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{{userlinks|Clockback}}
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[===Hullo everybody, this is Peter Hitchens (in real life!) , not logged in as Clockback as I would then be censored and muzzled. Administrators have my e-mail address, thanks to the appeals they have rejected on it, and are invited to contact me if they wish to check the authenticity and provenance of this contribution. I would just like to ask all those involved in this decision to take a long, slow breath and look at what they have done. Most fundamentally, they have responded to a plea for help with a kick in the teeth. When I posted a request for assistance in a dispute with another editor, which had lasted five years and involved the other editor being unpleasantly rude, openly biased on the issue under discussion, and unresponsive on the talk page, on several occasions, the person who intervened(who could not possibly, in the time, have made a just or thorough examination of the matter) immediately blocked me, and to rub the matter in, blocked me indefinitely. This is plainly unjust and no free person would accept it or be willing to abase himself to get it lifted. If you wish to discuss this matter with me, treat me fairly. If ( as seems to be the case in some comments) you take a special pleasure in blocking a Mail on Suynday columnist, feel free. If that is your idea of a good time, then I can only say that we're all different. But do not pretend you are doing this in pursuit of the truth. the fact remains that my much-frowned-on edits, though satirical and not intended to stand (I made their purpose plain on the talk page) , were entirely factual, an undeniable truth which I have yet to get any administrator or editor to notice, acknowledge or address. Fact One:The police, in England, have precisely no statutory role in the investigation of crimes allegedly committed by the dead; and it is a legal absurdity for any English tribunal to say it has found no reason to doubt an allegation. Reason to doubt is actively embodied in the principle of presumption of innocence, is the basis of jury trial and is embedded in both civil and criminal procedure. If you are ready to listen, then I'm ready to defend myself. I am treated with fairness, an open mind and civility, you will find I respond in the same way. If I muzzled and silenced, then I just remember how my English ancestors would have responded to such treatment. Please do not delete this. I have of course kept kept a copy. Usigned but acknowledged as the sole work of Peter Hitchens.


Clockback is in real life, British journalist [[Peter Hitchens]]. He was recently indef-blocked by {{u|JzG}}. '''I will argue here that the block, while warranted, was too harsh and has outlived its purpose'''. The circumstances are as follows. The matter is a bit delicate, so please bear with me.
Clockback is in real life, British journalist [[Peter Hitchens]]. He was recently indef-blocked by {{u|JzG}}. '''I will argue here that the block, while warranted, was too harsh and has outlived its purpose'''. The circumstances are as follows. The matter is a bit delicate, so please bear with me.


Revision as of 09:14, 6 August 2018

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      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

      Administrative discussions

      ANI thread concerning Yasuke

      (Initiated 41 days ago on 2 July 2024) Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive1162 § Talk: Yasuke has on-going issues has continued to grow, including significant portions of content discussion (especially since Talk:Yasuke was ec-protected) and accusations of BLP violations, among other problems. Could probably be handled one sub-discussion at a time. --JBL (talk) 17:50, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Closure review of The Telegraph RfC

      (Initiated 35 days ago on 9 July 2024) Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § RfC closure review request at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#RFC: The Telegraph on trans issues's discussion seems to have died down. Hopefully I've put this in the correct section. Aaron Liu (talk) 03:49, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

       Doing... —Compassionate727 (T·C) 16:56, 21 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      This discussion is a huge headache. I'll keep working on it as I have time, but if somebody else wants to close this before I do, I won't complain. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 02:14, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      you could put the draft on the discusssions about discussions page, WP:DfD? Tom B (talk) 09:08, 27 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Nah, I know what the result should be, I just need to write an explanatory statement. That will happen this weekend, Lord willing. Thanks for the resource though, I had no idea that existed. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 19:54, 2 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Hi Compassionate727. I want to make sure this is still on your radar. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 14:58, 5 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Yes, and it's very nearly done. There's no reason I shouldn't finish it tomorrow, if not tonight. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 20:44, 5 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      {{Done}}. I fear I'm going to ruffle some feathers with that, but I do believe it both the correct outcome and the most inoffensive one. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 22:58, 6 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      ...why do you think the most inoffensive option is to re-close the original RFC to Option 1? What's your evidence that was the consensus of that original RFC? Loki (talk) 23:44, 6 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      eraser Undone per WP:BADNAC#2 by another user. Aaron Liu (talk) 00:11, 10 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      The close has since been rescinded by the closer, so is very much due for closing again. CNC (talk) 13:34, 10 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Place new administrative discussions above this line using a level 3 heading

      Requests for comment

      RFA2024, Phase II discussions

      Hi! Closers are requested for the following three discussion:

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

       Doing... reminder of civility norms. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:24, 1 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
       Partly done reminder of civility norms. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:40, 1 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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

      During Phase I of RFA2024, we had ended up having multiple closers for different RFCs, even the non-obvious ones. I think different people closing subparts of this should be acceptable Soni (talk) 09:22, 28 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Bumping this as an important discussion very much in need of and very much overdue for a formal closure. Tazerdadog (talk) 18:40, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
       Doing... designated RfA monitors (at least in part). voorts (talk/contributions) 16:40, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
       Partly done designated RfA monitors. voorts (talk/contributions) 17:31, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      For recall, @Sirdog: had attempted a close of one section, and then self-reverted. Just in case a future closer finds this helpful. Soni (talk) 07:17, 11 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Thank you for the ping. For what it's worth, I think that close was an accurate assessment of that single section's consensus, so hopefully I make someone's day easier down the line. Happy to answer questions from any editor about it. —Sirdog (talk) 07:38, 11 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      I agree. I also think closing some sections at a time is pretty acceptable, especially given we have only been waiting 2+ months for them. I also have strong opinions on 'involved experienced editors' narrowing down a closer's scope just because they speak strongly enough on how they think it should be closed. But I am Capital-I involved too, so shall wait until someone takes these up. Soni (talk) 08:53, 11 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      I tend to agree. Not many people agreed with the concerns expressed on article talk about closing section by section. If a closer can't find consensus because the discussion is FUBAR, they can make that determination. voorts (talk/contributions) 12:50, 11 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Gaza genocide#RfC on the inclusion on the BU Today article in the lede

      (Initiated 52 days ago on 22 June 2024) nableezy - 17:53, 29 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Titles of European monarchs

      (Initiated 51 days ago on 22 June 2024) - I thank the Wikipedia community for being so willing to discuss this topic very extensively. Because 30 days have passed and requested moves in this topic area are already being opened (For reference, a diff of most recent edit to the conversation in question), I would encourage an uninvolved editor to determine if this discussion is ready for closure. AndrewPeterT (talk) (contribs) 22:34, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      (Also, apologies if I have done something incorrectly. This is my first time filing such a request.) AndrewPeterT (talk) (contribs) 22:34, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      There is ongoing discussion there as to whether a closer for that discussion is necessary or desirable. I would suggest to wait and see how that plays out.--Wehwalt (talk) 14:58, 24 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      This is dragging on ad nauseam. I suggest an admin closes this, possibly with the conclusion that there is no consensus to change. PatGallacher (talk) 17:50, 28 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Anti-Defamation League#RfC: Wikipedia reliability section

      (Initiated 43 days ago on 30 June 2024) - Note: Part of the article and talk page are considered to be a contentious topic, including this RfC. --Super Goku V (talk) 10:28, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 447#Reliability_of_Thomas_Lockley

      (Initiated 41 days ago on 2 July 2024) - The original topic (Lockley's book, "African Samurai: The True Story of Yasuke, a Legendary Black Warrior in Feudal Japan") has not been the focus of discussion since the first few days of the RFC when it seemed to reach a concensus. The book in question is no longer cited by the Yasuke page and has been replaced by several other sources of higher quality. Since then the subject of the RSN has shifted to an extension of Talk:Yasuke and has seen many SPA one post accounts hijack the discussion on the source to commit BLP violations towards Thomas Lockley almost exclusively citing Twitter. Given that the general discussion that was occuring has shifted back to [Talk:Yasuke] as well as the continued uptick in SPA's committing NOTHERE and BLP violations on the RSN, as well as the source in question is no longer being used - I think closure is reasonable. Relm (talk) 20:17, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Hermann_Göring#Rfc_for_Herman_Göring's_Lede_Image_(2024)

      (Initiated 40 days ago on 4 July 2024) Discussion is ready to be closed. Nemov (talk) 01:09, 5 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Nikola Tesla/Nationality and ethnicity#Nikola_Tesla_birthplace_,_review_after_10_years

      (Initiated 39 days ago on 5 July 2024) This is a contentious issue, so I would like to ask for an uninvolved editor to properly close. Please have consideration to each argument and provide an explanation how each argument and source was considered. People have strong opinions on this issue so please take consideration if their statements and claims are accompanied by quotes from sources and whether WP guidelines are followed. We need to resolve this question based on sources and not opinions, since it was discussed multiple times over the years. Trimpops2 (talk) 23:46, 3 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:La France Insoumise#RfC: How should the political position of La France Insoumise be described?

      (Initiated 36 days ago on 7 July 2024) Discussion has already died down and the 30 days have elapsed. Uninvolved closure is requested. Thanks a lot! Chaotic Enby (talk · contribs) 21:45, 6 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:2024 United Kingdom general election#RfC: Inclusion of parties in the Infobox

      (Initiated 36 days ago on 8 July 2024). Ready for closing, last !vote was 12 July by looks of it. CNC (talk) 16:27, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Proposal to revise CSD R3

      (Initiated 35 days ago on 9 July 2024) Poster withdrew the RfC but due to the language used, I think a summary by an WP:UNINVOLVED editor would be preferable. Nickps (talk) 20:52, 24 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Hosni_Mubarak#Rfc_for_lede_image_for_Hosni_Mubarak

      (Initiated 33 days ago on 10 July 2024) This is ready to close. Nemov (talk) 19:34, 7 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Place new discussions concerning RfCs above this line using a level 3 heading

      Deletion discussions

      XFD backlog
      V May Jun Jul Aug Total
      CfD 0 0 2 24 26
      TfD 0 0 3 0 3
      MfD 0 0 2 0 2
      FfD 0 0 0 5 5
      RfD 0 0 52 20 72
      AfD 0 0 0 0 0

      Place new discussions concerning XfDs above this line using a level 3 heading

      Other types of closing requests

      Talk:There was no such thing as Palestinians#Merge to Golda Meir?

      (Initiated 257 days ago on 29 November 2023) Discussion started 29 November 2023. Last comment 25 July 2024. TarnishedPathtalk 00:34, 4 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Twitter_under_Elon_Musk#Requested_move_24_May_2024

      (Initiated 80 days ago on 24 May 2024) Originally closed 3 June 2024, relisted following move review on 17 June 2024 (34 days ago). Last comment was only 2 days ago, but comments have been trickling in pretty slowly for weeks. Likely requires a decently experienced closer. Dylnuge (Talk • Edits) 01:54, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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

      (Initiated 77 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)[reply]

       Doing...— Frostly (talk) 22:35, 17 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      @Frostly Are you still planning on doing this? Soni (talk) 16:57, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Soni, yes - have drafted close and will post by the end of today. Thanks! — Frostly (talk) 17:56, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      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)[reply]
      @Frostly Just checking, would you like someone else to help with this? Soni (talk) 07:31, 11 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Archived. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. put'er there 13:32, 24 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:You Like It Darker#Proposed merge of Finn (short story) into You Like It Darker

      (Initiated 75 days ago on 30 May 2024) Contentious merge discussion requiring uninvolved closer. voorts (talk/contributions) 01:35, 5 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:2024 Nuseirat_rescue operation#Proposed_merge_of_Nuseirat_refugee_camp_massacre_into_2024_Nuseirat_rescue_operation

      (Initiated 65 days ago on 8 June 2024) Since much of the discussion centers on the title of the article rather than its content, the closer should also take into account the requested move immediately below on the talk page. Smyth (talk) 15:17, 13 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      If the closer finds "no consensus", I have proposed this route in which a discussion on merger and RM can happen simultaneously to give clearer consensus.VR (Please ping on reply) 20:10, 13 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:List of common misconceptions#Split proposal

      (Initiated 36 days ago on 8 July 2024) – Editors would feel more comfortable if an uninvolved closer provided a clear statement about whether a consensus to WP:SPLIT exists, and (if so) whether to split this list into two or three lists. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:06, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Place new discussions concerning other types of closing requests above this line using a level 3 heading

      Pages recently put under extended-confirmed protection

      Report
      Pages recently put under extended confirmed protection (28 out of 8220 total) (Purge)
      Page Protected Expiry Type Summary Admin
      Draft:Landmark Structures 2024-08-13 16:06 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Ad Orientem
      Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Caleb Avilés 2024-08-13 01:54 2024-08-20 01:54 edit,move Persistent sock puppetry Star Mississippi
      Gabiley 2024-08-12 20:09 2026-08-12 20:09 edit Persistent disruptive editing: Regular semi-protection ineffective, persistent block evasion and additions of poorly sourced material. Yamaguchi先生
      Draft:The Young Scientists Festival 2024-08-12 17:56 2024-08-19 17:56 create Repeatedly recreated BusterD
      JD Vance 2024-08-12 17:28 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement CTOP AP Ad Orientem
      Mar-a-Lago 2024-08-12 17:23 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement modern US politics Ad Orientem
      Al Hasan Milad 2024-08-12 15:07 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Enwiki23 Favonian
      Mostafa Makhlouf 2024-08-12 10:12 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Justlettersandnumbers
      Jordan Chiles 2024-08-12 02:34 2024-08-19 02:34 move Arbitration enforcement: Biographies of living persons. Requested at WP:RfPP: Special:Permalink/1239661096#Jordan Chiles Red-tailed hawk
      Ana Bărbosu 2024-08-12 02:33 2024-08-19 02:33 move Arbitration enforcement; requested at WP:RfPP: Special:Permalink/1239661186#Ana Bărbosu Red-tailed hawk
      Draft:Umar jaum 2024-08-12 01:47 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Isabelle Belato
      Jason Itzler 2024-08-12 01:43 2024-11-12 01:43 edit Persistent vandalism Star Mississippi
      Michael Lisovetsky 2024-08-11 20:57 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated BusterD
      Yaroslav Kysil 2024-08-11 20:51 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated BusterD
      Mongol invasions of the Levant 2024-08-11 18:50 2025-02-11 18:50 edit Persistent sock puppetry; requested at WP:RfPP Isabelle Belato
      Template:Infobox Pan American Games event 2024-08-11 17:59 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2844 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II
      Draft:Shubham Rameshwar Kakde 2024-08-11 06:15 2025-08-11 06:15 create Repeatedly recreated Johnuniq
      Narayana Guru 2024-08-11 04:27 indefinite edit Arbitration enforcement Johnuniq
      User talk:Yamla/talk/talk 2024-08-11 01:17 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Ad Orientem
      User talk:RickinBaltimore 2024-08-11 00:17 indefinite move Persistent vandalism; requested at WP:RfPP Isabelle Belato
      Draft talk:Farlight 84 2024-08-10 21:28 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Ad Orientem
      Al-Tabin school attack 2024-08-10 13:36 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: Per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case
      Wikipedia talk:…/talk 2024-08-09 23:34 indefinite create LTA target Ad Orientem
      Wikipedia talk:… 2024-08-09 23:19 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated: LTA Ad Orientem
      1999 East Timorese crisis 2024-08-09 23:18 2025-05-14 00:00 edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; requested at WP:RfPP Isabelle Belato
      Template:Category link if exists 2024-08-09 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 3481 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II
      Taxila Business School 2024-08-09 17:05 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Justlettersandnumbers
      Draft:Sabit Yeasin 2024-08-09 16:16 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated BusterD

      User_talk:Timathom/Archive_1

      I attempted to break up the archive for User_talk:Timathom, but was unsuccessful in doing so. Can you please advise me on how to go about breaking up this archive, if I can not get the talk page deleted? Please {{ping}} me when you respond. --Jax 0677 (talk) 19:33, 20 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      It does seem odd that Jax has now taken it upon himself to archive inactive user's talk pages without their permission and actively looking for user talk pages over 100K in size to do so. --StarcheerspeaksnewslostwarsTalk to me 20:08, 28 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Reply - @The Banner:, as it turns out, on behalf of the user, someone else already archived the page here without splitting it into multiple pages. I changed the archive period, which caused the talk archive to be further split. --Jax 0677 (talk) 17:06, 26 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Bump - --Jax 0677 (talk) 13:32, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Why do you "bump" your section when it seems that the requested split has already been done by Lowercase sigma bot and nothing needs to be done further, certainly nothing that especially needs admins? If you have a technical question, WP:VPT may be the better place for this. Fram (talk) 06:55, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      TenPoundHammer XfD Topic ban appeal

      TenPoundHammer's current topic ban from "all deletion activities" is vacated, and is replaced with the following restriction: TenPoundHammer is indefinitely banned from initiating any deletion process (CSD, XfD, PROD). He may appeal this sanction after three months. Please note that while this is technically an indefinite topic ban, it is not intended to be anything more than a trial run for the specific purpose of a fresh community review in three months' time. There is no burden on TPH to wait longer than the three months to request a new review. Swarm ♠ 08:19, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Back in January, it was voted upon to indefinitely topic-ban me from XFD.

      I admit that XFD has been a major sticking point for me over the years, and the above discussion wasn't my first go-round there. This one seems to have been instigated by my attempts to clean up Category:Cleanup tagged articles without a reason field. I clearly bit off more than I could chew there -- I was plowing through a ton of articles that seemed incredibly abandoned and non-notable on first glance, only to be proven wrong by one AFD too many. I was frustrated to no end by a constant barrage of !votes that seemed to me like WP:ATA and a lot of what I perceived as WP:SEP behavior. It was driving me to become far more angry and confrontational than I needed to be. I think it was clear that taking on such a huge task was only exacerbating my problems in previous XFDs. When this happened, I was told that it would be possible to appeal later on, so here I am. I went overboard and kept provoking myself instead of stepping back, and I think the topic-ban was justified since it cleared my head of the XFD process and frustrations thereof for a while.

