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Horse Eye's Back's battleground behavior

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

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Over the past few months, I've observed a concerning pattern of behavior by Horse Eye's Back ("HEB", formerly Horse Eye Jack) that is characterized by vicious battlegrounding through unnecessarily personalized and deliberately aggressive comments. These issues have been observed and called to HEB's attention at least as far back as 2020, and they have not stopped.

I'd like to ask the community to issue a formal admonishment or other action, as you all deem appropriate.

Here's the history:

• In May 2020, Atsme said that "Horse Eye Jack does demonstrate tendencies to bait users and extend discussions beyond where they should go. I think an admin warning would go a long way in helping to get this editor back on track." In June 2020, HEB was blocked by Floquenbeam for "repeated feuding" with a now-blocked editor, with behavior that included "following each other to articles to revert the other, and near constant bickering and templating and insults and harassment."
• In 2021, HEB was told by El_C at ANI that "Horse Eye's Back, you need to take a step back, maybe two. [...] It is combative. It is adversarial. It turns the discussion into a battleground, so you need to start reigning it in better. There's no other way."

In 2023 and 2024, Horse Eye's Back has continued practicing battleground behavior. In recent months, they have done the following:

• After tagging a swath of articles written by TCN7JM, HEB told them that "I clearly said we had a lot of low quality content from unskilled writers and researchers. You are now complaining about those low quality articles from unskilled writers and researchers being tagged." (i.e. HEB is calling TCN7JM unskilled; August 2023)
• Told James500 that their comment was a "Good reminder to never let you write a notability guideline. There's common sense on one side here, but its not with you." (September 2023)
• Called Rschen7754 "a leader of the extremist wing" of WP:ROADS editors. (October 2023)
• Told BeanieFan11 that they "appreciate how proudly ignorant you are of that though". (December 2023)
• Went after Simon Harley for a lightly critical blog post about Wikipedia, and then accused Simon of holding a conflict of interest because of edits made about their secondary school 15+ years ago. (Yesterday)

Last October, HEB told LilianaUwU and Drmies that they would take their feedback about personal attacks "to heart". But I believe that the above evidence, plus a number of fruitless recent attempts to bring concerns to HEB's attention, demonstrate that they will not alter their behavior without formal action. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 01:46, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• Seconded (not independent, as I participated in the discussion on listed buildings noted above, and we've been on opposite sides in a number of AfDs). The critique of Simon Harley is startlingly inappropriate. I'd add that "I appreciate the personal feedback and will take it to heart, do you have any comment on my argument?" reads as aggressive to me, rather than a promise to behave more collegiately in future. Espresso Addict (talk) 02:22, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

IMO it reads as frustrated but trying to do my best to stay on track content wise. I can definitely see how it would read as aggressive though. I would note that in the same way my worst edits have been cherrypicked you could also cherry pick collegiality, for example from this very discussion before it blew up "Despite being in an argument with Ed on another page I heartily Agee with them here..."[1] Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:17, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• That is not a now-blocked editor, thats a LTA who was blocked years before I ever interacted with them. I did not attack Harley for a blog post, I pointed out they had gotten our policy/guideline wrong and that the restriction they thought existed actually didn't... We are in fact allowed to use sources which are publicly accessible but not online. I would note that The ed17 has omitted the key context here... They end at Harley, but they only brought this to ANI after this happened [2][3]. I find it baffling that the most important context was omitted from the report. Also just a note I currently have a LTA stalker undoing my contribs en-masse so if my comment disappears its almost certainly them and not a participant in this thread good hand-bad handing, I apologize in advance. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:17, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  Honestly, screw the LTAs that decide to revert people for no reason. That's a fair complaint, and may be worth a separate discussion. On the subject of this discussion, though, while there are tons of articles that leave a lot to be desired, I feel like you've been going way too far in the direction that all articles better be fixed right now, which includes the battleground behavior you've exhibited. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 04:31, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  I mean I gave them a reason... I kept opening SPI... Its a poor excuse but I wasn't in a good head space yesterday on account of the LTA. It must have been more than 100 reverts in 24 hours, maybe much more than that (most were repeats and dealt with by other editors who I am forever grateful to). If I may thats never been my editing philosophy, I believe in tagging *right now* but fixing over years. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:37, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• Thirded. (Like user Espresso Addict, I am not independent of the situation; I have not participated in the linked discussions, but have interacted with Horse Eye's Back in other talk pages). I have also seen HEB's unnecessarily personalized and aggressive behavior toward editors. Late 2022 they received a warning at this noticeboard for aggressive and inaccurate accusations of COI against an appropriately disclosed paid Wikipedian-in-residence. Over the past month or so, HEB has turned attention to similarly disruptive cross-posting that has involved attempts (1) (2) to make public claims about another the personal information of another user (myself), including expressing belief that I should have "zero expectation of privacy" (this fits the pattern of making disagreements personal, about a user's identity, rather than about the substance of edits or content on Wikipedia); and more inaccurate accusations of COI. Of the inaccurate and aggressive COI accusation, User:DJ Cane said that HEB was "operating on a very liberal reading of WP:COI" and that HEB's "zeal in confronting opinions opposing your own in this discussion is both non-constructive and alarming, and I agree with the discussion provided by @P-Makoto that your cross-discussion comments targeting specific editors is concerning and possibly worth an outside review on its own". Based on this widespread pattern of aggressive, battlegrounding behavior, I support the proposal to issue formal action. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 05:47, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

"inaccurate and aggressive COI accusation"? I don't think it was aggressive and it certainly wasn't inaccurate. Yes they disclosed (but only on their user page, not on affected talk pages and not whenever they discussed the topic)... But they're also the author of 75% of the article on their employer... See [4]. Disclosure doesn't free you from the other restrictions and expectations... For example "you should make the disclosure on your user page, on affected talk pages, and whenever you discuss the topic;" "you should put new articles through the Articles for Creation (AfC) process instead of creating them directly;" and "you are strongly discouraged from editing affected articles directly;". Horse Eye's Back (talk) 06:50, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

The "inaccurate and aggressive COI accusation" I linked to has nothing to do with the Harold B. Lee Library page or Rachel Helps (BYU). I linked to an AfD discussion about a different page where you were accosting Heidi Pusey BYU.

In any case, merely to clarify the particular matter you refer to: Rachel Helps (BYU) does in fact openly disclose that on her user page: I wasn't going to edit the page, but a previous copyvio put the page out of commission. I completely rewrote it so a page would exist. My edit history is available for anyone to examine. Other editors looked over the page. Since copyright violation is illegal and should be promptly replaced with non-copyvio content, this—while not ideal—is, I would posit, understandable (as a rare occurrence to not be recommitted), especially since Rachel Helps (BYU) is completely up front about it on her user page, has not repeated that, has made the disclosure on her user page, and has made sure other editors reviewed the contributions.

An occasional, rare questionable moment is understandable amid a long history of responsible editing; Rachel Helps (BYU) has a long history of responsible editing. Frequent, consistent misbehavior is much less understandable, especially when set against the backdrop of a pattern of battlegrounding, sealioning, and hounding; unfortunately, you have a long history of battlegrounding, sealioning, and hounding. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 15:52, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I have a long history of responsible editing, even my greatest detractor wouldn't argue that more than 1% of my edits are misbehavior. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:53, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

People aren’t here to call for you to be subject to an outright ban as you do make plenty of good contributions to the project. We’re here because you have a sustained history of aggression, targeting, and tendency to go off topic in discussions when another editor disagrees with you. Additionally your inaccurate interpretation of COI appears to lead to many of these interactions. DJ Cane (talk) 21:15, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Not a single person has called for me to be subject to an outright ban unless I'm missing something. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 03:50, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for bringing this notice to my attention @P-Makoto. To expand on what’s quoted of me there, it is clear to me that HEB has decided that any affiliation at all with the subject matter of an article to constitute a COI violation and they defend their opinion on that and any other subject I’ve seen in an aggressive, non good faith manner. DJ Cane (talk) 18:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• I do not wish to devote too much energy to this. I was not the kindest person in the world during these discussions and have since moved on to building the new AARoads Wiki and generally doing other stuff with my life. However I was pinged in the initial post, and the reason I was not kind in these discussions is because I feel so strongly about this, so I'll say this much: this is long overdue. The listed jab at me was especially out-of-pocket because my initial diatribe in that RFC did not mention or even name HEB, but not long after it was posted, he found it within himself to go back and tag a buttload of articles I had written and contributed to a decade ago. Just deeply petty and mean to the point that it could not be construed as anything other than a personal attack. It also feels worth mentioning that relentless sealioning is another card in HEB's deck, so if he starts ignoring the crux of your argument to keep asking for more proof/diffs, just know it's a pattern. I decline to answer any questions or comment further on this matter. Good luck. TCN7JM 06:03, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Thats sealioning? Good grief... I would say more but what's the point if you're not participating further. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 06:54, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• Just so this doesn't get overlooked, I want to point out that the comment from TCN7JM that HEB is replying to was You know this, otherwise there'd be no reason your side has been so heavily pushing for it. C'mon buddy, you're smarter than this. That is a blatant provocation; it's WP:ASPERSIONs against an entire group of editors, WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior, and incivility rolled into one. And HEB's response was to ignore the uncivil second part and just ask for evidence for the aspersion in the first part. That is, by any measure, restrained. Wikipedia is not a casual discussion forum; editors who make accusations against others are in fact required to back them up. If discussion weren't already swamped with so many different discussions, I would say that this is the sort of thing that would call for a WP:BOOMERANG. --Aquillion (talk) 08:06, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  +1. Diffs without context are my least favorite aspect of ANI. This one is particularly thin in terms of proving any "pattern". PhotogenicScientist (talk) 14:50, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• I have been personally warned by more than one user from interacting with HEB due to what they characterized as trollish behavior. I don't think any of them have commented here yet. My experience with HEB does not deviate far from their descriptions. Qiushufang (talk) 07:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  Considering HEB is one of the reasons roads editors forked, you were better off not interacting with them. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 23:27, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  If I was a reason it was a very minor one... Note that the AA roads contingent was considering forking long before I entered the topic space [5] Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:03, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• I don't have much to say except that in the discussion on Talk:Simon Harley I was concerned by the pattern I was seeing. Hostile posts followed by demands for details and clarification and at every point adding new issues is a pattern I've seen in other users before. It is a very negative one as it makes the conversation exhausting for all concerned. If HEB consistently demonstrates this pattern (and I have not examined all the diffs other people have provided, so I don't exactly know how valid their concerns are) then the community should have very little patience for it. The Land (talk) 10:53, 5 January 2024 (UTC)
• I don't see a great deal here except content disputes. As far as I can see, there is nothing in the difs above extreme enough to warrant ANI involvement. Most users who edit a lot will have edits which display their frustration, and the above difs show nothing more than that. What are we here for? What policies is HEB supposed to have violated? In many cases, established editors are (probably unfairly) given much more leeway than newer users, I don't see that happening here. --Boynamedsue (talk) 11:56, 5 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Huh? Behaviour during content disputes is very much what 'warrants ANI involvement'. For policies, try WP:NPA for a start. Johnbod (talk) 18:26, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, obviously, but my point is that I don't see anything in the behaviour outlined above that would warrant an ANI case.--Boynamedsue (talk) 19:12, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Then you don't understand ANI. Longterm serial aggression and personal attacks, despite numerous warnings, a block, and promises to change, are very much what ANI is exactly for. Softlavender (talk) 19:40, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I honestly don't see a massive degree of aggression there. I have seen cases showing lots more evidence of aggression laughed out of here. --Boynamedsue (talk) 19:46, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• (I wrote this last night, but got tired and went to bed before I could proofread and post) I have to say, although I'm biased, this user seems to get into ridiculously long arguments over ridiculous, petty and irrelevant things with just about everyone a LOT. Not to discount any work that Horse Eye's has done, but the majority of his contributions seem to fall under either (i) maintenance tagging and removal of content from articles, (ii) getting into silly battleground arguments with users and (iii) arguing over the reliability of sources (and, now I could be wrong, but his reliability standards seem wildly off view from what is generally accepted, e.g., stating that there's only a few people in the world who can be cited for all articles on American football, a vast, vastly covered subject which has over a hundred million followers - something that result in the deletion of 99% of articles on the subject).
  

His talk history seems to be riddled with other editors pointing out problematic edits, rude behavior, etc. A few that immediately came to mind (I don't have the time to come up with an extensive list):

From the ANI regarding myself from last January, User:Rlendog kept a list: User:Rlendog/Sandbox6

Several WT:NFL sections (see 43 mentions of his name at one NFL archive, even though he seems to have little interest in the sport (no edits there previously), he appears to have watchlisted it after the ANI about me to complicate and oppose actions there).

Especially unhelpful comments like here, where an attempt to defuse a conflict resulted in him calling me "ignorant" and making clearly unhelpful comments such as No. You're wrong and its as simple as that.

Absurdly long stalling of a DYK nomination, including what seems to be suggesting that being religious means one has a COI on religion and are worthy of receiving topic bans / ANI if they do not follow all COI procedures for all religious subjects and suggesting that users with tens of thousands of edits are SPAs for only editing religion-areas: Talk:Coriantumr (son of Omer). BeanieFan11 (talk) 16:50, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

The second half of that statement is key, I said that "You have potential..." and you have largely lived up to that potential in the time since (your editing certainly has improved, you're much less tunnel vision these days) even if I wish you would spend more time in non-NFL topic areas (I love your overwhelming passion for the topic area, but your passion for the topic area is also problematic). The idea that I am only on WikiProject NFL to mess with you doesn't pass the smell test[6]. You are a gifted researcher and there are many areas of the project besides American Football which would benefit from your input. It is news that Rlendog is keeping a dossier on me (complete with calling me a "horses behind"[7]), note that they appear to be misrepresenting the content of a number of those diffs... Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:48, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

@BeanieFan11: I hadn't seen that HEB had called you a single-purpose account without a firm basis. Saying "note that BeanieFan11 is themselves a SPA" for the frankly ridiculous reason "it all looks like sports to me" at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Larry Green is something I'd have added to the OP had I come across it. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 07:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• I have had unpleasant interactions with HEB myself, and the tone of it fits the pattern of what other editors describe above. In this series of edits on a banned editor's user page, HEB seemed to me to have a battleground-y rigidity about wanting to put a "badge of shame" there: [8], [9], [10], [11]. Now I'll say that I know full well that editors disagree on the substance of when to tag or not, but this is a matter of the attitude that HEB brought into that disagreement. One can see a wall of text of editors disagreeing here: [12]. No need to read all of it, but just start at the top and see the attitude adopted by HEB in replying to various editors, not just to me. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:23, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I am gonna say here that while I haven't read the OPs diffs, if they're like these ones I really don't think this deserves to be at ANI. Nothing here seems off even attitude-wise and I read the last diff as the majority of editors agreeing with HEB about the underlying dispute. Loki (talk) 19:29, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I do sometimes bring a bad attitude to talk pages (we all do sometimes), but that talk page doesn't seem to be among them... I certainly give you attitude in the linked edit summaries (not more than is acceptable), but not on the talk page... That actually looks better than I remember it being. None of those twenty comments are problematic unless I'm missing something (and if I am please link the diff). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:59, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I am not going to get into a back-and-forth with anyone here, but editors/admins can decide for themselves what they think of the interaction with Tamzin at the very start of that long discussion. I'm not saying that's the only example, just an easy one for other editors and for admins to look at. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

The innuendo isn't helping, I'm not seeing anything wrong with the edits there and the same *can not* be said about many of the edits that others have shared... They really are my darkest moments (have I made 50 bad edits? Almost certainly, but its out of 50k)... What you shared just isn't, I would actually present that series of interactions as evidence that I'm a decent editor (I don't seem to disrespect anyone, I don't bludgeon, I don't make sarcastic comments, I don't make jokes, I don't do anything objectionable as far as I can see). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:20, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• HEB has been harassing me since last year (see my talk page archive) and the students who work for me(see 1 and 2). He threatened to nominate us for a topic ban on editing pages about the Book of Mormon on Talk:Coriantumr_(son_of_Omer). He told my student that she couldn't vote in an AfD about a Book of Mormon topic she wrote a page on because we work at the BYU Library (and according to his logic, have a COI on all topics related to the LDS Church). In the same AfD, he wrote that the Book of Mormon "describes a religious fantasy world" and that there are "no 'possibly historical elements' in Mormon scripture". Not only were these comments irrelevant to the AfD, but they were also dismissive of my religious beliefs. HEB refuses to escalate to actually nominating pages he tags with notability cleanup banners for deletion, claiming to want to continue discussion. However, discussion with HEB is very frustrating because he continues to try to enforce his own idiosyncratic interpretation of COI and independent sources. Maybe there is an important discussion to be had about what really can be an independent source about religious topics, but I would much prefer that it happen with people who are not going to make me feel like crap. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 21:22, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  Additionally, HEB’s insistence that the Book of Mormon should be treated as a work of fiction is not in line with established Wikipedia guidelines (see: WP:MVF and others) but when pointed out HEB aggressively doubles down on their interpretation. DJ Cane (talk) 21:29, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  While I don't think anything being said there is excessively aggressive, I do agree that this series of diffs indicates that HEB's interpretation of COI is way too expansive. The idea that working at BYU (or heck, directly for the LDS church) means you can't vote in an AfD about Mormon scripture is IMO nuts. That would mean that rabbis have a COI about Moses. Loki (talk) 21:35, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  • @LokiTheLiar: Its not working at BYU, its being a paid editor... "you must not act as a reviewer of affected article(s) at AfC, new pages patrol or elsewhere;" if they're paid to edit pages on Mormon scripture then they can't act as a reviewer for Mormon scripture at AfD. The Rabbi is fine, so is the BYU student or professor who isn't a paid editor. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 03:48, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

    As I noted in this discussion, paid editors by the BYU Library editing subjects related to the LDS faith (including relevant discussions) is not a WP:COI violation per WP:COIE but if they were to edit articles about BYU or its professors that would be. This is a Wikipedian in Residence program and is even listed as such by Wikimedia. Nobody would bat an eye at paid editors from a state university contributing to pages about state government or adjacent topics. This, of course, is not the topic of this conversation but represents an example of how HEB has adopted a standard of their own to hold editors to that lies outside the standards agreed upon by the community. DJ Cane (talk) 04:40, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

    By "articles about BYU or its professors" do you mean articles like Harold B. Lee Library, Hugh Nibley, Leonard J. Arrington, Merrill Bradshaw, Brigham Young University Museum of Art, BYU Family History Library, Ronald W. Walker, Brigham Young University Student Service Association, etc? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 05:22, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

    Yes, but a quick review of each of those shows only minor edits (spelling, ref fixes, etc.) by a BYU paid account since about 2021 with the exception of on Hugh Nibley who, while he was a BYU professor was also a major figure in LDS apologetics which may or may not constitute COI depending on a deeper review of the content of those edits using systems we have built as a community to counter problems. In either case, COI issues with those articles doesn’t justify targeting or stirring up trouble in other places.

