUT ... the biggest thing is that Wikipedians are, by and large, passionate people. We're intense. We're the kind of people who would probably rather stay in and edit than go out and party. And we lack cues, in print, that would help us resolve things face-to-face. (And some of us, like myself, are on the autism-spectrum and don't do so well picking up on real-life cues, and we tend to interpret things slightly differently from neurotypicals.) Almost everything that goes wrong in here seems to stem, in one way or another, from each side not really "seeing" what the "other side" is seeing. Simple misunderstandings and misconstructions; and they get blown up into mega-dramahz conflicts. I wish I had a magic wand! The thing which would make the biggest difference would be if we could internalize a kinder approach. Not "letter of the law civility", because some people have it down pat how to be bloody unkind and deliberately hurtful-with-malice-aforethought with never a naughty word. It has to be an internal paradigm shift, towards genuine kindness. Pesky (talk) 16:31, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

@Mabdul I wouldn't bother collecting stats on the numbers of FAs etc as an indicator of quality. A few years ago you could get an FA without using inline citation. The FA standard today is significantly different to the FA standard of our early years - plenty of our early FAs have been delisted despite being better now than when they went became FAs. Better indications of quality would include the average speed with which we revert vandalism and the number of typos on the pedia per thousand words. I think you'll find both are improving, it is definitely harder to find certain typos now than it once was. Our best indications of improving quality remain the serious studies into our quality relative to other information sources - such studies are usually quite encouraging. ϢereSpielChequers 19:43, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

• Two thing I see repeated above in essentially every post: There is a perceived (real or imaginary) editor retention problem, and there is a civility issue around the community at large. However, aside from the occasional editor who fades into the night like a spent star, writing a manifesto about their experiences (as Fastily has done, leading to this discussion), is there anything that correlates editor retention to civility? How many editors do we lose because their lives change, because they become tired of writing, or because they've added all they feel they can to their topics of interest? I'm certain we lose far more editors to life than to inside factors. Another thought is the effects the social networking revolution have had on our community, and this civility issue. As Wikipedia has grown, so has the internet as a communication medium. In the last few years, social networking has made chatting on the web the preference over instant messenging programs. Could this contribute to editors spending more time on drama/talk pages and less on actually writing articles? - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ ^τ _¢ 16:26, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

  The reasons why editors leave the project need to be investigated and I believe there were at least attempts (not mine) to do this, though I would not be able to point out to any conclusions right now. I am not sure incivility plays such a minor role. My personal experience was that I had to leave another WMF project for good because of incivility.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:36, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I think what the problem (if that is what it can be called) is not people quitting Wikipedia on a whim because of some witch-hunt as a few editors have classified it as. It is more a point of people lacking knowledge and understanding in how to edit properly, and/or learning from any erroneous edits that may occur. In all due respect, as someone who is non-admin, I find the admin team are here to help, assist, and provide advice on the editing protocols of Wikipedia as a whole. If users are unable to comprehend that advice in a constructive manner, then it is a fault of those people, not a fault of the admin team. At the end of the day, everyone is human, and prone to making mistakes. But if those people aren't being encouraged to learn from mistakes, and rectify them accordingly, then that too is the fault of the individuals, not the fault of the people willing to help. I've made mistakes on here in the past, and if it wasn't for advice from admin or other more knowledgeable users, then I'd probably be still making the same silly mistakes. Whenever I come across someone who has made a mistake, I encourage them to learn from them, by providing assistance, or pointing them into the right direction by means of procedural links or simplified knowledge based on my own learnings. Yes, people get blocked and whatnot, but those blocks are only issued because A) the user is crusading into a childish battle, rather than reading the advice being given; or B) they had listened to the advice, but decided to ignore it for whatever reasons. The world and its people within it are always evolving, as is Wikipedia and its editorial team. People come, people go; but if you wish to slow down the number of people going, and maintain the number of people staying, then perhaps encourage users to learn from mistakes, rather than shoot them down for making them. Wesley☀Mouse 16:38, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I know of about 15 editors who got chased away by nastiness, plus another ~5 who were about to leave who I sort of mentored to stay. All of these were newer editors, (some of them experts in their field) so it's not exactly applicable to this discussion. But I can tell you that while ALL 20 were due to nastiness, NONE were due to simple/blatant incivility. About 1/2 were primarily sincere efforts to correct wiki-errors that the newbie made, but sort of teaching them the wiki-system by beating them with a baseball bat. The other half were pissing wars where the experienced person knows how to safely conduct agression and pissing wars (and win) via wikilawyering. North8000 (talk) 17:02, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Waggers is right on, the decline of article edits are because Wiki is much more established than it was when I first entered the project in 2005. And with established editors leaving, they claimed all the time (including myself) that they are leaving because of drama or whatever the situation is and they almost always come back eventually, some within a day. Only a small handful of established editors has left the project because of "drama" and so on and that's sadly includes are several of our best article writers. A few others left the project because of harassment off-wiki which it is tragic. But at least 90% of established editors who stopped editing was because they got a job, relocated, got married, children, college and so forth and it was a gradual reduction until they lost interest. Secret ^account 17:09, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Lots of editors "leave" for different Wikimedia projects as well, mostly alternative language versions of Wikipedia. At some point in the future, I'm betting that there will be some sort of merger of the different language Wikipedia's into a single project which will have improved multilingual tools available. What's being used on Meta, Commons, and MediaWiki now is a start, but I doubt that it'll scale well to Wikipedia's size. But the fact that something already exists just goes to show, that's the path Wikipedia is likely headed towards.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 17:26, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

• Once or twice a year a thread begins saying that editors are leaving Wikipedia in droves and a lot of data is presented. The problem with data is that nobody ever seems to know how to read it or understand context or the bigger picture, and it results in misguided breaching experiments like WP:NEWT. Established editors leave from time to time, some of it is legit in that they're bored or burned out or feel the project has changed too much. Others are just DIVAS who will be back in a few days when the requisite number of people have begged them on their talk page to reconsider. Lots of established editors get tired of their identity and all the drama, typecasting and stress an extended presence can bring, they "retire" and then a short time later create a new account as per WP:CLEANSTART. Worrying about whether Wikipedia will be here or not is pointless and out of our hands for the most part. Wikipedia is just a website, and many other websites have come and gone, some of them better than Wikipedia. That's life. - Burpelson AFB ✈ 17:27, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
• Our core of active editors has dipped but now seems to have stabilised. Editing levels per day are less than the peak, but maybe not when you factor in the number of vandalisms and vandalism reversions that are not needed because of the edit filters. Our number of active admins has fallen by more than a quarter from peak, but seems to have stabilised in the 730-750 region, however it has only done so because the existing admins are staying around so long. RFA's drought has continued to worsen the first quarter of 2012 saw 5 new admins, the worst result since 2002. So at some point we will have to reform or replace RFA. More importantly, the vast majority of new editors do not stay, with only a tiny proportion joining the active community. The problems we found in 2009 with WP:NEWT are still here, lots of newby biting, incorrect deletion tags and assuming of bad faith. I suspect the ratio of {{fact}} tagging to simply reverting unsourced edits has continued to drift towards a de-facto requirement that all additions be sourced. Part of this is almost certainly due to the disconnect between our written and unwritten rules. The fifth pillar warning "all of your contributions can and will be mercilessly edited" might almost be rephrased "your initial contributions will probably be reverted". Part is I suspect down to the drift from collaborative editing to template bombing, a drift that the new Article Feedback tool is likely to exacerbate. Perhaps the time has come to fork EN Wikipedia, in one fork implement WP:ACTRIAL, and also extend sticky prod to all unsourced articles. In the other replace the maintenance templates with hidden categories, and introduce a 24 hour period of grace for new articles when the only speedy tags that can be applied are the badfaith ones such G3, G11, G12 and G10. If the Foundation hosted both forks within the SUL it would be easy to migrate stuff between them. ϢereSpielChequers 00:09, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Seems pretty impractical, as the drift between the version would increase as time went on, and reintegrating them afterwards would be a total nightmare. Better to use another wiki - like Simple English - as a test bed and compare the changes within each wiki. or something. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:41, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

• I find something that needs to be written about all the time both in old articles and new. So, I don't know why people leave but they should if they do not enjoy it. And thank you administrators for your time. I guess that does not get said enough. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:54, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Cyberpower, you've been an active editor for what, six or seven months? Let me point out something that's obvious to people with ten times your history on the English Wikipedia, before you get too worried about editors who "are retiring way before they plan to": there is a dramatic gap between highly experienced editors saying that they are leaving the English Wikipedia (a popular pastime) and these editors actually leaving the English Wikipedia. In fact, although I've seen a lot of resignation manifestos over the last few years, I can't think of a single one offhand that actually result in a zero-edit retirement rather than (at the very most) a wikibreak of a few months. Presumably there are some, particularly among editors whose return is likely to be met with a block, but most self-identified retirees don't even manage to go an entire week without editing. (I do know people who have left, but none that first posted a long message about why they were leaving.)

NB I say this purely as a general statement, not about any specific case. But if I were you, I wouldn't worry too much about this. In the meantime, go read meatball:GoodBye. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:35, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

With regards to RFA, I'll note that I've considered it and may not even be opposed to pursuing it, but I'm frankly not comfortable with the idea of self-nominating for a process that's sure to result in (unintentionally or otherwise) some confrontation with perhaps negligible gains both for myself and the project. Perhaps more importantly, I can't see how my participation in the project would significantly benefit from my having Admin Mojo, though if others have ideas I certainly wouldn't be opposed to hearing them...perhaps there may be uses for my approach to this project that I have not considered. Alternately, perhaps there could be (or is?) a listing of areas of Wikipedia where more administrative help is desired, so that individuals who might be willing to go through the RFA process could also have some idea of where help is needed?

In general though, I would ask...if the project continues to produce and maintain quality articles, then does the number of active editors or admins particularly matter? I'd rather see 500 active editors with 10 million quality articles, than 3 million active editors with 500 quality articles. My point is that there seems to be a theory that increasing the number of active editors/admins will increase the quality of the project overall; I'm not convinced that that's true, at least at this point in the project's development. Doniago (talk) 14:51, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Seems like a lot of responses have been to the effect of "the sky isn't falling, therefore there is no problem regarding losing editors". This is logically unsound, it is missing the whole middle ground which is: There IS a problem worth looking at and improving, and no the sky isn't falling. North8000 (talk) 14:51, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree with you North8000. I think there is a serious problem with editors leaving that needs to be addressed but it isn't quite yet at the point were Wikipedia is going to go under because of it. Wether that happens sooner or later is irrelevant, at some point, if we don't change some things, it will happen and simply turning our backs to it isn't going to help. Just look at the WikiProjects. There used to be a lot more active ones and now they are all dying off, that seems to me to be an indication of some problem. I also think that the numbers above are a bit misleading. They use editors with 5 edits but it doesn't say if those edits are vandalism, socks or valid edits. Why don't we look at the numbers of editors who made say 100 edits. This is low enough that it should have a significant number of users and high enough that it would wash out any vandals or socks most likely. It will also skip over the editors who only do a handful of edits and leave. It might also be interesting to see trends of edits in the different namespaces. Are they going up in nonarticle (Wikipedia, User, USer talk, Etc.) but down in articles space? Are they going up in talk spaces? Just showing the number of edits, IMO, does not give us an accurate picture of the problem. Kumioko (talk) 14:26, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Also, "losing editors" may be only one of many impacts from the causal issues, and only one of the many things that would get nicer if we fixed some of the causal issues. North8000 (talk) 20:22, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Why don't we look at the numbers of editors who made say 100 edits.

Kumioko, we did exactly that, as you'd know if you scrolled up to the table reporting editor activity. Between the end of 2010 and 2011, the number of editors making >100 edits per month went up (by 0.3%, a statistically insignificant amount) . WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:12, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

The project is constantly renewing itself, continously evolving. It won't last forever, but it's been around for 11 yrs & counting. Therefore, nothing to worry about. GoodDay (talk) 04:45, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Semi-arbitrary break 2 - Losing Editors

If all article editing ceased tonight, how long would you guys go on talking about it at the noticeboards? See, guys? We'll never die! Someguy1221 (talk) 06:03, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

For me, personally (but then that's just me!), whether or not the encyclopedia is sustainable with a massive drop in editors (if there were such a drop) isn't as important as the principle of having left n-amount of hurt and wounded people crawling off to lick their wounds. That's just inhumane, and I wish I could think of a better way to address it. When I was doing a lot of new page patrol I pretty-much-as-standard left an easily-pasted lump of hints and tips (with a good section on referencing, courtesy of Chzz) on the talk page of every newbie or nearly-newbie I encountered. Mind you, I was working at the "cold" end of the backlog (new pages that had survived 20 - 30 days, so no quick-zap vandalism). I'm wondering whether something kinda-automated, to do exactly the same thing, could be added to Twinkle's repertoire. Mine was more personal than any of the standard welcome templates, but applicable to pretty much every new editor.

I got a thankyou message on 17 April for the tips I left on a talk page last October; I've also had messages from other people who've seen them on someone else's talk page and found them useful. In fact, leaving those spiels of stuff on newbies' talk pages may be the single most valuable contribution I've made to the 'pedia! Is something like adding that stuff as a Twinkle option feasible? It would make it so easy for people to do; it takes a few seconds. And I think that actual words on the talk page are more likely to be read than clickable links. Pesky (talk) 06:35, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't think anyone's suggesting (at least, I hope they're not) that it's acceptable to drive editors away through incivility or such, but I haven't seen anything conclusively demonstrating that any decrease in editors or adminship is due to preventable situations either. And if the departing admin/editor "gave as good as they got", I'm not sure it's legitimate to say that they're leaving due to something that could have been avoided. I don't imagine WP has much in the way of an exit interview process for departing editors. Doniago (talk) 19:08, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

@Pesky. Friendly used to be the tool for adding welcome messages, but it has now been folded into Twinkle - and yes Twinkle does have dropdown menus for welcomes to newbies. ϢereSpielChequers 19:19, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

(Comment without having read any of the above very closely) It's concerning that the number of active editors has been falling while, if I remember correctly, the number of readers has been increasing. To a large extent this reflects the fact that Wikipedia is now largely past its 'build' phase, and is regarded as being somehow part of the establishment and so is unavoidable - after all, the goal has been to develop a credible Encyclopedia. That said, there's still tons of scope to improve existing articles and develop new ones, and the - probably correct - perception that Wikipedia is now hard to get established in is a problem. Harassment of established editors (many of whom are admins) is also a problem, though I'm not convinced that it's getting worse. It's certianly not confined to Wikipedia: boorish behaviour is common on many websites. I'd like to see a drive to reduce the amount of 'red tape' in guidelines and policies and replace them with simpler statements of the expectations for editors. However, all editors can contribute to a nicer and more productive environment by remembering their manners and complementing good work (glib, but often forgotten - including by me). Nick-D (talk) 23:45, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

@NickD who said:"I'd like to see a drive to reduce the amount of 'red tape' in guidelines and policies and replace them with simpler statements of the expectations for editors." I couldnt agree more with you. Caden ^cool 00:16, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

I actually plowed through this very long topic, and I thought I'd make it longer. I don't know where all the numbers come from and I find statistics misleading, so I have little confidence in them. The phrase "death spiral" automatically sets up red flags for me as melodrama. I think we should focus on the following things: (1) quality of editors and admins, not quantity; (2) quality of articles, not quantity; (3) more professionalism in our interaction. Personally, I've been tempted to leave Wikipedia at times because of the contentiousness, the lack of civility, and the obsession with trivia (was someone born on October 8 or October 9?) leading to interminable discussions, but I've found that the best method is to stop participating in the stressful discussion, whether it be on a noticeboard or about an article (someone else suggested a variation of this - Fae? - stop watching pages that upset you - I've done that, too). Another problem is we really don't do enough to support each other. Too much argument. We don't say enough that we agree with someone, we just comment when we disagree; we don't support others enough when they are unjustly attacked, we let it go, even if we think it's unjust. I have more to say, but in an effort to keep this of reasonable length, I'll stop.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:59, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree. However, when I started this post, I meant that we were losing more editors that produce quality content than we are gaining. If you need me notify me on my talk page. I'm going back to me wikibreak.—cyberpower ^Chat_{Temporarily Online} 19:06, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Obsession with trivia can be a good thing because it means people are determined to produce accurate content. Bbb23's other comments about people failing to support each other when unfairly attacked and lack of civility are spot on though. In the spirit of his suggestion I'm supporting and agreeing with him and others here and sincerely thank them for raising such important points.--Shakehandsman (talk) 00:14, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not delicate, I don't mind getting bruised if there's good to be done. So/but for me the most stressful thing (and a very stressful thing) is realizing that many things are unfixable / hopeless because the policies are written such that they so easily and frequently mis-used contrary to their intended purpose. In short, because wiki-lawyering works and wins. And once a miscreant masters it, they can beat people up with immunity. North8000 (talk) 20:02, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Causes of editor loss

Strictly enforcing WP:NPA, WP:CIVIL, and WP:EQ would go a long way in retaining editors. Who wants to volunteer for something when you are being treated poorly? 140.247.141.165 (talk) 22:38, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

The problem is that overly strict enforcement would likely be used in editing disputes as a bludgeon against editors when the editor has expressed slightly intemperant comment out of frustration. Having to constantly take pains to express everything in the most civil of terms lest a minor breach of etiquette get you punished would drive away editors just as quickly or more so as the current civility issues do. Monty₈₄₅ 22:54, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree wholeheartedly with this; civility crusaders create the same toxic environment that serially abusive editors do. It goes both ways. On the one hand, having a lawless, caustic, Youtube-comments-section style free-for-all is sure to drive people away. But on the other hand, who wants to stick around when you have to sanitise your every word for fear of getting sanctioned for a slightly snippy phrasing? You can't "strictly enforce" a policy to be civil and unoffensive. That in and of itself creates hostility. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 23:35, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

I think you've nailed it. Viriditas (talk) 04:10, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Agreed.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 05:08, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I tend to agree with the OP, to expand on it a bit, however, the issue is not the occasional impertenent comment, it is people who have established that they have no desire to treat any other editors with respect, and who act with a sense of entitlement to do so merely because they have a few featured articles under their belt. It's not individual, isolated acts of incivility that need to be stopped, we can let the occasional outburst slide with no great problem. It is people who have established that they have no intention of abiding by the basic rules of decency and civility, no matter what, that we need to eliminate, as they poison the editing environment. --Jayron32 23:06, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

You're living in some kind of a make-believe world. For instance, can you name even one editor who has "established that they have no desire to treat any other editors [my emphasis] with respect"? Malleus Fatuorum 04:33, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Fair enough, that may have been a bit of hyperbole. You are correct that no editor treats all people as such, but when conflicts arise, the difference is in how an editor treats others in the context of that conflict. Even in emotionally charged conflicts, all editors should be held to standards of decorum and civility, instead of personalizing and becoming insulting towards those with whom they have disagreements. We need to make clear that while a single isolated outburst of rudeness shouldn't be sanctioned, patterns of aggessive, incivil, or rude behavior should. When an editor frequently and over a period of time, shows that in multiple conflicts they often resort to insults, personal attacks, and other immature, incivil behavior, it needs to be dealt with, and dealt with harsher than it is now. That is, we shouldn't block an editor for the first time they call someone a rude name or tell someone to fuck off, but when such behavior becomes repeated and a regular manner in which an editor interacts with people they disagree with, again, when it becomes a pattern of behavior, then it needs to be stopped. We can forgive and forget over the individual outburst, but when it becomes a repeated occurance for an editor to treat those they disagree with aggressively or rudely, to the point of insult, it needs to be dealt with. --Jayron32 14:09, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

But once again it comes down to what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. There's lots of high fallutin' talk about administrators being held to higher standards than regular editors, but the truth is that they're not even held to the same standards. I could very easily name you several administrators who were they not administrators would have even longer block logs than they already have. I won't though, for to do so would undoubtedly be considered a "personal attack", but a look through my contributions may provide a few clues. Malleus Fatuorum 15:22, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

And as a supplementary question, do you think it's acceptable for any administrator to have multiple blocks for incivility? Malleus Fatuorum 15:24, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

That's an interesting question in and of itself, but I'm not sure that it's directly related to the subject that started this thread, which seems to me to be dealing with civility "enforcement" in general. On that topic, I think that the difference of opinion comes down to individual editor's priorities or focus. If the focus is on "policing" (as it usually seems to be on, for example, AN/I), then Jayron32's view that "all editors should be held to standards of decorum and civility" seems to dominate. If the focus is on content itself (as in a content dispute taking place on an article talk page or a User talk page), then Monty845's view that "overly strict enforcement [is used in] editing disputes as a bludgeon against editors" seems to dominate. I think that where Malleus is coming to this discussion from is, essentially, having been caught between those two paradigms and trying to deal with it. The real problem here is that this push-pull goes on all the time, and it's something that many established editors are quite familiar with. I know that I've personally learned when to simply walk away for a content dispute, because as soon as any content dispute ends up on AN/I (or just about any other dispute resolution venue) then someone is getting smacked around and likely blocked. The content suffers, but I'd rather not get blocked or get someone else blocked because eventually the content will get corrected. Opinions on that vary though (Malleus, for example, obviously isn't one to back down... which I think is fine, it's just a different approach), and it would be nice to rectify things so we're not living with such different cultures here on Wikipedia.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 16:05, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Applying those policies to administrators and not just to regular editors would be a step in the right direction. Malleus Fatuorum 23:20, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

What about something like a Wikipedia-version of Robert's Rules of Order for all editors, specifically when it comes to debate and decorum? Viriditas (talk) 04:43, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

As long as the donations come in, the project will continue. GoodDay (talk) 04:50, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not meaning to open a Pandora's Box of comments here (though I can already imagine how that will happen), but maybe what's needed is a process similar to WP:AN3, where civility complaints can be filed through a formalized process where multiple instances of recent and ongoing incivility must be provided along with at least one notification to the editor of concerns regarding their tone? Just an idea, and FWIW I'd recommend that more than 3 specific instances be requied. Five strikes me as a reasonable number if they are recent and the editor was asked to desist. Doniago (talk) 14:20, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

The nastiest treatment is by people who know how to USE the Wikipedia system to beat up people. It's the nastiest because it can then be done with immunity. North8000 (talk) 14:19, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Another reason experienced editors leave is because they are tired of fighting day in and day out with vandals and inexperienced editors who burn up hours of their day. — GabeMc (talk) 06:45, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

It's fairly rare for such an editor to present too much of a problem long term though, some return a few times but in my experience 95% of the time they don't cause long term stress. They certainly are a nuisance but North8000's point is the key one - it's the conduct of experienced editors (and just a general acceptance of incivility) which drives people over the edge and actually causes them to leave for good.--Shakehandsman (talk) 23:46, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Want a solution? Here it is.

On this site, "experience" translates to experience with wikipedia procedures. That is the complete opposite of how things should be.

What to do?

Simple. Abolish all rules and start over from fresh. There can be a core team of admins left over, but they will be there to do the community's bidding ONLY and will be permitted to do nothing else - not even say anything, except to ask questions if they're unclear about what they're being asked to do. There can of course be admin bots with that too. And say good bye to the guidelines as well. And the essays. They'll all be archived of course, for historical interest and future inspiration. But that's it.

Then we build the wikipedia "system" up again.

Oh, and when we do this, we shouldn't be quiet about it. We should be loud. We should attract the best minds in the world to come and draft these rules, guidelines and so on. Richard Dawkins devising evoloutionary biology guidelines. Peter Singer animal welfare guidelines. Chomsky language. And some Wharton MBAs coming up with the new procedures. Give them a week or two to do it. Every means of communication possible - on wiki, IRC, email, SKYPE, phone, hell there'd probably even be TV time for something this big. This has to be a big discussion and I believe it could involve over a million people.

