Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard

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For urgent incidents and chronic, intractable behavioral problems, use Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents. If you are new, try the Wikipedia:Teahouse instead. Do not report breaches of personal information on this highly visible page – instead use Wikipedia:Requests for oversight. For administrative backlogs add {{Admin backlog}} to the backlogged page; post here only if urgent. Do not post requests for page protection, deletion requests, or block requests here. Just want an admin? Contact a recently active admin directly. If opening a close appeal, use {{RfC closure review}} When you start a discussion about an editor, you must leave a notice on their talk page. Pinging is not enough. You may use {{subst:AN-notice}} ~~~~ to do so. Sections inactive for over seven days are archived by Lowercase sigmabot III.(archives, search) Start a new discussion

"WP:CR" redirects here. You may be looking for Wikipedia:Cleanup resources, Wikipedia:Categorizing redirects, Wikipedia:Copyrights, Wikipedia:Competence is required, Wikipedia:Dispute resolution, Wikipedia:Content removal and WP:Criteria for redaction.

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You may want to increment {{Archive basics}} to |counter= 38 as Wikipedia:Closure requests/Archive 37 is larger than the recommended 150Kb.

Use the closure requests noticeboard to ask an uninvolved editor to assess, summarize, and formally close a Wikipedia discussion. Do so when consensus appears unclear, it is a contentious issue, or where there are wiki-wide implications (e.g. any change to our policies or guidelines).

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Do not post here to rush the closure. Also, only do so when the discussion has stabilised.

On the other hand, if the discussion has much activity and the outcome isn't very obvious, you should let it play out by itself. We want issues to be discussed well. Do not continue the discussion here.

There is no fixed length for a formal request for comment (RfC). Typically 7 days is a minimum, and after 30 days the discussion is ripe for closure. The best way to tell is when there is little or no activity in the discussion, or further activity is unlikely to change its result.

When the discussion is ready to be closed and the outcome is not obvious, you can submit a brief and neutrally worded request for closure.

Include a link to the discussion itself and the {{Initiated}} template at the beginning of the request. A helper script can make listing easier. Move discussions go in the 'other types' section.

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Non-admins can close most discussions. Admins may not overturn your non-admin closures just because you are not an admin, and this is not normally in itself a problem at reviews. Still, there are caveats. You may not close discussions as an unregistered user, or where implementing the closure would need tools or edit permissions you do not have access to. Articles for deletion and move discussion processes have more rules for non-admins to follow.

Technical instructions for closers

Please append {{Doing}} to the discussion's entry you are closing so that no one duplicates your effort. When finished, replace it with {{Close}} or {{Done}} and an optional note, and consider sending a {{Ping}} to the editor who placed the request. Where a formal closure is not needed, reply with {{Not done}}. After addressing a request, please mark the {{Initiated}} template with |done=yes. ClueBot III will automatically archive requests marked with {{Already done}}, {{Close}}, {{Done}} {{Not done}}, and {{Resolved}}.

If you want to formally challenge and appeal the closure, do not start the discussion here. Instead follow advice at WP:CLOSECHALLENGE.

Other areas tracking old discussions

• Wikipedia:Requested moves#Elapsed listings
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Requests for comment

Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 444#RFC: The Telegraph on trans issues

(Initiated 133 days ago on 3 June 2024) Initial close has been overturned at review. A new close is required. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:36, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

Surely someone wants to be taken to review and shouted at, even if just for the experience. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:23, 10 September 2024 (UTC)

Anyone want a closer's barnstar? (okay but seriously maybe we should just panel close this one, if only to prevent any further disputes.) --Licks-rocks (talk) 11:46, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Panel close is probably a good idea if we can get a panel together. Loki (talk) 19:35, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

I doubt it will be possible to assemble a panel for something as inconsequential as this. Frankly, I don't know what should be done here. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 13:44, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Just to mention that there has been discussion at AN to attempt to resolve the issue. --Super Goku V (talk) 05:56, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

My headache came back just reading that. Thanks, I'll extend my wikibreak a little longer --Licks-rocks (talk) 21:55, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done (Special:Diff/1250934591) by User:Sandstein -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 12:27, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Notability (species)#Proposal to adopt this guideline

(Initiated 65 days ago on 9 August 2024)

Wikipedia talk:Notability (species)#Proposal to adopt this guideline is WP:PROPOSAL for a new WP:SNG. The discussion currently stands at 503 comments from 78 editors or 1.8 tomats of text, so please accept the hot beverage of your choice ☕️ and settle in to read for a while. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:22, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Philippe Pétain#Rfc for Lede Image of Philippe Pétain

(Initiated 58 days ago on 17 August 2024) Requesting immediate procedural close for Talk:Philippe Pétain#Rfc for Lede Image of Philippe Pétain, because it is blocked on a Wikipedia policy with legal implications that no one at the Rfc is qualified to comment on, namely U.S. copyright law about an image. At a minimum, it will require action at Commons about whether to delete an image, and likely they will have to consult Wikimedia legal for an interpretation in order to resolve the issue. Under current circumstances, it is a waste of editor time to leave the Rfc open, and is impossible to reliably evaluate by a closer, and therefore should be procedurally closed without assessment, the sooner the better. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 20:42, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

• It's not appropriate to make an immediate procedural close in those circumstances. Wikipedians routinely make decisions about copyright, even those Wikipedians who aren't US attorneys. This is not a high-drama situation. However I'm starting to wonder if the RFC nominator might be on a crusade about our lede images for prominent WW2 figures, and if so, whether they might benefit from a sysop's advice and guidance about overusing our RFC process.—S Marshall T/C 09:16, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

  I'll do this, although I'm going to do the other close I committed to first. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 16:56, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

  @Compassionate727 FWIW the image was kept at Commons and here's a bit of a follow up on the copyright stuff discussed afterward.[1] Nemov (talk) 01:02, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

  @Compassionate727 do you still plan on closing this? Nemov (talk) 20:01, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

  Yes, sorry. The outcome of the Commons DR and subsequent discussions have raised more difficult questions than they answered that I'm struggling a bit to sort through. I've requested input at WP:DfD; depending on the feedback I receive, I may settle on an outcome or punt the whole thing to someone more experienced with images. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 20:25, 6 October 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Yasuke#RfC on Yasuke Samurai Status

(Initiated 42 days ago on 2 September 2024) Legobot removed RFC tag 2/10/2024 TarnishedPath^talk 01:00, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done-- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 18:24, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Assassin's_Creed_Shadows#RfC:Should_Assassin's_Creed_Shadows_include_the_Re-enactment_flag_controversy_and_Japanese_reaction?

(Initiated 19 days ago on 25 September 2024) Last addition/comment was a week and a half ago (October 4th). As far as I can tell all those involved with previous discussion have responded. Relm (talk) 10:43, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

Deletion discussions

XFD backlog

V	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Total
CfD	0	0	3	0	3
TfD	0	0	0	0	0
MfD	0	0	6	0	6
FfD	0	1	3	10	14
RfD	0	0	0	17	17
AfD	0	0	0	1	1

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 6#Category:Interwiki link templates - inline

(Initiated 37 days ago on 6 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:32, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 18:36, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 10#Category:Fictional witches and wizards

(Initiated 33 days ago on 10 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:32, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 18:43, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 13#By-state law citation templates

(Initiated 30 days ago on 13 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:32, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 19:15, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 15#Category:Wikipedia non-empty soft redirected categories

(Initiated 29 days ago on 15 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:32, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 19:17, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Hurricane Kirk (2024)

(Initiated 11 days ago on 3 October 2024) Active for over a week and the draft is submitted, would be nice if we can close. Crete44 (talk) 14:44, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done by Explicit. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 19:17, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 23#Template:Appalachia-stub

(Initiated 21 days ago on 23 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:41, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 27#Category:Selena y Los Dinos

(Initiated 33 days ago on 11 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:41, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 02:18, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 28#Category:Medical doctors in British media

(Initiated 30 days ago on 13 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:41, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 02:24, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 September 30#Category:Jewish American legal scholars

(Initiated 22 days ago on 22 September 2024) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 22:41, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Other types of closing requests

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)/Archive 194#Notifying_Wikiprojects_and_WP:CANVASS

(Initiated 139 days ago on 28 May 2024) Latest comment: 3 days ago, 79 comments, 37 people in discussion. Closing statement may be helpful for future discussions. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:29, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

 Doing...— Frostly (talk) 22:35, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

@Frostly Are you still planning on doing this? Soni (talk) 16:57, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Soni, yes - have drafted close and will post by the end of today. Thanks! — Frostly (talk) 17:56, 23 July 2024 (UTC)

I wanted to note that this is taking slightly longer than expected, but it is at the top of my priority and will be completed soon. — Frostly (talk) 05:14, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

@Frostly Just checking, would you like someone else to help with this? Soni (talk) 07:31, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

@Frostly: also checking in. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:33, 22 August 2024 (UTC)

Hi Voorts and Soni, thanks for the pings! I've unfortunately been in the hospital for the past week but am now feeling better. I apologize for the long delay in putting out the close and appreciate your messages! Best, — Frostly (talk) 03:59, 22 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm sorry to hear that; a week-long hospitalization is not fun. But, I'm glad that you're feeling better. Best, voorts (talk/contributions) 19:06, 22 August 2024 (UTC)

Ping @Frostly again (I saw you've been editing Commons). Hope your still better, and if you don't feel like doing this one anymore, just let people know. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:02, 3 September 2024 (UTC)

Archived. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. ^{put'er there} 13:32, 24 July 2024 (UTC)

Just a note here that Frostly has not edited in over a month. Might be best for someone else to close. --Super Goku V (talk) 07:45, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