    Note: I acknowledge a more thorough review could show more but I was looking for accounts with BYU in the name, which appears to be the standard these editors are using as part of how they identify themselves. DJ Cane (talk) 05:40, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

    This isn't entirely on-topic but you need to go back further, for example Rachel Help's first editor at Harold B. Lee Library is in 2016 (diff unavailable do the copyright strike) and there are substantial edits along with the minor edits... So many substantial edits in fact that she is the author of 75.2% of the page. In 2017 she re-wrote the page [13] with a significant new emphasis on awards and positive rankings. You will also note that there isn't a disclosure on most of those talk pages which is required, we have a system and these editors aren't following it. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 09:43, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

    Whataboutism based on issues 6+ years ago that aren’t ongoing isn’t a very effective argument. DJ Cane (talk) 15:57, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

    Appears to be ongoing, this edit from the 5th is the sort of edit that really needs to be proposed on the talk page not done directly [14]. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 07:01, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

    Another prime example of what is not a COI in this situation. DJ Cane (talk) 07:07, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

    How so? It appears to be both a paid edit (all of which incur a financial conflict of interest per WP:PE) and to have additional conflicts based on organizational affiliation (in case you didn't catch it some of the removed text concerned the "Museum of Art at Brigham Young University"). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 07:11, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

    The edit summary should be sufficient for a reasonable observer - the portion removed (a collection at BYU) was not relevant to the article (which covers art with Mormon themes and from Mormon artists). The collection could be appropriately added to Brigham Young University Museum of Art but not by @Rachel Helps (BYU) because that would be a COI, or possibly elsewhere which may or may not be a COI. DJ Cane (talk) 07:21, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

    I guess we're just going to have to agree to disagree. One thing thats become clear from this conversation is that COI might be the most nebulous part of wikipedia, no two editors have provided the same standard or expectations for how COI should be perceived and adjudicated. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 07:27, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

The paid editing standards apply to all edits which have been paid for which for these accounts is all their edits. I think you're getting standard COI and PAID confused. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:50, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Voting in an AfD (or RFC or similar) is not what that line refers to. It's being a reviewer. Also that line is from WP:COI not WP:PAID, so it only applies if the account has a COI, which the person you were accusing still very much did not. Loki (talk) 05:05, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

WP:PE says "Being paid to contribute to Wikipedia is one form of financial COI; it places the paid editor in a conflict between their employer's goals and Wikipedia's goals." We can have a discussion about whether or not AfD is included in "or similar" but AfD is clearly similar to AfC so if its not included some clarification is needed. WP:PAID says "Paid editing is further regulated by a community guideline, Wikipedia:Conflict of interest. This advises that those with a conflict of interest, including paid editors, are strongly discouraged from directly editing affected articles, but should post content proposals on the talk pages of existing articles, and should put new articles through the articles for creation process, so they can be reviewed prior to being published." The paid BYU editors edit the articles directly and create the articles directly. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 05:10, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• As someone who's sometimes disagreed with Horse and sometimes agreed with him, I think that nonetheless the bedside manner can be a bit lacking. Also, this seems rather bizarre — wtf is that? Homeslice hasn't edited the page in 15 years and has very little current authorship, what could this possibly have had to do with the dispute at hand? jp×g🗯️ 21:56, 5 January 2024 (UTC)
• This thread cited above by Rachel Helps is absolutely bananas, both in terms of HEB's ridiculous interpretation of COI, and his blatant attempts to cow others into submission with threats of topic bans. The gravedancing on Roxie the Dog's user page cited by Tryptofish (and HEB's refusal to either walk away or admit his edits were not helpful) is also troubling. This pattern of behavior seems to be widespread and unlikely to stop, given their history. Parsecboy (talk) 23:20, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  I think the fact that this "pattern of behavior seems to be widespread and unlikely to stop" is the nub of what ANI ought to evaluate here. I recognize that HEB also has a long track record of making good contributions, so this gets into a "net positive" versus "net negative" kind of balance. How that balances out, I'm not yet sure. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:32, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

• I think a TBAN on LDS and BYU topics, broadly construed, would possibly be a good starting point. It would at the very least stop one area of targeted harassment and put HEB on notice that more sanctions may follow if the behavior does not improve. Softlavender (talk) 23:59, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

  That might not be the best idea, LDS topics are already heavily-skewed in *favour* of the topic, largely due to the fact that the majority of editors who work on it are mormons. 208.87.236.202 (talk) 00:49, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Having HEB’s aggression/targeting mixed in will not resolve or add any value to that issue. DJ Cane (talk) 01:42, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  I'm not convinced that HEB is being particularly aggressive, and I very much am not convinced that their overly expansive interpretation of COI is worse than POV-pushing. Loki (talk) 03:27, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  I agree with Softlavender's proposal that a TBAN on LDS and BYU topics, broadly construed, would possibly be a good starting point. I have seen HEB's behavior become highly disruptive in that part of Wikipedia, since 2022 and up to the present.

  Respectfully, Loki, I disagree with your assessment of HEB's behavior. I think it's important to keep in mind that this is not about these interactions and confrontations in isolation, but how they have accumulated into a disruptive pattern. What most alarms me is how even after receiving a warning for harassing Rachel Helps (BYU), HEB has continued to be sufficiently preoccupied with WP:HOUNDING her that over a year later HEB now is attempting to threaten her students with topic bans. If HEB's behavior were more isolated or didn't have a history behind it, then I could understand not raising it to ANI. However, the extent of it across time, topics, and people lead me to agree with at a minimum Softlavender's proposal.

  Finally, I would say that whether or not HEB's overly expansive interpretation of COI is worse than POV-pushing seems like a potential inadvertent distraction, inasmuch as it may lead us to be dwelling on other people's behavior (POV-pushing) when that can be considered independently of HEB's behavior, and the latter's what this ANI thread is about. If there are concerns about POV-pushing from editors who aren't HEB, then they and their POV-pushing can be taken up in a separate thread or separate threads. For this thread, my comment are about HEB's behavior, and I include the overly expansive interpretation of COI. For what it's worth, if this is referring to Rachel Helps (BYU), my experience has been that she and her students make good-faith efforts to be careful about POV and have been, in the handful of times I have seen missteps, receptive to good-faith feedback on their edits. I've found them much easier and more productive to work alongside than HEB, who so quickly escalates to deploying their overly expansive interpretation of COI to try to disregard and eliminate editors from topics and pages. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 04:25, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  • I've proposed a formal admonishment below but left it generalized because it's difficult to pinpoint the one true concern. HEB's interpretation of COI is at the root of several—but definitely not all—of the problematic behaviors/concerns identified above, which is broader than LDS/BYU. Still, I'm not sure thatthere would be appetite for enforceable editing restrictions that instruct HEB to bring any COI concerns to the COI noticeboard in lieu of a talk page in any namespace. Regardless, I would personally encourage HEB at least ask general questions about their interpretation of COI at COIN. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 07:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

As a voluntary restriction I could get behind that... The only problem I see is thats its more of a privilege than a restriction and some apparently want to see me punished... Normally you're supposed to go talk page first, "If you believe an editor has an undisclosed COI and is editing in violation of this guideline, raise the issue in a civil manner on the editor's talk page, which is the first step in resolving user-conduct issues, per the DR policy, citing this guideline." but I wouldn't mind being able to start at the noticeboard. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 09:32, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, the argument here is that we should just not enforce our own policies as long as someone has a particular POV in a topic area -- I do not think this is a good idea. jp×g🗯️ 09:48, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Like boynamedsue above, I'm struggling to see anything ANI-worthy here. I'm seeing a lot of misrepresented diffs here (the diffs in the OP are not vicious battlegrounding, the COI diffs are not harassment or "going after" anyone), I'm seeing a lot of editors who have previously had content or policy disputes with HEB piling on (in some cases after being pinged here). I would oppose any sanctions on these diffs. Everyone makes snippy remarks now and again, the quality and quantity of HEB's remarks don't seem particularly bad, and while conduct concerns like COI would be better brought to COIN than raised with the COI editors (who will never agree they have a COI), I think this ANI pile-on is worse than the alleged incivility. And FWIW I believe if you put it on your resume you have a COI for it, whether it's education or employment. Levivich (talk) 00:24, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I would agree, in terms of COI, people with a personal connection to a topic, especially potential economic benefit from its positive reputation, have a COI. That may or may not be the mainstream interpretatiob of COI (I almost never edit in fields where this might be relevant) but it surely isn't an ANI matter to be reasonably wrong here?Boynamedsue (talk) 05:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree with this interpretation of COI. I do think HEB's interpretation goes beyond that in the cases above, although I also feel there's more nuance to what is COI when it comes to editors from religious schools and BYU in particular. The bludgeoning and targeting are problematic. I think that this might be exacerbated by the frustration inherent in 1v1 and 1vmany arguments where he knows there is PAG/MOS violation to some degree from the "other" side, and they're just not getting it so he tries to approach the problem from different angles or catch them out in some other way. JoelleJay (talk) 20:26, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree, more nuance in BYU's case: All seem to agree that the school owned and operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is — and should be — different from other universities ... the school 'stands unquestionably committed to its unique academic mission and to the church that sponsors it.' ... 'being a university second to none in its role primarily as an undergraduate teaching institution that is unequivocally true to the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ in the process' [15] Levivich (talk) 22:06, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• After reading all the various diffs, the only problematic thing I'm seeing is that HEB has a very expansive idea of what a COI is. I don't think that HEB is being particularly uncivil or aggressive in any of the linked diffs. (Given this, I would also like to object to ScottishFinnishRadish's closing of the COI section above, because I feel that section and not this one has the more meaningful part of this complaint.) Loki (talk) 03:24, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• I don't really see much aggression or incivility; what I do see is that Horse Eye's Back is inexplicably ultra-confident in what they are saying, even when that is absolutely ridiculous to everyone else. This discussion cited above is just bewildering, where they ardently and confidently misunderstand, inter alia, what being a reliable source is, what subject-matter experts are, what the meaning of "niche" is, and probably more still, and yet they still carry on in possibly the most self-confident manner imaginable. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 19:49, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  @AirshipJungleman29: Perhaps "aggressive" is the wrong word to use, and if so I'd be happy to use a different descriptor if you or others have one. "Sealioning" was one potential descriptor I used below. The intent in my use of "aggressive" was to describe that sort of passive-aggressive(?) relentless attack and defense without self-reflection. As I said below, "It's not that HEB is consistently uncivil, but that they frequently exhibit aggressive battlegrounding behavior with individuals who either happen to disagree with them or HEB thinks have violated a Wikipedia policy/guideline." Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 20:06, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Fourthed (or whatever number we're one now). Battleground behaviour is evident as presented by Ed and others. I myself have had a few negative interactions with the editor in question where similar behaviour was exhibited. JM (talk) 23:02, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I think this is a very self explanatory piece. Baiting and harassment in its finest. [16] — MatthewAnderson707 (talk|sandbox) 03:25, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

That's not harassment, by any stretch. And I hardly call it baiting. Expressing astonishment that someone reviewed something so quickly is not either. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:59, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

No, this is his usual method of trying to provoke an argument with editors of WP:ROADS. Even the language shows high levels of passive aggressiveness. Even the angry "Don't you dare" shows it. — MatthewAnderson707 (talk|sandbox) 20:46, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Seems like a reasonable response to an editor removing another editor's talk page comment with the edit summary "rm bad faith comment." I'm not the one in that series of discussions openly engaging in battleground behavior "regardless its no longer my battle" [17] yet I'm the one thats been dragged to ANI. Odd no? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 02:28, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

@MatthewAnderson707, no it doesn't. Not by any stretch of the imagination. It's examples like that why me and many others didn't think twice about opposing. TarnishedPath^talk 10:36, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

COI clarification

Not a matter for ANI. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:04, 5 January 2024 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
On the user talk page @Parsecboy: said "On what planet does having attended a school constitute a WP:COI? Let me be clear: it doesn't."[18] with @The Land: saying "Hello Horse Eye's Back. Like Parsecboy, I can't imagine circumstances where regular, non-controversial editing pages on a school one attended would be a COI requiring declaration."[19] and I just wanted to check whether that was true... Thats not how I've seen COI applied in practice and it certainly clashed directly with what WP:COI says but if Parsecboy and The Land are *right* I am definitely the asshole here. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:21, 5 January 2024 (UTC) My intuition just from reading WP:COI is that making edits about a school that you are attending is probably a COI, but not a school you attended. I would guess that most edits about otherwise obscure high schools are from people who attended those high schools. Loki (talk) 04:34, 5 January 2024 (UTC) The context here includes both edits while attending and edits after attending. I agree with you vis-a-vis obscure high schools but I'm not sure that its ok just because a lot of people do/have done it. For me the biggest aspect is self promotion... Lionizing anything which is on your resume is effectively self promotion, but the seriousness of education COI goes in descending order from post-doc lab to pre-school. IMO high school is about the cutoff for where I'm worried about it. We all know the first thing recruiters do when they see a school on a resume is look it up on google... Which takes them straight to wikipedia. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:39, 5 January 2024 (UTC) HEB, this ANI has been opened about your behavior, and I'm concerned you created this section to distract/deflect from that. If you want a clarification about our COI policies, WP:COIN is available. Ed [talk] [OMT] 04:56, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Yes, my behavior... Hence "if Parsecboy and The Land are *right* I am definitely the asshole here." What appears to be deflection is pinging in a whole series of editors I've had issues with over the years to dogpile on me while omitting the actual context of the complaint. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 06:44, 5 January 2024 (UTC) There is absolutely no blanket COI between an individual who attends a school and an article on that school. The argument that it does belies a complete misunderstanding of what a conflict of interest actually is. If the editor works for the school in any capacity, then yes, there's a COI. If Horse Eye's Back's interpretation is correct, you can go through the edit history of probably every article on a school and block all of the editors for violating this conception of what constitutes a COI. You could count on one hand the number of editors who have contributed to schools they didn't attend. Parsecboy (talk) 10:25, 5 January 2024 (UTC) There absolutely is a blanket COI, the only question is whether it’s a concern to wikipedia. I think it might actually be you who misunderstands what a COI is. I don't believe I ever called for blocks, I've only asked for disclosure. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:07, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Absolute nonsense. Please explain what interests the average student have that conflicts with Wikipedia’s goals (beyond petty vandalism, which isn’t a COI issue). Are you arguing that the average student as a financial interest in how their school is portrayed online? Parsecboy (talk) 11:38, 5 January 2024 (UTC) WP:SOAPBOX points 1, 4, and 5. The only way for them not have a special interest is if school reputation plays no role in hiring or advancement in their field nor do they ever plan on working or seeking employment in such a field... If it’s on your resume you have a conflict of interest with it. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:44, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Still no explanation about how that applies to students of a school (and numbers 1 and 3 have nothing to do with a COI, and would apply equally to non-students as well). As for 4, the editors in question never worked for their schools, nor were they writing articles about themselves. Are you arguing that they benefit by making their school appear better than it was? If so, that’s so damn thin it’s transparent, my friend. Parsecboy (talk) 12:05, 5 January 2024 (UTC) 1, 4, and 5 not 1, 3, and 4. #4 covers writing about yourself *and* "projects in which you have a strong personal involvement." Yes that is my argument. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 12:09, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Then your argument is a joke. The idea that anyone could personally benefit from making their high school seem better on Wikipedia is cosmically absurd. Parsecboy (talk) 12:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC) What if you're currently in the college application process? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 12:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Lol no. Have you ever worked in an educational system? Heck, even applied to college? Nobody is researching highschools on Wikipedia to make decisions on who gets accepted. We’ve crossed over into parody, right? Parsecboy (talk) 12:32, 5 January 2024 (UTC) "unnecessarily personalized and deliberately aggressive comments" indeed... Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:00, 5 January 2024 (UTC) My comment was in no way aggressive, and the only personalization was questioning your experience in this area, which seems relevant, since you are making an argument that is ludicrous on its face. At what point are you going to stop digging in your heels on this obviously wrong position and admit you have grossly misinterpreted COI? Parsecboy (talk) 13:27, 5 January 2024 (UTC) I worked in college admissions for two years. We used wikipedia daily, its simply not possible to memorize thousands of highschools. I applied to college. Is there any other personal information you would like to know? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:33, 5 January 2024 (UTC) And what did you use it for, praytell? Surely you are not seriously suggesting that, for two students who have identical GPAs, ACT/SAT scores, extra-curriculars, etc., you would break the tie by checking the Wikipedia article on their high school. If not, then the student has no particular interest in their school's iamge on Wikipedia. Parsecboy (talk) 13:44, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Not directly but we would assign the school an "academic reputation" score of 1-5 which for prep schools was pretty easy because there are actual rankings but for the random public schools yeah it pretty much was just googling the school and assigning an arbitrary score. We had less than 20 minutes to review their entire file including essays and letters of recommendation. I don't know what you're imagining but its not a terribly fair or scientific process. In my own professional life I have had a recruiter quote the wikipedia page for my college to me so I'm assuming he looked at it. Maybe that is what colors my perception of COI, I know how much it matters. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:53, 5 January 2024 (UTC) WP:COI says that it's a policy that should be applied with common sense. To my mind, what school someone attended is only loosely an 'interest', let alone one that is likely to come into conflict with anything else. The idea that editing one's secondary school is effectively self-promotion on the grounds that some future employer might care about what the Wikipedia article about the school says. This would be quite an innovation for our COI policy. As I said, there might be some edge cases where the school or edits about it are particularly controversial. But that's not the case here and there's no justification for jumping on Simon Harley's talk page with threatening messages. The Land (talk) 10:44, 5 January 2024 (UTC) When does it become a COI which matters then? When you're editing your thesis advisor's page? Also note that these edits are controversial because the articles (List of headmasters of St. Bees School and History of St. Bees School) don't actually appear notable... Making a page for a non-notable thing you have a COI with strikes me as a problem. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:07, 5 January 2024 (UTC) WP:COI says that Any external relationship can trigger a conflict of interest [emphasis mine] and later How close the relationship needs to be before it becomes a concern on Wikipedia is governed by common sense. I do not think "I previously attended this school" is a conflict of interest which requires disclosing. If it is, I strongly suspect that the vast majority of substantive edits about schools across the entirety of wikipedia are in violation of it! Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 10:36, 5 January 2024 (UTC) @Caeciliusinhorto-public: what about currently attends or works at the school? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:11, 5 January 2024 (UTC) "Works at the school" I would consider the same as working at any other institution; WP:COI explicitly says that being an employee of an institution is (not just can be) a financial conflict of interest. Even if someone is editing an article about their employer off-the-clock and not as part of their job, I would think it should be disclosed, though such editing might still be completely unproblematic. "Currently attends" I think is okay and generally does not require a COI disclosure; I suspect that there might be less community consensus on that though. Fundamentally I just don't think that attending or having attended a school gives the average person any particular interest in presenting a school in a particular way that would conflict with their duties as a Wikipedian. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 11:53, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Is there a difference to you between a public school where education is freely provided and a private school at which the student has a strong financial relationship with the school? (or for that matter a public school which charges tuition) Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:59, 5 January 2024 (UTC) I can't see how it makes a difference. I can't see how an editor who went to a fee-paying school should have a conflict of interest wrt that school any more than an editor who shops at Walmart has a conflict of interest wrt Walmart. If we consider that a disclosable COI, then Talk:Walmart is improbably light on required COI disclosures! Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 12:52, 5 January 2024 (UTC) They don't seem to be the same relationship... Surely a business owner has a COI with their employee in the way that a employee has with the business owner? Its not only the employee who has a COI. If the school pays you 45k a year you have a major COI with the school, so why would there be no major COI if you pay the school 45k a year? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:00, 5 January 2024 (UTC) If the school pays you 45k a year you have a major COI with the school, so why would there be no major COI if you pay the school 45k a year? Why should these two situations be equivalent? If you are employed by someone, they have the power to punish you (up to and including firing you) if you do things which reflect negatively upon them, and to reward you with bonuses or promotions if you do things which help them make money (and, of course, if you do things that help them make money then they are more likely to remain solvent, and thus you are more likely to keep your job). If you regularly pay an organisation thousands of dollars, they have no such power over you. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 14:38, 5 January 2024 (UTC) So you're saying that employers don't have a COI with their employees? Its only employees who have a COI with their employer? I don't think thats right, if I employ Rudy Giuliani as my lawyer I have a conflict of interest with Rudy Giuliani. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:42, 5 January 2024 (UTC) No, that's not at all what I said. I haven't got a strong opinion on whether a business owner prima facie has a COI wrt all of their employees (certainly business owners have a COI with respect to at least some of their employees, but would for instance Jeff Bezos have a COI with respect to any random person who happened to work as an Amazon delivery driver? I'm not convinced he would). Even if we accept arguendo that they do, the school you go to is not your employee, even if you are paying them directly through school fees rather than indirectly through your taxes. A fee-paying school is a business and their students are customers. I do not think that people in general have a COI with regards to businesses they patronise which requires disclosure, even if their financial commitment to that business runs into the tens of thousands of dollars. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 15:14, 5 January 2024 (UTC) I'm a bit skeptical of the idea that simply attending a school could give someone a COI. If we included that, why not include, I don't know... "anyone who lived in town X" or even "anyone who lives in country Y"? Are we going to ban every New Yorker from editing New York? Should every American citizen be considered to have a COI with regards to WP:AP2? Or (and this is the classic example to me), would we consider every citizen of Israel, and every citizen of Gaza and the West Bank, to have a COI with regards to WP:CT/A-I? And maybe every Jew and Muslim to boot? For that matter, what about religious beliefs in other contexts? Could anyone with a strong religious belief (or staunch atheism) be considered to have a COI not just with regards to their own faith, but everyone else's? Should we extend that to everything their faith has weighed in on - which, for some major faiths, could be almost everything? There are clearly some relationships that an observer notionally could conclude could incline someone to bias that don't rise to the level of a COI. While financial COIs are of course not the only ones that exist, I think that it's reasonable to say that something should rise to at least the level of a serious financial COI (ie. something that a reasonable observer would assume is as significant to the editor as large amount of money, just based on whatever detail is known about them.) People could be presumed to have that sort of COI with regards to their family members or the like; but I don't think you'd usually presume that level of COI with regard to your hometown, nation of origin, alma mater, or the like. Even religious belief - which might rise to that level - isn't usually considered sufficient for a COI. (Though that said, I personally don't think it would be amiss to treat people whose nationalistic, political, philosophical or religious beliefs rise to the level of "as important to them as life itself" as having a COI with regards to core articles about those things - but it would be a very difficult thing to practically enforce. And that is stuff that is way more weighty to most people than their alma mater.) --Aquillion (talk) 11:48, 5 January 2024 (UTC) Yes all of those people have conflicts of interest, they just aren't significant enough to matter most of the time. Thats the nuance that I think most people miss about conflict of interest, we are all immeshed in a massive web of conflicts of interest. Each of us has nearly innumerable conflicts. I'm interested in where you would draw the line, where does education become a significant COI? Professors you had? Thesis advisor? Former lover/professor? When you donate to your alma matter? When your kids goes there? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:57, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Admonishment proposal

About a dozen editors above have voiced concerns with HEB's behavior; two editors called it "sealioning", which to me looks to be an apt descriptor in the general internet sense. It's not that HEB is consistently uncivil, but that they frequently exhibit aggressive battlegrounding behavior with individuals who either happen to disagree with them or HEB thinks have violated a Wikipedia policy/guideline.