So yeah... this would be massive. My question is: does the community have the balls? Especially since, if you are currently a "prominent" community member, you ain't gonna be after this. Egg Centric 19:14, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

It's certainly an interesting proposal, but like you, I'm not sure if the community would be willing to take it on. After being here for about nine and a half months, I think a fresh start of some sort for Wikipedia would be a very good thing. I'm not certain about scrapping everything, but yes, a fresh start for the whole project would be very nice. As a side note, I'm not sure that that admins' noticeboard is the best place for a discussion like this; perhaps Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals) would be better? Chris the Paleontologist (talk • contribs) 19:58, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, that didn't work out so well when they tried it on "Blood on the Scales". Your solution is tantamount to throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Not good. Viriditas (talk) 04:33, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

You could use an even more thorough approach to the same goal: abolish the community when you start afresh. Ban all the existing editors at the same time that you abolish all the rules. Then just let in editors who you think are good. Change the domain name and servers too. In fact Wikipedia's content policies (specificially the CC licensing) is designed to allow exactly this, it's called a "fork", and multiple people have done it with varying degrees of success. Citizendium is probably the best known of them. It's better than Wikipedia in some ways and worse in others. Same for Wikinfo. Veropedia is of course dead. None of these really got all that much traction, but on the other hand, I half-remember hearing that a fork of the Spanish Wikipedia ended up supplanting the original one. Anyway, good luck with your fork; you might want to make another post once it's up and running. 67.117.130.107 (talk) 00:44, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Your memory is ok, but apparently ends in mid-2004. Enciclopedia Libre, a Spanish-Wikipedia fork, was indeed more popular. But that only lasted from February 2002 to ~March 2004. It's not quite dead yet, but it's not going anywhere either. Someguy1221 (talk) 01:05, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

"Just let in editors who you think are good" - who is this "you" deciding who is "good"? You've abolished all the rules, remember... JohnCD (talk) 19:03, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I prefer evolution to revolution. That isn't to say that revolutions aren't sometimes necessary, but when they are it is because some establishment has sat on all possibility of reform. We aren't in that position, consensus makes change much more difficult than majority voting would, but it is still possible and it does sometimes happen. ϢereSpielChequers 19:22, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

What is this...the "Six Million Dollar Wikipedia"? "Gentlemen...we can re-build it....." LOL! I think this all can be nutshelled down to this......stop looking so close and reading the freaking tea leaves over what is happening here on Wikipedia. It isn't rocket science and it isn't the end of the world or the site. Statistics are an awful thing in the wrong hands and just ask yourself - who is leaving and how is that determined. Can I delete my account? I don't think so? So what is this about established editors leaving. I think we are talking time only here. And some editors have twice as much editing in as I do with the same time and some editors with almost twice the time even less edits than I. It's all overblown and hyped up. The problem is getting people to stick around longer and getting thold ones to come back. That just seems a little too "social media" like for me. Wikipedia can improve a lot of things here and there. Maybe another update to the formatting of the page, maybe some different types of mark up allowance (what can be done on wikipedia), maybe just getting the discussions rolling more to change consensus on things that directly relate to ease of use, and overall look. Maybe something as dumb as allowing some set skins to certain articles, or just pushing projects more for a more interesting and yet somewhat controled experiance for editors. We don't have to re-invent the wheel....but we could loosen up a bit.--Amadscientist (talk) 01:37, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Loss of editors is a problem, and also indicative of some problems that we should fix. No, the sky isn't falling, but we're plateaued out due to some problems that we need to fix. Incidentally, IMHO the area where Wikipedia has the worst retention rate and where it most needs needs to have a high retention rate is newer editors who are experts in their fields. I have seen many leave and have provided some partial mentoring to get some to stay and become editors North8000 (talk) 19:45, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• You want solutions? Here are solutions... You want more administrators? Fix the dysfunctional RfA process, in which one NO vote counts as 3 YES votes and those holding the tools are regarded as members of some sacred priesthood rather than the Universal Set of Experienced Editors Who Are Vandal Fighters, as it should be. The tools really are NO BIG DEAL. You want more editors? Fix this lousy editing software that requires contributors to write code. Make it work as simply and intuitively as MS Word or Apple Pages or whatever WYSIWYG word processor you prefer. You want to reduce vandalism? Require registration an sign-in-to-edit. This is not rocket science.

I personally don't think there is a serious crisis in terms of participation. It's harder to make contributions now than it was in 2004. Don't believe me? Look at the quality of the referencing in ANY 2004 article you care to name and compare that to a decently constructed article of 2012 in terms of form and content... Things are at a much higher level now...

The project is a compendium of pop trivia on the one hand — which is much as it ever was. In terms of "hard coverage" encyclopedia articles, the project needs more experts, retired professors and the like. It is natural that there will be fewer people involved. If you want more of them, the editing process needs to be simpler, the difficulty of adding footnotes to form is the big barrier. Carrite (talk) 19:56, 29 April 2012 (UTC) Last edit: Carrite (talk) 19:59, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

WP's loss of good editors has nothing to do with difficulty of adding footnotes, or even with random vandalism by unenrolled users. When I see a good editor leave, it's always because of frustration and burnout with the site culture, which mostly means tolerance of pushy jerks and every form of COI. WP:RAUL is kind of old now, but those not familiar with it might take a look. The current editing atmosphere is far more bureaucratic than it's ever been in the past, and the "reforms" that keep getting implemented are making it worse rather than better. The project lost its sense of purpose long ago, so what's left is slowly filling with poison. 64.160.39.217 (talk) 22:06, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

As Jesus O'Buddah once declared, "The burned out editors will always be with you." The key is to make sure that the river flowing into the reservoir is equal to or greater than the water flowing out the spillway. That requires more editors. WMF thinks the key is User Talk pictures of kittens, kicking grouchy content creators out if they can't mend their ways, and adding thousands of random "crowd sourcers" through outreach campaigns targeted to a mystical youth demographic. I content that given the developing LEVEL of content, what are needed are more grouchy old content creators with specialist expertise — which requires, first and foremost, editing software that will make their contributions possible. Carrite (talk) 16:07, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I do think North 800 is correct however, and we do seem to be losing a lot of newer editors with expertise in their fields and much of that is over confusion as to how their edits may be COI, POV or OR. Some leave over continued disputes over their contributions for POV reasons and some leave when a simple warning turns into a bite and their simple misunderstanding of policy and guidelines gives way to a perception of them as an undesirable editor. Specifics in regards to newly formed ediors and guidance in these areas could help a lot. More emphasis on COI editing, what it is, how to work within guidelines on such articles that may be in conflict ets. Being an expert in a particular field does not make you a COI editor. Being directly linked to a subject does. However, having a COI does not mean you cannot edit and educating, even the more established editors seems to be of great concern. I wonder if an occasional ad at the top of the wikipedia page that remains, similar to the Foundation announcements, should be used clarify problem areas of concern to the general community. Anything else might be very difficult to implement, such as some kind of auto generated Newcomer page with clarification of editing for pay, declaring a conflict if desired, what POV is and how to reference a fact etc. I don't know if this is possible, or even already done in some form, but it could help to guide future editors in the direction of collaboration if nothing else and give them a much better chance of surviving the first edit, which seems to be the problem. Many new editors don't make a second edit. If they do, there may not be a third.--Amadscientist (talk) 18:04, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Orange Mike

New user Admarkroundsquare (talk · contribs) uploaded a new logo for Round Square and explained at the help desk that he works for the organisation and asked for help updating the article with new information and the new logo. So Orangemike (talk · contribs) blocked him without discussion and slapped an offensive template on his user page.

This seems inappropriate to me. Is this the way admins typically treat new users? Do you, as a group, approve of this kind of behaviour? I've notified Mike of this discussion. I haven't discussed it with him because he clearly thinks it's OK and I'm actually interested in what the admin community thinks. I'm not looking for any action, just opinions (unless there's a pattern of rudeness). --Anthonyhcole (talk) 12:19, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

This is certainly the appropriate venue for this kind of discussion, Anthony; I am not even remotely offended. My reasoning was that the username Admarkroundsquare was clearly for advertising and marketing of Round Square, and thus was inappropriate. I will readily acknowledge that I am not hospitable towards advertising and marketing in Wikipedia, but did not think my actions were out of line. That "offensive template" was designed by Wikipedia's user interaction gurus, not by me, and is the standard template for spamusernames. --Orange Mike | Talk 12:33, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

The issue at hand is not really blocking the editor, but your attitude in dealing with these people. Which is problematic IMO. --Errant ^(chat!) 12:40, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• People with undisclosed but obvious affiliations edit articles like this every day, I see it all the time. If he was less honest, he wouldn't have disclosed it like most. I always like it when editors disclose it honestly.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 12:37, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Mike has a particular... view.. of editors associated with organisations or their own biographies - which is that they are bad people, here for a nefarious agenda and must be immediately blocked with prejudice or put in their place. Part of the problem is that block notice (not his fault) which doesn't help explain the issue at hand to what is probably a well meaning individual who doesn't know how things work. But then we also have this from earlier today - Wikipedia:BLP/N#Keith_Gary - in which he bites heavily at a new editor on the basis of reading "my Wikipedia page" as asserting some kind of ownership. I've recently noted Mike's work through a recent AN/I and I have quite a lot of concerns about how he deals with COI, BLP subjects etc. as well as possible issues with content he is adding in his own topic field. An RFC/U might be in order, although it would be nice to see his response to these concerns. -Errant ^(chat!) 12:40, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

content he is adding in his own topic field???? --Orange Mike | Talk 12:44, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

We'll deal with that in a moment. But reviewing the block procedures; why did you use a "bad faith" template for an account that has tried (and failed) to update their logo, then asked for help on the helpdesk? Certainly the username was wrong, but why not use {{Uw-softerblock}} in the absence of any actual promotional editing? --Errant ^(chat!) 12:46, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Ummm... "How do I delete a page from Wikipedia that was produced ages ago. I need to replace the whole page with up to date information and new logo." isn't promotional? --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 12:52, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Misguided, sure. Aiming to be promotional. But assuming they can't have WP:NPOV explained to them is a succinct failure of assume good faith. --Errant ^(chat!) 12:57, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• I think it would make more sense to wait until they had problematic edits. We're supposed to assume good faith, not shoot on sight. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 13:00, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, it's a username block, and the username does contain the name of the organization. The discussion of COI seems relatively neutral. I don't see this as horrible. Possibly a little more tact was in order, but that's arguable.--Wehwalt (talk) 13:06, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I will readily concede that I have low tolerance towards paid editors and the entire COI/PR/spindoctor industry (which seems to have us targeted for conquest or destruction, if we don't yield to their demands). On the flip side of WP:AGF, I will point out that it was at my instigation that we created the {{causeblock}} template, for the clueless well-intentioned advocate who creates an account in the name of their cause or not-for-profit organization, but is not spamming Wikipedia. --Orange Mike | Talk 13:32, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Seems to be a simple case of WP:ORGNAME. User had a clearly promotional username and was engaging in promotional activity. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 13:40, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

WP:ORGNAME says:

• Users who adopt such a username and engage in inappropriately promotional behaviors in articles about the company, group, or product, are usually blocked.
• Users who adopt such usernames, but who are not editing problematically in related articles, should not be blocked. Instead, they should be gently encouraged to change their username. (emphasis not mine)

This editor did not make any problematic edits. In fact, they don't have a single edit in article space. Also, how is a newbie supposed to know about WP:ORGNAME? I've been on Wikipedia for 2-3 years now, and I've never seen that policy before. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 14:07, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Uh, the guy made it clear that he was here to construct a page for his company. Again, Advertising and Marketing. WP:NOTAD. The fact that you are ignorant of the relevant policy is really quite meaningless. I have been around for around the same amount of time and have known about it for quite a while. Spend a couple months patrolling new pages and recent changes and you'll learn these ropes right quick. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 15:31, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Hmm, I think your response here rather highlights the problem... A new user is always ignorant of policy; treating them as a criminal rather than trying to educate them is simply bad faith. So what if they are here to market their company/organisation - doesn't make them a bad person incapable of changing. I hope to god you don't patrol new pages with that sort of attitude. --Errant ^(chat!) 15:39, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

This particular block I find to be justifiably "preventative". As outlined before, policy is pretty clear on promotional behaviour and usernames. If the guy is such a "good person", then why don't you go and suggest that he change his username and mentor him on policy? If you're right, then he should warm right up to it. As for myself, I grew tired of NPP about a year ago, to an extent because of PR guys like this one. I'm not buying your line. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 15:49, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Furthermore, speculations on whether or not an editor is a "good person" or "bad person" are really quite irrelevant. Such wishy-washy subjective labels are not part of the workings of this site. I have never seen a block that says "You have been blocked indefinitely from editing Wikipedia because you are a bad, bad person." I am sure that many vandals, POV-pushers, and even banned users are great guys/gals in real life—they just cause issues for the functioning of the project. Character evaluations are utterly meaningless. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 16:08, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I am not understanding how {{softerblock}} is considered offensive – especially since it starts with "Welcome to Wikipedia", and kindly tells to "please take a moment to create a new account". --MuZemike 15:56, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Orange Mike originally placed {{Uw-spamublock}} on the user's talk page and it has since been replaced with {{softerblock}}, so it was the spamublock template that was referred to as offensive. -- Ed (Edgar181) 15:59, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

OK, I see why: We usually do that to direct users who have already made edits to change their username so that they get to keep their contribs when switching to another username (normally via WP:CHU); {{softerblock}} is more intended when there are no contribs under the username (or they have all been deleted) and when it would be easier for that person to simply create another account on his/her own without our assistance, unlike the other username blocks. --MuZemike 16:15, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

This is now a non-issue, as the original {{Uw-spamublock}} has been replaced with {{softerblock}}. There is no evidence that the user even saw the harder block template—it was up for less than 24 hours—so the slightly too-harsh response by Orangemike is old news. Orangemike should be forgiven this very minor blip which was only a matter of degree of response. I am 100% supportive of anyone who stands between PR agents and Wikipedia, to make it more difficult to turn the encyclopedia into a promotional tool. Binksternet (talk) 16:29, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• The block and the {{Uw-spamublock}} block notification template were appropriate. Advertising is not permitted on Wikipedia, and the username indicates that this was the account's purpose. I do not see the problem here.  Sandstein  17:22, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

  You might think that, but that's not what WP:ORGNAME says. If this is the new community concensus, then someone should make following changes:

• Users who adopt such usernames, but who are not editing problematically in related articles, should not be blocked. Instead, they should be gently encouraged to change their username. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:22, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• The block was itself valid. So what would've happened if the guy had a non-promotional username and posted "Hey, this company's logo changed, see the link here", would we have blocked him immediately with a bad faith template? That's where I have trouble with this one. I think we can block, advise them why (and a template does not work well for this) and still accept valid, correct information. Someone says that an article is out of date, getting blocked doesn't mean they're wrong. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 17:39, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
• I'm going to have to agree with Ultra on this one. I prefer the ErrantX approach much better. I'm not saying the block was wrong - but, if you're not "not hospitable" toward a particular group of new editors, then take a break from that area for a while. No need to wp:bite someone just because they don't know the rules. Personally I think admins. should strive to achieve higher standards than that. The guy/gal wants to update a logo, and we slap him with some "you're outta here" template? We can do better, and we should. — Ched :  ?  18:20, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
• Yes, clearly User:Orangemike has declared a strength of opinion in this area that makes his use of tools in the area totally inappropriate - if you can't stay unemotional in a sector then stop policing it - Here is the user Orangemike very recently immediately attacking a user after a very good faith request to contribute a picture after the user opened a good faith thread at the BLPN noticeboard - Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Keith_Gary - Youreallycan 18:36, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
  • I object strongly to that categorization. The user talked about an article about himself as if it was his MySpace or Facebook page, in language that implied ownership of the article; I firmly stated that the article was just that: an article, not a "page". It is him, but is not his' and is not under his control. That is not an attack in any way. --Orange Mike | Talk 19:15, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
    • You can strongly object all you like. Anyone is able to look at that discussion - you started on an attack position not a welcome one - you assumed a lack of good faith - you attacked , you didn't show any good faith or welcome at all - not at all - users can read that discussion and see for themselves. -How can I add photos to my wikipedia page? - did you help them in their question ? - no you didn't, not in any way - Youreallycan 19:24, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
      • Mike; I think that is the crux of the problem. Because my reading of the comment was "the article about me". You assumed that meant he could control it, which is a lack of good faith - especially as a perfectly reasonable reading of the comment doesn't show that. When users ask for help you should give it to them nicely - not jump down their throats. You categorically & needlessly attacked him. --Errant ^(chat!) 19:30, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
        • Lord knows I've had plenty of disagreements with Youreallycan, but he's right in this case. Your response was not at all welcoming or friendly. You have no idea when they said "my article" if they meant "it's an article about me" or if it meant "it's an article I control". You assumed the latter, and not the former. It seems to me that newbie isn't going to be aware of WP:OWNERSHIP and probably doesn't realize that such language can be interpretted to mean ownership. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:33, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• The block itself was fine, if a bit too quick. Choosing to use {{softerblock}} would have been much better, but it's not required, It's a judgement call, and not everyone knows about it (or thinks about it, with the automated tools that many people use). I'd just like to point out that this is part of what is something of a campaign over Orange Mike himself (and Cla68, not coincidentally). Making decisions about other users through that prism, and with passions running high, isn't the best way to manage things. At the very least it opens people up, on both "sides" of the issue(s), to criticisms over their politics.
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 19:07, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
  • Whatever happened to assume good faith? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:16, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
    • What's to assume? I don't think that I'm assuming anything.
      — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 19:18, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

"Assume good faith" does not mean burying your head in the sand and pretending that nothing is going on. --MuZemike 19:28, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

And what exactly is going on? The only thing we know for sure is that they said that the logo in our article is out of date and the wanted to update it. I checked out their web site and it turns out Admarkroundsquare was correct. tThe logo in our article is out of date. Here's the new one. What's wrong with updating the logo to their current one? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:37, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

"How do I delete a page from Wikipedia that was produced ages ago. I need to replace the whole page with up to date information and new logo."--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:39, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

You say that as if it contradicts what I said. Let me clarify. The only thing we know for sure is that they said that the logo in our article is out of date and the wanted to update it. What other changes they had in mind, we don't know. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:42, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Yup; and I absolutely agree, Sarek, that they probably wanted to do exactly as you posit. But why does that mean they are not welcome? Do you disagree with any of our policies? I'm guessing there are some you think are wrong, or at least not perfect; but no one wants to block you for it! Because you have had the concept of community concept explained, and accepted it. But what you are advocating is not giving them the chance to have it explained... --Errant ^(chat!) 19:47, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

What am I supposed to be "positing" here? I was quoting the editor verbatim. I'm not advocating anything, except not misrepresenting the information we have. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:53, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

heh. yes sorry a little sleepy here... consider my comment intended generically, then. --Errant ^(chat!) 19:59, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I'd like to point out that, regardless of what anyone here may or may not desire, "Indefinite" doesn't mean "permanent". This user still has talk page access, and is quite welcome to request a name change (which will likely involve and unblock, but there's nothing wrong with that). AGF can just as easily be applied to everyone in this discussion rather than just a few of the participants.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 21:46, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Let me draw a comparison - you are on vacation in some country which language you barely speak, looking for a hotel. Eventually you find one and walk in, but once you walk inside and try to ask the receptionist for a room you are grabbed by a doorman and tossed out. Once outside the doorman hands you a note stating that you are not wearing black shoes, thus you are not allowed entry again until you do. Now, what will you do - get some black shoes or be abhorred by your treatment and search for a new hotel?

What i am trying to explain here is that new editors are complete rookies who only just made their first edit, and often don't have a clue what they are doing. Just blocking them with a template message will scare people away - period (Unless they have a specific reason to "get the black shoes" such as marketeers). I utterly detest spammers and marketeers and i am only to glad to throw those out, but all to often we truly lack empathy towards new editors. Note that this is quite a general comment on newbie treatment, though it does somewhat apply in this case as well. Excirial ^{(Contact me,Contribs)} 22:22, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I don't disagree. I'd like to see the policy changed so that "automatic blocks" are not issued, basically unilaterally, against users who certain administrators feel have "promotional" user names, and I've spoken out against that in the past on AN/I. That seems like a separate issue though.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 22:35, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Excirial, your example would make sense if there was no sign at the door of your hotel. But there is. In English. You walk in anyways. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 00:07, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes indeed, there is. But have you recently looked at the sign up page and imagined what it looks like to a new user? It is so riddled with links, text, policies and so on which means that it is easy to miss the sign. How often do you read the entire EULA when installing some software, and did you ever you read the entire manual when you buy something from a store? I am not surprised that editors just see the two "Fill me in" boxes for username and password and ignore the rest.

I don't intend to state that not seeing the rules doesn't mean that they are there. My entire point is how we deal with people who go over the line - a friendly comment or even a softblock and a manually written explanation of the block are vastly preferable over a spamblock. Especially in cases where the editor did nothing to bad so far. Excirial ^{(Contact me,Contribs)} 12:16, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Proposed blocking. --MuZemike 23:57, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

OrangeMike should be drawn and quartered. Now that I have your attention, everyone seems to be quoting WP:AGF without assuming any good faith on the part of OrangeMike; saying he "attacked" a new user instead of considering the fact that he was following what he thought in good faith to be the policy. No permanent damage has been done, and even as an admin who thinks WP:BITE is the worst problem on Wikipedia right now, I don't think any further action is required. The harsh template has been replaced by a more welcoming message, and instructions on requesting an unblock if the user wishes. I think we should also start a new policy: Wikipedia:Please do not bite the admins. We are human after all, and no one has just straight-up asked OrangeMike if he'll agree to be less WP:BITEy in the future. So....

OrangeMike, could you please agree to be less WP:BITEy in the future, especially if they are posting in the correct venues seeking help? -RunningOnBrains^(talk) 06:29, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Running, I try not to be bitey; but I simply cannot agree to any commitment which would preclude me from blocking blatant violations of our rules. Advertising and marketing by COI editors is one of the biggest dangers to our prized neutrality here, and it's delusional to pretend otherwise in the sacred name of AGF. Nonetheless: I'm already keeping this discussion in mind when choosing between a softerblock and a spamuserblock.

I am already, also, keeping this discussion in mind when encountering folks who genuinely don't understand the distinction between "my page" (which I control) and "an article about me" (which I do not).

I hope some of those who have piled on me will agree to spend more time at the Help Desks and maybe in the Tea Room, helping those noobs you are advocating for. (Yes, some of you already do; it would be obnoxious and unfair of me to pretend otherwise.)

I would also hope that this discussion might lead to some discussion in the appropriate venues about improving the wording of the standard templates, which some of you clearly consider a bit bitey.

I hope this response is satisfactory to those not of a lynch-mob mentality. For those who are of that mind: sorry, I have no intention of going away or of dropping the Mop-and-Bucket with which I have been entrusted. I've been shat upon by the best; I don't frighten easy.

I am, however, weary. I myself would like to go back to trying to improve the content of this encylopedia; I've got several projects I've been neglecting while this discussion dragged on. --Orange Mike | Talk 17:05, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, that's a step in the right direction, but please keep in mind that WP:ORGNAME says that you cannot block someone for their account name until after they're had problematic edits. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:39, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Thought experiment

I was thinking about how to demonstrate the perspective that is eluding some of the commentators here - and perhaps this is it. Imagine that I flicked through your contributions. I expect that, and this applies to all of us here, I could find something that violates one of our policies in some way or other (ostensibly or otherwise). Is it to be assumed you, being regular editors, know policy and therefore are deliberately violating it? Should I block you and whack a template on your userpage? Or is it more likely that an explanation would be of effect? This is the core of the issue; as regulars Wikipedia is as natural to us as breathing. To a new user - yes, even one who wants to make their article say nice things - it is a black box. By assuming the worst of faith & dumping an aggressive template note on their page (which they probably don't even know exists, yet) we don't even make an attempt to educate them, we just decide they are unsalvageable. What's the response? They are upset, create a new account and try to "delete" the article. They contact OTRS. They decide Wikipedia is obnoxious and tell their friends. Seriously, the way we treat newbies is disgusting. I'm sorry to Mike that he has become the current focus, because he is far from the only guilty one, but he is a strong example of one of our most pressing problems. --Errant ^(chat!) 19:37, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

OK, so our Standard Operating Procedure should be then, if we find usernames that don't fall within our policy, should be to tell the user to change his/her username and/or establish an account, and if he/she doesn't, then ignore the problem? --MuZemike 19:42, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Uh, I'm not sure how I would be suggesting that... if we take this case I gave you an example (by doing it) of what we should be doing - which is politely blocking the username, explaining why and then trying to answer the question posed. Ignoring the problem is silly, as is stamping around all over the place. --Errant ^(chat!) 19:45, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Maybe the next question should be: Is a block ever a polite action? Because from what I gather above, the answer seems to be "no". --MuZemike 19:48, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I invite those who complain so much about our treatment of newbies to pop over to UAA and see what's actually going on there. If you don't like the way things are being handled, do it yourself; guess what, after the thousandth SEO upstart tries to spam about his company, your patience will run thin. We have a username policy for a reason, and people who violate it should change their usernames. It's not unlike requiring someone to put on a shirt before they walk into an establishment with a "No shirt, no shoes, no service" sign. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 19:50, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

That's a bad analogy, because we don't have a sign of that sort. What we do have is a global invitation to edit... A lot of the UAA stuff is obvious, I agree, but many (such as this one) are not. It would certainly be worth having a discussion about improving the default templates to assume better faith, certainly. @MuZemike; of course a block is impolite, but often that is the only option. My argument is that it shouldn't be the first option if the situation doesn't seem utterly lost from the get go. --Errant ^(chat!) 19:55, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Have no sign for that? Good — so make one. Should be easy. Oh, strike that. I just logged out, and looked at the "create an account"-page. There is a sign. Maybe make it bolder or colored. Or blinking. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 20:08, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

From the "create an account" page:

"Username policy prohibits usernames which are promotional, misleading, or offensive:

• promotional usernames:

• containing existing company, organization, group, or website names (including non-profit organizations)"

There is a clear warning. This isn't some obscure guideline, this is explained up front when a user creates an account. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 20:19, 27 April 2012 (UTC).

Might be nice if the process to change a username was made easier by programming. If this issue is one that some newbies feel bitten by, and administrators get tired of seeing, then a more 'self-serve' process, where admins can check a box or something might cause fewer problems for editors and admins also. -- Avanu (talk) 20:20, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

reality is that, as I suggested above, you could make the note blinking yellow with stars in 70pt, some people never follow it, either because they are dumb, illiterate, or just willfully ignoring it. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 20:23, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

We can assume good faith, but I don't think we can assume people aren't stupid, illiterate, or ignorant. Some people have an amazing capacity to impress, not by their feats of strength, but by their ability to take something that seems foolproof and still find a way to mess it up. We do hope admins at least have one eye (figuratively), in order to lead the nation of the blind if needed. -- Avanu (talk) 20:33, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I've never seen much sense in that part of the username policy that says they can't include names of companies or organizations. It's a simple fact that we have lots and lots of editors who edit on behalf of their company or organization – often in a problematic way, often not; we couldn't stop them doing that even if we wanted to, and at present we don't actually prohibit their editing as such. It strikes me that as soon as we're stuck with working with these editors, we should actually encourage rather than prohibit their announcing their affiliations in their names. I've often found blocking such account to have been quite counterproductive. Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:43, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Absolutely agreed.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 15:41, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

There are difficulties and complications in keeping track of who is entitled to use a company or organization name. If Bob works for FooCorp, and creates User:Bob(FooCorp), what happens when Bob moves to another company? Do we close the account? Do we rename it to User:Bob(NewJob)? Does FooCorp's HR department give it to Carol, and rename it to User:Carol(FooCorp)?

Who actually holds the copyright for the submissions made by the account, Bob or FooCorp? How do we know that Bob really works for FooCorp, and is entitled to represent them in public? Who gets to make the call on right-to-vanish questions?

