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Current issues

MediaWiki talk:Recreate-deleted-warn

I have cross posted this from WP:VPT. I am attempting to open discussion at MediaWiki talk:Recreate-deleted-warn. Participants welcome there.

Fop revert war

Resolved

– clear 3rr violation

I just blocked Petercrapsody69 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) for 24 hours after he made 6 reverts in about 30 minutes to Fop. He want's to add a picture of himself and consensus is no. I probably should havn't been the one to block because although I didn't remove this particular image I have been against his vanity and I removed the original. Posting for a review. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 16:25, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's an obvious 3RR violation. — Carl (CBM · talk) 16:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Could some take a look at this. Thanks. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 16:32, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Some background is also useful here. It's a single purpose account to insert vanity. After another vanity addition to the article, I did some further investigation of this, and it seems to be a horrendous vanity campaign by one Alex Ghionis, who's MySpace can be seen here. He's also making vanity edits as an IP, such as this, these and these. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ghionis & McKee is relevant as well. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 16:36, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have notified the real Alex Ghionis and brought your potentially libelous claims to his attention. What do you think you are doing? That is very much uncalled for, especially considering you're incorrect. Please keep our discourse civil, please. Petercrapsody69 07:30, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, I just want to point out that my account has begun work on building pages for the short stories of Anton Chekhov. I would appreicate it if you looked into the account history properly before you decide to label it as a "single-purpose" account. Your other piece of questionable research - that I am someone named "Alex Ghionis" from what appears to be Northern Ireland - raises another interesting point when your user page is considered. You clearly take a personal and political bias toward the issue of Northern Ireland. This raises the suspicion that your edits against me are political and biased in their nature. That is against the nature of Wikipedia, as I'm sure you know, and it leads me to argue that the "consensus" reached on the Fop issue is, at best, flawed. There were several posts that supported my edit, but those are overshadowed by several particularly active editors who were determined to have their voices heard. I also raised several relevant points regarding the issue that were NEVER addressed, by you or the other few particularly vocal editors who were determined to see the outcome they wanted. I was trying to discuss the issue civilly. I ask you to please stick to the points and issues at hand. By the way, I live in Hong Kong -- indeed, am typing to you now from Hong Kong -- and have never been to Northern Ireland.Petercrapsody69 07:44, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please see no legal threats. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 07:34, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please no wikilawyering. Petercrapsody69 07:51, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please also see wikilawyering while you're at it. You've played the "political bias" card on every editor (including administrators) that has attempted to stop your campaign of vanity. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 07:49, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have just pointed out your flawed "research" into my "personal life." Can you please address that, and prove that it was not biased? Petercrapsody69 07:51, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There's no need. Take me out of the equation, and every other editor still says the photo doesn't go in, for reasons of vanity, spam, conflict of interest or biographies of living people. Please stop wasting community time and accept this. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 07:53, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If I take you out of the equation, I am still left with repeatedly unaddressed and valid points that I have raised on the Talk:Fop page. If you would like to justify your editing decisions, I ask you to address the issues and not spoend your time wikilawyering by citing sometimes contradictory "policies."Petercrapsody69 07:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Will someone please address the issues? Petercrapsody69 08:52, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(deindent) Which ones? Other pages are just as bad? --Haemo 08:02, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I thought wikilawyering was frowned upon.Petercrapsody69 08:43, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That's not lawyering; the whole point of the page is that it's invalid to protest a deletion, or removal, because you claim other articles suffer from the same problem. Lawyering is when you apply a narrow, or misplaced, interpretation of a guideline in a way which is not in the spirit of it. --Haemo 08:47, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Great, then can we open a new thread to discuss the actual issues and go through the arguments? I think there is a valid point here, and it's being lost under glib justifications citing various "policies." All I am asking for is a fair debate, please. Petercrapsody69 08:52, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You've had your "fair debate" -- policy is totally clear; you are citing a picture of someone as a "fop". This requires a source, because "fop" can be a derogatory term. There's no real debate on this, because it's directly from the guidelines. --Haemo 08:54, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Where in the policy does it say prima facie pictures don't require citations unless construed as "derogatory." Who determines what is "derogatory"? Certainly, if the subject of the picture is comfortable with it, then it is not "derogatory" to the only party who could be offended by it. The fact is, that edit simply illustrates the article, thus improving it. There is nothing about that photograph that decreases the quality of the article. How does the quality decrease, my friend? Petercrapsody69 08:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Based on Talk:Fop and the contribs history, I see nothing wrong with the block or with the image removal by User:One Night In Hackney and User:CambridgeBayWeather. The only ambiguity is whether the image removal should be because of vanity, spam, or BLP. — Carl (CBM · talk) 16:55, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Again, there was hardly a "consensus" on the issue; just several particularly vocal editors. There were dissenting opinions -- valid ones -- that were never addressed. I have explained above why the editor, [User:One Night In Hackney]] was apparently biased in his decision-making. I ask you to please look at the relevant issues again. That's what Talk Pages are for. Petercrapsody69 07:44, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I again refer you to wikilawyering. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 07:49, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

May I please refer you to wikilawyering, which is what you have been doing with all of your "policy" citations, despite the fact that you appear to have a different agenda. Petercrapsody69 07:52, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Look, you're wrong here -- the overwhelming majority of your edits have been disruptive, and it is clearly against policy to insert an unsourced image of someone calling them a "fop". Your personal attacks against Hackney are not helping. --Haemo 07:54, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why was my "personal life" researched and posted onto the pages of Wikipedia? It wasn't even mine. It was an innocent bystandard. I don't think that should be ignored. My arguments about Fop are clear and on the Talk:Fop page. I am just pointing out now that there was bias in the consensus.

Whether or not you are the person in question is immaterial -- you have still been disruptively editing, and the picture clearly violates guidelines. You can throw the rest away - the only "bias" here is towards enforcing guidelines. --Haemo 07:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Then may I please ask you, Haemo, to enforce these same guidelines on the pages for duck and soldier? Petercrapsody69 08:00, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(deindent) It's prima facie obvious in those cases, and if you click the images on those pages you'll see the say what the subject is by attribution. You really don't see a difference between labeling a picture of someone a "fop", and labelling a picture of a duck a duck? In any case, see WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. --Haemo 08:04, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Despite the fact that prima facie is law language (wikilawyering), it can be argued to be prima facie in this case as well. Have you seen the recent picture, which satisfies the definition of "fop"? Petercrapsody69 08:45, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"It can be argued" contradicts the definition of prima facie. That's the whole point you seem to be ignoring -- that, and the fact that the examples you gave both clearly show attribution on their image sources. Yours is a subjective call, without a reliable source, and is a derogatory term. It's like claiming you can identify a gay man from his picture. --Haemo 08:49, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's not "derogatory" -- that is a matter of your opinion. The examples I cite lack citations proving what they are, as does, Hippie and Dandy. You're correct that I misspoke with "it can be argued." It simply is prima facie.08:55, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Petercrapsody69 is trying to insert the photo into the article again, despite there being a clear consensus against this, and having been specifically told not to add the photo by an administrator here. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 09:16, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Petercrapsody69 is now indefinitely blocked for serving no purpose to the encyclopedia. I will be deleting his portrait, as well.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 09:25, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Too late! It's gone - Alison ☺ 09:27, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well... Someone decided to upload it at the commons as Image:Alex-fop.jpg—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 09:29, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) gone again. Down with narcissism, I say! :) - Alison ☺ 09:35, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sadly Image:Alex-fop.jpg is still on Commons. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 09:29, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Relevant admin-related BLP discussions

Please see Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Badlydrawnjeff/Proposed decision#Summary deletion of BLPs and Wikipedia talk:BLP Admin#Possibly relevant arbitration case for a proposed arbitration case principle (which may not pass) and a discussion on the talk page of a rejected proposal that may now be more relevant, both of which admins should be aware of. Carcharoth 16:41, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, that will be a fairly significant change to BLP in practice if it is endorsed.--Isotope23 17:50, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- I didn't think ArbCom was supposed to be changing policies, just interpreting them. This would be a change in BLP. — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 19:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - Agree. -- Renesis (talk) 20:09, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    - It's got five support votes now, so I guess they may change policy anyway. Hmm. - KrakatoaKatie 01:33, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- I don't this is a change to policy. There are two choices in the case of a severe, complete-article BLP violation--stubiify and delete. Which of those depends on the severity of the problem, and is ultimately at the discretion of an admin, to be reviewed afterward by the community. Chick Bowen 03:19, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - It is a change to policy with respect to the way that speedy deletions are contested. Before, a contested speedy deletion would have been sent through AFD. The principle that contested speedy deletions should go through AFD is a long-standing one, and was the understanding upon which the whole speedy deletion system was originally founded, and which has been reinforced consistently since (such as with the introduction of criterion #A7). The arbitration committee is most definitely changing long-standing policy. With this revision to policy, contested deletions remain deleted, and there is no way for non-administrators to access the content and thus contribute to a discussion on whether the verifiability and neutrality policies were adhered to.
    This is a very bad decision by the arbitration committee, not least because the only-administrators-have-the-franchise system that it introduces is a recipe for more wheel-warring and divisiveness similar to what we have seen recently, not less. It's also an extra unnecessary hurdle. In order to dispute the speedy deletion of the article and have it sent through the normal deletion process, first one has to form a consensus (of editors most of whom won't even know what the article contained) to even obtain access to it at all.
    Ironically, a far better procedure (and one that seems to me to be blindingly obvious) for disputed speedy deletions that doesn't require this policy change and that doesn't introduce extra hurdles, was actually proposed on these noticeboards by one of the disputants in the arbitration case a while back: Blank the article (so that non-administrators can still access the edit history to see what is being discussed), protect it (to ensure that the discussion pages are used for the dispute), and send it through AFD in the normal way (noting in the nomination the reason for blanking and protection). Uncle G 14:12, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There is related discussion on WT:CSD, specifically about speedily deleting BLP violations. >Radiant< 10:44, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