Unfortunately, HEB is not understanding those concerns, as he has chosen to dispute nearly every negative characterization brought up in the above discussion.

As such, I'd like to move for a formal admonishment. As part of that, HEB would be warned that if their battleground behavior continues, admin action will be taken and/or editing restrictions applied.

Pinging the users who have commented above: Espresso Addict, Horse Eye's Back, LilianaUwU, P-Makoto, DJ Cane, TCN7JM (apologies for pinging per the end of your message, please don't feel like you need to comment again), Qiushufang, The Land, Boynamedsue, Johnbod, Softlavender, BeanieFan11, Tryptofish, LokiTheLiar, Parsecboy, Caeciliusinhorto-public, Aquillion, Rachel Helps (BYU), JPxG, Levivich. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 07:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support my own proposal. I'd be thrilled if this formal action curbs HEB's worst impulses and sets them on the path of being a better collegial editing partner. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 07:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose. Like I say above, apart from the COI stuff I'm not seeing it. Loki (talk) 08:22, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support if it gets them to stop being needlessly antagonistic about literally anything and everything. Qiushufang (talk) 08:57, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support Reading through Rachel Helps' talk page archives, this seems like pretty clear sealioning behavior to me. There are countless warnings of their behavior, yet also many people that have come to the users's defense - WP:UNBLOCKABLE comes to mind (although a formal admonishment seems the best option here). I would recommend HEB try to focus on other activities on the wiki besides posting COI notices/enforcement on user talk pages. Darcyisverycute (talk) 09:05, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Just a note that while I do not meet the definition given in the link both Ed and Parsecboy do. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 09:49, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support -- like I said, the bedside manner could stand to be improved. (As a parenthetical note, I didn't get a ping from that comment above, even though I was pinged with the {{u}} template -- maybe it failed?) jp×g🗯️ 09:51, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  What's astounding is that the people who personally warned me (multiple) about HEB haven't even commented yet. The fact that multiple complete strangers who I had zero prior interactions with would individually send me warnings about another editor's behavior is insane. I have been editing for as long as HEB practically every other day for five years and have gotten into good deal of disputes, but this is on a whole other level. Qiushufang (talk) 11:17, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  If you want my blessing to link those warnings and ping them without anyone being able to call "canvassing" you have it, I have nothing to hide and we've certainly got a party going already. Would also like to know if you're going to open a SPI anytime soon with what I brought to your talk yesterday, if you're not let me know and I'l open the SPI. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:27, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose - as written - admin action will be taken and/or editing restrictions applied - is too vague and doesn't offer any specificity. Admin discretion would allow an admin action to be just another warning, and what editing restrictions are you asking for? You stated there is a "concerning pattern of behavior" by HEB, "and they have not stopped", but this proposal falls short of actually stopping and/or curtailing that behavior. Isaidnoway (talk) 10:22, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
  • @Isaidnoway: I didn't think there would be support for specific sanctions as we are talking about a broad pattern of behavior. The hope is that a final and formal warning shot would set HEB on a better path, while also giving admins broader leeway for tackling issues in the future. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 17:17, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose I believe that having this ANI opened is punishment enough and should give HEB plenty to think about. No formal warning required. Tooncool64 (talk) 10:13, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Tooncool64: Were the six attempts I linked in the OP, plus the plethora of time HEB has disputed negative characterizations in this discussion, plus the multiple times HEB has been discussed on this noticeboard, not proof that informal curbs aren't enough? Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 17:17, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose, I don't see any behaviour that would warrant a sanction of any type. I think we are perhaps dealing with users who are over-estimating what is required in terms of politeness to suggest WP:NPA excludes any display of exasperation at all.Boynamedsue (talk) 10:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose - the diffs are not frequent, not aggressive, not battleground, and not sealioning. Levivich (talk) 13:15, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support, with the additional suggestion that further formal action be proposed and discussed. I agree with Isaidnoway that the proposal as written risks doing too little to dissuade HEB. HEB has been warned here at ANI previously (see Drmies's comment at the end of this thread that I linked in my "thirded" comment about HEB's persistent, disruptive, and targeted behavior against a user, including accusations based on inaccurate interpretations of COI, stating Horse Eye's Back, you need to back off. This is your clear warning: drop the stick.), and has chosen to persist. HEB's behavior has been long-term over the past couple years, widespread across topics, disruptive to editing, beyond mere expressions of exasperation, and unrelenting (if anything HEB has expanded the scope of behavior, e.g. see how targeting Wikipedian-in-residence Rachel Helps (BYU) in 2022 has turned into targeting students working for her in 2023–2024). Formal action should be taken. As far as my suggestion to propose further formal action (beyond the proposed admonishment), in the linked thread Awilley suggested a one-way interaction ban. Maybe some one-way interaction bans would both stop HEB's targeting of some users and provide a clear disincentive against further behavior like this. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 15:36, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support with the additional note that I’d like to see one or more specific consequences outlined in this forum for if HEB continues the unwarranted aggression, targeting, etc.

DJ Cane (talk) 16:00, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Further comment: there’s a lot of people voting oppose who are right in saying that none of the concerns brought up violate any policy on their own, but at least in my opinion these editors are taking issues individually as if they are occurring in a vacuum. They are, of course, right if that was the case but it simply isn’t. There is a clear pattern of hostile behavior from HEB stemming several years and some of the sealioning reported by other users was later exhibited in this discussion (such as when HEB tried to justify themselves multiple times using years old edits). Furthermore, this crowd has started what appears to be an unjustified discussion claiming canvassing is present here simply because there are editors who take issue with HEB’s behavior. There is a lot to unpack from what has been said in this discussion, but none of the “side quests” should be used to distract from the issue at hand which has already been formally warned against at least once yet continues.

DJ Cane (talk) 15:18, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

For me, that "further comment" exactly pinpoints what I see as the issue here. I hope that this proposal does not get lost in ANI indecision. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:49, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps I just don't understand what sealioning I because what's been presented here doesn't seem to meet any of the common definitions of sealioning... If there's a pattern here it certainly isn't clear. I don't think I've "tried to justify themselves multiple times using years old edits" so you're going to need to actually make that argument rather than just cast aspersions. Also note the irony of referring to editors who disagree with you as "this crowd" and casting aspersions against all of them in a discussion about supposed battleground behavior. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:34, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Re: Bringing up years old edits to justify and/or sidetrack the discussion, see references to issues from 2021 and issues from 2016-17. In the latter example, it is admitted that it isn't on topic. DJ Cane _(he/him) (Talk) 11:10, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

In neither diff do I "try to justify themselves" unless I'm missing something. "it is admitted that it isn't on topic" would appear to misrepresent "This isn't entirely on-topic" Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:35, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose I'm unconvinced that the totality of evidence here rises to the level of a sanction. FWIW, called Rschen7754 "a leader of the extremist wing" of WP:ROADS editors. is hardly false, is it? Black Kite (talk) 16:11, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Black Kite, just because something isn't false (and it is false) doesn't mean it should be said. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 16:23, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Well, one can argue that either way, but it's certainly not an unreasonable position to take. I would expect a sanction to be applied where aspersions had been made that were clearly unreasonable. Black Kite (talk) 16:32, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Also, calling somebody a religious or political extremist may be classified a personal attack. Calling someone an extremist in terms of their interpretation of wiki policies is definitely not a personal attack. HEB wasn't suggesting the user belonged to some secretive far right sect, he was saying that his interpretation of the rules was a minority view at the far end of a continuum. From the COI squabbling on here, I get the impression that HEB might well be "a COI extremist". I trust nobody will be reaching for the New Section button upon reading that? Not even HEB himself.Boynamedsue (talk) 16:44, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Well, precisely. Rschen's interpretation of the sourcing required for ROADS articles was certainly at the extreme end of a continuum, which is why I don't think HEB's comment was unreasonable. Yes, HEB could perhaps wind in the level of their comments sometimes, but as I said above I don't think that they're running past the levels required for a sanction. Black Kite (talk) 16:53, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Black Kite: Given the way the word "extremist" is almost always used outside of Wikipedia, which is to say that it's used to describe terrorists and the worst of people's political/religious views, it's a heck of a word to use when you merely disagree with a person's stance on a Wikipedia policy. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 17:17, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  I can't say I would like to be called an extremist in anything, and I bet rschen wouldn't either. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 17:25, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Saying stuff another editor doesn't like isn't what a personal attack is. This comment is entirely about on-wiki behavior, and it's also, frankly, obviously true. Loki (talk) 17:38, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Because calling someone an extremist isn't a personal attack? LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 17:54, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  If a description of their behaviour is at one end of a measure of on-wiki behaviour, absolutely it isn't. In fact I'm slightly bemused that it could be taken as such (unless it's untrue, of course). Black Kite (talk) 18:43, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  I'm reasonably certain Rschen7754 has called me an extremist on notability at some point - and if they haven't, someone else certainly has. So long as the allegation is made in an appropriate location - and HEB's was - such allegations don't amount to personal attacks. BilledMammal (talk) 03:00, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Are you thinking of this from (ironically) @The ed17: in that same conversation "That's a pretty extreme stance."[20] Horse Eye's Back (talk) 09:10, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Could be, not sure - although I’m surprised to see The ed17 make such a statement given their expressed concerns about similar wording; I hope they will now be willing to withdraw those concerns? BilledMammal (talk) 14:17, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  "Extremist" is almost always used to describe the worst of society. That the word is derived from "extreme" does not mean that they are similar in use or impact. I'd invite you both to re-read what I posted above, where I called out the problems with using "extremist" in that context, and continue on to explore how the two words are used outside of Wikipedia. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 17:47, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  I find that very disappointing and hypocritical; there is no significant difference between the two statements, with the Cambridge Dictionary even clarifying that a "group of extremists" is equivalent to "people with extreme opinions". BilledMammal (talk) 18:06, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  I invite you to log off the dictionary, walk into a crowd of people, and see what happens when you accuse one person of being an extremist vs. accusing another of stating an extreme opinion in a social context. In any case, we're now off the topic of this ANI. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 20:54, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  I genuinely doubt I will get a different response to saying someone is an "extremist on non-political topic X" than I would for saying some has an "extreme opinion on non-political topic X".

  I also disagree this is off topic; it is appropriate to consider your behaviour here as the filer, including whether you engaged in the same behaviour you are objecting to others engaging in. Regardless, I’m happy to drop this now; we’re not going to agree, and I believe I’ve made my point. BilledMammal (talk) 21:29, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Yeah, I think the difference is that "extremist" is seen negatively when it refers to political issues, but elsewhere it can just be descriptive. Black Kite (talk) 21:26, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  I would have absolutely no problem with it, indeed I've described myself as an extremist on several occasions in terms of questions such as teaching practices and views on mobile phones. I'm wondering if this is perhaps a difference between linguistic variants.Boynamedsue (talk) 17:41, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  You're absolutely free to call yourself an extremist if you like. I don't know whether it comes down to linguistic variants, but from what I gather, in the context of the diff, and in the context of calling others extremists on Wikipedia, doing so has registered as a personal attack because it shifts the conversation away from the disagreement and the interpretation being wrong, toward the character of the person, suggesting that they are are wrong not because of a different perspective or disagreement, but because they are, as a person, "extreme" and therefore unreasonable and illogical, not to be reasoned with as a thinking interlocutor but instead dismissed as a force of nature. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 01:48, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support, of course. While my interactions with HEB have been mostly positive, I understand that it hasn't been the case for most, especially the roads crowd. I would say further discussion of sanctions might be needed, as well. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 16:21, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support: I want HEB to stay an editor for years to come–they've been kind and productive with me for some time now–but polemic comments on LDS issues in particular (like this one) seriously worry me. A formal warning is often the least invasive but effective measure, and I hope this is the last of the issue so we can all go back to working together. ~ Pbritti (talk) 17:25, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose I've seen some of the fictional character articles coming out of paid BYU accounts. Reasonable people can disagree, but I think some push back against minor character articles is reasonable. Big Money Threepwood (talk) 20:03, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Leaving aside a few issues which I assume will lead a closing admin to discount this comment (that this ignores the conversation above in favor of a content dispute, that this account knew Wikipedia policies from its first edit one month ago, and that this account could also make references to edit summaries, original research, markup, and wikicode a ~week later)—is your use of the phrase "fictional character articles" meant to refer to figures from the Book of Mormon? Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 22:11, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  The disagreement amongst some editors as to whether the Book of Mormon is a work of fact or fiction is the single most alarming aspect of this entire dispute. Levivich (talk) 23:26, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

  Well, myth or fiction. I don’t even think the BYU editors are trying to argue the Book of Mormon should be treated as fact in this context, though one can reasonably expect that their religious beliefs include such. In fact, the BYU editors have responded favorably to rewrites that improved POV. DJ Cane (talk) 00:05, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Having been the editor involved in that example of favorable response, I can comprehend the trepidation Levivich expresses, but I want to emphasize that the gracious response to edits I've made (including edits that connect Book of Mormon content to the early American context) has left me optimistic that these editors are willing to meet the Wikipedia project on its terms as NPOV goes. I think the way DJ Cane assesses the situation is spot on. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 07:25, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Do you agree my interpretation of policy on my first edit was correct? Please help me fix that page, as someone reverted me for not understanding policy correctly there. I thought user generated content wasn't reliable, but was told there is an exception for video game walkthroughs. I left it be because unsure. I try to read all of the linked policies but there are so many Big Money Threepwood (talk) 03:40, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support, per the comments that I and numerous other editors have said above. I agree with some of the concerns expressed here, that this may not be a strong enough outcome to ensure adequate compliance. On the other hand, I think it's acceptable to go a little gently at this point, in the hope that HEB will actually take this to heart, as he has already suggested above that he might do in some form: [21]. As for those editors who oppose the proposal (a significant number of whom I recognize as perennial opposers of any criticisms of civility failures by anybody), I do think it's worth noting that HEB did say that, and this is a pretty gentle sanction to place: it's basically just asking that he do as we expect all editors to do, but with the added condition that he has been warned that significant failure will come under administrator discretion. (And I'm not buying the arguments for oppose that rest on the desire to strengthen one "side" in the LDS POV dispute.) I see this as a kind of WP:ROPE, although given the past history, the rope will not be infinite in length. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:03, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support, pretty much as per Tryptofish. I definitely have stronger views about what constitutes acceptable conduct than some of the other people in this discussion, but I'm also pretty certain that HEB's conduct if continued will be a disruptive drain. I could probably be persuaded to support a stronger sanction, but have nothing in mind to propose myself. I would prefer not to conflate patterns of behaviour that occur across articles with limited issues about Mormonism. Hopefully HEB will read this discussion, regardless of whether this specific proposal passes or not, and take peoples' concerns on board. The Land (talk) 23:21, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose. I’ve been very concerned about BYU paid editing. I think it’s inherently a COI issue, and I’ve brought this up before. These are people being paid by the Mormon church to edit articles about Mormonism. I think in general BYU funding editing is a good thing – the Mormon church has great records, and I’m sure most of their edits are helpful – but we do need to recognize these folks do have a COI, and we do need to oversee these edits.

HEB may be too aggressive, but we shouldn’t restrict anyone checking these edits from being able to do so. These edits are COI edits and need to be checked, and we need this oversight, even if it’s occasionally a bit aggressive. Valereee (talk) 02:08, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Valeriee, "paid by the Mormon church to edit articles about Mormonism" isn't really a fair representation of what's going on. Rachel Helps, if I remember correctly, is paid by the BYU library to make some of the unique resources of that library available to Wikipedia. Yes, the library is owned by BYU, which is owned by the church, but the degrees of separation matter. There's no religious leader higher up in the church telling her what to do or reviewing her edits. I hope you'll take a few minutes to read her user page where she makes that relationship clear and is very upfront about her COI and POV. In practice she gets more scrutiny than many other editors in the topic area (probably because of her username). Whenever I review her edits I find careful, helpful, gnomish editing. I've seen a number of somewhat contentious issues where she offers helpful resources or ideas but holds back from !voting or taking a side. For example I remember her staying fairly neutral in discussions about eliminating the word "Mormon" after the LDS Church asked its members to stop using the word.

I also remember when HEB started stalking and hounding Rachel. It went waaaay too far. I'm traveling and on mobile right now, but if the diffs aren't linked somewhere above I can track them down if you want.