Do we want to be in a position where the Foundation has to deal directly with FooCorp's legal department?

Sure, we probably could hammer out some sort of policy on these issues, and then ignore it to try to come up with new ideas on the fly when we found the edge cases where it broke, and be embarrassed when some random admin was a dick to a charitable organization and the incident made the papers on a slow news day, and then end up with all the bitter arguments and recriminations that would necessarily fall out of the whole mess—but it's not worth our bother. We deal with individuals, not with corporate entities, and we expect usernames to reflect that. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:25, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It's super clear

What Errant and others are trying to tell the admins is that POLICY states you need to try to resolve a problem without resorting to the use of tools, leading by example, and behaving in a respectful, civil manner. Using language or taking actions that feel like an attack on someone who is most likely 100% ignorant of policy is not in line with policy itself. It would be like a police officer shooting a suspect and later saying "I could just tell he was going to shoot me", even if he was just standing there and the officer hadn't said one word, and the suspect didn't have a gun drawn. I'm puzzled why those of you who are administrators can't simply say "yes, that is what policy says, I will recommit to being civil, and lead other editors by example". Rather what I often see is a zillion excuses why it simply isn't done. Every one of us understands that reality won't allow a perfect world, but there's no reason for admins to avoid saying, "OK, I see your reasonable point, I'll do my best." We end up in this long nitpicky discussions because of that simple lack of humility and human-ness that would put the issue to rest instantly. -- Avanu (talk) 20:05, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

hm. So what you're saying is that only admins are supposed to read policy, and are then under the obligation to explain to everybody else individually what the policies are. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 20:14, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Not at all. Without question Admins should know policy. But so should editors. Take another pass at what I wrote above; you're very much missing the point. -- Avanu (talk) 20:24, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• Yes, admins SHOULD know policy; even worse when the person who doesn't understand the policy is a director of a major chapter. Un-fricking-believable. How does one de-appoint? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 12:23, 28 April 2012 (UTC)
• Blocking a wikipedian in residence is pretty crass though, don't you think? My concern is that our instant-block practice just hides COI rather than makes it go away. Secretlondon (talk) 12:27, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

@Bwilkins, actually in looking at that diff, it shows not really an ignorance of policy in that he's not aware of it, but an ignorance of policy in a WP:IAR way. Look, in the end, why put the letter of the law over the spirit of the law? There are times when it seems like the bureaucratic mindset has pushed away the friendly neighborhood spiderman mindset. Peter Parker would be our greatest admin because he knows 'with great power comes great responsibility', and without an honest recognition of one's own weakness, you limit yourself. -- Avanu (talk) 13:59, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Bwilkins, it's you and the blocking editor and a whole bunch of editors on this page who seem to be ignorant of policy. Seem to be, but the policy, don't block has been pointed out several times here. So I don't know what's going on. Do you agree that the policy says we should discuss the name with unproblematic editors, and encourage them to change it? If you do, can you concede that you've been misreading policy? --Anthonyhcole (talk) 16:59, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Practice is generally nuke from high orbit if there is a hint of corporate editing. Username vios pick up all the COI ones, and we have a block first _practice_ Secretlondon (talk) 18:47, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

My page

One of the things that makes Wikipedia seem unfriendly to outsiders is that the use of plain English ("my page" or "our article" being shorthand for "the article about me, or the company I represent") triggers an immediate assumption of bad faith: the article subject must be claiming WP:OWNERSHIP of said article. Well, they may be, but probably they're just trying to communicate in plain English because they didn't realize that the "Wikipedia way" of referring to an article requires you use a bit of convoluted speech. "The article about me" is OK, "my article" will get you into trouble. 28bytes (talk) 20:25, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Another way to put it is: profound lack of empathy -- inability to remember that everyone here once didn't know squat about Wikipedia and made equivalent "mistakes". Nomoskedasticity (talk) 20:50, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Hence this rather old essay of mine (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 00:10, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks

Clearly Mike breached WP:ORGNAME here, but clearly some ORGNAME/COI editors are a nightmare. I deal with obsessive fringe theory POV-pushers a lot, so probably have an inkling of what he has to deal with. In that light, I'm more than happy to cut him some slack.

I'm disappointed though by the response of most of the rest of you. He did cross the line in terms of civil behaviour and policy. This was an opportunity to quietly remind him of WP:ORGNAME and WP:BITE, and gently encourage him into line. A couple did, but most of his peers supported him in his denial that he'd done anything wrong. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 14:15, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

The message I use is:

if the name you have used includes or refers to the subject of the article, you must choose another username. As explained in WP:USER, only individuals may edit. When you have a username that is or includes the name of your organization, you imply that you are editing officially, and have a superior right to edit the page. But that is not the way WP works--all editors are considered equal--and your contributions like those of any editor must be justified by sources. I'm sure you do not intend to give such impression, but that's why we have the rule. Therefore, please choose another name. On that user page, you should say whom you are working for.

I do say this for partial names also. I think that partial names also promote ownership,& perhaps our written policy needs to be changed to reflect that.

But I do not block unless they are being uncooperative, and then I word it something like "To ensure you make another account, I am blocking this one." ; since the usernameblock preset on Twinkle defaults to prevent their making another account, it defeats entirely the purpose of our policy on user names, they they should make another one. On the one hand we tell them to do it, on the other we prevent their doing it. It's time to fix twinkle: the default for username block should be a usernamesoft block. This meets the purpose.

Because of the widespread use of Twinkle and the need to keep things in sync, the procedure for changing these templates has now gotten so lengthy --requiring in effect a long period of experimenting with different versions under the guidance of the foundation, where after many months very little if anything has actually been accomplished, that we need to come up with something better ourselves. We have let Twinkle become our master. DGG ( talk ) 15:45, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Actually, that's not quite true. The kinds of tests the foundation people did with some of the templates have nothing to do with the technical needs of Twinkle, and they certainly don't mean WP:BOLD no longer applies to templates. If you want to change the wording of a template used by Twinkle, just change it. I'm sure it's possible, because I've done it numerous times recently. It's only if you need to change Twinkle itself that it may get complicated. Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:50, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Precisely why I've never used any (semi)automated tools or scripts or anything like that on any WMF site, with the sole exception of the nominate-this-file-for-deletion script at Commons. It's not hard to write something out by yourself. Nyttend (talk) 01:44, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Bwilkins and others

Above, I pointed out to Bwilkins that he and others appear to be either misreading or deliberately flouting WP:ORGNAME. He hasn't responded.

• The policy says:

"This does not prohibit every use of a company, group, or product name as part of a username."

so it is not obvious that "Admarkroundsquare" is a breach of this policy, and yet Orange Mike simply asserts it is a blatant violation of our rules, Wehwalt says "and the username does contain the name of the organization" as though that means there's obviously a problem with the name, Lothar says it "Seems to be a simple case of WP:ORGNAME", MuZemike asserts the name doesn't fall within our policy, Blade asserts the name violates policy, Fut.Perf. says "I've never seen much sense in that part of the username policy that says they can't include names of companies or organizations."

I'd like Fut. Perf. to point me to the part of username policy that says they can't include names of companies or organizations as part of a username.

• The policy says:

*Users who adopt such a username and engage in inappropriately promotional behaviors in articles about the company, group, or product, are usually blocked.
*Users who adopt such usernames, but who are not editing problematically in related articles, should not be blocked. Instead, they should be gently encouraged to change their username.

which is pretty unequivocal. Applying either {{Uw-spamublock}} or {{softerblock}} is a block. And yet Sandstein says "The block and the {{Uw-spamublock}} block notification template were appropriate," UltraExactZZ says "The block was itself valid," Ched says "I'm not saying the block was wrong," Ohms law says "The block itself was fine."

There is an unambiguous disconnection between policy and practice. That policy seems to be worded as it is in order to expressly prevent the kind of behaviour engaged in by Mike and supported by others here. I don't know enough of the dynamics at NPP or the politics of PR editing to have an opinion as to whether behaviour should conform to policy or vice versa, but clearly your behaviour and policy need to be reconciled. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 06:11, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

See WP:CONSENSUS. When that many admins agree... Doc talk 07:04, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

If admins are using a procedure "hardblock on sight" that is not supported in guidelines then it needs to be added to guidelines so that users affected by it can a, avoid it happening to them and b, so that they can be pointed to the reason they have been blocked clearly written down for them, - Youreallycan 09:58, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Hardblock on sight should not be applied in situations where Wikipedia is not being harmed in some concrete way. Issuing hard blocks for soft errors is out of line with our civility policy. -- Avanu (talk) 10:03, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

This behaviour is not only "not supported in guidelines" it is expressly proscribed by policy. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 03:40, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

The blocking of MonmouthMuseumWales (talk · contribs) (discussed here at RFCN) is another example of an admin going straight to a block without first discussing the issue with a user who has made no problem edits. In this instance the user name was the same as the organisation, so a name change is usually expected, but rather than follow policy and gently explain the situation, the account was blocked. Bwilkins thinks that's fine, and accuses the unblocking admin of misreading [1] --Anthonyhcole (talk) 09:28, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• This sort of thing has been happening for years. It was exactly what happened to me when I started: [2] (and no, JzG never did apologize). Nomoskedasticity (talk) 10:20, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• Blocking usernames that explicitly promote a company/organization in and of themselves has been long practice here. The policy (WP:UN) is that:

  When choosing an account name, do not choose names which may be offensive, misleading, disruptive, or promotional.

  A username that appears to represent more than one person, or appears to promote a product/company will be blocked. That is appropriate, that is long standing practice. Whether Mike used the right template above is the question but the block and others of this kind are appropriate. Gentle explanation can happen afterwards but users with promotional names will not be allowed to use these (becuase using them promotes what ever it is they are promoting)--Cailil ^talk 13:53, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

You're quoting that line out of context and claiming it says something that it clearly doesn't (i.e. no where in that line does it say anything about blocking the account). Here's the part about blocking accounts:

*Users who adopt such a username and engage in inappropriately promotional behaviors in articles about the company, group, or product, are usually blocked.
*Users who adopt such usernames, but who are not editing problematically in related articles, should not be blocked. Instead, they should be gently encouraged to change their username.

So, the block was an error. The admin should have gently encouraged the user to change their username. If anyone disagrees, that's fine: start an RfC and get the policy changed. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 16:40, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

*sigh* As the guy who designed the much-used {{coiq}} template, I can tell you that we sure as heck are NOT going to RFC every single obviously promotional username. That would be a horrific waste of everyone's time. We have the very gentle {{softerblock}} template for a reason - it's an AGF template. Someone want to create {{SoSoftItsLikeCharmin}} instead? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 17:14, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

No, I'm saying that if you disagree with policy, then you should start an RfC on the policy, not the username. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:24, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

This is interesting. Bwiklins seems to think that MonmouthMuseumWales and Admarkroundsquare are "promotional". What's promotional about them Bwilkins? They're clearly identifying an affilliation with the organisation, but they're not promotional. It's not MonmouthMuseumrocks or RoundSquareWillSaveYouMoney. Calling them promotional is weird. You can't just "call" any username that incorporates an organisation name promotional as an excuse for not following WP:ORGNAME. Follow that policy or change it to fit your behaviour. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 06:35, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

The entire problem is that they are accounts that appear to be the organization's, rather than a person's. When User:Microsoft adds an unsourced fact to Microsoft, it's going to be left alone - because that's the official word from Microsoft itself (I know, it wouldn't, but play along). Thus, the prohibition. In this case, the block came from the confluence of having a username that matches the company AND editing in regard to that company. If the user had gone off to edit articles on hockey teams, no one would've noticed the username problem. My problem with this block wasn't that the user was blocked - he should have been and was - but that no one said why. He just got an angry wall of text, and no answer to the question. When I block such an editor, I template - but then explain below. "You got blocked because you can't have a username that matches the company. So you'll need a new username, which you get by doing X Y and Z. Now, you wanted to update your own page, and you can't because of your obvious Conflict of Interest - but if you show me what the inaccuracies are, we can figure something out." Engaging them, even if they don't end up unblocked, sidesteps all of the bad faith and bad feelings that seem to have come up here. They may respond, they may not - if they do, we get accurate information and (maybe) an editor who sticks around (with a new username and staying the hell away from his COI). If not, I've wasted two minutes of my life. But this seems to greatly reduce the "Wikipedia is a bunch of assholes" factor, which is worthwhile. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 12:20, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I like your attitude, but you're wrong on a couple of points. Notwithstanding what some admins may do, policy allows a username to incorporate a company name (e.g. User:Mark at Alcoa), and allows such a user to add content to the organisation's article. Neither is a blocking "offense;" we appreciate the transparency. Certainly, if they're biasing the article they should be pointed to the relevant policies, and if they continue they should be corrected, blocked if necessary. But that goes for anyone regardless of the username.

In this instance the problem is with the blocking editor. He breached policy and is supported and encouraged in that by Bwilkins and others. I see that they haven't changed the policy yet to conform with their behaviour. If that's not going to happen, they should conform to the policy. It's not a big deal, or even a difficult or complex issue to grasp. The policy says one thing. They're doing another. Now that this has been pointed out, if they continue summarily blocking people for having an organisation name as a username, or blocking people (or threatening to block them) simply for incorporating an organisation name as part of their username, they will be demonstrating contempt for community consensus and should be desysopped. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 03:29, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

A point of clarification, I don't believe the example you used is consistent with the username policy which states: "usernames that are specifically disallowed":

Promotional usernames are used to promote an existing company, organization, group (including non-profit organizations), website, or product on Wikipedia"

.

And no, that is not the problem as described in the original AN. It was about a template and a perception of editor conduct in regards to an overzealous nature to these types of usernames as I recall. Not sure if it was actually proven as such.--Amadscientist (talk) 08:45, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

What's promotional about User:Mark at Alcoa? It identifies the user's affiliation with the organisation. That's not promotion. That's transparency; something we like. Blocking accounts like that has no basis in either logic or policy.

Not sure what you mean by "original AN". If you're referring to my original post in this thread, I was drawing attention to this very point. The editor was acting diametrically against policy. Personally, I have a problem with that. Particularly when it's an admin, and when it involves blocking editors. Just seems off to me. But it seems it doesn't bother the majority of admins commenting here. I have a problem with that too. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 13:18, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Even if it were promotional, we're supposed to encourage the user to change names, not block them. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 15:53, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

There's a huge difference between a username like "Mark at Alcoa" and "Alcoa". The first clearly identifies an individual which is allowed. The second identifies an organization which isn't. The issue is less about promotion, and more about ensuring that an account represents an individual. This is made pretty clear at WP:ORGNAME. -- Atama頭 16:18, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

A Quest for Knowledge is correct. See also WP:UAAI: "users who adopt such usernames but who are not editing problematically should not be summarily blocked; instead, they should be gently but firmly encouraged to change their username." --JN466 19:25, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

This is pretty much the point. Look at the username and how it reflects a breach in guidelines or policy. "Mark at Alcoa" does not breach any policy, as explained above. Then you have the example of something just without any identification to an individual ("Mark at...") and just "Alcoa", which, as you said would be more about ensuring the account represents an individual and less about promotion...then there is what this username was, "Admarkroundsquare". Which contained both an intent of promotion (advertising and marketing) as well as a specific company. This falls within the existing block policy and the original template could also be seen as simply meaning that new comers are not exempt from the block policy based soley on being new and not knowing the policy as you can read the policy BEFORE you register a promotional username AND we don't know if this editor was already editing with an IP to have even had such experiance while already contributing. While a more subtle warning with the block is better, it is understandable why a more sterner approach was selected and my experiance with Mike's similar blocks is that he has been in the right on all points he has made.--Amadscientist (talk) 20:04, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Could you please re-read "users who adopt such usernames but who are not editing problematically should not be summarily blocked; instead, they should be gently but firmly encouraged to change their username", noting in particular the words I have put in bold? Thanks. --JN466 20:46, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't need to re-read it. You show clearly that it states "Should" not "They are required" or "Must". Hmmmm. Guess that was not something you thought about?--Amadscientist (talk) 04:31, 2 May 2012 (UTC)signature added by JN466 07:28, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

If a policy says you "should not" do something it really means you ought not to do it. In particular, you "shouldn't" hard-block such users, as then they can't register a compliant account. If they do insist on writing crap, by all mean warn and then block; but don't block after five harmless edits just because of what someone's account is called. --JN466 07:35, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

So, I will ask again for clarification: Do we then inform such users with problematic usernames that they need to change their username, and, if they don't, we just simply ignore the problem? --MuZemike 03:01, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Of course not. If the username is the name of a group and it is being used to edit content related to the group, and after having the problem explained in clear and friendly terms the user chooses not to avoid the topic or abandon the name, it should be taken from them (indefinitely blocked). If it is a shared account, regardless of the name, it should be blocked (again in a clear, friendly, helpful way). If the name is promotional, it should be blocked (again, in a clear, friendly helpful way). Clearly "promotional" doesn't mean "a username that incorporates a group name."

Usernames that are not identical to the name of an organisation, nor promotional, nor a shared account, that simply identify the user's affiliation with a group are good. They are transparent. Something we encourage.

If the username is an organisation name, e.g., User:Alcoa, and it is not being used to edit content related to the organisation, there is no problem. If they are editing those articles, are pointed to WP:ORGNAME, and agree to no longer edit those articles, there is no problem.

The present problem: (1) When the username is the same as an organisation name and it is being used to edit content related to that organisation, the editor should be (per policy) politely pointed to WP:ORGNAME and gently, politely encouraged to either abandon the account or avoid that topic. Presently, they are just being summarily blocked with an unfriendly template. (Even the softblock template is officious.) (2) Usernames that incorporate an organisation name, though permitted, are being summarily blocked as "promotional" or "COI", when they are patently not promotional, and when editing with a COI is not a blockable "offense." Indeed, we encourage editors with a COI to declare it, and incorporating the organisation name in the username is as clear a declaration as we could ask for.

And it goes without saying that if an editor is biasing a topic, and won't conform to NPOV, regardless of the name, they should be blocked, topic-banned or site-banned. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 05:30, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Do you exactly understand how official organizational accounts work, i.e. not on Wikipedia, but in general (such as with Twitter)? In common practice, a company hires or assigns one or more people to operate this "official company account", and, over time, companies may rotate out people in charge of this account. The problem is that this goes against our policy that accounts are not to be shared. --MuZemike 05:52, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Yep. If only one user is using the account, it's not that kind of account. But, even if it is only used by one user, User:Alcoa shouldn't be used to edit content related to the organisation, because it could easily be mistaken for such an account. Whether User:Admarkroundsquare is a shared account could be established by asking the question, "Is this a shared account?" and pointing them to WP:NOSHARE and WP:ROLE. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 07:42, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

There is an easy solution to that. They can have accounts like User:Mark At Round Square, User:Jill At Round Square, etc. and can identify the full name of the person who operates the account on the account's user page, if need be with a confirmation e-mail from the company to OTRS just like we do it in other cases where impersonation could be a problem. At any rate, no one should be hardblocked just for having the wrong account name. --JN466 08:03, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

The problem should not be ignored if the user has a problematic user name (or wants to share an account), and does not respond to the gentle persuasion called for in policy. On the other hand, I would think most users would happily change names once the issue was explained to them. --JN466 08:03, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Unblock request

I have raised an unblock request for Admarkroundsquare, at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Unblock_request:_User:Admarkroundsquare. The user is currently hard-blocked, meaning they are unable to create a username policy-compliant account. This is an invidious and abhorrent way to treat people. --JN466 21:15, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Well that's not quite true; they could use an unblock request and ask for a new username. But that would require reading the instructions, which didn't work out so well the first time around... The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 22:16, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

They had no such instructions, because these had been replaced, by a well-meaning admin, with a soft-block template simply telling them to create a new account. --JN466 23:34, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Floquenbeam has lifted the hardblock but left the username blocked, which should allow the user to get on with updating the article. [3] --Anthonyhcole (talk) 11:41, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Larger issue unresolved

The larger issue - the disconnect between policy and supporters of OrangeMike's block - remains unresolved. Can someone who supports this block please propose a change to WP:USERNAME? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 04:47, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Why, this doesn't seem supported by the discussion. It does appear that Mike, while perhaps taking a more proactive response, was within policy and guidelines. I see that the editor that was blocked did make an edit, so the argument that they could not have done anything wrong to warrent a block is incorrect. The actual edit was indeed asking a question at the help desk...HOWEVER that is still an edit and the question asked was basicly asking how to get guidence to make it easier to get the POV results they wanted. This very well could be seen as the direct conflict in context to the promotional username that gave Mike the option as an administrator to make that call and he is willing to block when he identifies the criteria to do so. The danger to the encyclopdia is real and the amount of issues from these types of editors could range from "gaming the system" to outright harrasment of editors and individuals offwiki to those not involved here at all. I have seen it and Mike has seen it and so have many other editors. This has never been about Mike's supporters but the issue of the block he administered. About the template, He made an edit and that was the correct template to use in my view. It gave the editor the chance to take care of the situation right then and there with clear instructions. If anything went wrong it was replacing that template.--Amadscientist (talk) 05:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

The user said that the current page on their company is out of date. I am sure it is. So we have an out-of-date page in mainspace. Does that concern you at all? The ideal solution here is that someone works with the user to update the page in line with policy, not that the user is blocked. And there is assuredly a disconnect between policy and at least some admins' practice. I played a small part in the discussions that led to the present wording of the user name policy. The intention was that this practice of "first shoot, ask questions later" blocking should cease. --JN466 07:41, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, a user informing us in the name of his company that our article on said company is outdated really ought to be punished properly for making such a horrible, horrible POV/COI edit. It might lead to "outright harrasment of editors and individuals offwiki" otherwise, after all. Seriously, how on earth do you jump from a user asking to update an article to throwing around "off-wiki harassment"? --Conti|✉ 11:48, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

@Amadscientist: This editor did not make any problematic edits. In fact, they don't have a single edit in article space. Policy is quite clear that such editors should not be blocked. For those who disagree with policy, the correct course of action to change the policy. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 12:12, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

This discussion seems to have moved to Wikipedia_talk:Username_policy#WP:ORGNAME. Maybe close this now? (But don't immediately archive as there are a couple of current discussions linking to this one.) --Anthonyhcole (talk) 11:37, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Requirement for declaring an interest after off-wiki canvassing

After noticing over the last few months, Wikipedia Arbcom members, Admins and Oversighters creating and engaging with discussion threads on Wikipedia Review and Wikipediocracy, and then going on to use their tools and authority on Wikipedia in response to what I would consider to be canvassing off-wiki, I would like to propose a vote to clarify a possible interpretation of Involved admins:

Would you require users with sysop or other trusted tools on Wikipedia to openly declare their involvement of whatever sort in off-wiki prior canvassing when using their tools on Wikipedia?

