User talk:Kevin Gorman

This Month in Education: January 2014

This Month in Education – Volume 3, Issue 1, January 2014 Headlines Wikimedia Deutschland starts alliance for Open Educational Resources (OER); Berlin discusses introduction of OER in schools Next EduWiki conference slated for Serbia Presentation on Wikipedia at the 8th Congress of Innovation and Educational Technology in Monterrey, Mexico Presentation on Wikipedia at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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A barnstar for you!

	The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar
	For your work at User:Kevin_Gorman/Wiki-PR. Bearian (talk) 01:29, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

• Thank you... I hoped that resurrecting a few pieces of their past work would help counter some of Wiki-PR's recent public rhetoric. It's worth noting that I didn't pick out the worst seven pieces I could find, and also only resurrected pieces that could 100% be linked to them. I did offered to French via email that I would be happy to add any pieces of work they had done that were of substantially higher quality than the ones I had already resurrrected; he didn't reply. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:42, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Original Barnstar
	Thanks for answering my "conflict of interest" question. Jessica0Peace (talk) 01:54, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

• Hi Jessica0Peace - thanks to you for starting to edit Wikipedia :) please feel free to stop by my talk page if you have any followup questions about anything or need any help with anything. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:43, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Recent Edits

Hi! You recently helped edit Michele Colucci, an article I wrote, and I would appreciate if you would please consider contributing to the ongoing discussion about possible deletion of this article. Thank you. --Vindeniträden (talk) 21:45, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Please see

User:Smallbones/Questions on FTC rules Smallbones_(smalltalk) 01:43, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

• Thanks for the invitation Smallbones, but I'm going to hold off signing for now due to an interesting series of in-progress events. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 17:19, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Libyan Civil War

Hey, you protected this page as a result of IP disruption after this AN discussion; one of the IPs went back to the page after the protection ended and continued their previous crusade, and the other notified me of it on my talk page today. What do you suggest is the best course of action? Thanks, ₆an⁶sh₆ 20:33, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

• I'll reprotect it if they return again, but the edit you reverted was ~10 days old and they haven't come back yet. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:36, 8 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Sounds good. I haven't been watching the page, and the other IP just noticed it, so we'll see if the first IP comes back and does it again. I'll let you know. Thanks, ₆an⁶sh₆ 20:43, 8 February 2014 (UTC)
    • The IP is back: see [1] - I don't appreciate my good-faith edits being called "possible vandalism", but whatever. Do you think a formal RfC or something of the sort would help there? ₆an⁶sh₆ 20:24, 13 February 2014 (UTC)
    • Both IPs are also back at it on National Transitional Council... ₆an⁶sh₆ 20:33, 13 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Ansh - for now, I've thrown semiprotection on both pages because I agree that the IP edits are disruptive. I will review the length and other action necessary later tonight, as I'm in a bit of a rush atm. I'll try to provide advice about how to move forward as I can, but it is likely going to be faster if you ask another admin - unfortunately, I have a >60 hour week this week. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:16, 13 February 2014 (UTC)

Alright, no problem. Take it easy! Thanks, ₆an⁶sh₆ 21:23, 13 February 2014 (UTC)

User talk:KajMetz

Hi, Kevin, I just unblocked KajMetz based on their unblock request. I normally don't unblock without first consulting with the blocking admin, but you said at AN3 that you were off to bed and gave permission to any admin to act as they wished. Hopefully, you had a good rest. Regards.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:39, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

• No worries, looks good to me; thanks for handling it. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:45, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Thank you

Someone needs to take a stand against what vested contributors are doing to our community.

		The Admin's Barnstar
		For an uncommonly, and very justifiably, brave start to your career. Pakaran 00:24, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Have another one...

		The Resilient Barnstar
		For calmly and coolly dealing with a deluge of abuse, personal attacks and harassment that resulted from a good-faith effort to enforce Wikipedia policies. You handled this ugly mess far better than most users would. Robofish (talk) 00:46, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

		The Barnstar of Integrity
		For recognising that actions on-wiki have implications off-wiki too. Andy Dingley (talk) 01:15, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

	The Resilient Barnstar
	For believing in the importance of human dignity and being willing to defend that belief. Kaldari (talk) 03:51, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

		The Barnstar of Integrity
		For standing by your values in the face of calls to step down as a brand-new administrator. Jackmcbarn (talk) 04:17, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Elisabeth Camp

Probably I'm missing something, but she seems to have significantly less of a publishing record than most academics who would pass WP:PROF. Based on AfDs, Associate Professors even at places like Berkeley are often not accepted here , & I usually avoid working on their articles unless there is something special. DGG ( talk ) 00:19, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

• Hi DGG: it's one of my pieces that is still in progress; I have a good number of severely paywalled RS'es talking about her. Once some of the current situation calms down a little bit, I'll update the article and drop you a note to see what you think about it. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:49, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

• Hi DGG: just to ensure you I haven't forgotten, this is still on my radar. Unfortunately, some of the sources I need to write the article a bit more I'll only be able to access on Monday. To give you some idea of why I wrote an article about her on the first place: Quite a bit has been written about Camp's work, definitely more than enough to pass WP:AUTHOR. Brian Leiter, who runs a very well respected philosophy blog (not dissimilar in stature to Groklaw or The Volokh Conspiracy,) singled out her move to Rutgers as solidifying Rutgers' standing as the #2 philosophy department in the US. Her organizational work has also been written about quite a bit.