Anyway, you can research and form your own opinion. I just wanted to share my own findings. ~Awilley (talk) 04:14, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

"There's no religious leader higher up in the church telling her what to do or reviewing her edits." I don't think thats true, for example recently they've been focusing on The Book of Mormon to get wikipedia ready for a new Sunday school curriculum on the Book of Mormon which is being rolled out. So these edits are coordinated with the Church at large and meant to advance its purposes. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 07:04, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I consider it more likely that, being a Latter-day Saint who works at BYU, Rachel Helps (BYU) noticed that the LDS Church's Book of Mormon Sunday school curriculum (which has been announced ahead of time for years) might prompt more attention by people on Book of Mormon topic Wikipedia pages. I'd compare it to how, say, for example, with a U. S. presidential election on the horizon in 2024, there are probably American Wikipedia editors who are giving more attention to U. S. presidential election articles. I consider it a win for Wikipedia if responsible and responsive editors like Rachel Helps (BYU) and the students she trains help us as experienced editors get out ahead of masses of lay members (who, less familiar with policies like Reliable Sources and NPOV, might want to add citations to things like the Sunday School manual or scripture verses, rather than to the published scholarship Wikipedia should cite). P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 07:15, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

They plural not they singular. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 07:22, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

If you don't like me using the singular "they" to refer to you, I am sorry about that; I didn't see information on your HEB user page about what pronouns are appropriate so I figured using gender neutral terms was best. But I don't understand how disagreeing about whether or not "they" can be singular is ultimately relevant? P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 15:03, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

You didn't refer to anyone using they and you have no basis for thinking anyone here has a problem with using singular they. If you don't understand what heb meant, why not ask instead of low key suggesting heb has a problem with gender neutral pronouns. Levivich (talk) 15:48, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I think something has been lost in translation, I prefer the singular they (but don't make a big deal when people use he/she, the OG account name made a lot of people think I was a man because they read it as a reference to Jack (name) not Horse-eye jack) for myself. What I meant there was that by "they" I was referring to the whole ecosystem of paid BYU editors, not just Rachel Helps (BYU). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:12, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Ah, I see. I think that talking about how Rachel Helps (BYU) goes about this covers the matter. All the other BYU paid editors are employees of Rachel Helps (BYU) whom she supervises, as she discloses on her user page: I employ BYU students who edit Wikipedia under my supervision. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 19:06, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Awilley, I have read her user and those of multiple of her interns. I've read multiple articles created and edited by her interns. I have zero doubt that Rachel and her interns are operating completely in good faith. That doesn't mean they don't have a COI, and it doesn't mean we shouldn't regard their edits as COI edits and give them the additional attention we'd give the edits of any other well-intentioned COI editor. I wish HEB would be less aggressive and I have no problem with us telling them so. What I object to is the threat of a t-ban from LDS. Valereee (talk) 11:25, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

If it's any reassurance, only Softlavender and I have suggested any kind of topic ban. The actual proposal before us states that HEB would be warned. Are you willing to support a warning in which ANI tells HEB to be less aggressive, on not only Mormon studies topics but in the other topic areas addressed in the OP and some of the comments that followed? (e. g. targeting user Simon Harley and contributions made citing the Dreadnaught Project, condescending interactions with users on football topics, etc.?) And as far as COI goes, I find that I agree with DJ Cane: Having HEB’s aggression/targeting mixed in will not resolve or add any value to the process of paying responsible attention to the activities of paid editors. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 15:22, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

P-M, the proposal goes on to say As such, I'd like to move for a formal admonishment. As part of that, HEB would be warned that if their battleground behavior continues, admin action will be taken and/or editing restrictions applied. A lot depends on the closer, but depending on the close language, with a close that includes that language, an individual administrator could indef for a minor infraction and require agreement to a restriction for unblock. Valereee (talk) 18:19, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

There's no religious leader higher up in the church telling her what to do or reviewing her edits. Reviewing her edits, maybe not, but telling her what to do? Absolutely. That's the issue with BYU: policy is set by LDS Church. BYU faculty/staff/students/alum have raised these concerns for years; somewhere up above I linked to a newspaper article about it, and it's discussed in the Wikipedia article about BYU. Theirs is a very widely known and ongoing issue with LDS Church constraining academic freedom at BYU. [22]. We even have a whole article about it, Academic freedom at Brigham Young University. As I understand it, BYU's mission is to support/promote the LDS Church and BYU employees are required to further that mission (or at least prohibited from impeding it). This is what makes BYU unlike other religious-affiliated universities. It's not just like "oh we're a Christian university" by vague values or precepts or history, it's a university actually wholly owned and operated by a church. That's more like a seminary than a university. Levivich (talk) 21:19, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose per above, particularly Black Kite. BilledMammal (talk) 02:55, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Come on, BilledMammal. If I said you were an extremist regarding Wikipedia policies, and doubled down on it being the truth, you wouldn't like that, huh? LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 04:39, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Your select responses to opposition votes feels borderline WP:INAPPNOTE. Tooncool64 (talk) 04:41, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  I am 90% certain you meant to link to WP:BLUDGEONING. Loki (talk) 06:33, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Yes, thank you for the correction! Tooncool64 (talk) 06:34, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  See the reply that I made to one of your earlier comments in this section. BilledMammal (talk) 04:48, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support. Given both the scope of the OP and the breadth of the issues raised semi-independently by many different editors above, I don't think it's appropriate to suggest that any kind of sanction or admonishment here should hinge on whether one agrees with HEB's interpretation of COI in one narrow context. First off, even just looking at what has been shared in the diffs here, some of their comments in that area are deeply WP:battleground and entirely inappropriate for a collaborative project, even if (and it's a big if) we adopt their view on the COI issue. top to bottom. I share the concern of others here that many of these comments seem to come as an effort to cow other editors once a dispute has begun, with comments rapidly escalating into needlessly personalized comments (that is to say WP:PAs, really), and accusations of impropriety seemingly designed to undermine the rhetorical opposition's credibility.
  But even if we dismissed the entire cluster of issues connected with their disputes surrounding accusations of COI, there's still more than enough here to warrant community response: and an admonition is an incredibly weak form of response at that. However, perhaps the factor that most prompts my support, as an uninvolved but concerned community member, is the massive display of WP:IDHT throughout this thread. HEB is not categorically incorrect that a high degree of productive edits and many edits made in less disruptive interactions go towards buffering against criticism when their conduct is found to be sub-par. I for one do consider those ameliorating factors when forming an opinion about whether the time has come for community action. But only up to a point. And when I say "up to a point", I don't mean that we should measure such things as matter of a ratio of volume of good edits vs. disruptive behaviours. Rather, I mean, there are certain thresholds that once passed, require the community to intervene. And there's evidence of plenty of that above. Honestly, I might very well have supported a sanction with more teeth under the circumstances, and I feel a warning at the least is more than appropriate. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 03:00, 7 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose, just not enough there. I'm particularly concerned about the characterization of the BDS and LDS edits as "harassment", which by my reading is sufficiently baseless to qualify as WP:ASPERSIONS. Editors can disagree over what qualifies as a COI; doing so is not a basis for sanctions. The discussions should have been taken to WP:COIN by the editors involved; while in HEB's position I would have gone to COIN myself, the fact that the people on the other side of the debate didn't go there to seek affirmation for their actions suggests that they were not completely confident that that affirmation would be forthcoming, which implies that the dispute fell into the grey area that forms reasonable disagreements over policy. COI itself is an extremely important policy that often has vague borders at its edges; I'd be opposed to anything that might create a precedent that editors can essentially ignore COI concerns and then accuse the editors raising them of harassment if the issue doesn't disappear. We have valid resolution channels to resolve those disputes, which everyone involved was aware of, and which and (as far as I can tell) nobody here was confident enough in their position to go through them; therefore, it was just a protracted policy dispute, which isn't sanctionable. I'm also deeply concerned with the characterization of edits here as sealioning; Wikipedia isn't a casual discussion forum. Sealioning is a serious problem in places where the demand for sourcing or evidence is inappropriate and is being weaponized to place undue burden on one side of a discussion, but here on Wikipedia, you are, in fact, required to produce evidence for most major assertions you make related to editor conduct or article content decisions; if someone repeatedly asks you to produce evidence you've already produced, that would be misconduct, but that's not what I'm seeing in the discussions linked above. Looking over the evidence above, the people interacting with HEB were often making sweeping WP:ASPERSIONs with no evidence, for which a request for evidence was appropriate - eg. [23], which I'm shocked TCN7JM would have the audacity to present as evidence against another person. TCN7JM's statement there, which HEB was responding to, was You know this, otherwise there'd be no reason your side has been so heavily pushing for it. C'mon buddy, you're smarter than this; and HEB's response to that blatant provocation was a fairly andodyne request that TCN7JM provide something to back their sweeping assertions up. TCN7JM made sweeping WP:ASPERSIONs against an entire group of editors with no evidence, phrased in an obviously WP:BATTLEGROUND manner, then had the audacity to call for sanctions against someone simply for asking them for evidence? That is the sort of thing that, to me, would suggest a WP:BOOMERANG. --Aquillion (talk) 07:58, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Just as an aside, reading the above, has some agreement been made among the parties that this question must be taken to WP:COIN once this discussion is concluded? It seems pretty evident it should, given it is largely disagreement on this policy which has created this situation. --Boynamedsue (talk) 08:40, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support a formal admonishment. (Didn't receive the ping.) The editor frequently personalises disputes and engages in behaviour that reads to me as bullying, yet seems incapable of understanding that this is wrong. Espresso Addict (talk) 10:51, 7 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose When looking at the diffs in context I'm not seeing it and agree with the comments of Levivich and Black Kite. TarnishedPath^talk 10:52, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Support per Ed, but I for one think it should be more than that. JM (talk) 23:04, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support a formal admonishment. Per Espresso Addict, who puts it well. This is nothing to do with roads or LDS, neither of which I was previously aware of, but seeing him around elsewhere. Johnbod (talk) 02:40, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support, without prejudice to a further discussion about more serious sanctions. HEB serially tags pages for notability without any attempt at article improvement. Given the rapidity of these tagging runs it is clear they conduct no WP:BEFORE checks to confirm if the article is notable. Examples:

1. January 4, 2024 tagged 12 articles in 14 minutes with 10 further edits in between.
2. June 24, 2023 tagged 28 articles in several rapid bursts.
3. June 14, 2023 tagged 15 articles in 26 minutes.
4. June 3, 2023 tagged 21 articles in 26 minutes.
5. June 2, 2023 tagged 16 articles in 12 minutes.
6. April 28, 2023 tagged 9 articles in 19 minutes.
7. April 27, 2023 tagged 11 articles in 13 minutes.

Their MO seems to be tag the article then demand anyone challenging their tags prove themselves, as shown above often aggressively. Yet they have only ever nominated 5 articles for deletion [24] with a 0.00% success rate. A further question should be, should HEB be topic banned from article tagging? 1.145.151.182 (talk) 03:26, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

"Given the rapidity of these tagging runs it is clear they conduct no WP:BEFORE checks to confirm if the article is notable". No that's not clear. That's a ridiculous statement. If you're going to cast WP:ASPERSIONS, you need to provide incontrovertible evidence. TarnishedPath^talk 03:34, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Tagging an article for notability does not require a BEFORE check. JoelleJay (talk) 03:40, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

and I hardly think being unsuccessful on a total of 5 RfCs that they've nominated in a bit over 3 years is noteworthy. TarnishedPath^talk 03:47, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I only nominated those pages when asked to by others, generally I think that the appropriate time between tagging for notability and nominating for deletion is measured in years. Note that my approach is the opposite of aggressive... You're seriously criticizing me for not just sending them straight to AfD en-mass? Also note that the close edit times are based on lining multiple articles up in tabs because thats often the most efficient way to research related topics (one source might be applicable to multiple pages). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:29, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I am criticizing you for what appears to be a lack of diligence. While WP:BEFORE is not mandatory before tagging an article for notability, conducting a basic search for sources to confirm your suspicions is just good practice. It takes even the fastest editors much more than a minute to search Google, Google books, Google scholar, the Internet Archive etc under various search terms (and that is a basic search). This diff from above springs to mind if you claim you do this for the thousands of articles you tag in exceptionally short timeframes. And reviewing your AFD noms, personalized WP:BLUDGEONing those who oppose your noms seems to be the common trend. I agree completely with the comment directly below, you take an uncompromising approach in relentlessly enforcing unconventional interpretations of WP policies and guidelines. And you from what you have written here, you seem to be steadfast in the face of all criticizm. 1.145.151.182 (talk) 07:42, 8 January 2024 (UTC).

Good practice according to who? Which policy are you relying on in your sweeping generalisation when you attack HEB's character? You've not providing anything substantive here which backs up any of the tenuous assertions you've made. TarnishedPath^talk 08:52, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I am not unique in holding these views: WP:DRIVEBY / WP:CLEANUPTAG / WP:RESPTAG. 1.145.151.182 (talk) 09:28, 8 January 2024 (UTC).

I'm sorry but you don't have me at all. You were accusing an editor of not following some policy you made up prior to placing notability tags and then when challenged you refer to a help article, a information article and a essay which don't pertain to your assertion that they ought to have been doing a full AfD-before every time they place a notability tag. This is weak sauce. TarnishedPath^talk 11:31, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I think you overestimate my productivity by an order of magnitude, we simply aren't talking about thousands and thousands of articles (I only have 60k edits total or something like that). Also note that the diff you provided is not from a page I tagged for notability, its a page I tagged for verification (I have no doubt that the topic is notable). If you think that my notability tagging is bad perhaps you would like to provide substantive examples of pages I tagged for notability where reliable sources could easily be found (aka where it doesn't seem like I looked for sources)? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:32, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Sure: [25][26][27]. All of your AFD nominations were argued on notability grounds, the fact that 100% of them have failed would suggest your understanding of notability is at odds with the community's. 1.145.151.182 (talk) 02:14, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

HEB has nominated 5 AfDs in his 3 and a bit years. Yawn. Ultra weak sauce. TarnishedPath^talk 02:21, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Two flaws in the complaints here. "tags pages for notability without any attempt at article improvement" makes no sense. WP:Notability is about the topic, not the article quality. Also wp:before is merely a recommendation for AFD and not even a recommendation for tagging for notability. North8000 (talk) 17:41, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support. I've raised concerns about HEB on previous occasions, including the NFL discussion and the 2022 discussion about Rachel Helps. My impression of HEB is that they're a good editor who has three tendencies which when combined cause problems: (1) they hold some heterodox views on policies, (2) they're unwilling to back down on arguing in favor of those views, and (3) they cross the line into personalizing disputes. This combination is unfortunate, and if you're on the wrong side of a policy discussion the effect is aggressive and disconcerting. Skimming above, they're participating in the discussion (good) and don't agree that they need to change their approach (less good). Being "right" isn't enough in a collaborative project, and it's not all clear that their interpretation of COI policy is in line with the community's. Mackensen (talk) 03:58, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Mackensen: I have in fact agreed to change my approach around COI, I will be bringing issues to COIN if a brief talk page discussion proves unsatisfactory to the involved parties rather than entering into an extended talk page discussion or one spanning multiple talk pages. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:36, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Horse Eye's Back: I'm a little surprised to see that you've "agreed to change your approach" (on what I assume is the basis of this comment?) when that changed approach above doesn't agree with what you said you "could get behind" in that diff. Changing your approach is not the same thing as a voluntary editing restriction, and a brief talk page discussion is not the same thing as "in lieu of a talk page in any namespace." I'd personally want to workshop a voluntary restriction with other individuals in this discussion and ask you to formally commit to it, so I've started a new sub-section. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 05:04, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment. The comment above about "heterodox views on policy" certainly rings true. I was astonished to lectured be HEB last year on how apparently scientific knowledge is just "opinion" and needs to be attributed on Wikipedia. They informed me[28] of my apparent misunderstanding and suggested all my work on Wikipedia (that's 60,000 edits) would need "cleanup" with their help. Fortunately in the articles I edit there is enough weight of consensus this sort of thing is just dismissed as HEB going off on one, to be ignored. A combination of extreme zeal and fundamental misunderstanding is not a good thing, and even where HEB is "right" on the merits (as they often are), it should be noted Wikipedia has been changing over the years and these days WP:BRIE. Bon courage (talk) 08:59, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose per Black Kite. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 10:38, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Support. The potential conflict of interest is not the point here. There are ways to address conflicts of interest on Wikipedia without bullying, harassing, intimidating, and personally insulting editors. HEBs behavior is simply unacceptable in a community that values open discourse and communication. It discourages potential editors from participating in the process and has a chilling effect on newer and less experienced editors. HEB has consistently violated the basic rules of civility and respect that the Wikipedia community relies on. There have to be consequences for this kind of behavior. BoyNamedTzu (talk) 17:50, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@BoyNamedTzu: is this noticeboard discussion being talked about off-wiki in LDS forums? You haven't edited since November and have never before commented on a noticeboard before so this is a bit puzzling. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:12, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

HEB raises a valid point here. @BoyNamedTzu, given your contribution history, what exactly is your knowledge of this? TarnishedPath^talk 23:33, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose - This proposal could be better handled with a WP:TROUTing of HEB for being too personal / biting with some of their comments. Nothing else formal needs to happen here. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 18:02, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose Everything - I will keep this brief for fear of a swift indeffing, but suboptimal behavior is not malum in se. If we go about judging everyone on their bad interactions on bad days, there will be no one left to obsess over the minutiae we all crave. Perhaps others have different experiences, but in my life, I have known collegial people to disagree, to verbally spar, and even sometimes to end up using intemperate words. Should HEB do better? Absolutely. So should we all. Dumuzid (talk) 18:10, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Further comment. I already said above that I support the proposal, and further up above I showed diffs of the gravedancing edits, but I just remembered something that really needs to be pointed out here. Just after the gravedancing incident that I detailed above, HEB followed me to an essay that I had written, and made disruptive and WP:POINTy joke edits there: [29], [30], [31], [32], [33]. He also made constructive edits in the course of doing that, and of course there's nothing wrong with trying to improve an essay that someone else had started. But the edits I highlight here range from not particularly constructive to plainly vexatious. Coming as it did, immediately after the gravedancing incident, it seems to me to be a mean-spirited settling of the score. And that fits very much into the pattern of conduct described by so many other editors here. It seems to me that an admonishment here is pretty lenient. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:46, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  This definitely fits the pattern of behavior: after not immediately getting their way with a user on one page, HEB's subsequent edits end up including confrontational attention on other pages that user is involved in. It was the same way Simon Harley: HEB started cutting citations to the Dreadnaught Project after seeing Simon Harley's blog post. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 15:08, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  It's annoying that the allegation of canvassing / alleged canvassing is distracting from the actual pattern of behaviour here, which is problematic. JM (talk) 17:39, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose: Just don't see enough evidence here for this action to be needed at this time. Let'srun (talk) 23:06, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose, nothing here rises to the level of sanctions or even a need for a slap-on-the-wrist formal criticism. The worst offense seems to be the way-too-quick-tagging behaviour, which could draw a few trouts if not done very carefully and correctly. Randy Kryn (talk) 14:59, 9 January 2024 (UTC)
• I dont particularly like HEB and have generally found it to not exactly be a joy to participate in the same discussions with them, but I dont see it here, so oppose. nableezy - 17:48, 9 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose Lightburst (talk) 15:01, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Discussion closure discussion

Comment I'm reading 17 for and 18 against. Please correct me if I'm wrong. Additionally there has been strong allegations of WP:CANVASING for the for side. I don't see any community purpose in continue this. Everyone needs to WP:DROPTHESTICK. Can an administrator please close this as there is no consensus for anything. TarnishedPath^talk 13:49, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@TarnishedPath: Consensus is not vote counting, nor are there "strong allegations" that canvassing has significantly impacted the people who have participated here. See #Canvassing here? and JM's comment above: "It's annoying that the allegation of canvassing / alleged canvassing is distracting from the actual pattern of behaviour here, which is problematic." Please don't misrepresent this discussion in an effort to achieve your preferred outcome. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 17:05, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing this out, Ed. I agree that there have not been "strong allegations" that significantly impacted the participants. Editor boynamedsue, one of those who initially wondered if there was canvassing, concluded a bit later that {{[tq|There is no definite evidence of off-wiki organising}} and added that as things go we are still in AGF territory.

I think that users who have commented in favor of formal admonishment have presented well-documented concerns about serious behavior from HEB that violates WP:HOUNDING and WP:CIVIL. I acknowledge I say this as one of those who commented in favor of formal admonishment. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 18:05, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

While consensus is not a vote, it is supposed to represent the, y'know, consensus of the discussion. I really don't think any reasonable closer could describe this discussion as having a consensus to do anything. Loki (talk) 18:40, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm obviously on one "side" of this, but it seems to me that those supporting an admonishment have provided very specific evidence of the reasons for it. Although I don't think it is true of all those who oppose the proposal, a significant subset of those have failed to refute that evidence, saying either that they just don't think it matters enough (apparently not even enough for an admonishment, which is much milder than an block or ban), or saying that there is canvassing or other bad behavior on the other side. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:13, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

+1. The consensus level needed for an admonishment may be lower than the consensus required for, say, an indef block. Like RfA vs. RfB. But that's for someone else to evaluate. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 20:03, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I didn't add anything to my comment because I felt the support side hadn't shown convincing enough evidence, but all this is up to the brave editor who ultimately makes the close. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 20:41, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree that the support side has provided a list of diffs, but in my opinion they don't show what they're alleged to. Loki (talk) 21:19, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

^ Which is exactly what I described. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:34, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think it is?

The side supporting an admonishment provided a list of diffs. I read all those diffs and none of them seem particularly battleground-y or aggressive to me in context. Aquillion gave a thorough debunking of one above and we also discussed the "extremist" diff at length, but the long and short of it is that if you read the individual diffs they're all like that. Loki (talk) 00:09, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

In context, HEB began removing citations to The Dreadnaught Project (an online encyclopedia co-edited/co-authored by Simon Harley) across multiple pages (1) (2), (3), (4), (5), (6), (7), (8), (9), (10), (11), (12) around the same time that they read a Harley-authored blog post they disagreed with. In every case, HEB claimed the source was not reliable, disregarding prior discussion about The Dreadnought Project at the Reliable Sources Noticeboard. When asked to not unjustifiably remove citations to The Dreadnought Project, HEB accused Simon Harley of failing to disclose COI.

In context, after Rachel Helps (BYU) gave HEB some advice about source-text integrity, then HEB started making disruptive edits on pages Rachel Helps (BYU) had been contributing to, removing content and calling it "irrelevant" and inaccurately accusing her of COI.

In context, after receiving a warning here at ANI to stop hounding Rachel Helps (BYU), HEB has circled back around to her and her student employees. HEB posted inaccurate COI accusations to multiple editors' pages (1), (2), posted another such accusation on an Articles for Deletion page, told Heidi Pusey BYU and other BYU WiR editors to not participate in an AfD discussion or they would nominate them for topic bans for topic bans and said Y'all wouldn't be playing games with me now would you? when editors continued to participate, disregarding the inaccurate instruction.