      Recently I was asked to take a look at Beader. This article seems like a surefire AFD candidate. No sources that I have found, including Merriam-Webster or Wiktionary, support the article as written. An AFD would be a good way to decide whether to delete it outright, redirect to beadwork, or rewrite it to be about something else. I also found Template:Angaleena Presley, a template that navigates only three articles and isn't even used on its parent article, thus failing WP:NENAN. Thirdly I found Real-time multimedia over ATM, a completely contextless essay that doesn't seem to have any reason to exist. And finally I found Sports Overnight America, a show that airs on a non-notable SiriusXM channel, and extensive Googling of which does not turn up anything but reposts of episodes. I would like to use these four as a trial basis for reverting my XFD topic-ban. Perhaps some sort of soft limitations can be placed to make sure I don't go overboard again (limit on number of XFDs per day/week, one-strike rule on bad XFD behavior, etc.). Whatever it is, I would like to acknowledge my reckless behavior and be given a chance to appeal my topic-ban. Ten Pound Hammer • (What did I screw up now?) 22:45, 26 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      • Comment the TBAN placed approximately 6 months ago both prevented TenPoundHammer from nominating articles for deletion, and from commenting/!voting on other people's nominations. As this user has followed their TBAN and contributed constructively elsewhere, I'm inclined to support loosening the topic ban, with some restrictions for at least 6 more months. Based on the appeal statement, they seem more interested in being able to nominate articles than in voting, but it feels backwards to allow TPH to nominate articles for deletion but not to comment on other people's deletion proposals. A limit on the number of AFDs per day seems necessary as well. power~enwiki (π, ν) 00:27, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment I find your topic ban appeal inadequate in several ways, TenPoundHammer. The severe behavioral problems that led to the topic ban go back well over a decade, and I expect you to acknowledge those disruptive behaviors and make specific pledges to avoid specific behaviors. Let's take for example your long-term behavior of profanely insulting and berating editors who provide links to reliable sources showing notabilty in AfD debates. I speak as an editor who lists about 100 examples on my user page where I saved articles from AfD by adding sources. You seem to believe that such editors are obligated to add those sources to the article, even though there is nothing whatsoever in policies or guidelines that requires that. I recommend that you have a specific editing restriction that obligates you to add properly formatted references to any article you nominated for deletion whenever any other editor finds a good source. You should also be restricted from using the "f-bomb" or any other profanity or personal insults in XfD discussions. You have failed to address your misleading edit summaries which seemed intended to deceive other editors. You must make a firm commitment to informative, truthful edit summaries. You have repeatedly admitted that your Google skills are inadequate to properly complete WP:BEFORE. Since this problem has persisted for well over a decade, I want to know which specific and concrete steps that you have taken to improve your Google search skills in the past six months. I have a very strong suspicion that lifting your topic ban without specific restrictions on your behavior, and specific ironclad behavioral commitments from you, will lead straight to further disruption, and further blocks or bans. So, convince me that your long years of repeated disruptive XfD behavior will never, ever happen again. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 01:16, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support with conditions. The conditions being: "No more than one nomination per day"; "Nominations must involve a comprehensive deletion rational particular to the page nominationed, not a rationale that can be applied generically to many pages"; and "No more than ten XfD posts per day, counting nominations, !votes, questions, answers, and comments". TPH was always valuable in XfD functions, but I think the problems all stemmed from attempting too much. If this works out, the conditions can be relaxed. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:36, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose. The blatant problems were so longterm, so intractable, and so devious there is no way I would support a removal of the TBan, and the fact that the editor is already chomping at the bit is a red flag. He should also not be fielding requests to "take a look at an article" to see if he agrees it should be deleted -- that in itself is a violation of the TBan in my opinion. The fact is, there was overwhelming support for an indefinite TBan, and some additional calls for a WP:NOTHERE block. Softlavender (talk) 04:12, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support- I see strong evidence that, since the ban, TPH has been improving his attitude and skills and has acknowledged the behaviour that led to the ban. I'd support loosening the ban to allow one nomination a day without commentary on other peoples' nominations, lasting three months or so, and we'll see how that goes. Reyk YO! 05:55, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose The fact that you already have pages in your sights means you haven't been thinking about other things, you've just been biding your time. This is a behavioral addiction for you it seems, and you haven't hit 'rock bottom' to start the recovery process. So yeah, that's a no from me. --Tarage (talk) 06:53, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oh, for goodness sake. WP:ROPE is an essay. Using it here a quick way of saying "OK, let's give this editor another chance, because hopefully they'll be careful knowing that if they screw up again, they won't get another one". Also, TPB isn't blocked or banned anyway. Black Kite (talk) 14:04, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      As the primary author of that essay, I can assure you that what I meant was full site bans, and have adjusted the language to reflect that. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:51, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support. Time served, lessons learned. I think a second chance is in order. -FASTILY 07:43, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support. While as Softlavender says, there was indeed overwhelming support for an indefinite topic ban, "indefinite" does not mean "eternal", it means until the issues are acknowledged, understood, and resolved. They have certainly been acknowledged, and presumably understood. We can only assume good faith and give TPH the opportunity to demonstrate that they've been resolved. I do think a throttle of some sort is sensible (one nomination and three comments total across all XFD discussions a day?), and TPH must surely appreciate this would be the last chance, with any incivility towards, belittling of, or ranting at other editors seeing the XFD ban re-implemented, likely for good. I would like him to acknowledge what Cullen says, as the "specific and ironclad behavioural commitments" Cullen mentions are a reasonable expectation before the ban is partially lifted. Fish+Karate 08:01, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose, not only what Softlavender, Cullen328 and Tarage pointed out, but the examples given in the appeal demonstrate clearly why it shouldn't be granted:
        1. Beader can, by his own admission, by fixed via WP:ATD without an AFD. Yet he believes it should be discussed there. Plus, it takes only a short while to find this entry in the Dictionary of Occupational Titles which shows our article is copied from this work without attribution (but since it's a US government work, it's likely PD).
        2. The only reason why TPH thinks Template:Angaleena Presley should be deleted is an essay he himself wrote (talk about circular reasoning!) and the fact that it's not used in the main article, which can easily be fixed.
        3. Real-time multimedia over ATM might be a mess but it only takes a short Google search to find that this is a notable topic that can easily be written about by someone knowledgeable, e.g. [2] [3] [4] [5]. This seems to be another one of those cases where TPH believes deletion is in order because he does not understand it.
        4. Sports Overnight America can easily be merged/redirected to Sports Byline USA without an AFD.
      Judging by those examples, they do not inspire any confidence that TPH has actually learned why this ban was instituted in the first place. As pointed out above, it does not appear that he really stepped back and reflected but merely waited out the ban to resume the same problematic behavior. Regards SoWhy 08:15, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • For, one I don't think RMOA ought be devoted an entire article.But, it can be easily devoted a paragraph and merged, without an AfD, which I'll take an attempt at, soon:).But, , I'm clueless about Beader, do you think all the 13,000 articles at DOT, deserves a standalone article? Agree as to the rest.∯WBGconverse 08:24, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        I'm wondering if Beader probably should be at AFD. I can't find a single reference to this job that isn't copied either from the DOT or our article. You would have thought, wouldn't you, that if a job appears there it would be referenced somewhere? I wonder if it has an alternative, better known name? Black Kite (talk) 08:42, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose on the current appeal rationale, which seems to be saying "sorry for my lack of self-control that time", and talking as if the ban is just down to that one episode (with a passing mention that "XFD has been a major sticking point for me over the years"). It is not. User:Cullen328 says it best, and there's one key point behind my current opposition. This has been a problem for the past decade, and it consists of TPH either not understanding or refusing to abide by what XFD is for and refusing to follow policy before making nominations. WP:BEFORE is key to it, and I believe TPH says he's been bad at it because he's no good at Google. Sorry, but I call bullshit on that. It's plain from AFDs discussed during the ban proposal that he made no attempt whatsoever - other people found sources within seconds from simple searches that a child could do. And in his article work, TPH actually seems to be very good at finding sources. None of this has been addressed in the current appeal. TPH should stick to what he's good at, which is article creation and improvement. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:49, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        • Agree. For some reason, TPH abandons everything he knows when editing articles as soon as he encounters articles he thinks should be deleted. I'm certainly no expert but based on this it seems Tarage might be right when they call it a "behavioral addiction". It's doubtful that this has changed or will change, so keeping the topic ban is actually in his best interest. Because the next time we have to discuss his behavior when (not if) he goes overboard with deletion again, we might well be forced to consider banning him from this project altogether and not just a small area. And I don't see how this benefits anyone. Regards SoWhy 09:24, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose per Boing! and Cullen328 and SoWhy. While a restriction is probably annoying, and possibly prevents some productive work this editor would enjoy, it does allow him to be active on the site, which is a real positive for the encyclopaedia; a removal and (possible/likely) following reinstatement or ban would be a net negative for us. Happy days, LindsayHello 12:31, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support - a net positive, and quite frankly, quite a few of the AFDs I've been participating in have been lately have been pretty low in participation. We need more people discussing in them. 6 months was plenty long, and if people aren't happy with it, it can always be re-applied. Sergecross73 msg me 12:52, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support per (a) WP:ROPE, and (b) I was never happy with the discussion that imposed an indef topic ban in the first place; quite apart from the Opposes, there were quite a number of people supporting a temporary topic ban, not to mention drive-by Supports. While I respect Ritchie333 a lot, I don't think that was one of his best closes ever. Black Kite (talk) 13:01, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Would allowing TPH to comment but disallowing nomination work? --Izno (talk) 13:25, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        I don't see any problem with allowing XFD discussion, as it does seem to be nomination that's the problem. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 13:47, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment / partial oppose I note that "to bead" ("to provide with beads or beading") includes "a narrow moulding" (Chambers), thus a "beader" would clearly be anyone who attaches such a narrow moulding. I concur that a limit of one XfD per day would be a rational point of entry. Collect (talk) 13:30, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose per Cullen and Boing!--Pawnkingthree (talk) 13:36, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support per WP:ROPE. I have no indication (this being the nature of topic bans) that anything underlying has changed. But he deserves the chance. I'd support proposals such as limiting this to discussions, not initiating, XfDs, or rate-limiting them. I'm unconvinced by the examples like beader - having found a couple of obvious targets for deletion demonstrates little about the less clear ones, or (far more importantly) the behavioural issues around them. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:52, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment. I'm uneasy with those WP:ROPE arguments. That essay (which explicitly does not apply to ban/unban discussions) is basically a WP:AGF supplement, i.e. "if you don't know whether they have learnt their lesson, unblock them and you will quickly see". Some people here though are pretty certain that we do kow that TPH has not learned his lessons (and might not be capable to learn them at all) but support unbanning anyway. But they know that if we give him the rope, he will hang himself which is not a desirable outcome. We should not want that because he does good work in other areas. Regards SoWhy 14:08, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        Yes, I was thinking pretty much the same thing, and you've put it very well. I'm concerned that a WP:ROPE unban could backfire and lead to more extreme restrictions at a later date. And I really don't want that - I don't want TPH to end up with a more extreme ban than he currently has, and I strongly prefer restricting him to what he is very good at. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 14:51, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        I have never before seen a tbanned editor's good work in another area actually damage their prospect of getting the ban lifted. Wow. Reyk YO! 15:43, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        I can understand how my comment might have come across, and it was perhaps poorly presented, so I'll try to explain further. I am not opposing TPH's unban because of his other good work. My opposition is because TPH has not attempted to address the actual chronic problems with his XFD contributions, as I explained above, and I really think we need to see that if the ban is to be lifted or reduced. WP:ROPE is, as User:SoWhy suggests, something of an "I don't know, so let's see how they go" thing. But with TPH, we do know, and I think we should insist on a convincing addressing of his actual problems before we consider an unban. I think a WP:ROPE unban without such a convincing appeal would be more to his harm than his good, and that is based on my respect for his long history of contributions which I do not want to lose. I hope that makes my thoughts clearer. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:23, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I agree - but I also see this risk as being a problem for TPH, not for anyone else. No-one is forcing him to behave in a particular way. If that's a way which gets him blocked in the future, that's no different to any other editor. Andy Dingley (talk) 09:23, 28 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support - TPH is generally a deletionist, but not a crazy, Vogonesque one. Rather, he uses logic and reason and has the good of the encyclopedia in mind. We definitely disagree on where the line should be drawn at AfD on certain topics, but I respect him for the honesty of his opinions always — he's not irrational or unthinking, which is more than I can say for a couple of the AfD regulars, who remain unsanctioned. Carrite (talk) 18:37, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Suggestion

      • OK, for the time being, how about this? TPH's topic ban from deletion discussions is vacated; however, he is not allowed to initiate any deletion process (CSD, PROD or XFD) for a period of 3 months. After that period, he may apply here for the topic ban to be vacated completely. Black Kite (talk) 14:09, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Arbitrary break

      So is there a consensus here of any kind? Ten Pound Hammer • (What did I screw up now?) 23:53, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Unblock request by User:BukhariSaeed

      BukhariSaeed (talk · contribs) put the following unblock request on their talk page and asked me to copy it here for a community review. There was a previous review in November 2017. Huon (talk) 10:57, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      During the past several months i have realised that i have committed mistakes and i will not repeat the same mistakes (i.e. sockpuppetry, violation of WP:BLOCK, bad behaviour) and i assure that no harmful or destructive activity will take place no sort of vandalism, no sort of sock puppetry or any type of rubbish stuff will be seen.— Bukhari (Talk!) 18:30, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

      • Oppose and I think we should consider a WP:SNOW close here. The user clearly knew about our policies around WP:SOCK and repeatedly violated them during 2017. Claiming they suddenly realised their mistakes "during the past several months" stretches credulity past the breaking point. There's nothing in this unblock request that convinces me they'd behave if unblocked. However, note that I am not aware of any block evasion over the past six months. --Yamla (talk) 11:36, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment there appears to have been primarily "sock-puppetry to create the illusion of consensus" here, though there was some block evasion noted in their appeal in November 2017. They managed to get blocked within 7 days of creating an account, and had a whole bunch of immature behavior in response. They've been fairly active on other wikis (such as Urdu) since then. I do have some language/competence concerns; will this user be able to understand and follow site policies? And if they do inadvertently violate a policy or guidelikne, will they learn from their mistake, or will they resort to vandalism and sock-puppetry? power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:16, 28 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support I am an admin and bureaucrat on Urdu Wikipedia. Bukhari is one of the most active user of urdu Wikipedia, I see him editing on daily basis and his edits are very constructive. He knows Wikipedia’s rules and policies very well and now he’s eliminator on Urdu Wikipedia. I request English Wikipedia admins to unblock him please.--Obaid Raza (talk) 14:48, 29 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support with topic ban -- I administered the indef block for socking and understand Yamla's concern: User:BukhariSaeed began their editing career here with persistent conflicts, disruptive agenda-based editing and socking. In unblock requests, they swore on an "oath of god" that they would never sock again [6], [7], and yet were check-user confirmed to be creating socks at the same time. Similar misbehavior resulted in a separate indefinite block on Simple Wikipedia. Their Standard Offer request [in November 2017 determined they had still been socking again. But as power-enwiki states this appears to be a case of immature behavior -- as well as an overzealous agenda to promote religious figures. Since then this user has shown that they can contribute effectively at Urdu Wikipedia and Commons. My inclination is to unblock with a topic ban on Sufi and Christian Saints broadly construed so that they can first demonstrate the ability to adhere to policy. The topic ban can be reviewed after six months. — CactusWriter (talk) 18:30, 29 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong oppose - Per WP:CIR. BukhariSaeed who couldn't understand WP:SOCK even after months of the block,[8] and he was asking other editors to proxy for him. It is clear that it is going to be very hard to teach him the policies and guidelines whenever he will do anything wrong. It is also apparent on Urdu Wikipedia that he is indulged in off-wiki canvassing there.[9] Above unblock request is too unconvincing because it doesn't show what he will do if he was unblocked. Raymond3023 (talk) 18:09, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      You are wrong about proxying. I told him today that he should ask for email to contact him personally. We, Urdu wikipedians, are very connected on other social channels. Muhammad Shuaib (talk) 19:21, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      He was asking other editors to make edits for him while while he was blocked.[10] Read WP:PROXYING. Raymond3023 (talk) 19:34, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Raymond3023:, i was not convassing him, i find his edits on اللو ارجن, thats why ask for his e-mail or phone, i want to add him on Urdu Wikipedia whatsapp group, and he gave me his email address. If you dont trust me you can confirm from any Urdu speaker. Thanks— Bukhari (Talk!) 18:31, 30 July 2018 (UTC) -- Since BukhariSaeed cannot reply here, I'm copying his comment from his user talk page. Huon (talk) 15:26, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support per WP:SO and WP:ROPE. Blocks are cheap, and it should be made clear that a quick re-block is coming his way if he screws up again. --Jayron32 18:15, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support per WP:ROPE. Despite having got into trouble and having been blocked ("until the end of time" according to Google Translate) on Urdu Wikipedia about a year ago, the user has 93k global edits and holds advanced permissions on several sister projects, and has an Urdu admin here vouching for them. It seems reasonable to assume the user has mended their ways, until there's some evidence here to the contrary. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 18:55, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support with topic ban: I agree with CactusWriter. --Muzammil (talk) 19:13, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong Support: First of all I want to say that he's amazing person. We created together an International collabration called "Peace Spirits", to create some articles about India, Israel and Pakistan, BukhariSaeed did amazing work from his side in Urdu Wikipedia and I trust him to not break the rule again. Actually, I was suprised about his block, I couldn't belive that he opened a sock puppet. So I'm Supporting, I belive him. Ofek - Call me - In hebrew 19:47, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose No reason has been given how WP:ROPE applies here. Unblock request is poorly written and it doesn't show how he can benefit this encyclopedia. Onkuchia (talk) 19:31, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose "During the past several months i have realised that i have committed mistakes" that maybe sound for the first offense, not for repeated violations. Unless he could show significant contributions from English Wikipedia sister projects then only there would be some solid basis that why this account needs to be unblocked. BukhariSaeed has only 274 edits, of which nearly half of the edits were made on his own user talk page and mostly for requesting unblock. He has been blocked four times and I don't see how those numerous problems won't reoccur. Lorstaking (talk) 02:53, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose no indication that the potential good from unblocking outweighs the known potential for disruption. Unblocking is not in the best interest of Wikipedia because of that. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:07, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support per CactusWriter. We have evidence they have improved on sister projects. WP:ROPE, etc. I do support the minimum 6-month topic ban. Hobit (talk) 12:51, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • (Non-administrator comment) Oppose - BukhariSaeed refers to his multiple socking and creation of inappropriate promotional pages as "mistakes". A look at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Hammadsaeed/Archive (note that the account was renamed - Hammadsaeed is his old user name) shows what these "mistakes" were: repeated recreation of promotional pages, sockpuppeteering to keep these pages, creating socks with user names impersonating users in good standing, and personal attacks. He referred to his socking as a "mistake" back then as well and promised to stop for instance here, which he didn't - there were a number of socks and IPsocks after that, as can be seen in the SPI, and as pointed out above. As Yamla mentions, it's not as if BukhariSaeed didn't know about the sock policies when he created all his socks, which means that his definition of "mistake" is a bit unusual - maybe a language barrier issue, but still. Now, this was a while ago and people can change (he has clearly done good work at other Wikipedia versions), but the unblock request says nothing about what he means to do at English Wikipedia if unblocked, so how can we know? If the block is lifted I very strongly support the suggested topic ban on topics related to saints. --bonadea contributions talk 15:38, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong Support: I know this user Bukhari is one of the most active user of urdu Wikipedia, Urdu wiktionary. and others wiki project I see him edit basis and his edits are very constructive. He knows Wikipedia’s rules and policies very well, If they are banned then the Urdu wiki community will be a big loss, J. Ansari Talk 05:05, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • English Wikipedia is not any extension of Urdu Wikipedia. Show us if he has contributed well in an actual English Wikipedia sister project like Simple Wiki or Wikivoyage or others. Accesscrawl (talk) 05:21, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Note: J ansari updated their post above after Accesscrawl's reply.
      J ansari, replying to your new phrasing here: I agree that his English Wiktionary work appears to be good, and that is a positive sign, but I am still wondering what kind of work he would be interested in doing on English Wikipedia. I have posted a question on his user talk page asking specifically about that. --bonadea contributions talk 09:43, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support with topic ban i worked with this user in my cultural exchange project and he is very active in collaboration in Urdu, Punjabi and Arabic. I found his behavior here very strange and unexpected from him but i think the topic ban for 6 mouths (reviewable after that period) will do the job and stop his behavior. Regards--مصعب (talk) 08:17, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I disagree with this suggestion. Topic ban is for those who are disruptive for a specific subject. BukhariSaeed's problems have been more than just editing in a specific subject. That's why topic ban is not an alternative. Accesscrawl (talk) 10:17, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      •  Comment: Dear friend, you are perfectly justified in holding a different view, which you've done while voting above (Just after Hobit). So is perhaps the case with مصعب. CactusWriter and some of the other users. IMHO, nobody's views should be downplayed because they are not inline with yours. We should respect each other. --Muzammil (talk) 16:05, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      60.246.161.253

      Resolved by original poster. --TheSandDoctor Talk 17:31, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Resolved
       – -- zzuuzz (talk) 14:00, 29 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      This user is gross misuse of the internet at it’s finest, he is adding a gross, inappropriate, offensive, and just plain awful image to a large number of pages. Please, someone needs to oversight that person’s edits. ~SML • TP 23:13, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Whoops, wrong page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sixty Minute Limit (talk • contribs) 23:17, 27 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Something wrong with page Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as abandoned drafts or AfC submissions

      Maybe related to https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T195397? Ronhjones  (Talk) 18:52, 28 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      See also #Fault in page Category:Candidates for speedy deletion or one of its subpages hereinabove. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 21:02, 28 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Pinging Anomie who's been working on this: Any luck with the bugs? BlackcurrantTea (talk) 03:44, 29 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      phab:T195397 was fixed a while ago. Possibly this was due to phab:T199762, which is now fixed too. I manually triggered a recount of the category, let's see if it goes bad again. Anomie⚔ 20:26, 29 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Anomie: It's broken again. There's ~150 phantom items in the category. -FASTILY 22:02, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Deceased Wikipedian

      Required actions carried out. Fish+Karate 08:42, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      I've sadly found out that User:Markhurd passed away in September 2017. Could an administrator do the required actions? Thanks. Bidgee (talk) 12:22, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Standard Offer appeal by User:Towns Hill

      Unanimously opposed. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 12:31, 1 August 2018 (UTC)

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

      I am bringing forward, for community review, a Standard Offer appeal by User:Towns Hill. I have re-enabled their talk page for the sole purpose of answering community questions that may be asked during this review. The investigation page is at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Faizan/Archive. Checkuser @Ponyo: has been consulted and he has agreed to this review and has also checked the account.

      The appellant says: "It has been a year now since I last used a sock [14]. I want to apply under WP:STANDARD OFFER. I believe I can yet be and prove myself a decent, respectable and productive editor who can improve this website?s output in both quality and output. Despite my editing history I had extensive readings into and citations to scholarly sources. Given this chance I believe I will improve the encyclopedia's faithfulness to scholarship.

      I initially want to confine myself to subjects and articles related to Islam and Sufism such as Tawassul and Mawlid. Eventually I want to appeal my ARBIPA topic ban so I can one day return to editing the Kashmir articles."