Thanks --Fæ (talk) 14:25, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

!Vote on the need to declare an interest after involvement of whatever sort in off-wiki prior canvassing

• Absolutely support - anyone who thinks that they were wronged by anyone of authority (including the authorities of admins, such as deletion), should have the right to know such facts, as well as the community in cases where the decisions are appealed. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 14:32, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
• Comment - I think that these types of discussions often suffer from the deliberate distortion of the nature of sites such as Wikipedia Review and Wikipediocracy. These exist primarily as forums where contributors discuss Wikipedia and related subjects. Those contributors are individuals with widely disparate views and motivations. There is a tendency here to pretend that these sites are monolithic entities and to classify discussion as either "harassment" or "canvassing", depending on the which is most likely to achieve the desired result. I was a frequent contributor to Wikipedia Review until recently and various editors here tried to use me as the scapegoat for comments made there by others. This latest volley in the fight against "bad sites" appears to be another attempt to discredit admins who participate at those sites by implying that their actions have been negatively influenced by reading or participating in discussions on those sites. Those discussions may result in admins becoming aware of an issue and acting on it as a result, but Fæ's suggestion here makes it seem like they are proxying for banned editors or acting as meatpuppets. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 16:03, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
  • I have a conflict of interest which should be noted - I am the author of the blog post currently on the front page of Wikipediocracy, which deals with hardcore sex films on Wikipedia (not articles about them, but the actual films themselves). Delicious carbuncle (talk) 16:07, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
• Off-wiki canvassing among admins and other functionaries has existed as long as I can remember, largely in the form of IRC discussion. I think that more transparency is always better, but I don't think this is a new issue nor one confined to the specific forums mentioned in the original post. MastCell ^Talk 17:23, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
• Support Wikipediocracy is not the only site that has this issue, but the number of them doesn't really matter. Canvassing is canvassing and, for the most part, these sites are for a gathering of like-minded individuals, even if there are one or two outliers. So, it really is the definition of canvassing. This involvement should definitely be announced when becoming involved in a discussion as a result of this canvassing. Silverseren^C 17:39, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
  • I find this comment especially interesting coming from you, Silver Seren, since you were a regular contributor to Wikipedia Review and should have a better sense of what really goes on there. About half of the regular contributors to Wikipedia Review were banned users and others did not edit Wikipedia at all. It is rather hard to "canvass" people who do not or cannot edit Wikipedia, even by your "definition". Delicious carbuncle (talk) 19:44, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
    • Having been a part of WR, I would think that helps me know full well that canvassing does go on. There's more than enough users on there that are also active editors on here. And there is a group effort on there when a specific article is brought up to enact something on-wiki. It's rather obvious. Silverseren^C 20:19, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
      • Can you think of a recent example where this happened? Since we obviously define canvassing differently, it might be helpful to see what you mean. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 20:38, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
        • Yes, the Jim Hawkins incident is an obvious example. The AfD on it wasn't created until after this thread was created and it is likely to have been instigated from that thread itself. And Delete votes from a number of known WR/Wikipediocracy users and/or readers began pouring into the AfD after that. Silverseren^C 01:38, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
          • I started the Hawkins AFD after a report at the BLPN which you see I mention in the deletion rationale diff - my opening the discussion had nothing to do with any off wiki comments anywhere as I had not read them, after multiple on wiki reports about the article I felt enough was enough. Youreallycan 07:53, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
          • Let me see if I have this straight. Hawkins had been complaining about this situation for years, as I understand it. A thread was started on Wikipediocracy to discuss it. After that, an AfD was started, which you suggest, without any evidence, was "instigated" by the thread. And after that, the thread which was opened before the AfD has somehow "canvassed" people to vote a certain way? What nonsense. This was discussed on multiple WMF mailing lists and Jimbo's talk page. Of course a lot of people participated. I didn't vote in the last AfD, but if I had, I would have voted to delete because that is what I think should be done in these cases, not because someone on WR or Wikipediocracy wanted me to. I imagine others hold the same opinion and would vote the same way. Perhaps it is issues like this that cause them to be contributors to those sites, and not those sites that cause them to get involved with the issues here? What an incredibly tone-deaf example. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 02:55, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
            • Weren't those discussions started after the AfD began? The Afd was really the starting point, all the talk page discussions and discussions elsewhere came after the fact. Silverseren^C 03:16, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
          • (ec)Do you feel that this affected the outcome of the on wiki discussion? Kevin (talk) 02:56, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
            • Likely would have, looking at the early parts of the discussion, if not for the subsequent posting to several noticeboards, which then brought in so many people and such chaos that no consensus was really the only option. Silverseren^C 03:16, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
              • The subject of the article requested that it be deleted in 2006, which lead to the first AfD. And again, same thing in 2009. All the while making comments on the talk page, on Facebook, on Twitter, and on the radio. And you think a discussion of the article on Wikipediocracy materially influenced the outcome? I was hoping you might come up with an example that had something to it, but this is just ridiculous. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 03:39, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• Sort of support, ish, if it's amended slightly. I think the phrasing as Fae presents it here is imperfect when it comes to addressing the issue he wants addressed. If you want users (and I do believe it ought to be "users", not only "users with advanced permissions") to disclose when they've participated in discussion of a topic/action off-wiki, wording saying they must disclose when they've participated in "off-wiki prior canvassing" isn't likely to get you disclosures; it's more likely to get you a whole lot of neverending argument about whether thread X was canvassing. A more useful wording, I think, would be something like "users participating in discussions or actions on Wikipedia should disclose openly if their involvement was brought about by discussion off-wiki". In some cases this might be addressed by a one-time userpage notice - "This user participates in/on [IRC|Wikipedia Review|local Wiki-meetups|a consultancy related to editing Wikipedia] and may comment or act here on topics discussed or related to there". In other cases, it may be appropriate to add a note to an individual comment - "I came here because I saw the thread about this on site X" or, failing that by the commenter, a note similar in style to those we leave on SPA or unsigned comments "This comment left by a user who has participated in discussion of this topic on site X". There is a continuum here, ranging from things like "user asked for help in IRC help channel, so I helped them onwiki" all the way up to something like "I placed this block based on evidence I received in a private message from a banned user on Wikipedia Review". Even on the "clean" end of the continuum, I think there's little to be lost by just going ahead and disclosing, but I would hesitate to make it sanctionable to fail to do so for now, both because making it "encouraged practice" may be all we need, and because it may end up being used as a hammer against people ("You didn't disclose that you came here from Wikipedia Review thread X!" "That's because I didn't; I was just reading ANI and wanted to comment" "Impossible, you participate in Wikipedia Review, you must have come here from that thread. I demand you be sanctioned for failing to disclose!") and I'd want to see how that shook out before we started giving the requirement teeth. Why yes, yes I was bitten in the butt by drama recently because someone was upset about a topic being discussed on irc. Why yes, I do think disclosure is a good idea largely because it can help prevent situations like that in the future. Thanks for asking! A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 18:05, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
• I agree with the spirit of disclosing an off wiki reason that lead you to a particular discussion, but like Fluffernutter I fear where an enforceable rule could lead. Unless an editor has actively participated in an off-wiki discussion using connected identity, it will be impossible to tell if they saw an off wiki discussion and failed to disclose, or came to the discussion another way, despite frequenting the off-wiki location. If I were to idle in the IRC channel, and a discussion of an AN/I thread occurs, will I be imputed with knowledge of that IRC discussion even if I had IRC minimized and saw the activity on my watch list instead? Monty₈₄₅ 18:16, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose - This strikes me as an effort via the backdoor to establish a BADSITES policy towards Wikipediocracy and its better-known-but-now-in-its-death-throes predecessor. An administrator participating there and then working at WP is no different than an administrator participating on WP mailing lists or IRC and then working at WP. People have lives, they spend their time as they will. Even if one accepts that so-called "canvassing" is a problem in the first place (and I personally feel that so-called "anti-canvassing" rules are merely a mechanism of clique control to the exclusion of more democratic mass participation), there's not the SLIGHTEST bit of evidence that there's a coordinated effort by Wikipediocracy or any other site to "canvass" for action at WP, using tools or not using tools. It's a paranoid perspective, in my view. Most of the obnoxious parties at Wikipediocracy not only don't have tools to be canvassed to be used, they're blocked or banned out altogether at En-WP. It baffles me how this is even perceived as being a problem at all. Carrite (talk) 20:21, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• So you're saying that Wikipediocracy is the same as the mailing lists and the IRC, both of which are considered on-wiki and are subject to the rules of WP:CIVIL? Clearly then, Wikipediocracy should also be subject to these policies. Also, do note that people on the IRC have gotten in trouble in the past for canvassing. Organizing a group of people toward a specific article is canvassing. Silverseren^C 21:13, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• So you're saying that the biographies of living persons noticeboard is canvassing and anyone posting there should be blocked? Delicious carbuncle (talk) 03:04, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• The BLP noticeboard is a neutral posting, since it is not a biased, partisan area. An IRC discussion between friends on Wikipedia would be canvassing and a discussion of known like-minded individuals on a forum is also canvassing, since in both cases, the purpose of notification would be to get votes or statements of agreement in the on-wiki discussion. Silverseren^C 03:16, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Seren, it was the BLPN that first drew attention to the Hawkins issue by way of a section started by David Gerard who had been canvassed by the original author of the Hawkins article. As an aside I do believe that the origional author of that article has been appaleed by the churlishness of his fellow wikipedia editors, their lack of empathy, and gross impertinence towards a fellow human being. Your own attitude of demanding a doctors note is included in that above. John lilburne (talk) 07:47, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. I was originally mixed about this, but after further thought, I have to slip into oppose. Issues of canvassing in AfD's can be handled on a case by case basis, but a lot of the time someone saying off-wiki "Gee, this article about a BLP is a real hitjob" and people who read that forum who agree posting votes based on that reasoning (after reviewing the article themselves).. well, to ignore that a problem exists just because we don't like who's saying it would be cutting off our nose to spite our encyclopedic face. And while I deplore the actions taken by certain members of those sites (Self-disclosure: I am a member of two sites, one of which I have not made a single post, and the other I haven't posted at in six months or so), I think this action by Fae is motivated by the off-wiki attacks they have made against the proposer. I would suggest that such disclosure applies equally. SirFozzie (talk) 21:20, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
  • You may be confused about the proposal text, it asks for transparency, not that we should pretend that admins do not read off-wiki forums or to require that they can never take action if they have. Transparency is not "cutting off our nose". --Fæ (talk) 22:05, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose. Per Sir Fozzie, Fluffernutter et al. The proposal is symptomatic of a WP:BATTLEGROUND mentality whereby evildoers (i.e anyone associated with WR or Wikipediocracy) have to be fought and exposed at every opportunity. Oversighters, admins etc who act on information they come across somewhere else should not be assumed to be acting in bad faith without evidence or forced to don yellow e-stars just to please Fae.--Peter cohen (talk) 22:55, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose – There should be corners of the web where one can speak their minds freely, frankly, and naturally without fear of being punished on Wikipedia. People who speak freely outside of Wikipedia shouldn't be forced to display yellow stars on every discussion page, on every closing statement, or every edit or log summary. Reporting Wikipedia news and ongoings shouldn't be a crime. Should a columnist be forced to wear a yellow star for writing a op-ed column about a political debate? The proposal degrades those who use forums and blogs by forcing them to wear yellow stars. It's an insult to those users' dignities, and it discouraged frank, natural discussions outside of Wikipedia. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 01:43, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Except canvassing is something that users on Wikipediocracy do, including attempting to discover personal information on Wikipedians to use as chilling effects to stop certain people from editing, in addition to attempting to create legal actions against Wikipedia itself, such as through the chapters. I'm sorry, but "frank, natural discussions" are not what goes on over there. Silverseren^C 01:52, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• So where on Wikipediocracy is this discussion mentioned that Wikipediocracy members are being/will be canvassed from to oppose it, all while insulting Fae continuously in the process? Silverseren^C 01:56, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
  • http://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=305 – I don't see any canvassing or any insults. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 02:15, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
    • The canvassing comes from the thread existing, because it directs their users over here. Though I am happy that there aren't any insults. That's also rather surprising. Silverseren^C 02:19, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• Addendum: This isn't about canvassing – Read Fæ's statement again. This isn't about canvassing. Fæ's statement isn't about drawing attention to a discussion page. This is about someone on the Wikipedia Review or Wikipediocracy pointing out a mistake or violation, which results in a sysop fixing that mistake or removing the violation. For example (probably not the best example): http://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=299. If someone on a forum points out an image's inappropriate or inaccurate name, should a sysop seeking to give that image a better name really be forced to say, "Wikipedia Review said…"? I don't really believe a sysop acting on a mistake pointed out by the WR or Wikipediocracy to be "canvassing". --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 02:02, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• However, it is well known that Wikipediocracy is a group of like minded people, with only one or two members that disagree. Therefore, when one of the members brings up a discussion going on somewhere and berates it or praises it, it brings in the other members to vote or make a statement on-wiki to that effect. That falls exactly into the definition of canvassing, because it is notifying a biased, partisan group of people. Silverseren^C 02:07, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
  • Becoming aware of a discussion shouldn't be a crime. Learning isn't a crime. Reporting news and events isn't a crime. I have the right to learn about these sorts of discussions. It isn't the quantity of !votes that counts. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 02:19, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• • It's that it is being presented in a biased manner. Learning of news from, say, Fox News is likely to prejudice one to a certain opinion because of how the information is presented there. Thus, in terms of informing people about a discussion, this type of biased informing is exactly what canvassing means. It's directly why WP:CANVAS exists. Silverseren^C 02:27, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. Too open to abuse -- look at all the screams that go up when someone says, "Oh, I saw someone mention it on IRC..." --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 02:24, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• If they were mentioning it on IRC to a group of friend, thus leading them to join the discussion and side with that person, then that is canvassing, yes. Silverseren^C 02:27, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Nope. In the case I was thinking of, one admin said something like "Oh, fun, Admin B just blocked Admin C..." I looked at the case, saw that there was some related admin action that should be taken, and took it. Now, I wasn't canvassed to take that action, but if I had said that it had been inspired by an IRC conversation, I would have had to defend a perfectly normal action at far too much length.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 15:27, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. I was concerned on how I would word this (and still am), but I'll give it a shot. First, I have to say that I admire any display of transparency and all statements of honesty from editors. Now - over time we've developed a ton of rules (aka Policies) that with the best of intentions; but in practice they now utterly fail us. "Policy" is used more and more to batter people over the head with club-like bluntness. (CIV, NOTORG, CANVASS, etc.), and the loopholes in those policies are used to manipulate discussions. Now, on a more "off-wiki" sort of thought: What another editor reads, hears, participates in, signs up for, and which websites, IRC or chat venues, or email they exchange is simply nobody's damn business. And by the way - the sheer irony of posting this tread simply astounds me. — Ched :  ?  07:34, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose. I like the idea, but Ched makes a good point — we simply have so many policies that nobody can keep track of all of them. Imposing yet another requirement will not help in building the encyclopedia, but it will help to inflame passions among those who are more concerned with building an encyclopedia than with keeping track of policies and thus reduce the number of people who are writing. Nyttend (talk) 13:20, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• Support as a concept, though not a formal rule Wikiprocess should be open. I consider it wrong to proceed on private information or as part of a cabal. What is used to hit people over the head is these private arrangements. (but some types of things discussed I never see, as I don't use irc & don't participate in projects that require it. And to the extent I see something on my rare random looks at WR/etc., if I see a movement developing there, my normal reaction is to find some reason to oppose it. If I'm asked on or off wiki to intervene in anything, I normally say so, though I do not necessarily say who it was who asked me, especially if it was off wiki by private email. DGG ( talk ) 17:20, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• Support in general one should disclose when !votes are the result of otherwise untraceable canvasing. This includes IRC, and whatever else. I see no reason not to ask that people do so. It's not reasonably enforceable, but still... Hobit (talk) 03:50, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
• Comment I agree wholeheartedly with Hobit above, but because it's not enforcable it would be a silly rule to have. Rules that can't be enforced or policed just serve to undermine the rest of the rule-book. But while on the subject I would say this: we have talk pages, we have essays, we have userspace, we have the village pump, we have the Signpost complete with "comment on this story" sections... there is absolutely no need whatsoever for discussions about Wikipedia content to happen anywhere other than on Wikipedia (unless it's a legal issue, BLP violation etc). So for somebody to set up an off-wiki discussion forum for things that should be discussed on-wiki goes clearly against the principles of the project in my opinion, and editors participating on such a forum are for the most part, knowingly/intentionally or not, damaging Wikipedia. waggers (talk) 08:12, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
  • If you would forbid articles like this, would you also forbid articles like this? How about articles like this? Should they be allowed, or forbidden as "damaging"? Should people be allowed to talk about Wikipedia on Facebook, and Twitter? I find what you say quite extraordinary. I imagine it's the sort of line the Chinese government might take, concerning discussions of the Chinese government. --JN466 13:11, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose. Per Ched and Sarek pretty much. Snowolf ^{How can I help?} 08:51, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
• Support: if the good folks at Wikipediocracy or WR point out a problem that needs fixing, they should certainly be given credit for doing so.

  BTW: Would this also apply to requests on IRC channels, email requests to delete one's uploads, discussions of prior usernames with the members of ArbCom, and the "in camera" discussions at WMUK? --SB_Johnny | ^talk 11:34, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

  • SB_Johnny As you mention WMUK, your question seems pointed in my direction - yes; though a common sense interpretation of personal privacy, harassment or legal considerations may limit how much of the prior confidential discussions can be released. If use of tools on-wiki is the result of such discussions then we should always be as transparent as possible. For example, as an OTRS volunteer, I had a photograph (uploaded a few years ago) of a young woman exposing her breasts for a fun dare at a public concert deleted from Commons, after she emailed in explaining how being personally identifiable in the photo was a problem for her now. In theory, we could reject such requests as we have a full copyright release, though I would hope everyone understands that Wikimedia projects ought to be managed with respect, compassion and in confidence where information or images have a credible case of causing damage or distress to the models or other people involved. In that particular case, creating a lengthy deletion discussion would only draw unhelpful attention to the image and massively increase the distress for the model. If in the future we force that to happen as policy, then we should be totally fair and add extreme and dire warnings about the risks of irrevocably releasing images to Wikimedia projects in order to fully inform our contributors. --Fæ (talk) 12:05, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Right. Agreed. (Putting a halt to uploading images of that nature from flickr (etc.) where people don't seem to understand the licenses would probably be a good thing for the same reason, but that's a whole 'nother topic ;-).) --SB_Johnny | ^talk 14:29, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose as Presented Transparency is a good thing, but 'badsite' is not. This proposal is too enmeshed in the later.--Cube lurker (talk) 17:46, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
  • If you could suggest an alternative wording that can improve the policy and side-step a badsites debate, that would be helpful. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 18:14, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

  This discussion's to contaminated. It started as badsites, the clock can't be turned back to make it into a genuine transparency proposal. Not here and now.--Cube lurker (talk) 18:34, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose Per Sarek. And per Ched below, to note this proposal runs counter to the position Fæ took in an email on January 26 in a different situation. MBisanz ^talk 18:48, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Please note, I have asked Fæ to no longer contact me via email. MBisanz ^talk 20:46, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Archiving discussion only tangentially related to the matter at hand and that should be moved to a more appropriate forum or at least a separate thread, it really has no bearing on the proposal. Snowolf How can I help? 00:02, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I apologise for mistakenly assuming that a private email to you from 3 months ago, in consideration of your trusted roles as a bureaucrat, oversight and steward, where I specifically stated that I had been formally advised not to discuss certain matters on-wiki would be treated as confidential. Thank you for your clear statement that you take no responsibility for my wellbeing, I heartily recommend you make that advice far more public before anyone feels they might email you in confidence. --Fæ (talk) 21:25, 1 May 2012 (UTC) Well, since you've described the content of the email, I can respond here. It's fairly ironic that you are now proposing administrators be required to disclose off-wiki canvassing requests when taking action, when you, in January, canvassed me in an email relating to not discussing certain matters on-wiki relating to on-wiki conduct by yourself. I also reviewed your email from January, you did not mention any of those trusted roles and, regardless, none of those roles indicate a duty to keep the existence of communication private. I would assume all editors, particularly ones as active as yourself, know that there is no policy that prevents me from disclosing the existence of communication initiated by yourself via Special:EmailUser. (See WP:EMAILABUSE; "although you can describe briefly in summary what it contains or shows.") I would also assume that anyone on the internet knows that other users of the internet have no responsibility for their wellbeing beyond any contractual stipulations they have entered into. MBisanz talk 21:33, 1 May 2012 (UTC) Rather than policy, I always assume common sense and human respect applies and consider that part of our civil responsibilities as significant members of the Wikimedia movement. I certainly apply those principles in my roles as a Wikipedia admin, charity trustee and Wikimedia OTRS volunteer. If someone approaches me with related project or organizational problems, no matter who they are, they can always trust me to assume their emails are intended as confidential rather than finding them arbitrarily thrown into discussions on public notice boards months later. The only exception would be for legal matters, or if the emails were sent in my trustee capacity where even if confidential, they may be considered to be "on the record" by default and thereby I cannot guarantee they would not be made available in any necessary investigation. In this particular instance I draw a distinction between informing you about a background for which you may have been unaware, and what you believe is canvassing. If you want to see a good example of canvassing, take a look on Wikipediocracy and compare names expressing opinions in this discussion with active accounts on related discussions there. Even some of the people making personal or derogatory comments about me in this discussion are aware of my ethical approach to treatment of private email correspondence, as I have corresponded with some of them in the past, and would not dream of revealing anything specific about those confidential discussions. They are a part of how we can have difficult communications without causing unnecessary escalation or unintentional damage on a public forum. All of this is consistent with my reply here to SB_Johnny above on how to ensure transparency, as normally one asks for permission for what you need to say openly to use your authority on the projects if acting using confidential information, or you advise your correspondent(s) that you cannot act on the information yourself but explain what they can do to help themselves and retain their confidentiality. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 21:54, 1 May 2012 (UTC) Alright, so we disagree on some fairly core concepts. As I indicated, I have contacted the Ombudsmen, AUSC, OTRS-admins, and fellow Stewards so that they can investigate if my behavior was inappropriate in mentioning the existence of an email you sent me via Special:EmailUser. I'm more then happy to leave it to them to determine as we are unlikely to convince each other of the validity of the other's position. MBisanz talk 22:06, 1 May 2012 (UTC) In copying my confidential email to you to all those mail lists, you have revealed a private matter that I certainly had no intention of widely publishing. Your action was unnecessary escalation rather than using the basic primary response available to all of us with trusted tools, that is to resolve issues by simple discussion. I have not asked for an investigation into your behaviour, and I am extremely unhappy that you have shared a confidential matter with so many people. I have no idea how you can put this right for me, I hope members of those lists understand the nature of my concern when they read the email, and discover a matter that is absolutely no business of theirs and treat it appropriately by deleting it. --Fæ (talk) 22:16, 1 May 2012 (UTC) You indicated I had revealed information in conflict of my duties as a trusted user. Those are the entities that review abuse of the various trusted user tools. To clear my name without breaching your privacy by publishing the contents of the email publicly, my only recourse is for those entities to review my conduct. You should remember that when making allegations in the future. MBisanz talk 22:25, 1 May 2012 (UTC) A bizarre argument considering the email you copied to the lists was not the email you have referenced here and has passed on quite different private information. Consequently were I to have a complaint, it would be your inflammatory and unnecessary behaviour today, not information from 3 months ago. --Fæ (talk) 22:38, 1 May 2012 (UTC) You complained today to me via email about my public reference to a prior email you sent. Today's complaint was the email I forward to the review authorities as it was the one that referenced the alleged improper disclosure of private information by referencing the prior email publicly. MBisanz talk 22:46, 1 May 2012 (UTC) In what way are the multiple email lists you have inappropriately published a confidential matter to, without my permission, considered the appropriate review authority? I could imagine one such list might be the appropriate approach for an independent viewpoint to cover your own back, but copying to so many, appears to be a deliberate way of causing distress or using the lists as a punitive measure. Considering your statements have made it clear than none of the people on those lists is under any obligation to consider my wellbeing or the wellbeing of others likely to be affected in how they treat this information, and indeed by your own understanding of policy are free to re-publish it, surely you understand why I now see your actions today as inflammatory and massively increase the risk of this confidential information being made public for completely unnecessary reasons? It is not as if your original reference to my private email helped this noticeboard discussion, which I remind you was never about me, but about a general proposal. --Fæ (talk) 23:10, 1 May 2012 (UTC) If your email hadn't mentioned an abuse of my trusted access rights or had more specifically defined which trusted status I used to violate your privacy, I would have been able to more precisely tailor which reviewing authority was relevant. MBisanz talk 23:16, 1 May 2012 (UTC) Your behaviour today has directly put me and others at completely unnecessary risk when you could have simply removed your reference to a private email without affecting this generic discussion in any way. I suggest you follow up with the many people you have so widely circulated highly confidential information that they will be in no doubt is none of their business, to check if your inflammatory behaviour, which could have been so easily resolved through direct personal discussion, reflects badly on someone with trusted access. The fact that you have repeatedly refused to take any responsibility for my wellbeing or that of other involved parties, and in the process have forced me to raise my concerns about a highly confidential matter in public, by rejecting email correspondence, should be of general grave concern. Our community does not work by falling back on theoretical legal arguments every time there is a problem, if you are incapable of treating people in a respectful and civil way, then expecting the community to put our trust in you is misplaced. --Fæ (talk) 23:31, 1 May 2012 (UTC) I decline to withdraw my requests for review of my conduct. If my actions in referencing the email and indicating that I do not have a responsibility for your wellbeing outside of what is required by WMF/WP policy and the laws of my local jurisdiction are indicative of untrustworthy editorship, I full expect the reviewing authorities to act on me. Also, please show where I have been uncivil in this discussion or otherwise failed to respect you in my responses, as is required by WP:CIV, WP:NPA, or WP:HAR. MBisanz talk 23:38, 1 May 2012 (UTC) This discussion should really be best conducted somewhere else, as it is hardly relevant to this proposal and thread. If it is deemed necessary to conduct this here on AN, a separate thread or subthread would be handle it, tho I don't see what there is here for any of us to act upon. Snowolf How can I help? 23:41, 1 May 2012 (UTC) (edit conflict) You are replying to something I did not ask for, I certainly could not care less about your local jurisdiction, I am not threatening you with legal action for goodness sake. As for CIV, HAR, NPA - I suggest you take some time carefully consider the implications about revealing the confidential information about me and others and how we would be affected if the information goes public and the longer term personal problems for me, and potential reputational damage for others, that you would have caused by your actions. By failing to resolve the issue through direct discussion and forcing me to repeatedly try to explain myself in public without revealing the information itself, you have failed to be either respectful or civil with regard to my personal life or taken any apparent consideration of my long term safety. No, your behaviour is clearly unacceptable. --Fæ (talk) 23:53, 1 May 2012 (UTC) I see you throwing accusations that I violated your privacy, acted in an uncivil manner, and am untrustworthy; yet you have not filed for my recall or made a request at arbcom. Would you prefer I file at Arbcom to get an adjudication of your claims against me? MBisanz talk 23:59, 1 May 2012 (UTC) (edit conflict) Please don't rephrase my complaints. You have failed to be respectful or civil with regard to my person life. You have put me at unnecessary risk. If you want to help, then find a way to undo the problems you are creating for me. Please do not run around finding yet more ways to torment me and waste my time. --Fæ (talk) 00:07, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support; rephrase. It should be clear that if a known editor is engaging in a heated debate with an admin on WR, and that admin then finds a reason to block him on WP, there is "the appearance of bias". I would, however, say simply that "WP:INVOLVED can apply regardless of whether interactions occur on or off Wikipedia", to be clear. Indeed, an admin could be involved due solely to a bitter e-mail exchange or IRC conversation, though proving it could be tough. Wnt (talk) 22:29, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose - while in many cases transparency would be worth encouraging, a policy to that effect would just add complication to complication even without singling out particular sites... although is AN really the place to be making policies? Or am I just misunderstanding this entire thing? — Isarra ༆ 01:49, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
• Support nub of proposal. Good and bad criticism of wikipedia can come from many outside sources. If admin action is being taken because they saw X, then it "should" be mentioned, so as to clarify the discussion as to why and what exactly is being adressed. Seems like this should be developed at Village pump. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:45, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose - This is just more witch-hunty butthurt over WR/'ocracy, nothing to see here. Tarc (talk) 13:04, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose per Michaeldsuarez. Admins (and other users with elevated privileges) are trusted with their tools to step in with their own perspective regardless of the channel through which they were notified of the problem. There is no point forcing everyone to say "Facebook said", "Twitter said", or "this editor told me in the last WP:MEET" when the admin would've come to the same conclusion anyway had they stumbled upon the problem through a purely on-wiki channel like Watchlist or noticeboards. Deryck C. 14:46, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Jimbo's request