Whatever HEB's intent may be, the result that emerges in context is disruptive editing that starts after perceived disagreements, and an inability or unwillingness to recognize that disruption. The extents to which HEB is willing to go—numerous questionable removals of sources, multiple questionable COI accusations—amounts to a pattern of behavior on HEB's part which is contrary to WP:HOUNDING and WP:CIVIL.

I think that HEB's behavior toward Simon Harley and their long-term behavior toward Rachel Helps (BYU) (which has extended to include behavior toward student editors as well) are sufficient to warrant formal admonishment. I consider the diff Aquillion addressed and the "extremist" diff irrelevant to the way HEB's behavior toward Simon Harley and toward BYU WiR editors warrants formal admonishment. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 01:10, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Some of that doesn't seem to be right... For example if Rachel Helps is a paid editor then there is nothing inaccurate about the COI claim... And unless I'm missing something they are a disclosed paid editing account and as such have a financial COI with every single paid edit they make. I also didn't disagree with the blog post, I pointed out an error in it... Overall I agree with its contents. I would also note that if I had so inaccurately summarized either of those positions by other editors they would be in the diffs against me, but we have a double standard here. You are welcome to bring diffs against me, but it has to be real. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 02:22, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

To quote another user who expressed the matter well, this series of diffs indicates that HEB's interpretation of COI is way too expansive. The idea that working at BYU (or heck, directly for the LDS church) means you can't vote in an AfD about Mormon scripture is IMO nuts. That would mean that rabbis have a COI about Moses. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 04:16, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I haven't had much to do with COI on Wikipedia but if his ideas about COI don't align with Wikipedia's policy then perhaps Wikipedia's policy should change.

A story about how COI's are handled in professional environments. Recently in my local shire council there was going to be a vote about lease agreements to childcare/kindgarten centres which lease council premises. The current agreements are extremely generous as the centres are not-for-profits, which benefits the community by providing childcare at much reduced prices than commercial operations. However council is under severe financial strain and is looking to increase revenue wherever it can. The Councillors were extremely polarised on the issue and it looked like it was going to be a vote going against community wishes. One of the councillors who was going to vote for on the side of the community at the start of discussion declared he had a COI as his partner worked for one of he childcare centres and thus he was not allowed to participate in any discussions regarding any proposal to change the lease agreements or vote. My workplace has even stricter arrangements concerning COIs. TarnishedPath^talk 10:32, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I think my interpretation of COI is more or less accurate... Which is why none of the editors who oppose it seem to have actually based their arguments on policy/guideline but personal opinion (or at least I don't think they have, as always open to correction). Wikipedia's COI restrictions are *very* loose (like you my workplace's COI policy is *much* stricter), which is why its so odd to see people calling them onerous. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:10, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

See this comment as an example of relevant policy being referenced to you. DJ Cane _(he/him) (Talk) 11:25, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Do you mean "is not a WP:COI violation per WP:COIE"? COIE is an explanatory essay, COI is a guideline (and doesn't even appear to have been referenced, just linked). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 11:35, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Wait, hold up, are you seriously claiming that a discussion where as many editors of the Dreadnought Project itself commented as neutral editors advocating for using it (two) counts as binding consensus across the entire project that it's a reliable source?

This sort of thing is exactly the issue with the evidence presented: everyone who is for sanctions seems to think that posting many diffs is sufficient evidence even if each of those diffs individually is terrible evidence of any misbehavior on HEB's part. But garbage in garbage out: you can't expect to post a bunch of diffs-that-don't-prove-anything and expect it to add up to a sanction no matter how many of them there are. Loki (talk) 03:44, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm seriously claiming that HEB all of a sudden excising references, across multiple pages, to a source that academic journal articles and numerous military history books have cited as reliable, with no explanation other than "not reliable", after happening to read a blog post they say they found a flaw in written by one of the editors of that source, is hard to look at without wondering if something retaliatory happened. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 04:15, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Just re the difs question, a lot of difs have been provided. But within those difs there is very little evidence. The people who have presented these difs often have a long history of personal disagreements with HEB, the people who have opposed them do not. Could the history of disagreements be colouring their perception of these difs?

As to my mention of off-wiki organising, I was talking only about LDS, I have not looked in detail into the roads section, so I have no idea about that. As it stands, I strongly suspect that some LDS off-wiki organising has occurred. However, I recognise my suspicion is not enough to override AGF.Boynamedsue (talk) 10:04, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

The people who have presented these diffs often have experience interacting with HEB when HEB disruptively removes references without providing reasons or derails talk page conversations with COI accusations that don't comport with Wikipedia policy. The people who have opposed them seem to have less experiences like that. Could unfamiliarity with HEB's patterns of behavior be coloring the latter's perception of these diffs?

Inasmuch as we're assuming good faith, I'd appreciate you setting aside that suspicion. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:13, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I think there's a reason provided in all of the diffs presented so far, if you look hard enough you can probably find a fat fingered edit without an edit summary but there certainly isn't a pattern of them. The rest ("disruptively" "derails") is largely opinion and you are welcome to it but its a bit odd when combined with a call to AGF. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:22, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I've come across HEB in talk discussions, although we have not interacted directly, and I find your comment to be off mark. TarnishedPath^talk 16:53, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

@Tryptofish, I disagree that those who oppose have failed to refute the evidence. A large number have stated categorically that they have looked at the diffs and that in context they do not see it. That is very different from your claim that those voting to oppose are saying that "they just don't think it matters enough". TarnishedPath^talk 10:14, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

It's hard to see how simply stating that one doesn't see a problem with the cited diffs amounts to an effective rebuttal of the issues presented. DJ Cane _(he/him) (Talk) 11:15, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

@DJ Cane a user above gave Special:Diff/1113148084 as evidence of battleground behaviour by HEB. One does not need to go out and collect expert options about such matters to refute it. Saying that no, your evidence does not support your assertion is an effective rebuttal. TarnishedPath^talk 11:37, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree that that diff is a non-issue, but there has been evidence offered of multiple instances of behavior more problematic than that and reasonably brushing off a few bad examples doesn't refute all of the behavior presented. Multiple oppose votes simply reference Black Kite's vote which itself only references one example. Black Kite's example, for what it's worth, is also one that I think doesn't represent the meat of the problem which is that HEB can become aggressive and run around in circles, most often (from what I've seen) when they dispute the notability of an article or bring up a COI concern. DJ Cane _(he/him) (Talk) 12:02, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I myself referenced Black Kite's vote, but only after I looked at the diffs myself and a lot of the diffs were not far off the example I provided above as far as not substantiating the allegation. People really need to WP:DROPTHESTICK on this. TarnishedPath^talk 12:16, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I've looked at the arguments "that in context they do not see it", and when I compare and contrast that to "they just don't think it matters enough", my reaction to the argument that these are meaningfully different things is that I do not see it. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:01, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I referenced Black Kite, I did read the diffs and other comments. I'm sure other editors are also literate. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:47, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Further issue

As long as this is staying open, I want to note: [34], [35]. Sure looks like a deliberate non-answer to me. And with the inevitable scrutiny of a still-open ANI thread, it sure looks like continued conduct, without caring. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:39, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Tryptofish this is uncollegial, if I'm wrong and there is another way to get it to thank someone for the creation of an article rather than hitting thank on the creation diff let me know but throwing AGF into the gutter along with civility is just wrong. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:48, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Pot and kettle. It sounds like, in context, that particular editor did not want to be thanked, nor were they asking you to explain how notifications work. But you are making my point for me. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:56, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I think you're missing something... First of all "If you liked the page, please just thank the version in mainspace." and second I explained why I liked that specific diff not one of the versions in mainspace. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:03, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

She said that it was "a mostly blank draft page in my userspace". But even if this is now a post-draft article in mainspace, it sure sounds like you were "watching my contributions and wanting me to know they are watching". --Tryptofish (talk) 21:09, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that is the creation diff. If you know another way to thank someone for the creation than thanking them for the creation let me know. I liked a single edit which created a page of a book I own, if I was going to try and send that message wouldn't I go about it very differently? I've had people use thanks aggressively with me before, it was never a single thank for a page creation... It was a thank on every page I edited in a certain period of time and some from wayyyy back in the day. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:16, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

For what it's worth I didn't bring it up here because I wasn't sure of it being against rules and wasn't ready to characterize it as part of the pattern of behavior that I considered crossing lines of civility and hounding (see my comments above in this thread). For me it was personally uncomfortable (because I don't know how HEB would have known about that page so quickly other than by apparently watching my contributions and wanting me to know they are watching), so I brought it up with HEB on their talk page, editor to editor. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 20:52, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Which is perfectly reasonable. But given that it made you uncomfortable, I see it as relevant. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:56, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

@Tryptofish: While it didn't make me uncomfortable in context, HEB followed me to WT:MILHIST#MILHIST reliable source database (diff) eight minutes after I gave an opinion there. This occurred at the same time I was calling out his problematic behavior on User talk:Simon Harley (one of the issues I linked to when opening this ANI thread). HEB then explained on ANI that his MILHIST edit could be cherry picked as an example of collegiality. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 21:49, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Same pattern as what I said here: [36]. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:02, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

There's a point at which nitpicking becomes harassment and y'all passed it a while ago. Levivich (talk) 21:57, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

WP:FOLLOWING is not a nitpick. But if you think I'm harassing anyone, start a thread about it. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:02, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

+1 to both of Tryptofish's sentences above. There's a reason I brought that MILHIST example up here, in a discussion about following another user, rather than separately. As WP:FOLLOWING says, "Even if the individual edits themselves are not disruptive per se, 'following another user around', if done to cause distress, or if accompanied by [...] disruptive behavior, may become a very serious matter". Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 00:40, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

HEB has made edits to Talk:MILHIST since 2021. Trying to portray HEB making a post at MILHIST in which he agrees with you as WP:FOLLOWING is... not persuasive. Meanwhile, on Jan 4, you actually WP:FOLLOWed HEB from Simon Harley's talk page to a bunch of articles you had never edited before and reverted HEB's edits. [37] Levivich (talk) 01:22, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

First, Levivich, he responded to my edit in eight minutes. To me, eight minutes does not leave much room for an alternative narrative. YMMV.

Second, while recognizing that as an ad hominem argument, if taken at face value I'm not sure why you're presenting it as a gotcha. You can see the full prior context presented by P-Makoto in this diff, but in short my reverts were directly related to the discussion on Simon Harley's talk page. HEB removed the Dreadnought Project, a website authored in part by Simon, as a source from several different articles after reading a blog post by Simon that was critical of Wikipedia. As my edit summaries explained ("revert per Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 368#dreadnoughtproject; more discussion is likely needed"), I reverted HEB's edits as a small reliable sources noticeboard discussion had previously indicated that the Dreadnought Project would likely be reliable.

For why the reverts are not hounding, see WP:FOLLOWING again ("Correct use of an editor's history includes [but is not limited to] fixing unambiguous errors or violations of Wikipedia policy, or correcting related problems on multiple articles"). You can also read User talk:Simon Harley#Blog post for how I knew there were edits that needed reverting (specifically, search for "wholesale removal").

Anyway, this is a thread about HEB. If you have concerns with my editing, my talk page is open or ANI's add topic button is above. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 02:23, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Since this misconception has occurred twice in this thread chain, discussions at AN/I can cover all parties to a dispute (and all participants), rather than being solely focused on a single editor. CMD (talk) 03:42, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

No misconception here; I'm aware of that possibility. I suggested starting a new thread because the comment distracts from the OP. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 04:04, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

That page has been on my watchlist forever... I even disclosed in-comment that we were in a disagreement elsewhere... If disagreeing with someone on one page means you can't agree with them on another or congratulate them on their successes or thank them for valuable edits then what is WP:CIVIL? What doesn't seem plausible is that you thought that my agreeing with you on a noticeboard was intended to harass you. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:42, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Also note that your timeline re dreadnaught and Simon is wrong, I started removing that source before I read the blog post which I only found because a search for the source returned Simon's user page along with the other pages I edited. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 05:07, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I didn't say that following me to WT:MILHIST was harassment, and if I thought it was I would have brought it up in the OP! I did say that it didn't make me uncomfortable in context, and that I brought it up only because it was an action similar to a pattern Tryptofish identified. I've struck the incorrect words above. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 06:20, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Then perhaps you can clarify exactly what you meant by "To me, eight minutes does not leave much room for an alternative narrative." if thats not an accusation of harassment. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 06:26, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

That there is little room for a narrative that doesn't involve following me to that discussion. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 07:09, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

And you believe that even after being informed that I am a consistent contributor on that page? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 07:26, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

This has been going for 11 days now. There is no consensus for anything to occur. People need to move on and WP:DROPTHESTICK. TarnishedPath^talk 05:01, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I asked for an admin closure days ago, but it was archived off AN. I've restored that request now. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 06:20, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Voluntary editing restriction workshopping

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

---

HEB has indicated that they would be open to a voluntary editing restriction when it comes to confronting editors they believe have a conflict of interest. That seems to be at the root of many, albeit not all, of the concerns expressed by many above.

My specific proposal would be: When HEB becomes concerned that a contributor is editing with a conflict of interest, they will bring their concerns to WP:COIN in lieu of a talk page in any namespace. This would help avoid the concerns with HEB's style of discussion as editors with more experience in dealing with COI can quickly course-correct as needed. I've no idea if this idea is good or could be improved on; perhaps HEB should be punting all their concerns to COIN and not engaging further, or perhaps there's a way to allow HEB limited engagement on user talk pages (their preference). So, please chime in below.

The admonishment proposal should continue above, as I imagine it and a voluntary restriction would work hand in hand (assuming the admonishment passes). Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 05:04, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support Twice when I've tired of arguing with HEB over what constitutes COI editing for my team, I asked him to take me to COIN, in part to see if his accusations were serious, and also to force the issue (to see if there was consensus about his complaints). When he declined, I assumed that he was not as sure of his accusations against me as he seemed. This also made me feel like he was trying to intimidate me out of editing rather than follow policy. I would rather HEB lodge a complaint against me on COIN than repeatedly make the same arguments about my editing on my talk pages and the talk pages of various pages I edit. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 16:48, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  One of the issues here is that this has been brought up at COIN before, including by me. What happened there is other WiR objected to the idea that a WiR needed to disclose on an article talk, as that might endanger the program. Valereee (talk) 17:58, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Right now we are discussing HEB's behavior. If you would like to discuss mine, let's move to my talk page or COIN. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 18:07, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Rachel, you brought up taking this to COIN. And it's been brought up on your user before, and you rejected the idea of disclosing at article talk. Which I don't really understand. Why not simply voluntarily disclose? Valereee (talk) 20:37, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  I've opened a related discussion at Wikipedia talk:Conflict of interest#COI Article Talk disclosure. BilledMammal (talk) 03:32, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose, same reasons as above. Levivich (talk) 16:54, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Because this is a proposed voluntary restriction, and HEB has already agreed to some kind of that, this isn't really a support/oppose situation Rachel Helps (BYU) and Levivich. :-) The idea is to improve the proposal so it's effective in curbing HEB's worst impulses without losing their productivity, then ask HEB to sign onto it. Do you have any thoughts about how it could be improved? Or to Rachel in particular, are you saying that you like the proposal as written? Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 17:40, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  I think this would be improved if you dropped the stick and stopped pushing for restrictions. If an editor wants to undertake a voluntary restriction, then let it be voluntary. If an editor wants your help with a voluntary restriction, they'll ask. Proposing a "voluntary restriction" is not fooling anybody. Levivich (talk) 17:43, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Levivich: I'm sorry, can you show were I have been pushing for editing restrictions elsewhere? I believe the closest I've come to that is at 07:55, 6 January 2024, to which HEB replied that they would be open to a voluntary restriction along the lines I proposed. (Note that an admonishment is not a restriction.) While HEB has the ability to do whatever they'd like, I personally think it would have more helpful to them and everyone else if it's collaboratively built. That is the ethos of Wikipedia, after all, plus a voluntary restriction that doesn't impact the concerns raised by many people above is pretty useless. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 18:24, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  I like how you added "elsewhere" to your question, as if I said "elsewhere." I didn't. You've pushed in this thread here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. Levivich (talk) 21:39, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Levivich: By "elsewhere", I meant "outside this sub-section". I apologize for the ambiguity and ask for your good faith. I started the larger thread with a call for an admonishment, which is explicitly not a restriction despite you including that in your diff bombing. And rather than advocating for restrictions, I explicitly said that I didn't think there would be support for enforced editing restrictions, which you would have seen while compiling those diffs. So again, I'd politely push back on your assertion that I need to drop a stick, as I was never holding one. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 23:28, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Sorry for misunderstanding. I like the proposed idea for COI discussions with HEB. I do not think it will resolve the several discussions about "independent" sources that HEB has been involved in. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 18:04, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment for the time being while I think about this. While COI plays a prominent role in HEB's behavior toward Simon Harley and Rachel Helps (BYU), I'm not sure I would say COI is at the root of many, albeit not all, of the concerns; COI seems to be at the root of a few of the situations. Many other diffs shared both in the OP and throughout the comments on this thread are about battlegrounding, sealioning, incivility, etc. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 17:42, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose both because this doesn't actually address the issue that many people seem to have with my edits and also because once again its a privilege not a restriction (every other editor would have to open a talk page discussion *first* whereas I would have the unique privilege of being able to go to COIN first). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:48, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Horse Eye's Back: Would you be open to proposing edits that would improve on the proposal? Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 20:55, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose - Without tongue in cheek, this is putting the cart before the horse. A voluntary restriction does not need "workshopped" by the community as if it were some enforceable sanction. And as HEB points out, this could be seen as bypassing the "discuss the issue with the editor first" culture we've developed on Wikipedia. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 18:06, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Moot because HEB says just above that he opposes it, and anything "voluntary" simply won't work on that basis. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:50, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Tryptofish: I proposed this so people could edit and improve it, not support/oppose, but I guess that ship has sailed. I did intentionally start it from a proposal that HEB said they "could get behind". HEB is free to propose improvements. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 20:55, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks. At this point, it looks like the admonishment proposal is more likely to be productive. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:06, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose because I simply don't believe it will make a difference. I think a formal repromand is appropriate (as voted above), but I don't believe HEB will keep to a voluntary restriction created through collaboration in this forum thus I don't think it's worth the time and energy. Let's see how HEB responds to appropriate criticism in this discussion. Outside of the concerns listed in this discussion, HEB has demonstrated themself to be a reasonable and constructive participant in Wikipedia and as such I think they should be able to self correct - in effect leaving HEB to decide what sort of voluntary changes they should make. If, after a formal repromand, HEB continues to be disruptive in COI, notability, deletion, and other discussions I think it would be appropriate to issue formal non-voluntary restrictions. DJ Cane (talk) 03:19, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

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

Canvassing here?

For the record, this has nothing to do with the LDS Church-side of this dispute. I have no awareness of anything going on with that part of Wikipedia. This has not come up yet. Has no one noticed that:

• MatthewAnderson707, who hasn't been active in months, somehow found this thread just to comment in opposition to HEB.
• 1.145.151.182, who has never edited before on that specific IP, makes their first edit just to criticize HEB. I'm aware that IPs can change, but nothing in this range suggests they would have any interest in HEB before this point.

Those are just the most blatant examples. Two is coincidence I don't accept.

I'd also like to bring people's attention to this comment:

I have been personally warned by more than one user from interacting with HEB due to what they characterized as trollish behavior. I don't think any of them have commented here yet. My experience with HEB does not deviate far from their descriptions. Qiushufang (talk) 07:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Qiushufang explicitly stated they were personally approached by persons whose only intention was to malign HEB privately. I am glad Qiushufang admitted this publicly because I have been aware of this behavoir for quite some time but could not inform Horse Eye's Back about it since it occurred offwiki. From my perspective, it would seem that there is an semi-organized campaign that has existed (either presently or in the past) against HEB. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 20:18, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Pinging Qiushufang and MatthewAnderson707, as you've named them.

As the OP, I'm compelled to say that I have never canvassed/been canvassed to take an action related to HEB. That includes this discussion/proposal, which was collated and written without input from anyone else.