• I can't touch that cos I !voted, but although that was a productive and thought-provoking discussion, it's not a discussion that has an actionable outcome. I personally feel it can lie in the archives unclosed.—S Marshall T/C 11:36, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Israel–Hamas war#Requested move 13 August 2024

(Initiated 62 days ago on 13 August 2024) It's been more than a month. The closer must be shrewd and articulate, as the topic is highly contentious. They should also discard comments based on personal opinion rather than policy, and, of course, avoid having their own opinion influence their assessment of consensus. InfiniteNexus (talk) 21:51, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Imane Khelif#Proposal to create and split off new article "2024 Olympic Boxing Controversy"

(Initiated 58 days ago on 16 August 2024) Discussion has slowed. No comments in a few days. TarnishedPath^talk 02:12, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Talk:List_of_New_Testament_minuscules_(2001–)#Requested_move_22_August_2024

(Initiated 53 days ago on 22 August 2024) Open for more than 1 month. Natg 19 (talk) 16:58, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 13:57, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 16:38, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Climbing#Suggesting_a_change_of_WP:WikiProject_Climbing/Article_recommendations

(Initiated 49 days ago on 26 August 2024) I'd like a closure of this discussion, which was preceded by this discussion:Talk:Cobra_Crack#MOS:ITAL Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 16:50, 3 September 2024 (UTC)

There's not a lot of participation here. It might benefit from going to an RfC. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 18:17, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

The Cobra Crack discussion had 8 people. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:33, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Ryan_Whitney#Requested_move_29_August_2024

(Initiated 46 days ago on 29 August 2024) Open for more than 1 month. Natg 19 (talk) 16:58, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 16:45, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 18:52, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Stanisław_Potocki_(1659-1683)#Requested_move_30_August_2024

(Initiated 44 days ago on 30 August 2024) Open for more than 1 month. Natg 19 (talk) 16:54, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 19:21, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 20:13, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Moggy#Requested_move_4_September_2024

(Initiated 40 days ago on 4 September 2024) Open for more than 1 month. Natg 19 (talk) 16:54, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

 Done —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 20:19, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Talk:The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond#Proposed merge of Loch Lomond (Runrig song) into The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond

(Initiated 37 days ago on 6 September 2024) Contested proposed merge. Neutral closer required per WP:MERGECLOSE. voorts (talk/contributions) 15:22, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

Talk:2024_Lebanon_pager_explosions#Requested_move_19_September_2024

(Initiated 24 days ago on 19 September 2024) - Discussion has kind of stabilized, with 68 people giving over 256 comments. Awesome Aasim 21:00, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

Pages recently put under extended-confirmed protection

Report

Pages recently put under extended confirmed protection (31 out of 8598 total) () WATCH Page Protected Expiry Type Summary Admin Israeli attack on Ramyah UNIFIL post 2024-10-14 10:32 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement: Wikipedia:Arbitration/Index/Palestine-Israel articles Callanecc 2024 Hadera stabbing attack 2024-10-14 08:59 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction Johnuniq 2024 Hezbollah drone strike on Binyamina 2024-10-14 08:55 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Johnuniq Al-Aqsa Hospital massacre 2024-10-14 08:54 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Johnuniq United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon 2024-10-14 08:40 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Johnuniq Sheikh Hasina 2024-10-14 02:19 2026-10-14 02:19 edit,move Persistent disruptive editing: See the protection log for the history of problems EdJohnston Malayalam 2024-10-13 19:21 2024-11-03 19:20 edit,move ECP needed Daniel Case Portal:Current events/2024 October 11 2024-10-13 05:36 2025-01-13 05:36 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Israeli destruction of the Gaza Strip healthcare system 2024-10-13 00:00 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Steven Walling October 2024 Bachoura airstrike 2024-10-12 23:53 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Steven Walling No Title as of 13 February 2024 28,340 Dead 2024-10-12 23:42 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Steven Walling Esmail Qaani 2024-10-12 03:23 indefinite edit,move Contentious topics enforcement for WP:CT/IRP; requested at WP:RfPP Daniel Quinlan Draft talk:Mahammad Sami Shaik 2024-10-12 02:27 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Liz Zionism 2024-10-11 19:01 indefinite edit renewing existing protection after interim higher protection Valereee Eklashpur High School 2024-10-11 14:11 indefinite edit Persistent disruptive editing from (auto)confirmed accounts Star Mississippi Theo Gavrielides 2024-10-11 12:20 2025-01-11 12:20 edit Persistent sock puppetry ScottishFinnishRadish Template:History of Palestine 2024-10-11 04:53 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Wafic Safa 2024-10-11 04:49 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Pallava dynasty 2024-10-11 04:36 indefinite edit,move Community sanctions enforcement: per RFPP and WP:GS/CASTE Daniel Case Vaghela dynasty 2024-10-11 04:32 indefinite edit,move Community sanctions enforcement: per RFPP and WP:GS/CASTE Daniel Case Tokhi 2024-10-11 03:48 indefinite edit,move Community sanctions enforcement: per RFPP and WP:GS/CASTE Daniel Case Portal:Current events/2024 January 12 2024-10-11 03:16 2025-04-11 03:16 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Portal:Current events/2024 May 24 2024-10-11 03:16 2025-04-11 03:16 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Portal:Current events/2024 June 6 2024-10-11 03:15 2025-04-11 03:15 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Portal:Current events/2024 January 26 2024-10-11 03:14 2025-04-11 03:14 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Portal:Current events/2024 January 11 2024-10-11 03:14 2025-04-11 03:14 edit Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Portal:Current events/2024 May 28 2024-10-11 03:13 2025-04-11 03:13 edit Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Portal:Current events/2024 August 7 2024-10-11 03:13 2025-10-11 03:13 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Portal:Current events/2024 October 10 2024-10-10 22:40 2025-01-10 22:40 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic Wade Wilson (criminal) 2024-10-10 22:23 2024-10-17 22:23 edit,move Persistent violations of the biographies of living persons policy from (auto)confirmed accounts; requested at WP:RfPP Daniel Quinlan Portal:Current events/2024 October 9 2024-10-10 20:13 2025-01-10 20:13 edit,move Arbitration enforcement Cryptic

Mass G8 deletion of pages created by an IP

I've just deleted around 175 or pages created by 88.105.70.221 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) over the span of an hour or two. They were without fault talk or category talk pages of nonexistent articles and categories, and were mostly of the flora/fauna/biota/flags/symbols of Kashmir/Sindh/Punjab/etc. Some of the titles seems to suggest an agenda? I've saved a list here. The extant posts of the IP are quite related; despite yesterday being the first edits, I've blocked the IP to prevent further such actions. Anyway, given our history of mass-created/deleted pages (I recall an incident with bot-created algae stubs...), I would welcome a secondary review of this action by anybody smarter than I am on the politics of the region and categories in general. Thank you. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 12:45, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

• I wonder if this is PAKHIGHWAY (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) or some other restricted POV-pusher? Guy (Help!) 12:57, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
  • If it is, and I'm not sure we are going to be able to tell, that'd definitely be time for an indefinite block on PAKHIGHWAY. It's hard to see this action as anything other than disruptive. --Yamla (talk) 13:53, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

It would require a checkuser, obviously. Guy (Help!) 14:31, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

CU doesn't connect IPs to accounts, so that'd be useless. ansh666 20:31, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

@Ansh666:--That's partially wrong.Whilst CUs don't publicly connect IPs with UACs, they can easily do a plain CU block on the abusive account.~ Winged Blades^Godric 11:04, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

Exactly. What I meant was that only a CU could do this. Guy (Help!) 16:43, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Request

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

---

Requesting indef block from Wikipedia. Some admin block me from this site. Thanks. prokaryotes (talk) 12:19, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

 Done RickinBaltimore (talk) 13:15, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

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

proxies

Hey, is there anyway of detection an open proxy other than CU? I am incredulous at receiving user space vandalism out of Laos from an IP I never saw before. Cheers, -- Dlohcierekim (talk) 13:23, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

You can file a report on WP:OP and have them take a look. There are standard ways to detect open proxies that do not rely on CU or any other admin tools. --Ipatrol (talk) 17:21, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

SQL, has been working on some tools to help with this. TonyBallioni (talk) 17:23, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

A WHOIS lookup on the IP in question says it's associated with a SIP trunking company known as Star Telecom. There are multiple Viettel contact addresses, of which UNITEL (ref. in whois) are the Laos operator. Looks like some weird VoIP into Laos. Sounds like proxy, but maybe not open. ∰Bellezzasolo✡ Discuss 18:14, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

I looked into this at OPP - I can't find any evidence of this IP currently being a proxy. The netblock this one is from is 183.182.96.0/20, so I would keep an eye on those contribs and see if the vandal pops back up on another IP. SQL^{Query me!} 22:47, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

• Checkuser isn't really useful in detecting proxies. The tool itself is pretty limited, and I think most people would be quite underwhelmed if they got access to it. Wikipedia:WikiProject on open proxies/Guide to checking open proxies is useful, and there are a few websites that purport to detect proxies/VPNs, such as ipqualityscore.com. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 13:33, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject History Merge

• Now that I now know of the new way to auto-histmerge pages (Special:Log/merge, Special:MergeHistory, Wikipedia:Administrators' guide/Fixing cut-and-paste moves#Using the MergeHistory special page), I looked at Wikipedia:WikiProject History Merge, with view of helping there, and I found that the lists of history-merges to be done there, do not seem to have been updated for some years. Where is an up-to-date list of history-merges to be done? Anthony Appleyard (talk) 12:01, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

  @Anthony Appleyard: You could try the contents of Category:Candidates for history merging, which is a list of all the articles tagged with {{Histmerge}}. Fish+Karate 14:23, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

