Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
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Antifeminism

I've been trying to improve the Antifeminism article, because I think the current one is very bad for many reasons (it's very biased in tone, it doesn't accurately reflect its sources, and it's sloppy in general). There has been a huge resistance to this from a few editors though, who clearly want to leave the article in its current state, are unwilling to work cooperatively, and instead dismiss all criticism I have of it as original research, which lacks sources. Now I've tried to explain to them repeatedly that I disagree with this, because the criticism I had was criticism of the article, not of which information it should contain, or which sources it should use. They completely ignore this though, and instead keep repeating the same thing over and over again.

Now I've been trying to assume good faith, and kept assuming that they were misreading what I wrote, but it's getting so weird that it's becoming really difficult to maintain this. See this thread [[1]], and especially Fyddlestix (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) second reply. The section was about something I removed, because it was unsourced, but which got reverted back. I tried to discuss this, and explain why it wasn't supported by the sources, but instead they went on pretending that I was trying to add information, which wasn't supported by sources. There's just no way that such a reply can be made in good faith to the what I wrote above it. It's becoming clear enough that they're just intentionally being impossible, probably either to frustrate me to a point where I would give up, or provoke me into questioning their intelligence, so that they can block me over personal attacks.Didaev (talk) 17:56, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

This appears to be basically a content dispute, although it may be complicated by stubbornness and incivility. I suggest that you ask for formal mediation. A mediator may be able to get the parties to explain and work on their differences. If the other editors do not agree to formal mediation, then the next step for dealing with conduct issues would be Arbitration Enforcement under the gender-related sanctions under WP:ARBGG. But I suggest that mediation be tried. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:06, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

I see this less as a content dispute and more as a problem of disruptive editing on Diadaev's part. This user has been lobbying for changes to the article on Antifeminism for a couple of weeks, but their talk page posts are based on their own subjective opinions & reasoning, rather than on RS (this is probably the worst example). They've been prodded for sources and asked to stop making subjective arguments several times, and they've been given a formal warning for failure to cite sources and disruptive editing.

In the comment Didaev refers to above, I was simply trying to impress upon them the importance of citing sources - I was hoping that engaging with some sources might refocus the conversation and make it less subjective. But Diadev has chosen to raise the matter here rather than do that. So I don't see how mediation is going to help unless Didaev is willing to make some sourced, non-subjective arguments. Fyddlestix (talk) 22:22, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

On the one hand, a mediator would insist on citing sources. On the other hand, if User:Didaev is ignoring advice to cite sources, then that may be good-faith editing that is nonetheless disruptive editing. If this is seen as a conduct dispute, it is my experience that Arbitration Enforcement works more efficiently than this noticeboard. Has Didaev been notified of gender-related discretionary sanctions? Robert McClenon (talk) 23:42, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Good point, it looks like they hadn't been warned about the DS. I added the warning just now. Fyddlestix (talk) 01:47, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Surely Didaev is editing in good faith, but unfortunately is still not getting the point about how all of our work on the article must be based on the summarization of reliable sources. Didaev is offering criticisms of the article which are personal criticisms. This is not helping the situation at all. What is needed is for Didaev to refer to reliable published sources when making arguments about what to change in the antifeminism article. Until that happens there's not much influence that Didaev can have on the article. Lacking any leverage based on what is found in the literature, the talk page complaints by Didaev are ultimately disruptive. Binksternet (talk) 03:15, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

It seems to me that the 'reliable source' doctrine is being abused here to skew the page towards a particular point of view. On the original discussion page, Binksternet et. al. have explicitly stated their belief that the only valid sources of information about "antifeminism" are feminist scholars. This must lead to a one-sided characterization. JudahH (talk) 05:57, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's a fair characterization - as far as I've seen, no one has argued that feminist scholars are "the only valid sources of information" about anti-feminism. Rather, they've argued that there just isn't all that much (or any) academic literature about antifeminism itself that takes a "pro" antifeminist perspective. Fyddlestix (talk) 15:41, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

• JudahH, that's a load of bollocks and you likely know it. You are misrepresenting the opinions of Binkster&co, and doing so badly, both here and elsewhere, to the point that my ability to AGF is rather stretched. Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:15, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Try not to view everything through biased glasses, Kevin. If you're finding it hard to assume good faith, it's probably because you started out assuming bad faith instead. I've been polite and constructive in my (attempted) contributions to that article; just because I don't share your politics doesn't mean I'm trying to vandalize the page.

Here's a direct quotation if you need one: "Feminist scholars are a very highly respected source of information. Scholars in general are what we look for when a topic is difficult to define. There's no problem with referencing feminist scholars who are in fact the ones who study antifeminism the most. Basically, the only scholars of antifeminism are feminist scholars."

Premise 1: Scholars are what we look for as sources a topic such as this, in preference to other sources.

Premise 2: Only feminist scholars on this topic exist.

Conclusion: We look for feminist scholars as sources on this topic, in preference to other sources.

Whether the reasons for preferring "scholars" are sound or not, the outcome to relying primarily on them given these premises is an article written from a single point of view, rather than a balanced one.JudahH (talk) 04:00, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Your logic is faulty. The conclusion is not that feminist scholars are looked for in preference to other sources. We do look for scholars in preference to other sources generally speaking, and it is the case that a majority of scholars and other high quality sources writing about antifeminism do so from a pro-feminist standpoint. That is not at all necessarily a problem. Wikipedia doesn't shoot for some sort of vacuum point of view. If a majority of high quality sources about a subject reflect a certain perspective, than a properly written Wikipedia is likely to as well. That's a feature, not a bug. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:09, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

The conclusion in this particular case is that feminist scholars are looked for in preference to non-feminist sources—perhaps not because they're feminist, but the outcome remains the same. Re this being a feature, I respectfully disagree with you. If all of the sources used on a topic reflect a particular perspective, even if they are high-quality sources, the article is skewed because there are high-quality sources on one perspective but no sources for the other perspective. Rather, we should represent both perspectives from the best sources available. I further disagree that academic sources are necessarily better than primary sources—i.e. people's direct characterizations of their ideologies in their own words, but that's the less important point, I think. JudahH (talk) 04:36, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

You may disagree with it, but it is explicitly a feature of Wikipedia. Our articles are intended to "represent.. fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic." Further policies emphasize that in doing so, we should consider the quality of a source, and avoid giving equal validity to all apparent viewpoints. You might disagree with any of these things, but they are all long established features of Wikipedia. Wikipedia, as a project rejected the idea of sympathetic point of view long long ago. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:56, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

This is what I mean by "abuse" of Wikipedia's policies—maybe I should look for a more neutral word than that, but the claim that the only sources of significance on a political topic are the ones from a particular side basically favors one viewpoint over the other. This is not a neutral point of view. You sound like you're comparing one whole side of a political debate to "flat earthers" or something. Again, there's a vast difference between the opinions of academic scientists on a topic of science and the opinions of academic feminists about the views held by their opponents. The whole point of NPOV, as I've understood it is that when it comes to divisive issues that editors can't come to consensus about, the fairest approach is to give and source the views of both sides, and let the reader draw his conclusions. Not to refuse to even offer the viewpoint of one side on the pretense that it has never been described by so-called "valid" sources. JudahH (talk) 05:11, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

There's the issue of whether academic sources exist on the other side, see WP:GEVAL. Ian.thomson (talk) 04:42, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I didn't see this comment when I added the two paragraphs below, but the first one was basically addressing your point, Ian. I see a fundamental difference between more or less objective questions of science or fact, where it's reasonable to give academics the authority, and questions of people's political views, where subjectivity reigns, and being an academic doesn't mean that one should be the only source used to characterize political views that he disagrees with. I would add, that this is a case where using primary sources would be entirely reasonable, I believe, as no inferences need to be drawn from them—simply the statement that "such and such political group describes its aims so and so". JudahH (talk) 05:04, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

edit: I should add that there's a difference, IMO, between an article about, say, some contested fact of science, where the academic perspective can be reasonably assumed to generally have more validity than the less academic ones, and an article about people's political views, where being an academic does not make one more of an authority on the opinions of some group of people than belonging to that group.

I should also add that I'm not editing in bad faith here, and I believe that as long as we clarify what we're talking about, we can come to a consensus that everyone is happy with. As I just commented on that article's talk page, I believe that the root reason this article has been provoking such strong opinions is that it currently covers entire ranges of ideologies (antifeminism, and, by implication, feminism) as if they were a single, even an organized ideology. This gives rise to misleading implications about both sides.

Respectfully yours, JudahH (talk) 04:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Didaev is a new user and an 100% single purpose account — they've edited only Antifeminism and its talkpage. It does look like they've come here to right great wrongs, and I will consider a topic ban if they should persist with their agenda to the point of disrupting the talkpage. However, there's no need for anything like that yet, as they haven't edited since receiving the discretionary sanctions alert. Perhaps they're thinking about it and will return more willing to listen to experienced editors. Well, see the optimist's guide to Wikipedia, I suppose, but it never hurts to assume the best, especially of new users. Bishonen | talk 12:11, 22 June 2015 (UTC).

User: Stemoc

After continually being reverted by this user, I've decided that it would be best to take this to the Administrator noticeboard. Over the past several months, the user Stemoc has continually reverted my edits, for the sole reason of being disruptive. I think their latest statement made in an edit summary clearly states that they do not wish to act in a civil manner, and simply wish to violate Wikipedia policy outlined at WP:HOUNDING. The edit summary stated "UNDO long-term cross wiki vandal POV pusher whop uses the wiki for "self promotion"." This has continually been his reason, no matter the situation, in this case it was the addition of a different photo on the Donald Trump article which is non-controversial. (Note: There was a previous discussion at 3RR where it was agreed that I would not add photos that have already been uploaded for the sole reason of having my name in the title of the image, which I have ceased from doing. I have not broken this warning so that should not be part of this discussion.) But regardless, the user still seems to want to continue to revert my edits across several different projects, and was told to stop previously.

In a calm, measured response to a comment I left on his talk page, part of his response was to "stop acting like a pompous cry baby.." His edit summary here also indicates his unwillingness to act in a civil manner, and simply to be disruptive and revert edits without discussion. Quoting directly from WP:Wikihounding, "Wikihounding is the singling out of one or more editors, and joining discussions on multiple pages or topics they may edit or multiple debates where they contribute, in order to repeatedly confront or inhibit their work. This is with an apparent aim of creating irritation, annoyance or distress to the other editor. Wikihounding usually involves following the target from place to place on Wikipedia." As recent as a few moments ago, the user began participating in a discussion I created in order to gain a consensus on which image would be best at Jeb Bush. The user then personally attacked me stating "its Not a Communist regime either so we won't keep using your poor images all the time" to a comment I left in a related section where people began voting, despite policy that states Wikipedia is not a democracy. In that discussion, it was found that a different image was best to use, and I did not revert or try to disrupt that decision.

The user has had similar complaints left on his talk page, after he told another user to "get glasses" when trying to add a photo he uploaded in this instance. Here is part of the exchange...

“ No you LISTEN, you are the ONLY PERSON in the WHOLE of WIKIPEDIA that has a problem with the GOOD IMAGE being used. I tried solving it amicably but you decide to change the IMAGE again for the UMPTEENTH TIME, you REFUSE to a have ANY DISCUSSION but continuously KEEP changing the image, the post to have a discussion BARELY lasted 48 hours BEFORE you changed the IMAGE yet AGAIN... You are a VANDAL and I will NOW REPORT you....I wrote those in CAPS LOCK cause you seem to be blind or something ... ”

If that isn't a case against WP:Civility then I don't know what is. He has been warned for his uncivil behavior several times already, and yet they just ignore it and begin writing in uppercase and attempting shame others from editing. It also seems that he is doing the same thing that he accuses me of, as he is adding his own uploaded images to articles, without any sort of discussion, whether controversial or not, and most of the time without a reason given in his edit summary. I highly suggest reviewing his edit history, and his talk page.

Other violations that I believe he has made are outlined at WP:Disruptive editing, in response to this comment after I reverted him for reverting me because I made the edit, "Either follow our policies or LEAVE". That statement alone violates #6, which states "Campaign to drive away productive contributors: act counter to policies and guidelines such as Wikipedia:Civility, Wikipedia:No personal attacks, Wikipedia:Ownership of articles." I would also argue he is acting in a tendentious manner based on his recent edits alone.

Again, if this isn't a case of someone overstepping the line of civility, engaging in disruptive editing, campaigning to drive away productive contributors, and intentionally hounding someone's specific edits, then I don't know what is.

Here are links to edits where the user has reverted me in a hounding manner. [2] [3] [4][5][6][7][8] [9] [10] [11]

Calibrador (talk) 13:20, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Expect an accusational response from the user being reported saying that I'm adding my own photos as self promotion. This is not the case, and is not a violation of any policy anyway. As of recent, I have made sure to include clear edit summaries stating why I am changing a specific image, and created discussions in order to come to a consensus on which image would be preferred. Stemoc is simply acting in a disruptive manner no matter what discussion takes place, and no matter what my edit summary reasoning was for changing a specific image. Calibrador (talk) 13:32, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Before I begin, please remember that User:Calibrador was previously known as Gage Skidmore and he changed his name yesterday just so that he can knowingly continue to enforce his images into articles without setting off any alarm bells..Infact, just before changing his name, his last few edits involved enforcing his own images into articles and right after usurpation, he continues to do the same. The use has over the years continually used wikipedia for WP:SELFPROMOTION to an extent of removing better images for his own poor ones just so that he can use wikipedia to promote himself financially. The Quote he linked above was to another editor that is available on my talk page and it has already been solved "amicably" but he has linked it here trying to make people think that my comment was targeted at him..... I'm not in the habit of REMOVING other people's comments about him removing other images and replacing them with his.. He even threatened me on Wikimedia Commons to not upload his images from flickr which are under a free licence and as per Commons policy can be uploaded for use on wikipedia...The user has a long history of violation WP:COI and just by going through the users contribution history here, it will all be made clear. I'm NOT Hounding the user as he claims, I just found his "vandalism" unbearable and decided to take action by reverting them as he refuses to follow policies in regards to discussing his changes. Its either HIS images be USED on those articles or NO IMAGES and he will blatantly revert anyone else who decides to use a less controversial or better image...WP:CIVIL goes both ways and if admins refuse to warn and discipline this user who has previously been reported here in May, then this will be ongoing. The user is abusing our Terms of Use as was discussed in May on my talk page. He may not be a paid editor but he is using Wikipedia for Financial gain and that is against one of our policies as photographers get paid for the use of their images as tou can see here and quote

“ Gage Skidmore is a professional photographer currently based in the Phoenix metropolitan area. He began his career covering politics in 2009, covering the U.S. Senate campaign of ophthalmologist Rand Paul. Since then, he has been involved with a variety of organizations and campaigns, including the Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry, ASU Center for Political Thought & Leadership, Campaign for Liberty Foundation, Reason Magazine, Western Center for Journalism, and has been published in the Washington Post, Associated Press, Politico, and Forbes.

Media/business inquiries: gtskidmore@hotmail.com

”

If wikimedia blatantly allows someone to use the site to serve their personal monetary gain then this is not a place I want to be...I have been fighting Spammers and vandals across wikimedia since 2007 and users like him are the worst as they can usually get away with it..........oh and ofcourse you are Gage, do NOT deny it cause whats worse than violators are those that blatantly lie about it--Stemoc 13:53, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Please do not attempt to destroy my character, you are getting very close to libel with your false accusations. I have never made a penny from my involvement with Wikipedia. Your response also screams a great level of paranoia. Calibrador (talk) 14:03, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

False accusation?, you accuse me of WP:HOUNDing you and when i point out that you are using WIKIPEDIA for your own personal MONETARY gain, I'm destroying your character?. You Intentionally enforce your images so that you can tell your "clients" about you work using Wikipedia as a reference for your OWN personal and monetary gain and when users remove your pics and replace or update it with one that is BETTER, you revert them cause you want ONLY your images with you name at the END of every image name because you are a humanitarian and you love wikipedia and you are helping the wiki out of the goodness of your heart?, is thats what you are telling me?....Never made a a penny, who do you think uses all the images that get added to wikipedia?, newsites and other websites and I won't be surprised if they pay you for the use of the images, oh and lets not forget, free publicity..Just admit it and stop lying please....--Stemoc 14:18, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

None of what you just wrote is true, I suggest you just stop please. Calibrador (talk) 14:21, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Also I'd suggest acting more Civil instead of using Caps lock to imply shouting on the administrator noticeboard. Calibrador (talk) 14:22, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Stemoc, it's not clear to me how Calibrador is financially benefiting from Wikipedia. You link to his Flickr bio it doesn't refer to Wikipedia at all. And then you reference an article where not only is Wikipedia not mentioned but it states he posts all of his photos to Flickr under a Creative Commons license, making them available free of charge as long as he’s credited. and only charges for-profit publications for his work.

I can see how you could make an argument that Calibrador prefers using photos he has taken over other photos but you haven't presented evidence that he is financially benefiting from donating his photos to Wikipedia. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 14:38, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

That is how publicity works Liz, let put it this way, his images get noticed, he gets called up by someone famous and they ask him to do a 'photoshoot" for which he gets paid and at the same time he has to insure he gets noticed, Flickr is now ranked 130 odd but Wikipedia is STILL one of the top 10 websites in the world, so where are you more likely to get noticed?..Previously, when adding image a to articles, he used to add his name into the captions in infoboxes as well..just search through his edits in 2014 and you will find it which is how i actually noticed him in the first place..--Stemoc 15:40, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

I never did that, and I have never booked a photo shoot with anyone. How many times do you have to be told to stop making false accusations? Calibrador (talk) 15:48, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

I have mentioned it on my talk page many times that i use Caps and Bold for "emphasis" only on certain words, I'm not "Shouting"..and also why would you even accept what i said is fact because if it is , and I know it is, it means you have been violating our policies for years and have been getting away with it and you got your named changed just so that its not directly seen as a WP:COI which it is.Note: I havea shitty internet conenct adn moving to https has MADE IT WORSE so i cannot reply here anymore, i have already had 16 edit conflicts on this thread, please take anything else regarding me to to my talk page..I'm unable to post on pages larger than 150kbs (my net speed on enwiki is about 8kbps)--Stemoc 14:49, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

You also used caps on your talk page once because someone "needs to get glasses." Calibrador (talk) 14:56, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

• A month ago I reported Gage Calibrador at ANEW [12] so I'm not the only one to have an issue although since that report I've simply given up with the image-removal as I knew one way or another I'd end up being blocked, I still believe Gage Calibrador is using the image-titles as a way to promote himself. –Davey2010^Talk 14:32, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

• Since that discussion, I have agreed to use edit summaries, discuss, and come to a consensus when changing an image is seen as controversial. Calibrador (talk) 14:36, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

• That's great but the image thing is still an issue - No one would have an issue with your uploads if you just uploaded them as say "X at X.jpg" but surely you can see adding your name on the end of every image you upload does come across as self promotion and people are bound to have an issue with that. –Davey2010^Talk 14:44, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

• I would note that I do not even link to my Flickr when I upload my own photos, like when others upload my images. If anything Stemoc is the one promoting my photos. Calibrador (talk) 14:48, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm NOT promoting your images, I'm giving you "attribution" which is according to Commons policy regarding image uploads, so this is "attribution" as I have not only uploaded one of your images but given you credit as well as added the image to your private category, there is no need for me to do that but i do it nevertheless cause i go by the rules and follow the policies, you don't...your image uploads are always promotional--Stemoc 15:32, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Calibrador, you are adding photos with file names such as "William Lee Golden by Gage Skidmore.jpg". If you are a professional photographer, I think such file names are advertising your work. Many professional do contribute some of their images to WP, and in a sense it may be a form of advertising , because they are attributed in the meta data--but we have always regarded this as not just permissible, but a good incentive to get some high quality images. However, putting your professional identity in the file name does not seem like a good idea. I do not work all that much with images,and I do not know if it is against our rules for images, but I personally think that it certainly should be. If you want to avoid accusations of promotionalism, you might want to go back and rename them. DGG ( talk ) 03:39, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

Let me first say that e might have gone a bit off-track. However, having your name in the file name is not against any policies or guidelines (ot terms for that metter). If I wanted I could name a file "File:X at Y (thank you C0mpany Z for this great event).jpg" and intentionally advertise, but that alone isn't proof of any wrongdoing. (In the Creative Commons terms however there is a clause about "titles of works" and that they should be used. If the creator wishes they be names one way...)
Back to the issue at hand regarding if Cometstyles Stemoc is violating multiple policies on civility, I would say that this is a clear case. Even if the edits are somehow justified, they are HOUNDing in nature. This should not be acceptable. (There should be a clause like this in 3RR regarding reverting over multiple articles...) (t) Josve05a (c) 04:15, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

Its Ok to do that to a few image but that uploader has added more than 8000 images with that byline, just do a simple "by Gage Skidmore" on commons if you don't believe me. This is PROMOTIONAL. When someone adds an article about themselves or add links to their private websites, they are straightaway reverted, warned and in severr cases BLOCKED for spamming..this is one form of spamming..we may have different rules for articles and images but they both have the same outcome...The problem isn't the use of "by Gage Skidmore" tag in all his images, the problem is intentionally replacing other better and current images with his own on MAJOR article to boost his own stand and even without discussion as one user pointed above about the lack of using 'edit summaries'. Josve05, you are aware of my involvement in cross-wiki related spamming and vandalism and there isn't a day where i do NOT delete spamming on the 2 wikis i have adminship on....I see this as "blatant promotional/spamming" and though my involvement on enwikipedia has been limited since i returned (my own choosing), I will NOT turn a blind eye to it cause you may not see it as such but its blatant abuse of our policies....and again, reverting someone who keeps violating our policies does not make me a "Wiki HOUNDER"..I'm reverting what i see as blatant vandalism..the user has even gone to an extent of getting his name changed to make it easier to add his images without anyone pointing fingers..it would be nice if admins did their job as this user has been brought to this board now 3 times over the last 2 months and still has not faced any consequences to this actions...--Stemoc 14:05, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

I think this is a case of "everyone but myself" is at fault, and I'm a "social warrior" for trying to save Wikipedia from something that is not against the rules, and I'll keep link WP:Selfpromotion, even though none of what is mentioned on that page applies. Could an admin please weigh in on this situation so that falsehoods aren't spread again? Calibrador (talk) 14:21, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

The self promotion policy may see to be only related for articles but it applies to everything on wikimedia, self PROMOTION is self promotion, either your promote yourself, your company, your interests or your stuff, its Promotion and by deliberately removing other people images with yours IS self promotion...Do I need to make this any more clear?..--Stemoc 15:28, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

I would note that Stemoc is also currently reported at 3RR for reverting one of the articles five times within a 24 hour span. They were also warned by an admin for harassment. Calibrador (talk) 15:33, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

and more lies, I was neither "warned " by an admin (toonlucas22 is not an admin) but it was a mistake on his part as he was not aware of this thread nor the previous identity of Calibrador and on the 3RR one which Gage Skidmore linked above...and also, I have not violated 3RRand nor do I intend too..--Stemoc 15:56, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

I never said I'm an admin. I just came as an uninvolved editor. --TL22 (talk) 16:06, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

That part was my mistake, I thought he was an admin. I do have to correct the false statement that was made about 3RR, though, as Stemoc reverted an article to their version five times in a row, within (approximately) a 24 hour span. It was just slightly outside the window, but still applies. Calibrador (talk) 16:11, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

Yikes! Bbb23 just brought the hammer down on both Stemoc and Calibrador for 24 hours at WP:ANEW... I'm guessing this one can (and probably should) be closed now. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:05, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm going to keep this open until Stemoc and Calibrador return from their 24 hour blocks. I'd like to hear some proposals, as there's potentially an issue with Calibrador's behaviour, and in turn there's definitely an issue with Stemoc's behaviour. It would be good to get it sorted out with the minimum of fuss, rather than just closing this thread and having a repeat with either Stemoc or another user raising similar complaints in the next few days and weeks. I'd think the sensible suggestion here would be that Calibrador is either restricted from removing an existing image from a page and replacing it with an image he has taken/uploaded himself unless discussion has taken place prior to the switching of images, and consensus is in favour of the change, or there's a 1RR restriction, so he can make the switch without discussion, but if it's reverted, it needs to be discussed before the edit can be reinstated. If a page lacks an image, then Calibrador can add any image he so wishes. It's important to say at this time that we do appreciate the time and effort he puts into taking and uploading photographs BUT other photographers, both professional and amateur do exactly the same, and in the interests of fairness, we want to see good images from a wide range of different photographers being used on the project, this in turn encourages image contributions from other photographers. Every photographer who takes good images should have an expectation of their images being used by another project and that their images will be chosen fairly, without bias, and on the merit of the photograph and its content, composition and appropriateness for the article. Calibrador's behaviour isn't really allowing that to happen right now. Nick (talk) 09:25, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

• I notice that Calilibrador wrongly attempted to delete the block notice on his talk page while it was still in force, and that when policy was explained to him again reverted the notice anyway, only to be reverted again by Nick. Finally, as soon as the block expired, he scrubbed off the notice a third time. I would argue that this wholesale lack of transparency demonstrates an ongoing and obsessive interest with his image and PR, with past examples documented in the section below. This is a long-term, and current problem with this editor and there is very little contrition in evidence. I suggest the overall pattern indicates a desire to use Wikipedia as a platform for his profession as a photographer. Jusdafax 23:30, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

It is, he is trying to keep his talk page clean so that paying clients don't ask about his block, anyways thanks for pointing out the previous discussion involving him JustDaFax, maybe I should have pointed this out at the very top of the thread and saved myself a lot of time, the admin in that discussion EdJohnston warned him not to re-offend, and he did....many times actually..I'm tired of this cause I did not come back after retiring just so that I get involved in MORE wikidrama, I have no issue with this, I just do not like POV pushers regardless of who they might be ...I hope an admin comes with a solution soon which will stop this from happening again..--Stemoc 00:30, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

• Umm Stemoc I mentioned the report right above so I'm not sure how you missed it , That said even if it was mentioned right up the top it wouldn't made a blind bit of difference unfortunately . –Davey2010^Talk 01:37, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Say, Davey2010 could you ping those editors mentioned in your report, that had issues with Cali/Gage? They are likely not aware of this ANI complaint that is now in a state of WP:BOOMERANG and may well shed some light on why they had concerns. Thanks. Jusdafax 07:39, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Jusdafax - That's actually a good idea ... Should've done that sooner as anything's worth a shot tbh, MrX, Spartan7W, Lady Lotus, Dwpaul. –Davey2010^Talk 09:25, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Proposed sanctions for Calilibrador

• Agree, completely, with Nick's suggestion. It seems to be the most sensible and fair solution. I would be more in favour of the 1RR suggestion; it's not prohibitively restrictive (and doesn't discourage further contributions), but it reigns in any excessive promotional behaviour and forces him to seek consensus with other editors if they take issue with his revisions. Quinto Simmaco (talk) 01:09, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
• Indef block for Calibrador - Quinto, that type of sanction is only effective if Cali/Gage sees the continuing errors of his ways, and acts on them. He's been warned repeatedly to no avail, even reverting the block message on his Talk page when warned not to. Stemoc is likely right, Cali/Gage has deep reasons for his Talk page scrubbage. I say indef the character, at least until we get a serious commitment to reform that he can be held to. He's been gaming the system here for too long and shows no intention of stopping. Jusdafax 01:22, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
• Indef Calibrador - I'm probably not going to be liked for this but the editor has caused enough problems and I think the 1RR won't solve anything at all, We could go down the 1RR route but he'd end up being reported at ANEW and then it'll be this discussion all over again and he'd end up being blocked - Once unblocked we'll be doing it all over again. Indef seems a better and wiser idea IMHO. –Davey2010^Talk 01:37, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
• Agree -- In complete agreement with Nick here. The 1RR proposal for Calibrador makes a lot of sense. However if that doesn't work an indef seems like the only other option. -- Shudde ^talk 05:28, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose Stemoc is hounding Calilibrador and is seriously refusing to drop the stick. KoshVorlon Rassekali ternii i mlechnye puti 16:23, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
• I can understand 1RR and renaming of the files to remove his name (per DGG's comment), but before this last Bbb23 block for edit warring, he's never been blocked, and he has over 25,000 edits behind him. Indef blocking is excessive at this stage. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 17:00, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
• A lot of that was to get him to respond, which he's now doing, if less than satisfactorily. But Dennis, it's my firm belief that if he gets off with 1RR and renaming, he's getting off easy. I really don't want to go wading through his edits, just to find more examples. We are already at TL,DR. Davey 2010 has it right. Jusdafax 20:51, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Current and past problems with Calibrador, formerly Gage Skidmore: suggest extending current BOOMERANG with indef block

Good double block, and I share Nick's concerns. By the way, isn't this diff above in this very ANI complaint (!) using "very close to libel" as an implied legal threat in violation of WP:LEGAL, as well the use of the term "paranoia" an attack on the mental condition of the editor Cali/Gage has brought to this board? If so, wouldn't a continued block of C/G be protective in nature?

In any case, I've had some troubling issues with Cali/Gage Skidmore at the L.A. Reid article. In brief, he lies, distorts, ignores and in general does whatever needful to get what he wants. My involvement began in 2012 when I cordially welcomed him to the page while expressing concerns about his captioning. He gave no reply.

In August 2013, he repeatedly inserts his own photography as the infobox photo and refuses to reply on his Talk page or on the article Talk page when I attempted again to discuss. When challenged, he lied in his edit summary saying, as clearly shown in this diff that I had reverted him without explaining, which the diff shows my edit summary had, and that I was in violation of WP:OWN, when in fact I had repeatedly asked for Cali/Gage to discuss the matter.

I also noticed others had similar issues and Cali/Gage failed to respond to them either. Finally in disgust I walked away from what I felt was an unpleasant and manipulative editing experience. And this editor has a serious set of issues, as noted above, and in his warning at AN just last month, also as noted above. He's a fine photographer, but we can do without his hostile gamesmanship and relentless self-promotion, in my view. Jusdafax 12:47, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment The use of "very close to libel" once probably shouldn't be construed as a legal threat per WP:LEGAL. I don't really see enough diffs to support this strong of an action. I started looking through some of his photos and they are quite good. Personally, I think it would be a shame to loose his future contributions. --I am One of Many (talk) 05:59, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
• Reply - Not to go all Wikilawyer on you but the pertinent paragraph in that policy: It is important to refrain from making comments that others may reasonably understand as legal threats against them or against Wikipedia, even if the comments are not intended in that fashion. For example, if you repeatedly assert that another editor's comments are "defamatory" or "libelous", that editor might interpret this as a threat to sue for defamation, even if this is not intended. To avoid this frequent misunderstanding, use less charged wording (such as “That statement about me is not true and I hope it will be corrected for the following reasons...”) to avoid the perception that you are threatening legal action for defamation. As for photographers, he's good but not good enough to allow his brinksmanship and outright bad faith editing to continue, in my view. Jusdafax 06:17, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment I don't think you are Wikilawyering at all. I just think his phrase "very close to libel" is not quite the same as saying it was "libelous" nor did he do it repeatedly. I think before an indef block is decided, there should be more discussion about whether adding his name to the end of file names is a serious issue. --I am One of Many (talk) 06:33, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

• Darn it - that's not the only issue, as I demonstrate in this section just above. He's been abusing the place for years. You're right, the word "repeatedly" is in the policy too. But, now that he's unblocked, what does he do? Wipes his Talk page clean, and ignores the issues raised here. He does not apologize, does not comment, just up and vanishes. You OK with that? Why? Because he takes good pictures? Jusdafax 06:52, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

• I don't disagree with you that there are serious issues. I just did Google search in images for "Gage Skidmore" and it returns pages of his photos. So, maybe 1RR or 0RR would be a better starting point for now? --I am One of Many (talk) 07:01, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

• I think the first thing we all need to agree to is to get him to talk. He has a well-established history of avoiding discussion. That has to stop. Indef him, he's forced to face the music on his pristine talk page. He can answer questions there, express contrition and understanding of our policies, etc. Seriously, he must not be given a slap on the wrist and turned loose again on the project. Enough is enough. Jusdafax 07:30, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Calibrador response

If you look at my more recent edits, aside from accidentally reverting too many times on one article without knowing (trust me, it was my mistake), I have begun using edit summaries, tried to seek consensus, and mostly tried to avoid conflict. Stemoc reverted several different edits over several different pages within a short span of time simply for the fact that he believes I am somehow a COI violator. What should I really have done differently? I tried to include discussion, and a clear edit summary at every opportunity.

I sincerely apologize for my past indiscretions, I have seen the error of ways in the past about not discussing changes seen as controversial. I don't need to be punished in order to see that, I see it clearly already. Also, I did not disappear, and inviting everyone that has had something bad to say about me with no one on the other side to defend me is a little biased.