CyclePat (talk · contribs) unblock request

I just noticed an unblock request at User talk:CyclePat. While I am inclined to given him a chance to edit the encyclopedia, I also get the distinct impression from his request that he is going to attempt to continue discussion of WP:AMA and try to resurrect the historical page. I suspect such efforts will be viewed as disruptive by at least some editors given the history surrounding AMA, so I'd like to get further input here, preferably from editors not involved in WP:AMA/WP:EA. Pat can be a good contributor, but I don't want to unblock him just to see him indef'd as soon as he starts a thread at Wikipedia talk:Association of Members' Advocates. Thoughts?--Isotope23 20:56, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Still hasn't given up on AMA. I'm sorry to say, but I don't think he gets it yet. :( I wouldn't unblock yet. SirFozzie 21:01, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Only unblock on the understanding that they're not going to rehash AMA/EA again. Thanks/wangi 21:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Can he assert he will leave the AMA/EA alone? Navou 21:07, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, but will he? And even after he does, will he stick to his word?--MONGO 21:09, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If he doesn't, the great clunking banhammer will come crashing down again. We needn't worry about him breaking the agreement, provided he does actually agree. Moreschi ^Talk 22:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

With the assertion, I can agree with the unblock. This would be a net gain to the project assuming the contributions will build the article proper. If he goes against the assertion, reblocking can be accomplished very quickly. I don't have an issue with an unblock in this context. We should always be willing to let editors, especially those who have in the past made good contributions to the article proper a chance to learn from mistakes and contribute again. Thoughts? Navou 21:17, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would say that anyone considering overturning the indefinite block placed by JzG should consult with him first, or direct him to this section.--MONGO 21:50, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

JzG is aware and has made it clear to Pat SirFozzie 22:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, here's a link to the earlier discussion here on the same subject. —David Eppstein 21:15, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have never seen an unblock request that packed in quite so much wikilawyering, but that I could stomach, just about, if he actually said he'd drop it. Drop the AMA lark, completely. Never mention it again. Stay away from all dispute resolution, if he can (he can't meddle with ASSIST, cuz he's banned from there). I'll unblock myself, but I have to have this guarantee of never even thinking about the AMA again. I'm all for clemency, but there are limits. Moreschi ^Talk 22:14, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'd say that Moreschi neatly expresses my feelings on the matter as well. Pat has shown in the past that he is capable of contributing positively to Wikipedia. If he would like to do so again, he needs to (at a minimum) drop the WP:AMA stuff and stay well clear of WP:EA. I would expect that such a provision would be phrased in clear, inflexible terms, with the understanding that such restrictions would be interpreted very liberally and that he should always err very much on the side of caution. Frankly, he would be well-advised to stay away from any third-party participation in any dispute resolution process, as he has demonstrated exceptionally clearly in his recent edits that he just doesn't 'get it'. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

sigh* It looks like Pat seems hell-bent on not understanding the problem: [1]. I give up. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 01:35, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yup. I'll let someone senior in "Time in grade", so to speak, explain it to him, but he's made it clear that if he's unblocked, he will continue to advocate for the AMA. SirFozzie 01:39, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Community ban on him discussing AMA proposed. Ryan Postlethwaite 01:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I object to unblocking him. He has made it abundantly clear that he will continue crusading for the AMA. He needs to understand that such is not desirable. >Radiant< 10:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Possible Admin abuse of tools to erase edit history without Oversight Privileges

I'd like to request a review of what I believe to be is a loophole in oversighting of edits (removal of evidence of edits from editing history is how i'm using the term oversighting here). I believe based on the below that some admins are using the ability to delete and restore userpages, with the restoration leaving out edits made by themselves that could be considered unbecoming of an admin if brought up later.

I was accused in an edit summary on 5/27/07 [2] of being a sockpuppet (originally that edit by User:SlimVirgin had an edit summary of "rv sockpuppet"), and posted this complaint about it [3], which was also noticed by another user to corroborate the accusation was indeed made [4].

On June 11, I happened to notice that the original sockpuppet accusation edit from gone from User:SlimVirgin's talkpage edit history [5], so I clicked on the link given to show the deletion logs for that page [6] showed that another user, User:Crum375, had deleted/restored the entire user page of this user. I had previously checked that sock puppet accusation diff, and it was there only a few days before that 6/10 deletion/restoration. A query on Crum375's talk page indicated that he/she was removing vandalism from SV's page, which sounds reasonable. Why that would require a deletion/restoration of the entire page, including a 5/27/07 edit by SV on her own talk page, was not explained. My query about that unusual deletion/restoration of someone else's talk page, was met wonder about why I would care that SV's edit calling me a sockpuppet being gone would concern me, and then questioned with implications that I must be be 6/10/07 vandal that Crum375 said was the reason his/her actions were done that day.[7]

It appears that admins are using their own admin tools to delete their own user pages, then restoring them without embarassing edits, in order to circumvent what would normally required Oversight privilieges. In this case, another editor with an editing history that is consistently co-resident with the owner of the talk page, did the same immediate restore after deletion fast one. Checking the deletion policy [8] I don't see where the policy allows the deletion of an edit history from a user page by circumventing a regular admin loophole to oversight edits is alllowed. Covering up your own mistakes as an admin to prevent scrutiny by making further mistakes in abusing loopholes in wikipedia admin tools should not be tolerated. We are all accountable for our actions on wikipedia, or should be. I'd like the delete/restore habits on userpages by those 2 admins looked into. Piperdown 01:32, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

One way to remove personal info from a page is for an admin to delete said page then recreate it without certain parts of that page's history. This can be done without oversight, is permitted, and this is what happened here b/c when I accessed the deleted history I saw someone had posted personal info on SlimVirgin. That said, the admin who deleted then recreated the page histories did not recreate any page history after June 7, 2007, meaning there are 8699 deleted edits to SlimVirgin's talk page histories. I would suggest that in this case, oversight would have been the better route to use b/c it wouldn't have left so much of the history deleted. So despite Piperdown's accusations, the specific page history Piperdown refers to was deleted along with 8698 other page histories. This is merely a case of sloppy removal of personal info, not a conspiracy against Piperdown. Still, someone with oversight should clean this up. --Alabamaboy 01:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Alabamaboy, just to explain, Crum375 removed an edit that tried to out me (as I understand it; I've not looked at it yet), and then wasn't sure which edits to restore. Similar edits had been deleted in the past, and he was worried about inadvertently undeleting them, so he only undeleted some recent ones. At some point, I aim to go through them and check for the edits that need to stay deleted. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:53, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not claiming a "conspiracy". I'm claiming an embarassing edit was removed under disingenuous pretenses. If vandalism was removed, that's fine, good for Crum375. But can you explain why SV's post from 5/27 (who's contents is corroborated by another uninvolved user per my link above) was convenuently deleted in the process? Thanks for looking in the matter. I consider sockpuppet accussations used to discredit other editors without proof, especially by admins and never apologized for, to be a serious breach of adminship Piperdown 01:52, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I said, every single page prior to June 7, 2007, was deleted from SlimVirgin's talk page. The specific 5/27 edit you refer to was merely caught up with 8000 other deleted pages. That makes this a case of sloppy deleting and recreation of the page history. Nothing more. As for the sock puppet accusations, you will need to address that with SlimVirgin.--Alabamaboy 02:11, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

re:"a case of sloppy deleting and recreation". Conveniently sloppy. I did address this already with SV and was met with no response blanking.I'm not connected, not an admin, and not beyond accountability, so I'll defer to your amazingly assuredness that Crum375 is sloppy. I beg to differ based on the editing histories of both.Piperdown 02:16, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If you think yours was targeted specifically, two weeks after the fact, out of 8699 other edits, then I am not sure how you can say you aren't calling this a "conspiracy"... The way it works is that you can only delete all edits. Then you have to select which edits to restore. Crum375 simply chose to only restore 16 of over 8700 edits. -- Renesis (talk) 02:24, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

[de-indent]
I'm not claiming a conspiracy, and I can't see how you can claim I am and then educate me on how deleting/restoring is done. Do you think I should have known that already, so must be claiming a conspiracy, then feel the need to inform me about the process anyway? And why is another admin performing an Oversight action by sledgehammer instead of by scalpel? Do you not see the loophole in that? No wonder so many folks are so hot and bothered to become admins - it can be used to your advantage in content disputes and to cover your own tracks. I'm sure some vandalism is bad and should be nuked right away, but unlike admins, BLP subjects don't get the same emergency treatment on extremely offensive edits. Every time I stand up for myself on this site I get accused of sockpuppetry, conspiracy mongering, being smarter than I should be, etc. Thanks for the help regardless of the accusation. I'm getting used to it here. Piperdown 02:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I apologize for what seemed like bashing you while educating you... I thought we had already explained how deletion had happened, I was merely restating it. You'll notice that I said if you think yours was targeted specifically out of 8699 edits, dozens of which had piled up since the edit in question, then I don't know how you can deny the suggestion of a conspiracy. And I do agree, your username is ironic :) -- Renesis (talk) 05:36, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Like Alabamaboy said, SV's edit from 5/27 was removed along with 8699 other edits on 6/11. The deletion also occurred more than two weeks after your edit, and obviously had nothing to do with that particular edit. If you want it restored, it can certainly be done, but I don't have the time to check 8698 undelete checkboxes :) -- Renesis (talk) 02:11, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. Someone with oversight will have to handle this baby. Checking that many undeletes is a sure way to get carpal tunnel.--Alabamaboy 02:13, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You don't need to; just shift-select them. Or if you want to restore every deleted edit, just click restore with no boxes selected. Is there anything that should stay deleted before I restore it all? Prodego ^talk 02:15, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, there are two or three recent edits with personal info. Don't recreate those.--Alabamaboy 02:18, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Probably more then that, but there is no way I am looking at all 8000 of those. The page was actually so huge shift-selecting didn't work, and I had to use some javascript I have in my monobook to "invert" checkbox selections. Restored. Prodego ^talk 02:24, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's back. Thanks for the very quick response. For some reason I seem to be taking pride in my pseudonym's reputation and this matters more than I care to admit. You folks are good, I hope your skills are at some point used to earn yourselves a living on top of this volunteer stuff. Piperdown 02:28, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