• @Fish and karate: But that does not lead me to any information about the Wikipedia:WikiProject History Merge project. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 16:53, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
  • According to the page in question, the list was maintained by User:AarghBot which in turn was maintained by User:Mikaey. Unfortunately, User:Mikaey hasn't edited in a year and rarely edits anymore according to his contributions. You might leave an inquiry on their talk page asking them to run a new sequence and, if no response, try recruiting a new bot owner at WP:BOTREQ. Hth, Rgrds. --64.85.216.148 (talk) 21:00, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

Special:MergeHistory (the new semi-automatic history-merger)

• I have used Special:MergeHistory twice. These points arise:-
  • If I am history-merging page X into page Y:-
  • Please also let the user specify the oldest edit in Y to keep. I have already run into a case when Y's history started with a redirect to X, and I went back to the old method. There I have to undelete Y separately afterwards, and in the process I can tell it not to undelete that redirect.
  • Please let the user also specify the oldest edit in X to move. That is useful when X is a sandbox-type file that contains the edit histories of 2 or more successive drafts.
    • (This leads into a query about when ever will we have ability to directly delete or move some edits of a file?, instead of the long-way-round of deleting all the file's edits and then undeleting some of its edits.)
  • Anthony Appleyard (talk) 11:34, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

    From looking at the description, and the interface itself, I'd say that the tool is really meant for dead-simple copy/paste moves with no convoluted histories. As soon as you have to deal with "this edit but not this one" it's probably better to just do it manually. Primefac (talk) 14:08, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

RIP Admin Bhadani

We have received word that long time administrator Bhadani has passed on. For anyone that was well acquainted with him, an update to Wikipedia:Deceased_Wikipedians would be welcome. Best regards, — xaosflux ^Talk 15:09, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

Violations of Five Pillars

• In the past I never had to seek "consensus" but now people of questionable authority are using that guideline as an obstruction technique. I have given up editing several articles because I put in hours of hard work adding knowledge only to have it simply reverted without any explanation, without suggestions, without improvements, without corrections. Those people are following me when I try a minor edit of a few changed words even that is reverted without questions or anything except to be rude and obstructionist. Who are these people? Where have they all come from? There is nothing in the Five Pillars about "consensus". The basic directions are jump in, be bold, assume good faith, build upon previous edits. I can no longer believe anyone who says "consensus" because they simply assume an authoritarian attitude that tells me they are vandals, trolls, or rogue editors. To the management of Wikipedia I plead mercy and ask that you find some way of controlling or removing the obstructionists. Thanks. -- DHT863 (talk) 00:21, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

@DHT863: You have 75 article edits which indicates inexperience with how articles, especially ones that cover controversial topics, are built. Consensus is indeed how content is determined and is explicitly mentioned in WP:5P4. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 00:52, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

• Thanks for the info but I quit. Its all yours my friend. -- DHT863 (talk) 01:15, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

I have been engaged in a lengthy discussion of these issues on my talk page with DHT863. Any other administrator is welcome to add their thoughts, either here or there. Thank you. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 01:05, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment)@DHT863:: You are correct that Wikipedia wants us to be WP:BOLD, but at the same time it wants us to be willing to follow WP:DR when there are disagreements over content. So, if you're bold and make an edit, which is then subsequently undone/modified by another editor, then the next thing for you to do is follow WP:BRD and discuss things on the article talk. This means trying to establish a consensus for the changes you want to make; it does not mean posting a message on the talk page and then immediately re-adding the disputed content. WP:SILENCE is often assumed when an edit is made that is not immediately reverted; however, as soon as someone does revert/change (except in the case of WP:VANDAL) the content, then discussion is needed per WP:CONTENTAGE to establish a consensus for inclusion. It's possible that a consensus to not include the content already exists, but a consensus can change which means discussion is still needed. As for your commetn aout other people, the Wikipedia community is made up of people from all over the world, and bascially anyone who want to edit is a WP:WIKIPEDIAN. Certain Wikipedians have been given special "tools" to perform certain tasks because they are considered experienced enough and competent enough by the community to do such things. Adminsitrators are one such type of user, but there are other types as well. Regardless of user type, all Wikipedians are expected to comply with relevant policies and guidelines when they edit, and this sometimes means undoing edits of those who do not. Moreover, checking the contribution histories of editors is not uncommon and it's even considered appropriate to check for other inappropriate edits per WP:HA#NOT. Just a suggestion: If you're being bold and finding a lot of your edits being reverted by others, then maybe it's time to slow down a bit an be a little more WP:CAUTIOUS. Also, you need to be aware how a minor edit is defined by Wikipedia (see WP:MINOR) because that is the definition that matters. Just adding a single sentence to an article might seem minor to you, but might not seem minor to others. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:23, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

Need an uninvolved admin to shut something down and send us all to our rooms

Can someone uninvolved please just end this. We can't help ourselves, and it's devolved to pettiness. I would have closed it myself, but I predict with near certainty that someone would reopen it and complain because I'm involved. Thanks. --Jayron32 13:09, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

• Ugh. Will this do? Guy (Help!) 13:21, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

  It will. Thanks. --Jayron32 13:22, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

• I have to say, I laughed at several points in time while skimming through it. Killiondude (talk) 23:24, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

Man with long history of publicity stunts stages publicity stunt. Hold the front page! Guy (Help!) 23:27, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

"You have been blocked indefinitely from editing for abusing multiple accounts."

Should this warning ever be given, without specifying who the sockmaster is?

What's the point? The socks already know who they are. There's no gain from keeping this secret.

Why is the rest of the editing community excluded here? Socks are a persistent problem, and it's through having lots of editors watching out that we catch them, and catch them early. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:16, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

That is the standard message when you use Twinkle to indef block an obvious sock. It serves two purposes: to alert the community should they want to talk to the person who made an edit, and to alert the user when it's a false positive. Do you have examples where it's a problem? Guy (Help!) 23:21, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

Well if you mean, "Would you like to replace the general point you've obviously made deliberately as such, with a specific case so that it can turn into another one-issue pissing match", then no. Do you not think I'd have done that, if I wasn't deliberately avoiding doing so? Andy Dingley (talk) 00:32, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

If I'm blocking for this (and it's not an IP) I usually put the sockmaster's name in the block log, unless it's blatantly obvious. Either that or use the blockedsock template on the sock's userpage. Black Kite (talk) 00:36, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

I'd hope any admin could justify any such block to any relevant person if asked. But there's a few reasons a generic message like this is used: 1) in the vast majority of cases the reasons are blindingly obvious from the edits. 2) It's not always clear who the actual sockmaster is even though the socking is obvious. 3) Revealing accounts and linking IP addresses in some cases such as CU blocks might be potentially privacy-violating for the user involved, so shouldn't necessarily always be made very public. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 23:32, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

...and 4) When the sock is an LTA, sockmaster or meatpuppet group looking to gain recognition and we are wanting to DENY them.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 23:39, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

In many cases they are obvious at the time. But there's also a historical aspect to it. Sometimes sock hunting means going back over an old trail a year or so later, long after memory has become unreliable. Also in many cases it's not obvious. Nor will some admins even respond to such enquiries, at least not from the plebs. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:35, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Do you have examples or is there a particular case in mind where we might be able to assist you?
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 01:01, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

There is also an important WP:DENY factor. Some people have a hobby of disruptively socking and are encouraged when they get particular attention. A generic message is much better than splashing the name of an LTA around the project. If evidence of blocks being inappropriately applied is found, the admin has their tools removed after an Arbcom case. That is very rare, although obviously there will be occasional false positives. What is the actual problem? Johnuniq (talk) 01:13, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

• I think Andy has a point, here, though it might be better to discuss it at a page more tightly focused on that message and the twinkle implementation of it. I've seen this before with editors who were being problematic before their block, and not knowing anything about who was behind the socking left me with the nagging doubt that I might not immediately recognize the next sock. And: No, I can't give specific examples, either. It's been at least a few weeks since I saw something like this. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 01:15, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Tangential discussion

I realize this is off-topic but I wonder if an admin could look into this. I recently noticed something that I find surprising. This User was blocked as being a sock puppet. This looks like a productive editor to me. This User initiated many articles on individual works of art, including the now popular Selfportrait at 6th wedding anniversary, the artist's birthday having just passed. Could the blocking of that User have been a mistake? Bus stop (talk) 00:03, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Not a mistake. This was a sock of User:Slowking4 who was a productive editor but was indefblocked for (a) persistent copyright problems and (b) persistent abuse of anyone who cautioned them about their copyright problems. You can't see their deleted contributions, but it consists of hundreds upon hundreds of deleted images that were uploaded as fair use - but weren't. His user page still has a "Say Yes to Fair Use" banner - scroll to the bottom. Black Kite (talk) 00:21, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Hi Black Kite, thank you. I just thought I would point out that the charges are disputed. I am unfamiliar with the case. I think I just know good work when I see it. Bus stop (talk) 01:26, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