      The community will see, in the investigation report, several IPs that are marked as 'Suspected sockpuppets'. I queried this with Towns Hill who responded: "The last IP I used is this one. [15] I got it oversighted on May 8 this year. I think it was @Primefac: who sent me the confirmation email when the IP's contributions were oversighted. The rest of the IPs listed were not mine. If they were I would own up to them in my standard offer application since they are all from at least 6 months ago"

      I have no position on this appeal. Just Chilling (talk) 01:08, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      • Strongly oppose See this. If this is the case, TH hacked an account, and that beyond a shadow of a doubt is a deal breaker for me. RickinBaltimore (talk) 01:16, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose when applying for the standard offer it is incumbent upon the person asking for it to convince the community that the unknown potential for good outweighs the known potential for disruption. I don’t see that here. TonyBallioni (talk) 01:46, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong oppose - Aren't you supposed to request unblock through your main account which was Faizan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)? We don't grant unblock requests to sock puppets. "I want to appeal my ARBIPA topic ban so I can one day return to editing the Kashmir articles", that would be a nightmare. As mentioned on this SPI, whoever reads this request should know of this recent incident because there is much suspicion that this account continues to make edits on Wikipedia through suspicious accounts and IP addresses, targeting same articles, restoring same edits because of which he was topic banned and later blocked for sock puppetry when he was restoring the same edits through confirmed sock puppets. I see no reason to grant unblock. This account had been a totally net negative from the beginning and even after being blocked for sockpuppetry he was engaging in off wiki canvassing to get his opponents blocked (User talk:Towns Hill#Re: Your email). Lorstaking (talk) 02:17, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        @Lorstaking: see RickinBaltimore's link. Faizan is deceased; Towns Hill hacked the account in 2017. ansh666 03:30, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • People say anything when they want to get unblocked. Why it took Faizan months to come up with such unconvincing theory? He had many warnings and general notifications on his talk page before he was blocked. It is doubtful that he would wake up only after he was notified about the block and come here to claim he was hacked. I sense there was significant account sharing, but that cannot be construed as "hacking" since "hacking" is operating other's account without consent. Lorstaking (talk) 03:42, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Considering he is dead now and there appears to be a living person behind the account making this appeal, I would say it’s fairly likely that they are not the same people (and please don’t respond to this if you are going to claim that other trusted Wikimedians are lying about his death.) TonyBallioni (talk) 04:50, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • At this moment, Towns Hill is tagged as a sock Faizan per user page[16] and socks are not unblocked per the policy (WP:SOCK#Blocking). There was no account hacking since "Faizan" account has edited from both countries, Pakisan and Australia,[17][18] during the same period. Towns Hill resides in Australia per his userpage[19] and per his admission that he used this IP. If there was any account "hacking" then the CU could identify it. This is a case of account sharing and Towns Hill should better spend some time proving how his account has no relation with Faizan before requesting unblock. The Faizan account tried enough to prove otherwise during those on-wiki unblock requests as well as UTRS appeals (that I can't see) but none of them were successful.[20] Lorstaking (talk) 05:25, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Not being unblocked has more to do with the fact that there was no way for them to verify their identity. Policy is to not unblock under any circumstances in that case, and has nothing to do with a presumption of guilt. There is no way without a CU to tell where someone is editing from, and the check resulting in the block didn't seem to find anything unusual (i.e. the edits in the time range probably all matched Towns Hill). I won't comment on the UTRS appeal except to say that it didn't include any useful information. ansh666 07:09, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment by Towns Hill I realise that my past behaviour was not the best. I am not exactly proud of that. But I do have thousands of bytes worth of verifiable content to my name. The quality of my contributions were good. I realise that my behaviour of edit warring and socking was bad. I want to make a fresh start with my good side only this time. I understand some people doubt my application because of the Faizan incident. Faizan is now deceased and I don't want to dwell on his story too much out of respect for the deceased but his hacking claim was not the truth. I had been recruited (and rejected) at various times by Faizan, Kautilya3 and others for meat puppetry and in Faizan's case he told me to make edits from his own account. I can share these users' emails to me with admins in private if they wish to verify what I am saying. I will share this non-public information of other users only privately. Those days of allowing myself to be used as others' meat and using socks myself and edit warring were not exactly my best days. I am not proud of it. But I don't think this should be held against me forever. I do believe I should be given another chance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Towns Hill (talk • contribs) 18:04, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • As the blocking administrator, I am not happy that I wasn't even notified of this discussion or Ponyo's consent to it (Ponyo is a "she" btw). Beyond that, one of the things that disturbs me about this unblock request is TH's most recent comment above where they claim other users (some not named), including one existing editor, Kautilya3, "recruited" them. For that reason alone, I oppose.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:44, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose I don't see anything that would give me cause to trust this user again. The whole Faizan thing leaves a sour taste in the mouth; whether he was "invited" to use Faizan's account or not, that's a gross and knowing breach of Wikipedia's terms of use. Yunshui 雲水 13:54, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment My only involvement in this request was to respond to a CU request at UTRS where I noted that the IP used by Towns Hill to submit their appeal had not been used since January 2018 and that Just Chilling could bring the block here for a standard offer review if they chose to do so. I imagine not notifying the blocking admin of the request was just an oversight.--Jezebel's Ponyobons mots 15:58, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      And we would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you meddling kids!--Jezebel's Ponyobons mots 16:57, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Also, the assertions of being recruited-for-editing is seriously bizarre and needs to be dealt with by the functionaries.Either TH is speaking the truth (which shall lead to a site-ban of both him and K3) or he is alone fabricating things, which shall again lead to a ban of his.
      • I would have trashed the claims, given that I personally hold K3 in high-repute.But, the entire Faizan-TownHill sockpuppetry is downright confusing and it's highly doubtful as to whom of the two (Faizan or TH) spoke the truth.∯WBGconverse 12:10, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Longest Page in Wikipedia

      Page deleted (by Ansh666), creator blocked (by Bbb23). --TheSandDoctor Talk 05:12, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Someone kindly delete this. I can't even load the page to add a speedy deletion tag. GMGtalk 14:27, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Also apparently 1,000,000_Digits_of_Pi. GMGtalk 14:28, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      And 100,000 Digits of Pi as well. RickinBaltimore (talk) 14:29, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Could we have a slightly condensed version, say 33,000 Digits of Pi? Martinevans123 (talk) 14:34, 31 July 2018 (UTC) .... would probably still be a lot shorter than User talk:EEng.[reply]
      This was an oddly amusing find. That is a lot of numbers - 1 MB raw text. lol --TheSandDoctor Talk 04:30, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      ...and might we consider blocking, or at least warning, User:TheProgrammerBoy (formerly WindoRant) who created both of them? --MelanieN (talk) 14:46, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      @MelanieN: I warned the user. ~ Abelmoschus Esculentus (talk to me) 14:51, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      And I blocked them.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:19, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Could we get create protection? The first two are just asking for trouble and the third was also an article in 2015. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:33, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Do not protect, please. A similar page (existing as a redirect) was kept at RFD, see Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2012 November 4#Longest Wikipedia Article. – Uanfala (talk) 18:42, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I have redirected Longest Page in Wikipedia, but what do you think about the Pi articles? Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:47, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I have redirected them to Pi#Modern_quest_for_more_digits where there is information on when that many digits of pi were reached.. Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:55, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Though I thought this was a reference to the only page that can be seen from space. RickinBaltimore (talk) 19:00, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      These have tended to split opinions at RfD: a nomination in 2014 resulted in "keep", but the oucome of a similar discussion three years later was "delete". – Uanfala (talk) 19:05, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Uanfala and Emir of Wikipedia: the only reason Longest Wikipedia Article was kept is that Special:Longpages used to be there for a short time in 2005, so it ostensibly protects against linkrot (a horrible reason, IMO, but it is what it is). There is no such history regarding Longest Page in Wikipedia, so I R2'd it. ansh666 00:42, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      This wasn't the only reason the redirect was kept at RfD. As for the one you've just speedied, I don't think it should have been speedied: there was a comment in the previous discussion that R2 doesn't apply to these redirects, but more substantially, this one is unlikely to gain consensus for deletion if nominated at RfD now. – Uanfala (talk) 07:21, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Can we just get a general system protection against the creation (or saving) of pages of that size? I can't see any legitimate reason for having any. bd2412 T 19:07, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Shall we ping them? @Arunram: --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:14, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I think User_talk:EEng has him beat. Fish+Karate 11:06, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Fish and karate, in light of the discussion above, would you mind reverting your protection of Longest Page in Wikipedia? Thanks! – Uanfala (talk) 11:16, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Uanfala: Happy to if you can explain why it needs to be create-able. Fish+Karate 12:04, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Hmmm... salting is only for the cases where there is consensus against the creation, right? To recap what was said above, this redirect is very similar to a redirect that was kept at RfD, it was created by an established editor in good standing, and it was subsequently deleted using a speedy deletion criterion of contestible applicabilty. I personally have no opinion on whether the redirect should exist (the main issue for me is only the miscapitalisation), and I think if it were nominated at RfD, the most likely outcome would be "no consensus". I don't see how this could be the kind of redirect whose creation should be a privilige reserved for administrators. – Uanfala (talk) 12:14, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I don't particularly agree, in that the similar redirect was retained for its historical reasons (in the old days, before the Special: namespace, Longest Wikipedia Article was where the longest pages were listed), but nor do I care that much, so have unprotected the redlink. In the unlikely event of its being recreated I'm sure it will be deleted, and then we can all go round in circles and have this discussion again. Fish+Karate 12:23, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      A attempt to overrule our BLP policy with an RfC?

      See discussion and links at Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons#Musk part 2: can an An RfC overrule our BLP policy?

      May I request that an administrator evaluate whether I am right about this being a BLP violation? --Guy Macon (talk) 19:56, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      The link is Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Musk_part_2:_can_an_An_RfC_overrule_our_BLP_policy?. --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:58, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      You're wrong. I've said the same thing at BLPN. --NeilN talk to me 20:13, 31 July 2018 (UTC) @Guy Macon: I messed up the ping. --NeilN talk to me 20:15, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I don't see anything resembling overruling our BLP policy. More than likely, this is a case of WP:CRYBLP. - MrX 🖋 20:17, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      OK, Ill check that out. I still have no idea what the supposed BLP vio is.- MrX 🖋 20:13, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      "I do believe that associating an otherwise non notable individual with pedophilia, no matter how carefully you specify that the accusations are without merit, can be incredibly harmful. And I don't think that simply omitting the name does enough to protect him, given the ease of searching on 'musk pedo diver' --Guy Macon 06:57, 19 July 2018 (UTC)[21]

      "Agreed, in fact the situation is astonishingly obvious.... if notable person A says non-notable person B is a pedophile (later withdrawn), repeating the slur throws mud at B, some of which would stick. It could be argued that the effect of this article would be negligible but that is no reason for us to do something bad. Also, this article will exist for many years when the name of B would be totally irrelevant and the current news reports will have been forgotten. If the wording is kept, this article would still cause some readers to think there just might be something behind the attack." ---Johnuniq 07:31, 19 July 2018 (UTC)[22]

      "I've removed it as a blatant BLP violation. The BLP is written precisely to protect living individuals against this sort of smear. If someone wants to re-write it without including the diver's name, that would be at least compliant with the policy. However its tabloid gossip. WP:NOTNEWS. (Also no WWGB, I am under no obligation to re-write it myself to remove the offending material. It would need to be substantially re-written and I am not interested in enabling gossip. The onus is on those who wish to include the information to do the legwork to make it compliant with out policies.)" --Only in death does duty end 10:00, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[23][24]

      "Its flatly impossible to cover this without Identifying either directly or indirectly through linking to the material. Since the diver is a non-notable non-public figure, I am not satisfied after looking at the various sources that it is possible to comply with the BLP and cover this while protecting the diver. BLP applies regardless of if the person is explicitly named if they can be easily identified. Now you need to gain consensus to include the material, do not replace it again." --Only in death does duty end 19:25, 30 July 2018 (UTC)[25]

      "I previously reported it at Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard#False claims about the diver who got into a twitter fight with Elon Musk. The subsequent comments on that page made it clear that this is an unambiguous BLP violation to be removed on sight, and that the removals are exempt from our edit warring rules." Guy Macon 20:03, 30 July 2018[26]

      Also see:

      --Guy Macon (talk) 20:46, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Johnuniq hit it on the head with their RFC comment: "There is no reason for Wikipedia to name the person. It is fine to link to references which include all the details, if the material is found to satisfy WP:DUE as far as long-term significance for Musk is concerned." No one is explicitly arguing in the RFC that the other person's name appear in the article. Quite the opposite. --NeilN talk to me 20:56, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      That's what this is about? For crying out loud—leave the non-notable person's name out. Problem solved. Why the hysteria? This reminds me of the religion in infobox hysteria, which I recall also involved Guy Macon.- MrX 🖋 21:07, 31 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @MrX, you're missing the point; what's being argued is that even if the non-notable person isn't named, even mentioning the incident would be a BLP violation because it could potentially inspire someone to look him up. See also WP:ANI#Elon Musk. ‑ Iridescent 19:11, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      If someone learns about it, they might looks him up? That's ridiculous. By that reasoning, we shouldn't have an article on Elon Musk because someone could read about him and be inspired to look for more information. Natureium (talk) 19:48, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Iridescent, I'm not missing the point; I simply don't agree with the novel interpretation that citing sources would ever be a WP:BLP violation. Specifically, I don't agree that that citing sources would harm the person who's name is already indelibly recorded in numerous sources. Also, WP:NOTCENSORED comes to mind.- MrX 🖋 23:34, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I agree that "even if the non-notable person isn't named, even mentioning the incident would be a BLP violation because it could potentially inspire someone to look him up" goes much too far in interpreting the scope of BLP policy. Natureium's rejoinder is valid. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:38, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @MPants at work: On that, any ideas why Ages of consent in Asia#Thailand says the AoC is 18, whilst Age of consent#Age of consent by location reckons 15? —SerialNumber54129 paranoia /cheap sh*t room 15:09, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Serial Number 54129 Either because it was changed on one article but not the other, or because the law in question applies different rules to different situations and people got confused. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 15:17, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      (edit conflict)@Serial Number 54129: Sexual crimes are compounded if the victim is under 18, but the actual age of consent is 15. At least, according to legal blogs and other apparently reliable sources. Note the {{cn}} tags in Ages of consent in Asia#Thailand. I'm gonna try and dig up the best source I can and fix that. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:18, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      EDIT: I seem to recall there was some drama over this a few months back, maybe a year or so. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:19, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      That sounds phenonomally likely  :) Thank you both, interesting. —SerialNumber54129 paranoia /cheap sh*t room 15:36, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Exactly, calling it an "accusation" or a "claim" gives the wrong idea. It was more of a side remark rather than an accusation. If the wording is fixed I don't see how it would be an issue. ⠀TOMÁSTOMÁSTOMÁS⠀TALK⠀ 14:49, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      If we were talking about weak sources that were including the name, I'd fully agree with MPants here, we'd be talking about weak sourcing of a very serious BLP violation. But the fact that (with just a quick search) NYTimes and CNN both name the person, it seems impossible for us to hide with strong RSes are presenting. We can take care to not name names (the person was not a public figure), but we can't help the fact that the RSes we'd use for this name the person. That's out of our control. --Masem (t) 15:20, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      User:Tsma73

      Tsma73 and HelpUsStopSpam are unrelated, according to check-user comment. The former is also currently blocked as a sock of Schekanov. --TheSandDoctor Talk 17:26, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Could somebody please take a look at the activities of User:Tsma73, in particular User talk:HelpUsStopSpam/Archive 1#HelpUsStopSpam creates vandalism and Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2018 August 1#DataMelt? I'm tempted to indef them for WP:NOTHERE, but it's possible they're the legitimate victims of some kind of wiki extortion attempt, so I'd like other admins to take a look. -- RoySmith (talk) 14:56, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Tsma73 is a sock and other than being involved in the same AfD and slinging wild accusations at HelpUsStopSpam, the two users have nothing to do with each other. Not sure how HUSS is able to retain that username, but that's another issue.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:35, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I just had a look at their website and found this. The mention of them receiving paid editing emails is concerning, although given all these accounts are clearly very closely connected to the subject they shouldn't have been involved with the article in the first place. BubbleEngineer (talk) 20:21, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      They brought up the abstract "blackmail" [27] [28] claim here on Wikipedia, too, but never gave any details - and as usual reporting in a vague third person "From what I've heard". Their conjecture is wrong that these offers relate to my edits. These emails will likely be the usual SEO spam as seen on Quora: https://www.quora.com/Where-can-I-find-an-expert-Wikipedia-content-writer-or-editor . Also, the entire idea of blackmailing to delete does not work for a very simple fact: only admins can delete articles. Users like me (or BubbleEngineer, who started the AfD: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/DataMelt) can only propose a deletion discussion, which will be reviewed. So any such "gang" or "troll farm" would need an admin member. So who is the dark lord?
      What brought Datamelt onto my radar were the obvious COI edits of Special:Contributions/104.55.212.99 in April, showing repeated self-cite book spam all the way back to 2016 in Jython (spamming the datamelt/scavis book into the Jython article); and this [29] clearly verified the COI ("jwork.org administrator") - so obviously I put a COI warning & lack of independent sources on the article. Actually it was not me who nominated the article for deletion... all the sockpuppeting, IP canvassing, personal attacks [30], now even off-wiki attacks etc. of course do not help either. And I am not sure I can trust their claims anyway: you can see them sockpuppeting even on their own site: [31] "P.S.: This article is submitted by a Wikipedia editor who asks not to disclose his identity." (most likely, this "editor" is User:Tsma73, and potentially a WP:COWORKER/WP:FAMILY "meatpuppet" sharing the same IP). LOL: pretending they are their own users, since they don't appear to have any... HelpUsStopSpam (talk) 23:45, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Unblock requests claiming colocation, when IP is not blocked

      I often patrol Category:Requests for unblock and over the past few days, I've noticed a number of unblock requests similar to the one posted at User talk:2A01:CB15:A7:B700:4C99:C6B2:BF3B:8C60, where the person claims there's a colocation web host block or perhaps a proxy/vpn block, only... the IP address is not blocked. Now, I understand the block can apply to the range instead of the single IP address, but that's not the case either. If it was an autoblock, they'd be using unblock-auto. User talk:27.63.93.0 is another example, as is User talk:69.181.189.249 and User talk:60.25.10.137. In several years of patrolling, I don't remember so many unblock requests for addresses which don't appear blocked, so I'm concerned there's a real problem. I haven't ruled out WP:CIR (on their part or mine) or trolling, though. --Yamla (talk) 20:25, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      My guess is that in a lot of occasions with the new template changes - the VPN/Proxy is being turned off prior to the request. I've been noticing these a lot too since the change. SQLQuery me! 20:37, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Ah! Right, of course. That's plausible. They were on a VPN, they are blocked, they copy the block template, turn off the VPN, and post the request. On an IP that isn't blocked. --Yamla (talk) 21:09, 1 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I agree that that is plausible. --TheSandDoctor Talk 08:40, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      If that's what's happening, could the editor be cookie-blocked? I don't know what kind of notifications editors get if that happens. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 18:08, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I just tested it, it's identical to an autoblock. SQLQuery me! 19:46, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Request to lift topic ban (Sharkslayer87)

      Topic ban request by Sharkslayer87 is declined and said topic ban shall remain in full effect. Before appealing, it is recommended to follow the advice in Vanamonde's comment. --TheSandDoctor Talk 17:21, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      I was topic banned on May 1,2018 for violating several wikipedia policies while editing a caste article. I was relatively new to wikipedia and was not familiar with the policies. I know that ignorance is not an excuse. I apologize for my rude behavior. Since then, I have been making good contributions in other areas without any complaints so far. I promise I will continue to abide by wiki rules and remain a good editor. I request to consider my appeal to lift the topic ban. I have appealed for a lift in the past but was turned down. I am requesting again. I am ready to address any concerns you have about me. Sharkslayer87 (talk) 00:33, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      • I would recommend that this be declined. While Sharkslayer has mostly stayed free of conflict, their edits since the ban are minor in nature; dates, film cast members, etc. I would like to see some evidence that they can use sources properly in more difficult situations, before we let them return to the caste-related minefields. Vanamonde (talk) 04:16, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Request to lift topic ban (Light show)

      The topic ban is not lifted at this time and shall remain in full effect. Light show is to keep clear of all biography articles indefinitely. Light show is also reminded that this topic ban may be appealed again after six months has past (February 2019). Please refrain from appealing early and follow advice given. --TheSandDoctor Talk 05:22, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Please consider lifting this. I understand why I was banned, will do my best to avoid similar issues, and therefore don't foresee any more problems. My previous request was denied. It's been about a year since the ban was placed. Thanks. --Light show (talk) 00:37, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      "Light show is indefinitely topic banned from any edits relating to biographies of any kind, broadly construed. This community sanction may be appealed no earlier than six months after the date of this closure." .... This question is a clear cut violation of that topicban and as such NeilN's blocked LS for a month, No objections to this being reopened if an admin believes this was toosoon, –Davey2010Talk 23:01, 29 March 2018 (UTC) From Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive297#Request_for_guidelines_on_sexual_allegation_sections
      That's not one year, that's four months ago -- and it's a topic ban which explicitly states that you can't appeal it for at least six months. So that's one false statement and one topic-ban violation already. --Calton | Talk 01:32, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      (edit conflict) Also, don't drown us in the details on what you learned, how you've changed, etc. Please, those are superfluous. byteflush Talk 01:39, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • No Light Show is in fact correct that the initial ban was placed nearly a year ago [32], what Calton’s link shows is that they were still trying to end-run it four months ago, which is enough for a hard no from me. I think the community would expect at least six months of no activity whatsoever related to this ban, and personally I would start that time only after this current discussion is closed. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:54, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • You're right, I misread that as a new application of a topic ban, not the quoting of the already existing one. It's still less than six months since the appeal and the subsequent one-month block for violating the ban. --Calton | Talk 02:13, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • No - Personally I feel it would've been more wiser to have waited a year before returning ....No explanation has been given as to what they understand and what they wont do going forward, Either way I'm not seeing any valid reasons to lift this. –Davey2010Talk 02:16, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • No - Where's their "act of contrition" by stating what they understand about the reason for the ban? Where's the plan they should provide to show they won't revisit the same behavior? At Commons, LS had been blocked for years of multiple copyright violations on images, asked to be unblocked, it was granted, and then returned to the same behavior again while making excuses for the behavior - and not once admitting they were wrong. Needless to say, LS has been indeffed there. Their behavior there that didn't change - which is quite similar in attitude to their IDHT behavior here - why should we believe it will change in en.wp? Especially since they have no plan presented, no explanation of what it is they now understand about their block. I see nothing in this request that persuades. They could try to persuade if the request is done that shows some soul searching. I'd like to see some acknowledgement and promises from them first. After that, if the TB is lifted, I suppose it could be put into place again, but... does anyone want to go through that? -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 02:31, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • No - Problems with this editor have historically been endemic. There is nothing in this request that changes that. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:35, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • No - just saying "I understand why I was banned, will do my best to avoid similar issues, and therefore don't foresee any more problems." is not enough to address the whole host of issues that have historically happened with this editor. I would expect a bit more than this in order to consider removing the topic ban. Only a little over 100 edits since the last request to lift the topic ban does not show me that the behavioral issues have been addressed. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:28, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Reply: Since I linked to my previous appeal, I saw no reason to simply repeat my answers which I gave there to essentially the same questions. I even explained it again with a separate AN comment, where I said: "Basically, on more than four occasions where I've either complained or simply asked about apparent violations of policies or guidelines, it's resulted in me getting banned or blocked."
      And as we all know, I've never (seriously) been accused of violating guidelines about civility, being neutral, tag teaming, harassment, assuming good faith, using reliable sources, etc. In other words, following guidelines and editing properly are not and never have been an issue. And as far as I can recall, the only time I edit warred was when I tried to prevent an SPA editor from defaming Denis Avey, a British war hero. Go figure.
      The main issues have come from complaining about violations by others, and about which I offered a simple suggested compromise. In fact, now that two members of that 3-person team have resigned, that's another reason that problems aren't likely to reappear. I hope that addresses the "misbehavioral" issues you're concerned about.--Light show (talk) 17:15, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Since I linked to my previous appeal, I saw no reason to simply repeat my answers which I gave there to essentially the same questions.'
      You mean the reasons that were already rejected? Not a good start.
      And as we all know, I've never (seriously) been accused of violating guidelines...
      So, essentially, you did nothing wrong. Not helpful to your case.
      now that two members of that 3-person team have resigned, that's another reason that problems aren't likely to reappear...
      It's also just a plot against you. So I'll call that "strike three". --Calton | Talk 00:18, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • No - if one of the conditions of the ban was to wait 6 months before appeal and it's only been four, well, that in and of itself is more than enough to reject it. Unfortunately, Wikipedia is a complicated society, and rules are needed to regulate any complicated society. If you cannot follow the rules of your topic ban, how can we trust you'll follow the very important rules of BLP? John from Idegon (talk) 01:45, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      It was 8 months before I first appealed, not 4. --Light show (talk) 02:02, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Blocked from Saving Ryan Hampton (author)

      Page moved by Luk --TheSandDoctor Talk 17:17, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Hi, When I tried to save a stub I wrote about Bryan Hampton (author) the action was blocked with a message that said: "The page title or edit you have tried to create has been restricted to administrators at this time. It matches an entry on the local or global blacklists, which is usually used to prevent vandalism. If you receive this message when trying to edit, create or move an existing page, follow these instructions:

      Any administrator can create or move this page for you. Please post a request at the Administrators' noticeboard. You may also contact any administrator on their talk page or by email. Be sure to specify the exact title (especially by linking it) of the page you are trying to create or edit, and if it might be misunderstood (for example, an article with an unusual name), consider explaining briefly what you want to do. If you wrote any text, save it temporarily on your computer until you can edit the page. Thank you."