The main issue that was at heart here that was underblown because Stemoc enjoys making a lot of noise, and crying COI at every possible chance, is the WP:Wikihounding and uncivil nature of their edits. I have no idea why this has changed into a discussion about me. I've realized my edits in the past were disruptive, and if you look at my edits recently, I made sure to include an edit summary in nearly every contribution, and when necessary, created or participated in discussion. This includes the 3RR that I accidentally got myself into without realizing, I created a discussion on the talk page, and included a reason for making the edit in my edit summary. Unfortunately that was completely ignored by Stemoc in favor of COI accusations, and stating that I'm profiting from Wikipedia, which I have not ever. I suggest concentrating on that rather than my past mistakes which I apologize for, and have tried to amend. Calibrador (talk) 11:51, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Also the thing on my talk page was a mistake, I did not know about that policy, and when it was re-added, I accidentally thought someone re-added it to my talk page just to rub it in or something like that, I didn't look at the history page until after I had made the edit. My mistake once again. As for now, all users have control over their talk page, I think Stemoc is once again assuming bad faith, and made another COI allegation that was unfounded. I don't want to distract from the main issue though that I think has not even been addressed yet, so please discuss Stemoc's offenses. Calibrador (talk) 12:03, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

I actually found Gage creating this article really odd until I did a bit of research and found out that he is somewhat of a "follower" and then i found this..should we now assume Gage is a Paid editor as well cause your edits related to Rand Paul sure looks a lot like public relations work..no? So you use the wiki to push your own agendas, create articles on stuff which again boosts your own career and then you lie about it and then come here and blame me for foiling you? Just claim that you are a political photographer and you are doing all this just to boost your own career and this will all be over...Heck, you even uploaded a new yet poor picture of Donald trump because you didn't like the one I added as it wasn't one of 'yours'...When i first came across you a few years ago, I thought you were a hero for adding HQ pics of celebs and politicians free of charge, boy was I wrong and yet even when multiple users above have claimed that you have been 'gaming' the system, you still deny it and deflect it back to me...Honestly, if all this does not result in a ban or a block for you, I worry that you will do it all over again cause honestly, I do not think you joined wikipedia to help grow the database and you have no intentions whatsoever to follow our policies if they contradict with your ambitions and you have already been on the Edit Warring notice board 3 times over the last 50 days and yet you keep blaming others and refuse to accept that you made mistake after mistake and you even blanked your talk page twice even after 2 admins warned you not to and then you blanked it again the 3rd time just 10 minutes after your block was lifted..Why would anyone not worried about their image do that?...If you somehow walked away from this with just a slap on your hand then this would mean Wikipedia has failed...--Stemoc 13:02, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Please stop stalking my edits and crying COI. You've made your same point over and over and over, I'd like an admin opinion on your behavior, not your same opinion. Calibrador (talk) 13:09, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

• No doubt, Stemoc has his own issues. But this is the first I've heard of this Rand Paul article, which opens a new and distressing window on your POV pushing activities, Calibrador. Leaving that aside for the moment, as well as your excuses for blanking the block notices on your talk page repeatedly, which strain credulity since you are saying you didn't read the admin postings at all, we come to the issues I have delineated in detail above. You have posted a lot of words here. Not a single one addresses my specific and documented concerns, and those of others who have further concerns. So is this the best you can do? A "sweat promise" to now, after years, act like most decent Wikipedians, and actually use edit summaries, actually seek consensus? Now that major sanctions are under discussion here, I challenge you to address the charges that have been brought forward. Jusdafax 13:47, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
  • I thought I addressed them? I admit I should have participated in discussion in the past instead of acting in a cold manner. I hardly even remember the incident you are talking about in regards to the LA Reid article. FWIW, that was not my photo, I did not take it. I was acting like any other editor looking for a better image that was freely available on Flickr, and thought that better illustrated the subject of the article, and thought it was weird that a photo with someone else in the photo that was years older was preferred. I did not look at the article history you linked, I'm just going by memory. Not sure what else I can say, but I'd very much like a response to Stemoc's behavior, as absolutely no one with any authority has had anything to say about their hounding and uncivil behavior that I documented in my original report. Calibrador (talk) 14:00, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
    • Also, not to make this any sort of issue, but I just looked at the article, and would note that the photo that I added is now the photo that is universally used to illustrate the article across Wikipedia projects, and not as a result of me. Someone else did that. I really have no memory of that situation though, it was several years ago. I know I was in the wrong on that though, so I apologize. Calibrador (talk) 14:05, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

The fact that GageSkidmore/Calibrador suddenly changed his username is an indication that his intentions here are likely less than good faith. I really don't see a pressing issue at all with Stemoc, but with GageSkidmore/Calibrador we see a user who is all about self-promotion, and in many regards, whose motivations, i.e. Rand Paul book, etc. are questionable. He likes to ensure his pictures retain precedence over all others; yes, he takes many pictures that are free-use, and that is good. But many of his pictures aren't of article quality and composition, and he many times fights for ones that are the least worth inclusion. There have been problems in the past, and I see them again. He likes making great streams of edits on pages, rather than carefully consolidating his efforts, he continues to put 'by Gage Skidmore' on every single picture uploaded to the commons, obvious self promotion, and his consistent efforts to evade (name change and notification deletes) demonstrate his negative impact here. Spartan7W § 14:12, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

I would just like to note that I stole that idea from David Shankbone, should we bring David Shankbone to AN/I? The stream of edits that I think you are referring to were an effort to try to control my own content. Many (not all) of the photos that were uploaded from my photostream were cropped very poorly, or were not the best one to illustrate an article in my opinion. Most (not all) of my recent photo additions were replacing of my own photos with an alternate crop, or slightly different color, sharpness, etc. Some mistook that as simply uploading the same photo with a different title, but that was not the case, people were adding my photos to Wikipedia unknowingly to me, and I wasn't particularly a fan of the way they looked, however minor it was. I don't specifically recall very many instances where a "stream" of edits other than that one instance where it was controversial and someone took notice of it. After I was brought to the noticeboard, I did not continue that behavior. Despite what you may think, I'm capable of learning from my mistakes. As was the case with the recent noticeboard discussion, and is the reason I used an edit summary and created discussions on several recent articles. Unfortunately that was disrupted by Stemoc who reverted several different edits across several different pages, crying COI and that I'm somehow being paid to edit Wikipedia, how exactly should I have responded to that other than the way that I did? In the first few instances on one specific page, I reverted with a descriptive edit summary stating my opposition to the revert of my edit, and also included a talk page post. That post was met with a paragraph of COI accusations. In the end, another user, PrairieKid reverted the page back to my version twice more when Stemoc reverted it to their version. The fact that I overstepped 3RR was an accident on my part, I understand that policy very clearly, I would not have overstepped that if I had known the first edit I made also counted as a revert, I was simply re-adding official portraits that were replaced for some reason unknown to me. In regards to the Paul thing, I would simply consider myself an expert on the topic, the book article was added because I was trying to keep it consistent with the previous two book articles. Not sure what you were trying to imply with that, especially since the article is not written in a biased manner. I don't believe I've ever made any sort of NPOV edits to anything Paul related, if I did that was a mistake, but I do not believe I did. The only thing I can think of are stylistic article choices. Calibrador (talk) 14:35, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Really Shankbone? the guy that took random celebrity pics and never had a COI or ever pushed his POV across wikimedia? only a handful of his celebrity pics were with his name in the image title which i mentioned above, we ALLOW...not 100% of his images..He rarely if at all replaced someone's images with his own unless it was outdated and I doubt he made a single-cent out of doing this..I would be really surprised if he was ever dragged onto any of the WP:AN boards..and again, you are deflecting..Now you are claiming that users like Lady Lotus and I made "bad" crops?. Are you seriously suggesting that for example, this image by Lady Lotus was so "badly cropped" than you just had to replace it with this image of yours? or replace this with your cropped version or replace this image with one of yours for the exact same reason.. I don't think you care about the quality of your images cause if you did and you thought your version was BETTER, you would have uploaded your version over the "same image" that you were trying to replace, instead of uploading a same if not similar crop with again, your name in the image title...I have told you on multiple occasion that if any user on enwiki or commons finds an image on flick with a free licence and they find there is a need for that image on ANY of the 700 odd wikis we have (300 of which are wikipedias), they will freely be allowed to upload that image to commons so if you have a problem with it, please, feel free to change the license of your images on flickr to ARR (All Rights Reserved) but at the same time, you won't be allowed to upload those images here either without scrutiny....and regarding the PrairieKid edit, If you actually see the history, he changed an image because another user reverted my edit because he didn't understand why my "revert" of your edit was a "self-promotion" because you had your name changed which is why you did it (you can lie about it many times but we all know why)..infact there was no 3RR by me but I accepted the block because I felt that maybe NOW people might see exactly what I have been saying all along, I don't have to repeat myself again as everything i have said is listed above..You may not see it but even though you have been around since 2009, you still refuse to understand or follow our policies so you have not only violated one, but MANY of our policies over the years and you only got away with it because of your name. I have listed a few of your violations above and on the 3RR thread which you keep going back too, this board is NOT for 3RR....this board is about your attitude on this wiki and how you deal (or lack thereof) with other users and your ability (on inability) to both understand or follow our polices and your insistence of claiming over and over again that you are the victim here when its clear that you are not....So instead of deflecting to me, why don't you tell us why an admin should not block you? and P.S, I'm NOT Hounding you, I'm getting you to talk because over the last 6 years you have been on this wiki, you REFUSE to talk when posed a question and you always ignore hierarchy on this wiki and now when you have this opportune time to save yourself, you deflect, passing the blame onto someone else without realizing that this will only make it worse for you....the only reason I'm replying to your posts is because you keep mentioning my name and pointing fingers at me, i know how to defend myself since I have been in similar situation a few times....Everytime I post, I added more proof regarding your edits, and everytime you posts, its just more accusations hurled at me without an ounce of proof and yet, I'm the one hounding him as you claim....anyways I have wasted too much time on this, I have better things to do across wikimedia--Stemoc 00:37, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Stemoc, first off, you gotta learn to not slap up these giant text walls that make the average editor's eyes glaze over, and tone down your use of caps. That said, it appears to me you have a number of decent points. There is no doubt that Cali/Gage has utterly and repeatedly failed for years now to discuss and come to consensus, except when he is lying, which I document above. I'm hoping by keeping this thread open that others will come forth, so we can establish what kind of sanctions Cali/Gage will be facing. There is growing consensus something has to be done. Cool out, man. Jusdafax 02:07, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Haha, yeah can't help it bro, once I have something to talk about, my wall can be higher than the Great Wall of China..I actually cut myself short there cause most of the things that needed to be said has already been said....I have mentioned a few times that i use Bolds or Caps or "quotes" for "emphasis" only, I'm not really "shouting"..I agree, this has dragged far too long and needs to be solved once and for all...I have no interests in making edits to the wikipedia-space as i prefer most if not all my edits to be on the main space..--Stemoc 02:36, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Three words: Use paragraph breaks. BMK (talk) 12:14, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I was notified about this discussion on my talk page. I do not favor an indefinite block of Gage Skidmore (the username change was in bad faith, however, and should be reversed imo). Though he has demonstrated a strong POV against notable minor candidates for office as I documented here, my main issue with Skidmore is his lack of communication, specifically his refusal to discuss contentious edits he makes in furtherance of his POV. Nevertheless, based on what he has written above, I believe he has the potential to change. He adds great content to articles and wikipedia should not eliminate his ability to do so through an indefinite block. A 1RR restriction seems like a fair remedy. This may encourage him to discuss his edits (as part of the WP:BRD method) rather than reverting reverts without providing any justification.--William S. Saturn (talk) 06:03, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Proposal for interaction ban

At this point I think it would be very wise to consider implementing an interaction ban between myself and Stemoc, I don't conceive this ever resolving amicably as far as their prerogative goes, so I think this would be the best way to not be disruptive. Calibrador (talk) 15:44, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Oppose such interaction ban since the only one to benefit from it would be the proposer himself, who would get rid of a vocal critic. Criticism that IMO is justified, because like many others here I see Calibrador's activities as using Wikipedia for promotion. Thomas.W ^talk 16:05, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Oppose - Yup Thomas's hit the nail on the head - WP:IBAN states and I quote "The purpose of an interaction ban is to stop a conflict between two or more editors that cannot be otherwise resolved - There is no conflict - It's simply one (well actually quite alot) of editors unhappy with you and your self promotion here. –Davey2010^Talk 17:51, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Comment If they were civil about it, I wouldn't have made the request. Unfortunately they are one of the most uncivil people I have ever had interaction with. Calibrador (talk) 20:15, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

They have been civil tho so that doesn't wash either..... –Davey2010^Talk 20:50, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Not true. Calibrador (talk) 21:33, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Oppose - per Thomas W. I'm fed up, obviously. As I comment above, Stemoc's off-putting delivery is annoying, and post-block, he needs to cool that down. But Stemoc's got some valid points, and I for one am glad he's making the push to inform the wider community about Calibrador's promotional and conflicted edit history. This self-serving proposal merely continues that pattern, and coming in the midst of an ongoing discussion of boomerang sanctions against Calibrador, is arguably disruptive. Cali/Gage has clearly learned nothing from the way this thread has gone. If this is the best he can do, indef him, and we can discuss it without his attempts to turn the discussion. Jusdafax 02:17, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Proposal for a ban on Calibrador/Gage Skidmore to add his name as author/photographer to articles on en-WP

Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Captions#Credits we should not credit the image author or copyright holder in the article, unless relevant to the subject, but just having taken a photo of the subject of an article does not IMO make the photographer "relevant to the subject". So I propose a ban on Calibrador/Skidmore to add his name as creator/author/photographer to articles on the English language Wikipedia, whether it's done in the image caption, as a footnote, as a reference (yes I've seen his name added as <ref>Author: Gage Skidmore</ref> to articles, so that his name appears among the references at the bottom of the page, see Matt Groening) or in any other way. Having his name on the image page, visible when clicking the image, should be more than enough. Several proposals to add image attributions to articles have been made through the years, but all have AFAIK failed, so we should go by what MOS says, that is no image attribution unless relevant to the subject of the article. Thomas.W ^talk 16:07, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment Any actual mention of my name in an article, whether that includes a reference like you mentioned, or in the caption, was not done by me, and I oppose that as well. Calibrador (talk) 16:57, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• What about taking that to ArbCom so that arbitrators decide what to do? --TL22 (talk) 11:59, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Disruptive behaviour of User:Rolandi+

• User: Rolandi+ (talk · contribs)

Continously disruptive editing. The user refuses to discuss in a civil manner or contribute to the project.

• Without discussion, editing the infobox of Balšić noble family, changing the contemporary and historiographical view of the family (notability), that instead of Serbian, they were Albanian. There is a section regarding theories on their origin, and a discussion at the talk page.

• Without discussion, editing the introduction of Souliotes, changing the contemporary and historiographical view of the tribe (notability), that instead of Greek, they were Albanian. There is a section regarding theories on their origin, and a discussion at the talk page. Rolandi+ opened a dispute discussion about the article, which is very confusing.

• Without discussion, removing a reference of Kosovo Serbs, on the basis that "not reliable source, doesn't mention kosovo with its official name" and "Nacionalist media is not reliable source, doesn't mention kosovo with its official name .It has also comments ,so it is just a blog.There are some nacionalist comments that makes it clear that it isn't a serious Source." the reference uses Kosovo i Metohija.

The user has been warned countless times. He makes inappropriate comments such as I don't care about your stupid boycott ,I just see the sources, maybe you don't know how to use your eyes, so stop your foolish editings, where did your learn that ?or maybe you are the Master of Universe?, you are afraid of anti-serbians....I would like to be your friend as you make me laugh so much ... just for their fun?You are so ridiculous!!!!!!!!!!, MAYBE YOU NEED TO GO AND READ THE ARTICLE.IT SAYS: Also, I have reasons to believe that AlbertBikaj (talk · contribs) and Rolandi+ (talk · contribs) are the same person, based on scope, spellings and punctuation marks.--Zoupan 13:15, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

I was new here (now I have 4 days here) so I didn't know that I had to use the talk pages.After I was warned , I have ALWAYS used the talk pages of the articles or user's talk pages.(you can see that).After I was informed,I haven't edit anything at "Balsic family" "Souliotes" (I have used only the talk page after that.Actually without consensus at the talk page,Zoupan deleted from the "Souliotes" some informations +references that were on the article since a long time---I have asked for independent help at the relevant notice board. ) Zoupan also claimed "8,000–12,000" here:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosovo_Serbs .When I asked him to provide references ,he provided some references that didn't say the same thing he claimed (so he lied with his references). He says that I deleted a "referenced" source.I used the talk page to explain him that the used reference was not serious (so it is not reliable).The web page referred to kosovo as "Kosovo +Metohija" which is not its official name.The most important thing that makes it clear that it is not a serious media are the comments.There are many nacionalist comments (that a serious+reliable media doesn't allow ) such as "Ramush Haradinaj+Hashim Thaci are killers etc "/ "we will never return to Kosovo dialogue" etc. After we hadn't an agreement about "Balsic family " and "Kosovo serbs" ,he started claiming at the Souliotes' talk page that my references weren't correct.He wanted from me to answear his questions (he made these things only to "revenge" against me as I didn't have the same thoughts with him about some serbian related informations.).He also said that he had references where he based his claims.I asked him twice to provide his references at the talk page but he didn't (he lied again).Also he said to me that he would made edits at some albanian related pages (about the albanian nobility--He obviously wanted only to "revenge" ).---For all of these please see our talk pages and the mentioned articles' talk pages. As for my "inappropriate comments" I am ready to be more carefull in the future. He also said that he believes I am a sockpuppet.Actually ,he can investigate about that.Albert Bikaj is obviously "albanian" so it's normal for two albanians to edit albanian related pages.I am sure that Zoupan is the "same" person with other serb editors based on scope,spellings and punctuation marks.As I said :Zoupan thinks I am a sockpuppet and he can investigate about that. Rolandi+ (talk) 17:50, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm a liar and avenger? Okay. Please do take a look at the talk pages, because this is getting tiresome. Note that the user has made 8 edits to the above comment, with one timestamp.--Zoupan 20:20, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

It is true that I did 8 edits to the above comment, with one timestamp.However ,this doesn't mean that my words aren't true about you.As I said the other editors can see our talk pages and the mentioned articles' talk pages.And don't continue adding "Ottoman greeks" at the souliotes' article without our consensus .Rolandi+ (talk) 08:26, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

This disruptive pattern is still in full motion, while blind reverting appears a typical strategy for the promotion of a national pov. I've left a last warning in Rolandi's talkpage.Alexikoua (talk) 15:01, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Yes, he is still continuing his behaviour. He removed my referenced edits with the comments "no consensus-use the talk page", I then reverted his removal, with the comment "rev undiscussed removal, use talk page", upon which he reverted once again with the comment "Use the talk page as your references and edits aren't reliable.I don't have why to use the talk page as I am just deleteing your Unreliable edits."--Zoupan 18:29, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Zoupan continue deleting all my edits and references.(for example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehmed_Pasha_Bushati ).He deleted my references and said that I had to provide references.And this isn't the first time!Alexikoua also continue deleting my referenced edits by saying that they aren't decent .This here for example (Danişmend (1971), p. 41 ) is used hundreads of time at many articles (for example : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ottoman_Grand_Viziers ).If they delete my references because they are "decent and without consensus ",this means thatsome of their references also can be deleted. ( Zoupan uses mostly serb references that are actually unreliable.They consider all balkanik people as "serbs" .He also uses serb blogs as reliable references. )Also I want tou to prevent Zoupan and Alexikoua from leaving me warnings.If I do something bad ,I want warnings from other administrators. Rolandi+ (talk) 19:52, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Yet disruption is spread to a variety of articles with the same national-pov advocacy pattern: for example Markos Botsaris [[13]], Kitsos Tzavellas [[14]]. In both cases being eager to change the nationality without even with intenionally wrong edit summaries (labelling as "minor change" a change in the nationality at 1st line of the lede).Alexikoua (talk) 20:29, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Yes Alexikoua ,the "souliotes" has been sent to the revelant dispute resolution noticeboard.See the talk page also.There is no consensus that souliotes were greeks .You continue reporting me only to ban me because we don't have the same thoughts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Zoupan#Don.27t_delete_my_references .Maybe you think you are very intelligent or you are the Master of Universe,maybe you think you will ban me forever ,this is and will not be true.And if I will be banned ,don't worry ,you can't change the history,you can't change nothing as you are only ,but only a little ridiculous man.As Zoupan said ,Wikipedia isn't a reliable source , and this because there are people like you .Nobody takes your edits as serious ,there are books and other references where people read about nations and cultures ,nobody believes your lies.So go ahead and ban me , ban me if you can.And if you manage to ban me ,I will turn back (without sockpuppetery )here.And I will not comment at this talk page anymore ,because only people like you can be part of ridiculous things.Goodbye my little dear Alexikoua. As for Zoupan ,please Don't wake him up from his dreams. Rolandi+ (talk) 07:55, 27 June 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rolandi+ (talk • contribs)

KWW / The Rambling Man

KWW and The Rambling Man had been engaged in an edit war on the Phillip Seymour Hoffman awards page, TRM adding awards and then coming back to add references and KWW removing everything not well referenced at time of addition. Neither was following adequate policy to discuss disputed changes. It escalated on their respective talk pages and finished with KWW blocking TRM for edit warring, an obvious involved block.

Due to a combination of the edit warring and the disruptive discussion and the involved block I have blocked KWW for 72 hrs. I would like to request other admins and editors review the situation writ large and in particular both blocks. I believe mine was a necessary stop to disruptive activity however others may not see it that way. Any admin consensus here to unblock may be acted upon with my blessings without specifically asking me first. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:07, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• The Rambling Man (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Kww (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

• Adding links for convenience.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 22:16, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• The only article talk page contribution by The Rambling Man is a single paragraph of ad hominem. The bigger problem is KWW blocking him, which is arguably a textbook violation of WP:INVOLVED, and precisely what the policy is there to prevent. The rationale was "Violations of the Biographies of living persons" which would theoretically be an exception, but I don't see how lists of awards would qualify, nor can I conceive that the majority of admin would agree, per the exceptions. TRM's actions are a different story, and the edit warring could have been handled here or by any uninvolved admin. Not sure what to do there. The block duration is fine, but the rationale is wrong, as is the blocking party. There isn't much we can do at ANI about that, and the loss of RFC/U means ARB is the only possible venue to even hear the case. That is where it needs to be. Either way, I think you did the right thing with what you had to work with, George. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 22:21, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• For uncontentious facts, it's better to use {{cn}}, even on a BLP. Removing very-likely-true-and-harmless-if-mistaken facts is really not protecting anyone from anything, which is the main purpose of BLP policy; BLP isn't a tool in a game of Nomic. There's no justification to wield the BLP Hammer here. This wholesale removal of facts, which editors were in the process of sourcing, serves no purpose. Jesus, just give them a couple of days to source everything. Save the BLP card for when it's really needed, like when someone's reputation is at stake. Using it as an ace in the hole here devalues WP:BLP - makes it less likely to be respected in the future as a legitimate rationale.

As for the blocks: Kww's was way out of order, and I was a keystroke away from undoing it when I saw Kww had been blocked too, and I (uncharacteristically) decided to not to act unilaterally once I saw it was getting more complicated. He was "involved", and (this is an aside, not my main argument) Philip Seymour Hoffman is not a BLP. His death a year and a half ago doesn't count as "recent". So if nothing else, Kww was involved in an edit war and was using BLP as a justification when it wasn't. And blocked the person he was in a non-BLP dispute with.

I'd strongly suggest both be unblocked so they can participate in the discussion here. Both were handling this suboptimally, but if I have to choose sides, Kww's behavior here was shameful, while TRM's was just dumb. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:21, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Additional note: See here: User_talk:Georgewilliamherbert#Trying_to_nip_in_the_bud, where GWH says he's Ok with someone unblocking both so they can participate here. I have to leave, so in case there's some kind of fallout I'm not going to do that myself, but I suggest an uninvolved admin consider it. Might help throw water on the fire. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:28, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Certainly seems to be the textbook definition on an involved block; I don't see any way in which BLP issues are even close to excusing it. An unblock for TRM, at least, is in order; I think I'm going to go do that. Unblocking Kww to participate makes sense, I suppose. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 22:34, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

KWW was on the correct side of policy until the decision to use admin tools when involved in a content dispute. It would have been better to bring TRM's behaviour to public scrutiny. I think neither party comes out well in the end, I suggest we let the blocks expire(no objection to unblocking for the purposes of participating in this discussion of course). I think that George's block was reasonable given the circumstances. Chillum 22:36, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

No he wasn't Chiillum. Another example of your piss poor understanding of content.♦ Dr. Blofeld 07:32, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

The burden of verifying something before replacing it once challenged is clear in our policy. I think you just enjoy finding fault in me. Chillum 15:49, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Unblocking both seems sensible. Neither user has covered themselves in glory here, but the big concern for me is Kww's clearly involved block. Might be the sort of thing ArbCom needs to sort out. Jenks24 (talk) 22:38, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

TRM has been unblocked. I think it's only fair that Kww also be unblocked so that both can contribute here. Unblocking one and not the other isn't going to help. Bretonbanquet (talk) 22:49, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Per this discussion I have unblocked KWW and urged him to discuss here. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:57, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Kww abused his tools. He should be desysopped let alone anything else. Cassianto^Talk 22:58, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

As for why I blocked TRM, that wasn't until his disruption spread to List of awards and nominations received by Hugh Jackman. Take a look at the timeline:

1. TRM undoes a three-week old edit on the Hugh Jackman article, using an unsuitable user-generated section of IMDB as a source
2. he restores it after I pointed out that his source was unsuitable
3. he adds a source that doesn't substantiate most of the material he added
4. After I clean out some of the unsubstantiated material, he reverts
5. I warn that I will block
6. I revert, specifically calling out BLP and BURDEN. This is Hugh Jackman, BTW, no doubt that he's alive

1. he reverts again
2. And finally, I block him.

As I've said, no different than I would have treated any other editor that insisted on edit-warring unsourced material into a BLP. TRM's experience level doesn't give him special privileges in that regard.—Kww(talk) 23:01, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

You are still not addressing any of the criticisms; if you do not adequately do so, I will file an arbcom case promptly. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 23:02, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

20 minutes. I am at work, and have to do what I'm paid for.—Kww(talk) 23:06, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

(by promptly I mean like, tomorrow IF there's no progress on meaningful discussion... I don't mean, drop everything in your life and bring me a shrubbery right now. Sorry if I left that impression...) Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 23:28, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Using your example, you deleting sections of what he was working on just three minutes after his last edit [15], which was just the first of seven edits deleting wholesale the awards. He was actively working on and sourcing them when you did this.

I would also note that WP:BLP is meant to protect living persons from negative material about them, it isn't a catch all for any content whatsoever in an article about them. Adding an prestigious award may or may not be correct, but it isn't what BLP was designed to "protect" them from, so claiming an exception to 3RR isn't really valid here. And that makes you WP:INVOLVED, even if not intentional. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 23:08, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

OK,

1. This isn't a content dispute. It began as intentional policy violations by TRM, policy violations that he has never acknowledged and shows no sign of understanding.
2. As to the contention that TRM was somehow justified: no. His "last edit" was a wholesale restoration of unsourced material. That's not in line with either the letter or spirit of either WP:V or WP:BLP: the citation had to be in place when he restored the material, not at some unspecified time after. At the time he began disrupting List of awards and nominations received by Hugh Jackman, it's not clear that he had found a single acceptable source.
3. BLP is intended to prevent inaccurate material about living people. Both unsourced praise and unsourced criticism fall under it. The notion that the material has to be malevolent is inaccurate. From the nutshell: "Contentious material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced – whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable – should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." WP:BLP clearly and unambiguously applies to the material I had removed and TRM was inserting. Winning an award is a contentious item, as miscrediting the award does do harm to the person that actually won.
4. WP:INVOLVED shouldn't apply here, because of the "One important caveat is that an administrator who has interacted with an editor or topic area purely in an administrative role, or whose prior involvements are minor or obvious edits which do not speak to bias, is not involved and is not prevented from acting in an administrative capacity in relation to that editor or topic area" applies. I don't have any involvement with TRM, and my involvement with the area is strictly administrative: I remove material that isn't sourced sufficiently to satisfy WP:BLP and WP:V. As for Hoffman being covered by WP:BLP, there's legitimate dispute there: I had thought the time limit was two years, but I see that it is phrased more softly than that, with the expiration coming between 6 months and 2 years, depending on nebulous factors. However, as the timeline shows, TRM was blocked for disrupting the Hugh Jackman article: no nebulosity there at all.—Kww(talk) 23:37, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Removing unsourced material is the act of an editor, not an admin. Thus, this was a content dispute, and so you were involved. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 23:44, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Removing BLP violations isn't acting in an administrative capacity? That's an interesting assertion, but not one that I think would have wide support.—Kww(talk) 23:57, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Asserting one's actions are "removing BLP violations" is not a trump card that makes your actions outside of scrutiny. The actual action should actually be "removing BLP violations". Your claim of them as such is not enough to make it so. If you want to know whether or not they were clear BLP violations, read this discussion for consensus. --Jayron32 03:00, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• WK, if the BLP is invoked, the implication is that it's not a content dispute, and I believe we have to take the admin at good faith (Jayron, whether something is a BLP violation or not is frequently up for debate). Part of protecting the BLP is protecting the protectors. That's not to say that Kww's invocation of the BLP here was reasonable; I have no opinion on that right now, but AGF should extend to these cases. If an admin in all honesty makes a reasonable claim that they are protecting the BLP, we should accept that. Drmies (talk) 04:53, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• @Drmies: To the extent of blocking the other party in a dispute? No, I don't think I agree. I could see the normal exception in WP:INVOLVED being invoked (i.e. straightforward case...obvious action...any reasonable admin would have [done] the same) in such a case, which as always is used at one's peril, but I don't think that invoking a BLP gives one a blanket exception to the policy against involved blocks; that's too slippery a slope. The ability to judge a situation dispassionately is too often the first thing to go in a dispute, and blocks specifically are too powerful a tool to be used in its possible absence. (Keep in mind that I am talking about only Kww's block of TRM here, not any other aspect of the situation.) Other admin tools, like deletion or page protection, might be a different story. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 16:17, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Oh, User:Writ Keeper, I wasn't talking about the block. I haven't read everything here yet, much less followed the diffs, but that block smells bad a mile away. I mean, most blocks stink, of course, but if one makes a block like this, even when uninvolved (and I have not yet measures, let alone judged Kww's supposed involvement here), it should be a reasonably crystal-clear BLP violation, not some business about getting awards or someone putting them in one article and thus denying them of another subject, or something like that. Drmies (talk) 20:18, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• (Non-administrator comment) Either ArbCom both, or ArbCom neither, here. I lean in the direction of "ArbCom" neither, as this is mostly silliness, not malevolence... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 23:22, 24 June 2015 (UTC)
  • No, ArbCom is invoked here for alleged abuse of tools, which, if I understand it correctly, applies only to one of the two. Drmies (talk) 04:53, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Déjà vu. An editor was AE-blocked for a week earlier this year for re-adding unsourced or poorly sourced (IMDB) awards section. Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard/Archive215#Is_it_okay_to_add_back_a_completely_unsourced_awards_sect_about_BLPs.3F --NeilN ^{talk to me} 23:36, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Certainly was. I had forgotten that case: Cwobeel was AE-blocked for behaving precisely and exactly as TRM was doing.—Kww(talk) 23:42, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• That entire thread at AE is about how it is no big deal, followed by a week long block. Have we long our collective minds? Utterly overkill, and if actually enforced evenly, we would be blocking hundreds of people per day, none with any intent of malice. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 23:48, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Actually, most of this is prevented by filter 661, which prevents a very large subset of these edits from occurring in the first place. There are leaks, but generally the only time it becomes a problem is when someone edit-wars to preserve the BLP violations that have accumulated in an existing awards article. The filter was the only solution I could come up with that corrected the problem without creating these tempests.—Kww(talk) 23:57, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• As quoted above from BLP "Contentious material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced – whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable – should be removed immediately" (emphasis added.) Enlighten me, just how was this content "Contentious"? I understand that not all contentious content is negative (although BLP is most often cited in connection with negative content), but it can't reasonably mean "all content". What is being defined as "Contentious" here? DES ^(talk) 23:56, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• Miscredited material damages the person that legitimately won the award. How do we ensure that material isn't miscredited? Citations to reliable sources.—Kww(talk) 23:58, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

• I don't agree. By that standard, pretty much all content in a BLP is "contentious" as it could always indirectly affect someone if it is inaccurate. I think there needs to be a good faith belief that it is actually incorrect or likely to be incorrect, or else a request for sources that has not been responded to for a significant length of time, before this sort of BLP removal applies to not obviously contentious content. DES ^(talk) 00:22, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Obvious involved block by KWW, but the worst part is the wikilawyering above about how WP:INVOLVED should not apply here... which sounds like "I'm ready to do it again". Right or wrong he was about the contents of the edit warring(s), his interpretation of WP:INVOLVED boundaries is clearly silly nonsense. Kww should drop the stick and recognize he was patently wrong, otherwise that's probably stuff for Arbcom. Cavarrone 00:02, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Regardless of BLP our verifiability policy is clear about burden, but that is hardly the point. You were involved in a dispute over content, it was your edits that were being reverted. Another admin should have made the call. Chillum 00:01, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Textbook involved block. Unforgivable. I'm looking for serious sanctions here against KWW. --Dweller (talk) 00:02, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Instead of a pound of flesh would you be happy with a recognition of error and a promise to not repeat it? I would. Chillum 00:07, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Between the bizarre interpretation of BLP ("it's contentious because I say it's contentious", seems to be the flavour) blocking another admin in breach of involved and the self-righteous issue-avoiding responses on the topic, I've lost a fair whack of faith in KWW and I'm not entirely sure that recognition of error and promises not to repeat (even if forthcoming, never mind the grovelling apology that's due) will restore it. --Dweller (talk) 00:15, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Are we really prepared to state that removing BLP violations creates involvement? Given the AE decision, the notion that the edits weren't BLP violations don't hold water. We certainly don't believe that admins that revert and remove vandalism become involved as a result, so I do not see why BLP violation would be treated differently.—Kww(talk) 00:12, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• It seems that collectively, we are resorting to blocks way to quick to start with (and with much too cavalier an attitude about it), plus the involvement, plus the lack of acknowledgement. You can't promise to not repeat what you don't claim to understand or be guilty of. At least not sincerely. Maybe we need to sleep on it, but this isn't a singular or trivial issue in my eyes. At the very least, I want more clarity than an apology can offer. I'm I really expected to block someone for adding back an award on a BLP? If not, where is the consistency? Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:15, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Why yes, Dennis, if you notice people inserting unsourced material into BLPs, I expect you to remove it. If editors persist in inserting the material without providing citations, I expect you to block them for doing so.—Kww(talk) 00:38, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Regarding the comparison with the earlier AE - I think it's clear that Cwobeel was not making an effort to put in generally reliable sources on articles and did this repeatedly over months without fixing things. TRM did by the time he was done with (at least the Hoffman one) put in a long list including The Guardian, Bafta, the Golden Globes, NY Times, film critics groups who issue awards, etc. That result appears to me to match our community expectations and policies on source reliability and coverage. Even if we grant you the "contentious material" point, which I do not, refusing to allow sufficient time to put in reliable sources which one is in fact doing is the problem. The "immediately" does not reasonably mean "without exception and without allowing someone any time whatsoever to source something".

You appear to be asserting that it does, and if that's really going to be your final position, then this will end up at Arbcom. Much less the speed of escalation or the block involvement. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:17, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment(uninvolved non admin) Its a shame, and the actions here, edit warring by both, and and an involved block and then twisting policy to try and sweep it under a rug are far from what should be expected from admins. They should be examples of good behaviour not bad. Definitely an ARBCOM case in the making. Actions like this are why some question admin actions and put a mark on all admins. AlbinoFerret 00:19, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Just to make absolutely clear, I AM asserting that the edits were not a violation of BLP per the prior AE finding, prior WP history and community expectations. The prior AE was regarding ongoing patterns of edits that were never adequately sourced, not edits which were in the process of being adequately sourced in a prompt and ongoing manner. Cwobeel never fixed the problem. TRM was fixing the problem with what clearly appears to be a correct result (to me), and you allowed him no room to do so. Your rules and prior case interpretation are evidently so literal that your judgement is suspect. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:21, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

If we're in the practice of making things absolutely clear, I'm asserting that the sourcing needs to be provided prior to the restoration. None of this storm would have occurred if TRM had followed the basics of WP:V, much less WP:BLP, by restoring the material after he had found sources to substantiate it. His repeated insertions of IMDB, his edit warring over individual items that were not covered by his new sources while not providing citations, his repeated insults and attacks, all made it clear that he had no intention of abiding by our fundamental sourcing policies. If you can excuse this misbehaviour, I will point at your judgement as being suspect. This was, and remains, a case of an editor intentionally violating WP:BLP and WP:V.—Kww(talk) 00:33, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Go back to the Hoffman article. As it stands, when he was done, please tell me if you believe that the end result of his editing work was a standards compliant sourced article or not. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:39, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Well, let's see: he reverted in a set of unsourced awards and as of now, he has never introduced a source that substantiates that material, so no. There are numerous other awards in the "Film Critics Award" and "Miscellaneous Awards" sections that have no sources, such as the IGN awards, Gransito awards, Gold Derby awards, the International Online Film Critic award, the Venice Volpi cup, the Utah Film Critics awards, and more. Have you been defending his edits without checking to make certain that the sources he supplied actually substantiated his edits? That's the point: he restored challenged material without providing any substantiating sources, in violation of WP:V, much less WP:BLP. He provided sources that substantiated about half the article, and then tried to claim he was done.—Kww(talk) 00:52, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

The specifics of what's still not sourced adequately to your or policy satisfaction makes for a perfectly good article or user talk page discussion.

The question of whether his "done" point is good enough makes for another one.

The point is, you have now acknowledged that at least half of what he restored now *is* adequately sourced. You repeatedly acted in ways which attempted to frustrate giving him enough space and time to do at least that much sourcing and improvement work.

The point also is, whether the material is justifiably describable as controversial or as normal content (which, though needing correct sourcing, would not require immediate draconian action, much less edit warring).

The point also is, whether it is reasonable to read the policy or prior precedent in such a manner that prior fixes of the sourcing problems are required before re-adding material in general.

The point nearly finally is, whether any of this was suitably serious of a violation to edit war over, act in an escalating confrontational manner in general, issue warnings and finally a block over, versus being something which should have been fixed in the normal way of things with discussion. In other words, was it abusive behavior or merely imperfect editing.

And lastly, whether the block was involved or not.