What does that mean exactly, and is there an apology to Slimvirgin in there somewhere for the wacky accusation? - CHAIRBOY (☎) 02:43, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oh that is ironic. Piperdown 02:46, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, it's a question. You made an accusation, assumed abuse, and have used this discussion to repeatedly attempt to suggest that Slimvirgin and folks were "up to no good". WP:AGF is the applicable guideline here that you've disregarded, and common decency suggests an apology is in order. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 03:20, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's ironic because I lost AGF after your hero lost theirs and called me a sockpuppet and didn't apologize for it. Now I'm supposed to apologize for the blanking of those queries and the removal of them from the record.Instead they blanked 2 polite user page posts about it. I didn't even bother to query user:MONGO about his sneak RFCU using the patented "wordbomb" accusation technique, which my accusers have an editing history of using regardless of who they actually bludgeon with it. Piperdown 04:02, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, I don't really like SlimVirgin and I regularly disagree with her, but this is a basic civility issue and I'd hope you'd do the adult thing. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 04:19, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oh. :-( SlimVirgin ^(talk) 04:36, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And the edit history for the 5/27 post in question is gone again. Interesting edit history on that tonight. As the admins who helped out tonight saw, that edit was not something that qualifies for oversighting and if an attempt is made to frame me for something else just for raising this complaint, I'll take this to Jimbo. Piperdown 04:21, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is troubling in so many ways. I don't understand why Crum375, SlimVirgin and Jayjg are always at the center of this nonsense or who is really in the wrong. I honestly have no idea what it is, but all the intrigue that centers around those three is really detracting from the project. As far as "outing", how does that justify blanking the whole page? This deleting of edits from the history should be reserved for only the specific violations and used as little as possible. It's very, very troublesome to think that edits can just disappear at the whim of certain bureaucrats - shouldn't the history indicate at least that there was Some edit at the time, even if it's been deleted. I don't agree with the anonymity of administrators either, we should know the names of anyone with that much power over the flow of information. Why wait to take it to Jimbo? I'm not sure what response you expect though, I don't think any of this would be news to him. Fourdee 04:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This has been explained above, but let me try again. Admins can not selectively delete revisions. The delete function deletes all of a page's history, every single edit, with no option to do otherwise. When an admin restores a deleted page, he or she is presented with a list of all the edits to that page. The admin may check "restore all" or may click individual edits to restore them. To delete one edit that revealed personal information, Crum could easily delete the whole page, but then would have to manually click the checkboxes on over 8000 non-harmful edits. Some admins use javascript to make this process faster and easier but this is not mandatory. On the other hand, Oversight can selectively remove a single edit, but only about 15 editors have oversight privilege. There was nothing dastardly or underhanded about Crum's deletion, it was just a clumsy way of doing things. Thatcher131 13:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You are however forgetting that I restored all those edits, and then they were redeleted. Prodego ^talk 16:55, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

So basically, with a combination of javascript and deleting the article then restoring edits, any admin has the oversight privilege? Sounds even worse. You're right, that is clumsy - and seems to try to avoid the fact that the power to delete an edit is resricted to a few people and certain circumstances. *shrug* Just wondering why these same names are alwasy coming up in disputes. Fourdee 13:27, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, deleted edits may be viewed by any other admin. Edits removed by oversight are hidden from everyone (except the developers). Thatcher131 13:57, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

How did I get into this? And if you admittedly don't know what is going on, then you shouldn't be pointing fingers and making accusations. Jayjg ^(talk) 05:39, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what accusation I made. Fourdee 12:51, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You said I don't understand why Crum375, SlimVirgin and Jayjg are always at the center of this nonsense and all the intrigue that centers around those three is really detracting from the project. Jayjg ^(talk) 14:00, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Any admin can see deleted edits, so the ability to delete revisions is a far cry from oversight. If anything nefarious had gone on it would have been founds, but it seems all was in good faith here. ^(H) 13:33, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would suggest that anyone, admins or "regular" editors, who desire "outing" or personal attack edits removed from a page in the project ask an oversighter to do it instead of an admin clumsily using the page deletion function. The page deletion function obviously doesn't work well for surgically removing offending edits and it appears that this is what the oversight function was created for. CLA 16:59, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There are alot less people with oversight than with admin. If something needs to be gone NOW, admin delete is probably a good way to go. Then, request oversight on top of that. It depends though on the level of information posted. I think admin delete of innapropriate revisions is a fairly common activity, I know that i have done it several times then usually request oversight over the admin deleted revision. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 17:06, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It works fine if done properly, however in this case it was not. Prodego ^talk 17:03, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is a tempest in a teapot. Let's get the 8,000,000 non-offending edits restored, leave the ones claiming to reveal personal details deleted (and ideally oversighted), and move on. Fourdee, please stop shopping for forums in which to attack SlimVirgin, Jayjg, etc. I'm not clear why User:Crum375 re-deleted all of the edits, though. There's no problem with deleting edits that claim to reveal personal information, but collateral damage of 8,000+ good-faith edits and page history isn't acceptable. I'm assuming it's just a technical issue with finding the right diffs to delete. MastCell ^Talk 18:13, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Daniel Brandt, et. al. and WP:COIN

A number of editors have cited WP:COI in their reasoning at the deletion/DRV discussions for Daniel Brandt, Seth Finkelstein, and Angela Beesley. So here's a challenge: if you've posted that those articles ought to be kept because it's a conflict of interest for these people to want their biographies off our site, then please follow through by helping the backlogged conflict of interest noticeboard. There's more corporate spam, vanity, and pov-pushing over there than the board's core of loyal volunteers can keep up with. We need your help! Durova^Charge! 01:34, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll resist the temptation to suggest that Durova may have a conflict of interest in distracting people away from the Daniel Brandt DRV (JUST KIDDING!). :) But I totally agree - there's a lot of real COI junk, so we don't need to worry as much about the "avoid self-reference" stuff that passes for COI in the eyes of the beholder. Yechiel Man 03:20, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That DRV closed before I posted. And seriously, I'd love it if even ten percent of the people who participated there chipped in at WP:COIN. Durova^Charge! 17:31, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

User:ArmedBlowfish

Resolved

– Armedblowfish is not banned from Wikipedia

Some of you may recall that ArmedBlowfish is effectively "banned" by our software because he runs a Tor exit node. He's unwilling to give up running the node, but he feels that he has suggestions for policy changes that may be of use. He wants to post, on his own talk page, an essay about how to resolve a problem.

He feels banned. I'm pretty sure that he isn't banned, in the sense of Wikipedia:Banning policy. He just happens to be running routing software that is blocked from performing edits on Wikipedia. He accepts this and is reconciled to it.

So this might sound weird, but I'd like to get consensus that it's okay for ArmedBlowfish to post his policy suggestions on his talk page, the only page he is able to edit while the proxy is blocked.

Just that he doesn't feel that it would be right to participate in wikipolitics without consensus.

I'm asking here because obviously if he isn't allowed to do this, and he tries, you chaps are the ones likely to protect his talk page.

So comments please. Is this okay? --Tony Sidaway 10:46, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've said it before and I'll say it again...the Tor blocking policy is crap and all need to be made into softblocks, as they effectively keep out highly valued contributors such as this. Let him post it I say. ^demon^{[omg plz]} 10:49, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Armedblowfish is not banned, he may post if he wants and others help him. And Tor blocks must not be turned into softblocks. Kusma (talk) 10:51, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

^demon, softblocks mean that vandals can use Tor and avoid autoblocks; pick the next account in their bag and carry straight on. Applies to all open proxies. As Jimbo said, there are uses for proxies to provide privacy, editing Wikipedia is not one of them. Guy (Help!) 10:54, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, so block the individual users. ^demon^{[omg plz]} 14:10, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Like we do with JB196, you mean? Guy (Help!) 20:55, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but meanwhile is it okay for ArmedBlowfish to post an essay on a policy proposal to his own talk page? He really is watching and waiting for an okay before he will do it. --Tony Sidaway 10:56, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I dont see anything wrong with it. Users who are banned are allowed to discuss on their talk pages! After all what ArmedBlowfish is doing is starting a discussion. --soum ^talk 11:16, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I don't see a problem with putting forward ideas for discussion. Tyrenius 11:18, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I: don't see an issue. It's on his talk page, and we'd allow any user to make an unblock request on his own talk page... which this seems to qualify as. Firsfron of Ronchester 11:20, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Guy, you might want to see Jimbo's most recent statement on Tor proxies at Wikipedia_talk:No_open_proxies#A_general_statement. - hahnch e n 17:12, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

He is a good faith user, so it is most definitely acceptable for him to post suggestions on whatever he likes. >Radiant< 11:21, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Given the fact of the current discussion in the community regarding Tor, I think ABF's contribution to the discussion would be helpful and enlightening. He puts a real face on the controversy. JodyB_talk 11:36, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No issue. ABF is not banned, software does not make that call. Others can help him too. Side note, and if he likes, if HTTP exit is precluded by the tor software, then there should be no issue with the unblock of the IP he edits on, however, this may be between him and a checkuser, unless he chooses to publically disclose the IP for http exit denial confirmation. Navou 12:54, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed, he should be allowed to post it on his talkpage; he isn't banned. I'd be interested to see it because I can't for the life of me think of any acceptable policy change that would allow him to edit while running a TOR exit node. It would require a software change for him to be allowed to edit.--Isotope23 13:46, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I support ABF, I even voted support in his RfA, but we all make choices. He knows his ip is banned from Wikipedia because he chooses to run a TOR node on it in violation of policy. It's his choice that the computer he runs from his banned. He could always petition to get the IP unbanned or even just use a different computer. If I switched from my home internet to my cellular modem I could change my ip in seconds. Futhermore he could maintain multiple IPs for a nominal cost, one of which he could leave off TOR. This is his choice that he's banned. -N 15:37, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And the result of all that is here: his essay. --Tony Sidaway 06:23, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The idea of using the TOR network's own documented features to apply a consistent policy to all nodes, and only active nodes, has definite merit. Guy (Help!) 12:12, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Review of my deletion

Resolved

Could I have some reviews on my deletion of User:ALM scientist/Muhammad face Pictures? This was nominated for MfD (see Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:ALM scientist/Muhammad face Pictures) 5 days ago. Consensus points to delete right now. Before the MfD concluded, ALM scientist blanked the page which was perceived as a desire for a self-delete and deleted by Awyong Jeffrey Mordecai Salleh (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA). After he deleted it and closed the MfD, ALM scientist recreated the page with the edit summary "recreated. No need to delete it after I blanked myself." with the content "." Thoughts? His creation of the page seems to be a protest against the MfD discussion and is basically just to spite people. Metros 14:05, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's fine. Wikipedia is not a soapbox. Will ^(talk) 14:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And it's disruption to make a point. Will ^(talk) 14:09, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I also agree with the deletion. — Carl (CBM · talk) 14:39, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with your deletion. Blanking != deletion, and the consensus at the MfD was pretty clear.--Isotope23 14:52, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Indecent images