      I think this person should have a Wiki article, and I am not sure why it was blocked. I found the request for the article on the "Request for Articles" page, here. All I wanted to do was write a short article about Ryan Hampton. Thanks, Stregadellanonna (talk) 09:15, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Background info, Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive296#Ryan Hampton (Author). ~ GB fan 09:25, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Stregadellanonna: I suggest you create a draft at User:Stregadellanonna/Bryan Hampton (I created the page there) and submit it to Wikipedia:Articles for creation. There are concerns about this author because some illegitimate users tried to create it before. Thanks! -- Luk talk 10:04, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Luk, I know the header and the first sentence says Bryan but the requested article that Stregadellanonna is mentioning is Ryan. ~ GB fan 10:23, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Oh yes, of course I meant Ryan. Sorry for the confusion. I'll try and create the article according to your suggestion. Thanks. Stregadellanonna (talk) 10:32, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @GB fan: Oh, it makes more sense (a cursory web search for Bryan returned no meaningful result). I moved the page, thanks! -- Luk talk 10:35, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      TBAN for paid editor

      I am requesting a topic ban of User:Danilo Two from Bank of New York Mellon. This person works for the firm, Buetler Ink.

      Why?

      While this person has disclosed and is putting things through the peer review, the proposals are not grounded in the mission of WP and the policies and guidelines, but rather are raw PR for the client. We have TBANed people in this situation before, for example this thread from April 2017.

      The final straw for me is this RfC posted today, which is absolutely un-neutral.

      Earlier, they had made a proposal here which as I noted here, was trying to turn the WP page into a proxy for BNY's website, reflecting its current business and status only, and not an encyclopedia article with information of enduring interest. I noted that problem at their talk page in this diff.

      Subsequently here they wrote These graphs were not provided by BNY Mellon, but a third party.. They offered no explanation as to why graphs that are independent are somehow "worse", here in Wikipedia. I pointed out that problem to them, on their talk page, here. I also noted at the article talk page that no policy based reason was given.

      And now the RfC linked above. I called their attention to how un-neutral the RfC was at their talk page here. They responded by tweaking the RfC here. The RfC statement still makes their argument, instead of posing the question neutrally.

      There is no sign that Danilo 2 intends to do anything other than represent what the bank wants. That is not what editing privileges are for, and is an endless time sink for the editing community. Paid editors need to be Wikipedians first, and if they won't be, then we should politely close the door. Jytdog (talk) 19:48, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Disagreeing with you is not grounds for a topic ban. Have you tried Wikipedia:Third opinion? Gamaliel (talk) 20:01, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Never request a Third Opinion with Beutler. If they don't get it, they will then go to DRN, and if necessary to WP:ANI (although with no real issue at ANI). Robert McClenon (talk) 01:11, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Never attempt to service an edit request for Beutler. If you try to help them, they treat you like an employee and think that they have the right to censure you for failure to do their job. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:11, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      No, I complained because another editor had shown a pattern of highly idiosyncratic interpretations of content guidelines in responding to requests. I quickly found there was not a receptive audience here, and so I went back to working through these challenges. WWB Too (Talk · COI) 18:45, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      User:Gamaliel You have missed the point. Being here to represent the bank, without regard for WP's mission, policies, and guidelines, is not an acceptable use of editing privileges. This is not about the content dispute but rather Danilo 2's behavior. Jytdog (talk) 20:15, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      He's on the talk page starting an RFC, it looks like he has a lot of regard for WP's policies and guidelines to me. Gamaliel (talk) 20:21, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      He sort of knows how to work Wikipedia. I have not denied that. But the RfC itself is far from neutral, which is not valid DR. But thisis again not the point. Using the talk page and certain DR processes in order to advocate for what the bank wants, regardless of the content policies and guidelines, is not being here to build an encyclopedia, but rather to do PR. Jytdog (talk) 20:22, 2 August 2018 (UTC) (tweaked w/o redaction, since this has not been replied to Jytdog (talk) 20:27, 2 August 2018 (UTC))[reply]
      As long as he's trying to build consensus on the talk page, not editing the page itself, and is fully disclosing his interest, I see no reason for a topic ban. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:24, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Following the paid policy and COI guideline is a minimum - necessary but not sufficient. As noted -- we have TBANed people in this situation before, for example this thread from April 2017. Jytdog (talk) 20:27, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Oppose the editor appears to be diligently following the paid-editing/COI rules. The RFC seems to be worded neutrally-enough; while the argument about different corporate entities isn't terribly convincing, I don't think it's biased. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:32, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      User:power~enwiki on what planet is giving an argument to do X in an RfC about what to do, considered "neutral" in Wikipedia? Jytdog (talk) 22:52, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Earth, apparently. I haven't figured out how to get to any other planets yet. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:58, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I'm sorry, I don't follow. The wording Should the three graphs covering data for 2000-2008 in the Historical data section of the BNY Mellon article be removed or kept? seems fine to me; the original wording seems acceptable as well. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:58, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      User:power~enwiki everything above the signature is part of the RfC question. You correctly identify the actual question in the fist line as simple and neutral. But in both versions there is an additional paragraph giving the bank's/Danilo 2's argument. Everything above the signature is part of the "request". Neither version is even close to neutral.Jytdog (talk) 01:07, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Hi, I'd like to respond here to defend myself a little. I think a lot of the issues that Jytdog raises are misunderstandings and some come down to preferences on information to present.

      First, the request that Jytdog says was aiming to turn the Wikipedia page into a proxy for the company website was aimed at updating the Operations section which typically represents and is framed as the current operations of a company. I am not trying to remove historical data entirely from the article, nor turn the whole page into a company profile, but offer some suggestions to streamline the information and bring it up-to-date. After Jytdog offered his feedback, I didn't push this request further and I've in fact collapsed it (earlier today) and noted that I'd refocus my suggestions based on that feedback.

      Second, with regards to the graphs, I believe the way I worded my note has caused some confusion and I'm sorry for that. It was not my intention to say that third-party materials are not appropriate or that information from BNY is better; I was trying to respond to Jytdog's prior note that suggested it would be ideal to add new graphs showing a greater range of information, rather than delete the existing ones. The situation is that the existing graphs were provided by a third-party that owns the copyright; that third-party has produced more up-to-date graphs but they're copyrighted, so can't simply be added to the article due to that. I wanted to clarify that the graphs were produced by someone other than BNY Mellon, to explain that I didn't have access or ability to provide ones that were up-to-date and that keeping the graphs updated would be complicated.

      Third, for the RfC, as Jytdog notes, I adjusted it to make it neutral and I'm open to editors' suggestions.

      Finally, as Jytdog and others have noted, I'm keeping to the guidelines here and am not editing directly, and I'm responding constructively to feedback. Thanks, Danilo Two (talk) 20:44, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Giving your client's reason for removing the graphs in the statement is not neutral. That you are here arguing it is, is pretty much exactly what I am talking about. Jytdog (talk) 22:50, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • So Talk:Ogilvy_&_Mather#Edit_request:_Updates_Round_1 is another example of the kind of thing I am trying to articulate. The page has been almost entirely rewritten with reviewed content from Buetler folks - first Heatherer and now Danilo 2 is stepping in. People generally review proposals, and everybody being busy, what usually happens is that the foundation is kept and really just the copy is checked to remove puffery and to ensure the content is supported by the sources. But the aim and overall messaging remains. You will see this if you review the talk page.
      Now... Ogilvy & Mather, like most PR agencies today, has been struggling to adapt as more and more companies bring "creative" in-house and as the industry changed from emphasis on "creative" to buying ads in digital media (per this for example; likewise this)
      Our article doesn't provide that context (it should, briefly) but different companies have responded in different ways at different times.
      Ogilvy responded by profilerating divisions or subsidiaries to handle different aspects in different regions.
      Two years ago new management came in, and they have completely done over the company, consolidating most everything into one entity and creating new divisions within it to handle different things. There is an interesting business story there. something people could learn from.
      The proposal Talk:Ogilvy_&_Mather#Edit_request:_Updates_Round_1 would just erase the old structure and write in the new one. No context, no sense of history. Just turning the page into Ogilvy's website with a bunch of woo about "rebranding".
      There is nothing about building an encyclopedia there. I am sure the proposal will be duly reviewed and implemented and the page made over into Ogilvy's image.
      Like the intention at Bank of New York Mellon. Erase history, try to drive the page to express the Bank's messaging today. About today.
      Is that we want? I say no. I say that just disclosing and putting up (absolutely formulaic WP-content-looking edits that are actually just PR dreck) for review is not what we want. It is a time suck on the community, and even the best intentioned volunteers generally just polish the turd and don't ask paid editors to write encyclopedic copy (and if they won't, just saying "no thanks" or ignoring it) Leading to pages in WP becoming polished PR turds. Jytdog (talk) 01:01, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support but I don't see why we should bother with a TBAN. Indef and be done with it. All this account has been used for is PR; they are clearly not interested in helping us write an encyclopaedia. The paid editing guidelines are a minimum requirement to comply with the WMF's terms of use. They're not a license to ignore our core content policies and behavioural guidelines (WP:NOTPROMO, WP:COI, WP:DIS & WP:GAME, for example). – Joe (talk) 06:22, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • support indef-My primary impressions align with Joe.∯WBGconverse 06:34, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support - what Joe said. If you can get paid to write a good encyclopedia article, I've got no problem with that, as long as you are being open and honest about it. We have some paid editors that do just that. But if you are here to spin a Wikipedia article for your client, go away and don't come back. Y'all haven't forgotten Tony Ahn yet, have you. Stop the time sink now with an Indeff. He gets paid to promote his client. Working our system to do so will always end up in the paid efiedi getting what they want. They are earning their bread and butter by working the system. At some point, every legit editor will have to back away so he or she can go support their family. That's a glitch in our system that we absolutely cannot let paid editors exploit. John from Idegon (talk) 06:40, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support indef No one needs to query my stance on paid editing. Be gone Danilo Two and refund your customers. I don't like users profiting from my 1000s of hours and other volunteer hours protecting Wikipedia from monetary exploitation. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:38, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose Nothing this editor has done is out of line with what other paid and COI editors have been allowed to do. We allow [Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-10-08/In_the_media political operatives] to edit articles about political opponents, so it's ridiculous to block a paid editor who is completely following policy. Gamaliel (talk) 13:39, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I also oppose any sort of restriction at this time. The editor has worked to resolve issues from what I have read of the interactions on the talk page. Describing the RFC as non-neutral can be fixed simply by adding a signature to the first paragraph, which looks like a sufficiently neutral question to me. (I do not know if Jytdog is simply unaware that this is the fix to this issue.) The RFC starter is allowed to give his opinion first in an RFC. I am definitely not seeing any failures to meet our core content policies by the paid editor, nor any of the behavioral ones--and we don't topic ban users unless they do fail to meet the intent of those. --Izno (talk) 14:16, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      User:Izno to be clear, what I am saying is that they are violating WP:PROMO and WP:NPOV by working consistently to make pages simply reflect their client's current business and current messaging, with no regard for our mission to write encyclopedia articles. Wikipedia is not meant to be a proxy for organization websites. However much the content proposed by Danilo Two looks like normal Wikipedia content, it isn't. Jytdog (talk) 14:25, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support Topic-Ban - Beutler is in the business of systematically trying to game the system and is a threat to the integrity of the encyclopedia. (If there is a proposal for a block or ban, I haven't seen it.) Robert McClenon (talk) 01:11, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • TBAN (preferred) or block if that can't be worked out. Robert McClenon is spot on here: a threat to the integrity of the project. Guy (Help!) 13:03, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I was not going to weigh in here, except my name has been invoked a couple of times, and Danilo Two is on vacation this coming week. It goes without saying that I oppose placing any editing restrictions on this user, who is a colleague of mine. Let's back up a moment and recognize that WP:TBAN or WP:INDEF are reserved for editors who are disruptive, which Danilo most certainly is not, and WP:BLOCKNO advises against blocks based on content disputes, which is what this really is (Jytdog opened this thread after Danilo started an RfC). Except Jytdog is trying to make a more abstract case, that simply being a COI contributor is a violation of WP:HERE. This is a novel and dangerous theory to advance: whether you like "paid editing" or not, it is regulated by the WP:COI guideline, and Danilo has followed the advice of pages like WP:PSCOI to the letter. To propose any block or ban would not only be wrong on policy, but it would not serve Wikipedia in the long run. If COI contributors who disclose their relationships and avoid editing mainspace articles are blocked, only undisclosed paid editors will remain, and that would be a threat to the integrity of the project indeed. WWB Too (Talk · COI) 18:30, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      (edit conflict) @WWB Too: A few points. One, I raised WP:NOTHERE and proposed an indef block, not Jytdog, who as always has displayed an admirable dedication to giving paid editors a fair chance, despite the evident lack of appreciation. Two, it is not remotely "novel" to block editors who are here solely to promote the interests of external organisations. WP:NOTPROMO is a much older policy than WP:COI, and is policy not a guideline. In any case, COI contains the text: If COI editing causes disruption, an administrator may opt to place blocks on the involved accounts; continuously wasting the time of our volunteer encyclopaedia editors with POV attempts to further your clients' PR agenda is disruptive. Paid editors like yourself seem to find it convenient to ignore everything in WP:COI except for the bare-minimum requirements that let you carry on your trade within the terms of use. But in fact, if you actually read it, the overriding message of the guideline is don't edit where you have a conflict of interest, full stop. Discussions like this are the consequence of ignoring that very good advice.
      Finally, the tired excuse that you are the lesser of two evils holds no weight: yes, undisclosed paid editing is harder to deal with, but we don't solve that by giving disclosed paid editors a free pass to flout Wikipedia's core principles because they have a template on their talk page. Veiled threats aside, what does this project lose if we revoke Danilo Two's editing privileges? What has he contributed to our shared goal, when he's not being the errand boy for a bank? – Joe (talk) 19:45, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      If I thought that Danilo Two's actions did in fact "flout Wikipedia's core principles" I would agree with you. But the case for this is non-existent; please look below to my new subsection explaining the underlying disagreement and let me know if you still think it sounds like Danilo was trying to subvert Wikipedia to the company's PR gain. WWB Too (Talk · COI) 20:05, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment See "Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement" on Bookfarce. -Roxy, the dog. barcus 19:21, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support - I came here from a note on the CREWE Facebook page. Looking over the material, Jytdog's case is solid. Topic ban or block - David Gerard (talk) 19:32, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support a TBAN at the least, and likely that is the best for all accounts that have a COI with this subject. --Dirk Beetstra T C 19:38, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong Oppose the support votes are largely in favor of a back-door attempt to ban paid editing at an inappropriate forum; such a proposal should be an RFC advertised on WP:CENT. I don't see any other argument for action. power~enwiki (π, ν) 19:44, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        @Power~enwiki: how is TBANning one specific group of editors who are continuously polishing articles that they have a disclosed COI with a 'back-door attempt to ban [all] paid editing at an inappropriate forum'? We are not discussing a change to policy or anything here. --Dirk Beetstra T C 05:20, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        No, we are being TOU bludgeoned by a spammer who doesn’t want to follow WP:NOTSPAM, a core policy. Our disclosure and COI review process does not exist to facilitate promotion, and those who use it as such should be sanctioned. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:34, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment: I haven't reviewed much of what User:Danilo Two has posted, but I'm disturbed by many of the comments above. In particular, Wikipedia policy and guidelines do not require paid editors to contribute non-paid hours in order to be in good standing. This discussion should not be about (a) why such a (new) policy/guideline is desirable, or (b) getting in yet another swing at the goal of banning all paid editing. I will note that the cited thread from April 2017, is not at all similar - in that example, the editor had edited only one article; used sockpuppets (blocked); had an article ban put in place against her; and was caught placing articles in the press in order to use them as sources. All of that, plus her non-cooperative postings to the article talk page, would be sufficient to get her banned from Wikipedia even if there was no obvious COI. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 20:05, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      User:John Broughton I don't believe anyone has said that paid editors are obligated to volunteer. They are however obligated to follow the content policies and guidelines, and trying to turn WP pages into proxies for company websites and into PR violates WP:PROMO as well as WP:NPOV; articles about companies should be encyclopedic, covering their whole timeline with no particular WEIGHT on the company's current business. But this Danilo Two's proposals consistently do just that, which you would see if you did review their contribs. I had suggested removing them from just that one page, to try to bring their attention to this problem with their approach to WP. Others have taken it further. Jytdog (talk) 20:11, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support indef as ArbCom has already ruled, and WP:PAID makes clear, disclosure is a minimum. Individuals who are paid must also follow the policies and guidelines of the English Wikipedia, one of which being an absolute prohibition on promotionalism (WP:NOTSPAM). If someone doesn’t get that, they have no businsss editing. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:34, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Examining the original disagreement

      Editors commenting here should read the original discussion that led to the RfC that Jytdog identifies as his reason to make the TBAN proposal. Danilo Two had suggested the removal of this paragraph in the BNY Mellon article because it was outdated, lacked context, and wasn't helpful to readers. Jytdog stated that it would be better to update the charts, so Danilo explained the challenges to doing this, which included a desire to avoid COPYVIO. It was a civil conversation, which could have used more voices—this is why Danilo opened the RfC. And when Jytdog found fault with the way he presented the RfC question, he agreed to adjust the wording. I must ask, is this behavior worthy of a TBAN? WWB Too (Talk · COI) 20:00, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      You are trying to cast this as a mere content dispute. The TBAN request is due to behavior issue. Jytdog (talk) 20:06, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      What is the behavior issue? Yes, Danilo Two did include his perspective in the first version of the RfC, and that was a mistake. When you objected, he changed the wording. He is clearly willing to take constructive feedback, and is unfailingly polite. So which part of WP:WHYBLOCK did he violate? WWB Too (Talk · COI) 20:14, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Persistently trying to turn WP articles into proxies for company websites, focused on their current status and messaging, and erasing history while doing that. That is not what we do here. The minimal requirement for paid editors to be members of the community is to follow the PAID policy and COI guideline. But like everybody else paid editors need to aim for the mission and follow the rest of the content policies and guidelines. I have now almost verbatim repeated myself. That is tedious to me and I am sure everyone else, and I have no more to say to you here. Jytdog (talk) 23:30, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I'm sorry Jytdog, but that is simply false. Danilo suggested removing an iffy section, but that is not "erasing history". Furthermore, in several instances he suggested moving outdated information to the History section. It's just wrong to say he was only serving a PR purpose, and not trying to make it a more accurate and informative page. If this is your last comment, that's too bad, as we've been having a more constructive version of this conversation on your talk page. I am certain there is a solution here well short of topic-banning an editor whose edit requests you think are wrong. WWB Too (Talk · COI) 01:04, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Rollbacker status removed unfairly?