As I said elsewhere, TRM could have fixed this by acting differently. That's not the question. The questions are whether he actually edit warred (probably), introduced false or bad or controversial material by normal standards of controversy (probably not), introduced not yet sourced material (true), eventually corrected much of the lack of sourcing (you have yourself admitted, at least half of it he did). This picture, from a normal non-involved viewpoint, does not argue that edit warring to stop him, warning him, or blocking him were good choices, much less policy supported. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:11, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Actually, since his material about Vancouver contradicts the only source that he provided about Vancouver, I would say that he did probably introduce false material. I reverted obvious and intentional violations of our sourcing policies that were being accompanied by abusive edit summaries and talk page comments that made it clear that he had no intention of complying with them. As for whether his "done" point is "good enough", no, that is not a point of discussion. The material had been challenged. He had restored it against WP:BURDEN, and has not found references that support it. There is no policy-based argument for keeping such material. Sourcing about "half" of one's edits while reverting against both WP:BLP and WP:BURDEN is not some kind of success marker: it's a sign of absolute and abject failure to comply with WP:V, especially given that the article he was eventually blocked for was unequivocally a BLP.—Kww(talk) 01:55, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Kww, you have a such a monumentally WP:IDONTHEARYOU attitdue to all this, that I am staggered as to how you became an admin in the first place. This is not the first place that you have shown such an inflexible and arrogant stance, while hiding behind your interpretation of rules that everyone else sees differently. However you try and twist things, you were WP:INVOLVED. That's not the sign of good admin, but it is somthing that is a massive red flag to all. Sadly I suspect you'll dodge an ArbCom bullet in this instance, but unless you start changing your approach and attitude, your admin days will be severly numbered. - SchroCat (talk) 07:23, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Sadly, this is not surprising in the least. Recently, an ArbCom case was filed against Kww and I added to it, warning the committee that I had seen problems in Kww's behavior. He seems to assume his biases are neutral POV, and therefore, everyone who disagrees with him is breaking policy. So edit warring is restoring an encyclopedia against disruptive editors, and it doesn't matter to be civil towards them because they're second class Wikipedians. Edit warring, disruption, incivility, all in the name of preserving the encyclopedia, of course. So it comes as no surprise to me that he edit warred here and abused his tools, it wasn't hard to see this coming. LesVegas (talk) 00:35, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Really? So we're just going to ignore the elephant in the room? It takes two to tango, and this wasn't the isolated actions of a single Admin. Was Kww blameless or "innocent" here? Heck no! But I've seen enough from The Rambling Man to have concerns on that end as well. Again, if this goes to ArbCom, the actions of both Admins should be examined here. If this turns into a "let's lynch Kww" (who, in my experience, I've found to be one of the better Admins at smoking out socks and vandals), I'll swiftly be joining the camp whove lost confidence in the Admin corps in general. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 00:43, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

The Rambling Man could have de-escalated or proposed sources on talk or could have edited sources into a sandbox version or several other approaches. I think that those are obvious and givens. That said; "it takes two to tango" does not mean that both parties actually did something worthy of an arbcom case. I think looking at both in the incident would be unavoidable, but the amount of button pushing seemed asymmetrical. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:52, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

All he had to do was not violate WP:V by restoring challenged material without providing an inline citation that supported the material he had provided, and especially not do it with respect to BLPs. That's not some major expectation that is beyond his capacity. As it stands, many of the claims in the article still aren't supported by citations.—Kww(talk) 00:57, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Sure, if you view it in isolation, and ignore the pattern of behavior... Anyway, I can already tell this isn't going to end well. For the project. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 00:59, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

For the Watch. Arkon (talk) 01:01, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment (Edit conflict with several) (Following up Dennis's post of 23:08). I agree with Dennis that this looks like WP:CRYBLP rather than a valid BLP issue. Kww also described the reversions on the PSH list as challenging the list's veracity[16] which is obviously an editorial choice (thus, involvement), though he also considered the PSH award list edits to also be under BLP[17]. A few seconds with a search engine was enough to verify several of the awards, so this all comes across to me as Kww trying to make a POINT (one that in my opinion didn't need to be made). PSH's more important awards are also already listed and cited in the main PSH biography article, which as an FA has presumably been carefully vetted, also deflating the BLP argument if the disputed awards were the relatively minor ones. Anyway, wiping out the whole list was excessive. I'll leave aside the block issue for now, but at minimum I see battleground conduct backed by bureaucratic overzealousness and/or seriously lousy editing judgment here. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 00:43, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Kww have you lost your mind?? These are famous actors who win oodles of awards, much of which can be verified with some digging. Saying this is contentious is really pushing it to justify edit-warring while involved. This behaviour is extremely punitive to all content-editors and undermines what's left of the egalitarian nature of this place. You could have looked and found sources but your nose was out of joint so you turned it into a battleground. If we apply this behaviour across the 'pedia, we'd have no editors. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 01:08, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

NB: As Kww has no insight into the problem, I suggest a case be filed at arbitration for misuse of tools. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 01:10, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I belive it's true that an arbitratable issue is involved, but I don't believe it's hopeless than KWW can be shown the error of his ways through discussion. We should only file cases we can't deal with otherwise. We're not there yet. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:14, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't think it was normal edit warring in the sense of trying to push an opinion about the events described in the article. It seems to have been more about imposing an absolutist approach to Wikipedia policy enforcement (WP:BURO) for its own sake, in a situation where it wasn't helpful in the slightest. It would be great if Kww could lighten up about this, and realize that Wikipedia policies are means to an end, rather than ends in themselves. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 01:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• I echo the multiple people who note the WP:INVOLVED nature of this. Whether or not TRM needed to be blocked for edit warring or not is now irrelevant. If he did, KWW needed only reporting him at WP:ANEW. There's hundreds of active admins, someone would have taken care of it. Admins should not use their tools when interacting with people whom they are in an active dispute. This is a textbook case of an involved block. It may or may not have even been a bad block, but that's now irrelevant. I'm not sure any firm action needs to be taken against KWW, except WP:TROUT and to log this in our collective personal memories incase this becomes a pattern, though. It was a bad action, but I don't see evidence that it was more than a singular, isolated bad action, and I don't believe we need to arbitrate or demand resignation or anything else like that. We don't even need an apology, an allocution, an admission or anything like that. It'd be nice, but really what we need is just to all know that KWW has done this once, and if it becomes a pattern, act later. It's documented, it's almost universally agreed to be a bad thing, and we should move on and just keep an eye open for further problems. --Jayron32 01:25, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• If an admin is unable to understand when a block is legitimate or not, when WP:INVOLVED applies and how to proceed in case of content disputes and edit warring, he is unfit to use the block buttons. Competence is required, let alone measure and common sense. And the major issue is not the block, but the persistence by KWW to justify it through a biased interpretation of WP:INVOLVED. So far, his responses read like "I'm ready to do everything I did again", which is unacceptable. Cavarrone 01:45, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Meh. People say stupid shit in the middle of an argument all the time. Have they actually used their tools inappropriately after everyone has told them it was inappropriate? If they haven't, we can chalk it all up to "people saying stupid shit when they are angry". If they DO use their tools inappropriately again, then we have something to work on. But I generally tend to ignore the bullshit people yell when they are pissed, because it is meaningless. --Jayron32 01:51, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• The protection war with Philippe a while back[18] didn't involve blocking anyone but it did involve tools, and resulted in an arbcom admonition. The tool use seems like a technicality in both cases though. The issue as I see it is poor judgement combined with an overbearing attitude. I wish he would use a much different approach. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 02:02, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Actually, Jayron, if you believe I am writing this way because I am angry, you are only partially right. I am a little torqued, but it is primarily because people seem to be treating this as a content dispute, and that's primarily because of TRM's involvement. WP:BURDEN and WP:BLP, combined with a supporting AE decision, make this pretty much black-letter law. I remove unsourced material from award articles all the time: it's one of our chronic forms of BLP violation. I warn editors that restore that unsourced material all the time. If someone insists on restoring unsourced material to a BLP, I routinely block them. It's not some case of me getting a hair up my ass about article content in any way that's different from reverting vandalism or other, more egregious BLP violations. What happened today was that the editor that chose to violate policy has a support base and people are more inclined to look upon it as a content dispute for that reason. If this had been an IP editor inserting unsourced claims about K-Pop bands, no one would have batted an eye.—Kww(talk) 02:04, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• There's hundreds of active admins. You didn't have to be the one to do it. You're right, if this had been someone you'd not recently interacted with, no one would bat an eye. If it is a person you have a recent history with, ask for outside help. That's the proper way to do it. --Jayron32 02:14, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• I cannot remember any time in history that I have had a content dispute with The Rambling Man. Today was strictly about behaviour from the start.—Kww(talk) 02:23, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• You were in one with him. On multiple articles. Immediately before you blocked him. As others have pointed out, WP:BLP is not a license to edit war indiscriminately on BLP articles, nor does it mean you can just block someone because you don't like what they are doing on a BLP. Even if what they are doing is unreferenced for a few minutes. If you are unsure as to whether or not others would have blocked TRM in this case, look around at this discussion. Almost unilaterally, no one else would have. Your argument is invalid. If you had asked here or at WP:ANEW before blocking them, consensus would have been to not block them. Ergo, you're wrong. Any other ex-post-facto justification of your block is invalid. If you are going back and forth with an editor on any issue except eggregious vandalism or negative unsourced information about a BLP, it is your responsibility to ask another admin to do the review the situation. And again, if you're belief is "maybe it was negative". Read this discussion. No it wasn't. So just stop. --Jayron32 02:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Let me clear up any confusion: I'm not TRM's fan. The dismissive and ease of which you are saying you block someone over them adding an award bothers me, particularly since it isn't exactly a great way to keep new editors and smacks of the love of rules over the end product (an encyclopedia), but the involved issue is the biggest concern. But again, my comments are not due to any love for TRM. Assigning the concern to a fan base would be a big mistake here. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 02:17, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Kww: Alternately; you're overreacting to editors generally known to do good editing, and rather than AGF with them you treated them like IP editors inserting random garbage, which is all sorts of wrong.

It's not "just" a content dispute (on Hugh Jackman, that's a BLP) but you cried BLP on the Hoffman Awards list article and picked a fight with TRM, when everyone else above seems to agree that was the wrong thing for you to have done, and there seems consensus your application of BLP there was defective. That seems to have set the stage for whatever came next. Which took a grand total of 16 minutes and 11 of your reverts there, two warnings on TRM's talk page neither of which specified which article and which edits you meant.

And you did not evidently give him sufficient time to make similar cleanups there as he'd done with the other one.

Dude, sixteen minutes. You reverted 11 times, in sixteen minutes, without talking to him about the specifics or letting him fix things he was clearly in process of at least partly fixing.

If your trigger is set that sensitively, it's off. You need to stop that. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:23, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

(clarification) that's 11 times in 16 minutes on the Hugh Jackman article, which is the now-specified reason for the block (not clear at the time). Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:25, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Are you seriously claiming that TRM needs to be given specific instructions about what it means for a citation to support the material he is adding? That TRM did not know that the material he was restoring wasn't supported by inline citations at the time he made the restoration? And as for the eleven reverts, please: sequential reverts count as one revert. You would rather that I hadn't taken the time to look at the material he was adding and only removed the violating sections? I picked through his wholesale reversion and only removed the points that still violated policy after he had added an incomplete source.—Kww(talk) 02:38, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• (ec) I don't think I'm part of TRM's support base, and I do think (as others have said here) that reverting uncontentious and undisputed material is much different from reverting vandalism or egregious BLP vios. Treating stuff like that as a binary rather than a matter of good judgment is what I mean by absolutism and bureaucracy. And a good faith challenge over sourcing requires (IMHO) a material concern that the stuff being challenged is actually erroneous. While it's true that the BURDEN is on the one who put it there, challenging verifiable material (especially uncontentious material) too many times is either a battleground problem or a competence problem, take your pick. Per WP:AGF we are not supposed to treat people's edits as vandalism unless there's actual evidence of a problem. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 02:18, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• (ec) I'm torn. (Not about wanting to hit KWW with the fish, 'cause I'm completely on board with that.) Part of me agrees with Jayron32 that we should stick this in our brains in case a pattern emerges, and if that's what everybody wants to do, I'm okay with that. OTOH, I have two worries. The first has to do with something KWW said to Jayron32 above, about an IP editor inserting unsourced claims, and it is that we wouldn't be here munching popcorn and watching the show if TRM weren't an admin. This would have been a regular old unblock request, through a regular old procedure, and we might maybe possibly could have a thread about it here hours or even days later. The lack of scrutiny prior to today's events could be enough to have Arbcom examine KWW's past admin behavior. My second concern is that it appears that if KWW himself has any argument with any phrase in any article/list about a BLP, he believes it to be "contentious," and that's not what I take the BLP policy to mean. It does not require or encourage the removal of all unsourced statements. If KWW really thinks it does, that's a problem, and it certainly appears that is indeed the case. KrakatoaKatie 02:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• "Contentious" simply means that any reasonable person might believe the claim to be untrue. That does apply to most facts, yes, and WP:BLUE doesn't apply to winning regional film awards. I think Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive160#Cwobeel makes it pretty clear that these kind of additions do fail WP:BLP. I may not have remembered this exact case earlier, but I was a participant in the discussion and have taken numerous actions based on its conclusions. I do so habitually and without relying on some list of links to previous discussions.—Kww(talk) 02:51, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Cwobeel was a problem in that he repeatedly failed to properly reliably source, over months, despite many warnings and much chance to do the right thing. You've already admitted that even by your standards TRM at least half-correctly sourced the changes on the Hoffman article, and you aren't disputing the timeline that shows that you didn't give him a fair chance to try to do so on the Jackman article.

Even if you dispute eventualism, failing to give TRM 16 revert-free minutes to make fixes is nowhere near the same as months.

The situations are not comparable. That you keep coming back to Cwobeel is part of the indication of a problem. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:57, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

"Contentious" simply means that any reasonable person might believe the claim to be untrue. Kww, that is a drastic stretch or attempt to redefine the English language, to the point where the word means nothing and there was no reason to include it in the policy page. I'll go with wikt:contentious: "1. Marked by heated arguments or controversy. [quotations ▼] 2. Given to struggling with others out of jealousy or discord." I can't imagine a sane BLPN discussion that would find those award mentions to be contentious, unless there was an ongoing dispute or issue with someone with a history of making bad edits. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 03:30, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Your right that Kww's reading would make our use of the word contentious superfluous. But I would adopt a much more expansive interpretation: first, if someone is making a good faith claim that something in a BLP is not just uncited, but is factually wrong, its contentious under BLP policy. And second, all negative assertions about a living person should be considered automatically contentious. BLP has never required a citation for every single positive factual claim about a living person, and it shouldn't be read to do so. Monty₈₄₅ 04:06, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I'd say if you think something uncited might be factually wrong, you can revert it under WP:V without regard to whether it's a BLP article or not, as a content decision. While if it's a contentious claim in a BLP (and if it's negative, it's presumptively controversial and therefore contentious) you must revert it as a policy matter. The difference is if you make content decisions about an article, you are editorially involved in it and should stay away from it administratively.

I'll also add that the practice of flat-out removing stuff on suspicion of problems or DONTLIKE is obnoxious even if the stuff really isn't in good enough shape for the article (plausible uncited claim that you have good faith doubts about). The right thing to do is transfer it to the talk page and say what the problem is, per WP:PRESERVE which is a part of WP:Editing policy that nobody seems to remember. The talk post then alerts other editors of the issue, and maybe someone can find a good citation or figure out that it's actually a misstatement of something verifiable, etc. (Obviously there are exceptions like bad BLP vios). What happens now is the stuff just disappears and the only way to find it is by grovelling through the article's revision history, looking at piles of edits that turn out to be contentless, and often made by de facto unflagged and unapproved bots. Hope that's not too tangential. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 05:48, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• I was catching up on this thread and almost commented earlier, at which time I would have said "per Jayron32". But I got pulled away, and now that I've come back, and seen the adamant "I'm right you're all wrong" position... I'm starting to think there's a more serious problem, if Kww is unwilling to accept a fairly clear consensus about interpreting BLP (not, as he seems to think, about whether BLP is important or not, or needs to be "enforced" or not, but on interpreting what it means). He doens't need to agree, but he needs to accept consensus is against him - this was not "BLP enforcement" in any meaningful interpretation of the term. I remember that stupid ArbCom case someone above refered to (I was one of the Arbs, though in the minority): I opposed any sanction on Kww because the rules were being interpreted in a strict, sanctimonious, irrational way, to browbeat someone who was doing something that was actually fairly reasonable. But now it's Kww interpreting rules in a strict, sanctimonious, irrational way, to browbeat someone who was actively trying to do something about the problem (albeit in typical über-grump unproductive fashion). ArbCom was wrong to sanction Kww then, but Kww was wrong to block TRM now. If he doesn't see that, if he's going to stay in IDHT mode, then I'm not sure leaving this until it happens again is the best approach. Probably best to let him sleep on it. --Floquenbeam (talk) 02:57, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• I've certainly gotten the drift that many people don't think unsourced awards violate WP:BLP (although their reasoning eludes me). What seems to be happening here, however, is that people don't even wish to view TRM's edits through the lens of WP:V. There was nothing so urgent about having a list of awards for anybody that justified restoring the material prior to providing a source. Even if you all line up and say that everything I believe WP:BLP means is wrong and I just have to accept it, when did WP:BURDEN lose all of its teeth? Why is everyone so sympathetic to the restoration of unsourced material? Georgewilliamherbert keeps hammering at me for the "speed" with which I undid TRM's edits without noting that it was a sequence problem: if TRM had found sources for his material, added them, and then hit the "save" button, there wouldn't have been any reverts at all. I gave him his fair chance: I looked over his edits, removed only the material that remained unsourced while preserving every part of his additions that met policy. He responded by restoring them all en masse without providing a single source to back them up.—Kww(talk) 03:14, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Yet you've admitted he fixed at least half of it on the Hoffman article, given time (despite the edit warring). That demonstrates that he was making progress towards an article adequately sourced by community standards.

Getting into the edit war was not the right response, you were assuming bad faith and not allowing reasonable time for him to work on fixes to the article. The faster you go on these things the more it blows up in your face. You should have been able to tell from the first valid reliable sources on the first article that he was working in the right direction. Failure to AGF on that point and let him work on it some is the problem. You responded like they were outright vandalism, not works-in-progress. You can't treat known-good editor making in-progress-eventually-good-edits like a vandal. If you disagree with the incremental manner you ask them to sandbox or talk page, not edit war over it. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:22, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Well, I did tell him the acceptable sequence, which he proceeded to ignore. Somehow, his constant use of the words "pathetic", "vindictive", and "ongoing destruction" didn't reassure me much.—Kww(talk) 03:43, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Starting that (linked) discussion with "Do not..." kind of makes my point, not yours. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:58, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I will ask you to bear context in mind: even if we 100% accept your perspective that I was dead wrong about it being a BLP problem, at the time I was interacting, I sincerely believed that I was dealing with an editor that was intentionally inserting BLP violations. That tends to influence my tone and demeanour.—Kww(talk) 06:32, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

TRM's response wasn't ideal, but I somewhat understand the dynamic. Sitush said something recently that stuck with me: "Content creation is a world that too many policers do not understand... In situations such as this, the stalker has the advantage because we all makes mistakes in content from time to time but the stalker only has to find one to push the button"[19] (referencing a dispute unrelated to this one and whose details aren't relevant here). There's an understandable impatience that content editors have when they're told how to edit by people who don't write content themselves. Best thing to do is lead by example instead of acting like a supervisor and expecting people to respond like underlings. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 06:01, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

KWW, regardless, the appropriate response to someone actively working on an article, and slowly adding refs is not "edit war, edit war, edit war, scream WP:BLP, then block". The appropriate response is slow down, let them finish their work, and ask for outside input. If TRM had no intention of providing refs, then such lack of intention would have become evident if you had allowed them time to do it the wrong way. Instead, you edit warred repeatedly, played the BLP trump card, and blocked them. Now we're here discussing your behavior, and more than one person above have called for your tools because of it. If you'd done nothing for 24 hours, and TRM had actually done the wrong thing you're claiming you think they were going to do before you stopped them, we'd not be having this discussion at all. There's no loss to the encyclopedia if you actually let someone break the rules a bit before blocking them, rather than stopping them before they have a chance to break a rule you think they might be on the path to breaking. --Jayron32 03:27, 25 June 2015 (UTC)t

Actually, TRM wasn't adding any material to any article; he was replacing the mass deletions or blankings that Kww had made without any warning, discussion, consensus, attempt at finding/providing references, or even tagging. Kww seems to have conflated part of the Cwobeel AE discussion into blanket permission for him to mass delete from any and all awards articles or lists as he pleases, and either block or edit war if his mass deletions are attempted to be reverted. It is a longstanding principle and guideline that the correct way to remedy a list or list article that may need, or would benefit from, additional citations is to either (1) discuss the issue on Talk regarding the most pressing of the concerns and enlist help or input, (2) place "citation needed" tag(s) on the item(s) that seem problematic, (3) place a refimprove tag at the top, and/or (4) better yet, provide the needed citations oneself. Softlavender (talk) 06:36, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• It seems to me that there are at least two different readings of "Contentious material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced – whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable – should be removed immediately" and to avoid further dustups like this we should either remove the word contentious or the words "– whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable –" this would either give us what seems to be KWW's position "material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced – whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable – should be removed immediately" or what I suspect may be the Rambling Man's "Contentious material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced should be removed immediately". Either option would be shorter and clearer, on balance I prefer "Contentious material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced should be removed immediately". But we need to clarify the situation because this is not the only occasion where people have clashed due to different interpretations of the same policy. ϢereSpielChequers 14:53, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

  The problem there is that we end up with people wikilawyering that unsourced, contentions positive statements fall outside of BLP, which I think is not the intention. The word "contentious" is the problem. By definition, this became contentious as soon as Kww objected. As such, the most literal interpretation of the policy backs Kww (insofar as the Jackman article is concerned) - though that essentially creates a first mover advantage. The question, however, is what a reasonable person would expect. And in my view, it is reasonable to think that an unsourced list of awards can be allowed for a short period of time when challenged. I think Kww was right to challenge, and certainly right to challenge IMDB. But reasonably, he should have allowed TRM time to sufficiently source. So from that perspective - and despite obviously lacking some background interaction between the two - my read is that Kww started the edit war on the Hoffman awards page (not a BLP) and improperly cited BLP as an argument. Consequently, I don't believe he had the 3RR exemption he thought he did, and he certainly was INVOLVED in a content dispute. However, I have to wonder just what TRM was doing to go to the Jackman awards article specifically to revert Kww's clearing of that page from three weeks ago. I find it hard to view that as anything but WP:POINT and a conscious decision to open up a second front on their little battle as that was little more than an effort to provoke. Resolute 15:27, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

  The best read I've seen on this so far. Challenging was fine, blocking this early would have been wrong from any admin as overkill, no less an involved admin. TRM isn't innocent, his issues just pale in comparison. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 15:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

  Hi Resolute. I suspect that one problem we have is that one person's positive statement is another person's contentious one. But more pertinently, my reading of the current policy is that KWW is not taking it literally. Taken literally the sentence starts with "Contentious material" and therefore does not apply to anything uncontentious. I'm aware that there is a different interpretation, hence my suggestion that we go for something that we are all likely to interpret the same. ϢereSpielChequers 16:00, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

  But you also have to use some judgement in how you react as an admin. Even if you believe "John won an Academy Award" is a BLP violation, you don't react as if someone said "John is a pedophile". Contentious might be "disputed", but you also have to consider the actual damage done to the subject when determining how to react. In some cases, blocking, in others, tagging or discussing further, per WP:BRD. Everything isn't as black and white as Kww appears to be making it, that all unsourced edits remotely tied to a living person are block worthy if the editor disagrees with him. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 16:09, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

  I largely agree with Resolute. But I think the description of the material being "contentious" goes too far. Kww didn't seem to be objecting on the basis that the information was incorrect, or likely incorrect. Just that the reliable sources had not yet been added, even though the sources indicated that the information was likely correct, and it does not appear that Kww did any checking to determine whether there was a need to object to the information. So I would not say the information was contentious. If TRM did not add reliable sources in a reasonable amount of time, there would be adequate reason to revert. But it was not necessary to immediately revert the information when Kww had no reason to believe it was incorrect, had at least some reason to believe it was correct (as IMDB is usually correct on these matters), and could have waited for TRM to provide sources. And, of course, even if the material was contentious, that does not excuse an involved block. Another admin could have handled that if it was necessary. Rlendog (talk) 16:31, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I've started an RFC at Wikipedia_talk:Biographies_of_living_persons#Defining_the_term_Contentious to try and clarify how we want Contentious defined. This is hardly the first time it has been an issue. Comments welcome. Monty₈₄₅ 16:03, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Background info

Kww has been on a deletion spree, devoid of prior discussion or notice or consensus, on Lists of awards and nominations articles, and has created his own special edit-blocking filter which prevents anyone from restoring the awards. I bumped into this on List of awards and nominations received by Hugh Jackman. When I tried to restore the 60 awards and noms (out of 62) that Kww had deleted, I was unable to, even after several tries -- instead a big red warning message with the STOP sign and the following text appeared:

Awards and nominations must have citations to reliable sources validating each and every award received. If this edit is not an attempt to add unsourced material related to awards and nominations, please report this error.

I reported the issue on Talk:Hugh_Jackman#Eyes_needed_at_List_of_awards_and_nominations_received_by_Hugh_Jackman, and with some repeated questioning Kww revealed that this was an invisible tool he created and was deploying himself, after gutting awards articles, so that no one could add the awards and noms back to the articles unless each one had a citation. Please read the entire discussion in that thread. He stated that "Bear in mind: if you had actually succeeded with the edit, I would have blocked you if you persisted in making it after a warning." Softlavender (talk) 04:07, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Edit filter 661 has been in place since the Cwobeel arbitration decision. It does, indeed, prevent people from making most additions of unsourced awards to awards lists. I've referenced it in the discussion above. It does tend to keep this problem from growing without provoking edit wars, simply by getting the editor to include the source when the material is originally introduced rather than letting it linger unsourced in articles.—Kww(talk) 04:22, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I asked you twice about the genesis/aegis/origin/discussion of this edit-block filter, and your entire response was: It's intentionally invisible, and I am the author of the filter. It simply enforces a fairly obvious consequence of WP:BLP, and, if you wish to discuss it, I would suggest that WT:BLP is the appropriate location. Be certain to mention that the reason you discovered it was because you attempted to add a massive amount of material about a living person without taking the time to verify that it was true, in violation of WP:BLP, restoring it after its veracity had been challenged, in violation of WP:BURDEN. Bear in mind: if you had actually succeeded with the edit, I would have blocked you if you persisted in making it after a warning. That's not what you are saying now. Again, please direct me with a link to the precise discussion/origin/aegis of this edit filter, if indeed it is the same one you posted on List of awards and nominations received by Hugh Jackman. Whatever its origin/aegis, I can guarantee it is being used against Wikipedia policy when, after gutting an article of 60+ public-record awards and nominations without warning, cause, discussion, or even tagging, it is placed on the article while WP:INVOLVED, again without discussion, consensus, or permission. Softlavender (talk) 04:33, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't understand where you see that I am contradicting myself. Yes, I wrote that filter. I wrote it and installed it shortly after the Cwobeel arbitration enforcement. Yes, it is invisible to anyone without edit filter privileges, and it is invisible on purpose. It enforces what I believe to be an obvious consequence of BLP (a belief supported at the time I wrote it by that Cwobeel arbitration enforcement, although this discussion makes that less clear). Even if you reject my stance on BLP, it certainly prevents a widespread problem of editors violating WP:V. Any filter editor that reviews its history and content will see that it has been reasonably effective at blocking unsourced award additions, and is in no way specific to any particular awards article.—Kww(talk) 04:53, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Under the circumstances could you make it public, so there's no question what it's doing? (I can see, but others in the discn can't). Thank you. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 04:58, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

That would make it fairly useless, and I don't know how I could make it useful again after exposure. I assume that no one would believe that you are going to make false statements on my behalf at this stage of the discussion, so you should be able to reassure people that the filter was put in place roughly one week after the Cwobeel discussion, that I haven't edited it in months, and that it has no logic to look for any specific award article (although it does have logic to determine that the article it is dealing with is an awards article).—Kww(talk) 05:05, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

For the record, created 31 Jan 2015, last edited by KWW on 10 Feb 2015, on 4 June 2015 User:This, that and the other changed it to limit it to mainspace (previously had no namespace restriction so it would affect userspace). The targeting logic applies to the class of awards articles, not specific ones. I still feel that it should be made public but, yes, you have characterized it accurately there. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 05:14, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

(ec) Without bothering to verify it was true is ABF on your part, and the filter is massive overreach. If you watch the Oscar ceremony on live TV and see your favorite actress Jane Schmoe receive an Oscar and give a memorable speech, the need or lack of it for durable sourcing when you add it to an article is one thing, but it's bizarre to say you haven't verified that Jane really received the award. Stuff like that happens all the time whenever there's a live TV event like an important football game and someone updates an article with the score. And in general, people have knowledge that generally derives from RS even if they don't have the citations at hand, which they use when editing. Do I know that Austin is the capital of Texas? Yes. Do I remember where I learned that fact? No. Can you say I haven't verified it? That's silly, maybe I used to live there. You're using admin tools to impose an extremist vision on Wikipedia content editing. Please stop that. I'd go as far as to say are editorially involved in this whole awards thing by now, so you shouldn't be doing anything administratively in it. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 05:19, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Kww, Please link the discussion(s) regarding the (1) request for creation of, (2) the guidelines for deployment of, and (3) the permissions required to use, that filter. There is no directive or request for such a thing on the Cwobeel AE; the decision was simply that Cwobeel was "Blocked for a week and banned from editing BLP awards and nominations lists." [20]. Softlavender (talk) 05:19, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I have never claimed that any of those three things exist. I created the filter on my own accord, based on my understanding of WP:V, WP:BURDEN, and WP:BLP, and did so after the Cwobeel decision reinforced my understanding of the BLP consequences of unsourced awards. I have had the authority to do so since the edit filter was first deployed. Edit filters are generally pretty cautious (this one is, actually, because its logic weights it towards large additions), but they are not generally publicly discussed because it makes them too easy to bypass. Review of its history shows an extremely low false positive rate: only a handful of edits that it has blocked weren't additions of unsourced awards.—Kww(talk) 05:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• I find it shocking that you are so,dismissive of this, and the fact that genuine GF edits have been blocked by your filter, with the associated loss of goodwill involved from thos (and other) editors. Can I strongly suggest you get rid of this filter pronto. – SchroCat (talk) 05:37, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm very concerned by such auto-restrictive blocks, especially when it's the whim of one person who has put it there. Are there other examples of these active that I've never come across? Are these common? "Wikipedia- the encyclopaedia that anyone can edit unless they run into Kww's filters"! This really does seem to be over-stepping the mark as much as trying to claim Philip Seymour Hoffman is a BLP. - SchroCat (talk) 05:31, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

There are currently 54 invisible filters active on Wikipedia. Some are monitor only, but most prevent edits. Many are targeted against individual editors, some prevent certain classes of edits. I'm responsible for three of them that prevent edits and one that simply lets me know that I need to examine some edits to see if it's a repeat block evader.—Kww(talk) 05:45, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

We are deep into sledgehammer and nut territory. An ArbCom decision to take action against someone whose behavioural patterns in this sphere necessitated action does not give anyone carte blanche to stick in such a disruptive filter without specific consensus to do so. IF this flagged up an issue to you directly so you could make a subsequent jugement call, I would have no issue with that, but it's just awful and obstructive as it stands. I strongly advise this is removed immediately. - SchroCat (talk) 06:45, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Added: making the filter invisible is more ABF. Saying it becomes useless if visible shows a presumption that everyone who encounters it is going to analyze it and try to work around it and is basically a vandal. It goes against our principles of openness. The filter should be turned off, but it should also not have been invisible. Even actual anti-vandal scripts protecting the project from real vandals are visible[21] and their effectiveness doesn't seem impaired, so hiding the edit filter is just secretive and obnoxious. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 05:33, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Previous time KWW's edits were brought into question for the exact same thing. But hey, he's an admin, so that's fine. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 07:14, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

A number of anti-disruption filters are hidden. With some there's no point because it's obvious what they're filtering and therefore obvious how to avoid them, but with more complex ones, and ones used against persistent and determined vandals, it's often better to hide the actual regex that it's using. Black Kite (talk) 09:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

When a filter is targeted to a specific deliberate vandalism (edits made to harm the encyclopedia on purpose), the ABF inherent in hiding the filter (or writing it in the first place) is justified by evidence, and hiding it is understandable on a pragmatic basis even by those of us with philosophical discomfort over hiding stuff (I've never made an issue of the mere existence of hidden filters, though I think they are overused). In this case the edits targeted by the (now disabled) filter weren't vandalism, so the ABF was obnoxious. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 15:31, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Examination and discussion of these hidden filters is long overdue. But it's just a smokescreen here. Sure, we all know the TRM can be a pointy chain-yanker. But Kww should be made to hand in his little tin sherrif's badge, 'cos his trigger-happy attitude stinks to high heaven. 194.150.177.10 (talk) 17:13, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• These filters seem set to spring like traps upon unwary editors and then do nasty stuff to them such as removing permission bits. I'm not liking the award lists either which seem inherently intended to collect adulation of particular people in a way that violates WP:NPOV. For example, there seem to be few scientists but lots of pornstars. As for BLP issues, the idea that you can automate this by checking for sources is absurd. In browsing the lists, one finds the topical example of list of honours received by Sepp Blatter which well demonstrates the problematic nature of the concept. This contains a blatant BLP violation in the lead which has easily slipped through. I'm usually an inclusionist but think you could save a lot of aggravation by deleting every one of these lists. If subjects have significant awards then these will be for their notable deeds, discoveries, roles, &c. These should be covered in their main article and the giving of the award, such as the Nobel prize, will go best there too, endorsing the importance of that aspect. As for Sepp Blatter, I'm not touching his list for fear that some tiger or trap will spring upon me. Admins who act too protectively will find that they are making work for themselves as no-one sensible will touch such stuff. Andrew D. (talk) 17:22, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• No filter that I have ever worked on has taken any action against the editor that made the edit, Andrew D. In theory, the filter allows for automatic blocking and removal of autoconfirmed status. Automatic blocking of an editor was disabled on English Wikipedia before first deployment, because very few trusted an automatic process to do that. The ability to remove autoconfirmed status is still there on the menu, but I have never tried it. At this point, no filter on English Wikipedia automatically modifies any user right. They all log the edit, tag the edit, warn the editor about a potential problem and allow him to proceed, or warn the editor and prevent the edit from occuring.—Kww(talk) 18:04, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• The trouble is, as I have documented and referenced thoroughly, an edit filter error on a good faith edit might as well say "get stuffed". It stops the edit, but also stops the editor. The general vibe that comes down from the WMF is that we are the encyclopedia anyone can edit. Just look at how passionate we are about the importance of drive-by, one-off editors or how grumpy people can get about protection, disallowed edits due to a filter are the complete anathema to what the Foundation wants. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 20:00, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• (e/c with Kww) I thought of asking for an admin to revert that edit (so they could fix any resulting filter actions that non-admins can't), but then realized I have no permission bits to remove, so I went ahead and reverted just now. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 18:08, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Proposal: Take this to ArbCom and examine both administrators' actions and history

If you want to take it to ArbCom, go for it. Calling for a collective hanging from the yardarms first isn't necessary. There is no need to carry on this part of the discussion. --kelapstick^(bainuu) 16:40, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

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

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This current dispute is between two very hard-nosed admins. As it happens, I !voted against Kww's adminship due to temperment concerns. Note the many opposes. There were a lot of reasons not to give this editor extra buttons. He prevailed in his fourth Rfa. A major violation of WP:INVOLVED? No doubt in my book. As for TRM, he's been here forever. Pretty comfortable throwing his weight around at WP:ITN, where I have been watching him for years, as he drifts into borderline abuse repeatedly. I banned him from my Talk page just yesterday for posting what is a fine example of WP:BAIT: here is an admin coming to my page looking for a fight. In my long term observation, TRM is a bully who should desysopped. Am I, and others who take issue with his hostile bluster, correct? I propose the community send this admin shootout to ArbCom, who can take evidence, look at the long term histories of both admins carefully, and apply sanctions. Common justice and the long term health of the 'pedia calls for no less. Jusdafax 06:05, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I think this may be a good idea, since right now TRM is (or was) blocked and can't speak up at this ANI. We should at least let him have his say somewhere -- either unblock him and let him speak here, or let ArbCom check into the situation. Either way, no matter what, I think Kww's secret edit-block filter and his mass deletions/blankings of awards articles have both got to go. If it takes ArbCom for that, ArbCom it should be. Softlavender (talk) 06:48, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