I don't dispute the fact that most of his work here was good, unfortunately however when you're unable to adhere to a core policy the inevitable result is being blocked. Black Kite (talk) 01:29, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Black Kite and Bus stop, I'm the one who levied Slowking's indefinite block, but I don't remember the incident, so please take this as a general statement. When your problem is serial copyright infringement (whether abuse of fair use, or outright false claims of authorship), we have to clamp down hard (and be unforgiving on sockpuppetry), even harder than with community-damaging activities such as persistent abuse of people who caution you about your problems. Usenet didn't get in trouble with outsiders for its flame wars, and we won't get in trouble with outsiders if we permit personal attacks, but copyright ignoring will definitely be a problem. I'm inclined to be lenient toward a productive account that turns out to be a sockpuppet, and if you get blocked for vandalism and register a sockpuppet that creates a good article, I won't G5 delete it (if the article's good, why trash it), but if you get blocked for copyright-related reasons, hardblocking and deletion (unless the status can be verified, like this one as a translation of a WP article) are the only safe course for the project. Nyttend (talk) 15:16, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Hi Nyttend—veteran editors in the visual arts have opposed what amounts to unfair treatment of the visual arts (my words, not theirs) concerning notability requirements for such entities as works of art and art galleries and, getting to the point in this discussion, the justification for inclusion of images of works of art. A problem is that "Fair use" should be loosened for works of art. They are essentially visual. Art education calls for seeing works of art. Any commentary is almost of secondary importance. Blocking an editor that abuses the current guidelines on inclusion of images should be tempered by an understanding of their underlying motives. In short, perhaps they should be given a second chance, if they explain that they understand the serious risk to the project that may be posed by the unthinking inclusion of too many such images. Bus stop (talk) 15:39, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

You're going to have to wait for a proper response, since I don't remember anything of this block's circumstances, but I'm looking into it now. Nyttend (talk) 15:45, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

I've spotchecked a bunch of images, and all of them were photographs; maybe you'd find a little art in there if you checked everything, but if there's any there, it's not much. File:Delia Akeley.jpg was particularly egregious: it was deleted at Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2013 April 17#File:Delia Akeley.jpg because the nominator found a free image (okay, we all can overlook a free image), but then it was again deleted at Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2013 May 8#File:Delia Akeley.jpg because Slowking uploaded another nonfree image (rationale: no demonstration that a free photo exists; rather your flights of fancy doubt that one doesn't. prove a free photo exists by uploading one. as we can see in this photo, family photos can exist that remain in copyright; prove that the existing photos in books are free and not under copyright.) instead of uploading the free image. When you're having a large number of images deleted for improper fair-use claims, the only appropriate responses are "I'll be much more careful" (and complying) or "I'll stop uploading nonfree images". But when you make this kind of argument, and you keep going and uploading more such images despite warnings and a block, there's no reason to believe that you'll stop unless you are stopped. Nyttend (talk) 16:07, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

I don't doubt your justification for blocking. I'm trying to explain factors that have not been addressed yet, factors particular to the place of visual images in visual arts, and and that particular editor's attempt to build good quality articles in that area. It takes a degree of good sense to initiate on the English Wikipedia an article on Paula Modersohn-Becker especially the painting called Selfportrait at 6th wedding anniversary. (To be clear, the article "Paula Modersohn-Becker" was not initiated by the editor we are discussing.) When I saw that article I looked to see who initiated it. When I saw that the editor was a blocked editor I was quite surprised, and even further surprised when I looked at their editing contributions. The sensibility there impressed me. I personally have a liking for articles on individual works of art. Check out Portrait of the Artist's Father. I'm sure many don't share my interest. But that is a worthy article that we probably wouldn't have if not for that editor's contributions. Bus stop (talk) 16:27, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm sorry: I thought you were politely uestioning whether this user's block were perhps becuse the fir use policy ws being pplied too strictly to rtworks, such s pintings. Nyttend (talk) 16:41, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

I stand guilty of being too polite. I will try harder not to let politeness get in the way of arguing a larger point. I apologize and I promise never to do it again. Please accept my contrition as sincerely bleating out of the heart. Bus stop (talk) 16:54, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

No need to apologise :-) Sorry for the partial legibility of the previous note; my new computer's "a" and "q" keys are malfunctioning (intermittently...ugg) so I have to copy/paste the letter "a" if I want to type it, and I forgot. I'll be glad when the warranty shipping box arrives in the mail. Nyttend (talk) 18:02, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Maybe the malfunction wouldn't occur in a word processor such as TextEdit and then that text could be pasted here. (Just an unhinged thought.) Bus stop (talk) 19:05, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

No, unfortunately it's a hardware issue. It's even acting up at startup; I went to our IT helpdesk (they service computers owned by employees), and they tried to get into the BIOS setup before loading Windows, but it wouldn't work because the ESC key is having the same problem. [Glad that my previous computer is still working for many purposes; I'm using it now.] Nyttend (talk) 19:46, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, editors are entitled to disagree with our policies including our copyright policies. They're entitled to advocate for change in a resonable and non disruptive manner. What they cannot do is ignore our policies and continue with disruptive behaviour whether it's because of disagreement with our policies or whatever. And as said, our copyright policies are extremely core policies. Note that although our NFCC is more stringent than that allowed by US fair use law, for various reasons we don't make much of a distinction between likely copyvios, are maybe not copyvios but are violations of NFCC. Nil Einne (talk) 03:42, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure who you are responding to or if you are just weighing into the discussion. And I am keenly aware that I am off-topic. You are certainly on-topic when you mention WP:NFCC. The problem is that there is a need for images in art-education. This is a funny point and it is a point of contention. The counterargument, which is occasionally raised, is that excessive use of images merely "decorate" an article on a work of art or an art movement. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is actually the image that is most educational. The verbal content is merely supportive of the image. The cart is before the horse. Policy is telling us that "Non-free content is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the article topic, and its omission would be detrimental to that understanding." But it is often the other way around when concerning the visual arts. A lecturer in an art history class will display an image of a work of art and will provide spoken commentary on the artwork. A book will only omit images if it is assumed that the reader is already familiar with the images being referenced. It is OK to minimize the use of images in our articles. But they have to be available somewhere thus the use of internal linkage is essential. In short, the need for images in visual art is different than the need elsewhere. I don't know anything about the whole sock puppetry thing so I am only referencing the account of User:Sudowoodoo. This editor was doing great work. Many of the articles they created are translations from other language Wikipedias. Check out articles such as The Sunflower (Țuculescu) or The Apotheosis of Athanasios Diakos or Willows at Chiajna or The Queuing Continues or Apollo (System Copernicus). These are generally good quality articles on works of art. In every case there is a preexisting separate article on the artist, therefore linkage from the article on the artist to the article on the artwork helps to round out our coverage of a notable area of art history, and the linkage between articles minimizes the use of the image as it need not be shown in the article on the artist. (Unfortunately in some cases the image is duplicated in both articles.) Why not reach out to Sudowoodoo, acknowledge their contribution, and invite them to continue their good work? Bus stop (talk) 15:40, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

@Bus stop: I am one of the admins that most vehemently opposes their sockpuppetry, which goes way back, way before their block for being persistent abuse and copyright violations (the first sock-case was intentionally logging out to prove a point). They continue to insist in that, there are still images being deleted that were not falling under fair-use, they still verbally abuse editors who oppose their ways. I have, regularly and also fairly recently, reached out and suggested that they get their main account unblocked. They do not want to believe that that is a way forward, and continue to create sockpuppets. As these sockpuppets are being used to gather trophies (the forelast 2 sockpuppets were created to participate in a en.wikipedia article creation/improvement contest, one earlier in a global article creation/improvement contest), I go the harsh way and wipe everything from the face of Wikipedia, however good or appropriate the contributions themselves are (and I do not feel like looking whether some of the material is copyright violation or not, I just wipe).

I do note, that such images can be supplied by anyone, there is no absolute need to have a certain editor doing that.

So to answer your last question, Why not reach out to Sudowoodoo ..?, I would suggest to try again to Why not reach out to Slowking4? .. I have no objections to the main account getting a standard offer - and put an end to the unconstructive sockpuppetry (and no, these accounts are not a 'clean start' account as User:Slowking4 is alleging here). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 05:52, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, Beetstra. I posted this here. My hope is that it is a step in the right direction. Bus stop (talk) 14:30, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

The reply is here, similar to earlier replies to the same suggestion. Not that I have faith in an unblock, I will still support it. I guess it is now a de facto community ban. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:43, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Request for Administrator Comment

There is a content dispute at Talk:Notre Dame Cristo Rey High School. One user is hoping that independent administrators will step in to arbitrate. I know that admins do not settle content disputes, but I think the discussion would benefit if an uninvolved admin weighed in. BillHPike (talk, contribs) 02:16, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Further unsourced additions to WP:BLPs by User:InternationalSupporter3

Five hours after expiry of their one-week block for unsourced additions and changes to Sheffield Eagles players, User:InternationalSupporter3 went straight back to exactly the same behaviour: [2], [3], etc. This post at their user talk page, and this follow-up post, indicate that this user believes that their first-hand knowledge of the team is sufficient verification. Editor is now on their hundredth edit post-block, all on the same subject, nearly all to BLPs, and all without a single reference. The Mighty Glen (talk) 13:56, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Anyone know where the figure of 243 comes from that was added in the infobox for Stéphane Ruffier? There's no link in said infobox to a player profile, and none of the three external links verify this either. Unless they can provide a WP:RS, looks like they're going back to a block. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 18:27, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

• Blocked indefinitely until they can promise to start providing reliable sources. I looked at six articles; one source agreed with their edit, on the other five there were actually no sources whatsoever, or the source did not agree with their changes. Regardless of whether their edits are "right" or not, they can't stand without sources. Black Kite (talk) 19:04, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

WP:CBAN for ZestyLemonz

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

---

ZestyLemonz (talk · contribs) is a prolific sockpuppeteer deliberately evading the indefinite block placed by Bbb23 (talk · contribs) on 2017-04-12, later revoking talk page access on 2017-07-25. The sockpuppet investigations archive page is at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/ZestyLemonz/Archive. I count 52 accounts and a few IP addresses. The user is well aware their behaviour is inappropriate and has been repeatedly told about WP:SOCK, WP:BLOCK, and WP:SO, requiring them to cease editing. There are a number of UTRS appeals, too; see User talk:ZestyLemonz but note there have been UTRS appeals under sockpuppet accounts, I just can't immediately locate them because there are so many accounts. Just recently, see discussions at User talk:90.204.47.61. The user is generally abusive, no matter which account or IP address they are editing from. For example, at the aforementioned User talk:90.204.47.61, you can see they immediately received warnings about vandalising articles, adding unconfirmed information to articles, and engaging in edit wars. That was before anyone realised this was ZestyLemonz. In addition to those inappropriate edits, we've caught this user introducing incorrect (not just speculative information, but incorrect information) into articles before. It's not immediately clear if this was deliberate or a WP:CIR issue. Aldergate20 (talk · contribs) is the most recent sockpuppet account I am aware of. This account was editing yesterday. Given the number of sockpuppet accounts and the history of abuse, no admin would be willing to unblock the user at this time. I consider a ban to be a formality, but it might help ZestyLemonz understand the seriousness of the abusive behaviour.