      NOPE
      It seems pretty clear that there is a consensus that the removal was appropriate. Adamstorm.97 may re-apply through the normal process at WP:PERM.Beeblebrox (talk) 21:56, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Just over a year ago, xaosflux granted me rollbacker rights after I proved that I understood what constituted vandalism on Wikipedia, and in the time since I have only been questioned on my reverts a few times and been able to clear up those issues through talk page discussion. I have continued to use the standard procedure of reverting with edit summary and discussing at the talk page for any non-vandalism issues. Then, today, NeilN removed that status and the only explanation I was given was that I apparently misunderstand what vandalism is. My interpretation of vandalism has not changed since I was told it was correct last year, and from what I can see at WP:VAND, WP:NOTVAND, and WP:ROLLBACK my actions are still covered by those policies and guidelines and line-up with how I have been approaching the tool all this time. I would like to be given back the rollback tool, or at least be given an actual explanation for where I have been going wrong so that I can learn and earn the right back. NeilN is the one that directed me here. - adamstom97 (talk) 21:11, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      • Adamstom, please inform involved editors using talk page notifications. That is mandatory.
      For the benefit of other editors, here is the ANEW report against the user which led to all this. Lourdes 21:13, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • "Those are definitely all vandalism, from adding unsourced content to adding information on the post-credit scene (there is clear consensus not to add this)." Adamstom.97 was given a chance to step back from this. They did not. --NeilN talk to me 21:17, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      adamstom.97, you rolled back two edits (at least): [33], [34], which were clearly not vandalism. At the ANEW report, rather than realizing you made an error, you defended doing so: "Those are definitely all vandalism, from adding unsourced content to adding information on the post-credit scene (there is clear consensus not to add this).", and then defend being unwilling to discuss your reverts: "I think it is fair not to have to explain my reverts when the edit history contains dozens of examples of the same revert by multiple editors and the issue has already been discussed at the talk page." Given that, I agree with removal of your rollback permissions, as it is clear that you are unable to determine what is vandalism and what is not, and instead used rollback during a content dispute. No matter how right you think you are, you cannot do that. Seraphimblade Talk to me 21:21, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Firstly, I did send a talk page notification to NeilN who is the admin in question here. And secondly, those two edits are deliberate attempts to ignore discussion, are not covered by WP:NOTVAND, and are very clearly covered by points 1 and 5 of Wikipedia:Rollback#When to use rollback. I did not use rollback during a content dispute, I used it long after a content dispute to revert blatant attempts to ignore discussion and consensus by multiple misguided editors. If that is not allowed, then perhaps the instructions on how to use the tool need to be updated as this is all part of what I was told I could do when I first gained this status. I am also not impressed with the way I have been treated here - you could have said that I made a mistake, explained what that mistake was, and then left me to learn and earn the right back, but instead I had the right swiftly removed from with no explanation because I dared to defend myself! That is not the community spirit I have come to expect on Wikipedia. - adamstom97 (talk) 21:30, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Adamstom.97: - Regarding using the rollback tool to revert an edit inconsistent with consensus, see the very first point at WP:NOTVAND, as well as the third point. And you are correct, your very first edit after posting this was to inform. SQLQuery me! 21:38, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I think it's a pretty big stretch to refer to these as "bold edits", and I don't think that sets a very good precedent, but I can also see that I'm not going to get anywhere with this either. Now I just want to know whether I am going to be able to request the rollback tool be reinstated moving forward, or if I am going to be prevented from doing that by the petty behaviour that was displayed at the ANEW report. - adamstom97 (talk) 21:41, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Adamstom.97: As I said at ANEW, you get rollback access after you demonstrate you know what is considered vandalism, not before or as you adjust. The fact that you're still considering the edits as vandalism is deeply problematic. Editing against consensus (if it exists) or ignoring the talk page is not vandalism or misguided. It's simply disagreeing with consensus or the existing content. --NeilN talk to me 21:42, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I agree with Seraphimblade's analysis of the two given diffs: not vandalism-->rollback abuse. Drmies (talk) 21:43, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support removal (edit conflict × 4) - this editor evidently understands neither Wikipedia:What is vandalism? nor the requirement to be willing to discuss one's use of advanced permissions. The policy page says that rollback is to be used only when the reason for reverting is absolutely clear; in any instance where it may be necessary to explain why content is being reverted (such as enforcing the result of a talk page discussion) rollback is not to be used, and the reverting editor is advised to use a different method to undo the edit which allows entering an edit summary. More from the policy: "Administrators may revoke the rollback privilege or issue a block in response to a persistent failure to explain reverts, regardless of the means used." Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 21:44, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Look at it like this: If you're reverting because an edit is against longstanding consensus or because it's poorly sourced, it is particularly important for you to say so in an edit summary. Otherwise, the person you're reverting is likely to make the same mistakes elsewhere or even just repeat them on that page; they also won't have any idea what they need to do to address your objection (finding better sources or reaching a new consensus on talk, respectively.) Rollbacking vandalism is a thing because when something is clear, bad-faith vandalism, we can assume the editor understands what they're doing wrong, so there's no point in humoring them by explaining it to them. In all other situations (whenever an edit is in good faith), discussion is a vital part of the process. If you just revert with no explanation, you haven't fixed anything in the long term. --Aquillion (talk) 23:02, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      It's becoming very clear that there is a deep-seated holier-than-thou attitude here that is not conducive to discussion. However, my question has still not been answered, and I would like it to be before I move on from this discussion. Once again: will I be able to prove that I have learned from this experience and deserve to regain the rollbacker right, or will any attempt in the future to regain it be derailed by overzealous admins that do not believe a person can ever learn or change? - adamstom97 (talk) 21:49, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      @Adamstom.97: Your attitude isn't helping but yes, show that you've taken on board what you've been told here, and you should be able to get the right back in a few months. Conversely, continuing to call good-faith edits vandalism will result in a block. --NeilN talk to me 21:54, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      (edit conflict)On behalf of overzealous power hungry abusive rogue admins everywhere, let me just say that we can be surprisingly forgiving if you do show a real ability to learn from your mistakes. So far you’ve not done so. Thanks for asking. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:56, 2 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      INC sock?

      see - Special:Diff/853180521 - another INC sock? I blocked it anyway as vandal only. Ronhjones  (Talk) 00:03, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Significant WP:PERM/AWB backlog

      Backlog has been cleared, no requests open. — xaosflux Talk 14:13, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Wouldn't normally point out a backlog to AN, but the backlog for AutoWikiBrowser permissions is now 2 weeks, which seems really excessive. There's only 6 requests which should be pretty quick to deal with. Sorry to nag like this, but I've been waiting for 10 days to be able to start work on a template restructuring!--Newbiepedian (talk · C · X! · L) 01:02, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Also to add to this, the WT:AFCP backlog is growing in length too. Iffy★Chat -- 09:44, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I'll be dealing with these tomorrow. I've been travelling and have not had as much access as usual. Primefac (talk) 16:19, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Block review for Clockback

      Clockback (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) [===Hullo everybody, this is Peter Hitchens (in real life!) , not logged in as Clockback as I would then be censored and muzzled. Administrators have my e-mail address, thanks to the appeals they have rejected on it, and are invited to contact me if they wish to check the authenticity and provenance of this contribution. I would just like to ask all those involved in this decision to take a long, slow breath and look at what they have done. Most fundamentally, they have responded to a plea for help with a kick in the teeth. When I posted a request for assistance in a dispute with another editor, which had lasted five years and involved the other editor being unpleasantly rude, openly biased on the issue under discussion, and unresponsive on the talk page, on several occasions, the person who intervened(who could not possibly, in the time, have made a just or thorough examination of the matter) immediately blocked me, and to rub the matter in, blocked me indefinitely. This is plainly unjust and no free person would accept it or be willing to abase himself to get it lifted. If you wish to discuss this matter with me, treat me fairly. If ( as seems to be the case in some comments) you take a special pleasure in blocking a Mail on Suynday columnist, feel free. If that is your idea of a good time, then I can only say that we're all different. But do not pretend you are doing this in pursuit of the truth. the fact remains that my much-frowned-on edits, though satirical and not intended to stand (I made their purpose plain on the talk page) , were entirely factual, an undeniable truth which I have yet to get any administrator or editor to notice, acknowledge or address. Fact One:The police, in England, have precisely no statutory role in the investigation of crimes allegedly committed by the dead; and it is a legal absurdity for any English tribunal to say it has found no reason to doubt an allegation. Reason to doubt is actively embodied in the principle of presumption of innocence, is the basis of jury trial and is embedded in both civil and criminal procedure. If you are ready to listen, then I'm ready to defend myself. I am treated with fairness, an open mind and civility, you will find I respond in the same way. If I muzzled and silenced, then I just remember how my English ancestors would have responded to such treatment. Please do not delete this. I have of course kept kept a copy. Usigned but acknowledged as the sole work of Peter Hitchens.


      Clockback is in real life, British journalist Peter Hitchens. He was recently indef-blocked by JzG. I will argue here that the block, while warranted, was too harsh and has outlived its purpose. The circumstances are as follows. The matter is a bit delicate, so please bear with me.

      Clockback's block log is clean. The current dispute concerns George Bell (bishop), in particular, the section Child abuse allegations. Hitchens has written a lot about this matter in the British press. Clockback has sporadically edited the article in the past two-and-a-half years, largely without incident. They have also used the talk page thoroughly (I count 22 comments by them). This is by way of preamble, to stress that Blockback has been largely restrained and largely proper in their edits and discussion.

      In late 2017, the Carlile report on the matter was published. Please see this BBC or this NYT article for an overview. Around the same time, there was a long discussion on how to re-organize the section in light of the report. Clockback participated in that discussion, again, largely properly. For various reasons, the editor who started the discussion didn't find the time for a rewrite (or perhaps it was a failure of WP:BOLD). So the matter rested there.

      On 21 July Clockback made two edits to the article edit1, edit2. Both have edit summaries and seem like good-faith edits to me (I take no position on their correctness). They were also explained on the talkpage. Another editor Charlesdrakew reverted Clockback's edits with no explanation; Clockback reinstated the edits. On 28 July, Charlesdrakew reverted the edits again, simply saying that Clockback has a COI and should get consensus first, but no direct explanation of the revert. Clockback argued more on the talkpage, but no further discussion happened.

      At this point I should mention that the two editors had butted heads in the past. Charledrakew had complained (about an earlier version) that the section gives too much space to "professional loudmouths" and that the section thus "looks like a whitewash". I take no position on whether these concerns were correct, and whether or not Charlesdrakew intended to address Mr. Hitchens. The important point is that Clockback took these comments as a personal affront (Hitchens is quoted in the section).

      Things spiraled quickly after the events of 28 July. Clockback made this edit as a humourous (he says) rejoinder, which tried to express his frustration with a reductio ad absurdum. After he was reverted, he edit-warred to keep the text in. It was at this point that JzG blocked Clockback to stop the edit-warring.

      I tried to mediate between the positions, and reorganized the section thoroughly. You can read my explanation here. Both Clockback and Charlesdrakew, while not entirely happy, seem to be satisfied with my rewrite.

      Clockback's repeated unblock requests have been denied because the admins say that he has refused to acknowledge his improper editing. This charge is undoubtedly true, but I would ask people to read the excellent essay WP:Editors have pride. On the important matter -- namely the text of the article -- Clockback has already acceded to a reasonable consensus. One should not expect people to grovel. The block is now only punitive.

      The punchline to the story is given in my !vote below. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 07:04, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Survey

      His other edits are to Christopher Hitchens (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (COI), Peter Hitchens (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (WP:AUTO, COI), Education Policy Institute (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (COI, long-standing off-wiki agenda there), A Brief History of Crime (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (WP:PROMO, COI), The Broken Compass (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (PROMO, COI) - you have to go back ten years for a single mainspace edit that's even arguably non-conflicted, and even then it's a likely conflict given his off-wiki comments on the subject matter added at Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Overall: WP:NOTHERE. Very definitely.
      This is also as clear an example of m:MPOV as you could wish for.
      If unblocked he needs to be TBANned from COI edits, which is, to a good first approximation, 100% of his editing to date. Guy (Help!) 08:58, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block. Hitchens only edits in areas where he has a massive WP:COI. From his talk page it is clear he isn't going to change. -Roxy, the dog. barcus 09:16, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block. As I stated on his talk page, I would need to see some evidence his behavior would change, and I haven't yet. 331dot (talk) 09:35, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block. Clockback's edits...were not typical of his other edits to the page, which were largely restrained and largely made in good faith. - Kingsindian
      Really? "Nor was there any reason for a complaint to be passed to the police since, as Bishop Bell was dead, he could not be prosecuted and they had no statutory role in the affair. A complaint might as well have been passed to the Fire Brigade or to Tesco" was his addition to the ARTICLE. That prose wouldn't be acceptable in news reporting, let alone an encyclopedia. If he wants to promote himself and grind his axe, he's got The Mail on Sunday for that. --Calton | Talk 10:05, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I do not expect everyone to agree with me, but I do expect people to read properly. My comment was explicitly NOT about this edit, but the edits PRIOR to this whole unfortunate mess. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 10:23, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      And I expected you to note that was single example of how wrong you were -- and maybe note the others who've commented about his track record, but I guess it's hard to read properly when you're up on your high horse. --Calton | Talk 10:45, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      So, in a complaint about the heartless Wikipedia bureaucracy, your solution is ... more bureaucracy? No wonder Wikipedia is dying. Also relevant, in light of all the brouhaha about COI and so forth. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 14:57, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      3rd party appeals aren’t usually allowed because they miss the point of the entire unblock process: discussion with the blocked editor. They also tend to waste a lot of energy for no reason and are dramafests that quickly become disruptive. There is nothing special about this case meriting AN review outside of the normal process at the request of someone other than the blocked editor. Their appeals will be considered on their talk page, and the advantage there for them is that they aren’t considered banned and don’t require future AN review if the unblock is declined. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:03, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      One of the purposes of WP:AN is to review blocks. Nothing substantial would change if I copy pasted Clockback's last unblock request above my own statement. It's pointless WP:BURO. And if you hadn't noticed, I have been copy-pasting Clockback's comments from the talkpage here. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 15:06, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      No, bringing it here on your own without the active appeal is the exercise in bureaucracy: we just don’t do that except in cases of unambiguous abuse, which this isn’t. There is now an appeal on their talk. This should be handled there by discussion with them instead of being made a spectacle. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:11, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      What the hell? There's a block review of an AE case just below this section. Blocks are reviewed here all the time. I am going to ignore this trolling now. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 15:22, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      AE blocks have to be brought either here or to AE. Unblocking without consensus leads to desysop in those cases. There is nothing special about this block. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:24, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      So, if I give you an instance of the scores of block reviews which had nothing to do with AE, and were not brought by the blocked party, you'll go away, right? How about this one? Or this one? Or this one? I can do this all day. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 15:55, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Here's one from just a couple days ago where the block was overturned. Mr Ernie (talk) 18:08, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Mr Ernie:@Mr Ernie: So what is your opinion on the block? Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 19:35, 3 August 2018 (UTC) Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 19:36, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Non-admin comment The user is currently WP:CANVASSING support for his unblocking on Twitter here and here (feel free to move/remove this if I have commented in the wrong place). Endymion.12 (talk) 15:59, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block, this editor doesn't seem to be prepared to participate constructively. Max Semenik (talk) 19:25, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Unblock Clockback please - having read the material, he is entitled to express those views, however controversial and unpalatable they may be for some. And he has made some grave points and should not have to beg for forgiveness for expressing his, founded, views. Ours is a plural society, please reflect the same on this platform for Mr Hitchens.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 185.192.69.53 (talk) 13:13, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
        • Actually no he's not. He is entitled to express his views, founded or not, in accordance with the bounds of the law while writing for the paper, or on his own website or blog or anywhere else that welcomes it. However wikipedia is an encylopaedia written based on sources. Discussions here are intended to be about how we improve wikipedia. The views of random editors of stuff unrelated to that purpose aren't really welcome. Given our goals of building a community, there's some limited acceptance of editors express offtopic stuff like their views of subjectw within reason but this needs to be limited. Notably if several other editors feel that someone's specific expression of their views unrelated to how to improve wikipedia is harmful, it probably is since it's seemingly not improving community relations here but harming them. Note that I have not looked into the details of the case other than to know it doesn't appear to involve a living person since it's beside my point. Nil Einne (talk) 21:06, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support unblocking, an indefinite block for a first offence is way too much, Huldra (talk) 21:42, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block - Guy's reasoning stands up. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:33, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I will note that Hitchens has now made 4 unblock requests on his talk page, and all have been turned down (by 4 different admins) because they did not address the reason for their block. Filing multiple frivolous unblock requests generally leads to shutting off talk page access. In this case, Hitchens being a public figure may be working in his favor, as admins may be shying away from that course of action so as not to be named in the inevitable follow-up off-wiki commentary from Hitchens about Wikipedia's "autocracy" and "liberal bias" - but since that's going to happen anyway, no matter what happens now (even an unblock won't stop it), someone should just bite the bullet and shut him down. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:43, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block - Canvassing one's twitter followers in order to get oneself unblocked certainly means that a user should never be allowed to return. Icarosaurvus (talk) 22:37, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block. I am sympathetic to KingsIndian's position here, as I often am. But in this case I don't agree. We have just been through the Arbcom case of Philip Cross, where we had people involved in RW disputes editing about those disputes here in WP. This is not good for anybody. If you look at their edit count you will see that Clockback has pretty much only edited about himself, his family, his books, and things he pundits about in the real world.
      Back in 2015 I tried to explain COI management in WP] to him, and he replied: I've tried it and it doesn't work. You'll just have to trust me. If I restrict myself, as I have for more than a decade, to correcting errors of fact, I can't see any problem. the temptation to rewrite the whole thing in better English is immensely strong, but I have resisted it all this time and will continue to do so. I really don't see why doing this, openly, is a difficulty. That was after he had just been edit-warring completely inappropriate content into mainspace about some picture of himself. (diff, diff, diff). An unrestrained temper tantrum. His claim is also somewhat contradicted by his actual edits to the page about him, which includes things like this
      At the Bell page, folks have cited the edits at Bell - the first part about A complaint might as well have been passed to the Fire Brigade or to Tesco.. Has anybody looked at the rest of that diff? It also included This was a ridiculous statement, as under English law any accused person is presumed innocent until proven guilty.
      Away back in 2007 he was all up into contesting the reality of ADD in his Mail column (e.g here. And sure enough he made around 30 edits to the ADD page including beauties like this.
      Clockback obviously feels quite entitled to use WP like he would a column or blog to express his opinion and have temper tantrums. Wikipedia is however not his column, and he has not given us reason to trust his self-restraint. His temper tantrum over the block, is quite in line with what I have seen of him here.
      KingsIndian I do get it that WP can be difficult to understand and navigate, but for as long as Clockback has been around, he hasn't really engaged with what we do here, how we do it, and why. There are many people drawn here to edit about themselves or some other external interest. Some of them take the time to "get it"; Clockback has shown little to no interest in WP's mission but a great deal of interest in using WP as yet another platform to express his opinions. It's just not what we do here. It is fundamentally a SOAP thing. Jytdog (talk) 02:00, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block Indef block is suitable for such disruptive editors. So what if he's Christopher Hitchens' brother? Wikipedia is not his soapbox, and the editor hasn't recognized what they did wrong. I think, as a whole, we were way too lenient on them - seeing that they still have their TPA intact. byteflush Talk 03:59, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • information Administrator note I tried to close this as "no consensus to unblock" before sufficient time had elapsed for this to be considered a "community block" (which is a block that ends up endorsed after "due consideration" by the community, thus becoming a de facto CBAN). I did this in an attempt to avert unnecessary drama, prevent the escalation of an unintended CBAN, and to let this user retain the normal options for unblocking. Both the OP here and the blocked user have objected to the closure as too quick, and while I thoroughly explained to them the much more serious consequences of a formal community-endorsed block that has been given "due consideration", the OP has strenuously insisted that they want a fair trial. So, if the consensus to endorse the block continues to hold for a reasonable amount of time, that is a risk that the blocked user was made aware of and decided to take. Swarm ♠ 10:32, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support unblock A week would be sufficient, some people seem keen to support the block because of who he is. User:Charlesdrakew seems to be one of them and that his attacks are ignored indicates we aren't treating this case fairly and neutrally, which is another reason to unblock. ♫ RichardWeiss talk contribs 10:46, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support unblock as time served. If nothing else, they are clearly keen to discuss the matter, and they are equally clearly WP:HERE. I consider the block harsh for a first offence, and although Clockback does have a transparent COI, they apper to have been up front about it from the start, and with the exception of a couple of instances, adhered to our guidelines. Although of course WP:VOL says we do not, of course, have to do anything we don't want to do, I can't help but suspect that if they had received a litle more traction on the talk page, we might not be having this discussion. —SerialNumber54129 paranoia /cheap sh*t room 11:02, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I would respectfully disagree with the assessment that Clockback is WP:HERE. To date, the overwhelming impression I have gotten from his edits to both articles and talkpages is that he is interested in making Wikipedia read and operate the way he would like it to read and operate, without regard for Wikipedia's community, policies or processes. I've seen no indication that he has any interest in working on the encylopedia outside of areas in which he has a conflict of interest, and there is a definite hint of righting great wrongs to many of his contributions. Yunshui 雲水 13:30, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      More to the point, a ban from conflicted edits is a de facto site ban, Clockback only edits where he has a COI and this has been the case for at least ten years. Guy (Help!) 21:35, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support unblocking - having a valid opinion on an issue is not a "conflict of interest". Zacwill (talk) 13:38, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block per Jzg and Jytdog. Really now, editor has continuously edited either with a direct COI or to support their own viewpoints contrary to npov etc. Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:47, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block At first I was hopeful that this might be resolved relatively quickly but it has become clear from Clockback’s umpteen unblock appeals that he has not taken any of the advice in WP:GAB and is incapable of admitting that he has done anything wrong, and is continuing to attack his “opponent.” He has given no indication that he would not do the same thing again. I cannot see how we can unblock here. Pawnkingthree (talk) 18:01, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block I agree with TonyBallioni that a third-party block appeal misses the point. Discussion needs to take place with the blocked editor. Given the amount of discussion that already has taken place with them, I'm not convinced that the behavior leading to the block will not continue. The goal of a block is not punitive, but to protect the encyclopedia, which this block is doing. In addition, the behavior following the block (and relating to the block) is quite concerning to me, including the canvassing on Twitter and continued attempts at finding appeal proxies rather than handling the matter themselves per WP:APPEAL. The COI issues, editorializing, etc., don't have a place on Wikipedia and they don't seem to realize that we're here to build an encyclopedia, not a news outlet or blog. I think they should be given the standard offer and see where it leads in time once cooler heads prevail. Waggie (talk) 19:12, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse unblocking. I have for several years donated money to this organization with the understanding that it would be of good use for a non-profit organization such at this is in order to uphold this great informational website, available for all interested, had I known that this organization with its self proclaimed high values in the shadow uses censorship I would have never donated and will from now on never do it again until this unwrong is fixed. Quite amazing to see such a big ”trial” for what should be a small matter. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mhellstrom (talk • contribs) — Mhellstrom (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that editors have been canvassed to this discussion.
      • Your donations to WMF are irrelevant, and do not give your comment any more weight. If anything, what gives a comment additional weight is if it comes from a Wikipedian who has contributed significantly to the encyclopedia, of which they are examples on both sides of this issue. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:38, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block. No remorse and the posts at User talk:Clockback fail to persuade me that the block is no longer necessary to prevent disruption. Indeed, they seem to confirm that disruption is going to continue[35]. DrKay (talk) 21:19, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse indefinite block until Clockback’s attitude changes. I initially assumed this was going to be a partisan dispute of right wing versus left wing editors voting and was open to idea of supporting an unblock, but examining the facts and carefully reviewing his unblock requests, it is clear that this editor is disruptive and is draining of people’s time (he is behaving like the world and Wikipedia should revolve around him and he has the right to drain people of their time so he can WP:SOAPBOX his opinions (so much so he had to have his talk page access removed), instead of just editing productively and being willing to admit to mistakes. Should his attitude change only then can I support an unblock request.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 23:43, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support unblock I think an indefinite block is excessive in this case. I have looked through some of Clockback's contributions. He appears to always state that he is Peter Hitchens when giving his view on talk pages, and the recent edits at George Bell seem to be uncharacteristic of his editing. Edits such as this, the canvassing on Twitter, and other similar behavior display an unfamiliarity with Wikipedia policy, but I believe his edits are fundamentally in good faith. Hrodvarsson (talk) 23:46, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse indef somewhat reluctantly, after reading the user talk page. I do not endorse a community-ban; perhaps once the situation has cooled down (and they've stopped trying to get randoms from Twitter to get them unblocked), they'll realize just how ridiculous contributions like [36] are, and that none of their excuses for it were believable. power~enwiki (π, ν) 00:03, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Enorse block he writes: "I was blocked indefinitely, an absurd over-reaction to a legitimate bit of mild mischief entirely explained and justified by the appalling behaviour of the unpunished 'Charles'". Until he recognizes he has to follow community guidelines. -- 73.170.168.69 (talk) 01:32, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse block (Non-administrator comment) I've looked over the George Bell article edits and Talk page discussion, as well as the discussion on Clockback's Talk page. Clockback added inappropriate content to the article, edit-warred to keep it in, and declared that he would continue edit-warring. He calls the content "mild mischief" but to my mind, mild mischief is equivalent to mild vandalism. It is appropriate to indefinitely block someone who is edit-warring to preserve their mild vandalism no matter who they are or how long they've been here. Indefinite does not mean infinite and editors are blocked indefinitely all the time for first offenses (examples include vandalism, username issues, and legal threats). It would have been rather simple for Clockback to get unblocked but instead of doing that, he's said he can't guarantee he won't do this again and is blaming the other editor. Therefore, the block is preventing further disruption. I hope that we won't see any new appeals for at least six months; if that means that this block is converted into a community ban, I support that because he has shown himself through his editing (as detailed by JzG and Jytdog) to be NOTHERE. If Clockback is unblocked I support a topic ban on COI edits. Ca2james (talk) 04:00, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse Unblock Ought one be indefinitely blocked for causing certain people annoyance regardless of the importance of their contributions - and, potential contributions? It seems those in charge have forced Mr Hitchens to drink hemlock and, when he refused, into exile. Apologies if I have inserted my comment incorrectly. I have a feeling of trepidation while writing this and expect to be reprimanded or 'tagged' as I have just opened an account and this is my first edit. Is this the sort of atmosphere an interactive 'encyclopedia' should instil in its more sensitive users? Crosslaa01 (talk) 12:26, 5 August 2018 (UTC) Antony (user: crosslaa01) — Crosslaa01 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]
      • Endorse block for the original reasons plus the reprehensible canvassing. Nihlus 13:52, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Discussion