TRM is unblocked[22] but might be asleep or something. Any arb proceeding would of course have to look at both. Floq's suggestion of waiting overnight and seeing if people are thinking more clearly tomorrow sounds good from the perspective of arb cases being messy proceedings that we should try to avoid. On the other hand, there's enough evidence of long term problems that maybe we need a case. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 07:05, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I received a brief email from TRM (who I don't know from Adam and have never interacted with or received communications from) that "I am actually unblocked but in these circumstances I usually just let things play out." (I guess he noticed my post above.) I agree on both points that you made. Softlavender (talk) 07:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Since when it P.S. Hoffman a BLP anyway? He's been dead 18 months. I'm utterly astounded that an editor as shitty as Kww is an admin in all honesty. He completely lacks the temperament and fair minded approach to content to be worth of admin tools. If The Rambling Man agrees I'd suggest a desysopping of Kww and topic ban from editing award articles. His editing was disruptive, and TRM was clearly trying to protect content.♦ Dr. Blofeld 07:30, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• I was confused about this as well, but then looked at the two editing histories. Hoffman is dead, but Hugh Jackman isn't. Black Kite (talk) 09:30, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Yet it all started from Hoffman. Look at the timeline, he started blanking the Hoffman article, edit warring with TRM, claiming he was exempt from 3RR and warning him using the justification it was a BLP. Then, to prove his point, he moved to the Jackman's article. But all started from the Hoffman "BLP". I have to agree with Blofeld, I used to (also publicly) apprecciate Kww, but at this point he should be desypopped and topic banned from awards articles as a minimum. Except if he will post an extensive and convincing apology for all the bullshit he made and said in the last hours, obviously. Cavarrone 10:55, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Oppose. TRM has done nothing to warrant an ArbCom sanction here. If it wasn't for the awful WP:INVOLVED and against-policy step Kww took in blocking him, this would never have reached ANI, let alone anything more. I do, however, support taking Kww to ArbCom. Flagrant misuse of the tools, and his subsequent refusal to see any other point but his own (an inflexibility of attitude he has shown in other quarters) do warrant a closer scrutiny. - SchroCat (talk) 08:01, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• If you take Kww to ArbCom, TRM will be a named party anyway and his conduct will be examined. In the end it doesn't really matter whether the title of the proposed case is "Kww" or "Kww and TRM". Black Kite (talk) 09:32, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Support although this discussion isn't required, as any person can file at Arb. That said, there are several questions here, beyond the involved block, and the only body empowered with deciding these issues is Arb, leaving us no choice. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 11:09, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose for now. Let's see if this can't be worked out without going to Arbcom over it. bd2412 T 13:42, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose – Show me a pattern of abuse here (see: AntonioMartin case, etc.). Right now, all I see is a very ill-advised one-off. Neither Admin's hands are clean here. But I don't see a pattern of abuse of Admin tools here, just one case of over zealousness in "enforcing" Wikipedia guidelines. It is somewhat disquieting that Kww will concede no fault in this instance, but I'd rather AGF in regards to all the other good this Admin has done and assume Kww won't make a mistake like this again. If the community "lynches" every Admin who makes a mistake with the tools, there will quickly be no Admins left, and certainly no one running for RfA (anyone thinking about running for Admin should look carefully at what's happening here and consider very carefully before making that jump...). Let's call this a "collective reprimand" and move on... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 13:48, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

You want a pattern of abuse? Well, let's try the against consensus revdelling of the Best known for IP that other admins, particularly I, Chillum and Drmies all strongly opposed. [23] [24] plus lengthy talk page discussions on that page. Then, spinning back a bit further we have this kerfuffle with Floquenbeam over an unblock not being the letter of the law [25]. Spinning back further, we have this dramafest where he took an admin who had the sheer chuzpah to dare to unblock Eric Corbett to Arbcom, resulting in the loss of said admin. Anyway - Kww does do good work around here, but the "just doin' my job, ma'am" attitude really does cause more harm than good at times. I don't particularly want an Arbcom case either - they really cause more harm than good - but rather I would like all parties involved in this dispute to realise that something is seriously wrong here and take steps to correct it under their own steam.Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 14:17, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Support Although, as Dennis said, it's meaningless to vote on this sort of thing. In Kww's case, he has a horrible combination of poor temperament, hubris, and misunderstanding of policy. His gross misunderstanding of applied BLP policy is just the latest evidence in a longer pattern. Just recently, he suggested that Cochrane Reviews are unreliable if their authors are Chinese. Inflammatory comments that at the same time show a lack of the ability to read policies and guidelines reveal that there is a deeper problem we are dealing with. Additionally, Kww's default position has always seemed to be to assume bad faith, a long pattern I complained about just last week and this very attitude has now culminated in an involved block of TRM. If Kww fails to see where he is wrong, how can we assume he'll act appropriately in the future? He has shown that he's not here to build an encyclopedia, he's here to promote agendas and exercise his power even if it means abusing it. Seriously, do we want TIGERS running around with tools? LesVegas (talk) 14:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose take what to Arbcom? The fact that KWW actualy enforced BLP on an article? There's no question that's what he was doing, and there's no question his block was correct. I have a better idea, shut down that idea and lay off KWW KoshVorlon Rassekali ternii i mlechnye puti 15:47, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• No, his block was deeply flawed, and his action as an WP:INVOLVED admin is what is being very rightly questioned by most people here. If we don't examine the circumstances of an admin's misuse of the tools, then we open the door to a possible problems for everyone in the future. - SchroCat (talk) 15:51, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Except that it's not admin misuse. KWW removed unsourced items in a BLP, that's what has to be done per WP:BLP, The Rambling Man reverted the unsourced items back in which is totally wrong, so if you want to take about admin misuse , look there instead. KWW did right to block him as he was repeatedly adding in unsourced stuff to a BLP rather than looking for references then adding it back in once the references are found. Remember, the WP:BURDEN is on the individual adding material in, not the one challenging. No arbcom over this, it's straight up a good block, even if it is a bit WP:IAR. KoshVorlon Rassekali ternii i mlechnye puti 16:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Except that this also involves Kww edit warring while claiming BLP on someone who is not an LP, or a recent one. He was out of line on this one. He went from there to a rather petulant block of the same editor: that's a problem in my book, and most other people here, given the weight of opinion expressed so far in the thread. – SchroCat (talk) 16:38, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

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

Proposal: disable Kww's filter

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

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I propose that Kww's filter is disabled immediately. If he wants to have a filter or bot that flags up to him when edits are being made I don't have an issue, but I do object to this mindless/automated process which does this. Valid edits have been blocked by this filter, which should have been a red flag to anyone with a more flexible approach. The loss of the information from those edits, and the associated goodwill makes it clear this should be removed. I'd also strongly suggest to Kww, that rather than the knee-jerk reversions he seems so fond of, it takes only a shade longer to look for a bloody source! These are high profile people and are normally high-profile awards, so a simple search shows whether there is a problem. That is how you build an encyclopaedia, not by relying on flaming filters and bots to block good faith contributions. - SchroCat (talk) 07:49, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Strong Support. The secret edit-block filter, and the mass-deletion & content-restoration–prevention way it is being used, are a mind-bogglingly unilateral defiance of Wikipedia policies. Softlavender (talk) 08:00, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Comment I was going to make this comment above but here seems the better option now. I wanted to make the point that there are genuine reasons for keeping some edit filters hidden; some are quite easy to avoid if you know how the filter works. This is particularly important for LTA cases and other high priority vandalism. I've known some LTA users to vandalise the edit filter requests page, making it quite clear that they know there is an edit filter logging their edits. On the other hand if a filter is set to disallow, it's not hard to get to that filter if it disallows your edit. Being able to read what it does would make some filters alarmingly easy to get around. That said, I'm not at all convinced that this is the kind of filter that should be set to hidden. It's not the kind that would be detrimental to the project if avoided, and I agree that transparency should only be avoided if absolutely necessary. Sam Walton (talk) 08:10, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Strong Support -- as per SchroCat's rationale above. Cassianto^Talk 08:10, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Strong support per above, and further possible sanctions. I did try to restore Jackman's awards page and starting sourcing it and the filter blocked me with a ridiculous warning that every single award should be sourced and that anything else isn't acceptable.♦ Dr. Blofeld 08:13, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Strong support. To be blocking edits automatically based on a non-existent "BLP" rule invented by the creator is completely against the spirit of Wikipedia. I'd go so far as to say that the very existence of this filter illustrates a sufficient competence issue that I'd support desysopping, even though it would mean the timesink of an Arbcom case since I presume KWW's "I'm right, the rest of the world is wrong" reactions above signify that he'd rather go down in flames than admit he's made a mistake, let alone resign voluntarily. – iridescent 08:15, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Support. I have to agree with this this proposal. If it simply warns an administrator about a potentially poor addition that's one thing. But that's too much power for a personal bot. The thing is, this is one personal administrative bot that we know of. Is this type of thing common among administrators? I mean I really have no idea if multiple other invisible bots like this exist and this just happened to be one we found out about. It gives the feel of some Philip K. Dick dystopian society. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:16, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Support - Filters shouldn't be unilaterally implemented, as it opens them up to abuse. There needs to be consensus. — Chris Woodrich (talk) 08:18, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Strong support - this filter appears to have been added unilaterally without any noticeboard discussion or consensus viz the policy "Implementation of AbuseFilter on Wikipedia is done with due caution — most abuse filters should be tested for a few days (in "log only" mode) before being brought to full force ("warn", "disallow" or "throttle" modes)." I see no evidence this happened. Sam is right that per WP:BEANS we shouldn't publicly disclose filters, but just a reassurance from other admins that the filters are okay would help, which we don't have. After all, ClueBot NG does all its vandalism reverting out in the open using a Bayesian filter, which means keeping filter regexes secret is not necessary, as machine learning will stop them anyway. Work smarter, not harder! Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 08:24, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Support - conditional on complete transparency regarding all other such filters. I had no idea such things existed, and per Fyunck, I am uneasy regarding all such "bots" in operation without scrutiny and oversight. I'd like to see a complete list of such bots. Jusdafax 08:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
  • Their existence is not a state secret—you can see the full list here (KWW's filter is #661). As Sam Walton says above, the exact rules of some of the anti-vandal ones are intentionally kept secret to prevent people working around them. – iridescent 08:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Support I can understand the need for circumspection when filters are intended to catch out LTA stuff but not otherwise. That this one appears to have slipped through (or, at least, no-one saw it as a potential problem) makes me think we may need some sort of review mechanism for filters current and future. - Sitush (talk) 08:36, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Support Per much of what the others say. --Dweller (talk) 09:00, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Comment I've gone through the edit filter log, and checked the filters in question, #640 and #661 (which is what I assume we're talking about here). They're hidden so I can't tell you what they do but I think the implementation is weak, with admins complaining about false positives. I see that other admins have had problems with the top 100 filter. And I think the Best known for IP filter could be implemented more intelligently. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 09:06, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Ritchie333, the Top 100 filter had a disastrous error in it for an hour in Jan 2014. I don't think it has malfunctioned since then. 661 generated a false positive in userspace, which was the only complaint against it (since corrected) and 640 theoretically tripped in talk space (corrected, but it never actually happened).—Kww(talk) 13:19, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment it seems pointless to actually disable these filters, as they don't actually seem to produce many false positives. I assume therefore we are talking about setting the filters to log-only or warn, as opposed to disallow? Black Kite (talk) 09:27, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• But they do produce false positives, with all the crappy side effects that go with it (loss of goodwill, annoyance with the Wikipedia software etc) It's disheartening for good faith editors doing the right thing and then not being allowed to save their work. If Kww wants to reconfigure this filter to ping him when there is a problem so that he can deal with it directly, that's fine, but not as this obstructive faceless and Orwellian mechanism that does little good to anyone. - SchroCat (talk) 09:35, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Set them to log-only, then - the user doesn't see a thing then. Black Kite (talk) 11:35, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Support I would be very happy to see such a filter applied to controversial awards such as from the porn industry. I could understand extending the filter to other specific awards if we had a bunch of vandals repeatedly adding that award in a vandalising way, such as claiming various Islamic scholars had been awarded a lifetime achievement award by the Israeli Defense Force. I might also support changing our software generally to prompt people for a source either for all articles or all BLPs, but only if such a change was reflected in our policies, guidelines, training material and the user interface in a way that was consistent and user friendly. ϢereSpielChequers 09:58, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Support per SchroCat. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 10:40, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Burn it with fire per Ritchie333, Blofeld and Iridescent. Also a close review of other filters eventually created/used by KWW is necessary if not urgent. Cavarrone 11:00, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Convert to Warn. Blocking is unjustified, but unsourced cruft is a plague on Wikipedia. Guy (Help!) 11:05, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• This seems like an eminently reasonable solution to me. I wonder if anyone will listen?... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 13:50, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Support per iridescent, at least for now. Ultimately, Arb should decide the fate of all this. This is simply too large an issue for ANI, where we lack any tools to sanction admin actions. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 11:12, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

*Oppose take what to Arbcom? The fact that KWW actualy enforced BLP on an article? There's no question that's what he was doing, and there's no question his block was correct. I have a better idea, shut down that idea and lay off KWW KoshVorlon Rassekali ternii i mlechnye puti 11:20, 25 June 2015 (UTC) _{wrong section for my comment - striking out KoshVorlon Rassekali ternii i mlechnye puti 16:20, 25 June 2015 (UTC)}

What's that got to do with edit filters? If we blocked everyone who violated one admin's opinion of BLP, we'd have no editors left. It drives me nuts about people adding tabloidish sources to Katie Hopkins all the time, but I've never block over it unless there are repeated ad-hominem attacks added to it. Which is not what we have here. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:24, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Support There needs to be some sort of discussion and consensus before such a filter is delployed, in future. Not of the details of the regex or other filter logic, perhaps, but of the general existance, scope and purpose. Musch like the pre-approval needed for bots, I would think. DES ^(talk) 12:43, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Comment - I have deleted filter 661 as an inappropriate use of the edit filter. The edit filter is designed to catch abusive edits; it is not to enforce content disputes. And no, Kww, contrary to your demands of me earlier, I will not "discuss with you" before I remove inappropriate filters like I have before. Reaper Eternal (talk) 13:59, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

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

Filters disabled

As a result of this discussion, I have disabled and deleted the majority of my filters. The ones that remain are 550 (as it is used to monitor for "nowiki" markup insertion by a number of editors, including the WMF), 601 (currently disabled, but it's very effective against Colton Cosmic, so any filter editor may want to reenable it when he begins to act up again), and 667, which is a monitor-only filter. For anyone that's curious, the filter that Reaper Eternal refers to above (693) blocked the addition of the word "trans" to any article about Drake Bell: no false positives ever occurred. I put it in place after Drake Bell came under attack during the Caitlyn Jenner announcements. As a result of that filter being removed, Drake Bell has been on full-protection now for 24 days, all to allow for people that suddenly might want to discuss trans fat and transmissions in regard to Drake Bell. Seems like a poor tradeoff to me, but YMMV.—Kww(talk) 14:22, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't know whether to be annoyed or flattered that variations on my username appear several times in your Colton Cosmic filter. Probably both. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 14:38, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

He liked to talk about you a lot.—Kww(talk) 14:50, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

If you think that is the main problem with your filter, then I don't even know what else to say, other than that you should have never given yourself 'abusefilter'. Reaper Eternal (talk) 14:52, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I've made 693 visible so that anyone can take a look and comment as to whether full-protecting Drake Bell was a preferable alternative to that filter (or an enhanced version of the filter if it actually presented false positive problems).—Kww(talk) 15:17, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I only see 4 logged hits[26] from filter 693, all of them edits from the same user, who has been editing through 2008. They are repeated attempts to make the same edit, about a controversial tweet by Bell, sourced to an IBTimes article. While there are problems with the edit, it looks like something the normal BRD process could have handled just fine. Are there unlogged hits or expired logs? If there have only been 4 hits, it would have been much better to discuss the issue with the user. Even if the filter was needed, it should be seen as a limited form of page protection and discussed on the article talk page. I also don't see any reason to have kept it hidden. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 22:05, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I put the filter in place after a flurry of attacks on Bell. Reaper Eternal disabled the filter, and the page was put on full protection by User:Panyd a few hours later. The page has remained on full protection for most of the last four weeks. The filter has remained disabled since then, and even if it was enabled, the full-protection would prevent it from firing. It was intended to keep us from needed to fully protect the page, but others apparently find the full protection preferable.—Kww(talk) 23:28, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Agree that your edit filter seems preferable – full protection for an article like Drake Bell seems slightly crazy to me... I think I may even take this to WP:RFPP elsewhere. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 23:32, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the background info. It looks to me like the long lasting full protection on that article was excessive, though it may have been justified for a little while after the tweet drama (June 1 aiui). Pending changes was (and is) another possibility that doesn't seem to have been considered. Taking the filter as a reasonable third option, IMHO the right way to deploy it would have been 1) announce it openly (like protection), posting about it on the talk page to let people know what was happening and discuss whether it was wanted; 2) have it display a message when it disallows an edit, saying what the problem was and inviting the person to post an edit request on the article talk page if it had stopped what they thought was a valid edit. The one edit that it did stop was reasonably valid: it had a decent source, though the wording could have been improved. The person retried several times, then gave up, making no attempt to use the talk page. Someone else then tried to add the same info without a source and was reverted (not as vandalism). However a quick web search shows there are tons of RS documenting the incident, and there was relatively little talkpage discussion about keeping it out.

Overall I'd say this filter was a basically reasonable idea, but executed with too much secrecy at both the technical level (it didn't need to be private) and the communication level (it should have been discussed on the talk page). Getting a good edit stopped by a filter is immensely frustrating because you have no idea what you wrote that the filter didn't like. Overall I prefer pending changes to techno-fixes like filters, in situations where just one article is affected. The most useful (and most dangerous) capability of filters is their ability to act across the whole site, supplementing Cluebot and what's left of the RC patrol. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 04:52, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for deleting it, but looking at some of these edit filters...I don't know. Let's look at 616. In its current form, it reads simply (user_name="187.109.239.254")&(article_namespace=0), which, invisibly and (had MusikAnimal not disabled it a month after it was started) permanently prevents IP 187.109.239.254 from editing anything in mainspace. I'm having trouble seeing any reason why this shouldn't have just been a month-long block of 187.109.239.254, which would have served much the same purpose--it's not like the IP was contributing to any other namespace--and have been transparent and non-permanent, as we require of such restrictions to IP editing. Why would you make this edit filter? Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 15:14, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

It permitted the IP to contribute to talk page discussions of articles he was interested in, not just his own talk page. The IP's problem was that he refused to discuss changes. That filter was, admittedly, an experiment to see if I could find an approach short of blocking an IP that would permit the IP to still contribute. It failed. I would have disabled it myself short order.—Kww(talk) 15:25, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

If this is supposed to be a less harsh alternative to blocking, why would the filter be flagged as hidden from public view? And, especially given that the IP in question was showing no desire to contribute anywhere but in mainspace, how could that rationale possibly justify a completely-invisible-to-anyone-else pseudo-block? An edit filter, particularly one hidden from public view and particularly one that is permanent since you apparently forgot about it, does not provide the transparency required for admins to be held accountable for their actions. If that wasn't self-evident before you made the edit filter, then I don't really know what else to say. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 15:32, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Look, if it's continual abuse from a blocked/banned user or something like that, then those filters can be a big help. But there still needs to be oversight. Perhaps all these invisible filters can be put in a special administrative section that passes muster amongst many administrators first? If a few others find it will be useful and helpful with minimal collateral damage, then it gets implemented with a watchful eye to make sure it does what it says. I don't want administrators trying to stop real vandalism with one hand tied behind their backs. But all administrators should be made aware of an invisible filter so we have checks and balances. Most admins I've dealt with have been as straight and narrow as they can be, even if they're yelling at me, but not all. I can't believe the filter we were mainly talking about would have been given the ok by any group of administrators. Far too restrictive and isn't really targeted at a particular user. Fyunck(click) (talk) 16:26, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I certainly think there needs to be a talk page for each edit filter, like every article, and every page. People can then discuss issues and suggest alternatives, and gain consensus. There is an area for discussion, but it's not structured like a talk page (more like an ad hoc revision history) and if the filter is hidden, non-admins can't get at it. They might still want to discuss the purpose of a filter rather than the specific content. Also, some filters like 667 are probably better off written as a script using the API or PyWikipedia so they can do machine learning. (Yes, I'd like to write something like that if I ever have time). Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:36, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Would editors find it useful to have some structured non-ANI discussions (at one of the village pumps) about edit filters and when it should be appropriate to hide them? Sam Walton (talk) 16:41, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

If there aren't any other problems besides this one, not sure what it would help. There aren't that many, and if an admin wasn't to question a hidden filter, he can at WP:AN without disclosing the hidden info since other admin can see it. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 16:57, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

There certainly has been a "What!? There are filters?! Nobody told me about filters!" element to this discussion, and that's coming from editors with a fair amount of experience. That would indicate that we should consider elevating the visibility of the existence of filters.—Kww(talk) 17:21, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, I think at least raising some awareness would be appropriate in the circumstances. Ncmvocalist (talk) 17:26, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Myself, I'm aware of filters and I assumed that administrators had a set of "special" filters to help them combat big problems. But I also assumed they were listed on a restricted page for all administers to use and comment on their effectiveness. Sort of what we all have on our preferences or gadgets tab. I did not know that administrators could create them and use them with no real oversight. Obviously some of these filters need to stay hidden or they lose their ability to work. We need to trust, when multiple administrators test and evaluate these hidden filters, that they work well and as intended. But when I see many administrators shaking their heads in wonder and surprise at this over-reaching filter that Kww created, then we know their policy on filters needs a big tweak to be fair to all wikipedians, including themselves. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:36, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

FYI There is a full list of filters and their current status at Special:AbuseFilter. Sam Walton (talk) 18:49, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Yes but obviously not the invisible ones. Kww is being hit as having some underhanded agenda with this invisible filter. I'm not talking about his blocking a fellow admin while being deeply involved. That's a separate issue. But this misuse of an invisible tool. Having a vetting process where he submitted it to three other admins (that aren't his bff's) would also be protecting himself right now. So it's better for everyone involved. Instead of defending himself he'd be saying things like... I made it with good intentions and three other random administrators said they approved of it's functions. It might still get deleted if someone later complained, but it's end of story as far as some secret abuse of power. Fyunck(click) (talk) 19:32, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Fyunck, FYI I know that at least one of the Edit Filter Managers and Admins should be able to see the invisible filters. I could see 661 fine when I went to look. So it's not "private secret" to the creating user; it's only hidden from people outside (I think either of those groups, but not 100% sure). Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 20:19, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I understand that George. But the way it sounds and looks, there are over 250 filters that I can actually see. I have no idea the number of invisible filters. It sounds like an administrator can create an invisible filter and simply add it to the list and that no one actually checked on what this Kww filter actually did. It got lost in the giant list of filters. At least if it undergoes formal scrutiny by other admins before it is ever activated, it has a better chance of being weeded out as this one should have been. It sounds like no one really checked this one out, and that shouldn't happen. There needs to be something in place to verify the usefulness before they go live. Maybe there is, but I haven't heard anyone talk about it. Fyunck(click) (talk) 21:06, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I might be reading what you're saying wrong, but I just want to clarify that a 'hidden' filter isn't hidden from the list; you can still see the name and log. It's only the filter details (conditions, actions, notes) that are hidden. Sam Walton (talk) 21:09, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Should there be a systematic review of the edit filters that exist? Perhaps there are some which are no longer needed that could be deleted or disabled. I don't think editors are objecting to the existence of filters just that an edit filter can be easily created and forgotten without any oversight. And I think there shouldn't be an edit filter for an IP address which might be shared by other editors (or future editors). Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 19:57, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

There probably needs to be a centralized page where all the edit filters in use (and maybe even those that are "suspended" from use) are listed out, including what they do, and when they were instituted, so even though of us in the peanut gallery can see them. Doing so shouldn't be a big deal... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 20:08, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Since we're pretty tight on processing power for filters, old or inactive filters are regularly disabled. Sam Walton (talk) 20:12, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

IJBall, as Samwalton9 noted, you can see the visible filters at Special:AbuseFilter. If there are other, hidden filters, then that is the issue. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 21:44, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

@Liz: Every filter is on that list - 'hidden' refers to the filter's conditions, notes, and log, such as Special:AbuseFilter/696. Sam Walton (talk) 21:46, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

@Samwalton9: Well, then the conditions of some filters are hidden but I can click on others (like Special:AbuseFilter/11) and see the conditions that trigger the filter. So, it is the filters whose conditions are hidden that should be checked by those who can view them. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 21:54, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

OK, yeah – after perusing, there are a lot of edit filters marked "Private", and one could legitimately ask how many of those need to be "Private" and not "Public"... But, in general, this whole thing is above my pay grade... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 22:33, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Edit Filter policy

There has never really been a documented policy on what edit filters should or should not be used for, or on precisely how accurate a filter needs to be in order to considered suitable for its task. I think everyone agrees that countering vandalism is a Good Thing and that interfering with good faith editing is a Bad Thing, but very little has been written about what that should really mean in the context of edit filters. In practice, the edit filters have been managed via the mutual agreement of a small handful of the most active edit filter managers. There are about 170 users with the filter manager user right, and all but about 20 of those are also current admins (many of the exceptions are former admins or WMF staff). So, the group of people working in this area is generally an experienced and thoughtful lot, but there are still only a small number of people that are really active in managing the filters. At its inception (2009) I was one of the most active filter managers, but except for a brief burst of activity a few months ago, I haven't been very active on the filters for years. It is probably well past time that we write out some sort of policy on what edit filters should and shouldn't be used for, when the private setting is appropriate, and what minimum level of accuracy a filter should have before it is allowed to give warnings or disallow edits. Dragons flight (talk) 23:06, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree that this would be a good thing. Wikipedia:Edit filter should really be primarily a guideline on how the community expects filters to be used, rather than an out of date guide. Sam Walton (talk) 23:54, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I've created a centralised discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (idea_lab)#Edit filter policy. Sam Walton (talk) 00:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree wholeheartedly. I also used to be a very active edit filter manager (even before I was an administrator). A little over two years ago I raised concerns that the edit filter system was being abused and that many of the people that are currently editing them have very little understanding of the internals of how it is implemented (which is different from if they understand how the filtering works/how to write filter code). Since that time that abuse has been extended to the point where a fairly significant number of edits hit the filter (we have moved from "hitting the filter is generally suspicious" to "hitting the filter is a fairly common thing for newer editors"). I note that even log only filters used to be "no false positives". In a similar vein, there have been filters that have been turned onto disallow without even being tested, and several instances of filters that hit nearly edit being activated. I recognize that times can change, but honestly I gave up this argument years ago because it seemed like nobody cared. At the end of the day, the edit filter is really a backwoods area that only a very small portion of the community even knows exist (and then a much smaller proportion of that knows how to use it), and so if one speaks up with "this really needs to be fixed" the general response I have received is "who cares?" I'm glad to see at least I'm not the only one recognizing these problems, but I would hate to see the current use of the filter system actually get codified into policy. If we do that, then we are literally writing into policy "we do not trust new users to edit without intense supervision", which is what a lot of our current edit filters since become. --Shirik (Questions or Comments?) 01:09, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Arb case request

Well, since nobody else seems to be stepping up, I guess it falls to me. I've filed an arbitration case request, seeking resolution of the issues here, particularly of Kww's block of TRM. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 15:58, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Thank you. I felt I had to consider filing since I called for it here, but frankly, it's better coming from you. Nobody likes admitting it, but Wikipedia is all about "clout," which is also actually what this ArbCom case is really all about, as I see it... Two angry admins with chips on their shoulders who would not back down. Bravo, and thanks again. Jusdafax 16:51, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Kww's edit filters

After seeing the above discussion, I decided to take the time to review edit filters created by User:Kww. A summary of my conclusions follows:

• #693: Drake Bell attack: Gross technically deficiency in design, e.g. failure consider interplay of added_lines / removed_lines, possibility of "trans" occurring in neutral phrases like "transmit", or use on talk pages.
• #640: Vevo: Technically deficient design, e.g. failure consider interplay of added_lines / removed_lines, possibility of "vevo" occurring in neutral phrases (such words are rare, but I noticed "Groovevolt Music" in the log). In his initial version it also prohibited "Vevo" to be mentioned on talk pages. Not entirely clear on the motivations, but this is not necessarily a bad idea for a filter if there is general agreement (WP:SINGLEVENDOR?) that Vevo awards are not suitable for inclusion Wikipedia.
• #617: Mathias Sandell: Affected a wide swath of IPs without offering a warning message to explain what is happening to any false positives. Unable to judge the need for this filter or its historical origin because its motivation is not explained in the comment box. Something like this might be okay in the event of severe ongoing vandalism, but such events should be rare and this was active for a long time.
• #616: disruption of music articles: The targeted block of one IP from article space, correctly implemented. Personally, I think this is a waste of the somewhat limited abuse filter resources, but there has been no rule against it, and Kww apparently was looking for an option less extreme than a full block (a good intention).
• #526: hot100brasil insertions: Technically deficient design due to failure to consider interplay of added_lines / removed_lines. As a result this filter is simply swimming in false positives such that an editor will see a warning even though they didn't perform the indicated action.
• #529: chartnews: Same added / removed problem. Of the filters that Kww created, this actually seems the best motivated from looking at the log, assuming we agree that anonymous twitter accounts claiming to repeat third-party news is not by itself a RS (i.e. WP:TWITTER). A better version of this may be worth restoring.
• #661: unsourced section added to awards article: This is the one that already got a bit of attention because TRM triggered it. It is grossly deficient in design (same added / removed issue, no consideration of citation templates) and based on the discussion above seems very dubious from a policy perspective.

Based on this review, my opinion that Kww should not be writing filters. (I also think it is symptomatic of the fact we don't have enough written policy or internal review in the abuse filter space.) If it is deemed necessary, Kww's edit filter manager user right could be removed. However, I would hope that as an admin Kww would be willing to take criticism seriously and refrain from editing the filter on his own accord. Dragons flight (talk) 05:46, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Can these filters be made public? Isa (talk) 08:46, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

I doubt I'm going to be doing much with filters in the future. Responses, though:

• 693: This thing has been beaten to death. A simple filter, prohibiting the addition of the phrase "trans". Is it a filter that could have been left up, unattended, for months? No. As a quick "stop the attacks for a day or two in lieu of full protecting the article" it did fine. Since the phrase "trans" doesn't occur in the article and the filter prohibits its addition, theres no need for "added lines"/"removed lines" checking. That would have been an unnecessary waste of resources. For those that are unaware, Bell made a very unpopular tweet about Caitlyn Jenner and became a target of online attacks. His article remains full-protected today, nearly a month later.

• 640: I had not spotted the "groovevolt" false positive, but again, since VEVO was not in any of the target articles and the filter prohibited insertion, and "added lines"/"removed lines" check would have been an unnecessary waste of resources.

• 617: User:Mathiassandell has been evading blocks for years. There's not a lot of anonymous Finnish IPs editing Christina Aguilera and Mariah Carey articles, and the alternative would have been rangeblock Finland or to semiprotect an enormous group of articles. I'm unaware of any false positives, and also unaware of any improvements I could make to the warning that didn't give Mathias instructions on how to bypass it.—Kww(talk) 13:38, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• 616: An experiment in "less than blocking" an IP. It failed, and it's inactive.

• 526: Once again, if the string doesn't exist, there's no need to consider "added lines"/"removed lines", which would be an unnecessary waste of resources.

• 529: Again: if the string doesn't exist currently, "added lines"/"removed lines" checks are unnecessary.

• 661: The normal citation templates don't embed the "<ref" string, which is what the filter fed off of. This filter was actually fairly permissive, as it looked for the addition of entire new awards tables without providing a single citation for one of the awards. In theory, there are some edits to completely unsourced tables it would have prevented, and someone could have started the use of {{refn}}. The defects here are not "gross deficiencies in design", they are optimisations based on the real world consideration: a filter that tries to evaluate every possible edit so that it can run unattended forever requires far more resources than a filter that takes advantage of known information and is monitored. I do look at 661 violations regularly. Beyond the repaired case of firing in userspace, the only other false positives it actually saw were an editor that decided to use template formatting of an existing, completely unsourced table.—Kww(talk) 13:38, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

User:‎MELB1110 ignoring discussion on talk page

The problem with this new user is that he started editing the Armenia article after abandoning the discussion on the talk page. The matter is the geographical location of Armenia, an issue which is going on here since years (interestingly, on other main wikipedias there is no problem at all about it), and that causes recurring edit warring bursts. Several lenghty discussions on the talk page (i.e. this one [27]) established consensus that Armenia - altough in many respects can be considered an european country - lies geographically in Western Asia, and that in order to change this info one should find reliable geographical sources (this means geographical institutions, since physical geography is a science) showing a different geographical (not political) definition of Europe. In other words, if the Armenian academy of Sciences adopts a definition of Europe with its south east border at the Persian Gulf, we should take it in the article. Unfortunately, until now all the users pretending that Armenia lies geographically in Europe failed to provide these sources, bringing only sources which define Armenia "Europe" playing on the ambiguity between geographical and political definition of Europe. User:‎MELB1110 makes no exception to this behaviour. He abandoned the discussion, and edited the article first inserting as source for the geographic location of Armenia the BBC ([28]). After my revertion assuming good faith, he brought a web site with a map showing Armenia in its political boundaries as belonging to Europe ([29]). Unfortunately this web site (www.worldatlas.com) is a commercial web site. The reliability of this source can be determined observing that in the HTML page about Europe there are two maps of the continent, one with Armenia and one below the first one without it ([30]). He ignored my comments on the talk page ([31] and, in response to another user sharing my same opinion [32]) and after my revert assuming good faith he started to edit warring ([33]).

Attempts to communicate on his talk page did not bring much either ([34]).

User:‎MELB1110 is clearly POV pushing (see also these edits on the same line - [35] and [36] - about Cyprus, both reverted), refusing to get the point, ignoring the lack of present consensus and going against previously established consensus on the talk page (also in other threads in the archives). I would like to point out too that the article about Armenia is subjected to discretionary sanctions by administrators, so that any editor should be very careful in dealing with this article. I brought this case already to the edit warring noticeboard, but there no action has been taken, since the user changed his edits, and altough edit warring at the end, he did only three edits. Alex2006 (talk) 05:06, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

OttonielWhite/Elindiord

OttonielWhite (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has resumed making Twinkle reverts of valid edits without any edit summaries after the expiration of a one-month block for sockpuppetry. The sockpuppet, Elindiord (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), was twice blocked for the same behavior. This editor obviously does not understand what is wrong with their actions, has made no attempt to communicate, and should be blocked to prevent further disruption. Conifer (talk) 11:03, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Only one edit since this report was filed (which, it's worth noting, was reverted...). --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:12, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

battleground behavior and general uncivility by RGloucester

The latest from RGloucester (talk · contribs) is his refusal to accept the outcome of the Hillary Rodham Clinton → Hillary Clinton move discussion. This was a long drawn out discussion but consensus was quite clearly in favor of moving it. He has since been edit warring over the name in the infobox,[37], [38], [39], [40]. He has now announced his plans on the article talk page to do another move request to change it back. After a chorus of people opposing such an idea, he made this edit [41] indicating he believes that only his opinion is correct and that he WILL eventually get his way.