All in all, I wrote about her because I think she's an interesting person who definitely meets WP:AUTHOR, I would strongly argue meets WP:ACADEMIC, and certainly meets the GNG - she certainly stands out over most academics. (It's also worth noting that Rutgers has a much stronger philosophy department than we do at Berkeley - Rutgers is typically ranked #2 in the US by the Philosophical Gourmet Report, which is the most widely accepted ranking of philo departments in the English speaking world, whereas Berkeley is normally ranked around #17. That said, I'll add in more sources as I can (and once I've finished my first round of making bios that are close to being stubs, I intend to go over them again, and add significantly more information about their work.) I'm also hoping to get some USEP classes involved in the near future to help build out some of the conceptual articles that will allow for the bios I'm writing to more easily explain the work of the philosophers I'm writing about (right now, we're missing almost all conceptual articles in the fields a lot of the people I am writing about are active in.) Best, Kevin Gorman (talk)

• This is on my to-do list for this week. Since I initially posted the article, two RS'es dealing with her have popped up in the popular press, and there's 7-8 paywalled articles I'll be working off as well. Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:27, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Do something that you enjoy....

.... is great advice, given to me several years ago. Wikipedia is about contributing your own time, free of charge (for most of us), to better the collection of human knowledge that's freely available. Becoming an admin is a good thing mostly, it means once you've had enough experience, you can help reduce the ever-increasing tide of detritus (alternatively, it opens you up to a tirade of insults, false accusations etc). It also makes you feel that you are better enabled to wade into situations. Most often, that wading will end up with you up to (if not over) your neck. There's an inherent inertia (or forcefield, or something) in Wikipedia in certain corners, and there are dark and dusty and cobwebby cubbyholes where you are probably best advised to avoid, a bit like a "dark Wikipedia", where all the normal pillars are ignored.

I see you're through the maelstrom, and hopefully that means you can return to doing (a) what you found interesting and enjoyable about Wikipedia and (b) things to benefit the encyclopaedia. Getting involved in certain patches around here is inevitably going to end in disaster, and sadly you picked one of those. My advice is harmless, really, but I do get tired of some editors spewing bile, threatening retirement time after time after time after time after time......., diva-esque, while their defensive minions rush around screeching. To reiterate, do something you enjoy. Best wishes. Feel free to delete, of course. Just some ramblings. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:30, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the note, TRM... one of the kind of funny things about this week has been that I've actually spent a huge portion of it doing fun, enjoyable work that is going to result in quite a bit of benefit to the encyclopedia. One of the reasons that many of my replies have been delayed on issues this week on-wiki is that I've been spending large chunks of time in meetings with GLAM's about content donations, as well as training upper division undergrads in preparation for having them write significant missing articles about environmental justice issues :) I find it a bit amazing that we don't even have an article about climate resilience, and soon we shall. Best wishes, Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:43, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

This Month in Education: February 2014

This Month in Education – Volume 3, Issue 2, February 2014 Headlines Wikimania still accepting submissions for Education related presentations Wikimedia Deutschland: Summany of activities in January 2014 Wiki Borregos begin Spring 2014 projects Free online course: Writing Wikipedia Articles Turning senior Czech citizens into Wikipedians Editing Wikipedia brochure helps newbies learn basics New features for course pages released Interactive elements added to editing tutorials Articles of Interest in other publications To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

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WP:AIV

I responded to your block notice in diff; this is more an conflict dispute than vandalism. Cheers, Deville (Talk) 01:55, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

Responded to you there... but repeatedly blanking content that belongs there both according to literally every source you can find on the subject and common sense isn't a content dispute. It's vandalism. I can go make an ANEW report as necessary since it'll pull a block either place, but it seems a bit silly to send an obvious case that can fit in to two boards from one board to another. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:02, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

For future reference, there are discretionary sanctions on the Ayn Rand topic areas from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Ayn Rand that can be used. Mark Arsten (talk) 02:42, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

I went beyond the report at WP:AIV and did a preliminary look into the edit war. Admittedly, I have very little knowledge about the subject which may have serendipitously assisted in terms of uninvolved. What was clear to me was that there were seemingly legitimate grounds that this person should be included on that list as there was a reliable source, the article was a GA, and that there were plenty of supplementary articles like Objectivism (Ayn Rand) that supported the claim she was a female philosopher. My block was already in place when I saw Mark Arsten's link about the ArbCom case. As such I blocked under the grounds of disruptive editing. Blanking can be a grey area and I think at this point we should all move on give the net result was (hopefully) agreeable to all reviewing parties. Mkdw^talk 07:52, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

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Request for arbitration

I have requested a case for arbitration which involves you.  Giano  21:05, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

• There's something kind of funny about filing an arbcom request that includes a complaint that I refer to people by previous usernames while at the same time failing to spell my name correctly. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:49, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