      As above, please see the discussion on Clockback's talk page.
      The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
      • I have suggested a topic ban as an alternative to a full block, but as Clockback is effectively a single issue editor he might not regard that as an improvement. Assuming this is Peter Hitchens, which I have no reason to doubt, he is too closely involved with the subject to edit without conflict of interest. Hitchens has long been a leading member of the Bishop Bell fan club and rants about it in his Mail blog.
      While Bell is long dead the women who complained is alive and deserves respect. I have modified Kingsindian's rewrite slightly so that it does not look as if the Carlisle review is a vindication of Bell. It is not, being entirely neutral and criticising the church's treatment of both the complainant and Bell's memory.Charles (talk) 08:32, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      If 'Charles' cares to look, he will see that my personal link with the sign-on 'Clockback' has been confirmed by me according to Wikipedia protocols. There is no need to raise any question about the matter. My involvement in the Bell case is wholly disinterested. I have never met George Bell, am not related to him, I am not paid by him or his family. I took up this case because it seemed to me that an injustice had been done. I don't wish to boast, but merely offer this comparison for an example. Would Emile Zola have been disqualified from any role in the Wikipedia entry on the Dreyfus case, had there been a Wikipedia at the time, especially if he had intervened ( as I have done) cautiously and with referenced fact to back up my edits? ? Please note the hostile and pejorative use of the derisive term 'rants' to describe my writings about the subject. I also note his derisive use of the term 'George Bell fan club' to describe a group which includes Frank Field MP, Lord Lexden, several prominent churchmen and women, and a former editor of the Daily Telegraph, a distinguished QC and a retired judge. It has attracted support from both left and right, and from different wings of the C of E, including from the Very Revd Prof Martyn Percy, Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, and the Revd Giles Fraser. It is quite nonpartisan.

      How 'Charles' can portray himself as a disinterested or impartial editor while behaving in this fashion (or how his claims to be such can be accepted ) I have no idea. I remain amused that this behaviour goes unnoticed and unrebuked, whereas my actions get me blocked *indefinitely* . This behaviour by'Charles' is of a piece with his abusive and ad hominem use of the term 'loudmouths' and his insulting use of the term 'whitewash' to describe efforts to clear the name of an unjustly pilloried person. I am not a single-issue editor, as it happens, but I do have a special and close interest in the Bell case, and ( as most of my fellow-campaigners for justice for Bishop Bell are even older and fustier and unskilled in the use of computers than I am), it has fallen to me to try to get the entry to try to reflect the considerable efforts of that campaign, and indeed its success, in overcoming the original mistaken and unjust presumption of guilt. I have always been very careful in doing so, because I understand that some people might think my intervention improper. I have only ever done so when it was clear to me that important changes needed to be made, and that nobody else would do them if I did not. I have explained myself fully on the Talk page and always been open to compromise.

      'Charles' informs us: 'I have modified Kingsindian's rewrite slightly so that it does not look as if the Carlisle review is a vindication of Bell'. He then asserts:'It is not, being entirely neutral and criticising the church's treatment of both the complainant and Bell's memory'. This causes me to doubt if 'Charles' has read the Carlile report, or, as I have done, spoken to Lord Carlile about it. He cannot even spell its author's name correctly. It is a devastating rebuke to the church and the Sussex Police, and a demolition of the case against George Bell. It still amazes me that it forms such a small part of the Wikipedia entry, and that there was not, until I recently added it, even a direct link to it there. Lord Carlile said to me on the record at his press conference that he would not, were he a prosecutor in the case, have expected to secure a conviction of Bell on the evidence which he has seen (and he has seen it all). As Lord Carlile was specifically prevented, by his terms of reference, from ruling directly on the issue, this was as close as he could come to it. Charles says 'the women who complained is alive and deserves respect'. Why does he say this? I know of no occasion on which I have not shown respect to the claimant. I have never doubted that her accusation was sincere, and have never uttered a pejorative word about her, nor sought to insert anything uncomplimentary to her in the entry. Nor would I. Nor would any member of the group seeking justice for Bishop Bell. So what is the purpose of this sentence in this intervention by 'Charles'? This is about the Church, and the police, and those parts of the media which were beguiled by them, and always has been. Surely an alert and fair editor would be aware of this? Peter Hitchens, logged in as Clockback (talk) 09:26, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

      • I'll make a comment myself, because I find the situation more and more distasteful. I don't know whether to laugh or weep. See this section on the WP:ANI page, where Clockback appealed for impartial eyes on the matter. To remind people: at that point, the only talk page discussion was by Clockback, and he wasn't getting any feedback at all, except constant reverting.
      What he got instead was an indef block by JzG, who says that they didn't even know that he was Peter Hitchens. If he knew, perhaps he would have seen this edit not as "editorialising" or WP:NOTHERE, but rather as a little bit of self-deprecating humour. I thought the British specialized in such humour? Or maybe being a Wikipedia admin requires one to be a humourless pedant. It was definitely wrong to try this sort of thing in a medium like text where humour doesn't carry very well. But this kind of edit deserves an indef block?
      Have people completely forgotten how difficult and forbidding Wikipedia is to edit, especially for new and casual users? And when that user tries to complain or get some help, he is met with an indef, instead of someone probing beneath the surface and trying to help them out? The humourlessness, arrogance and officiousness displayed in this thread is truly distasteful.
      Finally, a word about COI. Clockback has publicly declared their identity. He was not blocked for COI, but for "editorializing" -- JzG doesn't mention COI once in their block rationale, because they didn't even know that Clockback was Peter Hitchens. Now to suddenly shift the justification (but to keep the punishment) smacks of "sentence first, verdict after". It is truly a looking-glass world here in Wikipedia.
      The justification doesn't even make any sense. People with a COI aren't absolutely disallowed from editing pages. I can give you tens of examples, including WMF board members and Wikipedia arbitrators who have engaged in "COI" editing in this sense. As I mentioned, Clockback waited for over half a year before making these edits -- the person who had proposed the reorganization didn't find the time to do it, so Clockback did it themselves. Anyone who has ever dealt with COI editing on Wikipedia knows that this happens all the time. I can give tens of examples (again). Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 12:29, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • You do know that the COI makes it worse, not better, right? Declared or not, it's over a decade since Clockback made a single mainspace edit that can be remotely plausibly argued not to be COI. So the harder you look at the problem the worse it looks. Guy (Help!) 13:38, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • So, even though COI had nothing to do with the block, one must keep the block, because COI? It seems to me that you have already decided on the sentence, and are looking for reasons to convict. If you apply Cromwell's rule for just 10 minutes, and cease your motivated reasoning, you might reach a different conclusion.

        And, if the real reason for blocking is COI, why not unblock Clockback, and open a real discussion here (or elsewhere) about COI, where they can defend themselves? There's no imminent disruption here which requires a block. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 14:43, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      • Hmm, I'm not an expert in these things but I'm guess canvassing your Twitter followers to come to this thread and !vote here in support of unblocking will not be kindly looked upon....--Pawnkingthree (talk) 14:40, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I think PH has come to realise what many of us have known for some time: that wikipedia is currently in the hands of an anonymous and somewhat oppressive autocratic elite who are accountable to absolutely no-one.
      Mr Hitchens is perfectly entitled to make this subject public. Telling others about this matter is not a crime!
      Those interested in "wikipolitics" might want to research the Philip Cross affair which has recently been the subject of numerous interesting discussions about the true nature of wikipedia.
      I can still remember the time when wikipedia was largely a bit of fun and it really was a platform on which anyone could edit. Those days are long gone. Some pages are jealously guarded and editing them is impossible. I for one now largely avoid it. John2o2o2o (talk) 14:49, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • You, for one, only have 211 edits in 6 years (at least under this account name) or which only 34 edits (i.e. 16%) are to articles. The bulk of your edits (167, 79%) are to talk pages. So, really, your opinion, as someone who has done little to nothing to improve the encyclopedia, is fairly negligible. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:08, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      I'd better respond to the various claims of 'conflict of interest' now being added on to the Kangaroo charges against me. I am probably the only living person in a position to know my father's actual function aboard HMS Jamaica in December 1943, and so perhaps nobody else could have removed the rather embarrassing claim (which my father and my brother would have hated) that my late father was in command of that fine cruiser at the time. As far as I can remember it was Captain Hughes-Hallett RN. The mistake arose from a misunderstanding of the Naval Rank 'Commander', which does not mean 'Commander of a Ship' (though some Commanders do command ships) . But if this is to be damned as 'conflict of interest', where are we? Nobody without such a 'COI' could have corrected this mistake. Should it then have been left uncorrected? Bizarre. I don't believe any such rule can be , or is consistently applied. As for my supposed crime in writing:' "Nor was there any reason for a complaint to be passed to the police since, as Bishop Bell was dead, he could not be prosecuted and they had no statutory role in the affair. A complaint might as well have been passed to the Fire Brigade or to Tesco', every word in it is absolutely true. But the qualification is only necessary because of the insistence by 'Charles' - who utterly refused to discuss the matter and who is emerging in this discussion as a thoroughly partisan and POV person on the subject of George Bell (would a topic ban be appropriate, do we think?), in retaining the pointless section on the non-calling of the police. One could likewise write, of this current dispute that the United Nations Security Council were not called in. But anyone who understood or knew anything about anything would not write that, and any editor of any sense would remove it. Peter Hitchens logged in as Clockback (talk) 14:09, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

      • Another copy-pasted comment:

      I feel it is now necessary to address the behaviour of 'Charles', and were I not blocked, I would do so. It is quite absurd that I should be muzzled while he faces no criticism at all. I have noted here 1: His refusal to engage with me on the Talk pages except to allege COI against me. 2. His repeated use of pejorative and hostile terminology directed at me and my associates ' loudmouth', 'whitewash', and now 'rant' and Bishop Bell fan club'. I think this amounts to a clear declaration of hostile bias on the subject under discussion. This is made worse, in my view, by the fact that (unlike me) his real identity is not declared and we cannot know what his interest in the issue may be, if any, whereas mine is quite open and undisguised.Those here who are so anxious to condemn me, mainly for mistakenly assuming they possessed senses of humour, are now aware of the behaviour of 'Charles' and cannot therefore ignore it. By *their own standards*, is this really acceptable in someone who boasts of a 'Platinum Star' for his editing? Peter Hitchens, logged in as Clockback (talk) 14:30, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

      • @Endymion.12: what I meant, was that this was his first block. To go from zero blocks straight to indefinite seems excessive to me. (It can of course be warranted, but then you would have do have committed a "wikideadly sin", say Outing, or legal threat, etc. That is not the case here.), Huldra (talk) 22:33, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • @Huldra: Given that they apparently do not understand why they have been blocked, and have refused to acknowledge that they have done anything wrong, I would suggest this block is preventative. They have already filed four unblock requests, each of which has been turned down. Endymion.12 (talk) 23:41, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      This is the final statement from Clockback. Copy-pasted from their talkpage, in response to this diff from Jytdog. Any admin can assess consensus and close this block review, if they wish. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 11:50, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Well, where to begin? I appear now to be on trial for actions many years ago, and for my supposed attitude, though the actual block was my punishment for being foolish enough to ask formally for editorial help in a dispute with 'Charles' who still goes unrebuked for calling me a 'loudmouth', and accusing me of 'rants' 'whitewash' and equally unrebuked for repeatedly ignoring my talk page requests for discussion and his autocratic, unexplained reversions of my explained and well-justified changes, for which I had been arguing on the talk page for more than *two years*. I should have thought my long-stretched patience with him, and my readiness to compromise show clearly that I *do* try to abide by the encyclopaedic spirit . Instead of help I got an *indefinite* block, which cannot possibly, in my view, have followed proper consideration of a dispute that had actually been simmering for more than two years. Perhaps Judge Dredd here has a toothache or an ingrowing toenail, which make his temper short. The fact that I am a newspaper columnist ('someone who is a pundit in the real world')is alleged against me, thus : I am 'treating WP pretty much like treat their real world platforms '.On the first, I freely admit that many years ago, I foolishly attempted to edit the page on 'Attention Deficit Disorder;' so that it reflected the considerable disagreements on the subject and the grave scientific weakness of the case for 'ADD' and its treatment with amphetamines. I may, it is true, have lost patience from time to time. I have learned since then that entries on such issues (and even on less contentious matters too) have guardians who will not allow them to be altered and who have the barrack-room lawyer's close knowledge of the regulations which makes them impossible to fight without an army of supporters and limitless time. I have neither. I learned from this, mainly not to trust any Wikipedia entries on issues of current controversy. But also not to bother. To bring these ancient scuffles up as evidence in this case is plainly absurd. Likewise the ridiculous suggestions that I am seeking to advance my own cause in factual edits to my Wikipedia biography or my late brother's. Oh, honestly. Hilariously, before Judge Block realised who I was he was consumed with fury at me for having described *myself* as having 'sabotaged my own education', in the belief that this was a malicious, destructive edit. Well, he can't have it both ways. It *would* be a malicious edit if an anonymous person who was not me did it. But precisely because I did it, it cannot be. Doesn't this show, that by including material critical of myself in my own biography, that I am not self-seeking here?

      I have a strong belief that most of the faults of the internet are caused by anonymity, and so never hide behind it. I decided, as far as I can recall, from the first that I would say exactly who I was on Wikipedia, as I do everywhere else. If I did not do this, most of the allegations of supposed COI could not be made, because nobody would know. But the implication, that I am so stupid that I cannot tell an encyclopaedia entry from a newspaper column, or vice versa, and that I think I could or should get away with interfering in entries which concern me in a way that suits my case, *while using my own name* is rather insulting. I am just not that thick. Actually almost all my edits on these sites have been tiny factual matters where editors have just git it wrong, and I know from direct personal knowledge that they have. I can't really see that this is a serious breach.

      The George Bell case is, I agree, wholly different. My involvement in it is wholly disinterested, in that I am not a relative of, or a friend of George Bell, or in any way obligated to him personally. It is, however, true, that I have been prominent in a campaign to get justice for him in this case of alleged child abuse . When I say justice, I mean precisely that. If a proper fair tribunal finds him guilty as charged, I shall accept it. If it does not, and there has so far been no such tribunal, then I shall continue to demand that public bodies, newspapers etc treat him as if he is innocent of these charges, as is proper under English law. I understand perfectly that some people will view my involvement in the Wikipedia entry as questionable. That is why I have used the talk page to encourage others to make edits which I regard as essential if the George Bell page is to be accurate . For good or ill I am one of the people who is best-informed about it, and I do not see why i should kepe that knowledge udner a bushel, when i could sue it to ensure a more accurate entry. This would have been a lot easier in the absence of the abusive, unresponsive, uncompromising and openly partisan editor 'Charles'( who as well as calling me a 'loudmouth', describing my work as 'rants' , characterising my efforts to get justice for an unfairly condemned man as a 'whitewash', describing a nonpartisan campaign containing many powerless people. the Revd Giles Fraser, and some other notable left-wingers as 'right-wing' and ' establishment' sneered at a disinterested and highly serious group of people ranging from members of the Chichester cathedral congregation, a group of former choirboys at that cathedral, a former chaplain of George Bell (and decorated naval veteran of World War Two) who, though dying, yet gave testimony in his favour, the daughter of a victim of Hitler helped by Bell, several distinguished academics, a retired judge, a QC and a dissident Labour MP to the former editor of the Daily Telegraph and the Dean of Christ Church as 'The George Bell Fan Club'). I have been most restrained in my interventions. I wish others would take on the task, but most of those involved in the Bell campaign and so knowledgeable enough to do so, have even weaker computer skills than I do, many are even older, and it was left to me. The satirical edit for which I am condemned (though every word of it was true) was never intended to stand, but it was intended to break the deadlock caused by the obduracy of 'Charles'. So it did. But my formal appeal for help got me ....blocked. That'll encourage the others. Well and good, that was a risk I suppose I ran. But it was clearly a ludicrous and hasty over-reaction, and people should stop making up retrospective reasons for it. Peter Hitchens, logged in as Clockback (talk) 15:52, 4 August 2018 (UTC)

      I suppose nobody cares that Calton (who has participated in this discussion, so is not uninvolved) has now hatted the above section, which includes my comment here. What gives Calton the right to go around hatting sections? Nothing is going to surprise me now. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 15:14, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Report

      This appears to be the investigative report mentioned above by Clockback that they seem to want to write about in Wikipedia. I have not read it all but it seems relevant here that it discusses "jounalist Peter Hitchens" on page 25, para. 110; and page 52, para. 204. Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:12, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:COISELF says "If you have a personal connection to a topic . . . you are advised to refrain from editing . . ." Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:24, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      He did refrain from editing. For more than half a year, in fact. The COI guideline does not absolutely disallow editing, but expects that you discuss things on the talkpage. Which he did. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 11:25, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The COI guideline does not give editors with COI any authorization to go ahead and make policy violating edits under any circumstances, to the contrary, it prohibits it. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:59, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Let me ask you something. You make a point about COI guideline saying that editors being advised to refrain from editing directly. I reply to this point. You don't even acknowledge what I said, and go on to make another point, one which I never disputed. Are we talking to the void or having a conversation? Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 13:17, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I thought I had replied to your point, but if it is unclear, your attempt to render null the community consensus in the guideline's various provisions advising/telling/asking/imploring/prohibiting the COI editor not to edit, is irrelevant wikilawyering. It is what should be done, it being a guideline, and that means a COI editor should do it, and 'I am not getting what I want' is not a valid reason for not doing what should be done by the COI editor.Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:36, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      COI stuff

      Let me address the point about COI raised by several people, including the initial blocking admin JzG and Jytdog above:

      1. According to the WP:ANI thread which resulted in Clockback's indef block, JzG wasn't even aware of their identity when they blocked them -- within 15 minutes of their post at ANI -- indefinitely. This means that JzG never even looked at Clockback's userpage (where Clockback self-identifies). Does anyone feel that a summary "sentence" -- in which such basic material facts as the user's self-declared identity weren't considered -- might be a tiny bit problematic? We report, you decide.
      An obvious example of how identity is relevant
      The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

      In particular, if JzG was aware of Clockback's identity, they would not have fingered this edit (cited in their ANI response), as some kind of WP:NOTHERE or "unsourced" and "editorializing" edit. The source includes the quote by Hitchens "[I] made sure I would never get into Oxbridge. It was my own fault". To render this source as "sabotaging his own education" is a perfectly acceptable WP:summary style edit. And why would JzG tell Hitchens what he does or doesn't know about his own actions?