For those keen to shoot down what I still believe is a mild proposal, that those with admin and oversight tools should be held to a reasonable standard of transparency, when using their tools if they choose to engage with off-wiki attack forums, I suggest you take a quiet minute to consider this request put out today:

Those who think of themselves as my allies on this issue I appreciate very much. I need your help. You do not help me by participating in a forum run by someone who I think is dangerous to myself and my family, who has posted a photo of himself online with a semi-automatic rifle along with a sick fantasy about a gun battle with me.--Jimbo Wales [4][5]

Are you honestly comfortable that we are not just allowing this situation to happen, but as a collective we support those amongst our numbers with a trusted status on Wikipedia who are not open and honest about taking part and hence covertly legitimize the same forums that harbour and encourage people who make personal attacks, creepily engage in long term internet stalking and harassment, make false public sexual and personal allegations and issue anonymous on-wiki threats against established members of our community? My ethical compass is certainly troubling me greatly right now. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 21:57, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

reasonable standard of transparency???? Really Fae? Tell me - where was this reasonable transparency at your last RfA? HUH? How dare you try to point a finger at others. You sir have lost the last ounce of respect I might have ever been able to muster for you. Damn hypocrite. You dare try to point fingers at "those with admin ..tools". Good grief. — Ched :  ?  07:24, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

'

make false public sexual and personal allegations; a recent example, perhaps, in the case where an editor viciously attacked another on the grounds of homophobia, dragged him to a noticeboard and essentially forced him to out himself in defence of the charge? That sort of thing is pretty horrendous, I agree. Ethics is certainly a double edged sword. --Errant ^(chat!) 08:44, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Jimbo's request (quoted above) seems to be a false and personal allegation as well (see diff). The hyperbole really isn't helpful. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 09:26, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I take seriously threats against people, real or perceived. That being said, his deletion of a post to his talk page is regrettable, since it seemed a serious response. I suggest that we close this thread. There's really nothing we can do.--Wehwalt (talk) 09:30, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Wehwalt, the clue about what we can do might be in Jimbo's direct request. Everyone here has their free choice of whether to support attack forums by taking part in them, or denying them oxygen. It is interesting to see the list of names here who appear to be resisting my request for transparency (even resorting to irrelevant personal allegations about me) and who are also known to be highly active advocates of Wikipediocracy, and frequently use free speech and transparency as their justification. I think we are all aware that personal attacks, hounding and harassment are not the same thing as free speech. Now, rather than rushing to find a reason to close down this discussion, why don't we let our opportunity for free speech have a moment in the sun? Cheers --Fæ (talk) 10:21, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

As I deleted nothing, your paean for free speech might be better directed to Jimbo.--Wehwalt (talk) 10:54, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I would not dare advise Jimbo on how to manage his own talk page, I've had my fingers burnt on that one before. Interesting reference to Apollo you made there Wehwalt. --Fæ (talk) 11:09, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Uh oh. Um, I hope I have not offended, I have not enquired into the, er, orientations of the Greek gods?  :)--Wehwalt (talk) 11:22, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

This is yet more WP:BATTLEGROUND nonsense from Fae. Greg Kohs does seem to be obsessed with Jimbo. He has also been criticised in such places as Wikipedia Review and Wikipediocracy for some of his posts on Jimbo and especially his daughter. However, it is inconvenient for Fae's Battle to mention that neither WR (particularly before the schism) nor Wikipediocracy have a monolithic party line. Also Greg Kohs isn't an admin or Mod on either of those sites and I don't think he has ever been one. Perhaps we should consider whether the attempt to pursue a battleleground mentality to the extent that Fae is doing here is appropriate in an admin.--Peter cohen (talk) 11:37, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Hi again Peter, could you do me a favour, as you regularly contribute there, could you confirm who legally owns the Wikipediocracy website? Thanks --Fæ (talk) 12:12, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

What happened is that about a dozen people, Greg among them, got together to set up a new site when Wikipedia Review went downhill. For a while, we were unsure what to call the site, and Greg in particular bought a string of domain names people had suggested. One of these was for the name we eventually chose, i.e. Wikipediocracy.com. The site hosting is not paid by Greg, but by another member of the collective. We're hoping to have the domain name and hosting bills transferred to a non-profit within the next few weeks. Greg will likely be one of about a dozen trustees of the non-profit. It's correct that he has neither moderator nor sysadmin rights at the site. --JN466 12:53, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

(EC. Jayen's reply is going to be more accurate but I had written this already.) They are setting up some sort of not for profit trust to take over the ownership. I don't know the membership of the steering group and haven't been invited to join. Kohs may have paid the initial cash but doesn't manage the content and, although he might be a member of the steering group, he would be just one of several voices. As far as current ownership is concerned, I think he just happens to have been the person who made most preparations for a new forum in January after Selina was late paying for WR's registration then, when she fell out with him, Hersh/Herschel Krustovski and Gomi/Greybeard in quick succession they set in motion the alternative site. Although more people actively sided with those three, I think most people who have moved there have done so because it looks like being the only game in town rather than because they have a clear understanding of the rights and wrongs. But this is similar to lots of people contributing to or reading Wikipedia because it is the only show in town not because they necessarilly think it is superior to what Citizendium, Encarta or Britannica might have produced in its absence or that it has better policies than them. The fact that I contribute to Wikipediocracy is no more evidence that I support all of what Kohs and Herschel think or that I approve of them as individuals than the fact that I contribute to Wikipedia should be taken as evidence that I approve of you or Jimbo or agree with what you say. And that is the fallacy of your proposal here. The criticism sites are not monolithic and there is no party line. Various Wikipedia admins, functionaries and beaurocrats have participated on those sites and various other people monitor them even though they might not participate. This makes them different from the various closed lists that have featured in Arbcom cases regarding the Middle East and Eastern Europe.--Peter cohen (talk) 13:03, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining your understanding of the future situation. I look forward to Gregory Kohs no longer being the registered legal owner of the website and finding out who will be the new owner. Until, and if, that happens, I think it entirely accurate for anyone to call it Gregory Kohs' forum. Note, you probably mean "directors" rather than "trustees" if it is to become a not for profit. I will be interested in seeing who is prepared to take personal liability for the forum and put their full legal names in the public domain as directors. Depending on how the company is registered, it may well be subject to hate crime legislation, an interesting position for the future directors considering the current culture which enabled the recent faggot "fae got" incident which passed without any meaningful sanction against the person involved.

Peter, as you appear to be arguing against closed lists, and presumably must highly prize transparency, you may want to review your opinion in the above discussion where you appear to be against it for those who have trusted authority on Wikipedia.

By the way, most of us with a Jewish heritage would probably find your immediate comparison of my proposal for transparency with the holocaust, an extreme and offensive viewpoint. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 14:01, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Assuming that the planned non-profit organization will be in the US, you have two potential sources of information:

• Assuming that they manage to get tax-exempt status on the grounds that they're supporting Wikipedia's educational mission (a little dubious, but it would probably work in the end), you will not necessarily be able to find out who all of the directors (or trustees; for charities, the terms are used interchangeably in practice) are, because their gross receipts will be so low that their public reporting will be the 990-N, which needs to list only one officer (who might not be a member of the board). Seeking tax-exempt status isn't mandatory, and if they don't, they can avoid tax liability simply by not making any profits (which should be very easy for a website to arrange; this is the approach I would take if I were setting up a similar program).
• Assuming that they incorporate, you should be able to find out (from the state) the names of the president, secretary, treasurer, and agent for service of process (could be all the same person if not a non-profit; may be as few as two people if it is). Incorporation isn't necessary, of course, but it provides some liability benefits. If they incorporate, the individual directors (and owners, if it is not a non-profit) will not necessarily have "personal liability" for the contents of the website. That, after all, is the primary point behind incorporation: you can sue the corporation, but you can't win the assets of the people who run it or own it except in specific, unusual, and very severe situations (and online insults isn't one of them).

Whether or not an insulting speech in the absence of an independently criminal action (e.g., yelling a slur vs yelling a slur while killing someone) counts as a hate crime is outside my area of competence, so I'll leave that to others, but free speech laws are generally very broadly construed in the US, so I wouldn't count on it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:42, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Oh I think we reached the point some time ago where some consider that anything less than abject brown nosing is a 'hate crime'. John lilburne (talk) 14:59, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

It's probably not smart to scheme on a public noticeboard about how best to get around hate crime legislation; your call I guess. I fully accept John lilburne's implication that I am an abject brown noser. I'm naturally talented and have many years of experience in that department. Cheers --Fæ (talk) 16:28, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

It's probably not smart to scheme on a public noticeboard about how best to get around hate crime legislation... - Is that REALLY what you're reading in the comment above yours? I find that baffling. So-called "Hate Crime Legislation" wouldn't seem to have anything to do with anything in this specific instance, let alone there being any attempt to "get around" it. Is this some sort of veiled legal threat? I'm at a loss... Carrite (talk) 17:07, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Fæ, what are you babbling on about? You seem to have the recipient of the brown-nosing confused, and the rest of your comment is just completely bizarre. John lilburne (talk) 18:38, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• Am I the only one who thinks it a bit hilarious that Jimmy Wales' "Those who think of themselves as my allies on this issue I appreciate very much. I need your help." is being quoted by the proposer as bolstering his backdoor BADSITES proposal? What "issue" is it to which Mr. Wales refers? Hmmm? It is, pretty clearly, his desire for users to be able to filter sexual content at Commons, set in motion by the activism of some contributors to Wikipediocracy on the festering situation there. Wales is essentially saying, those of you with me on the image filter issue are not doing me any favors working through that site, which is "run by" [incorrect statement by JW, per the above] a person that I see as a possible physical menace to me. The proposer is keen to hear what is useful to him, ignoring the basic issue involved and quoting out of context.

I'm not going to defend the words or actions of ANYONE at Wikipediocracy. Indeed, I find several of the principals there, including the Wikimedia-project-banned individual with whom the proposer is at war, to be obnoxious and consider them opponents. But the views and actions of a few are not sufficient to condemn that project as a whole, which in this case I believes serves a positive mission as a source of independent criticism of the systemic problems of WP. Carrite (talk) 16:44, 1 May 2012 (UTC) Last edit: Carrite (talk) 16:45, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• Carrite, you may not be the only one who finds Jimbo's personal request for our help hilarious, but I expect you would definitely be in the fringe minority. I read his request as genuine and I think most readers would accept it in good faith. --Fæ (talk) 17:10, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Whew, difficulty discerning meaning or something. I find YOUR quoting his comments made originally in the context of helping offended users mitigate the porno catastrophe that is Wikipedia Commons to be hilarious, not his seeking of help for those who don't want to see, y'know, naked butts of boys in ropes and stuff like that. Carrite (talk) 20:12, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Let's see, Gregory Kohs has been in a long-running, online (entirely online) dispute with Jimbo Wales. The two men can't stand one another and Mr. Wales gives as good as he gets. Some time ago, Mr. Kohs posts a picture of himself with a friend's rifle on his Facebook page. In the comments thread, a friend asks him something like "I hope you're not planning on killing anything with that." He responds, "I understand that Jimmy Wales often carries a gun, so I have to be prepared with counter-fire." [6]. Hmmm... Counter-fire. counter-fire. counter-fire. This is A. clearly a joke and B. A reference (in the context of the lame joke) to self-defense. Now, six month's later Wales (who would like nothing better than to shut Koh's up and smear his good name) writes: I think (Kohs) is dangerous to myself and my family, who has posted a photo of himself online with a semi-automatic rifle along with a sick fantasy about a gun battle with me. This is a classic, classic Wikipedia smear tactic against people you don't like/disagree with. Then Mr. Van Haeften, who has made a habit of accusing all and sundry of "homophobia" and "harassment" and "hate crimes" and posing a danger to his family, for the crime of criticizing him (I've been on the receiving end of this nonsense in the past) and for seeking for, well, transparency as to his past and current actions on various Wikimedia projects, tries to stir up a little wiki lynch mob against those who would dare to frequent the Wikipedia criticism site wikipediocracy.com because, because... the dangerous Mr. Kohs posts there too. If Mr. Wales is really concerned that Mr. Kohs is a threat to him or anyone in his family, he should seek a restraining order. As for the backdoor "badsites" policy, well, Mr. Van Haeften will just have to adjust to the fact that he's not going to get his way.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:38, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Dare I suggest it's probably a pretty heavy BLP violation... runs and hides --Errant ^(chat!) 18:06, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

BLP does apply to talk pages. Suggesting that a living person is a danger is definitely a BLP violation. Although I'm not stupid enough to try editing Jimbo's page. Ken Arromdee (talk) 22:52, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• As usual, a lot of the rhetoric here is overblown. At the same time, while I don't subscribe to the stuff about hate crimes and gun battles, it's obvious that there are individuals whose interest in Jimmy Wales and his family verges on the uncomfortably obsessive.

  The whole thing is sort of ridiculous; obviously, the people who contribute to Wikipediocracy are not about to stop just because Jimmy Wales asks them to. And in the end, a discussion forum is just a discussion forum. If a website lost all redeeming value simply because it was frequented by a few nasty, obsessive pieces of work, then Wikipedia should have been closed down long ago.

  That said, there's a sort of icky, vindictive, excessively familiar undertone that runs through a lot of posts on those off-site forums, and it's fair to consider whether we as Wikipedia contributors want to be associated with that. MastCell ^Talk 18:39, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Nothing useful is happening in this discussion. I'd suggest a RfC or a narrower focused request for arbitration rather then continuing to attack each other. SirFozzie (talk) 18:14, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Observation & Admonishment The reference to yellow stars is in extremely poor taste. Please don't do that. 140.247.141.165 (talk) 21:59, 1 May 2012 (UTC) Sorry, but I'm not going to allow political correctness and the insistence for the use of Newspeak get in the way of a frank comparison. I won't compromise my language, ideas, and thoughts for the sake of not hurting someone's feelings. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 00:03, 2 May 2012 (UTC) I really don't see how something as petty as internet site 'loyalties' can be "frankly compared" to genocide. It's not "Newspeak", it's keeping things in a rational perspective. Get over yourself. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 00:10, 2 May 2012 (UTC) What if your country were to decree that any person who has read the Communist Manifesto, the Bible, the Koran, or The New York Times must wear a special patch that identified them as a reader of such material? Fæ's proposal isn't any different. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 00:17, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Guys, you do realize this is going to be another one of those legendary threads that people cite to indicate how nutty Wikipedia is? If you go on these other sites, you must! I don't see the proposal as a "yellow star". The way I interpret it - maybe someone will disagree - I see it as requiring admins who are involved with another party on one of those sites to acknowledge that fact and act accordingly when dealing with him. I proposed a rephrase above just to be double sure. Not a yellow star, just an ordinary recusal. As for the other stuff, well, clearly Jimbo has the right to remove stuff he's read and doesn't feel like answering from his own bloomin' talk page. We all have that right. And he has a right to ask his "friends" to avoid contributing to his "enemies" offsite, when there are potential threats involved. (Of course, whether they do so is another matter) And I don't necessarily have to believe the guy who made the maybe-threat that it wasn't a threat. I'm reminded of the Giffords cross-hair debate. Not saying I want him convicted in a court of law, but Jimbo doesn't have to believe him. Let's tone down the rhetoric here and make a commonsense interpretation that if you're in a knock-down drag-out with another editor, and you're an admin with your finger on the block button, your judgment might not be perfectly impartial. Wnt (talk) 00:44, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Yes ("how nutty Wikipedia is") - this thread is a great piece of evidence of the Wikipedia "fair game" mentality, where supposed WP:NPA and WP:CIVIL policies are simply suspended when the targets of personal attacks are critics - especially from high-status members of the hierarchy. Wnt, while there's many insults on both sides, and unarguably extensive acrimony, the particular mudslinging here should be completely out of bounds. Especially on a site which claims to have a civility policy (with endless debates over it). It just shows how selectively it's enforced, and what a large component there is of social power. When you give such utter nonsense defamation the slightest credibility, you show that smears work. That a strategy of throw some mud and see what sticks, can succeed via simply doing any damage at all. Note in view of the above, "yellow star", hyperbole issue aside, is not really the correct figurative descriptive. Rather, it's "bullseye". That is, effectively, participation in BADSITES combined with any action would be a basis for directing a fusillade of abuse at an admin, on the theory of giving aid and comfort to the enemy. It's obvious how this would work - Admin does something on a controversy, and "discloses" participation in BADSITES thread about it. Immediate flame about how could anyone ever support such a pit of devils by even entering their unholy lair, and this taints the soul forevermore. When admin denies being a witch's familiar, in response, have another recitation of all the utter evil which has been perpetrated by the fiends in human form. Repeat. At length. Or, in Wikipedianese, "drama". This thread is the proof. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 11:56, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Speaking of the attribution of evil, what do you think of the discussion at #Orange_Mike above? Especially the last section, #Larger_issue_unresolved. --JN466 12:28, 2 May 2012 (UTC) I'm not meaning to duck your question, but I've got some pretty complicated views about paid editing, and there are many things in the mix of my thinking - my knowledge of what Jimbo was doing with the business Bomis and now with the start-up Wikia, my having been at one of the fairly high-level Harvard talks about these sorts of sites, my general dislike of the exploitative nature of "Web 2.0" and its structure, the counter-intuitive nature of some of the way the human mind works, etc - it's kind of hard to put it down in short comment, and I'd probably get in trouble for some parts of it here. In terms of choosing my battles, PR people can take care of themselves, they get paid to do it. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 13:17, 2 May 2012 (UTC) The other comparison I considered using instead of the Yellow Star was that people had to attach a sound file of a bell and append "unclean" to their post. I've now realised that what Chairman Fae would really want is an Unwikipedian Affairs Committee in which anyone who is suspected of having posted to a bad site has to confess, recant and name some associates or be banned from the internet.--Peter cohen (talk) 14:05, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Nice ad-hom there Peter, though kind of you to call me Chairman Fae, I like it, much nicer than faggot "fae got". Strange how people call me the dramah queen when you are the one comparing a simple proposal for better transparency with the holocaust and the anti-communist witch hunts of the House Un-American Activities Committee. --Fæ (talk) 14:58, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Fae, did Peter ever call you a "fae got"? No? Then why the fuck are you implying that he did???!??! Can you stop being such an obvious and utter slime ball for just a second?VolunteerMarek 17:20, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Fae, you're letting yourself be trolled (and I don't just mean by Peter). And Marek, even if you're right on the point you still don't have to be vulgar about it, or take such glee in watching him lose his cool under provocation, or add extra WP:personal attacks of your own. Wnt (talk) 17:25, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Thanks Wnt. Interesting however, that I'm a slime ball because I dare mention that the owner of Wikipediocracy calls me a faggot by using a stupid pun on my name, and yet it is perfectly okay to use the holocaust as a casual way of making fun my proposal on this noticeboard. Nice Wikipediocracy travelling circus we see here don't you think? --Fæ (talk) 17:31, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Fae, if you're walking down an alleyway and a drunk hooker starts punching you, yes, you can punch her back, and yes, you can win the fight, but when the video comes out on the News at Nine you're still the one who's come out with problems. You have to hold yourself to your own high standard in stuff like this, and not get dragged down to the level of the people you're arguing with. In this case that doesn't refer to restraining your emotions, which you've kept in check quite admirably considering the circumstances, but rather to making sure that you don't become unclear or unfocused in your arguments. Not everyone reading knows the whole past conflict. Your clarification above is a step in the right direction. Wnt (talk) 17:58, 2 May 2012 (UTC) Well first off , there is the utter hypocrisy of a person calling for transparency given the underhanded method in which he gained adminship on this project by failing to disclose a previous disgraced account name. Second, the "fae got" bit was something uttered by Thekosher, a name long-banned and long-disgraced on this project. What Fae is trying to do is paint everyone who does not like them with broad swipes of the Kosher Brush(tm), hoping for a bit of guilt-by-association to settle into the minds of those who are reading this. Tarc (talk) 17:34, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Copyright backlog getting horrendous

This little cat first cried for your help on this issue in February 2010. Here he is again. Will you please, please help him?

• Wikipedia:Copyright problems
• Wikipedia:Suspected copyright violations

Well, I was hoping to make good ground on the backlog at WP:CP today, but that was before I discovered to my dismay that the WP:SCV backlog stretches back almost as far. This means we're likely to lose rather than gain ground, because I can't even keep up when SCV is kept up to date ... not even when I give it every spare moment of the weekend I can muster.

Please, please, please, people. This is important work. Yes, it can be tedious, but it's usually not that hard. And even if you just pitch in a little, you can be a big help. "Many hands make light work" and all that.

You don't have to be an admin to work at WP:SCV. The instructions are in the collapse box at the top of the page.

Much of the work at WP:CP is limited to admins, but it's not all hard. There's pretty comprehensive advice at Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Advice for admins, and I am so willing to offer on the job training. And hire a maid to clean your house. (Well, not really. I'd have to justify to my family why I'm not taking care of mine. :))

For those who like the idea of handling text-based copyright issues but for some reason shy away from WP:SCV and WP:CP, we also have backlogs of over a year at WP:CCI. (I really recommend that the less experienced don't start at the oldest. Those tend to get old for a reason...they're hard.) But I'm not really here today to plead for CCI. It's the far-more urgent WP:SCV and sometimes-urgent WP:CP that need you most.

Please. We are drowning. Or, less dramatically but more accurately, really falling behind. :/ --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 18:03, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

I looked at a few but without admin tools there's not much I can do so I stopped. All I would be able to do is just ask someone else to take action so I would mostly just be in the way. Kumioko (talk) 23:35, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh, there's tons you could do to help at WP:SCV. :) WP:NPP pick up on blatant issues quite often, but sometimes they don't - and sometimes the creators remove the copyright tag and the new page patrollers evidently don't notice that they were there. In those cases, adding a speedy deletion tag can be helpful. Sometimes there is a plausible chance that the contributor could offer permission (if User:CompanyX copies content from the website on Company X, say), and in those cases especially the proper course is to blank the article and use the template that {{copyvio}} generates to let them know how to give permission. Anybody can do that, and admins are not supposed to delete articles in such cases until a week after they have. Sometimes it's a matter of talking to somebody about how to handle Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing or Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia. Sometimes the source is public domain or compatibly licensed, and they may need to be told how to attribute in accordance with Wikipedia:Plagiarism. Sometimes it's a false positive, and a note just needs to be added to the entry to document that the article has been checked and is okay. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 10:21, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I am not able to assist at the moment, with finals coming up. But I can give it real focus after May 8th, so remind me then, if you would. And, dear god, that kitten is the cutest thing in the world. Silverseren^C 02:37, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm in the middle of some content work with materials I have access to for a limited time (plus working on the RfC), but once the RfC (and school) are over, I'll try to help. I have decent database access through my library and community college, if that's a plus. Keilana|^{Parlez ici} 02:51, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank you both! Access to sources is great (although I do sometimes run by WP:RX when I can't get ahold of one, and that frequently works). And, yes, that kitten is insanely cute. :) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 10:21, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Last time you asked I was willing to help and immediately ran into this problem. So no, sorry, not the second time until the problem gets resolved. I mean not this particular article, which is already fine, but the attitude that bureacratic procedures are above all does not matter what.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:49, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

While I appreciate your willingness to help, I'm afraid that we do have policies against even temporarily publishing content that may be against the law. This is why potential copyright problems are blanked until the listing is closed, and this is why matters that might violate WP:BLP are removed while we figure out if they do...and not left in place until after. This is to help protect the encyclopedia, our reusers and the individuals whose rights may be violated. Your help in copyright work would be much appreciated, but I don't think it would be a good idea to change this practice as a matter of principle given what could be a risk. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 10:21, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

The point is that the copyrighted text was there for couple of weeks before I started editing (not obviously introduced by me, and it was not removed by anybody, though clearly identified and templated), was removed after I started rewriting it, despite the fact that I promised to finish the work in several hours, it was clear that I am currently working on the article, and my edits were reverted. Best luck with finding somebody willing to help.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:29, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

And the article was about events occurred 100+ years ago, so that it did not contain anything even remotely close to BLP.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:32, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I didn't intend to imply that it was a BLP issue; I simply note that legal issues including BLP and copyright have certain handling. In terms of the principle, and not the specifics of this incident, once content is identified, there is a level of diligence that can help minimize legal problems. This includes immediate removal. I can see that you are upset about this incident, and I'm sorry about that, but it didn't have anything to do with me and the principle is sound. If you think the principle is being misapplied in a particular situation, you can discuss that politely with the contributor with whom you disagree and seek dispute resolution if the two of you can't reach consensus. In general, though, I'm afraid that I can't guarantee anyone a conflict-free experience helping with copyright issues. But I appreciate your good wishes. :) There are always people willing to help out. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:32, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes, indeed, I believe that the principle was being misapplied (in the end of the day, I was removing the copyrighted content, not introducing it), and I tried to discuss it with the editor, but the discussion did not go anywhere. I am absolutely sure they did it in good faith, and I am not so much interested in the article (and the article has been fixed by the editor anyway) so that I would go through the dispute resolution process, but it still remains by far my worst experience on this project since 2007, and I wish it would remain my worst experience still for some time.--Ymblanter (talk) 12:44, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I tend to avoid these lists, because of what amounts to OWNership issues by the regulars there. they have adopted a certain series of discrete steps, and I prefer to do things differently to get the same result. (I do not participate,in fact, in any Wikipedia project that uses coded symbols.) So I just work on my own with what I notice or what is called to my attention, which is in any case as much as I can handle. It;'s not just the machinery I dislike, it's the approach: in general the problem I have with the approach is the same as what Ymblanter noticed: those working at those boards prefer to remove, even if rewriting is feasible, and I prefer to rewrite when possible: both ways remove copyvio, but one gets us an article. An example is the list that MRG suggested for non-admins to do, she left out: rewrite to remove the copyvio, remove the copyvio portion, stubbify the article--all things that any editor can do. Similarly, unless someone is doing it repeatedly, the way to handle close paraphrase , copying within WP or failure to attribute a quotation is usually to just fix it, like any other error. And I disagree completely with the view that if something has been there for 100 hours, we are aiding violation of the law if we leave it in another few hours while we're working on it--it's de minibus--we should do whatever facilitates working on it. And for things that only might be copyright violations Wikipedia has no obligation, legal or moral, to remove until it's shown to be copyvio or we receive a takedown notice. In another direction, I do not blank and suggest giving formal permission if the material would be promotional--I delete using both G11 and G12 as a reason--there's no point telling someone to go through the trouble of giving formal permission if the material is unusable. DGG ( talk ) 17:13, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