Resolved

– This seems to have been a simple misunderstanding ^(H) 15:26, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have been patrolling for vandalism recently and decided to check the new images, there are multiple images being uploaded by User:H2g2bob that constitue pornographic images, although some have a slight educational application, most of these images appear to be uploading for no other reason than to put pornographic images onto wikipedia. Although I have marked some of the worst for speedy deletion I believe further input is required to check the validity of these images MarkBolton 15:10, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I dont see any indecent images here. Already deleted, are they? --soum ^talk 15:17, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Deleted images would still appear in his upload log, afaik. Seems to me a frivilous report. -N 15:19, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Not only that, but this user appears to be tagging images ON COMMONS for speedy deletion. I think a warning is in order. -N 15:21, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

MarkBolton is referring to images like Image:Cunnilingus 2.JPG and Image:UC-smile.jpg which H2g2bob tagged as {{badimage}}s. They do appear to be on commons and uploaded by other people there, but since the only action in the edit history here is the tagging by H2g2bob, it's easy to see why MarkBolton just assumed that they were uploaded by H2g2bob. Metros 15:24, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I was going to point the same thing but you beat me to that. --soum ^talk 15:27, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the input people I think there should be some guidence on the images pointing to a wikipolicy regarding images or content such as this as there is already the {{badimage}}s, having looked around i could find none, and since they appeared on the new images pages i assumed that they were wikipedia images, then thought to ask the question here, I think the warning was a bit quick since i only requested deletion for a couple and then asked the question here MarkBolton 15:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Right now, no pages on the English Wikipedia link to Image:UC-smile.jpg. Image:UC-smile.jpg does seem like a good, raw image of Unassisted childbirth but it also seems unsettling. I posted a note at Unassisted childbirth talk page to give them a change to use the image if they want. Also note that the person in the image seems to be the one granting the license on the image page, but it usually is the person pushing the camera button that is the copyright holder of this kind of work. -- Jreferee ^(Talk) 16:51, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's a lovely picture. --Tony Sidaway 17:03, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have to disagree slightly with your assessment of the copyright situation. If it's my camera and I ask you to take a picture of me, it should be considered a work-for-hire and the copyright still belongs to me, even though you actually composed the shot and pushed the button. howcheng {chat} 23:31, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Change to CSD I7

After seeing Connie Talbot (Britain's Got Talent final).jpg uploaded, I noticed that no image criteria for speedy deletion covers fair use images uploaded under a free-content tag (though G12 may cover it), so, to cover such uploads, I've slightly changed the wording from:

Non-free images or media with a clearly invalid fair-use tag.

to:

Non-free images or media with a clearly invalid licensing tag.

I know there should be discussions and all that, but this is really a no-brainer. Will ^(talk) 16:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is one of those "existing practice" things; fairuse images uploaded as PD or GFDL-self or whatnot are technically copyvios and Subject To Ardourous, Painful and Futile Deletion Process Unless License Is (Eventually?) Changed By The Uploader at best. From a purely practical point of view, this really should be a CSD criterion, with some reluctance; people sometimes can't bother with even thinking of the licensing and stick a PD or GFDL-self license on stuff they found on random websites or on screenshots they made. *sigh* License stuff is so very complicated! --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 18:15, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I support deleting obvious copyright violations on sight, and anything that can be done to fix that (like tweaking the CSD wording) is welcome in my eyes. -N 18:17, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Special:Upload already says we do this, and block the uploaders besides. —Cryptic 19:00, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

um no really bad idea. If you can show it is non free it is covered by g12. In future disscuss on CSD talk first.Geni 19:45, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see why it's such a bad idea. An album cover with {{logo}} is still bad. So is an album cover with {{pd}}. They're both copyvios. Will ^(talk) 20:05, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Correct. I agree with this change completely. Policy is descriptive. --Deskana (talk) 20:06, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Did you just try to argue that it is imposible for there to be such a thing as a PD album cover?Geni 20:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, I said tagging an image with an incorrect license is bad, whether it's a free license or a non-free license. Will ^(talk) 20:24, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If you can show it to be incorrect it is covered by G12. Otherwise it is rather hard to be certian.Geni 21:15, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I3: Improper license. EVula // talk // ☯ // 20:11, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The wording of I3 seems to only include permission-given licenses, not any incorrect license. So tagging something that is fair use as PD, for example, wouldn't be covered under I3, according to its description. --Deskana (talk) 20:13, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

True, though I consider Fair Use images tagged with Free Use tags to meet the spirit of the criterion. Vague? You bet. But it allows me to clear out obvious problems without worrying about not having a 100%-specific CSD reason. (I try to fix it before I just delete it, but sometimes deletion is the best path) EVula // talk // ☯ // 20:56, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with you in principle. I delete blatant incorrectly tagged images on sight, too. Perhaps it should be reworded if it's vague?

Isn't this discussion better suited for Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion? howcheng {chat} 20:19, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Block this proxy

Resolved

Blocked.

Can someone block User:69.64.84.92 as a proxy? ([9]) --ST47Talk 22:57, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Deletion and redirect request

Speak 06:42, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

– Redirected. -- Jonel

Action requested: That Haruyoshi Hyakutate be deleted and redirected, along with a redirect for Seikichi Hyakutake, to the Harukichi Hyakutake article.

Background: The kanji for Hyakutake's given name can be read as Haruyoshi, Seikichi, or Harukichi. No documentation apparently exists that documents which reading Hyakutake preferred, but Harukichi appears to be the most common in availble sources (see list of references for Guadalcanal campaign). I've already merged the information from the Haruyoshi article into the Harukichi article. The merge tags have been on both pages since January 2007 and no one else has commented on the proposal. Therefore, appears to be non-controversial and uncontested. CLA 00:38, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Looks fine, but can you not just replace the page with a redir, rather than deleting? It's important to preserve the article's edit history, least of all to show at a later date as to how the merge went and what happened. - Alison ☺ 00:55, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- I've taken the liberty of redirecting both the Haruyoshi and Seikichi pages to Harukichi Hyakutake. -- Jonel | Speak 02:20, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - Thank you for the quick response. CLA 02:41, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Fixing link to archived discussion on protected talk page

Resolved

In order to allow admins (and other users) to follow the full discussion at User_talk:RJII#Blocked, can someone please fix the link which currently points to this page, so that it points to the following place?

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive47#User:RJII

Od Mishehu 06:41, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Viridae ^Talk 07:36, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

MPFAP - the return of an old chestnut

I have suggested a change to MPFAP here which removes the "disputed guideline" tags and is just a page telling people that MPFA isn't generally protected, except when under extreme vandal pressure. I'd appreciate comments here. The rewrite doesn't solve the larger issue of whether the current practice should change, it's just a way of removing the disputed tags by replacing "should be" with "is" (you can't dispute something that is, because it either is or it isn't!). DrKiernan 07:53, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Anonymous threats....

Yesterday and the day before that I took the time to proved the page Baccara with a detailed discography and also making a few minor - note: minor - edits to the existing biography. Today I received this rather unpleasant and anonymous message:

Please stop modifying Baccara's article This article is within the scope of WikiProject Spain, and it's written by close friends to both María and Mayte. Indeed, it's a mere translation from the Spanish article. At least tell us your ideas in the discussion page before you tear apart our work. Take a look at Wikipedia's policies. If you keep modifying the article, it loses its neutral point of view. Thanks in advance. And by the way, there's no such thing as an extended version of "Sleepy-Time-Toy". The difference between 7" and 12" was the sound quality. Any more changes, and we'll have to make a vandalism report.

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Dreamer.se"

Any reactions?

S.

Well, it was an unsigned message from Oaobregon (talk · contribs) who seems to have ownership issues around the Baccara article and, given your good faith edits, should probably tone it down a bit. Then again, have you tried discussing it with them or mentioning it on the article talk page? It's a little early for admin intervention - Alison ☺ 09:41, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

About our discussion with User:Dreamer.se... Well, we're not against changes and improvements to any article. But do you consider more than 20 changes in one single day healthy to the article? At first, we didn't revert his changes because they were, indeed, good ideas. But when he added an "extended version" of the single "Sleepy-Time-Toy", we did revert it because that "extended version" does not even exist. When reverting, we did give a good reason, but he just didn't care and kept on modifying it with something that is not true. We told him: <<There's no such thing as an "extended version" of "Sleepy-Time-Toy". The difference between 7" and 12" was the sound quality.>> Don't you think this was a good reason to revert this modification? And next, he added a table with some chart positions (copied from the German Wikipedia) that is not entirely verifiable. As we understand, Wikipedia's articles must contain facts, not gossip. Once again, we thank any positive contribution... But don't you think any major changes should be first discussed in the article's appropriate page? User:Oaobregon

In what way were the edits disruptive? Was the information untrue? I agree that the editor might want to use the Show preview button more often, but unless the information is untrue, a BLP violation, or unsourced, then to remove it and threaten a vandalism warning is over the top. Please review WP:OWN. Corvus cornix 17:35, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

They should probably also review the prohibition on role accounts. You each need to get a separate account on English Wikipedia. Natalie 06:48, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actions of Alansohn in relation to continued WP:POINT disruptions on Wikipedia talk:Schoolcruft

Since 14:26, 18 June 2007 (diff), Alansohn has engaged in disrupting editing on Wikipedia talk:Schoolcruft to the point where users are becoming significantly frustrated at their inability to achieve an appropriate resolution to the specific users' concerns despite reasonable and continued attempts to do so. The user has also specifically attempted to breach the spirit of WP:CANVAS by attempting to bring like-minded users into ongoing discussions relating to his discussions on the talk page in question.(diff) This has now escalated to the point where the user has been significantly WikiLawyering and falsely accusing users of making threats towards the user and engaging in personal attacks.(diff - refer to edit summary) He has also engaged in the same editorial practices that he has continued to accuse others of.(diff) Further to this, the user has gone within minutes of committing a WP:3RR violation on the essay itself (diff1 diff2 diff3), and as an experienced user with over 37,000 edits and using his account since May 2005, should have known better.