      1. COI was not mentioned in the block rationale. Clockback made 5 unblock requests. None of the admins -- none -- mentioned COI while declining the block.
      2. Now, this new charge of COI has been added to the chargesheet. Why? Supposedly the conduct is so bad that it merits an indef block without any prior warning or discussion? Where is the disruption or imminent disruption?

      I submit that this is a severe case of "bad block". If the COI issue is really important, the proper way to proceed would be to first dispose of this unrelated matter. Hopefully unblock Clockback, and then talk to them or discuss their actions at a noticeboard. See this discussion by Jytdog, for instance. I will only say here that the COI guideline does not directly disallow people from editing the articles. I said above that I can provide tens of examples of editors (including WMF board members, and sitting and past arbitrators) who have violated the COI guideline in this sense. Test me if you want. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 11:09, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Thanks for your response. The general issue, and then the specific one.
      The general point on COI: COI guideline says that -- with a few exceptions -- conflicted editors are strongly discouraged from editing directly. I believe that this notion has fairly broad and deep consensus (there are very vocal dissenters, of course). There is good reason for this guidance and the consensus behind it. When conflicted editors edit directly, they tend to add bad content and tend to behave badly trying to retain it -- edit warring and making tendentious arguments to keep it. Accepting the restraints of the COI management system spares everybody that drama, grounded on an acknowledgement by everybody involved, that a conflict of interest is present, and needs management.
      As a last general matter: I acknowledge that there are cases of glaring COI editing. WP is shot through with garbage content along with good and like any human institution has flaws and hypocrisy in its administration along with good. But I am somewhat dismayed to see you, whom I respect, making an othershitexists argument.
      Now to the specifics: What I tried to emphasize in my vote, is that with Clockback we have someone who is a pundit in the real world who is a) treating WP pretty much like treat their real world platforms and not engaging with the mission of WP and the ways the community has developed to realize it and b) editing about themselves and the issues they punditize about in their RW platforms. The latter is where the formal COI is, but the former is the deeper problem, which the COI only exacerbates.
      The block log says Tendentious and POV editing, including edit warring, inserting opinion as fact and heavily editorialising in articles related to controversial figures.
      In my view that aptly summarizes Clockback's entire career here in WP. It summarizes a) above, and b) above helps explain why Clockback behaves this way. Many people have a hard time seeing the mission clearly and engaging with it and the ways we realize it; conflict of interest makes it yet harder yet for people to clearly see what we do here (and hard to not see WP as a soapbox/platform for promotion). Someone whose real world occupation is writing their opinions will have a very hard time. We should not unblock Clockback until he shows some glimmer of self-awareness about how incorrect his approach to WP has been. (and btw, expressing self-awareness is not "grovelling"; that is, sadly, how many tendentious, indefinitely blocked editors frame this essential part of the community reconciliation process.)
      I'll add that I trust Guy's instincts a great deal. Not perfectly, and I have been on the wrong end of him shooting from the hip. But he has a great sense of whether somebody is fundamentally here to build an encyclopedia or not, and understands that good faith is not a suicide pact. He indefs perhaps quicker than most admins. I have breathed a sigh of relief after many, many of his indefs.
      A question I will turn back to you:
      What evidence do you have that Clockback understands or even cares about a) our mission to create an encyclopedia with articles summarizing accepted knowledge, working in a community of pseudonymous editors, and b) the way the community realizes the mission -- namely by placing authority in reliable sources, not on the opinions or claimed expertise of any editor, and striving to summmarize those sources neutrally? Jytdog (talk) 14:24, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I'm sorry, but I can't help but notice that you didn't address a single point I raised. You say you sympathize with my points. I don't want your sympathy. And you can keep your faith in JzG. I have no interest in such things. Unless you address my points -- all directly relevant to the block -- I'm afraid, there's no use talking.

      Here's a direct question: Does indef blocking a Wikipedia editor, who has been here since 2006, within 15 minutes, without taking into account their self-declared identity, without even checking their userpage, and making at least one demonstrably wrong assertion about their edits, indicate "due diligence" to you?

      And what does COI have to do with anything? That's not what the block was for.

      I promise that if you address my points, I'll address yours, even though I consider COI to be essentially a red herring. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 14:35, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Red herring? You named this section 'COI stuff' --- the account was blocked for non-policy compliant editing over years --- but that there is WP:COI, would be a probable explanation for such an editing pattern. Others think that enough talking with the editor about their problematic editing did occur before the block over those years. Indef does not mean infinite, it means address understanding (and/or formal restraints) for/of issues/pattern/policy, so that the disruption will not re-occur.-- Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:14, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      COI was not the primary reason for blocking, but the edit that triggered the block absolutely was COI (along with many other tihngs) and more than a decade of nothing but COI edits in mainspace is a great reason for not unblocking IMO. Guy (Help!) 15:30, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Kingsindian I am sorry that you feel I didn't address your points. I feel I did. Let me walk it through:
      Your first sentence: I submit that this is a severe case of "bad block".
      I addressed why I thought it was a good block per the block rationale, which in my view accurately summarized what Clockback has been doing in WP. I also discussed the particulars of Guy's blocking style and how this fits with that.
      Your second sentence: If the COI issue is really important, the proper way to proceed would be to first dispose of this unrelated matter.
      I tried to explain that in this matter, COI helps explain Clockback's pattern of behavior, but I very explicitly said in (a) that the fundamental problem is Clockback's lack of engagement with the mission and how we realize it. I even used the little "a" and "b" to try to make the difference clear between the problem "a" and one cause of it "b". I also tried to explain (and I will elaborate here) that COI matters come to the community's attention because of the kind of content conflicted editors tend to generate, and because of how they tend to behave. There are content and behavior problems. These problems can be described without any reference to COI - violating NPOV, adding unsourced content, edit warring, tendentious arguments on talk, etc. These issues can also be addressed at ANI or by admins without any reference to COI. We bring COI into it, because if there is a COI and the person acknowledges it and how it creates problems in this particular environment, they will generally start to behave better and edit better -- the understanding by the conflicted person is essential. COI is a definable, well-understood thing. This can lead to better outcomes for everybody. I try to do the same thing when somebody edits as an advocate and creates bad content and behaves badly -- I try to help them become self-aware of their own passion, so they can self-manage it better. Advocacy is less well-defined in the real world, and much harder for everybody to think about and manage. But again, what calls attention, is the bad content and bad behavior -- the observable, diff-able things they do in WP. These are what were addressed in the block notice for Clockback.
      Your third and fourth sentences: Hopefully unblock Clockback, and then talk to them or discuss their actions at a noticeboard. See this discussion by Jytdog, for instance.
      I directly addressed this and said that the block rationale was solid, and Clockback should not be unblocked until he shows self-awareness that he has been using his editing privileges incorrectly - namely as an extension of how he writes in his columns and blogs without regard for WP's mission and the methods by which we realize it. He seems to be unaware (and unconcerned) with what we do here and how we do it.
      Your fifth sentence: I will only say here that the COI guideline does not directly disallow people from editing the articles.
      I directly addressed this.
      Your sixth sentence: I said above that I can provide tens of examples of editors (including WMF board members, and sitting and past arbitrators) who have violated the COI guideline in this sense. Test me if you want.
      I directly addressed this.
      So... ? I do not agree with you, but I did try to speak to everything that you raised. I did try. Jytdog (talk) 15:52, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Jytdog@ It should be pointed out that [39] would be inappropriate whoever added it. To say that someone "sabotaged" their education would require robust sourcing even knowing that it was added by the subject. This had no source. Guy (Help!) 15:18, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      @Jytdog: My points are numbered. There is a big chunk of text before the "first sentence". Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 15:55, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      I'm sorry let me directly address them as well.
      1) you wrote:According to the WP:ANI thread which resulted in Clockback's indef block, JzG wasn't even aware of their identity when they blocked them -- within 15 minutes of their post at ANI -- indefinitely. This means that JzG never even looked at Clockback's userpage (where Clockback self-identifies). Does anyone feel that a summary "sentence" -- in which such basic material facts as the user's self-declared identity weren't considered -- might be a tiny bit problematic? We report, you decide.
      As I noted, the problem was Clockback's pattern of observable behavior. Those who are in the "content not contributor" camp and oppose addressing COI matters much if ever, should be delighted that this was based solely on diff-able observable behavior without regard for who this person is. Unmanaged COI has been (as I have now said twice) a cause of the behavior, but the problem is a deeper lack of engagement with what we do and how we do it. See discussion above about what calls our attention to APPARENTCOI in the first place -- observable, diff-able behavior.
      1a) You wrote "In particular, if JzG was aware of Clockback's identity, they would not have fingered this edit (cited in their ANI response), as some kind of WP:NOTHERE or "unsourced" and "editorializing" edit. The source includes the quote by Hitchens "[I] made sure I would never get into Oxbridge. It was my own fault". To render this source as "sabotaging his own education" is a perfectly acceptable WP:summary style edit. And why would JzG tell Hitchens what he does or doesn't know about his own actions?"
      I really didn't want to respond to this (which is why I haven't so far) but now that that I am, I will say "Jesus fucking christ." Think about that last sentence. So you would give people who verify their identities more authority here in WP than other editors? Shall we also give company reps more authority? Shall we just hang up our hats and call this "PRopedia"? What the hell? (first question is real; last three are rhetorical)
      Calming down, and dealing with the ref and the edit -- did you look at what else he did in that diff? Look at the block of text that includes "as part of the group of reporters accompanying Margaret Thatcher After witnessing the collapse of the Communist regimes in Czechoslovakia and Romania". There is unsourced autobiographical writing. Not OK here.
      With regard to the bit that you pull about "sabotage", yes that does have some support in the source and Guy was incorrect about it being unsourced; that is a valid "gotcha". However, that phrase is something that should catch anybody's eye as "color" in a BLP article and does call for examination. Looking at the source -- there is an intentionality to "sabotage" that is not necessarily present in the quote. Fucking up in a way that turns out to have longterm consequences (as passionate young people often do), and owning the fuckup and its consequences, is not the same as intentional destruction i.e. "sabotage". A lot depends on what "Made sure I would never get into Oxbridge" actually meant in that conversation. To resolve which it is, would require discussion and looking at what other sources say about it.
      2) you wrote:COI was not mentioned in the block rationale. Clockback made 5 unblock requests. None of the admins -- none -- mentioned COI while declining the block.
      As I noted, the problem was Clockback's pattern of observable behavior. It is appropriate that COI was not discussed.
      3) you wrote:Now, this new charge of COI has been added to the chargesheet. Why? Supposedly the conduct is so bad that it merits an indef block without any prior warning or discussion? Where is the disruption or imminent disruption?
      As I already have written, it is not so much a "charge" as everybody going "yep that explains some of the behavior" and "yep unmanaged COI is a problem". I have consistently been trying to separate out the long term behavior and the underlying lack of engagement with the mission and how we realize it, from this cause of the behavior. I am starting to feel like I am repeating that too much. gah.
      I have written too much but I just want to end the same way I ended my !vote. Clockback has not shown they understand what we do here nor how we do it. It is a WP:NOT problem -- It is fundamentally a SOAP thing. Jytdog (talk) 17:11, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      @Jytdog: I will go back-and-forth (once or twice max.) with your reply to my points (just to clarify the points). After that, as I promised, I will reply to your own points. Feel free to end the conversation any time, but let me know if you do.

      Let me make a general point first. Perhaps I am unfair, but it seems to me that you're trying to find reasons as to why your position is the right one. That is not the correct way of evaluating hypotheses. So, if one is in a Bayesian model, one can have a prior (say, "JzG is usually right about COI or indef blocks, so this block is good with probability 90%."), but must be willing to update it. I don't see any updating at all here: you may concede a point here or there, but ultimately, you change no positions. None. That's not really an argument; that's just providing justifications -- what theologians call "apologetics". Sophisticated theologians can construct quite elaborate apologias.

      Let's be specific now. When you say Those who are in the "content not contributor" camp and oppose addressing COI matters much if ever who do you mean? Do you mean me? I never said or implied anything even remotely like this. So why construct this elaborate strawman? Could it be that you're trying to find reasons for justifying the block, and and not updating the probability of the hypothesis "the block was made improperly"? Again, I'm telling you how it looks to me. It looks like apologetics.

      Let me make a simple assertion: The identity of Clockback was indeed relevant to his editing. Everyone in this discussion agrees with this assertion. Indeed, people are now insisting that his identity is hugely relevant to the matter, because "COI! COI! COI!". So how could it not have been relevant when he was blocked? It follows directly that a basic, material fact was disregarded before passing this summary "sentence" of indef block. As far as I can determine, you never challenge this simple point. This is evidence for the hypothesis "the block was made improperly". You seem to disregard this. Apologetics.

      Let's look at the "diff-able" behavior. It is not me that "pulled the bit" about "sabotage"; it was JzG. You concede that I am largely correct about the matter. Ok: more evidence for the hypothesis "the block was made improperly". But you quickly move over this concession and try to find other evidence -- which JzG doesn't cite -- for the hypothesis "the block was made properly". Apologetics.

      Lastly, you read my sentence: "none of the admins ever mention anything about COI while declining unblock". You read it, acknowledge it, and skip right over it. No updating anywhere. Apologetics.

      Ok, you decide if I'm being fair. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 17:50, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Thanks for your reply. I think smaller bites might be helpful.
      Is ~think~ you are perhaps asking "was the original indef valid?" and the answer you are hearing is "based on my evaluation of this person's behavior, the indef is fine".... and that is not answering your question. Is that correct? Jytdog (talk) 18:02, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I made several points. My first point was about irregularities in the original block. And I was pointing out that because of the irregularities, COI was not and could not be a factor in the block. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 18:25, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Yes you made many points. Hence "smaller bites". This was the first small bite. Which you did not make clear and instead smooshed over and brought up other unclear points. The broad conversation isn't working and a step by step one isn't working, so I don't know how to proceed with you. Jytdog (talk) 13:30, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      @Jytdog: Yes, I was directly responding to a request for a "smaller bite". You asked me to clarify what you ~think~ I'm asking. I told you what I'm asking. I actually did it once above. Here, I'll restate it for you (in the form of a direct question): "Do you think that it was proper to indef block an editor, who has been here since 2006, within 15 minutes, without even looking at their userpage, without even knowing their self-declared identity? And that one of the two diffs cited while blocking was a misreading (at best) of the source."

      Every word of what I said above is true. What I have an issue is that you acknowledge these facts -- plainly relevant -- and skip over them to try to find other reasons for the block. But you are still taking the validity of the block as a given, and never seriously consider the possibility that the original indef, when riddled with this many irregularities, could be wrong.

      Again, to take the Bayesian analogy, you never update the hypothesis in the face of the given evidence -- cited by the blocker, not me -- and instead try to search for more evidence in favour of the hypothesis. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 14:14, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      A simple question to Jytdog, JzG and others who claim that COI is the real issue here. There is a big schizophrenia in this thread. On the one hand, there are people (to pick Ca2james's comment as a random example, also every admin who responded to the unblock request, also Swarm), who claim that this whole drama could have been avoided if Clockback weren't so damn stubborn and unrepentant, and if only he acknowledged that their edit (about the Tesco and Fire brigade) was improper, he cou aould have been unblocked. This is accompanied by the intonation: "indefinite is not infinite". On the other hand, you have JzG and Jytdog claiming (and people agreeing with them), that the "real problem" is the long COI record, and thus he shouldn't be unblocked because he has and will engage in COI.

      I submit that the latter is simply rationalization after the fact (I have given proof of it above, and won't repeat it here). The former is wrong because Clockback has already accepted my rewrite; all he wanted from the start was impartial eyes on the article, because he was making no headway in the talkpage discussion. Instead, he got a kick in the face from JzG. I do not support his edit-warring -- but the conduct deserves pity, not contempt. Also, see this comment by Clockback. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 05:14, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      How many times do I have to explain this? The original block was for WP:TE/WP:DE/WP:EW (and WP:POINT, frankly, and possibly WP:CIR, certainly WP:NPOV, WP:V, WP:RS), the block review that you instigated has shown that in addition to being tendentious and disruptive, all this user's edits for the past decade are also WP:COI, despite numerous past warnings, and many are WP:PROMO. This is a user who simply does not accept our COI policy and who views his opinion as ineffable truth (m:MPOV). Add WP:NPA and (of course!) WP:NCR, leading to TPA removal, and I am left thinking that the only reason for unblocking at this point would be for comedy value, to see if he can collect the full set of policy violations before the next inevitable block. Guy (Help!) 12:55, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Nice series of blue-links you have thrown there. Considering that you were demonstrably wrong on one of the two diffs you cited in your block, I wouldn't crow too much about WP:CIR. As for the claim that it's only a matter of time before the next "inevitable block", clearly, Wikipedia administration is completely useless, since Clockback has never been blocked before. Indeed, an undeclared probably paid/COI editor merrily edited Education Policy Institute and never bothered to even post on the talkpage, while Clockback did discuss the matter extensively on the talkpage. Now Clockback is indef blocked while nobody gives a fuck about COI. Out of sight, out of mind. Nice work. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 13:29, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      We're done here. Guy (Help!) 15:02, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      User:Kingsindian, ok, the small bite. The block. So Guy's statement at ANI, in its entirety, was "I have blocked Clockback (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) based on a review of contributions, which skew heavily towards highly biased editorialising e.g. "sabotaging his own education" and "Nor was there any reason for a complaint to be passed to the police since, as Bishop Bell was dead, he could not be prosecuted and they had no statutory role in the affair. A complaint might as well have been passed to the Fire Brigade or to Tesco". This looks like a case of WP:NOTHERE, WP:RGW and m:MPOV. Undoubtedly WP:TE, and the opinions are unsourced." at 08:24. That was a response to Clockback's OP made at 08:09. I've already quoted the block notice made at 08:21 (this is where you got the "15 minute review" thing) but will do it again here: Tendentious and POV editing, including edit warring, inserting opinion as fact and heavily editorialising in articles related to controversial figures.
      So. you have accurately pointed out that the last sentence of the ANI statement is only half-correct (one of the two, was unsourced). Guy cited two examples. I do not believe that these were meant to be exhaustive, but rather examples. Anybody can click through large edits in Clockback's contribs and find those and the others and reach the same conclusion that Guy did, as expressed (with an error) in his ANI note or his block note, each of which focus on Clockback's lack of engagement with the mission and how we realize it. Without considering who he is.
      So I find the initial indef very valid. I figured since 2015 that this is where he would end up. That is my actual a priori here... based on my own past interactions with him and having considered his contribs before. If it ever would come to a drama board, he would not survive. Too many bad edits, too ignorant, too arrogant. (I always find it so weird and kind of sad when intellectuals make a bunch of drama about losing editing privileges when they have obviously not spent any time trying to understand what has made WP possible and write things that are just ...silly, yet said with such gravity.)
      Now, in addition you seem to be saying that Guy's analysis of Clockback's contributions would have reached a different conclusion, if Guy had taken Clockback's identity into account.
      I have a sense that you (and some others who have !voted to unblock as well) want to cut much more slack to people who come here who want to edit about themselves, especially if they do it under their real name. Be somehow more simple and gentle about things; smoothing over rough spots where they get caught and then kind of scooting them on their way. Like one would do with a child. If that is where you are coming from, part of me finds that lovely. And (if that is correct) there is something good there about not taking this whole thing too seriously. Is that at all accurate? Jytdog (talk) 03:53, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      @Jytdog: Thanks for answering my direct question. In your opinion, JzG's block rationale was not supposed to be exhaustive, just illustrative of something fundamentally wrong with Clockback's editing. JzG sensed something was wrong, but they couldn't pinpoint it since they didn't know Clockback's identity. JzG themselves says roughly the same thing. Please let me know if I've misunderstood you. Ok, let's take this position seriously, and address it. And this reply will address your initial points as well.

      For just a moment, consider the following hypothesis seriously: "Clockback is in the 95th percentile of COI editors. His edits are restrained, largely justified, largely beneficial to the encyclopedia, and any harm they did is minimal." You may recoil with horror: "WTF Kingsindian? Are you mad?". Well, I am indeed mad, but am I right? Let's apply Cromwell's rule.

      For evaluating such a hypothesis, one needs to look at all the evidence, not scattered diffs. And then we update the hypothesis accordingly. Space does not permit me to offer a full accounting, but here's what I'll do: I'll take three articles which Clockback edited, and look at all the edits they made to the article, as well the edits they made to the talkpage. Note that these are the articles which JzG and Jytdog themselves cited, so I am taking the hardest possible sample.

      Article 1: Education Policy Institute: This was the state of the article before Clockback edited it. It was largely written by, as I mentioned above, a likely paid/COI editor. JzG seems to have indef blocked the editor after I pointed it out, but that was never my point. Clockback pointed out on the talkpage that the article nowhere mentions the link between this organization and the Liberal Democrats. They discussed this matter on the talkpage. This information is present in the lead of the article now. I count this a clear case of WP:HERE.

      Article 2: Peter Hitchens The edits to this article go back a long way. I will only look at the edits post-2009 -- namely those discussed in Talk:Peter Hitchens/Archive 4 and Talk:Peter_Hitchens. I count at least > 90% support for my hypothesis. Let's take a look.