This is not the first time he has made such statements that things WILL go his way, which I feel is an intimidation tactic.[42] He frequently makes demands and refuses to accept when things do not go his way, such as this checkuser request.[43]

Additionally, he's being extremely uncivil at the Village Pump. He has violated WP:NPA by telling someone they are inferior and to accept their "station" in life [44]. What I find most bizarre is that he stated that "God has spoken to you and your cause through me, and I've said what he intended in a clear manner." [45] He also believes that nobody on Wikipedia has any rights to protest anything [46] (which I suppose he does not feel applies to him). He has been blocked four or five times this year already (despite his claims that "someone who is right can never be blocked.") [47]) and his antics frequently feature on Reddit. I feel something needs to be done about this user, unless he specifically states his willingness to work with other editors, that he will accept consensus when things don't go his way, and that he agrees he is not the messenger of God on Wikipedia. —Мандичка^YO 😜 16:38, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• I believe that this can be folded/merged into the #Hillary Clinton discussion above. It relates to the same set of issues. bd2412 T 16:52, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

@BD2412: it's actually a larger issue regarding one editor in particular and not specific to the Hillary Clinton article - there are other editors involved with the HC infobox argument. I think there is a larger and ongoing issue that needs to be addressed with RGloucester. —Мандичка^YO 😜 16:55, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Concur with —Мандичка. It's related, but RGloucester's battleground behavior and attitude deserve special attention. I would hope a warning would suffice. --В²C ☎ 17:00, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

@Wikimandia: Well, there seems to be a cycle where a warning is given or a "break" is imposed every few months or so. Given that's how it seems to be "addressed" on each occasion, I'm not too sure if it will be any different if the thread is down here or merged as a sub-thread into the above discussion. Ncmvocalist (talk) 17:03, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment - User:RGloucester is an editor who polarizes the community, who has supporters and opponents. "The community" at this noticeboard has never done a good job of dealing with divisive or polarizing editors. If anyone thinks that this editor really needs to be sanctioned, they can go to ArbCom. I concur with the criticism of his sometimes extreme self-righteousness, as in his statements that he may not be blocked because he is right; but the community at this noticeboard has never dealt effectively with polarizing editors. In the case of his comments at Village pump (miscellaneous), my interpretation is that he has forgotten that, on the Internet, no one knows that you are being sarcastic. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:10, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I strongly disagree that being "polarizing" ought to be grounds for any action against an editor whatsoever. In this case, there are plenty of other specific grounds for action, without resorting to a vague charge of polarization, which could be used against any editor who has a mind of his own, and honestly says what he thinks. In this particular situation, RGloucester is simply being dishonest retaliatory. He is planning to move the article not simply because it should be moved, but explicitly in retaliation against "Certain editors [who] have taken to the war path, ignoring Wikipedia policies, guidelines, and common sense. They attempt to eradicate the word 'Rodham', as if said word were vulgar." There would be no suggestion to again do an article move but for continuing efforts to remove "Rodham" from locations other than the article title. There is no need to point here to "polarization" because we can point to more specific bad behavior. Retaliatory editing is always bad behavior.Anythingyouwant (talk) 18:15, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment - It should be noted that American political edits are under discretionary sanctions per the new ArbCom ruling. To quote, standard discretionary sanctions are authorized for all edits about, and all pages related to post-1932 politics of the United States and closely related people. If RG has been made aware of these sanctions I just informed him of the discretionary sanctions ([48]), WP:AE would be the appropriate venue to air grievances and allegations of wrongdoing. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 17:40, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Can someone please explain exactly what this means to me? Does this mean that all post-1933 U.S. politics articles are under 1RR, or what?... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 18:51, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

@IJBall: Just standard discretionary sanctions. 1RR could be placed on a page by an admin if they felt it was necessary. But there's no blanket 1RR or anything. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 21:32, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Pssst...EvergreenFir, try using WP:GS to link to the above; it currently links to Deletion sorting.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 22:04, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

@Berean Hunter: Thanks! Fixed! EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 22:17, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Can I point out that the list at WP:SANCTIONS isn't even in alphabetical order right now? Am I allowed to fix that? Please! Pretty please?!! --IJBall (contribs • talk) 22:42, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• This thread is a nonsense. First of all, I have not "edit-warred" with anyone over anything. I've not edited the article in a week, and have no involvement with the development of its content (I have never edited an "American political article"). I opened a talk page thread ages ago, which was promptly ignored by the likes of Calidum, who continued edit-warring with other editors over the infobox header, leading to the article's protection. Second of all, I am preparing to open a new RM because no moratorium was enacted, and because I believe that the evidence shows that the other title should be the title of the Wikipedia article. This is what those who "moved" the article did (such as well-known title warrior Born2cycle), filing new RMs at every juncture for years, so I do not see why I should not be allowed it? What is the reason for this apparent double standard? Furthermore, I find it absurd that I'm being taken to task over people who dislike my character. I have committed no wrong-doing, other than that some people here seem to have a visceral hatred of my very being. There is no justification whatsoever for an AN/I thread, or anything else. Yes, I oppose liberal activism on an encylopaedia that is supposed to be a bastion of neutrality. It isn't supposed to be a soapbox, or so I thought. Was that not the foundation of the project? And yet, merely voicing an opinion on the matter of these banners has brought fellows out of the woodwork, trying to sink my every act. What is the meaning of this? Why has this come to pass? Why are these editors able to go about unabashedly attacking the likes of me, incessantly playing at political advocacy, and yet I'm the one that's being chastised with a paddle? Explain, dear AN/I. Explain. RGloucester — ☎ 17:52, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• (Uninvolved editor comment, aka. unsolicited advice) Bad idea, RGloucester. Even if you are "right" on the merits, back-to-back RM's never go down well, and yours will surely be voted down (not on the "merits") if you try this. You are best advised to wait about 6 months (or until Hillary!! gets elected – whichever comes first) and try again then. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 18:55, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment - Interesting. EvergreenFir notified RGloucester of discretionary sanctions, and RGloucester deleted the notification, saying that he has never edited an American politics article. Hilary Rodham Clinton is an American politician. To respond to Anythingyouwant, I agree that being polarizing or divisive should not be grounds for sanctions against an editor. Anythingyouwant stated that RGloucester has engaged in dishonesty and retaliatory editing, which are conduct issues. I meant that "the community" at this noticeboard has difficulty in dealing with identified conduct issues by polarizing editors, and that conduct issues by polarizing or divisive editors should be dealt with either by Arbitration Enforcement or by the ArbCom. RGloucester hasn't responded to my comment about dripping sarcasm on the Internet, which is a waste of pixels. I recommend that this thread be closed by an uninvolved administrator, and that any conduct issues be taken to Arbitration Enforcement. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying.Anythingyouwant (talk) 19:15, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

AE does not apply, as I wasn't notified of the sanctions until mere minutes ago. As such, I wasn't made "aware" of the sanctions until after the supposed "violations" occurred. Not that there were any "violations". You'll note that the sum total of my involvement with the HRC article is with regard to the title, not with regard to anything political. I have no involvement in "American politics", and know nothing about them, praise God. I do not consider the few edits I made to restore the infobox header to the consensus version a week ago to be "editing an American politics article". Insofar as "sarcasm" is concerned, I do not understand as to what you are referring. Please be clearer, and perhaps I can furnish you with a reply. RGloucester — ☎ 18:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment - Perhaps my reference to sarcasm with respect to RGloucester's comments at Village pump (miscellaneous) telling other editors to stop challenging the will of the ruling classes and the will of God and to stop being so self-important was too kind, and perhaps either he was trolling or he actually believed what he said. It is true that those comments do not fall within the scope of Arbitration Enforcement because they have to do with European politics. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:41, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I never say anything other than what I believe. RGloucester — ☎ 19:45, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

@Robert McClenon:, I don't know exactly what "polarizing" refers to in this sense. I don't see anyone on the other side supporting RGloucester. The closest thing was the suggestion that he was being sarcastic when he proclaimed to speaks the word of God and insulted someone, which he has denied. He's also denied edit warring and apparently feels editing the politician's name in the infobox falls outside of ArbCom sanctions as it is not political content. Do you still suggest taking it to arbitration? You work in arbitration, correct? —Мандичка^YO 😜 21:30, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I can't speak for Robert, but I read his suggestion to mean taking it to WP:Arbitration Enforcement, not to WP:Arbitration. AE is where admins evaluate possible violations of ArbCom decisions, includng those involving discretionary sanctions, while Arbitration is a much more involved and time-consuming process which is generally used for new cases. Take a look at the content at WP:AE and see if you think it's an appropriate place to deal with your concerns. BMK (talk) 00:01, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

My complaint about RGloucester is regarding their ongoing behavior, incivil approach and general diva behavior that is approaching infamy outside of WP (like this unwarranted absurd attack on Drmies) that was on reddit). AE is just about people violating arbitrary sanctions. I haven't studied everything RGloucester has ever written, but it appears they've never made any admission or indication of meeting people halfway, just a ragequit when they demanded to be blocked. —Мандичка^YO 😜 00:13, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

My recommendation was in particular to take the issue of move-warring or title-warring about an American politician to arbitration enforcement. The name in the infobox is the name of a candidate for President of the United States, and that is certainly American politics. If RGloucester thinks that he can persuade the uninvolved admins at AE that that isn't political, he can try to persuade them of that. If someone wants to propose sanctions for incivility with regard to a European political issue, they can do that here. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

@Robert McClenon: Firstly, there is nothing "uncivil" about stating that it isn't Wikipedia's business to be interfering in matters of law or government. Secondly, it seems that you, Mr McClenon, despite being being an Arbitration clerk, are not aware of WP:AC/DS procedures. I cannot be taken to AE in this supposed "American politics" topic area for anything that occurred prior to having been made aware of the sanctions. Given that I've not edited any American politics pages since that notice, mere hours ago, there are no grounds for an AE request in that topic area. Regardless, there would not be anything actionable even if AE was a possible route. I would remind Mr McClenon that Wikipedia is not a WP:SOAPBOX for certain political views. I understand that he may endorse the liberal views expressed in the discussion on the matter of the banners, but that does not mean he is able to initiate a sanctioning of editors who have different views, or view the neutrality of the encylopaedia as sacrosanct. RGloucester — ☎ 00:49, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

@RGloucester: I think you may want to correct your second sentence, because perhaps quite fortunately, he is not an arbitration clerk anymore since he resigned last month. @Wikimandia: So to answer a question of yours which seems to have been unanswered - he does not work in arbitration. Ncmvocalist (talk) 08:24, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Furthermore, I would like to note that Miss Wikimandia's mention of certain off-Wikipedia websites of ill-repute does not do her any service. It makes it clear that she is part of a long-running off-Wikipedia harassment campaign against me as an editor, started late last year during the Cultural Marxism deletion debate. Said campaign has been ongoing, and has made editing nigh impossible in some cases. If anything, I recommend that she be sanctioned for participating in this campaign of harassment, and for participating in what has essentially been stalking. RGloucester — ☎ 00:51, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm not part of any campaign to harass or stalk you. If your behavior has gained the attention of the wider world, that has nothing to do with me. I don't care about the "Cultural Marxism" page and have never made any comment about it nor have I ever edited it. You're entitled to your opinion and there's nothing uncivil about saying you oppose the banner idea... notice the many other people who expressed that opinion who are not being discussed at ANI??? However, you're not entitled to be rude. What is uncivil is your insults and inability to work with other editors, which is part of an ongoing issue you have of seeing yourself as superior to everyone (except God, who speaks through you, of course). —Мандичка^YO 😜 01:31, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I beg your pardon? What "insult"? I never "insulted" anymore. I merely said that one should know one's place, as one should do. Mind you, this was in response to an outpouring of passion on the part of one editor, whereby he was in anguish over the fact that many of the photographs he has taken will cease to be in his ownership if the mentioned law passes. I was simply making it clear that he has no right to decide whether the photographs are his own, and that Wikipedia is not a place for passionate advocacy. It isn't for us to decide. That's a matter for the ruling class, for our betters. If they decide that these photographs shan't be able to be used, then they shan't be able to be used. We have no right to challenge the law. The law is the law, and it must be respected. RGloucester — ☎ 03:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• The difficulty here is that there are two problems with RGloucester. (1) he's quite annoying - overblown pseudo-Jane Austen language, grandiloquent rhetoric, ironic references that only he finds entertaining, sometimes bizarre opinions etc and (2) there's certainly an element of WP:BATTLE in his approach. The first isn't sanctionable, although it would be better if he didn't do it. The problem with the second is that it gets so clouded with the first that it's actually a little difficult to assess whether it's bad enough that something need be done about it. I think there's a lack of diffs in this thread, outside of the HC latest, that clearly point to (2) - as opposed to (1) - being an issue. DeCausa (talk) 08:52, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• That is an excellent analysis. I would add, however, that RG's propensity for actively and noisily not accepting the results of controversial community-consensus discussions which were settled only with great effort on many people's part can be considered to be WP:TENDENTIOUS and WP:DISRUPTIVE in and of themselves, since he tends to go on and on and on about it, and often takes steps which muck things up. BMK (talk) 11:20, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't consider RG being disruptive. I've no problem with RG's passion for the topic-in-question & recommend we take no action against RG. As long as RG doesn't try to put Rodham in the infobox heading (via edit warring) or attempt to move the article itself back to Hillary Rodham Clinton? then there's no probs. GoodDay (talk) 12:18, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Rgloucester is the author of one of the most hilarious unblock requests I have read on wiki: On 18:24, 17 April 2015 he wrote "I refuse to be blocked. I am not blocked. You can pretend that you blocked me all you like, but someone who is right can never be blocked. It is impossible." If we can get more of this I think that is enough reason to keep him around for the lulz.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 12:28, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Disruption at Jackson, Michigan high schools

JacksonViking (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

The above user has been brought here before by me (see links below). He has a very big WP:OWN problem with Jackson High School (Michigan) and to a lesser extent, Lumen Christi Catholic High School, the two high schools in Jackson, Michigan. Evidence to his constant and unchecked WP:GAME and WP:IDHT have, IMO, risen to the level of WP:NOTHERE. I am asking for an indeff per NOTHERE, or lacking that, broadly construed editing restrictions on topics connected to high schools in Jackson, Michigan. Evidence follows. I leave the rest to the community.

• Archived previous report
• Recent NPA vio
• Recent disruptive edit (note refname Penis)
• Most recent attempt to reinstate content that the previous report was about
• Reinserting without discussion BLP violating content from previous report under a false edit summary
• Message left on my userpage about the above, transfered to my talk by another editor after he blanked my userpage to insert it (see below)
• RV of blanking by Barek
• Further userpage vandalism and playing dumb to be disruptive
• Prior talkpage communication to show the above was disruptive
• Prior personal attack

I believe the above, along with a browse of his talk page and contributions, shows amply evidence of a WP:SPA who has no interest in conforming to the community standards for either content or civility. Thanks. Notifying him next edit John from Idegon (talk) 18:31, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

The edit summary "Deleted a lot of content that was not cited similar to what John from Idegon does" seems more than a bit pointy. While much of the content was appropriately removed, there are some non-controversial bits which were blanked as well. The resulting page is left with several "place-holder" section headers needing cleanup. I'll look at that page a bit closer when I get home tonight to try to sort it out. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 21:08, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

And now you see the WP:DICKish behavior this user engages in regularly. Thanks to MarnetteD for reverting it. John from Idegon (talk) 00:18, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

This is extremely aggravating how literally every mistake I make on here you bash me. A lot of those things you're complaining about were noob mistakes. I do not how to contact other users and you refuse to help me but instead you refer to me with vulgar language such as "bub". Second, every single edit I make is reverted by John too. I say he gets off my back. JacksonViking (talk) 04:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Look at this too, John referred to my first comment on his edit page as taking out the trash. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AJohn_from_Idegon&type=revision&diff=668569410&oldid=668569387 Very unprofessionalJacksonViking (talk) 04:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I don't know if you're not able to read a diff or if it's a deliberate misrepresentation of it, but all John from Idegon did in that edit, and what he referred to, was removing a duplicated section header... Thomas.W ^talk 08:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I'd lean to misrepresentation. In the prior paragraph, HE referred to me as "bub" (not at all vulgar BTW) in the diff above labeled "further user page vandalism..." and I replied "So it's not bub now?" It's just another example of GAME. John from Idegon (talk) 15:18, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Are you guys not even going to acknowledge the first paragraph I left here? JacksonViking (talk) 23:35, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

JacksonViking, has it occurred to you that the reason no one is responding to the first paragraph you left is there is nothing to respond to? There is a welcome template on the top of your talk page that has links that could answer many of your questions. There is an invitation to the Teahouse, another place you can get your questions answered. You are posting here. You have (finally) posted at the article talk page, nearly 2 years after this whole debacle started. You are posting at the AfD another editor started on an article you created. Your claims of not knowing how to communicate are disingenuous. When you do communicate, you attempt to obfuscate the problem. You for example readd a huge block of BLP violating crap that you've refused to discuss numerous times, along with a minor and unneeded change to the notable people list. I revert, and You them charge to my User page, blank the entire thing and insert a whiny complaint about me removing your change to the notable list, totally ignoring the real problem. In the process, you refer to me as "bub" a term you find offensive enough to complain here that I used it. Is it any wonder you are not getting help from other editors? John from Idegon (talk) 17:17, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

User:DePiep

I undid an edit by User:DePiep and added the subject "This was not a minor edit - you are changing more than just infobox parameters" ([49]) beacuse he was changing text from other editors. He undid it with the subject "grow up and learn to read"[50] and I undid it again: "Stop it - you are changing the meaning of peoples text - look at the diff" and he undid it with "Get an editors life instead of tracking and bothering other editors. Create you own edits. And no, no contant changes because it's about par names". I confronted him on his talk page (see bottom - conversation before he archieved it), and asked for an apology, and he just said "And why should I not point to the "bothering" aspect?" Its not the first time, see e.g. Wikipedia_talk:Chemical_infobox#ATC_and_DrugBank_deprecations_reversion (and especially from "I did notice there were multiple editors in this discussion, and DePiep [...]", and its not so long ago he was here at WP:ANI last time Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive879#use_of_COI_as_a_weapon_in_content_dispute. Christian75 (talk) 22:47, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

User:Cliff1911

Adds unsourced material, eg. [51], despite warnings. Never adds edit summaries, despite requests to. Does not respond to talk page requests from other editors. Thank you. Magnolia677 (talk) 00:00, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I only saw the one revert, but he is actually right. Took me 10 seconds to find the citation for it at [52] The best thing is to just put it back with that reference. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:26, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• I also linked him to the essay WP:Communication is required. If someone is going to revert back, they need to be willing to discuss it, via WP:BRD. Since I've found the citation, told him on his talk page, I think we can wrap this up for now. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:29, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Here's the person's edit analysis. Behold and be awed.

Yeah, discussed this person here a while back. The general consensus of the admin corps was leave him alone, he makes occasional minor mistakes and won't talk, but his overall contributions are net positive by far, so let him carry on. Herostratus (talk) 01:32, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

User:Cliff1911 has more than 40,000 edits and it looks like every one of them is mainspace. He hasn't used an edit summary in his last few thousand edits, and may never have used them. He adds material to articles, much of it potentially useful, but never adds sources. He has had hundreds of comments left on his talk page, but has never responded, ever. This is the world's worst case of WP:IDHT. How do you deal with an editor who refuses to follow policy and refuses to communicate about not following policy? Alansohn (talk) 01:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

In the past, IPs have gotten blocks around here just because they won't respond to Talk page comments. I've got to think the same would apply to account-holding editors. This is supposed to be a collaborative environment, and not responding to queries, etc. pretty much destroys that. The other editor I can think of in this vein is basically a Wikignome, and about 80% of his edits are constructive, while the other 20% are more unhelpful, but their edits are so gnomish that no one has pursued it further in that case. But I'm of the opinion that not responding to queries at all is unhelpful, no matter the "quality" of the edits, and can and should be the basis for Admin action. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 02:40, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

The editor helps create content without creating drama. Leave him alone. GregJackP Boomer! 04:13, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Editors don't edit or create content in a vacuum. Is an editor really adhering to the fourth pillar if they never communicate... well, ever?! Look, I'm not saying to block for not communicating in this instance. But the discussion on their Talk page is entirely correct – the first time this editor commits an infraction, possibly even an inadvertent one, they're likely to end up indef blocked because the Admins will have no other choice if they never communicate. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 05:28, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Amazing that the only non-mainspace edits were also article edits, to an article that's now in someone's userspace (and someone might want to take a look at that too). The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 06:03, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I'd probably recommend an attention getting block. I can't remember the name of the editor but I remember a similar case from a year or so back where an editor refused to reply to comments on talk pages. If I remember correctly, it took 1-2 blocks for him to realize that people meant business and he eventually began responding to comments and leaving edit summaries. Honestly... at this point he's been getting so many warnings that at this point the only way to show him that we're serious about talking with other editors is to actually back up our words with actions. While he may have made beneficial edits, he's also made some non-beneficial edits and he's continued to do this despite several very clear warnings about a lack of sourcing. I'm of the mind that his continued actions (despite warnings) shows a refusal to follow the rules. If this were any other editor he'd have been given at least 1-2 warning blocks by now. The only reason he hasn't received them is because he hasn't responded to anything. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 10:40, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• Support attention-getting block. If he were just making helpful edits, it would be no issue. But there's some problems with his edits. Looking at his talk page, he doesn't just add info, he removes it without explanation, and does not respond/correct various problems like disambiguation links he adds. —Мандичка^YO 😜 11:52, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

A very recent precedent of a user making (some) bad edits and refusing to discuss with others, leading to them being blocked. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 10:55, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Of course, it's worth noting that the result of that was that the blocked user in question went the sockpuppet route... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 16:43, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Support attention-getting block. If he doesn't want to communicate with people that is absolutely fine, but that does not mean that he can continue editing in a way which, whilst it is not going to break enWiki, has received sufficient attention here and on his talk page from numerous editors that it is now disruptive. I don't really see a material difference between his behaviour and point 5 of WP:DISRUPTSIGNS. His behviour is taking up more and more of other editor's time. I don't really see why he should not be blocked until he states, however briefly that he will act on the repeated suggestions of the community as I don't see a single post on his talk page that could be deemed to be a positive reaction to his editing. If he then wishes to return to silence that is his choice Fenix down (talk) 12:32, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• Not yet. We've had a few of these lately, which inspired me to write WP:ENGAGE. The key here is asking how much disruption has he caused. One or two recent reverts is not enough. I've put him on notice, pointed him to the information that he can get blocked if he continues to revert without talking about it, the fair thing is to wait and see if he stops reverting. No one is required to talk here, as long as they aren't doing something that requires talking. The last thing we want to do is run someone off when it isn't necessary. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 12:54, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Good Lord. Leave him/her alone. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 13:26, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• "Not yet"? "Leave him/her alone"? Cliff1911 has made 40,000 edits in seven years, refuses to leave edit summaries, refuses to communicate and -- most fundamentally -- refuses to add sources for anything. If either Dennis Brown or Anthonyhcole would follow every one of Cliff1911's edits and add the reliable and verifiable sources required for these edits, I'd have no issue. Until then, we have an editor who refuses to follow bedrock Wikipedia policy and who seems to be operating in their own encyclopedia, not ours. Alansohn (talk) 14:34, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• The issue with this is that he's done this for years and he's been receiving warnings about his various edits since 2008. This post from 2011 shows that he'd been warned several times. He's clearly been warned dozens upon dozens of times about his editing and at this point he should be clearly aware that we want him to at least respond when people have issue with him. I mean, he's been brought to ANI TWICE, both in2013. He never responded in either circumstance and he was never blocked. At this point he's extremely unlikely to pay any attention to further warnings. I mean, at this point our lack of action is pretty much giving him the message that not only are his actions OK, but that Wikipedia is condoning his actions because he made a lot of edits. I mean, that's the message I'm getting from all of this, that an editor can be problematic and have the same problems over a period of six years and never actually have to face repercussions for repeatedly going against people's requests and Wikipedia policy. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 14:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Think about it this way: if he'd responded to us and basically told us "no way, I'm going to keep doing this, forget you guys" then we'd have at least blocked him temporarily. Well, that's pretty much what he's telling us with his outright refusal to even respond to anything. I mean, what does he care? If we continue on the way we have, he has nothing to fear - he doesn't have to change since people will argue that his amount of edits gives him immunity. (And yes, that is essentially what is being said here.) The length and amount of edits are nothing to sneeze at, but right now this is pretty much setting a dangerous example, that Wikipedia will turn a blind eye to problematic editors if they exist long enough on Wikipedia and edit enough. I mean, come on guys- this guy isn't going to change unless we make him pay attention and if he's not going to change then he's going to continue to make problematic edits, leave no edit summary, and refuse to talk with other editors. I'm not saying we should hang his head on a spike and never allow him to edit again, but clearly he's not going to change or respond unless he's at least given a 2-3 day (or even a week) block that forces him to stop and respond. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 14:52, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• When I get time, I'm going to try to count how many of his last 50-100 edits have been unsourced. I'd say that the bulk of them (like 70-80%) appear to unsourced and while these aren't huge BLP concerns (ie, he's not saying that Cher married a fish), they're still BLP concerns because they're unsourced. He's fully aware that we require sources, yet he also refuses to source. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 14:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

You don't have to add citations to your edits. If someone challenges what you add without a good citation they may delete your contribution. I'm fairly sure edit summaries aren't mandatory either - at least, they weren't the last time I looked. Perhaps I misunderstood the above, but I thought his/her contributions were good faith efforts and generally good. I thought he/she wasn't vandalising, edit-warring or in any other way harming the encyclopaedia. If I've got that wrong, I apologise. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 15:09, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

This is correct, though most people start to get upset when they keep finding their edits get reverted and either learn policy or quit. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Refusing to talk isn't a violation of policy, and specifically, a person can NOT be compelled to participate at ANI. He's been put on notice: if he edit wars (an actual violation), then he will be blocked. Blocking him solely because we want him to talk isn't supported in policy. Unless someone can point to a specific policy that he is violating, then a block won't stand, as it would blocking to force them to do what we WANT them to do, not what policy requires. We aren't here to do that. There are many, many individuals like this here at Wikipedia, who act in good faith but won't talk. I'm not prepared to get into the psychology of it, but it is common enough. If he edit wars, I will happily block for 24 hours the first time, and otherwise follow normal procedure for behavioral issues. Not talking, by itself, is not a behavioral policy violation. It is a pain, but not a violation. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 15:21, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I've spun through the last couple of hundred edits by this editor, and I cannot see any obvious clear policy violation other than possibly mild violations of WP:BLP through adding unsourced content. Most of the work seems to be insignificant plot summary gnoming. As Dennis says, if he starts to edit-war or violate real policies that can be backed with diffs, we'll look into it. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, I think that's where I am now too. But I agree with the discussion on his Talk page as well – if it ever comes to a block, it'll probably have to be an indef, as that may be the only way to get this editor to communicate... In the meantime, if this editor continues to add anymore unsourced info to any BLPs, they should simply be reverted as a matter of course. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 16:50, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Absolutely do not block this person. The only question for this particular person, since he's so unusual, is: is he a net positive, or not? If he's not, kick him off for good. If he is, leave him alone.

We cannot be at all certain that he is even aware of the existence of his user page, his talk page, or article talk pages, or how to use them. Any block of this person would perforce be permanent in my opinion, since he would presumably continue editing exactly as before when the block expires (which would then require longer and longer blocks, unless we were to back down), and he would presumably be unwilling (or possibly unable) to request reinstatement.

Some situations just need a good leaving alone. This is one of them. Herostratus (talk) 22:12, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• The question we should be asking is whether the disruption caused by this editor outweighs their positive contributions. While Dennis Brown's essay is very good and highlights good reasons why users should strive to communicate, there is no policy that requires any user to respond to talk messages or to use edit summaries, and I think it sets a poor precedent to start sanctioning users just because they don't use their talk pages. From what I see, this is an editor who is occasionally an inconvenience, but the disruption is extremely minor, and a long way off from being blocked under WP:CIR or any other guideline/policy. We all probably have better things to do. Ivanvector (talk) 22:30, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• While it may not be an "explicit policy", communication is absolutely in an implicit requirement of the fourth pillar. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 06:44, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• The calls for an "attention-getting block" are ridiculous. So this guy/gal operates in this odd way -- big deal. On balance he's way more helping than hurting, so leave him for God's sake alone. EEng (talk) 02:40, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• We can, but you've got to figure that he's had dozens of complaints over his edits and thousands of unsourced BLP edits. He's been asked to explain his edits multiple, multiple times. My biggest point with this is that the only thing he has going for him is that he's edited a lot. It's kind of well... this is what people talk about when they say that we play favorites. We could just ignore him now, but I can guarantee that he's going to end up being brought up at ANI again and I can guarantee that he's going to continue to collect complaints on his talk page from multiple different editors. Maybe it seems like this is all minor, but what we have here is essentially someone who is following their own rules and doesn't even have the consideration to at least respond to people's complaints. He's not following Wikipedia's rules, he's following his rules. If the two come together, then that seems to be mostly coincidental than anything else - he's been warned about several policies (using citations, for example)... and his reaction was to continue to ignore those policies. It looks pretty clear that nothing is going to be done to him, but I still have to extend the warning that eventually it's going to become necessary. He's adding BLP material without any sort of citation. The material may seem minor, but what happens when he adds something major? Something that someone might actually want to complain to Wikipedia about? What do we do then? Just say "oh, he edits a lot and refuses to talk to anyone, but he edits a lot, he gets a pass"? He doesn't have to write a book or anything, but to my knowledge he's never spoken to anyone since he's signed up with Wikipedia and there have been multiple complaints about him - and those are just the ones on his talk page and at ANI. I have no doubt that there are probably at least a few dozen more in the edit summaries of the articles he's edited. Long story short, at some point we're going to have to deal with his BLP violations (even though they may seem minor to some) and his constant refusal to talk to anyone or to even follow basic guidelines. If he'd at least started using citations in his edits that'd be some improvement, but I don't see where he's ever really done even that. I really don't think that a long edit history and seemingly beneficial edits should give you immunity to everything on Wikipedia. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 03:20, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

If you want to keep pushing this, you need to stop saying he has to use citations. Except in certain circumstances, citations aren't actually required. Is he disruptively restoring unsourced material removed by other editors? I really get the feeling a few people just can't stand this guy's eccentricity. It's weird but leave him alone. EEng (talk) 06:40, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Uh... sourcing absolutely is a requirement on BLPs, which is what this discussion has been about. Yeah, sure, explicit sourcing isn't needed on all articles. But it pretty much always in on BLPs – adding unsourced material to BLPs is definitely not "OK" in most of the circumstances that count. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 06:47, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Is he putting in negative or controversial BLP material? And the graph above showing how all his edits are to articles....we are here to build an encyclopedia, so someone who is dominated by article edits doesn't inspire me to instablock. We keep rehashing the same arguments, but he has been warned, and unless he has new actions that warrant a block, then blocking is improper. And this talk of an indef block is completely out of policy. We use escalating blocks as needed, we don't indef block someone out of the gate for stuff like this. The tone is almost vindictive and I simply don't understand why, and frankly, it doesn't matter: we don't block punitively, we block to prevent disruption, meaning even if he needed a block, it should be proportional to the risk he poses, NOT just to twist his arm. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 06:57, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Dennis, please see what I said above, as a follow-up to Ritchie – I don't think a block here is appropriate right now. That said, if this editor is adding unsourced material to BLPs, it should essentially be reverted as a matter of course. I'd like to believe that such reversions much get this editor to actually communicate then, but I suspect it's too much to hope for... But my overall point stands – we are building an encyclopedia together, in a collaborate environment, and as such communication is key. Those editors that choose not to communicate (like, at all) will sooner or later likely crop up as a problem. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 07:07, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Well, when that actually happens we can deal with it. Or are we putting people in jail now for crimes we predict they will commit? EEng (talk) 13:39, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Well, I think the problem is that Cliff's editing is already an issue – not a "blockable" issue – but an issue (e.g. adding content without sources, adding overlong plot summaries as was potentially done at The Postman (film), etc.), nonetheless. Which I think is Tokyogirl79's point. And that's where the lack of a communication becomes a problem – without communication, there's little hope of getting across exactly what others' problems with Cliff's editing is (the details just won't come across in single templated messages, even assuming Cliff is reading those), or prodding Cliff to change and improve as an editor. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 16:30, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Let me give an example: He was threatened with a blcok by an editor on his talk page for adding someone to the list of people born in Goldfield, Nevada. It was a final warning. It took me all of 5 seconds to find a source proving this fact: [53] (there are others, I just grabbed this one). It was an uncontroversial fact about someone who died 13 years ago. Magnolia677 threatening him was completely inappropriate. It wasn't a BLP issue. People put in correct but unsourced facts all the time, it is how a Wiki works. WP:V does NOT require we source all facts. It requires than they are able to be sourced, and it assumes that someone else will source them. Obviously contentious facts about living people should be avoided, but this isn't the case here, this was a matter of where a dead guy was born. It isn't against policy to add this to an article, and it isn't proper to warn. Period. Revert as unsourced or simply go find a source like I did, we are here to build an encyclopedia, after all, but you don't warn or block. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 07:12, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Yeah, the level 4 on that was overkill. So was the level 1 vandalism warning that Cliff just got from User:NeoBatfreak for the additions to The Postman (film) – Cliff's plot summaries there might have been over-long, but they certainly weren't vandalism... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 07:22, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Dennis Brown, it's impressive that it too you "all of 5 seconds to find a source". The problem is that Cliff1911 refused to spend those 5 seconds. He's never done it. He won't add sources, he won't leave edit summaries and he won't respond to talk page messages. If you're willing to clean up the crap he leaves behind after each and every edit of his, adding the required sources that he refuses to add, that's great for you, but Cliff1911 isn't doing that. We're here to build an encyclopedia by working collaboratively; he isn't. Alansohn (talk) 05:15, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Personal attack by User:Khaleejian against User:Elspamo4

User:Khaleejian called User:Elspamo4 "spammer" (in reference to his username) and "too butthurt" here in response to a completely legitimate action by User:Elspamo4. User:Khaleejian also previously renamed the same page to a more POV name[54] without even mentioning it on the talk page, let alone creating consensus for it.--Anders Feder (talk) 08:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• In the defense of the page move, it looks like Murbarak the Great is a nickname/title that's used (see this article at Britannica.com, although it's not the common name and as such the article should remain at Mubarak Al-Sabah. I've left him a warning on his userpage about responding with hostility. If he does anything else that's hostile then I'd recommend a cautionary block, depending on how he responds or acts. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 10:25, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• I've also asked that he not move any pages without trying to get a consensus, mostly because he's a new user and because sometimes pages are under specific names for specific reasons. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 10:31, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Thanks. The page move I was referring to was of "Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen" to "Saudi Arabia-led war on Yemen", though it is correct he also moved Mubarak Al-Sabah.--Anders Feder (talk) 10:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Ahh... that would definitely explain the POV move. It looks like there's still a redirect so if nobody objects I'll delete this. I'll give it a few minutes to make sure that nobody minds before doing this, though. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 12:07, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I've deleted it since it was a POV move and nobody has voiced any reason here for it to remain as a redirect. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 14:36, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• It is definitely worth keeping an eye on Khaleejian's edits. He has made some very questionable edits, some of which could be seen as disruptive and some of which are POV-pushing. In my view, this instance of incivility is overshadowed by his inappropriate article contributions. Elspamo4 (talk) 13:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• FYI he's also began Project Pages on Wikipedia:WikiProject Islamic State (ISIS) and Wikipedia:WikiProject East Turkestan Islamic Movement. I can see the ISIL one being worthy considering the traffic, sensitive information and related pages, but ETIM? There isn't even a project page for East Turkestan or Xinjiang.... Of course, I only know he founded these because I looked at his user page, making me a "sad person with too much time on their hands." —Мандичка^YO 😜 14:02, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  I'd like to note that neither project was approved by the council. Winner 42 Talk to me! 14:06, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Doesn't look like he's done much work on them but make userboxes to stick ok his userpage. He also wants to rename the ISIL article to Islamic State (despite recent failed rename proposal). —Мандичка^YO 😜 14:22, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Might this be outing [55]193.79.181.104 (talk) 14:20, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Interesting. Which forum is this and where can I join? J/K —Мандичка^YO 😜 14:22, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Topic ban user Huhshyeh from article Popular Front of India

User Huhshyeh has a single purpose account for Popular Front of India, since 2011 he is exclusively or mainly editing this page see his contribution. Given article is subject of discretionary sanctions by arbitration committee. The organization is alleged to be militant organization but claimed to be social organization. User Huhshyeh is exclusively editing this article since 4 years and he adds only "social work" of organization that too from unreliable sources like "Muslim mirror" "two cirles" etc. He is probably activist of that organization or paid editor for that organization. He has been involved in edit wars on the page. --Human3015 Call me maybe!! • 15:49, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Since the Arbitration Enforcement noticeboard hasn't been shut down by the recent controversy about a particular block, this would be more efficiently dispositioned at Arbitration Enforcement. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:22, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Robert McClenon yes you said earlier about arbitration but I thought first I should take this matter to ANI, also i'm having some problem on arbitration as I'm relatively new and don't know how things work at arbitration yet. --Human3015 Call me maybe!! • 17:25, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I want to give one stat, till now this user has made 365 main space edits xtools, out of 365 there are 194 edits on Popular Front of India, 30 edits on Social Democratic Party of India which is political wing on Popular Front of India, 20 edits on Social Justice conference which is another wing of Popular Front of India. So out of 365 there are 244 edits he made only on pages related to one organization and that too "promotes" that organization using unreliable sources and pushing POV for alleged militant organization. Rest of his edits came on organizations which oppose "Popular Front of India" and obviously he defamed those organization. Hence this user is surely activist of that organization and this is his single purpose promotion only account since years. --Human3015 Call me maybe!! • 17:25, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Robert McClenon, I would ask you not to take User:Human3015 fully. I was expecting him to provide accurate info atleast for this audience. So please have his statements double-checked, the most obvious one being "Social Justice conference being a wing of the organiation" PFI-wonder how a conference can be a wing? Also my last 100 edits were quite diverse I'd say, inclusive of a alternate political party Aam Aadmi Party, edit following an Bollywood actress [[[Shenaz Treasury]] open letter in support to women's safety, on the Giant Panda new triplet births, on evolving of the Ebola virus and an edit on Germany at the FIFA World Cup.