<blink>Goodness. DGG, perhaps you didn't intend it to sound this way, but there are a lot of what seem to me uncivil comments in this, including your accusation that "those working at those boards prefer to remove, even if rewriting is feasible" which is demonstrably unfounded. I have personally rewritten from scratch hundreds of articles flagged for copyright problems and repaired or stubbed many, many more. In terms of ownership issues, you would be very welcome to join a constructive conversation about how to better handle copyright issues, although I can't imagine how symbols create an issue. They're simply easier shorthand than typing the same thing over and over again. They're not mandatory or hard. I do, however, disagree with you heartily that we have no legal or moral obligation to remove copy-pasted content. By the same token, we could retain BLP issues until they are proven to be defamatory - but this is irresponsible from a legal and moral standpoint. Copyright infringement, just like defamation, has the possibility of doing real world harm to people. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 21:10, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Chugging in on WP:SCV, which I did not know of before. Can't promise much, but I'll pick off some. Procedure is SCV -> CP if confirmed, right? --Alvestrand (talk) 20:56, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. :) CP is the right avenue if you think there's a chance of permission to be verified. If it's a blatant WP:CSD#G12, you can tag it for {{db-copyvio}}. Wikipedia:Text Copyright Violations 101 has some basic information. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 21:10, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

</blink>Moonriddengirl, learn to close your HTML tags :-) I have to agree with DGG's parenthetical statement: any page that requires me to use little coded symbols is confusing. It would help if the SCV process (and the RFPP process) suggested the templates rather than essentially requiring them. Nyttend (talk) 21:14, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

:D I have no objection to that. I'm pretty sure it'll be non-controversial and will add them immediately. I don't always use them myself, although they are easy at a glance to read when checking to see if a day is done. I created them for my own use after typing that an article had been cleaned for the billionth time - it's just so much easier to type {{CPC}}. Voila! It does it all for me. I've noticed the time you've been putting in at SCV, by the way, and really appreciate it. :) (Oh, but I won't take RFPP. It may not be noncontroversial there.) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 21:18, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Noted in the group edit header that they are not mandatory. I'll explain the issues if it turns out be controversial. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 21:28, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

It's definitely an issue at RFPP; the first time that I worked there for a little bit, I left custom comments instead of the templates, and before long someone had left a message asking me please to use the template. Nyttend (talk) 21:40, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

DGG - With respect to your re-write comment, I'll be honest and say, yes, I have deleted articles and or content when a rewrite may have been possible. Did I want to do this, no, but given the backlog at WP:CP I thought it was more important to work through the backlog. What would we prefer - an article on something of marginal notability or stopping an ever growing list of blanked articles, some of which are bound to be high-profile. Personally I think it's the latter, hence the reason I sometimes delete articles I think could be re-written - although I will stub if I can. As for the symbols issue I'd agree with Moonriddenggirl that they're mainly there to help identify which listings have and haven't been dealt with and they certainly aren't mandatory. I agree with your comments on other tasks that non-admins can do but I don't see the point of your next sentence starting "Similarly, unless someone is doing it repeatedly,...". The reason we list these at WP:CP is to make sure they don't get missed, articles rarely get deleted for close paraphrasing and we fix the copying within Wikipedia problems by attributing properly. We also don't remove material that just might by a copyvio - if we can't find a source the tag is removed. Dpmuk (talk) 15:50, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Time for changes to the Username Policy? ROLE, ORGNAME and NOSHARE

Every policy has room for improvement, and the username policy is no different. I am not proposing (nor supporting/opposing) any changes myself. However, in hopes of drawing a wider audience to the conversation to achieve consensus I wanted to mention this here. In response to some potentially unclear wording in the policy we saw this RFCN and this conversation on Jimbo's talk page a number of editors are taking a stab at clarifying the policy. Admin who regularly review the backlog at UAA may want to review and comment. Your input on the username policy talkpage would be appreciated.  7  23:29, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

You might point out that WP:ROLE is not actually part of WP:Username, but part of the WP:SOCK policy. I think part of the problem in interpretation might have been the different goals of these two policies. The naming of users is primarily focused on avoiding confusing names and giving basic guidelines for new users, while the 'Sock' policy is about stressing the 1-to-1 relationship (1 human to 1 account) that is strongly preferred because of security and accountability concerns. -- Avanu (talk) 23:35, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

... Except that that's not actually what WP:SOCK says. Users are allowed as many accounts as they can use in a policy-compliant manner. Jclemens (talk) 01:30, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

You're talking about the exception, not the general rule. The policy still says what you just said. But if you're summing up general user creation policy in 1 brief sentence, you'd probably say "generally one human to one account", which is what I'm saying above. -- Avanu (talk) 01:39, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

See my most recent post on Jimbo's page for some ideas :-) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 12:26, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Admin refusing to participate in dispute resolution

There is a dispute over the structure of List of vegans, discussed at Talk:List_of_vegans#Legends.2Ftemplates. User:SlimVirgin has been claiming consensus for pushing changes through and I dispute she does have a consensus, so started a discussion at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard#List of vegans. So far she has refused to participate in the dispute resolution, claiming she does not need to: [7]. Administrator User:EdJohnston tackled her over her refusal to participate in dispute resolution, noting ...it seems to me that your insistence on removing the templates has no supporters but yourself. What consensus there is suggests that Betty's scheme is favored. SilmVirgin has refused to acknowledge this. She has also requested another editor on the article to write a program that will remove all the citation tempplates, which is expressly forbidden by Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Citation_templates_and_tools. Since EdJohnston does not believe she has a consensus for her changes, can you please compel her to participate in dispute resolution and to cease making structural alterations to the article until the issues are resolved at DR. Betty Logan (talk) 02:00, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Please remember to notify involved editors as required. Notifications to SlimVirgin and EdJohnston made. Monty₈₄₅ 02:21, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• This complaint is not valid and looks like forum shopping. Editors are not required to participate. Jehochman ^Talk 02:35, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

  If this complaint is not valid, I am going to take my efforts of Wikipedia. I have promoted articles to GA and FA status, but if there is not a legitimate process for settling a content dispute then I have no recourse. And this is not forum shopping; after filing a complaint at AN3 I tried being constructive by entering dispute resolution. Even EdJohnston said this was an appropriate step, and he advised me to come here if I was still dissatisifed, which I am. It is very clear that this would not be happening if the other editor was not an admin. Betty Logan (talk) 02:48, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• But if they don't participate, then that generally means that they are in the wrong and are trying to avoid responsibility. Silverseren^C 03:26, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• I've given three years of my life to this project working on articles and developing templates (just check my user stats), because I believe in free knowledge. You can't even give me one lousy dispute resolution process, where someone impartial decides what the consensus is. Betty Logan (talk) 02:54, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I think it's pretty strange to defend SlimVirgin over Betty in this case. It seems that SlimVirgin has been ignoring all objections on the talk page, refused to participate in dispute resolution, and is allowing her personal distaste for templates to guide her actions here. She has been dismissive of Betty Logan's attempts to insist on reliable sourcing (and, lets not forget, describing someone as a vegan is a WP:BLP issue, where strong sourcing is an absolute requirement). I've reverted the article to a version prior to SlimVirgin's participation. I suggest that she not return to editing the article until she participates in dispute resolution and agrees not to include statements about living people that don't meet WP:BLP.—Kww(talk) 03:30, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Kww, that was out of order. You've undone a lot of work, including adding new names and sources. I advise you to look at the page history, the serial reverting, and the talk page. Please revert yourself. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:41, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Here's your changes. I'm seeing only 4 new people added and about 5 source changes. The rest is just decapitalization and such, which isn't all that important. It's certainly easier to do it this way than to have to manually put the color coded stuff back in. Silverseren^C 03:48, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

(ec) Just as it was sorted out, Kww has stirred it up again. The truth is that Betty Logan has been a serial reverter on that page for two years, barely allowing anyone else to edit it, but without improving it either. I'm all for a bit of OWN when it helps, but what he has done has caused the page to stagnate. Now, because I tried to help a new editor he was repeatedly reverting over the last few days, he has turned on me, and has taken me to, I believe, four noticeboards since last night. You have just rewarded that behaviour, and have undone a lot of work in which I added names and references that he had been removing. Please revert yourself. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:49, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

And now we move onto the bit where, when you can't get people to agree with you, you try to discredit the person you're in a disagreement with. Really, I could make a checklist and mark each one as you follow it, you've done the pattern time and again. Silverseren^C 03:57, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

It wasn't sorted out at all, SV: you were simply ignoring all objections to your edits. Pay attention to the DRN request, and enter into it in good faith, with the full expectation that you might not prevail. Sure, Betty is frustrated as all hell and lashing out, but I probably would be too.—Kww(talk) 10:13, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

SlimVirgin did not request that anyone write a program. I told SlimVirgin that I would write a program (at a later date, after I've completed my current project) and SlimVirgin agreed that it would be a good idea. The purpose of the program would be to convert templated refs to non-templated refs in order to see if makes a significant difference in the page loading speed. Certainly, neither of us had it in mind as a permanent adjustment as no permanent plan for the page had been determined. It was just talk during the discussion & testing phase that we are still in. --Andomedium (talk) 21:46, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

See Talk:Pain/Archive_4#Cite_ref; it has been tried manually and apparently does make a significant difference if there are many citations in the article (Pain has more than 100). WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:11, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for the link. --Andomedium (talk) 15:32, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Forget it

Forget it, I've just had enough. I loved Wikipedia when I joined and now I absolutely hate it. You don't have fair rules for settling editing disputes, and you allow editors to destroy other people's work like what happened to User:Armbrust, the best editor you ever had. And you always take the admin's side and provide no mechanism for editors to have a consensus judged fairly and impartially. This is not a nice place. You probably think I'm a troublemaker because I'm a redlink, but I've promoted articles and peer reviewed film articles, and practically held the snooker project afloat with Armbrust. I want you to know how good I was though so here are the two articles I am proudest of:

• Don't Look Now – This is my favorite film and the article was shit when I joined Wikipedia. I single handedly developed it from this to this.
• List of highest-grossing films – I wrote all the prose on that, and designed and implemented the expandible tables at the bottom. I thought they were so cool, and really elevated the article. Under my guidance that article went from this to this

I think those two articles show me in my best light, it shows what I'm capable off when I'm allowed to edit fairly, although I doubt you give a shit. And you insult me by not even giving me the opportunity to have my editing decisions and my point of view heard fairly, by someone impartial. Over and out. Betty Logan (talk) 03:22, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, Betty, please don't leave. That was a really crass comment by Jehochman above, please ignore it. I'm sure there's people here that can help with this issue. Silverseren^C 03:26, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

(ec) Betty, for what it's worth, I apologize to you that we have gotten off track here. I take responsibility for that. The situation now is that several of us are discussing on the talk page what the formatting of the article should be. We agree that the list needs something to prettify it, and there are several good featured lists that we could take our lead from. One consideration is not to add to load time (already slow) with unnecessary templates, and to make sure the page is easy for new editors to expand (i.e. not too fiddly -- the previous colour-coding was problematic in that regard). The discussion is going well, and you are welcome to join in.

My suggestion is that you take a couple of days away from the article, and I will do the same. Then when we're both refreshed, we can meet again on talk to discuss how to proceed. Nothing has happened at that article that can't be changed easily, so please accept this olive branch, then we can start again with a better relationship and work to improve the page together. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:34, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not seeing any agreement on the talk page with your view on the load times. Furthermore, I just tried loading both versions and there wasn't any time difference. You also don't have any consensus on the talk page for the removal of the color coding. Also, this polite, fake positive wording/speech methods that you use to imply that you're the one that has consensus and that you're the one doing all the work in the discussion is really just insulting to whomever you're speaking to. Silverseren^C 03:53, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Did you clear your browser's cache in between? It's (I've been told) a necessary step to get valid results in this instance. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:13, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Betty Logan seems to be making pointed comments at EdJohnston now.[8] Not good. Mathsci (talk) 03:56, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not seeing a pointed comment, i'm seeing someone upset and burned out. She isn't even being insulting or anything, so I don't see the issue at all. Silverseren^C 03:59, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

No. A section headed "Thanks for nothing" seems to be a critcism of EdJohnston's closing of the report at WP:AN3. Mathsci (talk) 04:05, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I think EdJohnston's close of it was appropriate, but I can fully understand Betty being upset as they are if I had to deal with a talk page discussion like that one with Slim Virgin. Silverseren^C 04:09, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Betty Logan objected to the close explicitly.[9] The discussion on the talk page is proceeding in a calm and orderly way. Mathsci (talk) 04:17, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

It was already going in a calm and orderly way. And considering there's been only one edit since then, Slim Virgin making an RfC on the color thing, there isn't really anything that has happened since to be judged whether it is calm and orderly. I assume these comments are just trying to defend SV, Mathsci? Silverseren^C 04:23, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

No, SV is not the problem here. Meanwhile Betty Logan has forum-shopped elsewhere.[10] Mathsci (talk) 06:06, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I suggest you follow SlimVirgin's example, extend the olive branch and let this go. Its probably past time to close this thread before someone makes things worse. -- Avanu (talk) 06:15, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

If only it was an actual olive branch and not a snake. Silverseren^C 06:42, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh, so every time someone else puts a message on Jimbo's page, it's not forum shopping, but now it is? Besides, there's no link back here or even an explicit mention, so it's not forum shopping. Silverseren^C 06:42, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Please cut back on the drama-producing rhetoric, personalised remarks and scarcely credible wikilawyering. Thanks, Mathsci (talk) 06:55, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

So, essentially, you're not actually going to respond to what I say. I see how it is. Silverseren^C 06:59, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Please see Ched Davis' comments below: your contributions here seem to be in bad faith. Mathsci (talk) 07:26, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• I'm not going to enter into the meat of the disagreement itself, but I must say that when an editor (Slim) states I apologize to you that we have gotten off track here. I take responsibility for that. and Then when we're both refreshed, we can meet again on talk to discuss how to proceed. Nothing has happened at that article that can't be changed easily, so please accept this olive branch, - I find it rather unseemly for other editors to use language such as: this polite, fake positive wording/speech methods that you use and If only it was an actual olive branch and not a snake.. Let's try to do a little better please. — Ched :  ?  07:20, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• "I'm sorry people got upset" is not the same thing as "I'm sorry for what I did". Ken Arromdee (talk) 22:57, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• I did go a bit overboard with that, but i'm extremely annoyed that everyone is ignoring what Slim has done wrong (and the canvassing below). Though I am, admittedly, not surprised at the response either. And now we've lost yet another editor. Great job everyone. Silverseren^C 07:31, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Canvassing

Right here. Saying "Please don't feel like you have to comment" is just a veiled attempt to pretend it isn't canvassing. Why wouldn't he feel compelled to comment after being informed of it? Silverseren^C 04:33, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

If you're going to list diffs under a section titled "Canvassing", allow me to help by adding a few more: diff 2, diff 3, diff 4. — Ched :  ?  07:23, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

How is any of that canvassing? Those are all proper processes to be used in a dispute. The RSN discussion is in agreement with Betty. The AN3 discussion was no consensus, but noted that there was no support for Slim. And Slim refused to be involved in the DRN discussion. Again, how is any of this canvassing? It looks to me like a continually agreement that Slim has no consensus and is refusing to actually discuss anything. Silverseren^C 07:35, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh, I see the RSN discussion is not the recent one I was thinking of, but one from a few days ago. What does that one even have to do with anything? Silverseren^C 07:37, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Personally I hope that Betty doesn't leave, and I hope she and SV can find a resolution to all this. I do understand that once frustration sets in, it's often difficult to see another person's side of things. I don't know Betty - but she seems to be a good-faith editor, and I hope she'll stay. I'm just saying that having seen Slim around for many years, I know that she too is someone open to reason and compromise. I haven't read through all the discussions on this, and I'm not really interested in the "vegan" topic itself. If it were me, then after a WP:3O my next step would be to start a RfC on the article talk page (perhaps even try to get it listed at WP:CENT - at the conclusion of the RfC, you get some sort of established consensus. If it can't be resolved that way - then some sort of WP:MEDCAB type of thing perhaps could help. (and I should have said earlier too - SS, I do admire you sticking up for another fellow editor - I'm just saying it's not necessary to "bash" one person, in order to "support" another.) — Ched :  ?  07:53, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Please Allow SlimVirgin to Proceed

My words may not matter much because I'm not an established Wikipedia user (I've actually made many attempts over the past seven years to become an active Wikipedia editor but each time I was discouraged by users like Betty Logan who are so eager to delete the contributions of other users) but I'd still like to show my support for SlimVirgin.

If you check the History pages for the List of Vegetarians and the List of Vegans, it's quite clear that Betty Logan is more interested in completely deleting new (valid) list entries than in finding ways to help retain them.
If a new entry has no reference, Betty completely deletes the entry.
If a new entry has a reference but Betty finds the reference unsatisfactory, Betty completely deletes the entry.
Betty doesn't try to help create a better reference.
Betty doesn't seem to care that the entrant's vegan/vegetarian status can often be easily confirmed with a quick Google search and a pinch of common sense.
Betty doesn't bother to list the entrant on the Talk page so that other users can try to find a better source (something that SlimVirgin has already begun doing).
Betty just completely deletes the entry and that's that. The name usually remains gone from the list unless the user who added it happens to return to battle Betty, or another user comes along at a later date to try to add the name again.

While viewing the page history, I found more than enough reversions to convince me that Betty Logan shouldn't be maintaining these lists. Unfortunately, I didn't keep a good record of my findings (I'll read through the history again if necessary).
One example that I can clearly recall is Kesha who was deleted from the List of vegetarians simply because the user failed to add her in alphabetical order.
I don't believe that Betty Logan knows, or even truly cares about, what's best for these lists.
I believe that SlimVirgin does know (or will soon determine) what's best for these lists and I believe that SlimVirgin truly does care about what's best for these lists. I've looked at a lot of SlimVirgin's past work and I am convinced that, if allowed to work on the lists unimpeded, SlimVirgin will produce better structured lists and a better system for expanding and maintaining the lists. --Andomedium (talk) 21:03, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I disagree. While edits like this are not a good way to behave, it's also important to source things. If the reference is missing, or unsatisfactory, then remove the sentence it's referencing. That's pretty standard for information about living people. SlimVirgin doesn't necessarily know what's best for these lists, because they're not her lists: they're lists on an encyclopaedia, and lists on an encyclopedia should always be referenced with good quality sources. The Cavalry (Message me) 21:14, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Certainly it is important to source things, and Betty Logan does not appear to be doing that. The reason we edit by humans is so the full range of appropriate actions should be considered. Before removing someone from a list of that sort, one should make at least a cursory check that there is not available documentation--at least by checking the Wikipedia article in case there is a link that can be copied over. Otherwise its operating like a primitive level bot, and we already have enough of these without turning ourselves into unthinking machinery. SV's edits over the years have shown her to be, in contrast, an extremely resourceful editor, who takes care in following the actual BLP policy. DGG ( talk ) 10:01, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

(Comment by Non-Admin.) SlimVirgin is one of the finest, if not the finest administrator I have ever encountered. I do not say this because she has always agreed with me. Quite the contrary. But she has ALWAYS been polite and informative and an encounter with her will make a better editor of you for it. Just thought it had to be said and this was a good place to say it. Mugginsx (talk) 12:17, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

(Another non-admin comment). Let me begin by saying that I, deliberately, have not reviewed the edits at the page in question. It isn't on my watchlist, and it's an argument I can do without. But I want to criticize what I see in a lot of this discussion: character endorsements or criticisms that, likewise, seem to be made by editors who know nothing more of the specifics than I do. I don't remember ever having crossed paths with Betty Logan, but I most certainly have done so numerous times with SlimVirgin. Comments that someone (who is, whatever else, a long-time active user) is generally resourceful or one of the finest do little to shed light on a specific incident, and are the kinds of things that give rise to the perception that we have so-called "vested contributors". Veganism is somewhat related as a subject to animal rights, and I have a lot of experience there, and have had some truly horrid experiences with SlimVirgin in that area. That doesn't mean that the same thing is happening here, but please forgive me if I have a Pavlovian response and worry that Betty Logan might have reason to feel badly. And yet, it has been my impression that SlimVirgin has been making a commendable effort to be on good behavior since her return from her illness. I, very sincerely, respect that and wish her well. So, reputations are not going to help us here. Actually, it ends up being a matter of looking at the edits rather than the editor, in the sense that the specific editing actions are relevant in ways that reputation is not. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:24, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, I am no vested contributor. Look at my edit history before you make such a comment and you will see how unfounded it is. Mugginsx (talk) 11:10, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't think that that is what Tryptofish meant. I think they were referring to a tendency to overemphasize who the editors are (and possibly rule in their favor because of that) rather than on the substance of the dispute in question. North8000 (talk) 11:51, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I see. My apologizes. Mugginsx (talk) 13:14, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I just logged back in, and saw this, and I want to assure Mugginsx that North is correct, and I was not at all calling you (nor DGG, whom I also obliquely quoted) a "vested contributor". Rather, I was trying to say that your comments, amongst many other comments by many other editors here, reinforced the somewhat flawed perception held by other people that such "vested contributors" exist. In other words, the fact that certain users have a long history of positive contributions should not be a sort of "free pass" in the event of unhelpful contributions. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Need a new Admin attitude

Disclaimer: Before I begin, let me say that I know full well we have an ample supply of perfect, abundantly helpful, and unfailingly charitable administrators. The following comments are not intended to change the behavior or process of those admins, except to encourage them to help those few administrators who manage to fall short in minor ways.

The PROBLEM

Its becoming a tired refrain that when people bring an issue to the admin board for help, asking for 'X', invariably admins and other editors chime in on 'Y' and 'Z'. Far too often, it degrades into personal attacks, nitpicking on policy from all editors toward all editors, and generally unproductive tangents. Admins seem far too eager to use banning and blocking tools, and far too hesitant to apologize for mistakes.

The QUESTIONS

Is this the exception? Are these things the few public opportunities we have to see a generally streamlined and efficient administrative process at work, and are people misjudging admin behavior because of a few abrupt or insensitive comments?

What suggestions might improve this? Do we say "no tolerance for incivility from our admins"? Do we remove admins from the process and allow community consensus to develop first before an admin is allowed to use 'tools'? Would things like this help or hurt?

Could programming fix some of these things? After all, we debated 'bad' usernames at length simply because we let people sign up almost anything they like. Perhaps 'suggest-a-name' algorithims? Or maybe allow admins to have a temp-rename ability that would allow them to 'fix' a username by amending it to something that they feel is acceptable, without having to block someone outright (assuming it is a non-vulgar type naming issue). It could have 1 month temp duration before a block is instituted, which would give a non-problematic user time to work through consensus processes before they end up blocked.

Back on TARGET

Some admins have to shoot so often, they probably end up in the middle of the street at high noon without even trying. While we end up getting rid of a lot of bad guys this way, you might lose track of who is who.

I know what you're thinking. "Did he fire six shots or only five?" Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement I kind of lost track myself. But being as this is an Administrator, the most powerful editor in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya, punk? - Dirty Mopper

We love a cowboy; we love a person who stands up for what's right and don't take no guff from nobody. But even John Wayne's characters sometimes realized that they needed to gain some perspective. Yeah, they were usually right, usually brave, and usually honorable, but they weren't perfect.

The KEY

If we don't appreciate the impact our actions have on others, we end up locking them out. I can't tell admins what to do, any more than I can train a cat to use a toilet (although some people have). But I can tell you that I have seen a lot of people who feel very excluded by the behavior they see on these boards. I can tell you they don't walk away feeling helped, they don't walk away feeling appreciative for your hard work, they walk away wondering why they bothered. I don't think that is what admins want. I would simply encourage admins to hold one another accountable for civility above all else. Getting policy right is important, no doubt. Getting relationships right takes more work, but in the end more people will appreciate the hard work that you do and even scramble to step up and help. -- Avanu (talk) 07:34, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• To be honest, I'm very surprised to see no reaction to this thread. I was looking forward to various views. I think you've (Avanu) have made some astute observations. (and while "technically 'off the record' - I do enjoy the bits of embedded humor). — Ched :  ?  19:24, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I kind of finding it hard to come up with a response to this; there is no clear direction that the above comment is going in. --MuZemike 20:51, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Hey Muz - how ya doin? .. yea - it's rather difficult for me to compose a reply as well. I agree with a lot of the observations though. In general, I think our project does need to re-evaluate our stance on many things. Definitely a mind bender IMHO, and I've seen more than one lately along this line. I think it's an indication that there are indeed things that need to change if we're to survive - and I do want to hear other view-points. — Ched :  ?  21:31, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

(non-admin Pesky) Is it possible that too many of our admins are getting a bit burned-out? People can subject themselves to too much stress without really noticing it happening. I don't know what the fix for that would be, but it might explain a part of the problem. Avanu's made some good points there (and I liked the humour, as well :o) ) MuZemike, I think it's a hard thing to respond to, so not surprised people may find it hard to come up with a response. It leaves me with a kind of hollow, empty, "Don't know what, don't know how" to do anything feeling. But, underneath that one, I also have a feeling that there may be things that could be done. It just might take a while to come up with them. Pesky (talk) 21:40, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• I can't help but to conjure up the recent South Park episode where Eric Cartman tries to deflect attention from his misdeeds by claiming horrific deeds done by those around him, including alleged deeds of those accusing him. His friends and peers ignore this attempt at redirection and keep the discussion on-topic. This sort of action, I call it the Cartman Attempt, is employed with great regularity on these administrative boards. Much to my shock it actually succeeds in a great many cases. If this were a court of law an attorney or barrister would object based upon scope and evidence not in the record. Unless the judge was off his rocker that day a Cartman Attempt would be immediately shot down. We have no true impartial judges here (except maybe for the Arbitration Committee) and those pointing to a succeeding Cartman Attempt are not likely to succeed. Often folks point to the WP:BOOMERANG page but this isn't very reassuring for those who are truly interested in justice. I beg Wikipedia editors and administrators to see the Cartman Attempt whenever it is employed and to not let it muddy the waters. 140.247.141.142 (talk) 22:33, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

It's basically a typical ad hominem response to others' points. And no, you're right; that should be discouraged. However, sometimes that can be difficult, as there are people who make rather ridiculous claims about stuff – of course, this is all dependent on your interpretation of "ridiculous". --MuZemike 22:50, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Comment I've heard that diplomacy is the art of telling another person to go to hell in a respectful enough way that they actually look forward to the trip. Being able to do that requires an inner calm that wears thin after being faced with the same nonsense (person doesn't understand why he can't spam his product on every page in the wiki, etc.) for the 500th time in a week. That loss of calm (and therefore diplomacy) over repeated annoying incidents is called "burnout" and it happens to everyone. Forcing one's self to stay diplomatic while in a state of burnout is sometimes necessary, but it's stressful in its own right and increases the burnout.