I therefore move for a formal community ban against ZestyLemonz (talk · contribs), applied to the entire en.wikipedia, of indefinite duration and in any case no shorter than six months from the last edit they make with any account or via any IP address.

• Support as proposer. --Yamla (talk) 21:44, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support Largely a formality at this point.--Church ^Talk 21:46, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support - As a formality to clear any red tape and officiate this user as 'block on sight' when we see any of his accounts here. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 21:52, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support as above. TonyBallioni (talk) 22:14, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Not a fan of these in most cases, since this kind of request typically asks that we ban someone who will never be unblocked, but if you're actively making requests under UTRS, I suppose there's a chance that someone would unblock without understanding the situation properly. A formal community ban, with the big warning template on the master's userpage, will make it impossible for anyone to unblock as long as they're paying attention, and if someone forgets to investigate properly and unblocks, the block can always be reinstated. Nyttend (talk) 22:16, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support for clarity and finality. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 22:24, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) Weak support: I am growing to be less a fan of taking this formal step given the facts of sockpuppetry. I don't see the purpose, I don't think there's a realistic fear of an admin suddenly unblocking, and the application of G5 and similar policies to edits made during block evasion mean there is little difference between someone blocked for socking and someone banned for socking. I think it would be more constructive to create a LTA case page in situations like these, though those too don't really do much other than attach a further badge of shame to people who should be denied recognition. I do not, however, oppose this move because it's clear this particular editor is eligible for a formal siteban, and this is not the place to alter the banning policy. I believe we may be on the way towards banning policy reform, though, and this formal process should be tossed out as being effectively meaningless. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:26, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support, since it appears from the discussion that a community ban may make certain situations simpler to deal with. Bishonen | talk 22:29, 11 February 2018 (UTC).
• Support but lets not do this for every prolific sock-puppet please. de facto bans are fine. I can see this getting tedious really fast. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{(or here)} 22:30, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

• Insertcleverphrasehere, it already is tedious, since it happens too much. My only reason for participating is the user's active use of UTRS, which isn't typically an issue when someone's been "nominated" for a full community ban: your typical sockmaster brought here for a community ban is socking away without even pretending to use the unban process, while ZestyLemonz is simultaneously socking and pretending to use the unban process. Nyttend (talk) 22:36, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

• It's useful for cases where xwiki abuse is involved, and for cases where the sockmaster claims supporters on-wiki or is attempting to proxy edit and/or WikiLawyer. I brought one last week for all of these reasons, but I generally agree we should avoid it. I just think that in this case and the case I brought, there were/are valid reasons to do the formal process. TonyBallioni (talk) 22:46, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

• Support Enough is enough.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 22:40, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support Let's just dot the "i"s and cross the "t"s to let them know this is also a community endorsed action and that they're subject to a "revert on sight" order. I wouldn't be against, more or less, automatic community bans on editors who get blocked for socking. Blackmane (talk) 22:44, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Ehhh... I totally understand what you mean in principle, but that's not something we could realistically apply and with the confidence that it will have a 100% accuracy (in that it bans only the users we feel completely deserve it, and does not ban usernames that we don't). ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 00:12, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

@Oshwah: I made a slightly different suggestion in Newyorkbrad's discussion below. Blackmane (talk) 00:58, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• Support - This sock has been an issue for quite some time!, Support cban. –Davey2010^Talk 23:07, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support Dare I say it's beginning to WP:SNOW? RickinBaltimore (talk) 23:24, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support the archive for the Sockpuppet investigations is approaching 20000 bytes and lots of socks are easy to identify (one by myself). Iggy (Swan) 23:51, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Broader suggestion

Please see my comment in the similar "MyRoyalYoung" thread below. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:25, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

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

InterCity(IC)

I was advised to come here by Drmies.[4]

InterCity(IC) (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has been consistently disruptive. He clearly is not here to make the articles follow the sources, but rather is here for the sole purpose of attributing as many things as possible to Hungarian inventors no matter what the sources say. Examples:

• The transformer was a Hungarian invention[5].
• Nuclear weapons are a Hungarian invention, not an American invention[6]
• The turbo generator was invented by a Hungarian engineer in 1903 even though it had already been invented in 1887[7]

Plus, he edit wars, deletes other user's comments[8] and ignores/deletes any warning on his talk page, calling them spam or vandalism. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:39, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

I would like to suggest a community ban. Also, could someone look at his global contribs?[9] I suspect the same bad sourcing I am seeing here, but I can't be sure because of the language. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:39, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

• A community ban on what? Why this editor in particular?

It is not InterCity who is particularly the problem here, but this whole tree of nationalist invention categories. They have been a problem for years, they are a magnet for POV socks (Europefan is just one of an infamous bunch), there is no interest in developing any clear guidelines as to how inclusion should be defined (See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Technology/Archive_2#National_invention_categories). InterCity's behaviour hasn't done themselves any favours here, but in what ways are they wrong? What are they doing that's against the guidelines defining when something is credited to a particular country? (none, because there aren't any.) I don't see any of their editing here that's in any way worse than what other editors (including a couple of les unblockables) do all the time.

Why is a transformer not a Hungarian invention? Why are nuclear weapons not a Hungarian invention? Or do you mean a British invention, because the Hungarian in question was lying in a British bathtub at the time? What is a "turbo generator" anyway?

All of these are vague questions, with unclear answers. None of InterCity's claims here have been definitively wrong, such that we should be talking about topic bans. They haven't even been against guidelines for flagwaving POV edits in nationalistic categorisation, because we don't have any. We can't take punitive action without at least first defining that. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:00, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

The transformer was invented by Michael Faraday, and his invention was published in 1834. See Experimental Researches on Electricity, 7th Series. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. 124: 77–122. doi:10.1098/rstl.1834.0008. The first transformer to see wide use was invented by Nicholas Callan in 1836. It wasn't until 15 years later that the Hungarians at the Ganz factory started working on transformers. There is nothing unclear about this. --Guy Macon (talk) 04:41, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

So you agree that the first practical use of AC transformers as part of power distribution was Hungarian, great. So why doesn't that give them an invention credit for the transformers article? (it's a pretty blunt scope). Also Callan didn't work with what we'd describe as a "transformer" today, but rather an induction coil - a self-oscillating transformer, supplied by DC. That's much further from Faraday than Ganz' work was. So why include Callan (for whom there's also a separate article), but exclude Hungary?

I'm not claiming that Hungary should (or should not) be included here - but the issue is complex, unanswerable for as long as we refuse to express any real conditions for listing here, and certainly not material for topic bans. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:25, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

I respectfully disagree, as does Drmies. AN is not here to rule on content disputes, but rather to deal with user behavior, and InterCity(IC)'s behavior has been disruptive. --Guy Macon (talk) 11:54, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Then present a case as to why their editing is incorrigibly disruptive.

What you actually did was to go to WP:AN and post a list of content "errors", as if they were unarguable. Andy Dingley (talk) 12:05, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

The edit history speaks for itself. If you think that claiming that something can be invented in 1903 even though it had already been invented in 1887 is "arguable" I have nothing more to discuss with you. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:29, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• I agree that this editor is problematic. Note that he even blanked this discussion about himself on Drmies talk page, replacing the thread with a comment in which he claims to be leaving the English Wikipedia. That being said, he made a similar comment 11 days ago and then continued editing disruptively. This user, by his own admission, lacks the language skills to be editing here. Lepricavark (talk) 15:11, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Oh, I don't know that their English is that bad; I think the comment (about leaving en-wiki) is best explained by them feeling trapped, which is understandable. I do think that their edits were disruptive and I think it would be a good idea for them not to make such category edits and the related claims, and of course to refrain from the personal attacks. But I always hope that they come to understand the problem and find a way to contribute. Drmies (talk) 17:11, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Hmm, thank you @Andy Dingley for the consensus, that someone categorizes something and forbids it, I do not think it's my shame. I will not argue when it is not possible to argue if it is inappropriate for the discussion partners as in the present situation. They are still right even when credible sources say that they are wrong. @Lepricavark Since these inventions were also of Hungarian relevance, I was categorizing it as a Hungarian invention, but it was failed. The resources have been, but in vain. Its English wikipedia, all the English invention, even if the source is not even. irony. Thank you. @Drmies PS: "feeling trapped" how should I interpret it, would you please tell me? --InterCity(IC) (talk) 21:37, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Disruptive example what? , personal attacks example this so if If any of the editors say this is not a kind of attack? as it is said, is a personal attack, what I said was equal to this.. --InterCity(IC) (talk) 21:53, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Interesting that you feel that you are allowed to call someone an idiot[10] but consider "Now you are just being silly"[11] to be a personal attack. You deleted the comment you just linked to, calling it "spam".[12] Do you now understand why you cannot use Wikipedia as a source? If not, are you willing to discuss the issue? --Guy Macon (talk) 22:32, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• I've been watching this develop from the sidelines, and I fully endorse Guy's initial complaint here. There's nothing unclear about much of the content changes by this editor, and their behavior runs numerous red flags up the pole. This is a classic nationalistic POV pusher. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 22:39, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Also completely agree with Guy Macon. This user behavior has been consistently disruptive. Going against consensus and discussion and constantly deleting talk page threads and notices for no reason, even in other user talk pages. This is the kind of person that only make Wikipedia worse. --Ita140188 (talk) 06:25, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Proposal

InterCity(IC) (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is indefinitely banned from mainspace edits attributing or categorising inventions, technical developments or similar, by nationality. InterCity(IC) is permitted to propose such changes on Talk pages or initiate an article RfC, but is cautioned to respect consensus should it go against him. This is not indefinite license to argue. Repeat proposals or RfCs for the same topic may be expected to lead to a broadening of the restriction. InterCity(IC) is cautioned against removing, refactoring or editing the comments of others. This is disruptive and may be expected to lead to blocks.