My read of Qiushufang's comment was a bit gentler—that they were told something like 'I'm sorry for your experience, we've tried but failed to deal with them, and you might find that it's easiest to avoid them'. They may be able to say more, should they choose. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 21:11, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Pretty much. I was contacted by individuals describing HEB's behavior as either unfortunate or trollish after a brief but negative interaction I had with HEB. I don't disagree with them and I assume they have HEB's talk and contrib pages on watch at all times because I had no prior interactions with these people. I did not contact anybody despite HEB saying it was OK to do so. Qiushufang (talk) 21:19, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm glad you said something because I thought it was just me. It seems wildly obvious that "something is afoot," and I don't think it's limited to this thread: the number of new/inexperienced editors calling for sanctions on this page right now is beyond what AGF can handle. And that's coming from me, the undisputed world champion of new editors posting too much at ANI. Levivich (talk) 21:45, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

No one sent me a link to this or told me to post here, if that's what you're saying. This was done entirely by my own actions. There was no posting because for the most part, I'm done posting on Wikipedia. Just because I don't post doesn't mean I don't still keep up from time to time through observation. I got involved because this is an issue I personally feel strongly about and felt like it warranted a post. Unless you have proof that anyone canvassed, bringing me here, don't make baseless assumptions or accusations. I do not appreciate that. — MatthewAnderson707 (talk|sandbox) 22:22, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

You left when roads split and have now come back to comment in an ANI thread with the person you had argued with at Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2023-09-16/News and notes (which, I now realize, involved many of the editors in this discussion, including me). It's pretty obvious why you're here, and also obvious that you haven't just been reading ANI for three months... somebody posted something somewhere (probably AARoads) that alerted you to this. Levivich (talk) 22:35, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

There was a link on HEB's talk page which I do observe from time to time. Again, do you have any proof? — MatthewAnderson707 (talk|sandbox) 22:37, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

OK it would have been better if you said you watch ANI from time to time, because nobody is going to believe you've watched an editor's talk page for three months after leaving the project. The evidence is your contribs and presence here. Levivich (talk) 22:39, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I do observe his talk page from time to time. Not every day for three months, bit every couple of weeks. It's an obsessive habit caused by baseless paranoia that I admit needs to be broken. Whether anyone believes it or not, that's what happened. You're welcome to go right ahead and look around yourself on AARoads or anywhere else for that matter. You won't find any evidence of canvassing because that isn't what happened. Happy hunting. — MatthewAnderson707 (talk|sandbox) 22:45, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

What you're admitting to is worse than what you're being accused of. Levivich (talk) 22:48, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. TarnishedPath^talk 23:39, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Believe what you will, but I've said my piece. If you want to dispute whether it was against the rules or "worse than what I'm being accused of" over personal bias against anyone who takes issue with HEB, then be my guest. I refuse to give in to your scare tactics or this kangaroo court of an argument, with the mentality that anything I say can and will be used against me. Good day. — MatthewAnderson707 (talk|sandbox) 00:42, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Definitely not a kangaroo court. You admitted to basically only visiting Wikipedia to keep an eye on a user who you previously had a dispute with, then coming here to comment the moment you saw an opportunity to get them sanctioned. Frankly, if you don't just plain step away from Wikipedia, this admission alone would qualify for a one-way interaction ban to keep you away from HEB. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:13, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

"I wasn't canvassed, I was stalking" is certainly a novel defense. Levivich (talk) 18:06, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Levivich: Hypothetically, he wouldn't be the only one guilty of that. Remember, Qiushufang described multiple people messaging them after posting to HEB's talk page.

I don't believe MatthewAnderson was one of them. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 18:15, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm confused here. I have a few users' pages watched as well for prior negative interactions with them as well as multiple warnings by several users that indicate they are a problem for the wider Wikipedia userbase. Some of them are banned now with confirmed sockpuppets. I would not have been alerted to their behavior if they weren't on my radar beforehand due to their behavior. IDK if this is something against Wiki policy or else why would you be able to watch other users' talk pages? It only seems natural that you would want to know about happenings concerning them, and someone like HEB who's had altercations across various non-related communities would have more than qualified for observation. Is the problem here that the user no longer uses Wikipedia, that they are being accused of canvasing, or the fact that they are monitoring HEB because I do that with a few users as well? Qiushufang (talk) 22:29, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

At issue is that this user admitted to walking away from Wikipedia except for an obsessive habit of coming back to check specifically on HEB's talk page. Then they ran straight here to chime in while sanctions were being discussed. That carries an air of grievance above and beyond just having someone on your radar while actively participating in the community & editing articles. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:42, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

One thing I did not mention aside from having no relation to these editors who sent me warnings about HEB is that they have no shared topics of interest either. Unless they are using socks, their areas of interest on Wikipedia are completely different and non-overlapping whatsoever, which makes canvassing together somewhat less likely. Qiushufang (talk) 22:51, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Qiushufang: you're going to need to substantiate those claims with an editor interaction report or links to the edit histories of the editors you've made those claims about. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:36, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@MatthewAnderson707: What is the dispute you had with HEB in the first place? Have you, like Qiushufang, ever received a warning message about Horse Eye's Back? Have you ever participated in offwiki discussions about HEB?

I encourage you to be honest in your responses. It wouldn't be right for you to be sanctioned for what other people did. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 18:08, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I had been wondering much the same thing myself; whether it had been posted on some private Roads forum - which we do know to exist based on interactions with Roads members in the past. BilledMammal (talk) 22:51, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

What is Roads? JM (talk) 23:00, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• In no way do I mean to downplay the seriousness of the issue here, but in no way does it mitigate the issues with HEB. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:02, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Tryptofish: I would agree (especially in regards to the LDS Church aspect of this). However, this needed to be said either way. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 23:10, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Sure, we agree. But these should be understood as two separate issues. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:16, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Disagree, I think that if canvassing has occurred here, it would go a long way to explain the bafflement many of us feel about how the difs above could be interpreted as serious breaches of policies.Boynamedsue (talk) 08:06, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Boynamedsue 100%. TarnishedPath^talk 08:19, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• There also seems to be some possible evidence of LDS canvassing further up the page, in the post made by my near namesake. There may of course be an innocent explanation for a user who has not made an edit since November, and who has made a total of 198 edits suddenly finding their way to ANI for the first time. It would be nice to hear it.--Boynamedsue (talk) 17:01, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  Looking at BoyNamedTzu's edit log, it seems like BoyNamedTzu has been reading and editing pages with Mormon studies topics, including Mormon literature, which is where some of HEB's behavior took place. Maybe BoyNamedTzu noticed what was going on in pages adjacent to their activity and found their way to ANI for the first time the way I did: concluding that HEB's behavior had become an urgent matter, I came to the ANI board and was going to make a post here for the first time when I noticed there was already a thread about HEB. Rather than make a new thread, I commented on this thread. No canvassing was involved. It seems plausible to me that it could have been similar for BoyNamedTzu. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 17:08, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm going to ask you to make a very conscious effort to use the right spellings here, and correct the above post, given there are two users with very similar names and we risk descending into farce.Boynamedsue (talk) 17:14, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for catching that typo. I've corrected it. Guess we're all enjoying Johnny Cash. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 17:42, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@P-Makoto:That seems a remarkable coincidence. Maybe HEB is related to that fella in Montana who keeps getting struck by lightning? Boynamedsue (talk) 17:30, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I guess I find it less remarkable than you do. BoyNameTzu's most recent activity in November is drafting an article about Sam, a figure from the Book of Mormon, and HEB has been active in talk pages about Book of Mormon content that BoyNamedTzu could have been looking at to get an impression of what pages covering similar topics look like; then BoyNamedTzu was inactive through December, possibly related to being busy during the holidays; now that the holidays are over, he is on Wikipedia again.

I'm not sure of the relevance of guessing who might be related to HEB. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 17:48, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

No more edits have been forthcoming from this account, does that change your opinion? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:21, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

No, not really. People can become busy for all kinds of reasons. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 15:58, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Ok, thats disappointing. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:07, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Why is it disappointing that people can become busy? Neither you nor I know what's happening in BoyNameTzu's life. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:15, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

The disappointment is that it does not change your opinion, nothing more or less. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:17, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think any canvassing has occurred on the LDS-church side of this dispute, and I would not feel comfortable speculating as much. From what I can tell there are genuine concerns related to HEB's conduct regarding Mormonism, and nothing I have said should be used to take away from that fact. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 17:58, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

There is no definite evidence of off-wiki organising, so yes, as things go we are still in AGF territory.Boynamedsue (talk) 19:26, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

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

Intentional harrassment by Hemiauchenia

Hemiauchenia (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) I am bringing this here at the offending editor's specific suggestion. Said editor has been posting a series of personal attacks with the tone of trying to harass a fellow editor off of the site.

• you're the kind of low quality editor that Wikipedia needs to weed out. I suggest you stop whining and stop wasting the time of contributors who are far more valuable to the encyclopedia than yourself.
• It's not discrimination, it's called taking out the trash.
• You have nothing valuable to contribute to this website, and I suggest you find something better to do with your life.

Nat Gertler (talk) 05:50, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

This was an editor that was arguing that a medical textbook was not a reliable source. Their few other edits include additions that completely fail WP:MEDRS e.g. their additions to Banisteriopsis caapi back in 2018 What is one to say to an editor that can't respect basic WP:RS policy? Such editors are not useful encyclopedic contributors. You've redacted the comments and I don't plan to restore them, and I consider that the end of the matter. Hemiauchenia (talk) 05:54, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

If one cannot respond without violating WP:NPA and engaging in harassment, there is the option of not saying anything at all. That you feel that such conduct is not actionable and that you deem it appropriate to continue such attacks on this noticeboard only makes it more vital to make it clear otherwise. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 06:00, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

In one of your comments you asked What's the point of respectfully discussing with people like you who don't respect basic Wikipedia policies like Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources (medicine) or Wikipedia:Disruptive_editing#Failure_or_refusal_to_"get_the_point"? Does this same logic apply to people who don't respect basic Wikipedia policies like Wikipedia:Civility and Wikipedia:No personal attacks? Thebiguglyalien (talk) 06:08, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Look, I accept that I could have been less hostile (and it probably would have been better to do so) and I do not object to NG's redactions, but my view that this user was a disruptive editor who didn't respect basic Wikipedia policies remains. I've struckthrough all comments I made in the discussion if this helps. Hemiauchenia (talk) 06:21, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

I wrote out this long rant but deleted it. TLDR: Hemi was right, you took the wrong editor to ANI. Levivich (talk) 06:49, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Yup. It is a simple, demonstrable fact that Wikipedia routinely 'weeds out' contributors who demonstrate the abject failure and/or refusal to understand how Wikipedia works that was being exemplified in the WP:BLPN discussion. And given that it is necessary to do, so, one cannot reasonably describe a suggestion that it be done in such an obvious case as 'harassment'. Being told this is no doubt unpleasant to those on the receiving end, but we aren't here to hand out free hugs and candy floss... AndyTheGrump (talk) 07:08, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

It's absolutely possible to tell an editor they're not editing constructively without referring to it as taking out the trash and other language like this. Civility is still a policy, and it doesn't mean hand[ing] out free hugs and candy floss. ChaotıċEnby(t · c) 08:10, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps the civility policy could be rebranded as reinforcement learning for civil POV pushing. I think that might be where it has had its greatest success. Sean.hoyland - talk 09:40, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

• This noticeboard is for "urgent incidents and chronic, unmanageable behavioral problems". Is the OP suggesting something here rises to that level, or is this an isolated incident? Bon courage (talk) 09:46, 10 January 2024 (UTC)
• Hemiauchenia has 48,409 edits and has improved 1000s of articles. NatGertler has 40,667 edits and has improved 1000s of articles. Maybe Hemiauchenia didn't use the best language but their message was accurate. I really do not get why experienced users feel the need to report each other or infight when the real issue are accounts with no productive edits on this website causing trouble. This account here is the real issue [38] they have been disrupting the John McDougall article when their edits were reverted they filed a false complaint on the Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard ‎claiming a book doesn't include the word fad diet even though that very term is in the title. After they lost that discussion, Now they are back on the talk-page of the article writing nonsense. It's obvious this account won't give up on their crusade. In a few days or a week's time we may be back here at this noticeboard talking about them. As above the wrong editor was taken to ANI here. Psychologist Guy (talk) 12:59, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  This "experienced user" greatly decreased his Wikipedia involvement because not just of the culture of harassment, but because of the culture here at ANI which has judged harassment to be just fine if it comes from an experienced user (I have slipped back into the habit lately, but will likely be pulling that back._ If the WP:NPA is only meant to be no-personal-attacks-except-against-those-we-think-aren't-very-good-editors, then it should be rebranded as such, but until such is done, WP:BRIE still applies. Does the other editor need to get attention as well? Possibly, and you are free to do something about it, but there is nothing that says that both editors can't be in the wrong. Hemiauchenia originally blew off concern about his actions and said that I should bring him here, which is when I did so; that he has since pedaled back, admitted that some of his speech was improper (even if at times half-heartedly) is to be recognized and if he makes some statement that he would watch it in the future, would probably now be sufficient... but none of that should be taken as backing the idea that personal attacks intended to drive someone off of the site are not a "real issue". -- Nat Gertler (talk) 17:54, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  I can second this. Hemiauchenia acknowledged that it could have been handled differently, and I'm satisfied by that if it actually is handled differently in the future. But Wikipedia's toxic culture is one of the main reasons I've been less active over the last few months. I can only imagine how many would-be productive editors we've lost just so the old boy's club at ANI can engage in victim blaming and act like incivility is perfectly fine if it's "justified" or a "net positive". Thebiguglyalien (talk) 19:29, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  Also agree with this, there is absolutely a culture of defending incivility, up to the point of harassment, in the name of being correct/being a "net positive" contributor. And, needless to say, this absolutely goes against the purpose of Wikipedia. You shouldn't get a free pass every 10 thousand edits you make. ChaotıċEnby(t · c) 21:34, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  This "experienced user" greatly decreased his Wikipedia involvement because when people lie about what sources say, instead of doing anything about it, the community will punish other people for calling it out. Levivich (talk) 02:33, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

  Psychologist Guy this amounts to bullying when enabling insults and pushing half-truths just because you don't like what I say.

  Yes, I'm at fault for questioning weak sources, even textbooks, but I don't deserve harrassment for asking fundamental questions. Teleoid (talk) 17:07, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

• I propose that this be closed with no action against Hemiauchenia. Anyone is free to remind them of the need for civility in dealing with people who do not meet our requirements, but it seems that there is no need to as the editor has already acknowledged that. Yes, Hemiauchenia could and probably should have worded things a bit differently, but I see nothing remotely blockworthy. Phil Bridger (talk) 13:17, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  I agree with this. XOR'easter (talk) 21:01, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

• This report fails to recognise the aggressive tone that was being used by the person Hemiauchenia was addressing - neither party was blameless here. I do not believe that any action is necessary, but I would advise Hemiauchenia that even if the other party is being aggressive, belligerent, or just sealioning, resorting to snide remarks does nothing to enhance your argument, and often ends up with threads like this one getting started. Don't try to score points - you can avoid handing people a stick to beat you with if you are able to keep your interactions dispassionate. Girth Summit _(blether) 16:55, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  Are you thinking about [39]? If so, it should be considered that [40] effectively implies that Teleoid, who presumably takes the subject seriously, may be 'religious' and 'evangelical' about whole-food plant-based diets. I'm not saying that Teleoid's reaction was justified, but there was no need for the original insinuation either. It's in fact a huge and persistent problem within the fringe subject area that editors tend to address other editors with the same contempt they personally have for the subject. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 19:17, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  That's one comment out of many personalised and hostile posts that Teleoid has directed towards other editors. Here, they accuse other editors of being motivated by spite. Here the accuse others of gaslighting them. Here they are again attacking other editors' motivations. While I don't think that Heniauchenia's comments were necessary or helpful, it's Teleoid's mixture of belligerence, cluelessness and their willingness to personalise disagreements over content that is at the root of this issue. If we need to apply a sanction to prevent disruption, I think a TBan on Teleoid from that particular subject area would probably put an end to all this disruption. Girth Summit _(blether) 08:45, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

  Your last two diffs came out as links to the talk history. I agree though that the disruption is caused by a combination of Teleoid's incompetence and belligerence. I was assuaged by this, but I didn't realize that this and this was posted later. At least they seem to be having trouble dropping the stick. If the behavior doesn't stop soon I agree a TBan would probably help. As for the rest, I tend to agree with Johnuniq's comment below. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 15:56, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

  Hmm - odd. You'd think I'd know how diffs work by now. Oh well, here goes, for the record: accusation of gaslighting; attack on people's motivations. These latter two pre-date any of the diffs by Hemiauchenia in the original report - they weren't a response to them, they were a response to other editors who were trying to discuss the content rationally and in a civil manner. Girth Summit _(blether) 19:20, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

  I'd like to apologise for my defensiveness and if offended any of the editors, I reacted to perceived hostility in kind.

  I truly barely understand the rules here while the learning curve is very steep.

  This is despite being a member since 2018, as you can verify I have very few edits, and very little experience. Teleoid (talk) 22:24, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

• The only thing that in my view would improve Wikipedia more than a stricter enforcement of civility requirements would be a much, much stricter take on WP:HERE and WP:COMPETENCE: in my opinion, these should be policy and they should say that all editors are required (a) to gain a basic knowledge of what an encyclopedia is and how it is written, and (b) to demonstrate within a reasonable timeframe that they are actually capable of improving the encyclopedia in some way. Those who neither have the required knowledge nor show any sign of wanting to acquire it should immediately be blocked indefinitely, as do those who after a certain amount of time and edits cannot come up with evidence of having actually improved the encyclopedia. In effect, in my view we should do what Hemiauchenia suggested and 'weed out' 'low quality editors' quickly, systematically, and without fuss.
  However, we should never use such language when addressing editors. To speak of specific individual human beings in terms of 'weeding out' and 'taking out the trash' is never acceptable. Personal and condescending comments like 'find something better to do with your life' are also beyond the pale. Not only could Hemiauchenia have worded things differently, they absolutely should have. I think it's deeply problematic to take 'being right' as a sufficient cause to render WP:CIV null and void. For one, people think they're right all the time when they aren't, which would make such a principle extremely destructive also in cases where it's not actually warranted. But even when someone is right, insulting, dehumanizing or bullying those who are wrong is likely to have all kinds of negative consequences. And who's never been wrong? WP:BRIE indeed.
  Perhaps the unspoken idea behind some of the views given above is that for editors who are so wrong that WP would be better off without them, being uncivil towards them is an effective way to actually chase them away and make WP better, and so editors should be given some leeway to do just that. While I understand that rationale, I think it causes an unacceptable and largely unfathomed amount of collateral damage. Much more effective would be to have stricter policy, and proactive but civil enforcement of that policy. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 19:17, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Extended content

Adding that editors can and absolutely do learn and improve, and being uncivil to editors for not being right on the first try might chase away people who would've made great editors a few weeks or months later. ChaotıċEnby(t · c) 21:32, 10 January 2024 (UTC) Given that you chastised me a few months ago for rewriting a Wikipedia article you had a major part in writing in to fix serious, glaring issues with neutrality (See Talk:Francevillian_biota), and never acknowledged the clear problems, I think it's a bit pot calling the kettle black to make statements about editor competence like this. Hemiauchenia (talk) 04:05, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

I know this discussion is about Hemiauchenia, but the issue stems from the behaviour of a user with hardly any edits on this website Teleoid. This user has been canvassing off-site (Redacted). What is the correct way with dealing with this? From experience from what I have seen in the past, when new users create threads on internet forums asking for help this doesn't usually work. I have not seen any new users edit the article or talk-page so this is probably a non-issue in regard to disruption but the behaviour is clearly problematic here. Psychologist Guy (talk) 01:10, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

• The pious language above about being nice to everyone is fine but the real reason to be nice to POV pushers is that it makes less of an enemy of them. That makes it easier for them to slip away when faced with reality. Many examples show that goaded people will fight forever while people who are merely stonewalled by policy often give up. That's a trout for Hemiauchenia. Posting neutral messages on noticeboards asking for opinions should get enough editors involved so that each can revert without approaching 3RR. Use bland edit summaries that repeat mentions of NPOV and FRINGE, etc. Johnuniq (talk) 02:48, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Noting here that in hemi's contribs in the last day there is also https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:MobileDiff/1195168702 -- @Hemiauchenia: I am open to an explanation as to how adding the summary "loony rambling" to an edit removing a talk page comment improves the project in a way that simply removing the comment without remark doesn't. The impression I get is that viscerally insulting people in a way that implies you're speaking on behalf of Wikipedia as a whole gves ammunition to haters and damages the credibility of the project in exchange for absolutely nothing. jp×g🗯️ 05:36, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

This was removing an antivax comment saying that Wikipedia's purpose is to be "echo chamber for Big Pharma". I very much expect and hope that it is the position of Wikipedia that this is indeed "loony rambling". There are ways to remove such wibble without being so forthright about it, mind. Anybody who thinks this removal damages Wikipedia's credibility is probably already beyond redemption anyway, Bon courage (talk) 06:23, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

It is not only possible, but also quite simple, to remove inappropriate comments without making gratuitously demeaning comments towards the people who left them. jp×g🗯️ 06:43, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

And in response to that being pointed out, Hemiauchenia continues to make it clear that civility issues are not something he should be bothered with. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 07:46, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

It's hard to imagine that an editor is WP:HERE and competent when such brazen intransigence towards behavioral standards are present. It's not that hard to be civil; I'd argue it's much more difficult to be competent. SmolBrane (talk) 08:39, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I see that you have previously been blocked for this kind of remark. That's actually impressive in a way given that CIR/NOTHERE jabs are typically free insults that can be lobbed without backlash. Look, there are a variety of positions that can be reasonably defended when arguing about civility enforcement, but what you wrote is a cheap shot at someone who is clearly both competent and here to build an encyclopedia. Using those insults in this context is an absolutely classless move. Or to put it in terms with which you are familiar, it is uncivil to use HERE and CIR to insult competent editors. You should be blocked again. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 22:48, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

The reason civility scolds have such a hard time is that they choose such incredibly poor examples to make a fuss about; that warning from jpxg was absurd and pointless, the edit and edit summary it was in response to were completely appropriate. This is the internet, there are people who write loony conspiracy theorizing here, and there’s nothing wrong with accurately describing such. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 12:45, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Like seriously look at the thread — there’s a very good reason every single competent editor in the discussion is saying the same thing in the same way as Hemiauchenia! 100.36.106.199 (talk) 12:52, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

They are not. In that same section, Muboshgu says:

The notion of thiomersal causing autism has been sufficiently disproven by scientific consensus, in spite of what that one cherry-picked study says. We have a whole page on it at Thiomersal and vaccines.