  In a no-deadline, volunteer operation like this, a better solution is to just stay away from the affected area (or in intense cases, quit Wikipedia completely) until it stops bothering you and you are WP:COOL again. I think this thread is in response to Orange Mike blocking that newbie further up. Both threads are about failures of diplomacy. That incident struck me as showing burnout on the part of both Orange Mike and Future Perfect (and maybe others). The actual facts Orange Mike communicated were fine, but he could have been much more diplomatic, and that actually counts. A few editors (it's easy enough to spot them) are unusually skillful at this; the rest of us can all benefit from watching them and trying to operate the same way. 64.160.39.217 (talk) 03:21, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I will admit that I'm verging on burnout. Certain editors, especially JayEn and to a lesser extent Avanu, seem to believe that I should stop doing New Page Patrol, CSD, and UAA, so that new COI accounts won't feel intimidated in their attempts to use us as their advertising medium and fluff up the portrait of the people who pay the COIs' salaries. (Sorry, that's sure as hell what I'm hearing from you, even if you insist that's not what you're saying.) I have my own interest which I'd much rather be working on, but since these are areas where there is a constant backlog, I've felt it was my duty as an admin to concentrate on places where the Mop-and-Bucket was the most needed. I have compared doing NPP in particular to "drinking from the Magic Fire Hose of Sewage", and would just as soon leave it to others; but nobody else really enjoys doing it either, for obvious reasons (to those of us who've been on the front lines, anyway). Forgive me if I seem unrepentant for trying to do my best here; I know, I know, no good deed goes unpunished. --Orange Mike | Talk 15:37, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Why do NPP? It doesn't require a sysop bit. Nobody Ent 15:53, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

And I may misunderstand smth, but this page shows that there is a large group of users consistently doing NPP at least this year. Whereas I doubt that the majority of them (I am certainly not an exception) enjoys this work, the progress is consistent, and the backlog is now slightly over two weeks, so that if you feel that you are burning out, you can certainly take a break from NPP. Your contribution over there, as well as everybody else's contribution, is much appreciated.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:23, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I certainly didn't mean to disparage the work of anybody else who's doing NPP; but to me, a two-week backlog is just unacceptably high. NPP is one of the few places where we can act to stop the vandal, the attack-article maker, and the spammer and nip them in the bud, before they sneak by and become an embarassment to this project. --Orange Mike | Talk 16:36, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment. To the extent there is a problem, I think it's too difficult to fix. We have a mix of admins just as we have a mix of editors. Some are more deft than others. Some are more prone to keep things on track. Some prefer to let users vent a bit. Everyone gets tired at times and says things they regret. For some it's easier to apologize than for others, although it doesn't necessarily mean that the non-apologizing editor doesn't realize they crossed the line. These boards have developed a certain culture. It's not always pretty, but it ain't gonna change anytime soon, although we will probably be discussing it in different ways at different times and still arriving at the same dead end.--Bbb23 (talk) 03:42, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't spend much time on AN or ANI so I may be off the mark, but from the occasional glimpses I take, I see these boards evolving dramatically. A big shift happened a few months back when Newyorkbrad stepped in and made some stern observations about the ethos. That precipitated a bout of sincere navel-gazing here that had a lasting effect on the maturity and sincerity of discourse. And I think I've discerned a continually growing readiness to self-correct which leaves me mildly optimistic about this project and the prospect of an improved quality of life here, led by the admin corps. (But then again, I could be dreaming.) --Anthonyhcole (talk) 17:03, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I've only really been active for about sixteen months, but I'm sure I've noticed a lessening of general "making allowances for each other", an increase in dramahz, an increase in people feeling upset in general, several editors leaving in despair, and much more what I'd call "irritability" around. Is everyone burning out? Or are we somehow beginning to set a bad example for newbies on de-escalating conflicts, conciliation, trying to find ways to work together instead of obliterating the opposition and undermining each other ... this place isn;t the same as it was even just over a year ago. It's a less happy place. If we can work out why it is, then we know where to start fixing it. Pesky (talk) 17:16, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Concur; ANI is vastly improved over 2 to 3 years ago. Why, many days it's downright boring (this is a good thing). Nobody Ent 23:38, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

FYI: OrangeMike, I never said or implied that you shouldn't do New Page Patrol. The blocked user asked Jimbo why they were blocked, and I showed a scenario where MANY people are being blocked summarily for having a name that they likely signed up under in good faith. Our policy on Usernames and Socks says that we need to exercise Civility with new users. Having a process in place to eliminate promotional or role accounts is a good one, and I recognize that it is labor intensive to have to warn, then follow up and block. So I recognize that we have competing interests. The question becomes, how do we craft a process that actually follows Civility AND is not labor intensive for Admins? I think it is doable, but we need a willingness to push for change rather than simply admit we can't have both. Civility is a pillar policy, not simply a policy. This means we should not ignore it. But we have to also be practical. So let's look for solutions. -- Avanu (talk) 17:42, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Infinite patience is not one of the tools that admins are given upon receiving adminship. As most people who've interacted with me know, I spend a lot of time handling some of Wikipedia's worst snake pits, especially with regard to Indian castes (have a look at Talk:Raju and Talk:Saini for what I'm up against; these are demonstrative, not exhaustive, examples). The community at large seems to demand that admins handhold every misguided editor who wanders in regardless of their potential as an editor, and we listen to endless streams of bullshit when that doesn't happen. I'll claim to speak for a couple other admins as well when I say that I'm not interested in being nice and friendly to someone who doesn't have this project's interests at heart. If you want to spam about your company or write a hagiography for your caste/social stratum, you can go do that somewhere else, because you're not doing it here. It's not that hard to find out what this site is about, nor should we assume SEOs are merely innocent victims of The Cabal And Their Tyrannical Rules^TM, because they're not; they come here to promote themselves and/or denigrate those who they feel stand in their way. I have no intention whatsoever of offering my time and efforts to such people; in Indian caste articles, at least, I haven't had an issue because the editors there recognize that it's not worth wasting time on people like those at the above-mentioned talkpages. When it comes to spam, the community seems to think that we're the people who have to be endlessly tolerant, whereas it should rather be the other way around; new users should be trying to integrate themselves into the community without us having to spend hours upon hours working with useless spammers and POV pushers. When I joined in 2010, that's how I went about things; I read the basic policies of the site. If new editors don't and create a mess, it's not up to admins to force them to and it should be on the person who created the mess to do their reading, figure out what the problem is, and take steps to rectify it. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 18:38, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Coddling is not required but respect is (or ought to be). I'm blocking you POV scumbag! not good. I'm sorry, your edits are disruptive and you haven't responded to notices on your talk page, so I have to block you fine. Nobody Ent 23:59, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Well yeah, that's what I shoot for, but sometimes we're condemned for not being willin to go further even when it's apparent that it's an exercise in futility. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 00:12, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment - I've been very active in the COI area both before and after becoming an administrator. I'm very familiar with Orange Mike because he makes frequent reports to the COI noticeboard where I volunteer my time often. I don't know him well on a personal level, he's not a "friend" (not that I have more than a few people on Wikipedia I'd call "friends"). So I say this as an unbiased colleague. In my experience, Orange Mike is often passive in his dealings with COI editors, usually referring them to the noticeboard, rather than directly bringing down the hammer, so I can't see him having any sort of agenda or an increased level of hostility toward such editors than what is acceptable. I think he made a mistake in leveling a harsher block than usual in the username case discussed above, but we all make mistakes, I know I have before and will again. WP:UAAI suggests soft-blocking an editor who hasn't been disruptive yet if their username is unacceptable, and I've done that myself and I know that's not unusual behavior (I learned from watching others at WP:UAA). So I feel I have to speak up for someone who has been a huge help at COIN and elsewhere. -- Atama頭 23:20, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

General comment (not specifically addressing OM here) -- I don't think the situation is extreme in either way. I certainly don't see too many bans and blocks that are way out of line -- I rarely see anyone blocked who wasn't dabbling in gray area behavior. (Inconsistencies are a significant issue but that's not the topic here.) Do some admins sometimes get a little too intense in their interaction style. Yes. Are we going to magically fix that overnight? No. Does that mean nothing can be done? No -- we can gradually fix it, day by day, bit by bit. All we (bits or no bits) have to do is speak up -- but -- and this is really important -- we always have to evaluate whether our contribution will improve or worsen a situation. The fallacy is thinking that if our feedback to an editor (sysop or not) isn't met with You're right! I'm horrible, I'll never do it again!!! we've been ineffective. Most humans don't like to be cornered and demanding mea culpas is usually counterproductive. Just because you don't get a concrete reaction doesn't mean you're not having an effect. A lot of wiki-crap just can't be undone once done, so you have to think long term and strategically and just believe you'll make an editor a little more thoughtful the next time. Additionally, even if you have no effect on the editor you're addressing, you can affect other editors, and if an editor X was, in fact, inappropriately treated by an editor Y, the fact that someone said so can often make X feel less aggravated and more likely to start or contribute to positively. Nobody Ent 23:54, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

More eyes on the article List of current National Basketball Association head coaches would be helpful

The article List of current National Basketball Association head coaches needs a lot more people paying attention to it. At present there are only me and two other editors making changes to it as needed.

--184.6.219.143 (talk) 21:06, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

That's good of you, but why are more eyes needed? Are the constant coaching changes becoming a burden? :)--Wehwalt (talk) 08:51, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Pretty much. And some of the information in the lead is horribly out of date.

--184.6.219.143 (talk) 16:12, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

The Pirate Bay

[[11]] - TPB is now likley to be blocked in the UK. This means that some citations will become difficult for UK based Wikipedians to confirm

The current links to TBP in Wikipedia are here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:LinkSearch&limit=500&offset=0&target=http%3A%2F%2F*.thepiratebay.org

I've removed some links to TPB already :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Sfan00_IMG typically in articlespace, I've got no objections to admins carefully reviewing these removals.

The number of clearly 'bad' links is tiny though.

Sfan00 IMG (talk) 22:06, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I've got concerns about these links in general. For example this citation doesn't even support the material it is a citation for. I suspect some of these links are spam. The one Sfan00 IMG removed in this diff is another example. Material isn't supported, but it's a torrent to download the copyrighted track.--v/r - TP 22:10, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Is Sfan00 IMG planning to remove offline cites to foreign newspapers that are "difficult for UK based Wikipedians to confirm"? Exactly what's the point of this knee-jerk reaction? 2 lines of K₃₀₃ 22:19, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

No. Offline Cites to Journals aren't problematic. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 22:22, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Great, so ignoring the problem that they might not source what's claimed, why are you removing cites just on the basis people in one country may have difficulty confirming them? Since you spectacularly missed the point of what I just said.... 2 lines of K₃₀₃ 22:24, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

That confuses me too. I can understanding removing the links on the grounds that they make us guilty of contributory copyright infringement, but removing a link from a userpage on the grounds of "Removing Piratebay link - Blocked in UK" doesn't make sense to me. Nyttend (talk) 22:55, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

What the what? There is no way an editor should be removing links on userpages based on that reasoning. Also, I agree with asking why the user would be removing valid links/citations in articles based on this same reasoning(may be blocked in the UK). That is not up to any specific editor to decide and, if it's not Wiki policy, is itself a violation. Dave Dial (talk) 23:07, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, I just used a scholar source that costs $50 to read. Maybe I should remove it because some wikipedians might not be ready to pay that amount? Or how about books that don't have preview in google books (and are not available in pirate websites), should I stop using those because they are difficult to verify for some wikipedians? --Enric Naval (talk) 23:21, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

We should definitely be removing most of these for linking to copyright violations, but not for being inaccessible in the UK (although being illegal to possess might be a grounds). MBisanz ^talk 23:19, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the response, I'll revert the user space link you mention. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 23:24, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

@Sfan00 IMG, I looked at a few removals and they look OK. People complain because you are copy/pasting "blocked in UK" in most edit summaries, you make it sound like a knee-jerk removal. use "copyright violation" for edits like [12]. Use "primary source" for [13]. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:32, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

This is utterly ridicolous. We're not UK-based and there is no reason to remove links based on the UK status. I've reverted your removals when they were unjustified (several were just irrelevant/pirated stuff). For what it's worth, TPB has been blocked in Italy for years, and I didn't go around remove the links then. This is just utterly silly. Snowolf ^{How can I help?} 23:42, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I've reverted a few my myself based on consensus here, I've also noted in the edit summary that one appears to be public interest (and is as far as I can see PD-US Gov in any event). Sfan00 IMG (talk) 23:47, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Links to pirated stuff should be removed, see WP:ELNEVER. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:49, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

The Reinstated items are not linking to 'pirated' material, hence the revert. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 23:51, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm satisfied that you get the gist of the complaints here, and most of your removals were justified for various reasons other than the one being complained about. In any case, good luck and happy editing. Dave Dial (talk) 23:55, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Also created {{CensoredLink}} Although the wording is more polite in tone than some people might want ;) Sfan00 IMG (talk) 00:04, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

It would be better to switch the pirate bay links into direct magnet links, this avoids the issue of linking to a possibly censored site. At the end of the day that is how the Torrent is hosted on TPB anyway. It's entirely possible a site may disappear, but the magnet link is static. --Errant ^(chat!) 08:48, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

WP:ELNO #7. We have more editors who self-identify as furries than we do readers who have clients installed on their computers that can digest a magnet link. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 13:37, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Except TPB currently only offers magnet links themselves. So if the purpose is to provide a link to the torrent all linking to TPB does is add an extra click :) So to take on your reasoning; per ELNO#7 we should switch to using magnet links, as TPB is blocked in some countries and therefore the torrent is currently less accessible than it could be. --Errant ^(chat!) 14:21, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

From what I can tell, the majority of our links to the present TPB site are not actually to torrents. And ELNO#7 strongly discourages linking to torrents regardless of whether it's over http, magnet, gopher or anything else for that matter. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 14:26, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

C:SD backlog

There's a pretty hefty backlog at C:SD. Can someone please chip it down? I've had two G6's in the queue for several hours now. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 04:49, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Are they really hurting anything? Does it actually matter if they hang out for a few hours?

If they're deleted in less time than a PROD or AFD takes to process, then they're still "speedy" (per definition at the policy). We don't have a mandate to maintain our two-minute historical average. Indications of a bit more thoughtfulness (say, like a three-minute average) might actually be desirable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:19, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but if a freaking G6 takes more than 24 hours to get taken care of, then that's just inexcusable. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 00:43, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

If the G6 does not include a proper reason then some may leave it for later. Anyway this backlog will have been cleared multiple times sine the alert was raised here. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 08:28, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

There's a difference between "Can it be done quickly?" and "Is it urgent?".

Sure, if a G6 is sitting around for 24 hours then that suggests that we have fewer admins than usual working on CSD. However, it's probably not a crisis; does the delay cause any harm? It's an uncontroversial technical deletion, like prodding but without a week-long wait. If something like a G10 were sitting around for a long time, that would be a bigger problem imho. bobrayner (talk) 08:53, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

RPP backlock

There's a bit of a backlog at WP:RPP. I've done a little but there's still quite a list and I really need to go to bed. Could someone have a look? Thanks. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 21:44, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I cleared out a bunch of them. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 23:47, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

TFD closure needed

This TFD has been open since March and discussion has come to a standstill in the past week. Can someone close it please? It looks like a consensus to delete, since the lack of deletion owed to the Wikipedia:Soft deletion proposal which was soon rejected. Those presenting non-delete arguments are not backing themselves with policy, so I say it's a delete. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 00:43, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

 Done. In the future, however, please refrain from canvassing or making your arguments here. Any such discussions belong in that discussion, not here. Thanks. ···日本穣^? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 03:30, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Copyright Deletion

Earlier today I deleted Parvaresh-Vardy codes and list decoder as a copright violation of https://wiki.cse.buffalo.edu/cse545/content/parvaresh-vardy-codes-and-list-decoder It is a direct copy of the first half of that page. The author messaged me on my talk page. It appears that this is a college assignment. Would someone look at this and give their opinion on this article. GB fan 01:50, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I've undeleted. In response to a message that I left at the author's talk, the source page has been updated with an explicit CC-by-sa-3.0 release statement. Nyttend (talk) 02:51, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks GB fan 02:54, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Help needed to close old discussions at WP:MFD

Please see the oldest discussions at WP:MFD#Old business. There are a couple that are well over a month old. I would close them, but I've participated in some of the older discussions, and I've already been closing some of the others. Thanks! ···日本穣^? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 03:07, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks to whoever closed one of them. There's still one older discussion which needs to be decided and closed. Thanks in advance to whoever closes it. ···日本穣^? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 06:03, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Muhammad images should be closed, yes?

This talk page has turned into a talk page, and by that I mean a discussion forum. The RFC was closed a while ago and at least one of the closing admins stated here on AN that she wouldn't take comments made after the close into consideration (which I'm guessing is a normal practice and so I imagine the other two admins will follow suit).

Aside from the forum talk, there are examples of off topic and problematic behavior, such as this thread, wherein an editor educates us all on the possible motivations of those with whom they disagree content wise.

Lots of bickering, etc.

There are probably a few discussions which might work for the Muhammad talk page, but most of it is about the issue at hand which is currently being resolved by the aforementioned admin trio.

I would take this to WP:RFPP but who knows, this may be a more contentious issue than I think and could use the opinions of more than one admin. Anyway, if I haven't made myself obvious, I think the page should be locked for the good of the encyclopedia and the sanity of all those involved in the discussion :). SÆdon^talk 05:53, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Agree to the lock, as it's not being used to impove the page. Users should be directed to the Muhammad talk pages for improving that article, or to the closing admins (talk pages) to find out the status of the close. The talk page can be unlocked once a closure message is posted, whenever that is. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:49, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

What he said. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 17:43, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Requesting a topic ban for User:BruceGrubb

I’d like to propose a topic ban from articles related to Christianity for User:BruceGrubb, as suggested by several editors at the end of a thread on the Original Research Noticeboard: Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard#Christ_myth_theory. BruceGrubb has problems with original research, misrepresentation of sources, the use of poor *ources, and biased editing (largely in the promotion of fringe theories and fringe viewpoints on mainstream subjects). In addition, he often derails talk page discussions with long, rambling barely-relevant edits that often include text copy-pasted from earlier posts on different topics.

These issues can be seen in his recent activity on Josephus on Jesus. In this edit (inadequately described as a “major cleanup”) Bruce inserts text based on fringey sources from 1892 and 1912 and another mainstream source from 2002. There’s been extensive discussion on the article talk page, which indicates that the 2002 source doesn’t say what Bruce claims; he seems to be basing his text on a blog post that builds an argument based on the 2002 source—as Bruce himself says, “What the blog next does is takes the pieces Mason presented and puts them together in a different way…” Since the blog is not a reliable source, putting this in the article is WP:OR#SYNTH, i.e. advancing an original argument through the use of published sources. This is a major issue with Bruce’s editing, but he usually claims that he’s simply explaining what’s in the source, rather than creating his own interpretation of the source.

I’ve had extensive experience with Bruce’s editing at Christ myth theory—years of experience, in fact, so I’m not sure how to boil it down into something concise. Perhaps it’s enough to say that Bruce has been the most active editor on this article in the last year ([14]) and is responsible for almost all of the text in the lead and the first few sections; in the discussion at Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard#Christ_myth_theory, many editors agreed that the article had significant problems with OR/SYNTH, and even Bruce himself seems to complain that the article is problematic. So perhaps he should take a break. (That noticeboard also illustrates how difficult it is to discuss issues with Bruce—he writes gigantic posts that rarely respond directly to anyone’s points.)

Also notice that attempting to improve these articles often inspires a revert, e.g. [15] [16] (this resulted in the article being protected for 3 days) and [17] [18] and [19] [20]. Bruce has also been removing posts from his user talk page ([21] [22] [23] [24]), which is obviously his right, but it doesn’t indicate a willingness to solve problems constructively. --Akhilleus (talk) 18:56, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support - The history of demanding self-published sources be recognized as acceptable is troubling, and the recent misrepresentation of sources at Josephus on Jesus is even more so. I might limit the scope of the ban to early Christianity, including issues related to the Historicity of Jesus, but I am not sure that Bruce has ever shown much interest in any other Christianity-related topics, so I have no real reservations about the ban as proposed. John Carter (talk) 19:09, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
• Support - Seems that covering alternative history is not enough but could this be seen as attempting to write alternative history as OR into existing articles? I think so.--Amadscientist (talk) 19:25, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I am afraid that it looks like some WP:CANVASSing may have begun Special:Contributions/BruceGrubb since there are posts to talk pages of editors who are not currently mentioned in this thread. If this is in error than my apologies. MarnetteD | Talk 19:48, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Why is that under my comment. I have this page watch listed and it was the latest discussion.--Amadscientist (talk) 21:35, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It is under your comment because when I posted it there were no other posts after yours and, thus, this was the place to put it. I was simply trying to alert those that started this thread that something was up. I don't know where else it might have been placed and I was certainly not trying to make any comment about your post. If you want to outdent or indent it further please feel free to do so. MarnetteD | Talk 22:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

No need to do that. Thanks for clarification.--Amadscientist (talk) 23:46, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support - this fellow has caused havoc on Christ myth theory for the last couple years, resulting in more threads at WP:FTN than I wish to remember. He's a classic tendentious editor, and regrettably I think this is a clear case of keeping the tiger away from its prey. Moreschi (talk) 19:51, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment: This IMHO is the latest attempt by Akhilleus to WP:OWN the Christ myth theory article. As noted in Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard#Christ_myth_theory he has gone to noticeboards without notifying the talk page as to this going on.

He has verbally attacked myself and other editors in IMHO violation of AGF (see Talk:Christ_myth_theory/definition for some of that--did Anthony really deserve that kind of response?)

He has ignored the comments of his fellow administrators User:SlimVirgin (Talk:Christ_myth_theory/Archive_30) and User:Elen of the Roads ([Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard#Christ_myth_theory]) (who I have directly notified regarding this) as well at that of the community that IMHO clearly support my position that there is no real there there regarding this as a unified topic and numerous other behaviors to IMHO POV push that article it something not supported by the material.

For example, Akhilleus has even gone as far as to say and I quote "Schweitzer's comment in his autobiography is immaterial here" A quote that established just how Schweitzer classified John M. Robertson, William Benjamin Smith, James George Frazer, and Arthur Drews is immaterial?!? How does that work? Biblical scholar Marshall's two historical Jesus options (flesh and blood man or Gospels reasonably accurate) was similarity dismissed with something like 'Marshall doesn't give us enough options'.

@Amadscientist your alternative history comment makes no sense, unless you hold to the idea the Gospels are reasonably reliable as historical documents--something hotly debated (especially with regards to Mark and Luke).

@MarnetteD I would like to point out that User:SlimVirgin and User:Elen of the Roads are ADMINISTRATORS and this is the ADMINISTRATORS noticeboard. User:SlimVirgin felt the entire article was one big CFORK to begin with and User:Elen of the Roads stated "More significantly, since what is clear is that there isnt "a" christ myth theory, there are many of them, the article should focus on a run through the theories and their authors, not be containing sections such as that starting "There is no independent archaeological evidence to support the historical existence of Jesus Christ."

Funny thing, I am the one who removed that "There is no independent archaeological evidence" stuff while the rest of you were perfectly happy to leave it in.--BruceGrubb (talk) 21:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support - I am seeing current examples of biased editing and some misunderstanding of WP:NPOV, at Chick tract (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) Elizium23 (talk) 21:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Elizium23 is challenging the following:

"A quick look at some of the creationist pamphlets and books shows just how misleading and dishonest their presentations are. Typical of the genre is the little pamphlet Big Daddy, published by creationist Jack Chick." (Prothero,, Donald R.; Carl Dennis Buell (2007). Evolution: what the fossils say and why it matters. Columbia University Press. pp. 334–335. ISBN 0231139624.)