• Propose. Guy (Help!) 11:06, 13 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 14:31, 13 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support --Guy Macon (talk) 14:49, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Returning to the deletion, you said that: Per WP:TPOC Wtshymanski is allowed to delete anything he chooses from his own talk page, and is not required to respond to you in any way. You are required to follow our policy at WP:EW. so this You deleted the comment you just linked to, calling it "spam". That's why I deleted it as an unjustified accusation. Attól hogy nem vagy képes felfogni, hogy a források is kimondják hogy az magyar találmány akkor nálad van probléma. Különben is ilyen szabály nincsen hogy csak egy nemzetnek lehet ítélni a feltalálási jogot/kategorizálni. A Wikipédia nem forrás és nem hivatkoztam a wikipédiára. Kálmán Rudolf Emil nem Magyar ez nem igaz, Magyar-Amerikai. Az angol Wikipédiát mint már mondtam befejeztem az itteni ténykedésemet a sok kötekedő ember miatt, akik nem képesek elfogadni olyan dolgokat mint például a telefonközpont magyar találmány vagy megkérdőjelezi, hogy a feltaláló magyar nemzetiségű. Részemről ennyit akartam mondani és nem fogok többé angol nyelven megszólalni mivel felesleges. Ez a Guy Macon nevű fickó pedig egy érdekes figura, nekem azt tűnt fel hogy mindenáron még ha egyértelmű források is vannak, de nem képes elfogadni hogy azt magyar ember találta fel vagy jelentős szerepet játszott a feltalálásában. na sziasztok, jó szerkesztést. --InterCity(IC) (talk) 21:18, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Trademark Infringing Cal Poly Disambiguation Page

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

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Here, we have a 100% incorrect disambiguation page that is causing ambiguity. Cal Poly is literally the name of the college Cal Poly (see here). Cal Poly has never referred to Cal Poly Pomona since Cal Poly Pomona's inception in 1966. The Pomona campus was only called Cal Poly when that real estate was part of Cal Poly between 1949-1966. The term Cal Poly without a modifier is owned by Cal Poly (see here and here). As such, Cal Poly Pomona explicitly says to never refer to it as just Cal Poly (see here).

This is an unambiguous trademark infringement. This is not something Wikipedia can have decided by a bunch of random dizzy Wikipedia users. Now that Wikipedia's administration has been notified any safe harbor Wikipedia may have had is gone and Wikipedia is forced to make a determination and there's only one determination that can be made or else this site (which has been, and is, profusely used for hidden advertising) will be secondarily liable for trademark infringement. Please delete the Cal Poly disambiguation page before it gets Wikipedia in trouble.--TDJankins (talk) 00:01, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

@TDJankins: I suggest you knock off the pseudo-legalese before you edge into blocking territory. Our disambiguation pages are there to assist readers with navigating to similarly named articles/topics. Some pages, like Coke, contain trademarked terms. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 00:11, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Deletion is unnecesary, as it is helpful to disambiguate common usages that readers will look up, even if they are officially incorrect. It may indeed be desirable to add a bit more information about current name usage to this disambiguation page, even though this is not the typical practice on such pages. However, both "Cal Poly" universities have the very same owner (the California State University, i.e. the State of California), so it does not seem possible that there could be any trademark litigation between them. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:12, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia might be able to avoid secondary liability if the page name were changed to "Things with Cal Poly in the Name" or something like that.--TDJankins (talk) 01:45, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

@TDJankins: See my post above. Please drop this. Now. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 01:47, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

While our litigious friend may be heading to a block, I do feel that California Polytechnic State University is the primary topic for Cal Poly. I'll do the RM paperwork. power~enwiki (π, ν) 06:32, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

On what basis do you feel that California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo is the primary topic and not California State Polytechnic University, Pomona? Right now they are both listed in alphabetical order, and I see no justification for changing that. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:56, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

"random dizzy Wikipedia user" here chiming in. "Cal Poly" at least in the San Gabriel Valley (Pop. 1.5 million) and the Pomona Valley (Pop. 0.21 million), both which are within the boundaries of Cal Poly's Local Admission Area, usually refers to California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. Wikipedia is not here to prescribe, but to describe.--Chlorineer (talk) 17:05, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

• Since apparently people are discussing this here rather than just at Talk:Cal Poly, I repeat myself: "Cal Poly" as a stand-alone term appears to always refer to the SLO school. The web domain, Twitter handle, sports teams for "Cal Poly" all belong to the SLO school. The LA Times refers to the SLO school as Cal Poly, while referring to the Pomona school as Cal Poly Pomona. In fact, all of the references I find to the Pomona school use "Cal Poly Pomona". For the stand-alone term, I think it's clear that it primarily refers to the San Luis Obispo school. power~enwiki (π, ν) 17:09, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Why is this here? This is not an administrator issue, unless the OP wishes to WP:BOOMERANG-block themselves for NLT violations... This is a normal editing issue subject to normal consensus-building discussions. What administrator tool needs to be used here? What needs protecting or blocking or deleting? --Jayron32 17:11, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

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

WP:CBAN for My Royal Young

My Royal Young (talk · contribs) is a prolific sockpuppeteer deliberately evading the indefinite block placed by NinjaRobotPirate (talk · contribs) on 24 April 2017. The sockpuppet investigations archive page is at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/My Royal Young/Archive. Since then, a lot of sock accounts and numerous IP addresses have been used for almost ten months replacing content on certain articles with 'patient nonsense' and spamming certain user's talk pages (one being my own). The user sometimes creates nonsense arctiles/drafts, their behaviour is definately inappropriate and has been repeatedly told about WP:SOCK and WP:BLOCK, requiring them to cease editing. In addition to those inappropriate edits, many users have caught this user vandalising articles as soon as it happens. MRYWikiWarriorOps2017 (talk · contribs) is the most recent sockpuppet account I have found which has been registered on this wiki. Given the large number of sockpuppet accounts and the history of the long term abuse, I am considering a ban to be a formality.

I therefore move for a formal community ban against My Royal Young (talk · contribs), to be applied to the entire en.wikipedia, of indefinite duration.

• Support as proposer. Iggy (Swan) 00:03, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support - Support site ban as a formality to clear any red tape, and to officiate this user as block on sight when we see any of his presence here. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 00:09, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Even in the case of exasperating sockpuppeteers, let's avoid that sort of terminology. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:13, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Newyorkbrad - I'm sorry. You're absolutely right - I didn't mean for that to come out the way that it did, and the bold lettering didn't really help either :-). It was a bad attempt on my part to TL;DR my justification for supporting this ban in that doing so would formally allow the community to report and block any account of this user and as soon as it's identified as one. I've modified my statement above, and I thank you for the response you made. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 02:14, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• I'm going to have to oppose, per WP:DENY. Nobody would ever unblock, and I get the feeling this is only giving the troll the attention they want. Plus, since it looks like there's significant cross-wiki disruption involved, wouldn't a global ban be more appropriate? Sro23 (talk) 00:15, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• I agree with Sro23... this is just what My Royal Young wants. WP:RBI is a better response to this vandal. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 00:17, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• He is also a cross-wiki abuser, I think should appeal him a meta:Global bans at Meta-Wiki instead. SA 13 Bro (talk) 00:20, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • @Sro23: - Yes, a global ban would be appropriate there. There has indeed been that type of vandalism elsewhere. Iggy (Swan) 00:25, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Per the above CBAN discussion, I think these should only be done to indef’d accounts when there is a strong reason to do so. I’m not seeing it here, but I’d also think it is a bad idea to close this opposing the CBAN. Maybe this could be withdrawn? TonyBallioni (talk) 00:23, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• This is a de facto ban anyway. Nobody is going to unblock a sockmaster like this, and all socks will be blocked as uncovered. You do know that we don't run weekly checkusers on banned users, don't you? Guy (Help!) 10:51, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Broader suggestion