Did you know the admirable simplicity of Giano's user page: one castle and one category? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:23, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Gerda, but it's sometimes unimportant what people think - this is one such time. Kevin must find his amusement where he can. The important thing is achieve some rebalance to Eric's reputation.  Giano  12:18, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Giano, I just noticed that Kevin made a mistake that I had made before (telling you that you misspelled a name), - we should keep learning, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:30, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Don't worry Gerda; I can even spell my own name wrong - if it's not in spell checker it can come out in 50 different ways.  Giano  15:54, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Intended point taken Gerda, I hadn't noticed the cat before. I hadn't intended anything particularly malicious from commenting on his misspelling of his name, I just legitimately found it a bit amusing, especially given that I tend to refer to Eric by his former username out of completely innocuous reasons (mainly, if I refer to someone just as "Eric" in a conversation with people who are active on Wikimedia projects outside of ENWP, people tend to think of a number of people before they think of Eric Corbett. (AFAIK, Eric's never asked anyone not to refer to him as Malleus; I'd certainly avoid doing so if he'd asked me to do so, or if I had ever noticed him asking anyone else not to do so.) 22:42, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. I like simplicity, and I admire the castle, missing its builder. As far as I know, Eric talked to me first about using his real name, did you know? Quote: "I think a little more openness might go a long way." --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:55, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Why not just go and apologize to Eric/Malleus? That wouldn't hurt anyone.--MONGO 20:36, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• That is the smartest thing I've heard all day. Sometimes, a simple apology is enough. If it isn't enough, it was still due. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:31, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

• @MONGO, Kevin already explained why not in detail here: I am not going to apologize to Eric for several reasons. Ihardlythinkso (talk) 01:18, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
• As a bit of additional explanation: I don't believe that insincere apologies are respectful, and I think that even Eric would agree with me on that point. I certainly feel sorry about the situation as a whole, but I have a hard time feeling sincerely sorry for a comment I made based off of flawed information to someone whose first response asking him to lay off his participation in a thread was to undo my IAR hatting, whose second response was "What are you, an idiot? How can I be under a BLP sanction for commenting on someone who's dead?", and whose subsequent responses went down from there, culminating in him ragequitting. I'm sure it would satisfy some number of people if I went and posted a mea culpa on his talk page directed explicitly at him, but I don't think it would satisfy him, and I don't think it would be terribly respectful to do so. I made a general life rule some time ago to only apology in situations where I can do so sincerely. If his responses had gone down a different pathway, I'd likely have apologized to him directly some time ago. As it is: I don't feel sincerely sorry for offending Eric, and don't think an apology would carry meaning. Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:35, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
  • What kind of response do you think was likely after you dropped the largest and most pointy warning box possible (you have violated BLP ... enforced by block ... this is your only warning ... made pursuant to the requirements of this Arbitration remedy) diff? You failed to discuss anything without including threats of blocks (hint: that's not a discussion). No one cares if you offended Eric—it is the underlying issue that should be addressed, namely the correctness of your initial assessment (there was a BLP violation, and there was gravedancing, and Eric lacked common decency). I have said more in response to a suggestion at my talk). Johnuniq (talk) 02:39, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
  • You are rationalizing. You made some significant errors in judgement here, and your mistakes are by far a larger problem than his. Eric's mistakes are moot when it comes to your own culpability, they don't justify your mistakes. If anything, you have shot yourself in the foot and guaranteed that no one can even approach him about his mistakes as you won't properly rectify the issue. As an admin, you are held to a higher standard, one you accepted when you got the bit. We all make mistakes, but we admin don't have the luxury of casually walking away from ours. You left the job half done at Arb, although I'm glad you at least started it. If you are not capable of rising above your personal opinions of an editor (Eric or anyone else), and accept responsibility for obvious mistakes without comparing to theirs, then you should do some soul searching as to whether or not adminship is right for you. As an aside, your actions make life more difficult for all admin, and reinforce all the negative stereotypes we endure. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 02:43, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Ayup

I have been told by a little bird that <redacted for now> is a certain identifiable academic who has a RW dispute with <redacted for now>, and therefore should not be editing that article <redacted for now>. Do you know anything of this, please? You can email if you prefer to keep real names off teh wikipediaz. Thanks, Guy (Help!) 22:10, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Guy, I'll drop you an email when I can, I'm currently finishing up an email to all parties involved. I am aware of the situation, and think that it will be resolved amicably on both sides. I hope you don't mind, but I redacted the names of both parties as well as some information that would make them identifiable on this talk page for now in hopes that the issue can be resolved quickly. Once I've finished up the email to them, I'll drop you an email with more details. I'd discuss it directly on wiki, but believe that the best chance of not escalating the dispute is to handle it off-wiki. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for this. Best of luck dealing with prickly academic temperaments. Guy (Help!) 00:31, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Notification of case being declined

Hello. An Arbitration Case Request that you were listed as being an involved party to titled Kevin Gorman—Eric Corbett has been declined and closed. If you would like to read the arbitrators' comments you can do so here.--Rockfang (talk) 05:19, 21 February 2014 (UTC)