[...]

You complained of "censorship". Wikipedia "protocols" are quite alright with removing disruptive WP:FRINGE posts like yours. Our agenda is the verifiable truth, not conspiracy theories. Leave the science to the scientists. You have the personal right to not trust them, but not to spread that nonsense here.

You can tell he is kind of annoyed, probably because the person he's arguing with is saying stuff that doesn't make sense; but at no point does he attack the commentator or insult their mental stability. jp×g🗯️ 21:01, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

So it's okay to call the nonsense of other editors nonsense? Got it. Bon courage (talk) 21:13, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

For example, it is acceptable to say that someone is "incorrect" or "wrong". It is, contrariwise, unacceptable to say that someone is a "nutcase", a "son of a bitch", a "lardass", a (Redacted), or things of that nature. jp×g🗯️ 21:25, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I do believe you're getting it. A view can be 'nonsense', 'loony rambling', 'conpiracism' etc & it is fine to be forthright describing the view, but do not attack the person. This is the distinction you have failed to make. Bon courage (talk) 21:29, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

No; it would also be inappropriate to say that a comment was "nutcase bullshit", "son-of-a-bitch yammering", "lardass whining" or "(Redacted) drivel". To give a trivial example: saying "I note that the things you say are the exact same things that a big fat stupid dipshit would say" is obviously an actionable personal attack. jp×g🗯️ 22:25, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

What is the difference, in terms of severity, between 'loony rambling' and 'saying stuff that doesn't make sense'? Perhaps it would be simpler if we stopped trying to police civility with such a fine-toothed comb. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 22:35, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

If someone needs to be told the difference, then they might not be a good fit for a collaborative project like Wikipedia. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 22:41, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

If it's so easy to answer the question, why didn't you do so instead of taking a personal dig at me instead? That hardly seems like the civil thing to do. Why is it that the civility police have such a hard time being civil themselves? LEPRICAVARK (talk) 22:54, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Substance-blind tone-policing is completely unworkable, and the people who want to do it shouldn't be allowed within 100 yards of any fringe area. Is it ok to call a post someone made "nonsense"? Well the answer is that if what they're doing is arguing that vaccines cause autism on Wikipedia talk-pages, yes, absolutely, that's fine. (And the same is true of "loony conspiracism".) Of course it would be better if nonsense-pushers were restrained before anyone got to that point -- but imposing that constraint is a content-sensitive act, and you can't get to the right conclusion just by looking at who uses the fewest naughty words or the most strenuous tone. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 22:54, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Per WP:BRIE: Violations of Wikipedia's behavioral expectations are not excused on the grounds that the editor who violated those expectations has the correct position on an underlying substantive dispute or the interpretation of policies and guidelines within those disputes. Those expectations apply universally to all editors, and violations of those expectations are harmful to the functioning of the project, irrespective of the merits of an underlying substantive dispute. So no, there's no "content-sensitive" exception for conducting oneself inappropriately. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 23:05, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I've participated in plenty of discussions on contentious issues. So I've had the opportunity to witness what happens when somebody shows up to say everyone they don't agree with is insane, evil, retarded, etc; the outcome is not "the discussion improves and a bunch of really smart stuff happens". The outcome is that the discussion turns into worthless sewage. jp×g🗯️ 23:09, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Saying that a post is "nonsense" is absolutely acceptable (there's even a guideline using this term, although it's about a different kind of nonsense). However, "loony conspiracism" is closer to crossing the line as it involves words describing the person ("loony") rather than the points they are bringing.
The notion of getting to the right conclusion and the notion of whose conduct is fit for a collaborative project are two different things. Someone can be a civil POV pusher, while someone on the other side could be objectively correct but be a real piece of work about it. That doesn't prevent us from acknowledging that one was right on a basis independent from behavior, but again, being right isn't enough, and in that hypothetical example neither had an acceptable behavior, and both were at fault for different reasons. ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 23:28, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Again, this seems to be grounded in WP:It's Okay To Be Uncivil If The Other Person Is Wrong, which is not as of yet a policy or even an essay. If you would like to see that be policy, this would not seem to be the venue to cause that change to happen. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 15:57, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

WP:CIVILITY means treating fellow editors with civility; the policy does not give automatic respectability to the views they express (and the 'personal attack' being complained of in this thread is an attack on views, not on a person). In fact, Wikipedia has little tolerance for certain views: WP:NONAZIS, but also pro-pedophilia, holocaust denial, transphobia, quackery, and various other forms of fashionable antiknowledge. Perhaps WP:CIVIL needs to updated to get with the community reality? Bon courage (talk) 16:44, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't know what you are talking about. Nobody has said that we should give "respectability to the views", or that these views are correct, or that people should be allowed to put them in articles. jp×g🗯️ 20:50, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

WP:BRIE upholds civility as a reflection of the current community reality. I don't know what you are specifically suggesting with the last sentence, but it might run the risk of being headed in the other direction. SmolBrane (talk) 20:55, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• For interest, "Toxic comments are associated with reduced activity of volunteer editors on Wikipedia", PNAS Nexus, Volume 2, Issue 12, December 2023. Sean.hoyland - talk 05:07, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  Lest anyone ever accuse me of lacking integrity, this paper which supports my argument draws some questionable conclusions from incomplete analysis. jp×g🗯️ 05:38, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

To be fair, they are trying to do something that seems rather difficult to get right. It's nice to see people try though. Sean.hoyland - talk 06:48, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Comment: Can we say that Hemiauchenia comments are unkind and designed to hurt another editor? The comments do nothing to help the project. I see others trying to defend or explain the hostility of Hemiauchenia. He has a lot of edits, he improves articles etc. I first encountered this editor when they accused me of pure axe grinding with an edit summary of

don't care about your opinion Lightburst, take it to ANi if you care enough and watch the sparks fly.

when I posted on the Arbitration Committee Elections December 2021. I deleted the PA but they reinstated it. And then they started a COIN investigation against me. I questioned them on their talk page.

So I have experienced the editor's biting comments myself and it has a negative effect on editing. I removed their personal attack against me in April and they kept reinstating it.

You're basically the Wikipedia equivalent of a sovereign citizen. Nobody should listen or treat your drivel with any respect whatsoever.

Hemiauchenia only stopped by the AfD about the notability of an embassy to snarl, not to actually participate in the ivote. As many know, the common refrain at AfD is that Ambassadors and embassies are not inherently notable. And I came to their talk page but they deleted my note I have no intent to engage further with you on this matter.. Lightburst (talk) 01:09, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

• Why is this still going? There's no proposal for anything by anyone. Everyone needs to WP:DROPTHESTICK. TarnishedPath^talk 13:07, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  I think a lot of people, actually, have made a very specific proposal, which is that Hemiauchenia stop making rude posts. If you want, I can format it nicely, like an RfC, and then we can have bolded support and oppose votes. jp×g🗯️ 15:30, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  And in fact, unless I missed something, every participant who identifies themselves as an admin on their user page (you, Girth Summit, JohnnyUniq) has made that request in some form. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 16:29, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  One of them said no action, one said a trout, and the third had their comments partly redacted by a fourth. Meanwhile, the low quality editor was weeded out days ago. I agree it's time to drop this stick. Levivich (talk) 17:09, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  And yet, in the same Wikipedia day as you say this we had another editor pop up with new examples showing that this is not just an off incident for this editor but part of a running pattern of harassment, so this situation seems to merit further attention. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 17:28, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  Not new examples, old examples. The longer this stays open, the more likely it is that more editors who had conflicts with Hemi in the past will show up here to share. But Wikipedia doesn't do RFC/U anymore. I'm disappointed that you still think, after all that's transpired, after reading all the above, that this situation still merits further attention. Levivich (talk) 17:35, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  And I'm disappointed that you think that information showing that an editors personal attacks and harassment are not something we should be taking notice of. Not suprised, mind you, given the blind eye you chose to turn toward even the initial concerns, but disappointed nonetheless. I guess Wikipedia is a land of disappointment. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 18:50, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  As some German guy once said: "Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made." Just a random midweek thought. Cheers, all. Dumuzid (talk) 19:06, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  That Kant be true. Levivich (talk) 19:16, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  He also said we should treat our fellow man as an end in itself rather than as a means to an end. I think that includes being civil to each other. Ergo, Kant supported the fourth pillar. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 19:36, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

User who cannot learn what WP:V means

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

---

The problem has been analyzed at WP:FTN#Anthroposophy. My two cents are that SamwiseGSix cannot understand what WP:V means. E.g. [41]. Who's making the statement? It is SamwiseGSix's own WP:OR opinion (according to FTN). It is his own analysis, not explicitly stated in his sources. tgeorgescu (talk) 16:23, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Even Steiner's harshest academic critic Peter Staudenmeier recognizes that many features of Steiner's thinking were "anti-racist" - Steiner indeed made public calls to 'struggle against.. prejudice' and 'the tendency to discriminate based on.. race' during a time when the US President Woodrow Wilson was actually actively segregating the US Federal Government - plenty of WP:V evidence does appear accessible in this regard, starting even with the harshest critique itself along with additional original sources/publications: https://ecommons.cornell.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/db1dad79-53bf-451e-b95b-6982dd24afe3/content SamwiseGSix (talk) 16:45, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Rather then providing links how about three really good quotes that back up your suggestion? Slatersteven (talk) 17:36, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

what has this to do with "Both also acknowledge the extensive ontological, epistemological, and phenomenological bases and arguments upon which the philosophy and social movement is grounded", what is this thread about? Slatersteven (talk) 18:06, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

Your source does not claim that Wilson segregated the federal government. Sheer WP:OR.

See also [42]. This is an unrepentant pusher of original research. tgeorgescu (talk) 17:00, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Woodrow Wilson was of course actively segregating the US Federal Government during the 1910's which planty of WP:V sources can verify - Steiner made the above anti-racist statements (public calls to 'struggle against.. prejudice' and 'the tendency to discriminate based on.. race') in a prominent book he published (Knowledge of Higher Worlds) in 1914 and re-published 1918. Not seeing any original research here hm SamwiseGSix (talk) 17:05, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Yup, but unless a WP:RS (not meaning Anthroposophist publications) compares Steiner to Wilson, that is sheer WP:OR. tgeorgescu (talk) 17:11, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Steiner made many anti-racist statements including in books published in 1914 and 1918. Woodrow Wilson was actively segregating the US Federal Government starting in 1912 and continuing throughout his terms into the 1920's. These are just simply basic historical facts, which vast amounts of WP:V sources can easily verify. SamwiseGSix (talk) 17:34, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Do you understand that there is a difference between "it's false" and "it's original research"? Or are we speaking in vain, and nothing except indeffing helps? tgeorgescu (talk) 17:44, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Are you seeking to assert that including basic historical facts here for which vast amounts of WP:V sources exist, is in contrast to the WP:OR policies? Upon reading them it does not appear to be the case hm, please do include some of the policy language / references here if possible SamwiseGSix (talk) 17:51, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, then the conclusion is that nothing else helps. tgeorgescu (talk) 18:00, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

More precisely, Wikipedia can only report those historical facts which have been explicitly described in reliable sources. Wikipedia is not an encyclopedia based on Truth, but upon reliable sources. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:14, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

SamwiseGSix appears to have admitted in this comment at FTN that they had never read at least one of the citations they used for article content. MrOllie (talk) 17:33, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

wow. Paraphrasing: I'm sure this is what the source I read about some time ago but haven't read says. Narky Blert (talk) 18:26, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Jeez. Are we allowed to use the words 'utterly clueless' here, or does that violate WP:CIVIL? Either way, combined with the above responses, it appears that no, SamwiseGSix does not understand WP:V. Or much else regarding how Wikipedia is supposed to be written. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:28, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

well, that explains why the sources don't support what they wrote—blindlynx —blindlynx 01:21, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

It appears that they are just listing random sources now, [[43]] includes a sources about Marx and one about Woodrow Wilson neither of which make any mention of Steiner, anthroposophy or other stuff related to him—blindlynx 16:01, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@Blindlynx: Seen what you write, I propose a siteban for SamwiseGSix. tgeorgescu (talk) 16:07, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@Tgeorgescu sorry? —blindlynx 16:09, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

On a side note SamwiseGSix bombing in several hundred page sources without referencing page numbers—while knowing that they don't support their inclusions—is counter productive—blindlynx 16:07, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

These are WP:V sources that demonstrate Rudolf Steiner's vast body of anti-racist statements, especially in comparison with those of thinkers like Woodrow Wilson (who was actively segregating the US Federal Government during Steiner's life) and K. Marx and F. Engels, who expressed quite shocking ideas on race - Engels even calling for genocide. No original research, just historical facts 'explicitly described in reliable sources' meeting WP:V standards, and helping facilitate a very important NPOV standard for the Encyclopedia here.. SamwiseGSix (talk) 16:08, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@SamwiseGSix: Meaning I support a siteban for lacking basic WP:CIR. tgeorgescu (talk) 16:11, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

They do not. The relevant ones clearly discuss how he has both racist and anti-racist positions in his work not just anti-racist ones as you claim. The Wilson and marx refs have fuck all to do with steiner—blindlynx 16:14, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I have not claimed that he his only anti-racist - just adding NPOV to demonstrate that he made some statements that we would consider racist by our enlightened and progressive points of view today, while also making many anti-racist statements, which are very progressive in relation to the mainstream thought and leadership of his time. Balanced NPOV is important for the Encyclopedia here.. SamwiseGSix (talk) 16:20, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

No. you added badly cited sources that only 'demonstrate Rudolf Steiner's vast body of anti-racist statements' if you WP:CHERRYPICKED what they say; and sources that are in no way related to steiner. Cherry-picking is decidedly not NPOV. And doing that ignoring sections of sources that do not support your claims is decidedly unbalanced. Further, listing a 700 odd page thesis without refing page numbers makes verifying that source a lot harder—blindlynx 20:42, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@SamwiseGSix, you deciding to compare Wilson (et al) with Steiner is original research. You need a reliable source that compares Wilson (et al) with Steiner. See the difference? Schazjmd (talk) 16:17, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@Schazjmd: It is not a difference he is willing/prepared to learn. tgeorgescu (talk) 16:22, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Ok @Schazjmd, and perhaps such research could be quite easily publishable.. In the meantime does that mean we should go about adding "Racism" and "Thoughts on Race" sections to the biographies of historical leaders like Marx, Engels, Wilson, and all the rest? It appears some kind of non-neutral exception is being made for Steiner here hm SamwiseGSix (talk) 16:22, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

perhaps such research could be quite easily publishable

I'll bite. Could you rephrase this, what does it mean? Remsense留 16:32, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Certainly @Remsense - if world conditions and Wikipedia TOS truly necessitate it, one would expect to be able to publish a paper through the proper channels comparing Steiner's vast body of anti-racist statements (public calls to 'struggle against.. prejudice' and 'the tendency to discriminate based on.. race' in 1914 for example) during a time when the US President Woodrow Wilson was actually actively segregating the US Federal Government, with many professors at the time and still today citing F. Engals, who actually did call for genocide hm

To place the importance of NPOV in fuller context here, recent academic publications for example do illustrate the need and utility for implementation of Steiner's ideas around 'Social Threefolding' (essentially a full picture for sustainable democracy, helping facilitate the continued existence of the human species) in this time of civilizational risk and increasing 'p(doom)' - ie risk of human extinction via AI or nuclear war et al as illustrated in NYTimes and additional sources hm

https://cosmosandhistory.org/index.php/journal/article/view/1069/1723

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/06/business/dealbook/silicon-valley-artificial-intelligence.html SamwiseGSix (talk) 16:52, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

if world conditions and Wikipedia TOS truly necessitate it, one would expect to be able to publish a paper through the proper channels comparing Steiner's vast body of anti-racist statements

...But there isn't such a paper that you've provided, so does that mean that such a paper is potentially not necessary? Troubling is–ought conflation here. Remsense留 16:59, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Hm, ok - so does that not mean then that we must be morally obliged therefore to go forth and add such 'Race' and 'Thoughts on Race' style sections into the biographies of Engels, Marx, Wilson and the others then, if we are to truly be pursuing a 'Neutral Point of View' on the Encyclopedia here? It does appear that the NPOV standard is indeed a very important one for Wikipedia here, especially in these fast changing times hm SamwiseGSix (talk) 17:05, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@SamwiseGSix, your NYT source makes no mention of Steiner or "social threefolding", and this just reinforces the concerns in the thread about your understanding of verifiability on Wikipedia. Please read WP:SYNTH. Schazjmd (talk) 17:06, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes of course, been reading the WP:SYNTH section there - the journal article mentions Steiner and social threefolding, the NYTimes article is only for the discussion page here to hopefully help facilitate a broader context, that a range of prominent folks in tech are expressing concerns of a high probability of human extinction/eradication etc through AI et al hm SamwiseGSix (talk) 17:14, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Siteban

• Support as proposer. tgeorgescu (talk) 16:07, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  On what grounds? It appears you are not able to demonstrate the WP:V or WP:OR concerns you raise here then, is that correct SamwiseGSix (talk) 16:13, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Blindlynx: He is an unrepentant pusher of original research, and even in the 12th hour he does not understand what the problem is. tgeorgescu (talk) 16:16, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Tgeorgescu you've made your point, please stop bludgeoning this discussion. WaggersTALK 16:47, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I think it's fairly clear there's a problem here, but a siteban is overkill. A topic ban would be more appropriate in my opinion but we'd need to determine a suitable scope for that - possibly something as simple and broad as philosophy, broadly construed. These two editors have a bit of previous - see Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive324#SamwiseGSix from just a couple of months ago. As indicated above I'm a little concerned about tgeorgescu's dominance in this discussion, particularly in light of their warning for battleground behaviour from ArbCom less than two months ago. WaggersTALK 17:19, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@Tgeorgescu, I've seen this on the periphery at FTN and see that Samwise was already warned at AE, so the problems aren't lost on me, but it's also not extremely obvious to uninvolved editors glancing through this ANI what the issue is without obvious diffs. It's not clear cut things you can quote like personal attacks. It makes suggesting a siteban appear premature, which I believe is the case right now (the writing may be on the wall though). In the section above this, I'd suggest just making a few key bullets such as 1. text inserted/attributed to source along with the diff and stating it's nowhere in the source or their statement basically saying they didn't read the source. Right now I have to hunt for those details.