Further to this, the user is more than aware of WP:3RR having been blocked on 23 February 2007 for a 3RR violation on Springfield Park Elementary School.(user logs)

From information received from other editors, it appears on the face of it that the user has been engaged in a long history of poor editorial and consensus building practices despite such issues being constantly raised with him.(list of issues relating to users editorial practices). Thewinchester ^(talk) 12:32, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The Wikipedia:Schoolcruft article contained a statement on dealing with "Schoolcruft" that insisted that "However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are always the most difficult to deal with, and sometimes action through AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not learnt, nor will they listen to attempts or offers to learn why nobody likes what they're contributing." I was struck by the incivility of a statement that those who have been involved in a content dispute regarding school articles must inevitably be punished through the AN/I process if they have a disagreement on wording. After reviewing discussion and previous edits, I followed the "Please update the page as needed" invitation at the top of the essay and changed this to "However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors can be more difficult to deal with.", among other changes ([10]) to address the clear WP:CIVIL and WP:AGF violations; this change was reverted ([11]). At this edit, the text was changed to the even more offensive "... AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not heeded the call, or simply fail to participate in attempts to help them learn more about the problems with the content they are contributing." In turn, I proposed the compromise wording of "However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are often more difficult to deal with.", which in turn was reverted back to the new and more offensive version. A third and final attempt was made to address the WP:CIVIL and WP:AGF violations, which in turn was reverted back to the newer blatantly offensive version. As it was clear that the two individuals involved were blocking any effort to address the problems with the article, I made no further changes to the essay. There was no violation of WP:3RR policy. All of my edits to the section in question were made in good faith, retained the basic sense of the text in question, and were made to address clear violations of Wikipedia policy.

On the talk page compromise wording was proposed by User:TerriersFan, who had also been effectively blocked from making changes to the article by User:Thewinchester's bullying and abuse. I indicated my general acceptance with this wording, noting that "the changes proposed indicate that there must be significant complicating factors to justify pursuit of an AN/I in such circumstances.", only to be informed (at [12]) that this agreed upon suggestion to deal with the issues involved did not need to be addressed or considered. Attempts to discuss the multiple Wikipedia policy violations involved in this article were met with increasing threats, bullying and multiple personal attacks (see [13], [14] for some of the more egregious examples). Ultimately, in response to an acknowledgment that the wording was "less bad" than before, came the proof of the poison in the pudding: at this edit, Thewinchester insisted that the efforts to discuss the largely closed issue demonstrated that my expression of opinion on the issue was "just crying out for spanking at WP:ANI" and concluding with an yet another shameless WP:NPA personal attack to "go back to New Jersey and continue [sic] create useless redirects for bus route numbers".

User:Thewinchester has shown abundant bad faith in writing the offensive WP:SCHOOLCRUFT essay, and in his use of bullying, threats and personal attacks in dealing with constructive criticism from me and other experienced editors (see [15], [16]), and has chosen the path of incivility in dealing with a series of constructive suggestions. There is no consensus on the wording of this section; the equal number of editors who disagree with the offensive wording were bullied one by one into walking away from the article in disgust, a path I had already chosen. Just as shooting horses is seen as the only option to deal with many equine veterinary ailments, User:Thewinchester has decided that WP:ANI is the solution to deal with any and all Wikipedia problems, as he has done here. In dealing with the supposed "schoolcruft" issue, Thewinchester has demonstrated a persistent refusal to consider reasoned discussion and proposed compromise, and has used bullying and threats, abusing the WP:ANI process in an effort to circumvent violations of Wikipedia official policy and to suppress any suggestion that he disagrees with. Alansohn 14:37, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- In a conversation with another user (see here), which I assume was supposed to be unseen, User:Thewinchester made a hate-filled rant that those who disagree with him have to be dealt with through "appropriate procedural action", a process that he has abused, is abusing, and will continue to abuse. His final statement that "...I'm now going to engage in my favourite sport of poking the bear in it's own backyard. It's the bears fault, as he's lead me there..." demonstrates that there was no good faith involved here. Rather than dealing with the Wikipedia:Schoolcruft article's Wikipedia violations in a proper fashion, the sole goal of the process was to make a WP:POINT through bullying and provocation, as he himself has acknowledged and bragged about. I had hoped to make a constructive change to a less than constructive essay; In response, this AN/I, and User:Thewinchester's responses to those who have shown any disagreement with him, are part of a self-described premeditated effort to let anyone who disagrees with his own personal biases know that "they get dealt with accordingly". Alansohn 14:54, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  - And let's not omit this comment, that "There's a whole project who given half a chance would lynch the user and hang them [sic] from the nearest freaking yardarm." In some parts of New Jersey, as seen on The Sopranos, threats like this are followed by a bullet to the back of the head; here on Wikipedia that bullet is here at WP:AN/I. This systematic and pre-planned abuse of the AN/I process must be put to an end. Alansohn 15:02, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I have to concur with Alan. Apart from antagonising a whole slew of editors whom he berated, censoriously accusing them of attacks and poor faith, offering up lectures on civility and providing an all-round peacock display of wikilawyering, finally driving one to an outburst of total exasperation, Alan has done nothing wrong at all. He should be quite rightly aggrieved that his innocent inquiry into reversing the tenor of the Schoolcruft essay, an essay that, as he notes, violates all manner of Wikipedia policies by espousing a POV on a controversial topic, which is not what essays are supposed to do; he should be quite rightly aggrieved that his clearly demonstrated willingness to listen to those with whom he disagrees, his sincere desire to establish consensus with editors who disagree; indeed, he should be quite rightly aggrieved that his very good-faith intervention on an issue over which he has consistently demonstrated an open-mindedness, tolerance and willingness to listen that can only be characterised as flabbergasting; he should be quite rightly aggrieved that this has inexplicably ended up at AN/I. Barging in on a group of editors and informing them that they have violated policies of good faith, civility, point, and personal attacks is certainly not trollish behaviour and I for one salute Alansohn's vigorous defense of his actions and salute the diplomatic finesse with which he consistently deals with those whose views differ from his own. Eusebeus 15:40, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- My most sincere thanks to User:Eusebeus for his exceedingly genuine support on the persistent problems created by User:Thewinchester. One correction, though; User:Eusebeus's remark that editing an article to address policy violations constitutes "Barging in on a group of editors and informing them that they have violated policies..." and is somehow inappropriate, would mistakenly imply that the editors involved have a right to prevent participation from other editors, in violation of WP:OWN, a claim made multiple time by User:Thewinchester. The suggestion to move the article to userspace was made multiple times, consistent with relevant policy at Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#The differences between policies, guidelines, essays, etc., that "If you do not want other people to reword your essay, put it in your userspace." I would be more than willing to tolerate this as a userified article. As a mainspace article, policy dictates that it will be edited. I appreciate the most helpful remarks, and hope that this one small correction will only improve the overall tenor of User:Eusebeus's WP:POINT violation here. Wikipedia would only benefit further if User:Eusebeus makes more constructive remarks. Alansohn 16:50, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Alansohn has literally been given enough rope, and has proved the exact problems that have been gave rise to this AN/I report. And if the user wishes to continue a baseless and unjustified attack on an essay and refuses to participate in multiple attempts to build consensus that's entirly their prerogative. And on the subject of essays that clearly breach [{WP:AGF]], let's look at his own work - Wikipedia:Cruftcruft, which not only fails to completly assume good faith and proposes no attempts or action paths to reach positive outcomes. WP:SCFT has achieved community consensus (Demonstrated by a near snowball keep at an XfD discussion) and encourages strongly undertaking attempts to resolve the issues it covers unless the users causing the problems just refuse to participate in reasonable attempts to do so. Seriously, this could go on and on to the point where someone will just have to open a WP:RFC on the user in question, and i'm half surprised that no one has done so already. The continued rantings of this user about pointless and baseless arguments and claims have exhausted my good faith towards them, particually since they totally take figurative comments out of context for their own person and try to claim that there has been a threat of violence towards them. That's just pathetic and to me comes across as a sign of desperation for the sole purpose of a faulty claim to the moral high ground in order to prove a point. Thewinchester ^(talk) 22:14, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- User:Thewinchester continues to demonstrate a pattern of bad faith and abuse of process. The XfD keep only proves that other editors are willing to tolerate the article's existence as an essay. Multiple editors have tried to achieve compromise at Wikipedia:Schoolcruft, only to be rebuffed by User:Thewinchester's repeated bullying, threats and regular ordinary refusal to consider any alternative to the article he thinks he owns in violation of Wikipedia policy. The physical threats -- especially this comment, that "There's a whole project who given half a chance would lynch the user and hang them [sic] from the nearest freaking yardarm." -- are disturbing enough coming from someone on the other side of the world. It's the persistent threats and continued abuse of the WP:ANI process that are by far the most disturbing aspects of User:Thewinchester's behavior. His final statement that "...I'm now going to engage in my favourite sport of poking the bear in it's own backyard. It's the bears fault, as he's lead me there..." demonstrates that there is no good faith involved here and never has been any. User:Thewinchester is someone who doesn't just make empty threats; he follows through on his bullying and regularly abuses Wikiepdia process to make his WP:POINT that it's his way or your brought up on WP:ANI. It's time this is put to an end. Alansohn 22:26, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- I'm going to try and stay out of this one, but I would point out that contrary to Alansohn's statement above, this is to my knowledge only the second time Thewinchester has ever brought a case to AN/I. Orderinchaos 22:44, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm thinking an RFC is in order on this matter, or preferably going to WP:MEDCOM. It seems like a couple of people whining about an essay, and both parties blowing it way out of proportion. If one of you wants to do an RFC, then do it. Better than here, us admins can't really do much here.--Wizardman 22:29, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Essays are meant to be edited, but when the thrust of the essay is at odds with an individual users point of view, particularly when there is a consensus for the current version, then the opposing user is free to write his/her own essay (see Wikipedia:A treatise on essays). It is only an essay and is not policy and its reasonable to have opposing essays within the wiki (See for example WP:FAIL and WP:NOTFAIL). I agree with Wizardman that this seems to be a disagreement about content and that AN is really not the ideal place to be discussing it. All parties need to step back from this for a few days and calm down. Perhaps a moratorium or cooling off period for say 7 days where the 2 or 3 involved parties agree to not edit the article or talk page. The world will not end tomorrow. —Moondyne 01:16, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- The problem is that Wikipedia:A treatise on essays is, merely, an essay, and has no standing whatsoever as a policy or guideline. Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#The differences between policies, guidelines, essays, etc., which actually states that it "documents an official policy on the English Wikipedia" states that "If you do not want other people to reword your essay, put it in your userspace." Wikipedia policy makes all essays, even this one, open to editing by all editors and grants no one ownership rights, unless moved to userspace, as repeatedly suggested. Alansohn 01:43, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It may be helpful to visualize the efforts to modify the wording to something less offensive, and the effort to maintain the status quo by User:Thewinchester:

Iteration	User:Thewinchester and User:Eusebeus	Alansohn and other suggested changes
1	Original version: "Schoolcruft articles can always be improved, but even longer term Wiki editors know where to draw the line. Users contributing Schoolcruft to Wikipedia need to be watched closely. If they are a registered user, gentle coaching and comments on their talk page from more experienced editors will usually pull them back from a self-induced death spiral. However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are always the most difficult to deal with, and sometimes action through AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not learnt, nor will they listen to attempts or offers to learn why nobody likes what they're contributing."	First change: "Schoolcruft articles can usually be improved. If they are a registered user, gentle coaching and comments on their talk page can be useful. However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors can be more difficult to deal with." ([17])
2	Reverted to: "Schoolcruft articles can always be improved, but even longer term Wiki editors know where to draw the line. Users contributing Schoolcruft to Wikipedia need to be watched closely. If they are a registered user, gentle coaching and comments on their talk page from more experienced editors will usually pull them back from a self-induced death spiral. However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are always the most difficult to deal with, and sometimes action through AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not learnt, nor will they listen to attempts or offers to learn why nobody likes what they're contributing." ([18])	No change
3	Changed wording of final sentence to "However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are always the most difficult to deal with, and sometimes action through AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not heeded the call, or simply fail to participate in attempts to help them learn more about the problems with the content they are contributing." ([19])	"However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are often more difficult to deal with." ([20])
4	Revert to "However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are always the most difficult to deal with, and sometimes action through AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not heeded the call, or simply fail to participate in attempts to help them learn more about the problems with the content they are contributing." ([21])	Suggested edit "However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are often more difficult to deal with." ([22])
5	Revert to "However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are always the most difficult to deal with, and sometimes action through AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not heeded the call, or simply fail to participate in attempts to help them learn more about the problems with the content they are contributing." ([23])	User:TerriersFan suggested compromise wording of "However, articles created by anonymous IP editors are always the most difficult to deal with. When it has been clearly demonstrated that they have not heeded the call, or fail to participate in attempts to help them learn more about the problems with the content they are contributing, and the Schoolcruft crosses the line into vandalism then action through AN/I should be considered." ([24])
6	Compromise ignored	Compromise wording accepted "While less than ideal, the changes proposed indicate that there must be significant complicating factors to justify pursuit of an AN/I in such circumstances. As currently worded, the death spiral by those opposing "Schoolcruft" to open an incident for someone with what is at worst a content dispute would be almost automatic." ([25])
7	Compromise rejected: "*Um, this is an essay that lays out a point of view. It does not require any course of action. Since User:Alansohn is one of those whose actions are enveloped by the critical analysis proffered by the terms of the argument, his objections, while understandable, hardly need to be taken very seriously. Alansohn disagrees with the entire tenor of the argument. Why accommodate his own tendentious pov-pushing when he could simply write a counter essay?" ([26])

I disagreed -- and continue to disagree -- with the general tenor of the article and its insistence that content disputes revolving around school articles that are deemed to be "Schoolcruft" must continue on a path towards WP:ANI if other editors disagree with User:Thewinchester. All of my attempts at rewording the article left the essential gist of the article unchanged, but sought to remove the most uncivil and bad faith aspects. Compromise wording that I will still accept would leave in the possibility of a path to WP:ANI, but only where vandalism is involved. User:Thewinchester has refused to consider any alternative wording from an article that he has decide is his WP:OWN. Suggestions to move the article to userspace was made multiple times -- consistent with relevant policy at Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#The differences between policies, guidelines, essays, etc., that "If you do not want other people to reword your essay, put it in your userspace." -- and have been repeatedly ignored.

In a nutshell, User:Thewinchester has made a determined stand for the moral high ground that those who disagree with his personal biases will face AN/I if they have the audacity to disagree with him. It's not just an empty threat; It's happening right here, right now. Alansohn 01:43, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Considering both of you whacked warnings on each other's talk pages before it got here, and that you came close to violating other policies such as WP:3RR, I'd say it had gotten well past disagreement. You have every right to disagree with an essay, I disagree with many I see around the place. Likewise, I cack myself laughing at the ingenious wording of some which are blatantly anti-AGF (the vanispami whatever one, and WP:CB as examples) - despite assuming AGF in my own dealings, sometimes frustration is a factor! I'd rather see it expressed in an essay as a catharsis of someone's feelings that someone understands how they feel and move on, than for them to take it out on people who may be contributing positively. Ironically, the essay to which Alansohn posted a link to on the Schoolcruft page on 14 June [27], Wikipedia:Cruftcruft, is one of the most nasty pieces I've ever read. I, however, choose to ignore it as a view that doesn't match mine, and move on. I suggest Alan do the same re this one. Orderinchaos 10:11, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Holy crap. Alan seriously needs an extended wikibreak, or at least a moratorium on AfD-related issues. That's totally insane. Eusebeus 11:21, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

While it is an improvement over User:Thewinchester's threats of physical violence, what's with this latest personal attack. This is the second time you've violated WP:POINT right here on the Administrators' noticeboard. Again, address the issues in the article in question. I have. Alansohn 11:42, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Incidentally, the title of this piece is "Actions of Alansohn..." so discussion of your actions is entirely on-topic here. Orderinchaos 12:01, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Noting out that you've gone completely and obsessively over the top, Alansohn, is NOT "disrupting Wikipedia to prove a point" -- in fact, it's completely the opposite. You DO understand what WP:POINT means, right? Hint: it doesn't mean "pointing something out", even if it shares a verb. --Calton | Talk 12:14, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As an aside, I had completely failed to notice the authorship of the essay I cited (thinking it was just a link-in), and the tenor of my opinions has changed markedly - this is hypocrisy at its finest. I am curious to know if Alan would be so keen as for those of us who disagree with his definitions and, in particular, his characterisations of hard-working users and administrators to be refactored or removed. I note with curiosity Alansohn's comment on the Cruftcruft talk page[28] with consideration of his behaviour at SCFT. Orderinchaos 12:24, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As another aside, to show that this is a pattern and not an isolated incident, Alansohm seems to have done something similar in a "discussion" on the Kristi Yamaoka AfD where it didn't matter what I said as long as Alansohn got to reiterate his points about what I was doing wrong, despite the reasoning I gave him.. MSJapan 15:00, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please take a look at the AfD in question. User:MSJapan was warned by another user that "You've tried four times now over the last 15 months o have this article deleted. Enough is enough please. If 15 months after the first AfD you've been incapable of demonstrating lack of notability, it isn't going to happen. Continued attempts over and over again to have this deleted serves no purpose. Please, stop. Thank you." (See for details). User:MSJapan's actions in this AfD and the three previous ones he created speak for themselves in terms of failure to observe Wikipedia policy and persistent abuse of AfD policy. Alansohn 15:22, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That's not my point, and it only distracts from the real issue at hand. In the AfD, you asked questions regarding why I felt justified in doing what I did, and every time I answered, you basically screamed "POINT violation!", which means you didn't really care what I had to say. That illustrates a pattern similar to what is going on here, which is either a total disregard for or a weak facade of "discussion" in order to show that you're right and no one else is. MSJapan 15:46, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have repeatedly sought to improve an article that violates Wikipedia policy, only to face malicious attacks directed at me. In addition to User:Eusebeus's shameless personal attacks here, he also seems to have the same problem elsewhere on this same subject. Eusebeus' latest derisive remarks, "Have you seen the latest derangement at the Schoolcruft talk page" would fit squarely as a prima facie violation of No Personal Attacks. (see [29] for the details). Alansohn 15:16, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

How the FRACK does an essay -- which is, you know, NOT A FRACKING ARTICLE -- violate Wikipedia policy by having the temerity to not agree with your views? Wait, don't bother answering unless you can do so with fewer than twenty-five words, that doesn't rely on calling other people evil, and that cites actual policy WITH ACTUAL CITATIONS.

If you have a problem, write your own fracking essay and be done with it. --Calton | Talk 15:25, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Who WP:OWN's this "fracking" essay? I encourage you to read the relevant Wikipedia official policy on the subject at Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#The differences between policies, guidelines, essays, etc., that "If you do not want other people to reword your essay, put it in your userspace." Whether its just a "fracking essay" or not, the article is open to every single editor, regardless of their connection to the subject matter. Every single "fracking" edit that I had made to this "fracking" essay was intended to leave the "frackingly" malicious tenor of the "fracking" essay as is, while toning down some of its most WP:UNCIVIL elements. Why would anyone have a "fracking" problem with that? Feel free to move this essay to your userspace if no one else is going to be allowed to edit it, per Wikipedia policy. And by the way, "frack" you, too. Alansohn 16:05, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Calton, Alan did write that essay; he calls it Cruftcruft and it is a model of the restraint and fair-mindedness that he shows generally. Anyway, I think the suggestion made somehwere in all the above is correct: an RfC would be a more appropriate venue for the issues that have been exposed here. Eusebeus 16:01, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- It was very carefully modeled on WP:SCHOOLCRUFT, building on its fair-minded and balanced coverage of the subject, with many sentences kept as is, with a few words changed. I was very careful to remove the text in WP:SCHOOLCRUFT that advocates bullying and threats to subject to WP:ANI anyone who disagrees with the essay. And what's the big deal, it's just a "fracking" essay? Alansohn 16:05, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Administrative decision-making

For context:

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/HHO gas (4th nomination) - This article, as well as a few related topics, have a long history of deletion debates. The consensus of the latest review was that nothing should prevent recreation of a properly sourced article. A new version was started and edited with strong intent to fix any problems. The page was put up for deletion again after an editorial dispute. Outcome of this debate is that a majority agrees the new article solves the problems that resulted in the deletion of the last one. — This AfD was closed by Kurykh as 'delete', on the subjective notion that the article still violated WP:RS and that this administrator decision about policy violation trumps any majority vote.
Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2007 June 12 - The deletion review was speedily closed, reopened, closed again, on grounds that the topic exhausted the comunity's patience. Radiant! apparently still holds that it wasn't wheel warring and accused Georgewilliamherbert of making false accusations of abuse in return. It's was opened again, but I think these events quite nicely compromised any possibility to settle, in a neutral environment, the actual issue about whether due process was followed in the AfD.
Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive91#Omegatron - discussion on the above
User talk:Omegatron#HHO/Brown's Gas, #Outrage, #Query - related usertalk
User talk:Kurykh#HHO and Brown's gas deletions, User talk:Radiant! ("rmv negativity"?!), User talk:Georgewilliamherbert#Could you explain? - related usertalk for sake of completeness

I care about the results of this particular AFD/DRV no more or less than about any other. But it left me pretty much alienated, that's the word, at the inner workings of Wikipedia's power structure. I still am, a few days later, after these events made me take my first wiki-vacation ever, for the almost three years that I'm here.