      Examination of talkpage edits
      The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
      • This section: As far as I can see, Clockback is > 95% right. And they thanked the editor who fixed the problem. No issues.
      • This section: Clockback is entirely correct. Another editor implemented the suggestion. Clockback thanked them. No issues.
      • This section is trivial and no importance.
      • This section is WP:FORUM thread started by some random editor, and is of no importance. It is largely civil.
      • This section is entirely correct. We discourage such cases of "Jew-tagging" on Wikipedia.
      • This section. Hitchens is, let's say, at least 80% correct. All good-faith arguments. No issues that I can see.
      • This section is complicated. I think we can all agree with the assertion: "The Peter Hitchens article is improved if there's a photo there". Clockback went to great lengths to try to achieve this end, and it was finally met, albeit after lots of teeth-gnashing. See also, this section, where editor Maproom helped them out by cropping the photo. At least a few of Clockback's edits were improper. This was due to frustration with WP bureaucracy, which does not excuse it, but mitigates it. Here's the main thing. The edits improved the article, and did minimal harm. I count this > 50% WP:HERE.
      • This section is purely discussion with the editor and Jytdog. I see no direct effect on the article, so it's hard to judge. It's probably best if I simply don't comment on this.

      Now to article space:

      Article space edits
      The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

      First, a general comment. I count 21 edits by Hitchens in the past 500 edits. This means that to an overwhelming extent the article does not have any kind of spin that Hitchens themselves put on it. It is largely written by other, independent editors.

      Now specific edits. I can't look at all 21 edits (this reply is already too long), so here's what I'll do. I'll look at the 1st, 6th, 11th, 16th and 21st edit.

      • 1st Simple date correction. Entirely proper.
      • 6th This is the edit JzG cited. As I mentioned, JzG was > 90% wrong about this.
      • 11th Simple correction. Entirely proper.
      • 16th Bad edit. Jytdog calls this as a "temper tantrum". I have discussed this case just above (see the discussion about the photo).
      • 21st Simple edit, add photo. Entirely proper.

      Article 3: George Bell (bishop)

      Then let's consider the administrators who have a grudge against certain editors. If there's an SPI page in existence they will ensure it's protected so that accused editors cannot respond to the (usually ludicrous) charges filed against them. Or they set up a spurious "Long-term abuse" page containing allegations which would win the Booker Prize for fiction which is semi-protected for the same reason. These pages are supposed to be vetted before being placed in project space but they don't bother. On one particular page, which seems to crop up regularly, the first charge on the rap sheet begins "Alice has a long history with Bob. She routinely edit wars with Bob." A frequent cause of edit wars is that one party is attempting to promote his/her beliefs by adding unsourced content to articles. When the cruft is removed (s)he gets upset. The grudge-bearing administrators harass Alice by omitting to include the diffs which show that this is exactly what Bob is doing. 2A00:23C1:3180:6501:A49F:A732:3779:9BB8 (talk) 12:45, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      I always bend over backwards to WP:AGF but sometimes it's very difficult.

      ian.thomson's link actually says "we can cut some serious slack to administrators who are doing the good work of defending us from nonsense." The phrase "Give him enough rope ..." comes to mind. ian.thomson claims that this

      Has anyone before ever deleted Jimbo's posts from his own talk page?

      This happened yesterday, according to Special:Permalink/847736372#Mojoworker is inserting false information into articles. 92.8.219.247 (talk) 07:19, 28 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7F:BE3D:8000:4D6D:DF9B:7DC8:9B20 (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.24.109.21 (talk) [reply]

      consists of "legal threats", as was noted here:

      Is using a pre-populated edit summary "making legal threats"?

      Not one legal threat, note, a whole host of them. ian.thomson evidently thinks so (check his public log for 14:52 today, Thursday 28 June 2018).

      - 188.220.40.41 18:36, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

      Can somebody restore Clockback's user talkpage access?

      There is a strong consensus that the talk page access removal is endorsed. Alex Shih (talk) 10:28, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      I told Clockback that he can respond to the points raised here on his talkpage, and I'll transfer them here. It's somewhat tedious, but working. I have done this process before with other blocked users. For some reason admin Jpgordon has swooped in and removed talkpage access. They are not responding to messages, so I suspect they're offline. Can some admin restore Clockback's talkpage access? It hurts nobody and makes this process fairer. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 19:22, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      • Endorse TPA removal. If jpgordon hadn't removed TPA, I would have. The discussion there was not productive and Clockback had taken to canvassing for support on the above discussion. They may use UTRS. 331dot (talk) 19:27, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      You want to remove talk page access in the middle of a block review? Why? What possible justification could it have? Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 19:49, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      I'd say that the discussion above seems pretty clear in terms of a result and the reason for it. 331dot (talk) 19:55, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Who are you to prematurely close the discussion? Nobody died and made you king. Ridiculous. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 20:27, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      I am flabbergasted, frankly at the amount of correspondence this issue has generated. The individual who has been blocked (from his own talkpage) has revealed his identity as Peter Hitchens. Mr Hitchens is, and has been for many years a well known and respected journalist in the British media.

      The arrogance of anonymous admins such as "331dot" and "jpgordon" is frankly staggering. Have you people nothing better to do than bully other users? Mr Hitchens is perfectly entitled to talk to others about issues affecting his life and you have no right of any kind to prevent him from doing so. What are you people? Some sort of Orwellian thought police brigade?! What moral right do you have to dictate to other users of this platform? I disagree with you 331dot. Are you able to handle that? Can you bear to have others disagree with your position? (That is a rhetorical question).

      This episode, to my mind highlights a very big flaw in the functioning of wikipedia. Namely, that certain users who have an elevated status: "admins" are able to act without impunity. I believe that in order for wikipedia to work effectively, these individuals must be subject to some sort of public accountability. Perhaps the elevation to admin status should be accompanied by a requirement for them to reveal their true identities (as Mr Hitchens has done) in order for others to hold them truly accountable. They should not be able to simply hide in a cowardly fashion behind their aliases and bully other users. John2o2o2o (talk) 20:13, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Jpgordon isn't anonymous. He's J P Gordon. DrKay (talk) 20:20, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      John2o2o2o You are certainly entitled to your views. I am perfectly capable of handling disagreement, that isn't the issue here. 331dot (talk) 20:26, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Who are you "331dot"? And thank you, but I don't need your permission to express a viewpoint.
      Mr Hitchens is also entitled to his views. You should immediately restore his access to his page and leave him alone. In my humble opinion. And the issue at hand here is the high handed actions of "admins".
      Furthermore, I have never heard of J P Gordon. Perhaps you would like to explain to me (and again this is a rhetorical question, not requiring an answer) in what area of public life J P Gordon (whoever he or she is) has any power or authority over Mr Hitchens? John2o2o2o (talk) 20:38, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Odd that you (213 edits in 6 years), of all people, should question the bon fides of 331dot (admin, 73,070 edits in 6 years) and jpgordon (admin, checkuser, 62,984 edits in 14 years). What the hell have you ever done in the service of Wikipedia? The most you've ever edited an article was 4 edits to Ancestry of Elizabeth II. It appears that all you really do is chat on talk pages (78.4% of your total), where you like to present your own opinions as an "professional genealogist" as being more reliable than reliable published sources, claiming you discovered facts before the first published mention of them, and failing to give your sources when asked to (i.e. [40], [41], [42], [43]) Other editors can make their own assessment of what that makes you, except, at the very least, it makes you someone who is not at all conversant with Wikipedia policy, and really has no place at the table for this discussion, because, frankly, you don't know what you're talking about. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:11, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I wasn't granting permission; my permission is irrelevant. 331dot (talk) 20:41, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • @John2o2o2o: See my reply to 185.192.69.53. People are allowed to think whatever they want. Outside of wikipedia, they are allowed to say whatever they want within the bounds of law and if wherever they are saying it allows it. On wikipedia, the primary purpose of discussion is to improve wikipedia. There is some limited tolerance of other discussion but it's inherently limited and any discussion which harms wikipedia is not welcome. Notably we consider that it's harmful to use your talkpage when blocked for anything other than requesting an unblock which includes responded to any unblock discussion but does not include canvassing others to help you get unblocked. In fact canvassing is a more harmful use of you talk page than a lot of other nonsense that goes on on blocked editor's talk pages. (Canvassing is harmful regardless of whether you're blocked.) Note that as I said below, I have no specific opinion on anything that went on here. Actually what I said to 185 still applies. I have not looked at the specifics and frankly probably won't be doing so. I am simply dealing with your apparent belief that wikipedia is a free for all where people can talk about whatever they want. It isn't. In the modern age, there are so many forums and social media, plus the easy ability to start a blog or website where people can do that stuff. And as I understand it, the subject is a journalist anyway likely giving them even more avenues. Nil Einne (talk) 21:45, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Jpgordon removed talkpage access and immediately went offline, leaving no response to messages. What kind of WP:ADMINACCT is this? On these grounds alone, the action should be reversed. This whole matter is bringing out the absolute worst in Wikipedia. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 20:44, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Admins or any user are not required to be on Wikipedia 24/7. People have lives and are all volunteers here. 331dot (talk) 20:46, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Nobody asked them to be on 24/7. However, if they have to leave, they should at least have the decency to not take admin actions at the last moment, actions which directly impede an ongoing discussion. It's rather sad that I have to explain this to you. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 20:51, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      If we required admins to be online for several hours or more after their actions, we would surely have a lot of problems because things simply aren't being done. It's entirely reasonable for an admin to take non contentious actions just before they expect to go offline, and it surely happens many times every single day. I agree it can be problematic when an admin takes some contentious action and then is offline for a prolonged period although speaking generally, it's easy to see it's not always going to be obvious when an action is contentious. Nil Einne (talk) 21:10, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      They left less than 15 minutes after, not "several hours" after. And are you saying that removing talkpage access in the middle of a block review is an example of a "non-contentious action"? Meanwhile, here's what WP:ADMINACCT says: Administrators are expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their Wikipedia-related conduct and administrator actions and to justify them when needed. They could have posted in this thread to say that they're leaving, and maybe someone else could have handled it. A hundred things could have been done. I'm rather stunned that people are defending this behaviour. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 21:17, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      15 minutes or a few hours is largely besides the point. Ultimately if someone is not online for a few hours, there's no guarantee they are going to be online to deal with any fall out. Even a few hours doesn't guarantee it although if it takes a few hours for anyone to notice there's a reasonable chance it's not that important that timely action results. Do you not understand what 'speaking generally' means? In case it's still unclear I have no specific comments on the specific actions here. They are completely besides my point. I was simply replying to obvious nonsense suggesting something which would be extremely harmful to wikipedia namely that admins should not take action unless they expect to be online to deal with any fallout. This is clearly utter nonsense and I can't believe anyone would actually say that. And let me repeat for the last time, I have no specific comments on what happened here. They are entirely besides my point. I only wished to deal with utter nonsense express on AN suggesting something which would be incredibly harmful to wikipedia. If a page clearly needs to be protecting because of persistent proxy vandalism, or a non proxy vandal is going on a vandalism spree or whatever other nonsense that clearly requires quick admin action, I should not have to waste my time finding an admin who is going to be online in 15 minutes or whatever the fuck time period someone thinks is necessary. And yes this is a big deal to me because I live in NZ and at certain times of editing, somewhat less in than in the past but it still happens, there are a lot fewer admins around. And I don't like wasting my time dicking around with IRC or whatever the fuck you think I should waste my time dicking around to find an admin to take action who is going to be around for however the fuck you think they should be to take action which anyone who has spent any time on wikipedia knows is needed and does not need someone to hang around for. Nil Einne (talk) 21:31, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Related: UTRS appeal #22275. SQLQuery me! 21:49, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Any admin who wants to is welcome to restore the user page access. I know nothing whatsoever of this conflict other than what I was drawn to as a result of the request for unblock. Just like his unblock requests, the verbiage on his talk page did not seem to be addressing the reasons for his block, and did not seem to me to be going in a useful direction. As far as "who is jpgordon", well, I'm probably one of the least anonymous editors on Wikipedia; I've been entirely public in my networked life since the early days of usenet and BBSing. But that's meaningless here. The question is asked, "in what area of public life J P Gordon (whoever he or she is) has any power or authority over Mr Hitchens?" That's easy. I'm one of 1,211 administrators on Wikipedia, and, like each of us could, I exerted blocking authority regarding the Wikipedia user account identified as User:Clockback, with the intent of reducing disruption to Wikipedia. Obviously it has failed in this instance; the disruption instead increased. Oh well. --jpgordon𝄢𝄆 𝄐𝄇 22:29, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Well you shouldn't have jumped in should you. No one cares if your anonomous or not or who you are you are a wikipedia admin and should adhere to standards for that. Your comments are exactly similar to the blocking admins claim , ow, I didnt know anything I just blocked , I just removed talkpage access - laughable that our admins are aware of so little what is going on and that they use tools we provide them and trust them with without checking what the full picture is. Sadly, I am fully aware that Gordon and Guy are both really smart fully aware experianced editors and know exactly what is going on and it would do them and us a service if they both admitted that. Govindaharihari (talk) 22:37, 4 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • There is no "standard" or policy which requires admins to be available around the clock, regardless of what action they have taken. Please take a look at WP:ADMINACCT to see in what ways admins are accountable for their actions. Jpgordon removed Clockback's TPA at 14:15, 4 August 2018, posted about it on Clockback's talk page, and then went offline. Their very first edit once they returned online is the one you see a few comments above this one, explaining their action. That is the very definition of administrator accountability. Your complaints are totally without merit, as are Kingsindian's, and you both need to calm down and stop bloviating. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:23, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support restoring talk page access: I think his talk page access should be restored. I understand his behaviour was disruptive but the community needs to be able to consider any further comments for evidence of remorse/regret and willingness to change.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 00:27, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • I don’t think allowing him temporary talk page access for one or two days while this unblock request is in process is a big drain on the community. My line of thinking is that talk page access is necessary, or at least helpful, in the hope he could reflect on himself and realise that needs to and will stop being a WP:DICK and be able to voice this to the community who are voting on whether to unblock him. I realise that it is bit of a long shot but he deserves that chance to prove himself to be a long-term benefit or negative editor.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 03:35, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • He'll almost certainly get temporary talk-page access back at some point. If the community endorses the indef block -- as it certainly seems it will -- the block then become a community ban. If and when Clockback appeals that ban, some admin will likely restore TPA so his appeal can be copied over. Under normal circumstances, they might even unblock him to participate in the appeal directly -- but in this case, that's quite unlikely to happen, given Clockback's behavior after the indef block; I don;t think even the AGF-ingest admin would trust him with that license. Beyond My Ken (talk) 07:38, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse TPA removal - Clockback was using the talk page to file frivolous unblock requests which blamed other for his block, and did not address the reasons he was blocked. Further, he was also using it for WP:POLEMIC purposes. The primary -- if not only --- purpose of a talk page to a blocked editor is to deal with getting unblocked, but Clockback showed by his actions that he did not take that seriously. Hence the removal of TPA is appropriate and should be continued. Clockback can pursue an unblock via UTRS. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:34, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse TPA removal - finally; I already mentioned above that I'm surprised that this hasn't happened sooner. If this editor was not related to the famous Christopher Hitchens, this would have been done a long time ago. They had enough time to violate WP:NOTTHEM multiple times, hadn't read a single policy, guideline or essay linked to them (WP:GAB, WP:COI, WP:FREESPEECH, WP:MEAT - those first came to mind, surely there are others), made several frivolous unblock requests and yet they were still pushing their PoV on the talk page, saying that the block was unfair. And - as the icing on the cake - some editors even supported their unblock request. It would be funny, if it weren't so sad. byteflush Talk 00:49, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • People are missing the entire point of why this talk page removal is bad. I told Clockback that he could respond to stuff written here on his talkpage, and I will transfer it over. I have been doing this, as I have done so for other block reviews for other blocked users I have carried out in the past. When Jpgordon says that he saw lots of "verbiage", this is what he saw. What possible disruption is so huge that it couldn't wait till this review is over? As for people claiming that he was disrupting by opening unblock requests, that is also false. The last request was when Jpgordon declined it, and Clockback opened no more unblock requests before this wholly unjustified action by Jpgordon. What is wrong with you people? Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 04:47, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Did I say anything like this? I was giving explanation of why Jpgordon was seeing "verbiage" on the talkpage -- this is because I told Clockback that he could respond to claims here (this is completely standard practice). Jpgordon himself has taken the position of "I have very little familiarity with the whole matter, so please excuse me if I stepped on some toes". And I'm not allowed to give him context so that they may change their mind? Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 06:08, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      But much of that "verbiage" was not relevant to his being unblocked, and was, in fact, attacks on other editors - like all the stuff about "Charles". You really should not have copied it over, since by doing so you gave heightened visibility to those attacks. It was also a mistake on your part, since that stuff just made him look worse. Beyond My Ken (talk) 07:32, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      He was responding to an AN thread. So of course there would be comments on editors. That is the whole purpose of an AN thread. To discuss user conduct. If I had a dime for every personal attack made at ANI, I would never need to work a day in my life. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 07:41, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      If you are, as you state in the edit summary, tearing your hair out, you are too invested in this matter. 331dot (talk) 07:52, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse TPA removal. When consensus is against you, and you have to say "What is wrong with you people?", it might be time to also ask "Am I really in the right on this?" - and perhaps "Am I helping X, or hurting them?". I don't have a whole lot of sympathy for someone canvassing off-wiki, nor can I see much reason to re-instate access to someone whom causes plenty of disruption here without access. SQLQuery me! 05:29, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse TPA removal. Entirely within policy and justified under the circumstances. DrKay (talk) 07:19, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse TPA removal, unless I somehow missed that WP:NPA is now optional. Max Semenik (talk) 08:38, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Endorse TPA removal He was wasting everyone's time, and frankly, providing even MORE justification for the indefinite block. Why Kingsindian is choosing this particular hill to die on is beyond me. --Calton | Talk 09:30, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Why these comments about "dying on this hill" or "I'm too invested"? I'm still alive, and I am not aware of having broken any policy. I am quite calm in real life, rest assured. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 09:56, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      AE block appeal

      I have been blocked for a period of 72 hours for allegedly violating WP:1RR. Even though I haven't been blocked previously, I was handed a three day block while other users have recently been given lenient blocks of just 24 hours. Firstly, the user that reported me has been making reverts on the same Human rights abuses in Kashmir article himself, that too without engaging on the talk page and I am the one being blocked. The blocking admin didn't even wait to hear from me. The first diff reported was a revert from 28 July. The second diff reported was actually an edit that I made on 2 August and not a revert. The third diff reported is the ONLY revert that I made on 2 August that too when the reporting user had reverted me. Now if both me and the reporting user made a revert on 2 August, how does that violate WP:1RR and why I'm the only one being blocked? This was simply a content dispute where the reporting user never engaged in a discussion but the admin decides to block me without a violation of 1 revert per 24 hours even occuring. Son of Kolachi (talk) 14:13, 3 August 2018 (UTC) Copied from [44] --NeilN talk to me 14:23, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Revert 1, Revert 2. I typically block for 72 hours for first time violations when doing AE WP:1RR blocks. --NeilN talk to me 14:30, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Clearly edit warring over time, but I don't see that they were ever notified that there was a 1RR restriction in force. They attempted to discuss on talk, but weren't able to bring in enough people to establish a consensus in either direction. I'd support a reduction, or even time served. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:39, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      @SarekOfVulcan: They were notified of DS and the article has the proper edit notice. --NeilN talk to me 14:52, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Ah, I see the editnotice now, thanks, and their edits aren't tagged as mobile, so objection withdrawn. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:58, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Decline unblock Normally, I would grant an unblock request for two reasons 1) the block was genuinely in error or against policy or 2) the person in question cops to what they did, and convincingly argues they intend to play by the rules. The diffs above show the block was justified; 1RR was clearly violated. The person's response show no indication of culpability, it's all deflection onto the actions of others. For that reason, I cannot support an early unblock at this time. --Jayron32 18:25, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      • Decline both edits are reverts, the first one removes some text which was recently added to the article by someone else and the second is a reinstatement of the first edit. That there's discussion on the talk page is not an excuse for edit warring. I don't see any evidence anyone else has recently violated 1RR on this article (the "other user" mentioned only made one revert) and even if they had that would not be a reason to lift the block. Hut 8.5 19:46, 3 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      Administrators' newsletter – August 2018

      News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2018).

      Administrator changes

      added Sro23
      readded KaisaL • Ymblanter

      Guideline and policy news

      • After a discussion at Meta, a new user group called "interface administrators" (formerly "technical administrator") has been created. Come the end of August, interface admins will be the only users able to edit site-wide JavaScript and CSS pages like MediaWiki:Common.js and MediaWiki:Common.css, or edit other user's personal JavaScript and CSS. The intention is to improve security and privacy by reducing the number of accounts which could be used to compromise the site or another user's account through malicious code. The new user group can be assigned and revoked by bureaucrats. Discussion is ongoing to establish details for implementing the group on the English Wikipedia.
      • Following a request for comment, the WP:SISTER style guideline now states that in the mainspace, interwiki links to Wikinews should only be made as per the external links guideline. This generally means that within the body of an article, you should not link to Wikinews about a particular event that is only a part of the larger topic. Wikinews links in "external links" sections can be used where helpful, but not automatically if an equivalent article from a reliable news outlet could be linked in the same manner.

      Technical news

      Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:31, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      "Pending review"

      Fixed. --TheSandDoctor Talk 04:23, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Could someone enlighten me as to why my recent change to Chuckle Brothers ([45]) is deemed by the software to be subject to "pending review"? I'm assuming it's some technical glitch, though I don't know which technical board to go to to ask about it. Thanks. PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 11:38, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      It was caused by a "pileup": an IP's edit needed confirmation, and this affected all succeeding edits. Should be fixed now. Favonian (talk) 11:55, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      OK, thanks. Does this usually happen after one edit that needs review? I'm sure I've edited after such edits before, without this occurring. PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 12:04, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      AFAIK, yes. Favonian (talk) 12:10, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Yes, it must happen. The idea is that someone must approve the IP edit or take action such as revert, and this is why all subsequent edits are marked as not reviewed until the action has been taken.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:31, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Request Move

      Done by Beyond My Ken --TheSandDoctor Talk 04:24, 6 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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

      Can someone move this page pls, see talk (page already exists). prokaryotes (talk) 22:25, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

      In process. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:52, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Thank you. prokaryotes (talk) 22:58, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
       Done Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:00, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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