The mention by User:Human3015 of edits protraying the right wing truths of the [[[Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh]] - an organisation banned thrice in India for it's murdering of the father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi amongst other extremities, is what hurts our "human" friend the most? Ironic, I'd say, given the intro the user has given. As requested, before, please have the page semi-protected Huhshyeh (talk)

NPOV and repeated unwarranted reverts by User:Human3015 & User:Irrigator & media sources

Am reproducing the talk on the page Popular Front of India .ywoo Pls have a check on the history of reverts unsupported by full facts by both user Human3015 and his alias User:Irrigator. Wonder how the user discredits sources "Muslim mirror" "two cirles", and now added 2 more to the list "Mangalorean.com" and "daijiworld.com", while source like papers like the New Indian Express have been taken to task by the Press Council of India asking around 10 papers to "more careful" in publish such sensitive information. Oh yes, this information being from a minority newspapers should be wrongfully giving info on the PCI directives as well, I should suppose. Wonder where the space for alternate media went in WP? While the PCI directs 10 main streams newspaper to be careful of the content, and even asked them to publish reverts, small local newspaper - four of them atleast in User:Human3015 view-are discreditted without any incident?

User:Human3015, I don't believe it's your or User:Irrigator or editors group created to unwarrantly discredit sources and a well wisher of alternate politics, supporter of backward and minority sections in an already marginalised Indian society. So there is nothing wrong in giving the giving out the other side of the story that is usually unsaid and partially brought out. This is Wikipedia, and not a portal for main stream media. If that's not inline with the WP Ideology, let the WP Admins kindly communicate that. User:Human3015 can go ahead to discredit Huhshyeh like you try to discredit the 4 alternate smaller newspapers . I edit with the same user, while this pages as seen a lot of aliases trying to blanks out the positives; as I have maintained in my intro, I stand for alternatives and against bias. Huhshyeh (talk)

s "Human3015 should stop giving false information and justify reverts. Recent revert by the same user is false is 2 counts : "Reverting content from unreliable sources and restoring deletion of sourced content from reliable sources" @Human 3015, pls explain 1. Reverting content from unreliable sources : which the "reliable" sources? 2. restoring deletion of sourced content from reliable sources  : please read again - there is no deletion of any sourced content here.

Edit, but simply don't revert, and don't falsify info Huhshyeh (talk)

Human3015simply doesn't read, simply don't revert - there is no PFI mentioned in the news sources. Hence section "Murder of VishalKumar" removed Huhshyeh (talk)"

Alias Irrigator seems to have conveniently left out the media being discreditted by the very source in his revert "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Popular_Front_of_India&oldid=668701237". @WP Admin, please note alias User:Irrigator and User:Human3015 for NPOV, selective omissions and unsupported reverts — Preceding unsigned comment added by Huhshyeh (talk • contribs) 07:46, June 27, 2015‎ (UTC)

References

• Comment @Huhshyeh:, we are not talking about content dispute here. Here questions are, Is it your single purpose account? Are you activist of PFI? Are you on Wikipedia exclusively to promote PFI? --Human3015 Call me maybe!! • 10:31, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Comment already answered in above section. please re-read as you always miss out the main points Huhshyeh (talk)
• To the Admins: I will quote two key sentenses of Huhshyeh which clearly suggests that he is hardcore activist of Popular Front of India and he is here on wikipedia just to promote the organization.
  • Quote 1: The mention by User:Human3015 of edits protraying the right wing truths of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh - an organisation banned thrice in India for it's murdering of the father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi amongst other extremities, is what hurts our "human" friend the most? Ironic, I'd say, given the intro the user has given
  • Quote 2: editors group created to unwarrantly discredit sources and a well wisher of alternate politics, supporter of backward and minority sections in an already marginalised Indian society. So there is nothing wrong in giving the giving out the other side of the story that is usually unsaid and partially brought out. This is Wikipedia, and not a portal for main stream media. If that's not inline with the WP Ideology, let the WP Admins kindly communicate that.

Here his statements clearly suggests that he is activist of PFI. He himself admiting that his edits are not belongs to "mainstreame media" but from "alternative sources". From his attitude of talking we can feel how committed he is to particular philosophy. As I said earlier in my comments xtools Huhshyeh shows that his nearly 70% of main space edits came on Popular Front of India(PFI) and its related wings. Remaining most of 30% edits came on organizations who oppose PFI. He is mainly editing same page since 4 years from unreliable sources. I demand to topic ban this user from said page. Thank you. --Human3015 Call me maybe!! • 14:55, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment Glad that Human3015 didn't omit the key part of the paragraph like he usually does in his numerous reverts (see above section for details) "So there is nothing wrong in giving the giving out the other side of the story that is usually unsaid and partially brought out. This is Wikipedia," WP isn't a the encyclopedia of the Mainstream media, it's the complete balanced factbook avaliable online. So all news -alternative and main stream- concerning any topic need to highlighted, not just the bias of a person part of a fascist right-wing thrice banned organisation ,the RSS . Am for alternatives, the complete truth - and you don't have to be a part of any organisation for that. Let the WP Admin decide accordingly. Huhshyeh (talk)

• Comment from the sidelines: This is part of an ongoing war between pro-Pakistani and pro-Indian editors here on en-WP, with tit-for-tat reports at SPI, admin/forum shopping and everything else you can imagine, a war that is the direct result of Darkness Shines getting banned, a ban that changed the balance between the warring parties. A balance that until that ban had made Indo-Pakistani articles relatively peaceful (compared to what they are now). Thomas.W ^talk 14:51, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• I'm going to second what Robert McClenon said above, this is better addressed at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement as all involved parties seem to been notified of of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/India-Pakistan and the subsequent motion. —SpacemanSpiff 15:04, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• @Huhshyeh:, as admin suggested, I will go for Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement, but lets resolve this issue here instead of wasting time in arbitration. You should not revert edits done by other users from reliable sources just because they project negative image of your organization Popular Front of India, also you should not include lay claims from un-reliable sources just to project positive image of your organization. In some extent positive claims are ok even if they are from un-reliable sources, but if you keep on adding those claims then its not fair. --Human3015 knock knock • 10:04, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Self-recall for The Rambling Man

The Rambling Man (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Hello all. I'd like to request a self-recall, i.e. comments and opinions as to whether I should remain an admin just a touch more than eight years in the role. Recent events have demonstrated that there are serious question marks over my ability to conduct myself as an admin, and that I may be bringing the rest of the "admin corps" into disrespect; indeed I have often been cited as "one of the worst admins" and that I have "no credibility" on Wikipedia. While I fully accept my approach in many places and discussions has been abrasive and sometimes unnecessarily fighty, but I have never knowingly abused the tools afforded my by the admin bit. For openness, I have, in the past, been temporarily blocked for transgression of an IBAN and I was recently blocked by a fellow admin for a BLP violation (the outcome of which is discussed in some detail in sections above). The latter, and its subsequent fallout has determined this course of action.

The time has come that I do the right thing and submit myself to the community (well, this community) for scrutiny. For what it's worth, I'd prefer to keep the bit in order to continue to help out as and when necessary, and will endeavour to moderate my "snippiness" in either case. Naturally, I will stand by the result of the consensus as closed by an uninvolved admin. Thanks to all those who take the time to comment, pro or con or otherwise. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:13, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• This being ANI, I claim an exception to the IBAN, so that I can make this statement: I have had a number of disagreements with TRM over various issues, but I cannot think of any instances where he has abused his admin authority. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:44, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Isn't this usually done through a Wikipedia:Administrator review? I know that this method isn't used a lot but, in my experience, ANI can be a forum where there is often more heat than light. I think you would want a careful consideration of your tenure, not just editors' thumbs up or thumbs down reactions. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 16:51, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  I don't know, I wasn't aware. I'll leave a note there after I've put my son to bed. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:57, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Is there any advantage to taking it over there? That looks like a forgotten corner of the Wikipedia. (I can almost literally see the cobwebs...) --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:09, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I tend to agree, there's one review there which has had no comments for about seven weeks. I'm "happy" to use this place right now, after all it seems to be the place where my most vociferous critics spend a lot of time. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:17, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Sounds like a waste of time to me, as if there isn't enough of that going on already. I don't think there are many concerns by significant amounts here over Rambling's Man's general conduct. I might be wrong, but I can't see what benefit giving you a grilling would achieve here. If you've ever been combative, it's perfectly understandable given the arrogance of some of the people on the site.♦Dr. Blofeld 16:48, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Extended content

One of your clique buddies continues to censor my pointing out of your own arrogance. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 23:27, 26 June 2015 (UTC) There is no one here any more arrogant than you are. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 23:18, 26 June 2015 (UTC) You need to retract that comment. No one here is more arrogant than you are. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC) Knock it off. You and your clique are the most arrogant users I've ever seen on Wikipedia. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 16:54, 26 June 2015 (UTC) Goodness, it took all of 12 minutes for you to go into pointless incivility and POINTy comments. Not your record perhaps, but well up there. – SchroCat (talk) 16:57, 26 June 2015 (UTC) Goodness, you showed up, right on schedule. Not your record perhaps, but well up there. And the others can't be far behind, unless they're asleep. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 17:05, 26 June 2015 (UTC) Mimicking - how very mature of you. Your obsession over this non-existent "clique" really is paranoid nonsense. - SchroCat (talk) 17:19, 26 June 2015 (UTC) Doc, can I be in your clique? Go on, go on; I'll make badges for everybody. Belle (talk) 17:10, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I've had some issues with your style in the past, but not with your admin tools. Moderating your snippiness, as you put it, is all I'd ever ask for, and I'm glad to see that you're gonna try to do so. Your admin bit is fine by me. (and yeah, liz might be right about the whole bureaucracy thing, but whatevs.)Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 16:55, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• No issues, Rambling Man, will wait patiently for a GA review, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 17:01, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• The only thing you did wrong was edit warring, which a number of editors have gotten a bit heated and done over the years. That's an editorial / judgment error, not an admin abuse issue. The worst sanction I could possibly see happening (if Kww hadn't abused his sysop bit) would have been you and Kww getting blocked 24 hours for making a few too many reverts. ;) Reaper Eternal (talk) 17:00, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• (Non-administrator comment) My advice? – Take a one-year self-initiated sabbatical (after which point you can simply request your tools be returned, if you after a year you still desire to reclaim your tools). I haven't seen or heard of any evidence of abuse of your Admin tools. But your interactions with other editors leaves much to be desired. Further, you seem to enjoy "content creation" more than Admin'ing more anyway. So I can't help but think that a one-year sabbatical might be the best for all involved, perhaps most for yourself. Please know that this is nothing more than a good faith suggestion. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:03, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Interesting, although resigning the bit now would 100% be considered "under a cloud", so requesting it back would require an RFA. And it doesn't seem to be my admin'ing that's called into question that often anyway.... The Rambling Man (talk) 17:31, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  I can only speak for myself, but I wouldn't see it as "taking a leave under a cloud" – if it's voluntary, it's kosher. (I.E. No one would be "forcing" you to take a sabbatical.) I don't know the particulars of the process, but I don't think an RfA would be required here (would it?...). --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:47, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Just a couple of days after being blocked for a perceived violation of the BLP policy? I think cloudy would be understating it. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  A "block" that's been universally perceived as being improperly levied. (Look, I don't want to see Kww desysop'ed for that – but even I think that your block in that situation was completely inappropriate, and should never have been enacted...) --IJBall (contribs • talk) 18:03, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  A "block" which has just been left forever in my block log without any kind of problem for the blocking admin. Anyway, thanks for your advice, I'll take it all onboard. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:05, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• You're fine, TRM (I don't mean that in an admiring your physique way; you may be fine in that way too, who knows?, not me). You have the tact of a sledgehammer and the finesse of a paving slab though. Belle (talk) 17:10, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• No issues. Best of luck, JoeSperrazza (talk) 17:10, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• Your admining is fine. The role of administrators as ambassadors or whatnot is overstated. Alakzi (talk) 17:25, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• There are two things about the way Adminships are currently viewed by many around here that really quite bother me: 1) that Adminships should be "lifetime appointments" (I couldn't disagree more with this), and 2) that the only consideration that should go into evaluating an Admin is their use (or abuse) of "the tools". The second one has become a real stumbling block around here to improving the Admin corps IMO. The fact is Admins basically serve a supervisory role on this project, and in real organizations appraising supervisors goes beyond just whether they "unjustly sacked someone" and looks at how they interact with underlings (and with each other). The truth of the matter is that a very important part of an Admin's job is in fact interaction with other editors (often esp. newbies). Take a look at two recent RfA's, Ritchie333's and NeilN's – in both cases, a recurring theme for their being promoted was their positive interactions with other editors, especially new editors. Even with Ser Amantio di Nicolao's current RfA, a recurring theme is the positive interactions other editors have had with him... So, really, I could not disagree more with the statement, "The role of administrators as ambassadors or whatnot is overstated." Interaction with other editors is of paramount importance in appraising how an Admin is doing their job. It's not just about "tools". --IJBall (contribs • talk) 18:00, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Administrators are not part of a rigid power structure; they are held directly accountable to the community. There are plenty "real" organisations which operate horizontally. A candidate's feistiness serves as an indicator of the possibility of their abusing the tools; it is not the expectation that admins have otherwise got to behave better than the herd. Trying to get along with each other is important for everyone. Alakzi (talk) 18:15, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Again, we're getting lost in the obsessive focus on the "tools". Appropriate interaction is especially important from Admins. Admins should and must be held to a higher standard. Saying there isn't a "rigid power structure" doesn't negate that there is one, in fact. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 18:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I do not agree that admins should be held to a higher behavioural standard than the rest of us and hence I do not consider his frequent abrasiveness to be a reason to resign. You're begging the question; yes, if you claim that admins must behave better, then there is a power structure. Do note, I do think that admins need to be on their best behaviour when doing admin work. Alakzi (talk) 18:49, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Since you're asking for feedback: Can you explain why you edited through full protection here? --Laser brain (talk) 17:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Sure, my interpretation of that particular admin action was very similar to a recent one where an involved admin was overstepping the mark by shutting down ongoing discussion. It should have been down to someone else to do that. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:48, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  But the protection policy doesn't allow administrators to edit through full protection to express displeasure with the protection, or because they don't feel the protection is valid. --Laser brain (talk) 17:55, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Well my bad. It was still the wrong thing for the admin to do. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:58, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Should you resign? Yes. Have you abused your tools? Yes. Why should you resign and how have you abused the tools? You've abused the tools often through your bad behavior, negative attitude, your bully type tactics, and your vulgar language...especially when interacting with editors you dislike. For these reasons you should step down. Caden ^cool 18:40, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Thanks for your comment. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Someone needs to learn what admin tools are then. If you think RM has abused them, please show diffs. If not, then you're just using this as an opportunity to make ad hominem comments. - SchroCat (talk) 18:43, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• You are are wonderful editor and a good admin. Sure, there was a bit of warring going on, but it was for the benefit of the project and there was no disruption in mind. I shan't comment specifically to Caden's remark, but I should treat it with the contempt it deserves if I were you. Cassianto^Talk|

"'ere, Sharon, where did I put that Mars bar?"

Self recall? Is that like total recall but with without the rose tinted spectacles? Martinevans123 (talk) 19:05, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you Martin, helpful as ever. I really liked the original, ("you're in for a big surprise!" and Sharon Stone practising her serves) but the sequel sucked. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:08, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Two weeks. Pedro :  Chat  19:15, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

It was a "reboot" rather than a straight sequel. (Sorry, can't resist...) --IJBall (contribs • talk) 19:17, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose self recall Long term user, relinquished 'crat rights so clearly not holding on to bits for the sake of them. One of our most active WP:ITN editors, a place that needs more admins. Yep, you're abrasive at times and I think you could knock some of the immediate snark on the head. But then again so could I. No tool misuse has been demonstrated (Caden makes allegations but provides no diffs or other facts) and only a net positive to the project. Pedro :  Chat  19:12, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I haven't seen any reason whatsoever for The Rambling Man to turn in his badge, with the possible exception of his own fatigue (as someone who had voted for his bureaucratship, I didn't see the need for him leaving that club either, personally, but he might have). Mostly per Pedro: The Rambling Man's experience and judgment at WP:ITN are valuable, also as an admin who is able to post hot items to the main page sooner rather than later. And I also agree with the other things Pedro said; more diplomacy and less condescension (and less sensitivity) while arguing wouldn't be undesirable, but that has nothing to do with whether The Rambling Man should remain an admin or not. ---Sluzzelin talk 19:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• The Oil drop experiment shows that even senior scientists will modify their own reported findings to fit them within the "orthodoxy" - even when scientists have put effort into attempting to be objective. Groupthink comes about in organizations that actively try to avoid it. Personally, I see this on ITN - three or four editors will remark adding support for a nomination, then an experienced editor will rubbish the proposal with brusque language - making others who support the idea more cautious and more likely to decide not to contribute. Bear in mind that for every senior admin that uses brusque, snide, sardonic, cynical, or dismissive comments, it's possible that more than one good faith editor decides not to engage in a topic area where they feel the quality of discourse is going downhill. I don't want TRM to cease adminship - but he should stop making facetious remarks in places that don't involve vandalism or edit wars (like ITN). -- Aronzak (talk) 19:43, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• If someone can show me specific diffs showing abuse of tools, I will try to evaluate them fairly despite my generally favorable opinion of TRM. Otherwise, I will assume that in this, as in most accusations of "administrator abuse", it is the admin who is being abused. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:05, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• I have a faint awareness of some history of snippiness, so I applaud TRM for the promise to work on that. I also applaud TRM for the self-awareness that some have expressed concern which led to this request for feedback. I do not support the suggestion (made above) of the relinquishment of tools at this time. I haven't thought through whether this would qualify as "under a cloud" or not and I don't care to investigate it but I understand the possibility so I would not think it wise to resign the tools at this point. I also have too much to do to undertake a review on my own. If there are editors who have concerns they have been invited to provide evidence. I will review the evidence is presented but I won't go looking for myself. So far no evidence has been presented, the unsupported post of Caden notwithstanding. Caden, provide diffs and I'll look at them. If you don't your allegation is likely to be ignored.--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:26, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Clarification: What I suggested above was a "sabbatical" or "leave of absence" not a "relinquishment". Sabbaticals are part of the job in that other field that involves lots of writing and researching: academia. They should not be viewed as "abnormal" or "unusual" here. How many first-hand reports have we seen from editors who say taking a break from Wikipedia was the best thing they've done? And I can think of at least one Admin who said the same thing about taking a break from the tools... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 20:33, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Just resign the tools and get on with editing, which is what this project is supposed to be all about anyway. You don't need a title and a block button to be validated as a Wikipedian. Carrite (talk) 20:37, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Yes, that had crossed my mind, problem is that on the odd occasion I do use the tools, it's normally to things like move ITN items to the main page, or fix errors there. I don't need it to be validated as a Wikipedian, I would prefer to keep it to assist the project. Perhaps someone could tell me how many times I've used admin tools outside the main page, DYK queue etc maintenance and how many times I've used it to block, protect or delete... The Rambling Man (talk) 20:40, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• @The Rambling Man: "I don't need it to be validated as a Wikipedian" - no but others critically do see it that way - and it makes them less likely to want to vocally disagree in places like the ITN and DYK queue. This is an issue for editor retention, because novice editors feel uncomfortable disagreeing with a senior, longstanding admin. See Feynman's quote about how experienced scientists modify their findings to avoid disagreeing with a senior, published figure. Your admin powers may only be a small part of your time - but the fact that you're an admin makes non-admins cautious to come to the defence of non-admins you make abrasive comments towards, especially on DYK and ITN. Editor retention is one of the big issues with the project - and when junior editors are snapped at on ITN or DYK, they may be less likely to feel like contributing. I don't want you to lose your adminship, just appreciate that being an admin and making abrasive comments makes non-admins unwilling to challenge you, and that can drive down editor retention. I'd prefer TRM to commit to something like involving a wikiproject like editor retention in monthly reviews of conduct, and getting suggestions to improve ITN and DYK for new users. -- Aronzak (talk) 06:39, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• I dislike The Rambling Man as an editor and as a person (at least the part of his person one can know from interacting with him on wiki - possibly he is a swell guy in person but that seems beside the point). On wiki he is perpetually abrasive, condescending and arrogant, dismissive of others' arguments and unwilling to engage in serious discussion, and when one responds to him in kind he is petulant and easily offended. Pretty much classic baiting behavior. I have had quite a few disputes with him, principally at ITN where I consider him to display consistently poor judgment and worse behavior in relation to other editors with whom he disagrees. In that context, I have made many personal attacks against him, all of which I consider to have been well deserved. I have seen him interact in similar ways with others at DYK, though fortunately I have not had to interact with him there. I have however not seen him ever abusing his admin tools. I myself resigned my tools because I realized it was too hard for me to keep civil during heated engagements and when confronted with baiting behavior. TRM is able not to use swearwords and direct personal attacks. But almost all of his comments in conflicts are veiled personal attacks, or passive aggressive baiting. I don't think that is a good way for an admin to interact with others. I dont think he has violated any rule, but I also don't consider him to be a good administrator. I think a good admin is also ideally a nice person who treats others better than the mere rules require, but I realize that being a nice person is not something that many consider a central aspect of wikipedia, and I assume it is possible to be a reasonably good admin without being one. Whether to resign one's tools is everyone's own business. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 20:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Cheers Maunus, overlooking your own contentious behaviour when interacting with me, your analysis of me is close to my own. Hence the pledge to do better in this regard. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:44, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

You will note that in the above I am quite candid about my own short comings as an editor and as an admin.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 21:00, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

As I said, this discussion should overlook your own behavioural issues. Thanks for the comment. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:03, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

As a piece of advice I would note that I have found resigning the tools to be a relief and while sometimes I wish I could make a deletion in preparation for a move I honestly don't really need them. I think you are probably, like me, a better content writer than administrator.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 21:11, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• My thoughts - If you feel you're not being a good admin, resign the tools without prejudice and take a break. Dennis Brown did this earlier in the year and it seemed to be a good deal. Your boat race articles are still at GA standard as far as I know, and they are a good bit of work. If you don't resign under a cloud, you can get the tools back easily enough. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 20:46, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

  Yes, as mentioned above, there is a cloud here, that I was blocked by a fellow admin just a day or two ago for an alleged BLP violation. This is cloud territory. Moreover, it's not that I feel any of my "admin" tasks are beyond me or conducted poorly, just that I have been castigated far and wide for not being a "good" admin (seemingly for behaviour I exhibit outside the making of admin decisions). As for the Boat Race stuff, yes, as far as I know, I currently have 163 good articles (including two women's race articles) and 3 featured articles. More to come that way, but that's nothing really to do with this. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:50, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

As far as I can see, that dark cloud is still very firmly parked over Kww Valley. But great that we can all enjoy this cathartic group airing session. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Mixed blessing It might be seen as under a cloud if it he resigned the bit now, Ritchie333, since he started the recall process (I handed mine in because I just had filed for divorce, so was distracted). That said, I will opine, in a way TRM will understand: I think you are a flaming pain in the ass. You are often too gruff, you can be dismissive of others, and often can be compared to a bull in a china shop. I disagree with you regularly, and I'm sure I piss you off frequently as well. That said, I've never seen or would expect you to abuse the tools and your demeanor when acting as admin is well within expectations. I am comfortable with you keeping the tools. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 20:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• Regarding the Kww block: he got a lot of serious pushback for it, including multiple editors and admins calling for an arb case. I think the institutional memory of it will follow him around for a long time even if there's no formal reprisal for the specific incident. And the underlying issue on your side was basically lame edit warring, a venial sin in the scheme of things if it doesn't happen too often. If you really want to wear the hairshirt over it, report yourself for 3RR and ask for an uninvolved admin to block you for 24h, after which you're good to go.

  I've been more seriously annoyed by the friction you've gotten into at Refdesk/ITN/DYK and I urge you to tone it down if that's still going on (I don't keep tabs). At other times I've seen good analysis and judgment from you, enough that (maybe since I haven't looked at the problem areas too closely) I'd generally prefer that you stay on, maybe after taking a temporary break from adminning as others have said. I generally want to preserve what's possible of the remaining "Old Republic" DNA in the admin corps as a foil against the present-day bureaucracy even if it means occasional ludicrous incidents like the Antonio Martin thing. So I'd encourage you to self-reflect for a while on the areas where you've gotten in friction, and work out how to either avoid those areas or do better in them, while still maintaining reasonable standards in other areas. If you can do that, I'm satisfied. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 21:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

FWIW, I don't think a turning in of the tools is warranted. Some grumpiness and exasperation is not a prerequisite for this.Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 21:54, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• I would urge you to continue to be an admin but to work harder to set a better example. Specifically be more civil, refrain from personal attacks, and try to communicate in a manner the de-escalates conflicts rather than drive off those seeking to communicate. Also, please don't edit war. We need admins and I would far rather you clean up your act than give up the bit. Chillum 22:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• I in contrast urge you to resign as an admin. I will repost from the closed section above regarding you: "Pretty comfortable throwing his weight around at WP:ITN, where I have been watching him for years, as he drifts into borderline abuse repeatedly. I banned him from my Talk page just yesterday for posting what is a fine example of WP:BAIT: here is an admin coming to my page looking for a fight. In my long term observation, TRM is a bully who should desysopped." I repeat: came to my page looking for a fight, because I had previously questioned your posting an ITN item you had !voted on per WP:INVOLVED. No admin should use the snarky, hostile and combative rhetoric your position as admin allows you to get away with, which is a deeply ingrained habit. You abuse your power, and should give up the extra buttons. Jusdafax 00:15, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• I concur. BMK (talk) 00:20, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment If you want to take a break from adminship but don't want to give up the bit under a potential cloud, just don't use any admin tools for awhile. Edit as if you don't have them. Once this incident blows over, you can decide to resign if you want and there won't be any question about whether you can re-admin just by asking a bureaucrat. 207.38.156.219 (talk) 00:13, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• (Non-administrator comment) I personally think you should keep your Admin rights and spend more time editing and mopping WP:FOOTY related articled, especially Ipswich Town stuff. You are an asset to the project overall; yes you can loose your cool but I think 99% of the time it's justified. I have never seen you abuse your Admin tools, you just get very grumpy ;) JMHamo (talk) 00:56, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose recall. Lawd knows TRM and I do not often get along personally, and we often butt heads on many issues, but I have never once seen him misuse his admin tools. The measure of an admin should only be in how they use their tools. TRM has never misused them to my notion, and there's room in the big world of Wikipedia for a wide range of personalities and experiences on Wikipedia. We will never be friends, but I will defend his admin status to the ends of the earth. He's always been a model admin in terms of his measured, careful use of his tools. As a double endorsement of his worthiness, he recognizes his own shortcomings above, and a self-reflective, self-aware person who is willing to grow is exactly the kind of person we want as an admin. Again, I do not approve of much of his interpersonal approach in dealing with people he disagrees with. But he's never let that bleed into his admin work, and it would be a loss to the community for him to lose his tools. --Jayron32 02:45, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• also oppose recall Certainly I have been warned several times by TRM and also helped in situations by him. Over the course of many years feathers will get ruffled from time to time. But I can't think of any instances where he has abused his administrative authority. Maybe his fuse is a bit shorter from when he started but he acknowledged as much. It would be quite a shame not to have his experience in solving issues. If he really wants to step back, take a 30-60 day vacation from administrative chores. Stay an admin, don't resign the tools, but just do editing and nothing else. If you're feeling unappreciated, maybe that month would recharge the batteries. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:46, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Just a quick comment to follow up on what was said above — if you take a one-year sabbatical and request the tools back later, it won't be a problem. Your admin rights will have been removed for inactivity, which isn't considered under a cloud, and by definition it's several months separated from any conflicts you're in right now. Nyttend (talk) 13:51, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

  I could, but since my sysop tools include being able to edit the main page, I'd prefer that not to be the case. Right now I'm pretty much dedicated to putting quality items at ITN and fixing ERRORS. I do block the odd vandal and protect the odd page, but that's in the minority. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:45, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• A desysop would be a bad idea; you're not indispensable, but you're much less dispensable than others, particularly at ITN, but also elsewhere. The reserved approach with the admin tools is admirable, as is the ability to crank out an amazing number of solid, quality articles while being an admin. I have found your willingness to jump immediately into full snark mode depressing sometimes; God knows I don't expect perfection, but I wish it happened less often than it does. I'd grudgingly support a too-grumpy TRM as an admin; I'd wholeheartedly endorse a less-grumpy TRM as one. --Floquenbeam (talk) 15:33, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Comment There's now an arbitration request open so I'd say file a statement and answer the case if needed. If the case is declined or if it closes without desysopping, I think that means there is not a cloud and it is ok to resign temporarily if that's what you want to do. 50.0.136.194 (talk) 21:32, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

  Please see my opening statement, I believe that I do not misuse the tools and would prefer to keep them. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:45, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) I'm largely in agreement with most of the above. I don't think you should resign as an admin. You haven't misused the tools and we are short of admins in most areas, including the ones I generally see you in. That said, it definitely wouldn't hurt if you made a conscious effort to try and be less abrasive in your dealings with other editors. Jenks24 (talk) 21:34, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

  I agree, I've noted that in my opening statement. The Rambling Man (talk)

• Abrasive and fighty to some and in certain areas, yes; trustworthy in terms of the tools, also yes. If you do genuinely make an effort to 'moderate [your] "snippiness"', then I don't believe you should be (self-)recalled. In the future, if an issue do raise your temperature, try walking away for a bit. Reduce your stress level, and also better for the pedia. On a side note regarding any passing cloud, I would say any resignation now would be under a cloud, but not because of the recent block, but because of the open ArbCom case request where you are named as a party. -- KTC (talk) 22:24, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• The Rambling Man, I voted for you for adminship over eight years ago and for bureaucratship over seven years ago. Do I regret those votes? No. Do I want you desysopped? No. Do I think that you need to make a few changes? Yes - because I think you're a good person, good editor and good admin, and I think the project would be worse off without you. If you feel as though you're been dragged into disputes of which you want no part, there is no shame in backing away from them. Some people above have noted that you can sometimes be hostile (I prefer "grumpy" as it's a less hostile word than the word "hostile"!) when dealing with people, especially with those who are causing you trouble; my answer to that is if you feel other editors are stressing you out, honestly, there is no shame - no shame at all - in someone with as much experience as yourself asking someone else for assistance. If nothing else, I certainly do recommend taking a break: it's amazing how taking a week or two (or a month) off refreshes one's enthusiasm for editing. Again, I continue to hold my long-standing positive impression of you and it is my preference that you remain as an admin; just take on board the advice that people have given you here and I think you'll be fine. Best. Acalamari 22:27, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Resign From what I've seen, The Rambling Man routinely violates our behavioural guidelines such as WP:CIVIL, WP:OWN, WP:BATTLEGROUND and WP:INVOLVED but he shows restraint in his use of tools like blocking and deletion and so his bark is worse than his bite. I can cope as I'm quite thick-skinned but it seems likely that other editors would be provoked or driven off by this nastiness. As admins are supposed to show exemplary behaviour, he should please give the role a rest and try to find some more congenial corner of the project to work in. If the break is somewhat voluntary, he might reasonably return to admin duties at some future time. Andrew D. (talk) 22:54, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Resign. The Rambling Man drove me from contributing from WP:ITN/C, and partly drove me into my semi-retirement (I lost confidence in the admin system, I'd name a few other high up people I've lost confidence in too, but it's not the time for that) There are so many sections on AN/I's archives that contain the word TRM, I can't believe he still has tools, and that scares me. One of those AN/I sections is this, where I disastrously tried to get action taken against him. I don't understand why people here are blind to what I see. TRM has given far enough trouble. I can't really say when he's misused his admin tools, but only numerous abuse cases of his editing tools, and surely someone who abuses editing tools shouldn't be trusted with sysop tools. The community's handling of TRM's behavior is a reason that I think that Wikipedia doesn't have a bright future (and therefore discouraging me from contributing). This wiki-depresses me (seriously). --AmaryllisGardener ^talk 02:05, 28 June 2015 (UTC)
• Comment Full disclosure; TRM and I are parties to the IBAN which TRM mentions in his opening statement as having been temporarily blocked for violating. (Baseball Bugs and I sought that IBAN when a dispute between TRM and myself at ITN ended up with TRM following me to other pages, especially the Reference Desks, where somehow BBB and I became conflated in his aggressive behaviour.) I'll speak here, given he has brought up the issue and invited comment. My opinion largely parallels the comments of Baseball Bugs and Jayron above. TRM has had some serious issues dealing civilly with other users as an editor himself. But I have never seen him once abuse his admin privileges.

It is largely for this reason that I argued TRM should not remain blocked when he violated the terms of our IBAN last autumn. There has been a little bit of gamesmanship by him since (and there was a lot when the IBAN was first instituted the prior winter, diffs upon request), but I felt at the time that the permanent mark should be and was enough. Given I don't see diffs regarding this latest issue, I cannot comment on it. But the bottom line is that the "problem" with TRM is not as an admin but as a user.

Had anyone asked me a year ago, my opinion would have been adamant that TRM should be desysopped. His behaviour is hostile enough in general that it is unbecoming an admin, and I cannot see that he would ever become an admin at this point were he not already grandfathered in. But that's a problem with adminship in general, not something that TRM has caused. My belief is that the admin system needs fixing, with term limits and a lottery giving some privileges to experienced users in good standing. Anything to break up the permanent old-boy's-club we have now, which I think drives away a lot of older and professional contributors with no desire to become wikilawyering experts.

But frankly, the loss of TRM's admin work at ITN would be a huge blow. I would suggest that something like a plea-bargained deal be arranged. Perhaps TRM can voluntarily accept a limit of no personal comments and no more than two comments per thread at ITN (and on other talk pages, if warranted)? Something significant along those lines would allow TRM to continue his good work, but would put a damper on the impulse to argue every point until blood is drawn.

I see the point of those who call for TRM's resignation. I also see that while he's a frigging pain in the arse, he doesn't abuse his position other than by besmirching it with his unbecoming behaviour. I think something absolutely should be done, something or record here or at arbitration, and by decree if not voluntarily. But I think this thread is a good palm branch, TRM is a valuable contributor when he contributes, and we should keep the good of the project in mind above our own personal grievances.