""Nebraska man," as we outlined already, was the mistake of one scientist and was corrected within a year." (Prothero,, Donald R.; Carl Dennis Buell (2007). Evolution: what the fossils say and why it matters. Columbia University Press. pp. 334–335. ISBN 0231139624 pg 334)

As I explained in talk:Chick_tract#NPOV_does_NOT_apply_to_the_content_of_reliable_sources_but_how_they_are_worded_in_article_space NPOV applies to reliable sources which Columbia University Press clearly is. He provided NO reliable source to counter this but rather comes crying here that I am somehow violating NPOV. Now you have a prime example of the nonsense I have to deal with.--BruceGrubb (talk) 21:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support - I spent an hour today reading up on a source on Josephus on Jesus which BruceGrubb had twisted to support the almost exact opposite of what the author says. It was used out of context, and significant parts of the line of reasoning which it was supposed to support were not discussed at all; the source given by BruceGrubb for those parts is the "amateur research community". I don't think issues of WP:OR and WP:SYN get any clearer than that, and when I asked BruceGrubb on the talk page whether the source actually supported that critical piece of information (before looking it up myself), he did not answer that rather simple yes-or-no question but responded with what a collection of further unrelated citations which supported parts of his position and therefore to him apparently justify his synthesis. If this were a single incident I'd say a stern warning might be sufficient, but apparently it is not, and more thorough measures are required. Huon (talk) 21:31, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
• Support. This has been going on too long - it's got way past warnings, talkings to, advisings, noticeboards, talkpages or discussions. Bruce has a (metaphorical) banana in each ear - anything you say sounds to him exactly like what he wants to do.Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:11, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

You'll notice the way he says above that I support his position...classic example of this problem. I said he'd written a bunch of OR into the article, and suggested someone ask for a topic ban. Elen of the Roads (talk) 22:17, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Elen of the Roads, you are then denying that I stated on your own talk page "I believe you and I are in agreement that there is no one Christ myth theory thought I must ask if you share SlimVirgin's view that the entire article is one big CFORK." (sic)? Do you also disagree with the clarification above that clearly states that my position that "there is no real there there regarding this as a unified topic"? I have to ask who here really has "a (metaphorical) banana in each ear"?--BruceGrubb (talk) 22:27, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Possibly the same person who is stated below to have considered the Oxford and Cambridge university presses unreliable because they are in a nominally Christian country? Bruce, I have to say that your obvious personal belief in the idea that Jesus/Christ was a myth has apparently so seriously warped your judgment that there seems to be increasing, perhaps unanimous, agreement regarding your conduct. Whether you personally would ever admit to that, of course, is another matter. However, please read WP:POV - there seems to be ever-increasing evidence that your biggest problem lies there. John Carter (talk) 23:43, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support: I also made comments on the WP:NORN board, so I will just provide general points here. The problems I see, as outlined by Akhilleus are:

• Continued use of Self-published sources. This happens even after the user has been notified that a source is self-published. A recent example was the book by Richard Gibbs referred to in the links above. It is still there with a "self-published tag" on it.

• Continued use of WP:Original research items. The user even calls these the results obtained by "amateur research community" without naming the amateurs. There is a serious WP:OR issue here and it does not want to go away. It will be WP:OR for ever.

• Continued use of outdated and antique sources that have been long surpassed by modern scholarship. I once commented that a source he used was from 1910 and was over 100 years old. The retort was that no, it was republished in 1912 and was hence only 99 years old.

• Continued "knowing use" of statements that fail verification. At one point the user may admit that material is not in a source, then will add it again a few weeks later with the same source but with somewhat different language. As user Huon stated on talk today after directly checking Mason's book: "Bruce Grubb is twisting Mason's points beyond recognition".

• Continued use of WP:Walls of text as a method for changing the subject.

There is really little hope for remedy in this situation, and a topic ban is the best and perhaps the only way to stop the incredible waste of time that will otherwise ensue if this user realizes that "they can do all of this" and walk away scott-free. That can not happen. History2007 (talk) 22:09, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment. I haven't followed the subject area in question (thankfully), but I'm very familiar with Bruce's edits at WT:V and the related mediation pages, and I regard those edits as borderline disruptive, so the rationale expressed by those supporting the topic ban rings true to me. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:17, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support: An indefinite topic ban on all religion-related articles very broadly construed is LONG overdue, if not an outright community ban. This user constantly produces sources that clearly fail our policies, introduces OR and synth that abuse the sources, is a master of WP:IDHT and WP:DEADHORSE, and sttempts to flummox anyone opposing him with long, rambling, barely coherent and off-topic filibustering. As someone else put it, a classic tendentious and disruptive editor that has wasted an enormous amount of time on the part of other editors. Fortunately, I have not had to deal with him myself, but have been lurking on the articles he mentioned and am surprised that it took so long for someone to start up a topic ban discussion. As I said, it's LONG overdue, and there is no hope that this editor will ever be able to edit productively in the banned area. There are fundamental competence issues that cannot be overcome. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 23:21, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support. This is an editor who tried to argue that Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press are unreliable sources because they are somehow linked to a Christian (British) state, and because the former publishes Bibles! [25]. Bruce has constantly and consistently misrepresented sources over a long period. At one point he claimed that a passing remark by the writer of an obscure article in a sociology journal was proof that Christ myth theory was a widely accepted view among sociologists. His posts are long walls of text comprising often almost unintelligable if interminable arguments. They function as battles of attrition against anyone who opposes him. I admit that I gave up the effort of expecting productive debate years ago. His agenda is clear: to make Christ myth theory seem more plausible and more widely accepted than, in fact, it is. He is an unrelenting POV warrior who believes that pious fraud is a legitimate means to convey WP:Truth. Paul B (talk) 23:24, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support I won't tediously reiterate the reasons provided above, but I agree entirely. Eusebeus (talk) 23:55, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

The Oxford and Cambridge issue was when I thought COI applied to sources as we as to editors. To clarify it wasn't just that Oxford and Cambridge published bibles but they had a special contract with the Crown (ie head of the Anglican church) to print the Authorized King James Version (the official bible of the Anglican church). As I said back then to expect any kind of verdict other then "Jesus existed as the Bible portrays him" from them was an on par with Brigham Young University Press saying anything but the Book of Mormon is historical accurate, Gregorian University Press saying anything but negative things about abortion, any German university from 1936 to 1945 doing anything but proving Jews were a parasitic/despicable/vile race, any 1950s US university saying anything but negative things on any subject views as communist, or a university that is getting huge grants from tobacco companies would say anything but that smoking is safe/good for you. This is known as "Confirmation bias" or "hypothesis locking" which Horace Mitchell Miner so brilliantly satirized in his famous 1955 "Body Ritual among the Nacirema" article.

This is all ignoring the fact Oxford and Cambridge are in a country that until 1998 had a very broad Blasphemy law that would have made any meaningful review of the historical nature of Jesus next to impossible.--BruceGrubb (talk) 06:31, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

This is simply disingenuous. UK case law had long since established that denying the existence of God, or arguing against fundamental Christian tenets, did not qualify as blasphemy so long as it was done in a civil and respectful manner. This was true since at least the mid-20th century. Your point does not stack up. Moreschi (talk) 11:50, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I think it was pretty much established in the mid 19th century when Charles Bradlaugh was acquitted of blasphemy for his numerous anti-Christian publications. Bruce's portrayal of Britain as some sort of Christian police-state with censorship comparable to Nazi Germany just indicates that he has a fundamentally distorted view of reality. Paul B (talk) 11:56, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

As I said: "There are fundamental competence issues that cannot be overcome." Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 07:06, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

"This is all ignoring the fact Oxford and Cambridge are in a country that until 1998 had a very broad Blasphemy law that would have made any meaningful review of the historical nature of Jesus next to impossible." What kind of fantasy world are you living in? All the major Jesus myth books were published in the UK before 1998 without any censorship. For example, Allegro's The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross was published by Hodder & Stoughton. Paul B (talk) 09:38, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Request for admin closure: The votes are now 10 to zero in favor of a topic ban. The reasons provided by the users who support a ban are generally uniform and consistent, and the comment by Dominus Vobisdu just above echoes the observation that Bruce's statements in this thread do not reflect an awareness of a need for change, rendering any type of warning ineffective. Ten-zero probably amounts to consensus on this, so closure would be appropriate so we can move on. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 07:31, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Oppose closure now, it's been less than day. and insert "not voting" blurb here. Suggest waiting at until, say Friday. Nobody Ent 11:32, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

(non-admin intruder ;P) Oppose topic ban. Any kind of mentoring or re-focussing on the cards? Much less humiliating and quite possibly more constructive. My personal opinion is that while BG can come across as irritating, it's generally because he has something sensible to say and nobody's listening. I (think I) can see both sides of the problem here. Bruce has an excellent mind and (check his user page) background / qualifications. He's not an idiot. But ... BG, you can be a bit over-intense and over-verbose, even though you have good points, and people rebel against that. Hugz, anyways, and I hope that whatever happens is a sensible and constructive way forwards. Pesky (talk) 14:55, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Given the evidence and the well-reasoned rationales above, I'll be okay with closing this unless significant evidence to the contrary is given in the next day or so. I'm uncomfortable with a topic ban being enacted after such a short period in general, but the support is all well-reasoned rather than just pile-on. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 17:35, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Request for comments on my closure of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seamus (dog) (2nd nomination)

I recently closed Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seamus (dog) (2nd nomination), a lengthy and contentious deletion discussion as keep, with a lengthy rationale. As I expected (what with the nature of the topic), an editor has disagreed with my closure and has begun a discourse with me at User talk:ItsZippy#Articles for deletion/Seamus (dog) (2nd nomination). I've given further explanation of my actions to him there, but I think it would be helpful for another administrator to review my closure; I have said that I am willing to accept an alternative if others think that would be necessary. Could someone have a look and give me their opinion, please? Thanks. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 20:49, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

This is like forum shopping your close - please just address the issues and request raised on your talkpage - Youreallycan 20:54, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It's probably because of that that he's asking his colleagues. It's probably therefore the right thing to do. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:05, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Its not correct procedure at all - if an administrator is not confident of his own close without asking other administrators to comment then clearly he should not have closed that or for that matter any other discussion - especially when they are aware the discussion is contentious Youreallycan 22:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

:: Hi, I'm ItsZippy. I am 18 years old. Ah, Wikipedia, always improving. Nice to check in and get reminders of how this encyclopedia is administered.Bali ultimate (talk) 22:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

So ad hominems are the word of the day? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:23, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It's not an ad hominem. I have mentored many young journalists in my career (all of them over 21 when starting out). Some went on to be brilliant, some were washouts. None of them were qualified to exercise editorial discretion, in any capacity, without years of work and training. The fact that you have 18-year-olds running around casting nonsensical super-votes when any adult professional editing an encyclopedia would say: "The dog story? A graph or two in the Romney election campaign article" and move on. This is an entrenched, deeply harmful systemic problem and yet another reason for qualified professionals to stay away. There is nothing ad hominem about pointing out that untrained teenagers should not be making these kinds of judgements, on (unfortunately) the most frequented online resource for knowledge. (I know, it will never change. But sometimes I can't help pointing out folly when I see it). Ah, and before someone says "grownups are incompetent too sometimes" let me save you the trouble. Some mature people are unqualified. No 18-year-olds are qualified.Bali ultimate (talk) 22:31, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

If I may say (speaking as an "untrained teenager, who knows, maybe I should be seen and not heard), "pointing out that untrained teenagers should not be making these kinds of judgements" is exactly what constitutes an ad hominem argument and a silly one at that. In any case it's just ridiculous to assert that being any given age must make you inept at making judgment calls. - Jarry1250 ^{[Deliberation needed]} 01:23, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

"None of them were qualified to exercise editorial discretion, in any capacity, without years of work and training." Really, its the pathetic journalists who've written 100s of stories about Seamus that are to blame here, not the 18 year old who has paid attention only too well to what journalists are telling us.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 03:22, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

You illustrate my point very well. Journalism is, largely, ephemera. The hot, the new, what people are talking about right this second. The decisions I make at my newspaper about what we publish in the daily are very different from the decisions I make about what we publish in the weekly. And the decisions about what is an encyclopedia topic are different still. Judgement, maturity, and discretion are what inform the process. Adolescents (and their adult fellow travelers) who read a newspaper article and feel that "tells" them an encyclopedia article should be written (based on transient ephemera) are precisely the problem. Sheesh.Bali ultimate (talk) 13:58, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree, though I do not think the problem is particular to young people. The wider culture informs us all that the ephemeral has infinitely greater weight than it does in reality. 24/7 news stations might be far the most obvious symptoms of this disease but they are most certainly not the worst. Moreschi (talk) 14:14, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, if this were one newspaper article on an ephemeral subject, you might have a point. In this case, we're talking about 100+ articles over at least five years. While we all have our own views of what an ideal encyclopedia would cover, admins are not given the freedom to close discussions based on their personal views--they're required to close based on our guidelines, which is what the admin in question did. Mark Arsten (talk) 16:15, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Again with the "adolescents"... Judge people on the decisions they make, not their age. There's simply no reason even to refer to it, for it to every come up in a discussion of this nature. - Jarry1250 ^{[Deliberation needed]} 17:03, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook when he was only 20 years old. Suhas Gopinath founded a company and became its CEO when he was only 14 years old. If someone can handle CEO's job at the age of 14, then ItsZippy, who is much older, can easily handle the role of a Wikipedia admin at the age of 18. --SupernovaExplosion ^Talk 05:04, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

It had better be an extraordinarily sharp 14-year-old admin, wise far beyond his years, before I even had to question his or her age. I've got t-shirts older than that. 14 years old and making life decisions? Really? Scary stuff, folks... Doc talk 05:19, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

What a strange false comparison. I am not sure how running a business compares with adhearing to objectively looking at political issues, and if the movie "Social Network" is even close to reality, Zuckerberg would make a terribly biased admin. Arzel (talk) 13:38, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Zippy, here's my 2 cents. The plus:fantastic closing statement. The minus: absolutely inverse "decision" than was possible based on the arguments. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:23, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

+1. Also, if I may, a small suggestion: It'sZippy, your mop is still somewhat new. It may be a good idea to avoid the particularly contentious decisions for the moment, until you're a bit more comfortable handling it. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 22:34, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• (Non-admin comment, with caveat that I participated in the AfD). I think that the close was reasonable (and far from "absolutely inverse"), and that you explained it very well. I also think that you handled the complaints at your user talk very considerately. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:14, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
• I'm guessing this is going to wind up at DRV anyway, but here's my two cents - decently argued close, but I think it's a horrible decision that misses the big picture. We have an article on Mitt Romney's dog. Not the dog controversy, the actual Dog Itself. Jesus H Christ. I'm sorry, but if that close doesn't represent a facepalm moment as far as Wikipedia's claims to be a serious encyclopedia are concerned, I don't know what does. Moreschi (talk) 23:22, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• A few years ago we had a political party make a statement that the governing party leader ate kittens. It became a big election kerfluffle. I don't think we have an article about said kittens. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 23:45, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• That's because there are no reliable sources to prove that the kittens existed or were eaten :P Snowolf ^{How can I help?} 05:00, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• To clarify, I might just grit my teeth and howl in pain - but ultimately accept - an article on the dog controversy, but one on the actual dog itself is a joke. It's generally accepted that when someone/something is notable for one event only and has no chance of having an encyclopedic biography they are incorporated into the article on that event. Madeleine McCann, Ian Huntley and so on are redirects for perfectly good reasons. But no, while this is a bad close I do not think it is a call-for-desysop-and-call-him-a-terrible-person close. Moreschi (talk) 09:57, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• I haven't read either the article or the afd so I'm not commenting on their content (I might do so later, if I have the time and stomach to read the things). But this dog is now quite famous and it would have surprised me if we didn't have an article about it. We've had Bo (dog), Barney (dog), Buddy (dog), Socks (cat), etc. for quite a while. So the deletion attempt on Seamus offhand sounds tendentious, regardless of whatever wikilawyering may have framed it. 64.160.39.217 (talk) 15:13, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• I think it's a perfectly reasonable close, well grounded in policy. Moreschi is free to promote a guideline on the notability of dogs. Someguy1221 (talk) 23:31, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

  For what it's worth, I said in the AfD discussion that it should be renamed from the dog to the incident, per WP:BLP1E. I was only half-joking, because it really is a problem over multiple pages that we name articles for animals, when they are really about events that happened. BLD1E, anyone? --Tryptofish (talk) 00:12, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

  Well, BDD1E in this case. 28bytes (talk) 03:07, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

  The article title is kind of peripheral to the topic coverage, and if there's battling going on then the problem is with the editors rather than the topic. FWIW, noticing just now that Laika (sort of the ultimate in BDD1E's) is a Featured Article was one of the increasingly rare moments that made me proud of Wikipedia. 64.160.39.217 (talk) 17:47, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• I have to agree with BWilkins and Moreschi on this one. 28bytes (talk) 23:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
• I think some of my colleagues here are taking a hyper-serious view of things. WP will not be a laughing stock for covering what newspapers cover. (What people laugh at us about are the sort of topics people here think important, but newspapers do not cover.) DGG ( talk ) 00:14, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I'm with Moreschi here. Scientific commentary on a dog Mitt Romney owned in 1983? The mass media are aiming for the lowest common denominator, as a purported encyclopedia we should aim much higher. Kevin (talk) 00:26, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I concur with BWilkins and Moreschi here. MBisanz ^talk 00:30, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I think it is ridiculous that we have decided to delete Obama Eats Dogs, which is basically a right wing attack on Obama, but kept Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seamus (dog) (2nd nomination) a left wing attack on Romney. Wikipedia's editor base clearly leans to the left, but I would have hoped that we could have put our political biases aside and make a fair decision regarding both articles... Both have received ample media coverage and pass the General Notability Guidelines, so there is really no excuse. Monty₈₄₅ 02:28, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

False equivalence works better in the mainstream media than on wikipedia. On wikipedia, we're just haphazard. Yes, most of the world is "biased" against the American far right, perhaps that influenced the outcome.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 03:14, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• I took part in the AfD discussion, and I thought that ItsZippy did a very good job with a difficult issue. He actually read through all the arguments, and wrote a detailed response that explained his conclusion based on Wikipedia's policies. That's what a closing admin is supposed to do. WP:ROUGHCONSENSUS states, "Consensus is not determined by counting heads, but by looking at strength of argument, and underlying policy (if any)." If an editor does not like the outcome, they have every right to go to deletion review, but ItsZippy did nothing wrong, and I think this is just a case of "I just don't like it" syndrome. Debbie W. 02:40, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I support keeping the article. It is well-written, well-sourced, and Seamus is arguably the second most famous/notable dog in the US right now. — GabeMc (talk) 02:45, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I agree with DGG's comment. Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 03:41, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I would have to question the experience of any admin that would make the following statement. Merging with the Obama dog article, as noted, would not be correct as the two issues are very different in nature. As any person can see the two issues are directly related. The poorly named "Seamus" article is nothing more than a political talking point from the left, pushed by a single journalist for several years. The Obama dog eating story is political response from the right to that talking point. To make the statement that they are very different in nature seems quite odd. Arzel (talk) 04:04, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I was going to save this for the DRV, but I'll say it now: Admins have some leeway when closing discussions--they're not vote-counting robots. They weigh consensus and strength of argument, and that's what was done here. In fact, I think the closer's rationale was pretty well reasoned--far more reasonable than the ad hominem attacks against him, at least. Mark Arsten (talk) 04:02, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• Reluctantly have to agree that ItsZippy came to a reasonable close, and was wise to come here for review. I don't agree with his conclusion, but I cannot find a considerable fault in the reasoning. I still believe the article is not much more than an attack, especially as written. Although the closer felt there was a consensus to Keep even lacking a clear consensus to delete, we still Keep. So I hesitantly support the close. -- Avanu (talk) 04:15, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• Meh - It is becoming clear over the last few years here that to actually get a non-notable hit-piece deleted when the target is hitting a conservative American politician requires a great many dominoes to line up just so. When the inherent bias of most Wikipedia editors plus the I-never-met-an-article-I-didn't-like dogma of others joins forces, the odds are long, and a closer is left with little alternative but to count sheep. Tarc (talk) 04:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• Reasonable closure by ItsZippy. --SupernovaExplosion ^Talk 05:08, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• I can see a potential reason why ItsZippy would close the AfD that way, but his reasoning was not reasonable, nor did it justify his close. At DrV, I would probably vote to reopen, rather than to revert the close. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 06:23, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• Comment I'm just going to point out something that was pointed out by myself, Debbie and others in the midst of that AFD: this topic has been covered by The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Time Magazine, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, International Business Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Irish Times, and the Guardian over the period of at least a year in most cases and in some cases even more. That's not an exhaustive list; almost every major paper in the US and many internationally, as well as radio and television, have covered this story. It's not our job as editors to second guess our sources or express disregard for what they consider to be a worthy topic. Our job is to take sources, determine their reliability, and based on what they report, represent fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by said reliable sources. Significant views on this topic obviously exist; we would be remiss to ignore them. I fully understand that many people here believe that this topic is not worthy of being in this encyclopedia - I don't disagree with a lot of these arguments, but I believe that NPOV should trump all else. SÆdon^talk 09:11, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• Comment. I only commented at the AfD in question, since I never vote. But wouldn't it be much better that whenever an AfD discussion exceeds (say) 20 or 30 votes and has lengthy discussion, then let it by closed by 3 admins, not 1. This doesn't happen very often and would not unnecessarily burden the admin who "dares" to close it. I also think that for controversial decisions, the closing admins should be randomly selected. That would remove questions about admins coming in to close something based on their own opinions. MakeSense64 (talk) 09:37, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
  • This is a very sensible suggestion. There's going to be a lot of similar kerfuffle this election season and I strongly recommend we follow this procedure when closing similar AfDs. Moreschi (talk) 09:57, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I agree with your proposal. Although I think that ItsZippy did a fine job explaning his rationale, having 3 closing admins for contentious AfDs would reduce any allegations of bias or mistake by the admin. Debbie W. 10:49, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Maybe, but it might also just lead to a mini-admin debate too. ... -- Avanu (talk) 14:23, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
• As others have said above, (and I do appreciate the effort) - I think the close was incorrect, but appreciate the attempt at both determining a consensus and at providing the reasoning. Political, Religious, and National debates are always going to be difficult for anyone to close, and there's always going to be someone who disagrees with it. I also agree that there will be a DRV in the near future. And the trifecta mentioned above is something I can easily support. — Ched :  ?  10:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• MakeSense64's suggestion, well, makes sense! What a solid idea. Pesky (talk) 15:35, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• • • The bureaucracy will expand to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy! Except it won't. This was, by the arguments above, simply a bad close (even if the closure action itself was exemplary and should be complimented for a difficult situation like this). We haven't enough admins active in closing AfDs already without new procedures being put in place for something as idiotic as head counts. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk)

If the AfD closure was faulty for some reason there's Deletion Review where disputants can present their case why there was fault in the rendering of consensus from the AfD. Hasteur (talk) 16:28, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• I recommended "delete" and the result was "keep". But I was fine with the close. There's a fundamental flaw in that admins, who are just are just people with some extra tools to implement basic policies, are elevated to being the (only) people who handle complex closure situations. But I don't think that it hurt us here. North8000 (talk) 16:34, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for the helpful comments made here. I don't have a great deal to add here, really - my reasons for the closure are at the AfD and expanded at my talk page. I am more than happy for someone to open a DRV if they think that is necessary; I'll accept whatever outcome that may have. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 17:17, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Afd is attracting pollitical crazies

This AFD should be monitored by admins very closely because Drudge Report has linked it's users to it. Lots of pollitical arguments are being made and oh yes there are socks. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 22:43, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

As I can see, IPs and new accounts cannot vote anymore. --SupernovaExplosion ^Talk 05:30, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Whatever, I weep for the administrator who will close this AfD. --SupernovaExplosion ^Talk 06:51, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Confused

I wanted my username to be changed from "Gay Mormon Boy" to "Mormon Man" and it was, but for some reason the "Gay Mormon Boy" account still exists. I am confused, and this was not the result I wanted. Can someone please help or explain this to me? Gay Mormon Boy (talk) 00:30, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

You re-created it by re-logging into it after I renamed you. Just don't log into it again and only log into your new username. MBisanz ^talk 00:31, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

OK, thank you. Gay Mormon Boy (talk) 00:32, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

No problem, I know it's a flukey system. MBisanz ^talk 00:34, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I would very much like the "Gay Mormon Boy" account to be deleted, or blocked, or renamed to something completely neutral and uncontroversial. I did not want to recreate it, and I am most unhappy with its continued existence. I'm not sure I want to edit Wikipedia at all if it is still there. Someone help me please. Mormon Man (talk) 01:01, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I have locked it and you will no longer be able to log into it. MBisanz ^talk 01:05, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. Mormon Man (talk) 01:10, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

What the crap is LOCKED? I've never seen that before. Someguy1221 (talk) 01:23, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

See meta:Global locks. MBisanz ^talk 01:29, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Abuse. Jafeluv (talk) 06:34, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

How so? Looks like a good solution to me.--SPhilbrick(Talk) 15:36, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Now that you were at it, you could have also renamed it...... --Enric Naval (talk) 16:21, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I could have, but then it would have auto-recreated if he ever tried to log in again. Locking it prevents him from logging in. MBisanz ^talk 16:45, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

User:Shrikanthv removing links to Siddha Yoga from articles

I have no personal association with Siddha Yoga. I came across this because a page was on my watchlist. Shrikanthv (talk · contribs) is removing internal links to Siddha Yoga with the edit summary (Removing link(s) to "Siddha Yoga": commercially motivated links , trying to get donations and sell articles , reference source is not meeting with WP ref criteria. Can someone look into this and decide if his edit are appropriate? Thanks! — goethean ॐ 16:37, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Arbitration motion regarding Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Cirt and Jayen466

Resolved by motion at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment that: The Cirt and Jayen466 case is supplemented as follows:

Notwithstanding other restrictions on his editing, Cirt is granted an exemption in order to edit the article Dan Savage bibliography, its talk page, a peer review for that article, and a featured list candidacy for the article. This exemption may be withdrawn by The Rambling Man at anytime, or by further motion of the Arbitration Committee.

For the Arbitration Committee, Alexandr Dmitri (talk) 17:11, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Discuss this