There's one thing I learned from this: next time, stay out of deletion debates — I'll have more influence on the debate if I remain a neutral admin and close the discussion myself.

For crying out loud, this is what it has come to? I don't want to work like that. I don't want to live in a Wikipedia where I CAN work like that. It's dangerous to accept a community where this is possible. I have the admin tools to carry out consensus, and enforce it if need be — not to make consensus. Yet, it slowly appears to become acceptable.

Admins get more and more relied upon as decision-makers and holders of power. Generally, the margin seems to become wider, of what constitutes an uncontroversial decision at the sole discretion of a single administrator. There even appears to exist an atmosphere where it's considered more efficient when an admin cuts corners with the process. When you raise concerns about the process you're told that's not a productive approach. I don't think this particular case is an isolated one.

Just like in the real world, we're under a permanent threat of the creeping erosion of our freedom. A constant pressure from well-meaning individuals to act on behalf of all other people, and to decide for us what is right and what is wrong. All for the collective good of course. I have neither the energy nor the skills to actively fight against this.

So, what do we do to counteract it? Don't say the wiki-process is self-regulating, it isn't. Not when administrators may agree to "disagree with respect to the importance of said process". Femto 12:42, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have no answer, having just noted basically the same thing on a different subject here and similarly here (without the rhetoric). Short of a series of administrative RfCs (which I am afraid I have neither the time nor patience for) I can see no recourse to stop this kind of administrative "God mode" (for the want of a better expression). Arbcom would never take these as cases individually. Perhaps a large community discussion on the role of an admin, might help reinforce that admins are servants to the community and their opinions never ever overrides community consensus. Viridae ^Talk 13:02, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Don't underestimate ArbCom's willingness to look at wheel warring and other administrative abuses. One mistake by an admin will not be acted on but a pattern of repeated behavior may get their attention. Thatcher131 14:43, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not personally aware of a pattern, but there are discussions on Talk:DRV about it. If there is one, it needs to be stopped. — Omegatron 23:36, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's not entirely clear to me what this complaint is about. Is it in respect of Omegatron's undeletion of an article of which he was a significant editor? We already discussed that. Is it about the serial re-creation of this article, which has been deleted by four separate AfDs? I thought we'd discussed that, as well. Guy (Help!) 14:57, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It surprises me that people persist in the claim that something not involving the admin tools of deletion, blocking and protection can in fact be wheel warring, as the definition says the exact opposite. The only wheel warring I see here is this. >Radiant< 15:58, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think the actions of certain users in repeatedly defying consensus and recreating an article which the community has consistently voted to delete should be examined, although that is beyond the scope of AN. Orderinchaos 23:09, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- Actually, they voted to keep it, but the discussion was ignored by the closing admin. See the AfD. — Omegatron 23:39, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As for my undeletion, we've already discussed it, I've freely admitted that I made a mistake, apologized, and no one has a serious problem with my actions (which were arguably acceptable anyway).

As for Radiant's actions, I don't see how this could be any clearer.

Wikipedia:Wheel war:
- "Do not repeat an administrative action when you know that another administrator opposes it."
- "Wikipedia works on the spirit of consensus; disputes should be settled through civil discussion rather than power wrestling."
Closing a DRV is an administrative action.
Radiant closed the DRV with no explanation besides the edit summary "No."
George re-opened it, with the edit summary "Don't speedy close DRV on clearly debatable AFD articles."
Radiant, without discussion, and knowing that another admin opposed his action, repeated it.
See also WP:WHEEL#Possible indications.

Does anyone besides Radiant disagree that this is wheel warring, both in the spirit and the letter of our policies? — Omegatron 23:36, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

- A half truth is a whole lie. You are quoting only half of the sentence, which goes "A wheel war is a struggle between two or more admins in which they undo another's administrative actions — specifically, unblocking and reblocking a user; undeleting and redeleting; or unprotecting and reprotecting an article. " >Radiant< 09:11, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comments requests on new exception to WP:3RR

I've recommended an addition to the exceptions for our WP:3RR policy. Comments requested please at Wikipedia_talk:Three-revert_rule#Recommended_additional_exception. Thanks, --Durin 14:06, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ambiguous votes in AfD and other votes

Dear admins, what is the proper way to proceed when an editor casts an ambiguous vote in an AfD, e.g. one in which his reasoning or parts of it contradicts the vote cast at the beginning of the line.

Is it a proper way to go to inform the editor in question of the ambiguity and, for the moment, to strike the ambiguous vote? This in order to ensure an unambiguous vote? Or is that considered vandalism?
Is it proper for the editor that has cast the ambiguous vote to lambast the messenger with foul language and unjust accusations? Is such language considered a personal attack?
Does it make a difference that the messenger is the same editor who has created the article subject of the AfD.

Thanks for your consideration. Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 14:07, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, at articles for deletion, they are not really a vote, more of a discussion, so I probably would not strike another editors comments in any context.

It would be proper to question an editor with regards to a comment at afd, that is part of discussion. It may be inappropriate to strike another editors comment regardless. The editor should only be striking his or her own comments. I hope this helps. Navou 14:15, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'd say if you think it's ambiguous, it's better to notify the editor without striking the vote. It's less likely to cause offence. Striking through is normally done only by the person who made the comment. I see in this case it was made clear that the striking through was done by someone else, as it was written underneath it. But still, it would surely have been enough to have put a comment underneath it that it seemed ambiguous, without actually striking through. The striking through certainly wasn't vandalism, which is a bad-faith attempt to compromise the integrity of the encyclopaedia. Bad language happens on Wikipedia, and most people don't get upset about it. A pity this escalated. It's obviously two good-faith editors who have got on the wrong side of each other. Hopefully it will calm down. ElinorD (talk) 14:19, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks I understand now that not striking it would have been better. But I want to ask - was it justifiable for me to strike it just for the moment until the other editor would get back and clarify?

And what about the other two questions? Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 14:21, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, no striking of comments, not even temporarily. With regards to the properness of casting an ambiguous comment, there it no real policy against it. These things happen and the closing editor (the one who closes the AFD) will take these things into account. The closer reads the entire discussion and does not tally "votes". I would not consider it vandalism. Vandalism is a bad faith attempt to damage the article proper. However, this term is easily misunderstood. A personal attack would be if I said "you suck" or "your a nasty <whatever>". Fowl language happens. Both of you appear to be acting in good faith and it is important to understand that you both will need to continually assume good faith and understand this is a misunderstanding. If I were in the same situation, I might apologize and move on. I don't see any difference to whether or not you created the article or not, the action would likely have the same consequence. However, if you created the article, you actions at AFD may be looked at slightly differently. With regards, Navou 14:29, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I think it would have been better not to, but I wouldn't call it a heinous offence. The question to ask is probably was it necessary? Writing an indented note underneath it, saying that it seemed ambiguous and you'd contact the user on his page, would have been enough. Striking his comments may have given the impression (and in this case unfortunately did give the impression) that you thought you had the right to alter a signed comment by someone else. I'd call it entirely innocent and excusable, but I think that once you saw the reaction, it would have been better to say, "Oops, sorry, I didn't realise it would seem like trying to alter your vote", rather than leading to a situation where one good editor is furious with another good editor. Question 2 is a bit loaded. Admins don't act as the manners police, and everyone can reach their own conclusion about the language used. Question 3, again, I don't see that anything terribly improper was done. Certainly, striking the vote, and indicating clearly that it was you and not the other users who did so, was not going to help you to get the article kept. That was certainly obvious, so I can't see that there was any sneaky motive or anything like that. But it certainly looks better for the article creator not to be the one to tamper with a delete vote. Just as in an RfA, the nominee shouldn't strike through an oppose vote even if it's clearly invalid and from a sockpuppet. Leave it to someone else if it needs to be done (which in this case it didn't). I think everyone needs a cup of tea! ElinorD (talk) 14:35, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict, replying to Navou) I did not consider it vandalism but an honest mistake, a vote that hasn't been thougt through fully.

Should my good faith intention of attaining a clarification be considerd vandalism? Should I be lambasted for it (using the word "vandalism" and other words). Should admins that are part of the whole discussion and hence have a POV stake in there as well issue warnings about this affair? Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 14:37, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Elinor, for the advise. Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 14:43, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Admin advice (just a CYA)

I have rewritten Tanbur (actually still in progress) and am working on a rewrite of Tanbur (Persian). I have found myself in an intermittent content dispute over these articles with an anonymous user (but see User talk:Johnyajohn), who claims to represent tanbursociety.com and is trying to effectively mirror articles on that website. I've presented my issues on the articles' talk pages and have just left a note at WP:RF3O. Anon user has already been warned about removing content, maint. templates, etc. from these articles. After his/her last edit I left a "final warning." Assuming we go through another round: Would I be abusing my privileges if I were the one to impose a block? Should I instead leave a note at WP:AIV? I thought AIV was for current vandalism (i.e. happening right now) and I usually don't see the edits until a few hours later. Thanks in advance. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 16:50, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

IMO, since you were involved in editing it would probably be best to post on ANI and have another admin review and take action as appropriate.--Isotope23 16:53, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Block request for anonymous user 69.223.169.170

User 69.223.169.170 (talk · contribs) continually adds the questionable entry of Carlos A. Cook without justification for entry's importance. The page has been previously marked for deletion. Further, the user deletes vandalism warnings and other community warnings on the user talk page. Suggest strong administator warning or possibly temp ban.--Ewhite77 17:14, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Said user has only been given a third-level warning. Once he gets a fourth-level warning and still vandalizes, WP:AIV will bring down the blockhammer. hbdragon88 18:50, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Featured articles

The matter has a pretty old history and probably was already noticed. Anyway, I want to expose it anew since in my opinion we faced a proceeding tendency, related to featured content. The featured articles to a greater or lesser extent are a common target to be affected by some backlogged tags in that way they aren't a featured articles anymore by definition. Most of them are marked as having unsourced statements, even such vital articles as Cheese or Technetium. As of June 20, 2007 among crippled FAs were or still are absinthe, alchemy, Azerbaijani people, black pepper, Boy Scouts of America membership controversies, caffeine, cheese, Duke University, Mozilla Firefox, paracetamol, trade and usage of saffron and so on.