μηδείς (talk) 02:57, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Do not resign. I asked for anyone here showing me specific diffs showing abuse of tools. None were provided. Resignation or desysoping is the answer when you cannot be trusted with the tools. The answer when multiple editors tell you that you have been acting like a jerk is to stop acting like a jerk. It really is that simple. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:02, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Guy, it's not just about the tools – Wikipedia:Administrators#Administrator conduct (aside: this needs a shortcut – I'd suggest WP:ADMINCON or WP:ADMINCOND or something...) is an actual thing: "However, sustained or serious disruption of Wikipedia is incompatible with the status of administrator, and consistently or egregiously poor judgment may result in the removal of administrator status. Administrators should strive to model appropriate standards of courtesy and civility to other editors and to one another." This, and a recent statement at ArbCom, confirm that Admins can lose the bit for other than just straight "abuse of tools". --IJBall (contribs • talk) 03:37, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• WP:ADMINCOND is now a shortcut. BMK (talk) 03:47, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• @BMK: Danke! --IJBall (contribs • talk) 04:02, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Bitte. BMK (talk) 04:32, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• @IJBall: Thank you! --AmaryllisGardener ^talk 03:56, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• My thanks to IJBall and to BMK for the pertinent shortcut. IJBall has said in different words, and citing the actual policy repeatedly violated by TRM, that I have tried to emphasize in my own statement here, and at the ArbCom case request. We also have a user stating they were driven away from ITN by the abusive comments TRM indulges in. Enough. TRM, you need to resign the tools at once. It's the decent thing to do. Jusdafax 05:04, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Seriously? "Sustained or serious disruption of Wikipedia"? Evidence, please. Show me the diffs. All I have seen so far is some rudeness that, while undesirable, wouldn't get an ordinary editor blocked. Especially without being warned and given a chance to change his behavior. The words "triggerhappy" and "bloodthirsty" come to mind... --Guy Macon (talk) 05:37, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Well, the thing is, we aren't talking about "my" issues with TRM, so I can't provide much in the way of diffs (this is literally my only "semi-bad" interaction with TRM, and that didn't break my skin, though neither did I consider it "constructive"...). But neither am I going to ignore the comments of other editors here (especially in regards to the ITN section), nor can I ignore the numerous cases I've seen come through ANI about TRM. Again, it doesn't satisfy me that "an Admin hasn't abused the tools", as I expect more from an Admin than that. And creating enough of a "hostile environment" that it's a pervasive issue with a significant segment of the community is enough for me to see an Admin desysopped. I'm not saying that TRM is at the level – but if ArbCom is taking this case, I'd sure like them to look in to that, as well as Kww's block. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 06:02, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose recall This got started because of Kww's misuse of the tools. The fact that TRM refused to do the same shows who can be trusted. MarnetteD|Talk 05:11, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose recall I've only skimmed the earlier ANI and comments here. It seems to me TRM didn't do anything particularly alarming or concerning besides argue with someone who appears to have been in the wrong. I also would like to see diffs - everyone (not that there are many) who has claimed TRM is disruptive, you should back up your claims with diffs! Show us what he's done! Otherwise I just have to assume it's something personal. —Мандичка^YO 😜 06:53, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• There are numerous examples prior to this latest spat with Kww. For instance, see Inappropriate conduct by administrator User:The Rambling Man. Andrew D. (talk) 10:20, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose recall. I oppose recalling TRM because I have never seem him abuse his admin powers, nor do I see evidence of him doing so here. Like all of us, he is not a perfect human being or Wikipedian and he admits the things he needs to work on and from what I know I believe he is doing so. I don't expect any editor or admin to act perfectly all the time. In the past we have had strong disagreements (which I likely am part responsible for) but they had nothing to do with his admin powers. I don't think they need to be removed. 331dot (talk) 12:54, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Edit Warring Natg 19

Natg 19 has ignored wikipedias threevert rule and is edit warring among pages of players drafted in the 2015 NVA Draft. Among the pages are Larry Nance Jr. and Rondae Hollis-Jefferson. Although it has been pointed out these players are not signed he continues to add them to their current teams. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Toeknee44 (talk • contribs) 16:50, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Is there any reason not to file a report on this at WP:ANEW then? --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:04, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

IJBall, can you remember being a new user? I can. I actually still remember the time, ten years ago, that I first reported a problem to a noticeboard (there was a bewildering variety of them even then, though not so many as now), with much effort and doubt, and somebody spoke to me just the way you did there, and how disconcerted I was. The way to reply to good faith reports is to thank the user for their assistance. Then, if you must, you can point them to a different noticeboard for next time. Thank you for reporting the problem, User:Toeknee44, please consider using WP:ANEW next time you need to report edit warring. I was going to take a look at your complaint, but realized that my understanding of... what sport is it? Oh, basketball. OK, my understanding of professional basketball is unfortunately so tiny that I hesitate to review your complaint. I hope another, more clued-in, admin will do so soon. Bishonen | talk 17:12, 27 June 2015 (UTC).

FTR, that wasn't intended to be "snarky", and I apologize if it came off that way. It was more an attempt to point Toeknee44 to the correct noticeboard. I apologize Toeknee44 for being curt. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:14, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Also, I just checked and it doesn't look like Natg 19 has crossed 3RR – there was an addition, and 1 revert at Larry Nance Jr., and just the one addition at Rondae Hollis-Jefferson. (In fact, I see some later self-reverts from Natg 19 on this issue...) So it looks like Natg 19 got the "message" in time before crossing any "redlines". I suggest that this one can probably be closed. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:23, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Editor: "Helpsome"

I am new to Wikipedia and was treated very rudely by "Helpsome" last month. S/he called me a liar and was generally abusive.

I suggest the following: 1) S/he be reprimanded and given some general guidelines on civility. 2) S/he be given retraining on actually reading what s/he was deleting before s/he deletes it. (The entry on one of the articles I added material to is now messed up due to his/her editing without looking -- it has entries in the Reference section with nothing being referred to). 3) I request to be allowed to enter material as long as I do not "self-promote" without being abused.

Thank you.

W. Paul Marshall

("wpaul1972")

I've moved the required user notification to Helpsome's talk page from the title of this section. Sam Walton (talk) 18:27, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Here Wpaul1972 (talk · contribs) is the link to make it easier to read this editors relevant pages. It looks like the article in question is Nagarjuna (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) and the ensuing discussion at User talk:Helpsome/Archive 3#Nagarjuna MarnetteD|Talk 19:11, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Looks like this may be helpful: Shankara1000 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) as effectively Helpsome seems to be suggesting that Wpaul1972 is a sock of Shankara1000. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 19:24, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Helpsome did not edit since 19 June 2015, he may not be able to comment on this complaint. JimRenge (talk) 20:10, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

These are the edits that appear to be in question: [56][57](and by Shakira1000). However, I must note to Wpaul1972 that this revert did not remove the improvements you made here, merely, he removed the information for Jones Richard. That seems odd. I would like @Helpsome: to explain this focus, however noting the above. -- Orduin ^Discuss 21:21, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Again, I am not Richard Jones or any of the other scholars I try to add. I do not know him. I did once speak to Lex Hixon after one of his talks, but he is dead. I don't understand the reference to Shankara 1000 -- if Helpsome is suggesting I also use that name I never have. Paul (wpaul 1972) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wpaul1972 (talk • contribs) 20:25, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

@Wpaul1972: Please sign your comments using 4 tildes (i.e. ~~~~). The system with automatically sign and date your comment. Thanks. BMK (talk) 21:13, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Repeated copyvio creation

Ali_qahremani (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

In the past few hours, Ali qahremani has done nothing but create articles which plagiarize different sources, under titles that are only related to the article topic, in may cases topics that should be covered by existing articles. User does not respond to any messages, even when a non-template one was sent. Conservation may not be the best option. Ian.thomson (talk) 19:02, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I blocked and asked for feedback.--S Philbrick(Talk) 19:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

In some cases, this is slightly more complicated than it appears at first blush. In some of these articles there is an indicator of the copyright problem but the duplication detector report shows no overlap. While not having confirmed this my guess is that the copied material comes from the text of the article as opposed to the abstract. In one case Oncogene virus I'm puzzled, as the attempted an article is clearly a copy of the abstract, yet the duplication detector report shows no overlap. I haven't fully investigated why but this puzzles me. However because the editor manages to include the copyright notice in the article, and in at least one case there is substantial overlap, it makes sense to stop this editor and make sure they engage in discussion.--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:08, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Eyeballing it confirms the copyvio (or at least enough of a copyvio), I'd have to guess that something's gone wrong with the copyvio detection software(s). Ian.thomson (talk) 20:57, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Earwig's copy vio detector shows a 99.4 % overlap. It's actually the better tool, and I use it almost exclusively. -- Diannaa (talk) 21:49, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

73.166.187.154 - League City, Texas IP

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

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The user behind this IP has been brought to ANI at least three times, [58][59][60] sometimes from other IPs, but no admin has ever committed to addressing this editor's problematic behavior, which tends to include battleground editing and edit summaries, unsourced or improperly sourced content, edits that conform to their personal preference and not the preference of the various manuals of style and community consensus, and most recently BLP violations. This user tends to fall off my radar, until I start seeing problematic edits, the removal of comments and warnings from their talk page, and snippy edit summaries, then it becomes clear who they are. The most recent referral to ANI was here, but the editor escaped sanctions likely due to references to self-harm. I emailed the emergency team and didn't press the matter.

• From this most recent IP, editor has been instructed numerous times to stop submitting unsourced or improperly sourced content: [61][62][63][64][65]
• When the user submitted unsourced biographical content, then described Tefkasp's reversion as "foolish", I attempted to edify the user on WP:BLPPRIVACY concerns and explained very clearly what the community's expectations are. Their response was to blank the explanation, commenting "Dude just leave me alone, you aren't helping me." Clearly the explanation did not resonate, as they have continued to add unsourced and improperly sourced biographical content with no regard for WP:BLPPRIVACY. They have been warned by Binksternet and Yamaguchi先生. After Yamaguchi removed birthdate content attributed to a Twitter post, the IP added it back without a reference, seemingly in defiance of Yamaguchi and WP:BLPPRIVACY. An earlier warning from Binksternet about adding unsourced content was met with more ignoring of the problem "Honestly dude you are speaking just plain nonsense. :("
• User has been around long enough to understand that genre is subjective and should be referenced. This change was reverted, but the editor resubmitted it with the exasperated and baseless summary, "Seriously, the film has some intense moments that make it feel it's a thriller according to the trailer why dismiss them???" This clearly is not consistent with WP:OR.
• Before I knew that I was dealing with this same editor, I had a recent run-in with them at Talk:The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water on the issue of including unnecessary content to the film's plot section. I explained that there were derivative works/copyright concerns related to adding unnecessary info, they responded with this petulant link to a YouTube video of Peter Griffin saying "Who the hell cares?" They don't seem to be able to discuss content issues from the perspective of existing community guidelines, typically resorting to 'but I want it in there' emotional arguments.
• Personal attacks here, calling editors communists for upholding site wide consensus.
• User has previously acknowledged behavioral problems, but I don't see that they have done anything differently to manage their anger or to make their own experience here go smoother. I don't think the editor has the skills to edit here constructively. Apparently all attempts to guide this editor are resented, all warnings are ignored, and everybody other than this editor is in the wrong.

For these reasons I am requesting administrative sanctions. Thanks. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 19:32, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Possible suicide threat (and I already contacted emergency@wikimedia.org). (non-admin closure) Erpert blah, blah, blah... 04:37, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Because that's the truth. If you want to block me for what I say to all of you then do it because that's the last straw. I would rather drink cyanide and jump off a cliff and forget about what happend here, but the honest truth It seems that the WHOLE Wikipedia site is changing especially with YOUR views regarding on "Sources" and post-credit and mid-credit scenes. So good bye--73.166.187.154 (talk) 19:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC) :(

WP:NOTHERE. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 19:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

IP editor, you've never made one coherent argument for why your preferred edits are consistent with Wikipedia policy and guidelines. The sum of all your arguments amounts to "I don't like it, you're all unfair, I'm mad!" At some point, particularly when a dozen editors have challenged your edits, you have to acknowledge the possibility that your understanding of existing guidelines and policies may be woefully inaccurate. Since you've provided no explanation of why you feel things are changing, there's little anyone can do to discuss matters with you, although you are still welcome and encouraged to explain. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 20:22, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I did made my point, I am really baffled on the changes and rules you make regarding on twitter and facebook in the past few hours thinking they were never meant to be their at all. I don't want to have the twitter and facebook sources to be dismissed.--73.166.187.154 (talk) 01:30, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Endorse administrative sanctions for the reasons outlined above by Cyphoidbomb. It is very clear that this user has elected to ignore our editorial policies and will continue to edit in a disruptive manner until such actions are taken. Regards, Yamaguchi先生 19:37, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• Endorse - Especially due to the above comment by the IP, in part due to the indication of suicidal thoughts. -- Orduin ^Discuss
• Endorse site ban for any editing that follows the pattern established by this person from the Greater Houston area of Texas. Far too much flaunting of WP:NOR, with a combined effect of NOTHERE. Binksternet (talk) 20:49, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• Endorse. The editor is NOTHERE, so they clearly shouldn't be here. - SummerPhD^v2.0 01:14, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Endorse - Clear case of WP:NOTHERE. --TL22 (talk) 02:43, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• A glance at the IP's edits led me to believe that sanctions may be necessary, but the editor did make a few factual changes, and did start to put in references. Not sure what the best sanction - if any - would be, though.- Penwhale | ^{dance in the air and follow his steps} 05:04, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Nor am I. My request for sanctions isn't intended to be punitive, it's intended to inspire them to change their behavior. The problem is exacerbated when we start introducing statements about self-harm. I'll leave it at that, so as not to fan flames. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 14:06, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

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

Original research

Per this previous discussion, User:Medgirl131 has been notified that changing and creating new navboxes with the suffixes "oidics" or "ergics" is in many cases original research and confuses readers because these terms do not exist in the scientific literature. Despite these cautions communicated both through talk pages (diff) and private e-mail (withheld for obvious reasons), Medgirl131 continues to create new navboxes such as {{Prostanoidergics}} that until this navbox was created, the term Prostanoidergics was completely unknown. Compounding the problem is that Medgirl131 refuses to gain consensus on the appropriate talk pages such as Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Pharmacology before these edits. It is Medgirl131 right not to communicate on talk pages. However if Medgirl131 wishes to add controversial navboxes to a large number of articles, IMHO Medgirl131 should be required to obtain consensus at the appropriate project talk page before making these edits. I am sympathetic to Medgirl131 privacy concerns and I am willing act as a mediator via private e-mail to to determine if there is community consensus for these proposed edits. Boghog (talk) 21:07, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I am sympathetic also. We have a lot of people making up new terms for Wikipedia and we try to curb this. This user contributes good content to Wikipedia. I expect that this person knows the rules, knows how to engage in discussion, knows why this notice is being posted here, and can anticipate the likely outcome of coining new terms without providing justification. I would comment on any proposal justifying these names. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:34, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Personal attack by SpyMagician

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

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Personal attack aimed at myself by User:SpyMagician: [66] Note that this comes immediately after I asked user to discuss the edits rather discussing me personally.173.252.18.173 (talk) 22:10, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

There was no personal attack and this is utter nonsense. The issue was this 173.252.18.173 is repeatedly claiming they have over a decade of experience on Wikipedia yet got upset when I reverted their badly worded, cited and added addition to the Soaked in Bleach page. I initially reverted their addition, and this editor reverted that reversion here and then started a discussion here in which they were indignant towards basic Wikipedia style regarding quotes and citations. The net result is I simply decided to look at the citations and properly reword and replace the core content here. This IP user (173.252.18.173) is simply being a troll about this all despite—when all is said and done—the section was expanded as they desired. But apparently this IP user is upset I did it the correct way with proper citations and proper quotes. --SpyMagician (talk) 22:24, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

You referred to me as "delusional", which I take offense to. Stay on topic. You had the opportunity to discuss edits but chose instead to discuss me personally. You continue to do that here. 173.252.18.173 (talk) 22:29, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

OK, a second personal attack ("troll") right on the administrator's noticeboard is unwise. 173.252.18.173 (talk) 22:31, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Taking offense at being called "delusional" or being a "troll" is patently ridiculous especially when you stated with your original reversion, “nonsense; this is an encyclopedia and opposition to encyclopedic information violates its fundamental principles”. By your logic I should be the one complaining about “abuse” since you said my reversion—which was initially based on article bloat but then anchored by the fact your additions did non properly cite/quote the reference—was described as “nonsense”. Are you saying now it would have been “encyclopedic” to leave in place your edit which provided an uncited, 100% incorrect quote and leave the original, non-fleshed out reference? Give us all a break. But again, your behavior speaks for itself. --SpyMagician (talk) 22:38, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

My behaviour speaks for itself? Need I remind you who the subject of this ANI is? 173.252.18.173 (talk) 22:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

And here [67] the same editor remarks that he feels I need to be stopped, and have no right to take offense to the personal attacks. 173.252.18.173 (talk) 22:54, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Stop crying wolf. Now. I'm just tired of people misinterpreting comments and failing to assume good faith on other editors. If you feel to be the victim of unlegitimate criticism discuss it with the user but don't go crying wolf. I simply feel annoyed for this stuff. --TL22 (talk) 02:45, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment I don't want to take side here, but I think the unregistered editor is not assuming good faith. According to the statistics, SpyMagician is a user with eight–year experience and I have found nothing offensive in his replies at his talk page toward the Canadian user. I beleive there is no need for this procedure. If the intention is to solve the quotation issue, it could've been done at the article's talk. If the intention is to get SpyMagician blocked, then a boomerang might occure.--Retrohead (talk) 23:02, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

OK, here's my comment on this: Retrohead may have a bias against me and this should be weighed when examining his involvement here. He asked me to edit an article on his behalf, and requested that I scan several pages from a book and email them to him [68] [69]. I declined. Now he's insinuating that I might receive a block... for being on the receiving end of a personal attack? My nationality ("Canadian user") is irrelevant, and this issue is about a personal attack and not "the quotation issue".173.252.18.173 (talk) 23:10, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

173.252.18.173, don't spin my words. I said ANI is the last resort for a dispute between editors and that it would have been better to resolve this at the article's talk. I see you were the one who blanked your personal talk page when SpyMagician tried to open a discussion, thus you have no right to blame him (or me) for being uncooperative and biased. My advice for you is to practice teamwork and take disagreements less painfully.--Retrohead (talk) 23:28, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I am entitled to do as I please with my own talk page; it's important to note that there was absolutely no discussion taking place on my talk page anyway. Please, this is not about editing, it's about abusive remarks being directed at me. 173.252.18.173 (talk) 23:29, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Hmm, weren't you the one who accused the other side of sockpuppetry? Look, I know you're trying to improve the article on Cobain's movie, but please take these trivialities less harsh.--Retrohead (talk) 00:45, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Can someone please just end this never ending roundabout this IP is trying to make or boomerang him/her? The IP has made no attempt to discuss with the accused on how any issue he/she has can be solved. So far, he/she blatantly twists everyone's words to make some sort of "case" and it's really annoying. We're here to build on articles and this kind of stuff just slows things down.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 03:42, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

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

Deception, impersonation, sock puppetry, vandalism, topic ban, block, and scrutiny evasion

I apologize for the long post, but I feel it is necessary for the reader to get a full sense of the entire picture. A TL;DR summary is at the end for convenience.

AnulBanul (talk · contribs) is an account that demonstrably belongs to user Wüstenfuchs (talk · contribs) a fact that runs counter to his blatant lie that he has "no connection to the said user whatsoever". [70] The user, in spite of his "Armenian who lived in Serbia" persona [71], has never once edited the Armenian Wikipedia (hy.wikipedia.org) or Serbian Wikipedia (sr.wikipedia.org). [72] Note that Wüstenfuchs joined WikiProject Armenia [73] and that later AnulBanul joined WikiProject Armenia as editing from Georgia [74] then Russia [75]. He then began building his persona changing his intitial name from Anulmanul to Anna Sahakyan [76], then Anushka [77], then Yerevani Axjik [78], and then to his current name AnulBanul. He then uploaded a selfie image [79] to presumably impersonate a person named Anna Sahakyan from Yerevan that he took off a Facebook profile or VK (Russian social networking website). He proceeded to use that image on his userpage and refer to himself as "Anna" [80] and created a backstory for the said individual. Numerous FB and VK profiles exist under that name, but I won't link any for their privacy.

Note that AnulBanul instead edits the Croatian Wikipedia which when he does concerns right-wing and far-right Croatian politicians and parties. [81] which is quite odd when the user labels himself a liberal from the University of Belgrade. [82] Indeed it's hard to believe it's anyone other than him when he does such obscure and specific edits such as [83][84] (among the litany of other identical ones shown below). Note that the Wüstenfuchs account became inactive on 20 September 2014, [85] two days later the AnulBanul account became active on 22 September 2014. [86] The last edit of Wüstenfuchs (Bilal Bosnić, ISIL recruiter) and first edit of AnulBanul (Military intervention against ISIL) are both related to Islamic extremism. Further note that Wüstenfuchs' Mostar IP was blocked for block evading in order to edit war. [87] That same IP (93.180.104.124 (talk · contribs)) edited three articles, all of which were created by Wüstenfuchs and all of which were later edited by AnulBanul/Wüstenfuchs with the same POV: Avdo Humo (IP: [88], AnulBanul: [89]), Hasan Brkić (IP: [90], Wüstenfuchs [91]), and Osman Karabegović (IP: [92], Wüstenfuchs: [93])

On 26 May AnulBanul was topic banned from anything related to Bosnia and Herzegovina for 3 months [94] Immediately the day after he proceeded to vandalize a Bosnia and Herzegovina related userbox in order to troll. [95] A week later he violated his topic ban via IPs 185.38.146.201 (talk · contribs) and 93.180.126.249 (talk · contribs) both Mostar IPs. Both have the same exact lines and POV on obscure articles with one of them being pushed against Dragodol, his edit warring buddy that was also topic banned, in the Nijaz Duraković article [96][97] and in the Jovan Divjak article the same exact line of unsourced nonsense that he was a "show general". [98][99] Note that the 93.180.126.249 Mostar IP's contributions on the Croatian Wikipedia. He picks up where Wustenfuchs and AnulBanul left off on the Croatian Party of Rights of Bosnia and Herzegovina article [100] and on the Croatian Democratic Union 1990 article [101] where his Herr Ziffer (blocked) and Wustenfuchs accounts formerly edited and on the Croatian Party of Rights (Bosnia and Herzegovina) [102] article where Wustenfuchs formerly edited. Another IP (blocked) that edited all those same articles in the same manner also created the Nijaz Duraković article on the Croatian Wikipedia. [103] He later admitted that those were indeed his IPs [104] however those were not the only topic ban evading IPs. Other discovered evading IPs that AnulBanul did not disclose include 85.94.128.192 (talk · contribs), 46.35.153.151 (talk · contribs), and 46.35.131.167 (talk · contribs) and there are more than likely many others out there. The story does not stop with using IPs to just topic ban evade as he has also used them to vandalize, commit BLP violations, edit war and circumvent 3RR, etc and the AnulBanul account is not the only sockpuppet he has and has used the K. Solin (talk · contribs) and RossaLuxx (talk · contribs) accounts to split his edits, evade scrutiny, and have sleeper accounts. There may be many more such accounts out there.

Evidence that ties the accounts together:

AnulBanul

First ever upload on commons by AnulBanul was uploading a map of the Croatian 2014 presidential election [105], this same map was added to the Croatian presidential election, 2014–15 article by a Mostar IP [106], the same Mostar IP created the Teroristički napad u Mostaru 1997. (1997 Terrorist Attack in Mostar) article on the Croatian Wikipedia [107] which AnulBanul later created on the English Wikipedia as Mostar terrorist attack [108] Wüstenfuchs joined WikiProject Armenia [109], later AnulBanul joined the WP as editing from Georgia [110] then Russia [111] Dragan Čović, AnulBanul uploaded an image of the Bosnian Croat politician and credited it to Herr Ziffer [112] Herr Ziffer was Wustenfuchs' sockpuppet handle at commons [113][114] Talk:Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia, removal of WikiProject Former countries by Wüstenfuchs [115], later same removal of WikiProject Former countries by AnulBanul [116] Džafer Kulenović, same "Croatian politician" POV [117][118] Osman Karabegović, article created by Wustenfuchs [119], expanded by AnulBanul [120] Hasan Brkić, article created by Wustenfuchs [121], portrait image uploaded by AnulBanul [122] Milan Gorkić, article created by Wustenfuchs [123], expanded by AnulBanul [124] Nermin Nikšić, article created by Wustenfuchs [125], end of term added by AnulBanul [126] Bilal Bosnić, article created by Wustenfuchs [127], updated by AnulBanul [128], addition of Wikiproject Bosnia and Herzegovina by 5.133.xxx.xxx [129] Bariša Čolak, article created by Wustenfuchs [130], updated by AnulBanul [131] Marinko Čavara, article created by Wustenfuchs [132], updated by AnulBanul [133] Fadil Hadžić, identical denial that the man is Bosniak [134][135] Asaf Duraković, identical denial that the man is Bosniak [136][137] Ante Jelavić, infobox update by Wustenfuchs [138], infobox update by AnulBanul [139] Croatian National Assembly, article created by Wustenfuchs [140], later moved and updated by AnulBanul [141] Independence Day (Bosnia and Herzegovina), article created by Wustenfuchs [142], later moved and updated by AnulBanul [143] Barryevi amandmani, article created by Wustenfuchs [144], updated by AnulBanul [145], updated by 5.133.xxx.xxx [146] Croatian Peasant Party of Stjepan Radić, moved by Wustenfuchs [147], later moved by AnulBanul [148] Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bosnian language removed and Serbo-Croatian added by Wustenfuchs [149], same edit later done by AnulBanul [150] Jure Pelivan, article created by Wustenfuchs on the Croatian Wikipedia [151], Croat ethnicity added by AnulBanul on English Wikipedia [152] Križančevo selo killings, concerning the deaths of Bosnian Croats, moved by AnulBanul to Križančevo Selo massacre [153] Bosnian Muslims, same removal of redirect and replacement with DAB [154][155] Canton 10, same return of unconstitutional symbols [156][157] John Kasich, same concern of Croatness in early life section [158][159]

K. Solin

Željko Komšić: addition of "illegitimate representative" content and reference stuffed by Wüstenfuchs [160][161][162][163], sources replaced (note sfn template) by K. Solin [164] removal of information relating to Georgetown University degree by K. Solin [165], removal of information relating to Georgetown University degree by Mostar IP [166], removal of information relating to Georgetown University degree by AnulBanul [167] Dragan Čović: infobox updated by K. Solin [168], infobox updated by AnulBanul [169] Milan Gorkić: created by Wüstenfuchs [170], updated by AnulBanul [171] and K. Solin [172] (note same HHVM tag) Canton 10: cantonal assembly updated by K. Solin [173], by Mostar IP [174], by AnulBanul [175] Faculty of Law, University of Mostar: article created by Wüstenfuchs [176], redirect created by Herr Ziffer [177], article updated by K. Solin [178] Faculty of Philosophy, University of Mostar: created by K. Solin [179], moved and updated by AnlBanul to Faculty of Humanities, University of Mostar [180] Commons: Both at the University of Mostar specifically the Faculty of Philosophy/Humanities. Use identical name format using (1), (2), (3), etc. Use identical licensing and summary. AnulBanul uploaded images of a speaker at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Mostar [181][182][183][184][185][186] AnulBanul uploaded images of the exterior of the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Mostar [187][188][189][190][191] K. Solin uploaded images of a speaker at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Mostar [192][193][194] K. Solin updated logo of Faculty of Law, University of Mostar intially uploaded by Herr Ziffer [195]

RossaLuxx

First edit ever edit on Croatian Wikipedia was creating a sophisticated userpage with a gradient and image. Note the code in RossaLuxx's page <div style="background-color:{{prijelazna boja|top|#000000, #CC0000}};"> [[Datoteka: and compare to AnulBanul's page <div style="background-color:{{linear-gradient|top|#fdffe7, #FFFFFF}};">[[File: Added category to AnulBanul's File:Croatia 2014 map results.PNG upload [196], then uploaded File:Croatia 2015 map results runoff.PNG in same style of original, same summary, and same license [197] Mostar IP added AnulBanul's File:Croatia 2014 map results.PNG upload [198], 13 days later RossaLuxx added File:Croatia 2015 map results runoff.PNG using near identical description [199]

Herr Ziffer

Žitomislić: Herr Ziffer blaming destruction of a church on different army, [200], AnulBanul blaming destruction of same church on same army [201], later he claimed that he "wasn't aware" that he made the edit [202] Bitka za Karvačar: Herr Ziffer uploaded File:Bitka za Karvačar.jpg map on commons [203], the map was added to the article by Wüstenfuchs [204], article edited by K. Solin [205] (note there are only 4 editors who have ever edited the page [206]) Dragan Čović: AnulBanul uploaded a crop of Herr Ziffer's copyvio image [207] Rafael Boban: image uploaded by Herr Ziffer [208], added to article by Wüstenfuchs [209]

Note almost all of his discovered accounts have been indef blocked on various Wikis for tendentious editing and sockpuppetry:

• Wüstenfuchs (hr) [210]
• AnulBanul (hr) [211]
• Herr Ziffer (bs, hr) [212]
• Wustefuchs (bs, commons) [213]
• Wustenfuchs (bs, commons) [214]
• K. Solin (hr) [215]
• RossaLuxx [216]
• Ayohayem [217]

As shown above the user shows a propensity to evade scrutiny throughout Wikis by constant logged out IP hopping, fragmenting edit history among new accounts, and making sleeper accounts. In addition to this he has also:

• Used a Mostar IP of Anulbanul [218][219] in order to commit sneaky vandalism, a BLP violation, and libel by referring to a man as a "shithead" ("govnar") in Serbo-Croatian and pretending it's his surname [220][221]
• Used a Mostar IP of Anulbanul to immaturely troll on the Valentin Inzko article [222] and has even vandalised a "on this day" template he personally dislikes while logged in [223]
• Used Mostar IPs to help initiate and facilitate edit wars, avoid 3RR, and then report the other user [224]
  • Canton 10: [225], [226], [227], [228]
  • Herzegovina-Neretva Canton: [229][230][231][232]
• Used Mostar IPs to delete sourced information and/or push POV
  • Bosnian mujahideen: [233]
  • Blaž Kraljević: [234][235]
  • Jovan Divjak: [236][237]
  • Mostar: [238]

His Wustefuchs [239] and Wustenfuchs [240] accounts were both blocked on commons "unfree files after warnings" and abuse of multiple accounts. [241][242] Despite this he has evaded his block via sockpuppets and continued to purposefully upload copyrighted material under false CC licenses with his Herr Ziffer, AnulBanul, and K: Solin handles as the authors.

• Uploading as AnulBanul an image crop of a file uploaded by Herr Ziffer which was removed for copyright violation [243]

• Uploading as K. Solin an image crop of a file uploaded by AnulBanul which was removed for copyright violation [244]

• Uploading an image [245] taken from [246] while claiming he made it and falsifying the license

• Uploading an image [247] taken from [248] while claiming he made it and falsifying the license

• Uploading several other copyright infringing images as sockpuppets Herr Ziffer [249] and AnulBanul [250]

TL;DR:

In summary his activity on Wikipedia involves:

1. The absolute denial of any connection to his sockpuppet AnulBanul account and creation and non-disclosure of any other sockpuppet and sleeper accounts (K. Solin, RosaLuxx, etc)
2. The impersonation of an Armenian female individual named Anna Sahakyan from Yerevan to appear more neutral, completely unrelated to past edits/accounts, and assume her identity (even going so far as to upload her selfie image) in order to deceive other users
3. The constant splitting of his past edit history through new accounts and IP hopping to game the system, sockpuppeteer, deceive users, vandalize, commit BLP violations, circumvent 3RR, and avoid scrutiny
4. The forging of a clean slate that is without previous ARBMAC warnings and blocks to appear in good standing and receive more leeway around admins
5. The willingness to repeatedly avoid blocks and topic bans if he was sure he wouldn't be caught

--Potočnik (talk) 03:21, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I have not once edited with any of those accounts at the English Wikipedia, except Wustenfuchs, and I have the right to do so, I can switch to another account for several personal reasons. This was in order to protect my privacy and to protect myself from vandal attacks and other attacks after I edited several pages related to the Syrian civil war back in 2012. It is not my fault that Wikimedia creates accounts on all wikis if you create an account on a Croatian one. Those accounts remained inactive and will remain so. I was blocked for using IPs on your report, and my block ended today. Moreover, I said those were my IPs. Another thing, you will respect my gender identity. I'm not "he". --AnulBanul (talk) 03:51, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Good to know you that finally admit to the fact that Wüstenfuchs is indeed your account after claiming that you had "no connection to the said user whatsoever" and again admit to editing from Mostar and not Armenia, Serbia, Georgia, or Russia as you wished to purposely mislead others into believing.

The valid reasons for multiple accounts are listed here. None of them state that doing what you claim to have done it for is valid. In any event all the edits of the K. Solin, Herr Ziffer, RossaLux accounts were in 2014 and so have nothing to do with some 2012 harassment.

Nonsense those accounts have edits on English Wikipedia and correspond with your POV as demonstrated by a litany of diffs. Accounts are automatically made when you visit Wikipedia in another language (that's understandable), but you not only did this and edited on the English Wikipedia. You edited the Milan Gorkić page on 27 November 2014 as AnulBanul with HHVM (note tag in summary) ‎[251] and then three days later as K. Solin on 30 November 2014 with HHVM [252] Adding content as AnulBanul [253] and picking up where you left off as K. Solin [254][255] with references you had previously added as Wüstenfuchs. [256] But I suppose that the brand new account adding info in your POV in an obscure article that you created with the same 1984 Croatian work you used is not you?

In my past correspondences to you as Wüstenfuchs I referred to you in male pronouns (Wikipedia is overwhelmingly male) and you never raised this issue, and up until this point the same with your AnulBanul account. I have a hard time believing that you're a female... or that your name is actually Anna, or that you are Armenian, or that you studied at the University of Belgrade, or that you were born and lived in Yerevan, or that that is your selfie image. More likely you are impersonating some poor girl using her name, photo, and location to deceive users. --Potočnik (talk) 14:24, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

It is clearly my name is not Anna, as I said, I used this previous account. You can proceede with sock puppet investigation, if you wish. I'll admit I used K. Solin as my account. But had no intention of hiding my edit history. If that's wrongful, I'll suffer the consequences. --AnulBanul (talk) 08:17, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Don't be shocked if others don't jump in on this, very much TLDR. Let me clear up a couple of things here and allow you to restate the things that really matter: First, whatever happens at Commons or other Wikis, we don't really care so much here. We have no authority there, the rules are different on different wikis, so our focus is really on activity HERE, under most circumstances. Having the account does't matter, only what you do with it matters.

• Next, ANI is the wrong venue for a sockpuppet investigation, and in fact, it is the worst possible venue because it doesn't generate all the autolinks for investigating and ANI isn't a formal board like SPI. Regardless it is here, but you've made it more difficult to investigate.

• What really matters most is overlapping edits on the same article, etc. Secondarily, a clear showing of avoiding scrutiny. If they are avoiding an Arb warning, you can typically just add that Arb warning to their page and be done with it. If they are using multiple accounts for reasons under WP:SOCK that are acceptable, then they aren't sanctionable. It isn't clear because you have focused on quantity rather than simple linkage here. Can you please narrow it down to what really matters. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 06:45, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I mentioned commons and the other Wikipedias to demonstrate that the behavior isn't restricted to a single language or part of Wikipedia and to show what he has a propensity for doing. I didn't dwell on it much. A sockpuppet investigation shouldn't be necessary in the first place as users who do have multiple accounts are supposed to have them "fully and openly disclosed" and not create personas for them, deny any connection to them, and keep them hidden. But if you insist then I'll post the matter there also. None of the valid reasons for using multiple accounts is applicable here. As shown above he has been "avoiding scrutiny" by "using alternative accounts that are not fully and openly disclosed to split your editing history means that other editors may not be able to detect patterns in your contributions. (...) it is a violation of this policy to create alternative accounts to confuse or deceive editors who may have a legitimate interest in reviewing your contributions" (AnulBanul, K. Solin) and "editing logged out to mislead" by "editing under multiple IP addresses may be treated the same as editing under multiple accounts where it is done deceptively or otherwise violates the principles of this policy." (edit war and avoid 3RR, delete sourced info, POV push, sneaky vandalism, a BLP violation, troll) --Potočnik (talk) 14:24, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

The point is, you muddy the waters when you add all that extra stuff. Show links to articles where he edited first as an editor, then as another editor or IP. Those are facts, all the other stuff just makes it too long to read and determine. Sockpuppet investigating is about dry facts, no opinions. Honestly, WP:SPI is where it needs to go, as you are claiming four accounts, and there is the need for a formal board where random input from other editors isn't an issue. They key is getting it right, not getting it fast or in the ANI crowd. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 15:26, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I have violated my topic ban, and was blocked for ten days - that is, until today. --AnulBanul (talk) 08:39, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• I agree this goes beyond sockpuppet as it seems to be all about long-term gaming the system and may need to go to arbitration. Even if it's tl;dr, I read and it's good detective work. The whole back story doesn't matter (there's no problem to invent an identity, outside of taking someone else's photo) except it's very easy to prove untrue and thus provides no plausible alternative as to another identity. Additionally, someone who goes to extravagant lengths to edit here is not likely to be dissuaded by the usual sock blocks. AnulBanul, if you are an Armenian (or Russian-Armenian, by your name Anushka) would you prefer to discuss this situation in Armenian or Russian? You only edited one article on the Russian Wikipedia and I can't understand it [257] - in the infobox, you changed the link to Split (town) to Split (the disambiguation)... a bit odd. —Мандичка^YO 😜 07:57, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

I already explained myself. See my other post. --AnulBanul (talk) 08:10, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Sorry AnulBanul, which post is that? This one? —Мандичка^YO 😜 11:37, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

No. The one where I said, that I created additional account in order to distance myself from possible vandalisms made on my old Wustenfuchs account, after editing Syrian civil war topic. --AnulBanul (talk) 13:07, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• Proposal to take this to arbitration. I have been trying to go through all this information across the various wikis and admin reports, admissions of using multiple accounts without disclosure, admissions of ban evasion, admissions of violating topic bans, etc. I don't think ANI or SPI is the right place for either as the response will be "tl;dr" which is benefiting AnulBanul, as is the "different wikis have different policies" reasoning. He created the AnulBanul account after being given a two-year ban on the Croatian Wikipedia, in order to evade the ban (behavior not allowed on any Wikipedia) and AnulBanul was indeffed on the Croatian Wiki after being caught. As AnulBanul's favorite topics are areas under oversight, I think it needs to be taken to arbitration. Taking a random person's someone's photo off the Internet and uploading it to Commons as a "self-portrait" in order to use it on the a Wikipedia userpage to disguise oneself (sorry, this is not you [258]) is a significant violation of the rules, and should be investigated. —Мандичка^YO 😜 12:33, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Ownership behavior on Harry Potter

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

---

Tarc (talk · contribs) is in violation of WP:OWNBEHAVIOR for the refual to allow the addition of one word -- one word -- to the article Harry Potter, without having cited one single fact, source, guideline or policy to explain this. It's agreed that this change is more accurate, but Tarc wont' allow it because it is "pointless". This precisely fits the definition in WP:OWNBEHAVIOR: "An editor reverts a change simply because the editor finds it "unnecessary" without claiming that the change is detrimental. This has the effect of assigning priority, between two equivalent versions, to an owner's version."