To avoid the need for these sorts of recurring discussions, should we consider instituting a policy that any sockpuppeteer with more than [some number, e.g. 20] confirmed socks will be considered as the equivalent of community-banned? I can see pros and cons to this approach, so let's discuss, whether here or on a policy page. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:22, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• I have mixed thoughts on this. I thought of proposing it myself after the above thread. My concern here is that it would prevent needed bans of sockmasters with less than X socks. I think a better approach would be that in addition to the current restrictions, CU confirmed sockmasters can only be unblocked after community discussion or by an ArbCom appeal (with an obvious exception for the blocking admin to lift if there has been a technical error.). TonyBallioni (talk) 00:26, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • I think people can make mistakes and learn from them. One round of CU-confirmed socks? Meh, I don't think that's enough to warrant a ban. But personally, I wouldn't unblock after multiple rounds (where the subsequent socks are created after the original CU check) without making the user go through WP:SO and even then, I'd be hesitant. I'd support changing policy to consider such cases to be WP:CBAN'ed. --Yamla (talk) 00:35, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
    • My concern is that it would prevent the banning of users who because of other reasons need a CBAN from getting one. A user who uses socks to evade a community imposed indefinite block being an example of a scenario where I think community consultation should occur before unblocking. TonyBallioni (talk) 00:45, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
    • Another way to address my concerns would simply be to eliminate the mostly theoretical distinction between community indefs and CBANs. TonyBallioni (talk) 01:01, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Rather than setting some sort of threshold, just give CheckUser admins the discretion to commute a regular indef block in to a CheckUser block with the caveat that a commuted block requires community discussion for an unblock. There will usually be a SPI for most sockpuppeteers anyway so a note on the SPI for the master account should suffice not to mention it can also be noted in the block log. There is already an established practice that CU blocked accounts should be referred back to the CU anyway so this wouldn't really change much. Blackmane (talk) 00:57, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Something like this is what I was talking about. Normally CU blocks involve other disruption beyond having multiple accounts, so requiring community review is in my view a positive. It would also address the CBAN question, as declined unblocks after discussion are considered CBANs. TonyBallioni (talk) 01:01, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• I sort of support a move like this, though only so long as there is a rational reason for going the extra step of formal bans. My take based on the discussion above is that there is an issue as respects cross-wiki disruption and getting global locks. I am not sure about that explanation as yet; I think that there is an aspect of seeking to influence administrative decisions on other wikis that may be beyond our station. I am not sure if this is an improper reason. I am also hoping that we might be able to take this problem as an incentive towards discussing comprehensive banning policy reform. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 01:15, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• Once someone has around 20 confirmed socks in a few cases, they are already considered de facto banned now. This is particularly true since they are almost always CU blocked. No admin CAN unblock them unilaterally. This wasn't so much the case 5 years ago, but we have gotten more aggressive with CU blocks, which is probably a good thing. I don't think we need policy as much as a community understanding that once someone has a large rap sheet at SPI, you can treat them as banned. When someone reverts someone as a sock, it really doesn't matter if they are banned de facto or de jure, they are still responsible for being right about the connection, and the distinction is meaningless. Formal bans are simply not very useful in these sock situations. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 01:56, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • I generally agree, except that I believe we should enshrine the current treatment of CU blocks in our policy. Part of the problem is that the practices surrounding CU actions are generally not ones where the unwashed masses' opinions are factored in outside of a formal RfC or similar. Whether our policies are positive policies or are simply codification of existing practices, we should have broader community discussion of these things. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 02:09, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support this broader suggestion (not sure if 20 is the right number, but I'm willing to accept it), provided that there are at least 3 rounds of blocks - that is, a set of new or never-used accounts is established after the initial block, and a third set of new or never-used accounts is established after the second set. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 09:01, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Per Od Mishehu, I don't know if 20 is the right number, or even a necessary number - I would go with 3-4 rounds of socks being blocked and that is it. How do we administrate this, do these editors need to be listed? (and additionally, when do we consider to give these editors a LTA-page, which in some cases may be needed - though be avoided in others). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 09:22, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

@Beetstra: The LTA page is already existed, the "page creator" which was created by a good hand sock of himself. One of our global steward Ajraddatz has also warned him that not to engage a "good hand, bad hand" vandalism socking behavior at here in previously, while he still continued his disruptive behavior for personal amusement in anyway. No any local admins and global stewards are going to unblock and unlock him, using the vast number of dynamic IPs for vandalizing the projects was available on the records. MRY is a active cross-wiki abuse vandal from Philippines, instead of appeal him the community local ban on the discussions, requisition him the global ban at Meta-Wiki site would be preferable. In this case, we just give him the WP:RBI treatment and that it. SA 13 Bro (talk) 11:40, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

@SA 13 Bro: I was more talking in general, if we just define that people who sock so long / so often are by default community banned, do we then also have to by default record them those 'auto-community-banned' users somewhere, is it reasonable, where applicable, to create an LTA for these users, etc. (I am thinking about another user who would fall in this category, vide supra). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 12:23, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Does it need to be specific? Can it be something like, 'Socking is against community norms, disruptive socking may result in indefinate community ban imposed at administrator discretion or by proposal at AN.' Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:18, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

I'd prefer that it would default into that, User:Alanscottwalker. Socks tend to personalize against the admin that (last) sanctioned them, if I after n socks and m blocks have to formally instate a CBAN at my own discretion that effect may be stronger, and similar when initiating a ban discussion here. If it just defaults, then anyone can just tag the main account as community banned, and list them (and where appropriate, make an LTA for them). Any complaints are then 'it is not my decision/suggestion, it is a community decision'. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 06:17, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

• Obvious outcome is obvious. What Newyorkbrad said. Any uninvolved admin (and policing the abuse does not make you involved here) can add such a user to the banned list, and just drop a note at ANI to say it's been done. I think we're probably all happy with this going by default unless there are objections. Pace Alanscottwalker and Dirk, it's also absolutely fine to come here and ask some other admin to do the needful, but we don't need a debate or a vote in these cases, precedent is clear on this. Guy (Help!) 10:53, 13 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support: Indefinitely block and global lock is already banned to him, my standpoint is consistency as the SPI clerk Sro23 that has mentioned at above, it doesn't need to give this vandal troll the attention they want. SA 13 Bro (talk) 13:59, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

UpsandDowns1234 block review

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

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Can a neutral third party admin review the Standard Offer request from UpsandDowns1234 (talk · contribs) per User talk:UpsandDowns1234#Unblock request 1, and determine whether specific unblock conditions would be appropriate or whether a clean-slate unblock would be more appropriate? I'm very much WP:INVOLVED so won't take any action either way myself; I proposed the conditions I felt would be appropriate, but U1234 has rejected these and made a counter-proposal that he be unblocked but banned from editing his own talkpage. Obviously this would be highly unusual, to the extent that I feel any attempt to impose such a condition would require community consensus and couldn't be imposed by any admin unilaterally. Also paging Primefac and NeilN as the admins who imposed the original blocks. ‑ Iridescent 09:35, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

• I'm in two minds about this. On the one hand, this is what the SO is for, and I'm usually (per WP:ROPE) the first to let someone back in. And on the assumption there's been no socking, the criteria for consideration have been met, and the original disruption was (IIRC) childish rather than malicious. On the other hand: I'm not sure U&D has learned anything enough during their time off. On the one hand, they seem to be under the impression that the SO is negotiable (by them), that their return is inevitable just because six months have passed, when actually their remark ("Note to uninvolved admins: If you shorten or remove my block, then mark the unblock request as successful, otherwise, mark the unblock request as unsuccessful)" suggests they are still focussed on adminstrative minutiae, when that was something that contributed to their original block.
  In any case, advising a reviewing admin what to do with an unblock template is frankly bizarre—while also suggesting they don't understand what went wrong. As to their request to have talk page access revoked: emphatically disagree (per "it's unthinkable, surely, that in a collaborative environment—where communication is not just necessary but paramount—that you are unable to respond to other editors-!"). The suggestion alone may indicate that they don't realise the importance of communication; but of course it may not. And to be fair, U&D has presented a pretty comprehensive admission of previous disruption. >SerialNumber54129^{...speculates} 10:59, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Decline SN54129 above spelled it out perfectly. While, yes the standard offer is there for a user, they do not understand the reasoning for the block to begin with it seems. The fact that they do not know why they are blocked tell me they will return to the same behavior that led to the block in the first place. RickinBaltimore (talk) 13:10, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Unblock only if Iridescent's unblock conditions are unconditionally agreed to. Furthermore, indicate they are on a short leash and any kind of disruptive behavior not covered by the conditions will result in an indefinite block. I suspect this reblock is inevitable but perhaps we'll all be surprised. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 13:30, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Decline I saw this in RFU earlier. I got the distinct impression that we were being trolled and that even if we weren’t being trolled, an unblock would only lead to disruption. Also, a note to the closer that should this appeal be declined, it counts as a WP:CBAN. TonyBallioni (talk) 14:01, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Update: I would support an unblock if they unambiguously agree to accept Iri's conditions. I don't want this as an "We unblock you and here are the conditions" thing without them agreeing to it, as I think that would fail miserably. TonyBallioni (talk) 16:52, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Unblock best wa follow the current account and mentor them over dealing with alternative accounts. The editor clearly wants to edit and will do so blocked or nor.... best we watch over.Change vOTE after comment ....simply not mature enough. [User:Moxy|Moxy]] (talk) 15:38, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Unblock with Iridescent's unblock conditions. The talk page revocation is a non-starter. All editors that are currently editing must be able to discuss things on their talk page. ~ GB fan 15:41, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Blocking admin comment based on the conversation on my meta talk right after pulling TPA, I see exactly the same behaviour as before, which was quite well summed up by SN above. The Standard Offer is not an "automatic" return, and I'm not sure they've learned their lesson. However, provided they keep within the restrictions provided they'll either become a productive editor or end up site banned. Primefac (talk) 16:23, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
  • Yes, that was my impression as well: they are going to continue the games that led to the original block. The SO requires that the user understand what led to the problems, and promise to avoid them. I'm not seeing that here. He fails one of the conditions for the SO, even with Iri's conditions. TonyBallioni (talk) 16:34, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
    • ​My proposed conditions were drawn up to intentionally create red lines. They mean that if he has anything useful to contribute he can contribute it, but the first whiff of trolling and he's gone for good this time. My gut feeling is that this is an editor who's very young and who's experimenting with the boundaries of the envelope rather than acting out of malice; if that's the case, then intentionally pushing him into a sandpit would give UAD a place either to demonstrate that he can work cooperatively, or demonstrate conclusively that he can't. It's not as if his contributions won't be heavily scrutinised. ‑ Iridescent 16:45, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
      • ​Yes, very good point. I think your unblock conditions are good, but I was less than impressed with the response to them. I've been dealing with an LTA who takes the "well-meaning idiot vs. malicious actor" thing to a new level as of late, and that likely influenced my views here. I've updates my comment above: I'm fine with unblocking if he agrees to your conditions, but I think it is important that he be the one to agree: I don't think it will work unless there is buy-in from the unblocked party, and the easiest way to gauge this is "are you cool with this before I unblock you?" TonyBallioni (talk) 16:52, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Support unblock if he accepts my conditions (or similar), oppose a full no-restrictions WP:ROPE unblock (although if he demonstrates an ability to comply with the conditions, they can obviously be lifted later. The ability to comply with other people's decisions even when one doesn't agree with them as a key—arguably the key—Wikipedia skill, and some people just don't have it. I'm reluctant to go all out with a community ban, even if this appeal is declined; assuming that UAD is a child (a fairly safe assumption) he's likely to become far less annoying as he matures and it would make sense to leave the door open. ‑ Iridescent 16:45, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Unblock in +/- 2 years. Not mature enough right now. I recall the rather large amount of time that was sunk into trying to help them be productive, to no avail. It is nearly impossible that they've matured significantly since then. Their recent talk page comments confirm this. --Floquenbeam (talk) 16:48, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Unblock per pretty much exactly what Neil said. Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 16:49, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Decline initially. I would prefer that the block be retained in place for six months, and only then released on the conditions originally proposed by Iridescent. --Anthony Bradbury^"talk" 18:15, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Decline per the number. I'm not convinced that they understand why they were blocked in the first place, despite their assertions otherwise. ansh666 18:19, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Decline I might sound mean, but I think we are either being trolled, or this individual simply does not understand what Wikipedia is here for, and the protocols that are followed. I cannot see a net positive in unblocking, especially as it seems like the blocking admins are being lectured to. Aiken D 19:27, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Comment: In the Unblock request, he refused to agree with Iridescent's quite reasonable unblock conditions. That does not give me a lot of confidence that he won't go right back to being disruptive if unblocked. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:42, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
• Comment Iridescent, where did he suggest being banned from editing his own talkpage? I've read through the request without seeing that, and neither a search for talk nor a search for discussion found anything that looked relevant. Looks to me like he's proposing "Reduce my indefinite block to six months [so it would end in August] with no talk page access." Nyttend (talk) 22:50, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