One may consider that the relevant act to combat that issue would be an ordinary deletion of crippled sentences per WP:IAR. Otherwise I think that some relevant Wikiproject or Task Force might be able to assist. Ultimately we should put an end to FAs, backlogged in such way. Brand спойт 19:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with you for most of the articles, but some like trade and usage of saffron fit my perception of an FA. bibliomaniac 15 ^{BUY NOW!} 20:02, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not certain this wouldn't better be situated elsewhere; this is not, unless I'm missing something, a matter that particularly requires administrative intervention or is relevant principally to administrators, and so I would encourage you to raise the issue at WP:VPP (and, with at least a link to the antecedent discussion, at WT:FA). Joe 21:00, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Shaykh Nazim al-Qubrusi

I previous AfD'd this article. It has been restored, and I note that a lot of the text is based on the previous version of the article [30]. I'm not interested in challenging it as a repost (mainly because it doesn't read quite so much like a worship piece anymore). I'm thinking that for GFDL purposes we should quietly restore the article history though (unless you feel like deleting it again, but as he has a lot of followers I don't think that's going to work). Yes? -N 22:40, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Meh. It looks like it was rewritten from scratch - the oldest diff is just one sentence long. Yechiel Man 23:47, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Turkey on the loose

Could someone with the ability to correct moves take a look at Turkey? Aycan (talk · contribs) has unilaterally moved it to Türkiye, with no discussion that I can see. I'd try and work it out, but am cramped for time, and think it'd take an admin to undo the move anyhow. Tony Fox (arf!) review? 22:42, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've moved it back and issued a {{uw-mos1}}. I can't believe we even have a template for that. -N 22:46, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
- I can't believe we don't use it more often :) Fvasconcellos (t·c) 02:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

User:FatherTree Canvasing

This user was making false accusations of my being a sockpuppet [[31]], which I filed previously. An administrator seemed to support my filing,

":You're definitely correct. I'm not sure he's active enough for a block to have an effect, but a short-term block (24 hours) might send a message to FatherTree that we take WP:CIVIL seriously. Yechiel Man 03:20, 20 June 2007 (UTC)"

Now he is now engaged in WP:CANVAS, which is not ok as I read the statement. See diff: [[32]] in response to an active mediation case at [[33]] This violates the policy because it is biased and partisan

I don't see how we can mediate these issues at this time with this behavior. He is clearly an SPA on this article. I'd like him to stop making false accusations and stop fishing. Administrative action is required. DPeterson^talk 01:51, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just to clarify: I am not an administrator; I just have a nose for messy situations. I do strongly recommend a block against User:FatherTree. He continues to accuse the complainant here of sockpuppetry despite the fact that Checkuser proved he is innocent. Unless I'm missing a critical detail, it's really simple, and the dispute resolution process will be better served by temporarily removing a bad influence. Yechiel Man 05:29, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Weird Bio Getaround

I noticed the user User:Charlie_Snow as well as User:Bubba_Yarbrough and User:Zach_Ze. I belive the Charlie Snow user (which is the name of their band) was created as a way to get around the bio and notability guidelines - whats the best way to proceed? I know it is a sockpuppet of one of them, but is this legitimate and it is a violation of policy to get around notability requirements this way? Thanks! Matt/TheFearow (Talk) (Contribs) (Bot) 02:15, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Charlie Snow needs to be asked about his actions at the talk page. His only edits have been to his own userpage, so it's probably a sockpuppet. If he shows no interest in working on any other part of the encyclopedia, action will need to be taken. --Masamage ♫ 02:17, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, i'll comment later, I have to rush off now but I thought i'd drop this note in first. Thanks! Matt/TheFearow (Talk) (Contribs) (Bot) 02:19, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

User:Charlie_Snow is obvious spam -- period/full stop -- and I've speedy-tagged it, like I have a few dozen others. After all, accounts are for individuals, not bands, companies, or groups. --Calton | Talk 07:35, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have declined speedy on the user page. Its not anything promotional or advertisement. Barring the notability criterion, its otherwise okay. And since the notability clause does not apply to user pages, I think a chance a be given to the users to sort it out rather than deleting it on sight. --soum ^talk 07:49, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've deleted all of their user pages. If they don't contribute to the encyclopedia, then they don't deserve the privelege of having a userpage. Wikipedia is not a free webhost.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 09:14, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Administrator Ryulong

I have been keeping my eye on this administrator and listening to some of his comments. It seems like he's breaking a lot of rules. What's with the you cant have a your own user talk page if you have not contributed comments. He's made them several times, like here [34] and here [35] — Preceding unsigned comment added by TV2007 (talk • contribs) 2007-06-21 11:19:59 (UTC)

If you followed the link he provided, Wikipedia is not a free webhost, you'd see exactly this:

Wikipedia pages are not:
Personal web pages. Wikipedians have their own user pages, but they may be used only to present information relevant to working on the encyclopedia. If you are looking to make a personal webpage or blog, please make use of one of the many free providers on the Internet. The focus of user pages should not be social networking, but rather providing a foundation for effective collaboration.

Wikipedia is very lenient considering some of what I see, but no, if you haven't edited anything but your User page, and that has nothing about your Wikipedia goals, then no, it's not within the scope of Wikipedia. All I think is that he should have left a note more clearly on the User Talk page to save himself some grief if they complain.--Thespian 11:30, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I see nothing out of line here. Ryulong is most certainly correct. Why he may be skirting policy technically in the way he's going about the deletions, I see that as a good thing. ^demon^{[omg plz]} 11:44, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

interesting TV2007 15:56, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Islam, ToFA, June 23

I just happened to take a look at the Islam article while reviewing a report at WP:AN3 when it dawned on me (or rather I noticed) that the article is going to make its Main Page appearance as Today's Featured Article on June 23. As many of you are aware, it's generally accepted that we not protect Today's Featured Article. Each day I (or, rarely, someone else) remove any edit protection and add full move protection to Today's Featured Article. But this is a bit different. Currently, the article is on near-permanent semi-protection, due (of course) to vandalism. If we remove the semi-protection from this article, the article will be an utter disaster. Yes, sadly, we all know it. Is it okay if we just leave the semi-protection on or should we (gasp) unprotect and see what happens? -- tariqabjotu 02:16, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

According to our PR, the reason vandalism isn't much of a problem is because other editors will quickly correct it. Perhaps there is some way that can be made more likely to occur.Proabivouac 02:19, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

At the risk of letting the camel's nose into the tent, the ultra-controversial, extremely vandalism-prone nature of this article leads me to believe that this is one case where the FA should remain semi-protected for the day. Raul654 02:53, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, at the risk of losing my minty fresh admin tools, I've always felt that TFA may warrant semiprotection under certain circumstances. I'd say this is one of those times, but that's just me. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 03:05, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You wont lose them for expressing an opinion on policy matters - you will if you ignore consensus. However, in this case I agree with you. Viridae ^Talk 06:17, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Excessive AGF towards a user with a long, long record of 3RR, edit-wars and POV-pushing

R9tgokunks (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), suspended several times (days, weeks, even a full month) from editing because of his constant edit-wars is back and, guess what, edit-warring again, erasing whole passages without justification and randomly putting misspellt German names wherever he can, like here or here ("Garten Botanik" is no German). In spite of his long block log and the repetitive pattern of his demeanour, he is met with extreme AGF by Heimstern (talk · contribs), among others. This is abnormal ! Thanks, RCS 07:16, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That's an issue you should probably raise with Heimstern. It would help if you clarified what exactly his action was, e.g. to decline a report on 3RR or AIV, and now for you to appeal that decision because the past history was not considered. I found a mixture of good and bad edits in the last two days for this user; based on that pattern, I didn't see why he should be blocked again. Please explain further. Yechiel Man 14:56, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Request for other admins opinion on Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Petri_Krohn

I would be grateful if another admin would take a look on this candidate RFC/U and express their opinions on questions risen...--Alexia Death 08:05, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry to ask such a silly question (I'm new to this), but where exactly do you want me to comment, there, your talk page or where? DrKiernan 09:19, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your interest. On that pages talk page would be best :)--Alexia Death 09:29, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Undo a deletion request?

I don't want to hit a permissions error, so I'll hand this over to an admin. A brand new, 3-edit editor has flagged the thorn in wikipedia's side article of Wikipedia Watch for deletion. After making my comment, I thought it odd that no one else had commented on that in the next hour. At that point I found that all that had been done was adding the template and creating the AfD (which is one of the three edits). It was not added to the AfD Log, which is either being unable to follow the instructions or mischief-making (I'd assume better faith if the user had even one edit before yesterday :-P ).

Of course, you'll want to check for sockpuppetry, all the tricks, but I'm wondering if, in this case, my action should be to a) remove the template from the page, and tell them to redo the nom properly if they want it, b) link the page from the AfD Log the way that it should have initially been done, c) leave it up to the admins, it'll be fine now? ;-) --Thespian 11:20, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

See /Incidents#Disruption via multiple accounts. Uncle G 11:53, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Edit Page

The article on Frank iero is wrong. He has FOUR dogs, as stated (by himself) in a recent edition of Kerrang!

I'm not an admin but I think you've posted this comment in the wrong place, this is for discussing administrator related actions, if you need help you may wish to leave a comment at the help desk, Cheers --The Sunshine Man 16:05, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sockpuppet user

It is suspected that user Playguy is a sockpuppet of user WikiTweak

For the past couple of days ExcellentEditor has been edit warring with Wikitweak on the mama's family page. This is the way ExcellentEditor reverts the page. [36] and he Wikitweak gets rid of the information calling it vandalism[37] which I disagree with. I thought it was good for the article. Anyway, a 3rd editor got involved to try to solve the problem by making this edit which was meant to be a compromise. He shortens the information and puts it in a different place [38]. However, PlayGuy, suspected sockpuppet of WikiTweak, comes today and reverts it back to the way Wikitweak had it, with incivility in his edit summary. [39]. Also, his only edits have been on ExcellentEditor's page and Ebyabe's page, if you look here [40]. This is what he says to the 3rd editor who got involved to help the matter [41]] and this is what he says to ExcellentEditor [42] TV2007 16:16, 21 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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