The reason this small thing is such a big deal is that Wikipedia is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit. We have to put our foot down when we see veteran editors who act as if they can veto anything they don't like for no good reason. I'd like a temporary block, or a topic ban, to give Tarc a mild reprimand to stop this type of behavior.

By the way, I also reverted 4 times instead of 3. I lost count. My bad. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 04:31, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Prior to this hitting ANI, I protected the article and issued 3RR warnings to both editors. Nakon 04:33, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Facepalm For fuck's sake, I do not "own" nor have ever asserted "ownership" over the article in question, having only edited it very occasionally over the years. This editor made a change to a passage in the article, was reverted by another editor @J.A.R. Huygebaert:, then raised a concern of accuracy of said passage on the talk page. Huygebaert explained his reasons, I chimed in that I agreed. We explained, and patiently re-explained those reasons, whereas Mr. Bratland became increasingly...shrill, as seen here when we had the audacity to, golly, disagree. When an editor fails to find consensus for their suggestions, just steamrolling along heedless in't a good idea. No wrongdoing on my part, nor Huygebaert, nor even really Bratland apart from an all-too-common-these-days inability to cope when confronted with people who do not agree with on's opinion. Maybe more will now see this (and really it is all over a single word), flock to the article and agree with him, then that will be that. Who knoiws? All I do no is at the time, his was the lone vice for the change.

There's an hour of Big Brother: After Dark left, and I intend to chillax and watch. Hopefully this will be the only response I'll have to make, as I find that exile from ANI (and this is a exception to the prohibition, dear readers) is rather quite refreshing, and I do not miss this hole in the wall at all. Tarc (talk) 04:50, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

PS - It's agreed that this change is more accurate, but Tarc wont' allow it because it is "pointless", I never agreed to the former, nor did I ever use the word "pointless" or anything similar in this exchange. I think the filer has confused my posts with the other editor, and added a bit of flourish on top. Tarc (talk) 04:59, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

WP:OWNBEHAVIOR doesn't depend on how may edits you've made in the past. You're simply preferring one version over another, yet you've cited zero evidence that the other version is detrimental, only that it's "unnecessary". That's precisely how we define ownership behavior. I repeatedly asked if there is any source evidence that could change your mind -- and there is none! Facts, guidelines, and policies are not relevant. Which means you think you can get your way by voting: "we favor this over that, we don't need a reason, end of story". WP:CONSENSUS requires you have reasons; without reasons what you're doing is disruptive editing. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 05:02, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I, along with the other editor, explained our opinions in a rather detailed manner; for you to say there were no reasons given and that they were "just votes" is disingenuous, bordering on deliberate deception. We both gave reasons as to why changing from "X is Y" to "X is mostly Y" wasn't a good idea. I'm not going to rehash that here, as that's not what ANI is for. Anyone here can read the talk page themselves. This is purely for behavioral issues, and as your claim of "ownership" is based on a demonstrable falsehood (that we "just voted" without "giving reasons"), this this filing has no merit. And for for really real, sighing off for the night. Tarc (talk) 05:19, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• As Tarc has removed a poor addition (it makes the prose lumpy, is unnecessary and is, yes, pointless), my advice to Dennis Bratland is to read WP:BRD, re-read it, and then try not to edit war over such poor additions again. You should also read WP:BOOMERANG and not be surprised if this thread turns against you. - SchroCat (talk) 06:50, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Concur with SchroCat. GregJackP Boomer! 16:22, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I have to say that Dennis' addition of a term that he knows is going to be controversial, while discussion is ongoing, but to put it under the guise of "being bold" borders on disruptive editing - certainly antagonistic. Moreover, to say in the edit summary that he has done this "per talk discussion" insinuates that he has consensus, when that is clearly not the case. Chaheel Riens (talk) 18:44, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

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

Terre Haute Indiana IP vandal - Muppets vandalism continued

Hiya, this is a continuation of this closed ANI report. Basically, a vandal who uses IPs geolocating to Terre Haute, Indiana, US and other Indiana cities is on a long-term campaign to disrupt articles related to the beloved Muppets. Kudpung was kind enough to protect a number of articles, but the user is back at a different IP (50.104.196.249 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)) messing with the articles that were not protected. Kudpung didn't see egregious vandalism from this IP, but my argument was that the IP should be blocked per WP:REVERTBAN since they have been vandalizing Muppets-related articles for quite some time and are de facto not welcome here.

• This report demonstrates some, but not all, of the scope of the problem. I only started noting geolocations in my edit summaries late last year or so. Their disruptions are not limited to Muppets stuff, but they are focused on that subject.
• Though I know that blocks aren't punitive, the vandal continues to avoid virtually every standard we have for discussion, sourcing, etc. They have never discussed anything as far as I know, they never submit references, and there's no presumption that anything that comes out of these socks should be considered correct. It's just a distraction.
• Here, for instance, they keep submitting the same giant list of pointless Muppet cameos in spite of a number of other editors rejecting the content. Other examples of that same edit here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here. That's a combination of POV/ownership/edit-warring/ignoring what the community wants and is absolutely disruptive. The persistent unsourced date changes are no better. Even if they hop IPs, they should be held to a basic standard, which they have never achieved. Thus, de facto banned. If you're still not convinced that this is the same person, please note the reported IP's unexplained removal of content here at Steve Whitmire (the puppeteer behind Kermit the Frog) and then some of the other removals here, here, here, here and you can probably continue the pattern.

So basically I'd like to get some clearance to treat this as a REVERTBAN/RBI situation so I can ask admins block the IPs on sight. It would also be nice to get some additional page protections on the articles that were most recently vandalized by 50.104.196.249. Thanks, and don't forget to change your mop water. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 14:29, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Note that this is a continuation of an even earlier ANI report, and in that one the IP was originally using a 50.104.200.xx address – is there anyway we can get some kind of rangeblock on 50.104.xx.xx here? Or will that cover too much territory for a rangeblock?... In any case, I support whatever it takes to stop this IP vandal once and for all... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 16:37, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Hey, thanks for that ANI link, IJBall! They have also edited from 172.78.xx.xx range and 50.106.xx.xx. They tend to edit from Frontier Communications IPs. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 16:54, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Owning issue with another editor, Part 2

Moved from WP:AN ~Adjwilley (talk) 15:06, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

In followup to this report, Gabrielkat has continued their owning on The Bold and the Beautiful and continues to revert my edits, has made ZERO attempt to discuss this issue with me properly and per Adjwilley I am to notify of this issue happening once more. This user is clearly interested in being the only editor to update the episode count, and is unwilling to co-edit, which shows severe signs of owning the page. User returned to reverting my edit (see here) to only replace it seconds later with their own (see here). I am requesting that this editor be held responsible for their irresponsible editing patterns. User was issued a notice by Adjwilley about this issue, and they chose to neither respond nor attempt to resolve the matter; instead, they're choosing to continue their editing behaviors. In turn, user also uses the same exact edit summary as I use, therefore it's even more suspect that they are editing this way to bait a potential edit-war out of this situation. They are clearly not here to edit cohesively in a community forum. User previously also admitted that they want to update the episode count by stating "Let me update the weekly episode count" as I noted in my previous filing, which shows they are still exhibiting the same pattern of behavior. And upon adding the AN-notice on their page, it was immediately removed, which shows they are not interested in acting in a civil manner with other editors. User is now attempting to do all soaps (see here), which is fine, but their edit to General Hospital is in violation of the consensus at the soap project, which states that it must be done once an episode has completed airing. I see this as an attempt of the editor using this as an attack against myself as an editor, as they've also ignored this ANI-notice. It is alarming that this behavior is continued to be acceptable to Wikipedia and its administration. livelikemusic ^{my talk page!} 18:07, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm kind of on break at the moment and haven't had time to review all the edits, but I did notice that at The Bold and the Beautiful article, User:Gabrielkat seems to have stopped reverting and then re-instating others' edits until last week, and then when they did, they self-reverted to the old edit count. This to me suggests a one time slip-up, rather than bad faith continuation of the disruptive behavior, though it's hard to tell when the user refuses to communicate. However, I have not had time to review the other diffs brought by User:livelikemusic. ~Adjwilley (talk) 15:06, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Based on Adjwilley's comments and my own observations, I've issued a final warning to him, making it perfectly clear that if he does this again, he will be blocked. This is the last bit of rope he will likely see with this. Reverting edits and then adding them back as your own, I find that particularly offensive and inconsistent with our goals at Wikipedia, and I think I made that clear on his talk page. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 15:35, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

@Adjwilley and Dennis Brown: I appreciate the moving to ANI, I hadn't noticed it wasn't there in the first place. My apologies; should have paid a bit more attention to the exact noticeboard I was posting. I hope that their final warning, despite their inability to communicate between editors and their insistent reverting of anything I leave on their talk page. I only hope this is a one-time slipup on their behalf, and that the final warning issued by Dennis Brown works out in the end. And I only hope they do not add in the information prior to the episode's completed airing (such as they did at General Hospital). Should the behavior arise again, should I re-open on ANI or report to one of you? livelikemusic ^{my talk page!} 15:43, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• You can ping either or both of us, with diff linking back. One like this: [259] should be enough to job our memories. If we don't respond in 24 hours (we do have day jobs and such) then you can file again or ask another uninvolved admin. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 16:32, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

@Dennis Brown: Excellent. Again, thank you to both you and Adjwilley for your assistance on this issue, as we all strive to keep with the goals of Wikipedia. (: livelikemusic ^{my talk page!} 16:46, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Active sockpuppetry, WP:OR and WP:POV violations by LORT44125

Road8985 appeared over a week ago, making pointy edits to the Russian Othodox church article which were reverted by other users and attempts to reason with the editor at Talk:Russian_Orthodox_Church#Interesting_facts proved futile, as they became hostile and aggressive, tossing out warnings against anyone that disagreed with them until they were blocked on WP:NOTHERE grounds. LORT44125 then appeared, writing in exactly the same stilted English, using the same phrases and defending the other edits and claiming simply to be "a friend" of Road8985. Other editors in the talk section voiced the suspicion that neither may be a new account. On my looking at their edits, it became clear that it was a blocked sockmaster, Need1521, back in another guise. Having attempted to reason with that editor in the past and seen numerous other editors and admins attempt to do so and seen the newest account blank and ignore attempts at discussion on their own talk, I believe discussion with them to be futile as they lack the spirit of collaboration necessary. I have filed a sockpuppet report here detailing the similarities, however, LORT44125 is now active on another page, still adding their own POV based on their own interpretations of sources and that disruption needs to stop. Valenciano (talk) 16:13, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Valenciano must be stoped (vandalism - war of edits and slander). He got the invitation. LORT44125 (talk) 16:34, 27 June 2015 (UTC).

• LORT44125 blocked as an obvious sock of Road8985. Tying back to Need1521 is impossible with CU and difficult with behavior alone, given the small number of edits all these accounts have produced, but not necessary anyway. For the record, you normally want to report socks to WP:SPI or use the template built into the Twinkle interface when you are at their user page. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 16:46, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks Dennis. I've already filed an SPI and it's linked above. Usually I'd wait for the outcome of that, but the SPI was filed 2 days ago and the LORT account was involved in fresh disruption so ANI was the only route, given the account's refusal to engage on their talk page. Valenciano (talk) 21:47, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Based on links provided at the end of the sock investigation, there is actually a larger issue here of a longer sock farm dating back to at least September 2011 and also involving Russian Wikipedia. I'm horrified that this nonsense has been going on so long. Valenciano (talk) 22:50, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

No admin or CU has come in on that one yet, but it may very well be large. That is why SPI is the best place for sockpuppet issues. We can do quick and dirty blocks for obvious cases, like I did here, but there, they dig deeper than we can in this environment. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 22:54, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Understood and I agree. In this case a quick block was needed, as the disruption was ongoing, but the larger issue will hopefully be sorted at SPI. We can close this section. Valenciano (talk) 23:19, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Non admin relisting AfDs that should be closed by an admin.

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

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Jaaron95 (talk · contribs) has been relisting a lot of AfDs , I'd like to my point out at least 3 examples of inappropriate relisting when there was clear deletion consensus:

• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Barry Lando the only keep vote came from an editor who worked on no other article .
• Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Salmat unianimous delete consensus.
• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gennaro A. Jerry Marino

LibStar (talk) 16:28, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Relisting isn't done because of a lack of consensus on the page so much as a lack of participation. All of these are single relists where the AFD has never been relisted and the participation has been thin. I probably wouldn't have relisted Salmat but I probably would have the other two. The purpose of AFD isn't to dispose of articles as fast as we can, it is to determine what is best for Wikipedia, and often that means relisting. I'm not sure the relisting of Salmat, the worst of these, is ANI worthy. I'm not saying this necessarily perfect, but I don't see anything to sanction over. One person talked to him on his talk page, but I haven't seen where you have before bringing him here. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 16:53, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I have contacted him earlier today but don't think he has been online to respond , but I think the issue here is that some of these relists should be left to an admin to close. Fine if there is a lack of participation or no consensus. LibStar (talk) 16:57, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm just saying that ones like the first and third, those are really arguably best relisted at least once. I would have, and I'm an admin. At worst, this is in the grey area like Salmat. If we have to err, it is better to err on the side of relisting once. Keep in mind, any admin may close any AFD before the week or relist period is up. It isn't like we are FORCED to wait another week. There may be better examples of his relisting things that didn't need it, but these aren't so bad. Talk, discuss, teach and learn. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 17:06, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

The real issue is this influx of relist monkeys that exist at AfD and the lack of admins to make a decission after 7 days. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 17:08, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Amused that I'm brought to ANI this fast (won't even wait for a reply in my talk page?)... Dennis Brown has spoken for me on my relisting. But I'll add one more, as to why I relisted Salmat. The discussion had a reply by Shad Innet, who by the way randomly made comments in Afds not stating reasons, which I disregarded and relisted. The same applies to Gennaro A. Jerry Marino AfD. I believe this ANI thread is not because I closed Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Patricia Eugenia Cárdenas Santa María (2nd nomination)? Regards --JAaron95 (Talk) 17:11, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

nothing to do with that AfD, I agree it's a keep outcome. LibStar (talk) 17:15, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

If it is a larger issue, then WP:AN would be a good place to discuss as a whole. The examples above are not terrible relists, even if 2 wasn't really necessary. Are you seeing worse judgement than this and can you give examples? If it is a systemic issue, we need to treat it as such, leave notices at WP:AN weekly, etc. In this case, I just can't sanction for the diffs provided, as I agree with at least two of them. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 17:14, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

this one may be no consensus Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Shamoun Hanna Haydo, but under Wikipedia:Non-admin_closure#Appropriate_closures not an appropriate closure for a non admin. If in doubt as a non admin, I'd leave it to an admin to close or relist. LibStar (talk) 17:23, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

similarly Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/What Kind of Man Are You?, non admins are only supposed to do no consensus closures when there is low participation. LibStar (talk) 17:29, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

The guideline is sort of a compromise, we don't want to encourage new or inexperienced editors to close when the outcome isn't obvious, but we also don't prohibit NAC closes so long as the closer isn't involved, and admin action isn't required. That is why the WP:BADNAC is silent on it, but the good section only mentions closing no-consensus when there are few comments. If a very experienced editor NAC closes a controversial discussion well, it will often be respected. So really the discussion should focus mostly on whether closes were substantively reasonable. Monty₈₄₅ 17:55, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I would say most admins would have deleted Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Janis Menken and another example of inappropriate relist Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Triangle Pest Control Scholarship Fund LibStar (talk) 17:32, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

There is no inappropriate relisting, although I agree that a relist on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Triangle Pest Control Scholarship Fund was unnecessary.I erred as it was one of my initial relists. The policy states that no consensus closes should generally be avoided, not as non-admins are not allowed. But I should say I was WP:BOLD in closing AfDs as no consensus. I was very cautious about my contributions in AfDs that I asked Northamerica1000 to keep an eye on my works in this diff. If I've erred on no consensus closes, I will apologize and will restrict myself from performing such closures. Regards, --JAaron95 (Talk) 17:50, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

As for NAC, regardless of the exact wording of policy, consensus has been that best practice is for non-admin to never close any AFD where there is the slightest chance of it being contested. Period. NAC should be done only on the most obvious of cases. The reasoning is that admin are expected to answer to and explain any contested closing, whereas non-admin aren't held to the same standard. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 18:02, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Alright, I apologize for my previous no consensus closures and will restrict myself from closing any such in the future which might be challenged. If anyone comes up against my no consensus previous closure, I'll immediately open them for further discussion. Regards--JAaron95 (Talk) 18:12, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

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

My message to Check Users and Administrators

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

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I started my Wikipedia journey in 2010. After that due to POV pushing, edit warring and various reasons I was indefinitely blocked. Later on I became a SockMaster. I am going to end this journey. As a friendly suggestion, I must say check user tools are not always right. Sometimes I have seen accounts unrelated to me were blocked and tagged as my accounts. When those new users who didn't make a single bad faith edit would put unblock request, claiming innocence, then cold hearted administrators would ask them to accept the check user results. Check user tools are made in Heaven, they can't go wrong. Some of them were even kids. Administrators thought I was posing as a kid. Probably they were using the same ISP provider and lived in the same city.If I had three sock puppets, CU results will tag two more as my socks. What I will do. If I will tell them they are not mine, will they believe me?. Now when a user gets blocked indefinitely, some trolls abuse the blocking administrator. The troll IP users are blocked and tagged as sock trolls of the blocked user. These people make the blocked account user's unblock request more and more difficult. The administrator and check user don't care to check details. Someone is blocked and talk page access removed. A random account edits the talk page "unblock me". Instantly these New accounts are tagged as suspected sockpuppets. If any other sockmaster is reading my comment, I would request you to give your views. Whether any account not created by you were tagged as your sock puppets due to IP match and location match. Don't remove my comment from this page or close this discussion . I am trying to help.Message to you all (talk) 19:55, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

In 2013 I used to live in a small suburb where personal net connection was not available. There was only one cyber cafe. I used four accounts to push my view. An SPI was filed and i got blocked. I used to edit movie related articles. Another accounts which belonged to an old man who was a retired History teacher got blocked indefinitely as he also used the same cyber cafe. The population in that town was small and everybody new each other. He told me he was blocked as a sockpuppet of *******. Only I knew, I am *******. Two months ago, i got the news that he passed away. He edited only four History related edits.--223.176.5.247 (talk) 03:25, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

It isn't really helpful if you don't identify which sock case(s) apply.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 20:05, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm at a loss to understand why we should give a damn about this, and why this account hasn't already been blocked for admitted block evasions. This is not a puppetmaster's forum - go start a blog somewhere. BMK (talk) 20:22, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• My guess is that it is User:Vote (X) for Change, created in 2010 and banned in 2011 (see this discussion on AN/I). Several trolling IPs have been blocked lately as socks of that user. Thomas.W ^talk 20:52, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Re: "will they believe me?", No. They will not believe you. Creating sockpuppets is an act of deception in order to gain an advantage over those who follow the rules. It destroys your credibility -- why believe a known liar? Claiming that some of the socks are actually innocent bystanders would be an obvious claim to make by someone trying to continue the deception. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:49, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

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

Cleanup after a user needed

Ranagolam (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

After creating a blank article called "Deleted this article" and repeatedly contesting its deletion, Ranagolam has blanked another user's page and moved it to two different locations. I don't have the permission to move it back. Ian.thomson (talk) 20:26, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• I'll take care of it. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:33, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I didn't see anything really blockable, just strange, so I just deleted the whole mess. The user page he blanked was basically an inappropriate userspace bio that hadn't been written by the user anyway. M's original userpage, the only real user involved here besides Rangolam, was deleted at user request in 2009. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:37, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. I'd've just dismissed it as a user not knowing what they're doing, but the page creation has me leaving their contributions page open in another tab. Ian.thomson (talk) 20:43, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Why is it even possible for anyone to create a blank page? There's no possible good reason to create a page with nothing on it at all. Nyttend (talk) 20:48, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I could see it being useful outside of article space (someone wants to get rid of their redlink username, but not actually wanting a userpage), but it would make some sense to have a filter preventing blank articles. Ian.thomson (talk) 20:56, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Personal attack by Singora

Can someone please do something about the ongoing harassment of me. I'm sick to the back teeth of this and it has now gone on for two weeks. Furthermore, Chillum, whose talk page has been instrumental in this harassment, has just received this message from some creature called Singora. Both Chillum, as an involved party, and Singora, as the author of such comments, have been notified. Cassianto^Talk 20:53, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• I just hit him with a 72 hour block, knowing comfortably that it was deserved solely for this edit [260]. If other admin want to take a look at the total circumstances and feel that an adjustment is needed, no prior permission is required. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 21:00, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Many thanks Dennis, much appreciated. Cassianto^Talk 21:01, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

No idea about any ongoing harassment, but that linked comment is as severe and calculated a personal attack as I've seen in some while. 72 hours is the least he should expect. Bretonbanquet (talk) 21:11, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I think the block was a good move, I was on my way to do the same thing. People have been using my talk page for general nastiness a little too much lately. This whole "call them as I see them" nonsense is a contagious and lame excuse for childish name calling. I would not tolerate even a drive by vandal being talked to that way, Cassianto certainly does not deserve it. The user could have made a cogent and compelling argument without resorting to personal attacks. Chillum 21:13, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

An indef of that Singora would be well-justified. And wasn't some drive-by making the same obscene slam recently? Coincidence? Or the same guy? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:46, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Good point, I hadn't thought of that. I would wager that they are the same specimen. Cassianto^Talk 22:49, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

My first instinct was that this was a drive by troll and to indef, but then I saw they had over 500 edits and had been here over a year. I have not looked at their contributions enough to determine if they are here to make an encyclopedia or not. I would hesitate to block indef if there are any significant contributions. After all if we indefed people for isolated(I think) incidences of name calling this thread would be a bit shorter. I probably would have given a 2 week block, but I think the block given is well within the realm of reason. Chillum 22:52, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Their contributions haven't exactly set the world of Wikipedia on flames, let me tell you. They worked on an obscure featured article which didn't even cut it as a GA, let alone an FA, and produced a load of unhelpful and dubious comments at the recent FAC of Burning of Parliament. I can't quite put my finger on it, but I'm sure I've come across them before somewhere. Cassianto^Talk 23:05, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

(edit conflict) SN: Cassianto, the title of this thread made it sound as though you were the one being reported for harassment. It probably would have been better if you'd left your name out of the title; when I read the first post, I initially was like, "He's reporting himself?" (And my apologies if you're not a "he".) Erpert ^{blah, blah, blah...} 23:25, 27 June 2015 (UTC) Dealt with. Erpert ^{blah, blah, blah...} 03:23, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

It has been harassment as it has been going on for two weeks now. However, this was more about the PA on Chillum's page which has kindly been dealt with. I have adjusted the title of this thread having seen its ambiguity. Thanks. Cassianto^Talk 23:48, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

If it continues, and it is part of a pattern, by all means come back with a list. My 72 hour block was done to be as generous as I possibly could justify, as he hadn't been blocked before and had a little time under his belt. If it happens again any time soon and you can show a pattern, he won't get the same benefit of the doubt. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:18, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Many thanks. Cassianto^Talk 06:59, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

The behaviour of Fayenatic london at Selmelier

I left a prod at Selmelier. The 7 day period expired, and Fayenatic reset the time on the basis that the creator had not been notified. I pointed out that per WP:PRODNOM notifying the creator was not required, and that the creator [had not edited in four years]. Fayenatic then reverted to their preferred version, and used their privileges to block non-autoconfirmed users (obviously targeting me exclusively, as nobody else has edited the article in a year and a half) from the article. 79.97.226.247 (talk) 22:09, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Stretching the PROD out seems unnecessarily bureaucratic, I admit, but isn't the biggest issue. Notification isn't required but it is strongly preferred most of the time. In this case, the editor hasn't edited in 3.5 years so it borders on overkill to force the issue. At first glance, it looks like Fayenatic london got into an edit war with this IP over the time stamp (purely editor actions), then used PC to protect the article (admin action), seemingly to give himself an advantage. In the least, this is unusual, and under WP:ADMINACCT, requires explanation here. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 22:18, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

79.97.226.247, you apparently didn't see the bright orange bar saying you need to alert Fayenatic london about this discussion so I posted one on your behalf. You need to disclose to the editor that you've brought a complaint to a noticeboard. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 22:21, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• FL could have removed the prod altogether (anyone can). Instead he decided to allow another week, which seems reasonable, and harmless. You shouldn't be repeatedly reverting to the old timestamp. I agree with Dennis that it would have been better for FL to ask another admin to review and install pending changes if needed, instead of doing it himself. Processing prod's could maybe be considered an admin action, but it's borderline. The best solution, of course, is for you (IP) to agree to either (1) let the prod run 7 more days, or (2) start an AFD instead, in which case I'll undo the pending changes. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:24, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
  • The part that bothered me was adding PC just to stop this one IP without discussing. In a way it is a slap in the face of IPs to do that, which is why policy says we don't do it for a problem with ONE ip, if this is indeed a problem. Or maybe there is more I just don't know, but it looks odd. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 22:36, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
    • I know, Dennis, I'm sort of agreeing. But it's a grey area; if an editor interfered with, say, an admin processing an AFD/CSD tag, we wouldn't allow them to revert it forever. I'm not sure I consider this edit warring over content, it's more like edit warring over how an admin processes a tag intended for admins to process. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:43, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
      • We're on the same page, it is grey indeed. I think I would have preferred he tried to communicate outside of a summary, at least once. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 22:48, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi all. I left an edit summary noting that an inactive editor may have set preference to be emailed about notices on his user talk page, so I thought another 7 days wait was reasonable. Note that I did not protect the page, which would have blocked the IP editor from reverting again. Instead of that, I activated pending changes, which would force an independent admin/reviewer to decide on any further reversion. Note also that having activated pending changes, I did not review the IP's further edits myself. – Fayenatic London 23:29, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Pending changes is not meant to be used for this sort of case. PC's for protection against vandalism/ BLP issues/ copyvios. This isn't remotely related to any of those. "Like semi-protection, PC protection should never be used in genuine content disputes, where there is a risk of placing a particular group of editors at a disadvantage." 79.97.226.247 (talk) 23:49, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't see this as a content dispute. It's just a judgment call on whether best practice is necessary for this page, resulting in a timing issue over when to let a PROD expire or whether to require a discussion at AfD (or, perhaps now, RfD, since another editor has redirected the page). – Fayenatic London 00:13, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• I have to agree with 79.*.*.* on the use of PC here. I don't see a need to labor it, but really, it shouldn't have been used and instead you should have just put a note on the IP's page. This is outside what PC is designed to be used for, which is really not much different than semi-protection in this case. Again, no need make a big deal over one time, but in the future it shouldn't be done that way (per the policy), no matter how effective it is. We are supposed to treat IPs the same as registered users under most circumstances.

• To the IP, I would say you probably shouldn't have edit warred over the timestamp either. The point of PROD isn't to quickly get rid of articles, it is an intentionally slow process for uncontested deletions. Once he changed the time stamp, you might have seen that as a "partial objection, give more time", and knowing he could have simply removed the PROD altogether, you would have been better not fighting over it. As Floq points out above, it is a quasi-admin function to do that. He chose to extend rather than delete outright, and admin technically have the choice of extending, deleting, or removing the PROD altogether. If it is really uncontested, it will eventually get deleted. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:14, 28 June 2015 (UTC)
  • Dennis: fair enough. Although the IP's conduct wasn't vandalism, I viewed it as wp:disruptive editing, reverting what I still considered a fair decision on use of admin responsibilities (deferring deletion of a page). As for putting a note on the IP's page for all to see, I thought that would have been an escalation, and more inflammatory than using PC to call in the attention of an independent reviewer. However, I've learnt to do that in future, thanks. (I wasn't sure which of us you meant in your 22:48 comment above until you wrote this.) – Fayenatic London 07:18, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Block evasion by User:Futurewiki and User:Dragonrap2

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The edits of User:Mega22 are quite similar, including this smoking gun. Thank you again. Magnolia677 (talk) 23:22, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Indeffed.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 23:35, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
• Berean Hunter beat me by a few seconds. Per WP:BEANS, I won't say why I know, but I know that it is him and I agree with BH's block. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 23:36, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

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

Cali11298

Cali11298 is a edit-warrior, personal-attacker, and prolific socker who already has 45 confirmed socks to his name. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Cali11298/Archive: he has over 12 SPI cases with multiple sleepers found on almost every case.

He needs to be banned. I'm also sending an abuse report to Verizon as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Esquivalience (talk • contribs) 23:03, 27 June 2015‎ (UTC)

I don't think complaining to the ISP has ever accomplished anything, but it would be great to hear a positive story. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 06:47, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Am I missing something? He appears to have been banned in April... what did I miss? Ogress _smash! 08:21, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Floquenbeam's actions at AN

Floquenbeam (talk · contribs) has:

1. Edit-warred at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard: [261][262][263][264][265][266][267] and as good as admitted that they intend to continue to edit-war[268].
2. Used rollback inappropriately: [269]
3. Blocked a user with whom they were in dispute without an appropriate rationale: [270]
4. Called another editor an ass and accused them of hypocrisy: [271] and admits that their actions are motivated by a desire to annoy another user: [272]. DrKiernan (talk) 09:00, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Floquenstein's monster (talk · contribs) could have done better. This is some seriously "time-out" worthy behavior. Doc talk 09:05, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Just drop the entire thing. Resolute's statement is gross bad faith anyway because Bish is on record as not wanting to interact with EC and because she has a pretty good rep for independence of thought (eg: she and I get on ok but nonetheless she hauled me here about something). Exacerbating an already bad situation with yet another strand is part of what I have called the "miasma" that surrounds disputes about Eric Corbett - it isn't helpful. - Sitush (talk) 09:13, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

DRKiernan is an admin, questioning the clearly questionable actions of another admin, here at AN/I. Don't attempt to drown it out. And you know what's actually "helpful" to Wikipedia? Encouraging debate among dissenting opinions rather than shutting it down in favor of what's "helpful". Doc talk 09:21, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Ohh, they're an admin, whooh, and that earns them immunity from being "drowned out" by a non-admin commenting (once), does it? I recommend one of the people who reverted the post back in, or why not User:Resolute himself, to take it to RfAR. That's the place to ask for a desysop. They'll look at the actions of everybody involved, but you won't mind that. Bishonen | talk 09:30, 28 June 2015 (UTC).

I don't agree with Resolute's comment, but we seem to be in a position where unambiguous edit-warring and blocking editors we don't like is treated far, far less seriously than an editor being rude. I would also characterize Flo's comments as much more uncivil than either Eric's or Resolute's. The misbehavior of some editors is being dismissed as appropriate and welcome, while less serious faults by other editors are being treated with great stricture. DrKiernan (talk) 10:21, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, DrKiernan, I forgot to mention you, too, as someone who could take the matter to RfAR. Seriously, since you feel that way about it, why don't you? I realize ArbCom may soon be quite busy with a shitstorm desysop request over Reaper Eternal's unblock of Eric Corbett, which I just noticed, but still. Bishonen | talk 11:29, 28 June 2015 (UTC).

I've not seen anyone dismissing stuff as appropriate and welcome. Certainly, my point is that nothing is to be gained from this. Everyone is het-up, as so often in this situation, and the fall-out and fallings-out are happening across numerous venues. Let's just draw a line rather than escalate it further. - Sitush (talk) 10:25, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Whilst I would normally agree with that sort of sentiment, there seems to be some sort of admin full moon at the moment, looking at current (unrelated) cases here, AN, and ArbCom. They need to get a grip. DeCausa (talk) 11:17, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

They do indeed. In this instance, Resolute shouldn't have posted that nonsense (not the only example of sensationalism from them) and Floq should have called it a day much sooner than they did. It is done now and kicking off another inquisition isn't going to improve matters.- Sitush (talk) 11:31, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

At best, the comment in question is an unhelpful generalisation and hard to interpret as not incorporating a personal attack. It is polarising and making things worse and should be removed. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 09:22, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Bullshit. I disagree with your characterization. Doc talk 09:25, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Oh goody, more scutiny-evading IPs. Floq was right to block the IP too. And Doc, here's a challenge, try to come up with some constructive comments. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 09:29, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

You're thick as thieves. I know how it is with you lot from the Merridew days. Same ones sticking together. Dissent, is there? Shut it down. Doc talk 09:36, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

That statement shows you have no idea about who is "thick" with whom then. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 09:45, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

As I said at Floquenbeam's talk page, the comment made by Resolute is rude and in bad faith but in no way a personal attack. I restored it not because I have "no class," as Floquenbeam put it, but because AN is not someone's user talk page. It's a point of principle. The talk page guidelines say that "Removing harmful posts, including personal attacks, trolling and vandalism. This generally does not extend to messages that are merely uncivil; deletions of simple invective are controversial. Posts that may be considered disruptive in various ways are another borderline case and are usually best left as-is or archived." Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 09:50, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Is accusing someone of having "no class" a personal attack? How about if it's from an admin? How about if it's from an admin with a lot of buddies, who can step on some toes? Doc talk 09:54, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Suppose you are right and everything Floq has done in the last 24 hours is horrible. Why would you want to make a big deal of it? Is your personal freedom in peril because your reverts were reverted? Do you think it is likely the fiendish behavior will continue until Floq is indeffed? Or are you merely wanting a small tar-and-feather party to celebrate the ongoing dramas? Johnuniq (talk) 10:05, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

I did not open this thread, nor did I ask anyone to open a thread about it. But I will comment on it, obviously. What "tar-and-feather" party are you talking about? Questioning an editor in this vein is now a crime? Shaddup. Doc talk 10:21, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Stop being dramatic. It's a simple, clear-cut case of edit warring. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 11:07, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

What is the point of the report—does anyone imagine that Floquenbeam is going to make a habit of this? What I find most irritating about the related drama is that WP:AE struggles to attract admin attention for the gamergate issue—serious and prolonged off-wiki organization ensures that waves of civil POV pushers promote the view that Wikipedia should be "neutral" and discount all the reliable sources which say gamergate is about credible threats of rape and murder directed at women. Firm admin handling of that is a bit too tedious I guess. Johnuniq (talk) 10:42, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

My point is that misbehavior by one editor should not excuse misbehavior by another. DrKiernan (talk) 10:46, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Of course, no one has suggested otherwise. Nevertheless, Wikipedia is not the right place for rigid enforcement of rules, and it is always desirable to think about the context and aim for a good outcome that benefits the encyclopedia. Johnuniq (talk) 11:08, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• DrKiernan, you obviously have every right to open this thread, but it seems moot at this point. Once I noticed the edit warring, I went to Floquenbeam's talk page, made it clear that reverting wasn't within policy and in a subtle way, indicated action would have to be taken if it continued. He hasn't reverted since then. Doc was understandably upset, we chatted, and I attempted to cool the situation down for the purpose of "preventing disruption". This isn't unlike what I have done for dozens of other edit warring situations, admin or not. Note, that I wasn't the only admin there. As far as I'm concerned, the situation got out of hand and was handled by using discussion to stop the actions that were causing disruption, ie: Floq's reverting. Doing anything else at this stage would be punitive. I'm not here to met out justice, I'm here to stop disruption, prevent dramah, and get people back to doing constructive things. From my perspective, this has already been accomplished and this thread is superfluous. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 12:13, 28 June 2015 (UTC)