  Yeah, I read that as TPA revoked for the remainder of their self-proposed 6-more-months block only as well, but it doesn't really affect my own opinion either way. ansh666 05:45, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

• Decline The responses on their talk page don't fill me with confidence that we won't be back in a very short period of time. Maybe along the lines of Floq's thinking (although not sure how U&D could be unblocked in -2 years) that given another year or two they might be mature enough. Blackmane (talk) 04:49, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

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

Notice of possible vandalism

Dear admins, can somebody – ideally with the relevant historical background – please have a look at the edits made by this IP. The person behind this IP has recently been editing in more or less the same subject area (cf. especially the article World War II in Yugoslavia, where my edits improving and completing citations and references where removed due to a revert to the version before the – probably biased and revisionist – IP edits. As there are still some referential mistakes to be fixed, I wold like to get to work soon, though to do so, I need to be certain first that no more reverts or rollbacks take place. Hence, I would also recommend to semi-protect the said article. Hoping for your understanding reply, and prompt initiative, I remain with my best regards.--Boczi (talk) 15:12, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Those edits are not vandalism, because they are clearly in good faith. What I mean by that is that it is clear the user of that IP address is making edits that they believe to be improvements to the articles in question. Vandalism means that the person is actively trying to make Wikipedia worse. They are not doing that. Having said that, it doesn't mean their edits are beneficial or should stay (and saying THAT doesn't mean I think they should go, I have no opinion there). That just means that if you disagree with those edits, you should seek dispute resolution if you cannot reach an agreement on where to go. But vandalism really just means "trying to damage Wikipedia", doing stuff like replacing words with swear words, or writing "Johnny was here!" in the article text or stuff like that. --Jayron32 15:17, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Dear Jayron32, thank you very much for your quick response! Regardless of whether vandalism is the right term in this case or not, would there be an efficient way to (administratively?) restore my edits? I would like to avoid having to carry out a manual recovery if possible. Apart from that, please understand that I just wanted to point to and inform about this issue here in case there were a VAND problem or rather a "good faith but no use" problem given here that should be brought to attention in order to prevent further damage. Please understand that I do not have the ressources to start another whole DR process here. Best--Boczi (talk) 15:43, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Well, to technically do that, you could use the WP:UNDO function, it takes about 3 clicks to do that. However, you'll want to avoid getting into a edit war with the user. If someone sees a bunch of back-and-forth undoing of edits, both parties to the dispute can be blocked for edit warring. --Jayron32 15:57, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

@Jayron32: Thanks once more. I know I could use the undo button but then I would have to undo OyMosby's revert, which in turn would restore the IP edits in question…--Boczi (talk) 16:25, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

 Note: Maybe OyMosby wants to give a comment here.--Boczi (talk) 16:02, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Hello. I have been seeing the same anonymous user with ever changing IPs all based in Serbia making revisionist edits on articles such as this one. The person has a clear agenda and is usually given a slap on the wrist. I tried reverting their edits but this may have impacted yours as well. Sorry about that. As for what to do about the IP user abusing this platform, it is hard to figure out. Sometimes their edit goes unoticed for a while, which is sad as readers will be misinformed. Peacemaker67 has tried to deal with this disturbance before, given he himself is busey with other matters probably already, but I think there is only so much that can be done with anonymous users who just change IPs. Which is what I beleive to be the matter. One person, mutiple IPs. OyMosby (talk) 16:51, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for commenting here. In this case, as I already implied above, one might consider [semi-]protecting the affected articles to prevent further damage.--Boczi (talk) 17:05, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

If we're trying to cut down on someone using multiple IP addresses, we have options of a rangeblock (if the IPs all originate in a conveniently small range that doesn't also generate good traffic for Wikipedia) or we could simply protect the pages against IP editing. Both of these are rather blunt tools to use, but they are possible depending on a few things. If someone could compile a list of IP addresses which you suspect to be this one problematic user, we could look that over. --Jayron32 17:17, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

I have semiprotected Yugoslavia during World War II for three months since that seems like an obvious step. One or more IP blocks might also be justified but that would require organized evidence, and it would help to get an opinion from one or more of the admins who have been active on Yugoslavian matters such as User:Peacemaker67. (I agree with Jayron32 that the IP edits are not obvious vandalism though they could be POV-pushing). EdJohnston (talk) 18:04, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Thanks Ed, I'll keep an eye on it. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 23:47, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Priya Prakash Varrier

Might need some attention here. It seems the involved editors and fans are voting to keep the the page undeleted. I think it require expert opinion from administrators or experienced editors. --Let There Be Sunshine 18:34, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

I've tagged the current votes that look meat like. I imagine there will be more though. Amortias (T)(C) 20:33, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

The closing admin will take note of the SPA's/fanvotes and close it accordingly. Blackmane (talk) 02:25, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Vorpzn and big undiscussed merges / renames

• Vorpzn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Recent editor (<300 edits) and already they're piling into seriously big merges and renames without any sort of prior discussion. See vorpzn (talk · contribs) for the best list, but today we have Solid rocket booster -> Solid-propellant rocket, Liquid rocket booster -> Liquid-propellant rocket , Booster (rocketry) -> Multistage rocket.

This has been raised before in September User_talk:Vorpzn#Do not redirect long-established articles without discussion and consensus, I raised it with them again a week ago and had a pretty dismissive reply User_talk:Andy Dingley#Natural gas and History of gaseous fuel. Raised again today at User_talk:Vorpzn#Undiscussed merges (again)

Sometimes our hunt for consensus means we're paralysed by inaction when it comes to taking big bold steps, but this is not the way.

Oh, and I've just noticed a WP:AIV posting Andy Dingley (talk) 11:50, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

And now User_talk:Andy Dingley#WARNING Andy Dingley (talk) 11:51, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

And now Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Reverts_all_my_edits Andy Dingley (talk) 11:56, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

I've already declined the AIV report and the Arbitration request is being discussed. There does seem to be a case of If I don't acknowledge you it never happened going on though. Amortias (T)(C) 11:59, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

They're still going about raising incorrect warning templates and undoing other editors work as vandalism. I'd block myself for disruptive editing but they may have a case for me being involved with having declined their WIV report and removing their Arbitration request. Amortias (T)(C) 13:20, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Blocked, 31 hours, for DE. Primefac (talk) 13:24, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

That wouldn't even be a particularly useful block. They'd get blocked for a day, others would be warned for being mean to new editors, and a couple of days later they'd be back at doing these terrible merges.

This isn't about userpage tagging or bogus AIVs, it's about merges and renames without any prior discussion. There should be a topic ban on that. That's heavyweight for such a new editor, but the disruption since and the refusal to discuss it here means I'm not in a mood to faff about with feeble warnings. Please look at the full contribs history here and say what you reckon to the merges. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:28, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

[edit conflict] and the expected block. Oh great. Now they have an excuse for not responding here, so the whole posting was wasted. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:29, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

They continued their editing nonsense for two hours after you had notified them of this discussion. Clearly they were not overly concerned with holding productive discourse. Primefac (talk) 14:10, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

• Looking at their talk page, I'm getting the suspicion that Vorpzn is not here to build an encyclopedia. Lepricavark (talk) 15:05, 13 February 2018 (UTC)