Instead, a topic ban seems like the much better route. Given the caution at AE already on their talk page at least, a ban from Steiner broadly construed under pseudoscience DS seems like a start, though maybe a wider scope is an option is there are issues elsewhere. I think I could get behind a topic ban (either an ANI one or any admin doing it under CT) if it was laid out a little clearer.

Just some general advice tgeorgescu, but it seems like Samwise didn't start up editing again (over a month break) until you pinged them at FTN. When an editor is causing issues in a fringe topic and hasn't been active, it's usually best to let sleeping dogs lie, especially if there's a chance they would have otherwise left the topic on their own and you/others could just fix the problems and move on. It probably would have been better at FTN to just ask for more eyes at the article due to those issues, maybe post a notice on the article talk page itself, but not ping Samwise. That's not to say it was entirely inappropriate since there's also notification considerations for noticeboards where alerting an individual editor makes sense at times, but with hindsight, it may have complicated things more in this case. Maybe they would have shown up anyways too, so that's why I'm not too critical, but just suggest being mindful of that dynamic. KoA (talk) 17:29, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@KoA: Diffs: [44] and [45]. The second diff was later than level 4 warning at [46]. tgeorgescu (talk) 17:41, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@Waggers: The difference between me and him is that I got that point: I was wrong about WP:PROFRINGE in talk pages being prohibited. That earned me a warning, and I do not seek to contest it. tgeorgescu (talk) 17:44, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I too get the point here guys, I am not seeking to reverse any such edits further. SamwiseGSix (talk) 17:48, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

In which case I don't think any further action is needed, but don't hesitate to report further disruption. WaggersTALK 08:46, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

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

BilledMammal disruptive editing

I'm reporting BilledMammal for disruptive editing at the discussion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:War_crimes_in_the_2023_Israel–Hamas_war#Organ_harvesting, specifically for edit warring and WP:STONEWALLING. Note that this is an especially contentious topic.

As for the edit warring, CarmenEsparzaAmoux added content (with references/sources) and BilledMammal reverted it. I later on restored the content and BilledMammal reverted that. kashmīri then restored the content and BilledMammal reverted them as well.

This user seems to habitually engage in WP:BATTLEGROUND editing. See for example the other discussion on the same page here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:War_crimes_in_the_2023_Israel–Hamas_war#Iran_'child_recruits'_and_whole_%22Use_of_children%22_section (similarly a highly contentious topic)

Quotations about BilledMammal's editing/debating there are as follows:

"You are effectively admitting that the section isn't adequately sourced and is simply an attempt to impose your own notion of 'fairness' or 'balance' to the war crime coverage." Pincrete 06:52, 4 January

"I have already made my objections clear and it is increasingly difficult to assume good-faith." Pincrete 15:20, 6 January

Additionally, an extremely recent example of WP:BATTLEGROUND editing can also be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Pākehā_settlers#Requested_move_30_December_2023, where some quotes from other editors about BilledMammal's conduct include:

"I closed the previous RM, and not much has substantially changed from the past RM" Sceptre 21:26, 5 January 2024

"I have to agree with Turnagra on the idea that the RM process is being used – whether intentionally or not – as a front for culture war politics" idem

"And you have completely missed my point yet again, which I can only assume is intentional at this point." Turnagra 09:22, 31 December 2023

"I don't elaborate because I can't be bothered with you WP:BADGERING every point, per your actions here and in every other move request." Turnagra 05:03, 31 December 2023

BilledMammal also seems to apply double standards. In the "Use of children" discussion (regarding allegations against Hamas) BilledMammal admits "while it is disputed whether children have been used [...]" and says "My point is that we don't require allegations to be proven or universally accepted to be included", but regarding allegations against Israel in the "Organ harvesting" discussion, BilledMammal says "I've ed your recent restoration; the source you provided is insufficient to meet WP:EXCEPTIONAL. If you can't find high quality reliable source that give the story any credibility, please don't restore it without formal consensus."

I hope an admin can review these cases and ideally someone could review more of BilledMammal's recent edits, which are of an extraordinary volume, as this disruptive battleground editing seems to be habitual with this user.

I resent that I have to spend this much time "investigating" and reporting this user when I would rather be engaging in more productive editing. I also apologise for the lack of diffs and overall unprofessionalism of this report, but I don't think it is fair that I should have the burden to do so much work just to report a user. Note that it is very difficult to "prove"/demonstrate this type of disruptive editing which is usually never egregious in any particular instance, which I suspect is why this user hasn't been reported more often or more recently.

IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 06:49, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I don’t have time for a full reply, so I’ll just make a brief one now and expand on it later if necessary.

IOHANNVSVERVS alleges that I’ve been stonewalling, which requires that I am pushing a position which the consensus of the community clearly does not agree. The discussion in question has had participation from five editors; three for inclusion, two against - there isn’t even a rough consensus here, let alone a clear one.

As a relevant side note, IOHANNVSVERVS has jumped straight into this topic area; even now, despite the ECP requirement, they have less than 500 edits outside of it.

Finally, I’m a little uncomfortable with them posting talk page notifications about this ANI thread to half a dozen editors who I have recently disagreed on content with; it feels like they’ve engaged in WP:CANVASSING. BilledMammal (talk) 07:24, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Finally, I’m a little uncomfortable with them posting talk page notifications about this ANI thread to half a dozen editors who I have recently disagreed on content with; it feels like they’ve engaged in WP:CANVASSING. I keep half an eye on this page out of curiosity and would have seen this anyway, but regardless I appreciate being given a heads up when I've been mentioned. It also seems telling that you are concerned at there being such a wide range of people potentially taking issue with your conduct. Turnagra (talk) 07:37, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I’ve long been concerned about BilledMammal's conduct (BATTLEGROUND is an apt description) and no, I didn’t get a notification. Schwede66 07:48, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• I have long had an issue with BilledMammal's approach to engaging with Wikipedia, and have considered opening something here about them myself. I haven't yet, simply because that sort of thing isn't what I'm on Wikipedia for, and that I'm perfectly happy to leave it be when my niche of interest (New Zealand-related topics) isn't in their crosshairs. But in nearly every discussion I have had with them, I have found the exact sort of WP:BATTLEGROUND mentality and frequent WP:BADGERING which IOHANNVSVERVS describes, as well as a frustrating tendency towards WP:SEALIONING and a refusal to WP:DROPTHESTICK.

I'd also note that this is not the first time that BilledMammal has been brought to ANI for this behaviour - at the time, they stated that "it is clear that in general how [they] engage in discussion is not ideal, and even if this discussion is closed without action [they] will take any criticism onboard and attempt to adjust [their] behaviour to address it". I think it is also clear that this attempt has failed, as the sort of things brought up in that first ANI discussion (disruptive editing, harassment, stonewalling and so on) are being raised again and are clearly still issues. Incidentally, one of them (accusing other editors with opposing positions of being canvassed) has already happened in their first message in response to the ANI.

I won't expand too much more for now - this and the previous ANI cover a lot of my concerns nicely, and as mentioned this sort of thing isn't my cup of tea or why I'm on Wikipedia - but I will say that I believe there is a clear pattern of disruptive editing across every topic area which BilledMammal wades into, and I hope that some action will finally be taken as a result of this. Turnagra (talk) 08:15, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Thank you for pinging me. I agree with the OP view and also find BilledMammal's editing pattern quite disruptive. Wars tend to be an emotive matter, and it's no surprise that editors sometimes find it hard to maintain NPOV in the face of immense human suffering or because of their national/religious/political affiliations. However, BilledMammal's editing goes quite far with one-sided editing and attempts to defend it, and I'd call such edits as mentioned a blatant violation of NPOV and collegial spirit.

At the same time, I'm not sure that BilledMammal's editing or attitude warrants an outright block (I haven't checked their earlier editing history, though). However, a TBAN might help other editors to maintain article quality. — kashmīrī ^TALK 08:49, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm uninvolved in any of the relevant disputes and I do think that BilledMammal's conduct War crimes in the 2023 Israel–Hamas war is WP:BATTLEGROUNDy, including WP:STONEWALLING regarding the organ harvesting paragraph. I don't read their arguments there as particularly policy-based and I also read the consensus of the discussion as basically against them, even before their most recent revert.

I'm less convinced regarding Talk:Pākehā_settlers#Requested_move_30_December_2023, which seems to be a pretty ordinary content dispute. (I'm also not uninvolved with that, though, since I !voted over there before commenting here.)

Since the main dispute here is on an Israel/Palestine page, you may want to go to WP:AE first. WP:ANI, at least in my opinion, is often less useful for conduct issues around controversial topics than WP:AE by their nature as controversial and WP:ANI's nature as a very public board. Loki (talk) 08:52, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment: I think this is @IOHANNVSVERVS: attempt to sidestep their inability to gain WP:CONSENSUS eg: [47], [48] and use ANI [49] to bludgeon their views into articles.

This type of statement in a CTopics area is disruptive: [50].

ATM, I've really only been watching the discussion at Talk:War crimes in the 2023 Israel–Hamas war, but think a boomerang on WP:BATTLEGROUND in this topic area might be worth considering for IOHANNVSVERVS.  // Timothy :: talk  09:54, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment. I'm not seeing diffs provided to support the claim here. I'm not involved in the topic, though I've dealt with some issues with BilledMammal in the past unrelated to this (and also seen them be really insightful in battleground situations too). I feel like I'd even-handedly pick up repeats of tendentious editing from them pretty easily if I saw it again.

Instead, when I go to look through Talk:War_crimes_in_the_2023_Israel–Hamas_war#Organ_harvesting, I'm not seeing anything stand out. If anything, at least on it's face, BilledMammal would be correct in removing text, asking for better sourcing, etc. in terms of WP:ONUS policy. It's up to those wanting to include the content to get consensus for it, and BM's comments at least seem even-handed from what I can gather. If there's any topic to WP:RAISE source quality right now and be cautious, this seems like one. If there really are WP:POV issues from BilledMammal, then that should be clearly articulated, though I imagine WP:AE is the better venue for that. ANI just isn't suited for contentious topics or having to sort through content disputes at that level. To be clear though, I think that would backfire on IOHANNVSVERVS right now if they went to AE.

Instead, I'm seeing editors like IOHANNVSVERVS lashing out at BilledMammal on the talk page in violation of WP:FOC with accusations of stonewalling, etc. despite BM trying to give some guidance on that there. This is a common problem in contentious topics where someone doesn't get traction for an edit and accuses another of stonewall, etc. as an attempt to win a content dispute. Coming here instead strikes me as battleground behavior when they simply could have started an RfC to strike at the core question of what would be WP:DUE inclusion of the reporting. Even if BM's behavior is an underlying issue here (not seeing it, but could be convinced with evidence too), IOHANNVSVERVS, seems to be showing more obvious problems right now. I wouldn't cast a full on support WP:!VOTE right now, but I agree with TimothyBlue above that a boomerang does seem like a reasonable discussion point for preventing disruption in the topic. KoA (talk) 16:47, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment This looks like a content dispute. If there's edit war issue take to the noticeboard. Frankly IOHANNVSVERVS's behavior here is more troubling. Nemov (talk) 19:49, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment this should be closed, and the matter taken to WP:AE. That is, if we want a constructive end to this dispute. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 21:26, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment I am involved in the discussion at Talk:Pākehā_settlers not the other articles, that I have not seen. I am quite surprised to see BilledMammal reported for disruptive editing. He has an opinion on issues and makes his point quite clear. I have never seen what I would call disruption. What I have seen however is a few editors unable to counter his arguments and getting frustrated. In the Pakeha discussion a consensus is beginning to appear to change the word from Pakeha back to European, as BilledMammal suggests with a few editors not liking that. What is wrong with that? I note that similar discussions with the same editors have occurred on other NZ related articles about similar issues (in brief - promotion of the Maori language). I think this complaint is without merit regarding the Pakeha article, and probably the other articles too. Accusing someone of being disruptive because you don't agree with them is bad form. Incidentally, I was recently been accused of badgering Turnagra in the Pakeha discussion for giving an opinion which he did not like (and in IMO was unable to counter) Roger 8 Roger (talk) 22:32, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  It's got nothing to do with the content, which I'm not going to get into here. It's got to do with the manner in which BilledMammal conducts themselves in these discussions. I'd thank you to not put words in my mouth. Turnagra (talk) 00:46, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment: For some reason, my computer decided to change "reverted" to "ed", this is the second time its happened, I will try and figure out why and look for it in the future. I've had some other issues, might be time to reinstall everything. Sorry for the issue.  // Timothy :: talk  05:29, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
• In disagreements between BilledMammal and Turnagra I have watched both parties disagree at length. They (and I) have disagreed for maybe three years now(?), mostly on whether New Zealand place names should use an official dual-language name, or only the English portion of it. I think both users have valid points, though I typically side with BM. If there is problematic behaviour, it certainly involves both of them. In fact, as an ideological battleground, I would be inclined to say Turnagra is more at fault.
  With that background, it seems poor judgement for either of them to close the other’s RMs (T closing BM, April 2022; BM closing T), March 2023. And in recent months, BilledMammal has opened RMs on several NZ places, and Turnagra has responded with some less-than-professional opposition (Oppose this ridiculous crusade against dual names has gone on long enough Hinemoatū / Howard River; Oppose this is ridiculous Lake Ellesmere / Te Waihora). Both editors left notes to tell the other off (User talk:BilledMammal#Your recent move requests and User talk:Turnagra#November 2023), and I almost went to say something to both of them, but felt I would have come off too involved for it to be helpful.
  In all though, I wouldn’t say that either editor is a “problem” in the larger context I’ve observed… but I also haven’t observed the Israel–Hamas stuff. — HTGS (talk) 22:41, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

86.19.222.221 reported by Danners430 - repeatedly removing sourced content in articles and ignoring talk page warnings

The IP editor 86.19.222.221 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is consistently removing sourced information from British Rail Class 730 and Alstom Aventra, and giving no citation in to verify the information removal.

Diffs:

• [51]
• [52]
• [53]
• [54]
• [55]
• [56]

The editor has been warned multiple times on their talk page about this behaviour, but they have not responded or acknowledged at all, and have instead continued until today to make these edits. In fact, when I went to get diffs for the warnings on the talk page, I realised that each and every warning relates to these two pages... Should action be taken here? Danners430 (talk) 21:48, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Blocked – for a period of 5 days: User talk:86.19.222.221#Block. El_C 13:45, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Edits with unsubstantiated claims

216.164.254.3 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) has been making multiple edits, adding claims that lack sources or references, which are later reverted by other users and then undone by the IP user. As an example, they've made edits on LGBT rights in Russia (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs),[57] which were partially reverted due to being unsubstantiated[58] and then changed back to the original without reason.[59]

This behaviour is recurring,[60] as well as an instance of removing topically relevant content,[61] for which they were warned twice on their talk page.[62]

Drunk Experiter (Kanni, she/her) (talk) 01:11, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment - this IP was already twice blocked for socking by @Drmies, and had TPA removed (maybe that's why they don't reply on their TP? I don't know if it expires with the block, although in this case it's beside the point as they don't care for the warnings at all, as their editing shows). Its latest block ended about a month ago, and it seems to have picked up right where it left off, with an additional case of casting aspersions to top it off. After the inevitable re-block someone will likely have to undo the unsourced changes and the removal of sourced content, but I'm not jumping in that area. Ostalgia (talk) 12:12, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

The edits for LGBT in Russia were undone because the article substantiates that the new morality laws allows for jail time for the rest of Russia under laws against promotion of LGBT identity and anti-transgender laws while the Chechnya area allows for de facto execution. As for undoing edits by unscrupulous IPs in Capital punishment in the UAE, I was undoing a well known blocked User:Rayanmou07 who has been using ip alts to parrot his actions that got him banned. That "behavior" as you call it is perfectly legit and within Wikipedia guidelines, as undoing sockpuppets edits is permitted. As for you Drunk Experiter, you only existed in 2019 and have been lurking and making few edits until this incident so your edit behaviors of just happening to obsess about the same topics as the blocked user and his ips that I've have undone is more worrying than my edits. These accusations you have made are at best baseless and at worst jarring misuse of incident reporting which was something Rayanmou07 did as well when he didn't get his way. I'm not saying you are him, but you do seem to act like him. Can we throw out this stupid bogus allegation now? 216.164.254.3 (talk) 03:55, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oh come on IP, it's kind of sad that you'd point at User:Rayanmou07 and call them "well known [and] blocked"; they're just a bit of a troll, while you have been whining about how unfair the world is since 2014. Isn't it time to grow out of that kind of behavior? Drmies (talk) 14:00, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

High-volume unhelpful short descriptions by 110.34.27.228

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

This editor has been warned numerous times to stop adding unhelpful short descriptions to articles, and has continued to do so in large volumes without acknowledging any warnings. Examples include [63] (and 50+ more identical edits to articles of the form "Religious freedom in ___"), or [64] (and several more identical edits to articles of the form "Tourism in ___"). "Overview of title" is never a constructive short description, and while they have been told to stop adding such short descriptions several times they continue to do so. I am not sure how to get this point across to them. Tollens (talk) 02:03, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Blocked – for a period of one week: User talk:110.34.27.228#Block. El_C 13:36, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Request REVDEL

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

---

I'm logging off but saw that a REVDEL/Oversight is needed for this. Not sure what the right forum is, but figured someone who can act is watching here. ~ Pbritti (talk) 05:36, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

It has been suppressed. Nothing to see here, literally. Cullen328 (talk) 08:31, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

@Pbritti: Since the edit was ultimately supressed, you should read the instructions in WP:Oversight and specially the warnings in WP:Requests for oversight, in case you come across something like that again. Specifically, requests for oversight should never be made in public and care should be taken to not bring attention to said edits.

Basically, as is mentioned at the bottom of WP:RFO, you revert the post(and revdel if you are a non-oversight admin) and if doing so won't draw more attention to whatever it is, and then you email the oversight team about it.

That said, speaking from experience, the oversight team does appreciate people for pointing out things like whatever that was (didn't see it), just be sure to not point it out in public next time :s.

– 2804:F14:80CF:A701:1C07:696E:B108:ACC5 (talk) 08:31, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Someone seems to have handled this. jp×g🗯️ 08:32, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

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

Creating my user page

Hi, so I'm trying to create my user page but my username that got accepted when I made my account is the reason I can't make it? (User:(゜-゜)) Is there any way I can create it? The block linked me to this noticeboard. (゜-゜) (talk) 08:28, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I suspect this is something to do with the title blacklist; I created an empty page at that title. See if you can edit it and let me know what happens. jp×g🗯️ 08:30, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I wish people would just stop being so "creative". Drmies (talk) 14:13, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed - names like this should be banned, makes it impossible to easily refer to/ping other editors. Pointless. GiantSnowman 14:20, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

@GiantSnowman See WP:Username policy section WP:NOEMOJI - The following types of usernames are not permitted ... Usernames that are considered to be emoticons or otherwise "decorative". 86.23.109.101 (talk) 19:49, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Great, thanks. GiantSnowman 21:15, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

LTA and trolling from HaughtonBrit (accusing unblocked users as sockpuppets in his edit summaries, misuse of WP:DENY)

To make a very, very, very long story short as I've been dealing with this user since October 2021 and his sockpuppets since December 2022, this user as of April 2023 has been using a combination of sockpuppet accounts, IPs that geolocate to Pittsburgh or Pennslyvania, as well as a wide variety of proxies to block evade ever since his account Javerine was blocked-[65]. His modus operandi is to steamroll a religious nationalist agenda on Wikipedia and he'll brutally, incessantly, unrelentingly harass and intimidate users he percieves as a threat to his agenda as well as pushing tendentious edits particuarly in military related pages that his co-religionists were involved in.

Also see some of this user's IP block logs since April 2023-[66] nad [67].

He has crossed the line again by calling an ublocked user Leviathan12 a sockpuppet in his edit summaries with this IP range-2601:547:B00:E453:0:0:0:0/65 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log)). This is unacceptable, he was previously trying to post on an admin's talk page with a sock account trying to get this account blocked earlier as well-[68]. This is flagrant harassement and Wikipedia should ban the IP range for harassment and block evasion. Southasianhistorian8 (talk) 14:55, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Suthasianhistorian8 is the one falsely calling me sock of HaughtonBrit. You can investigate and it will be proven without any benefit of doubt that users Leviathan12 and Monabhaii are none other than socks of KamalAfghan01 [69]. Same interest in articles that were vandalized by socks of KamalAfghan01. Quick check will prove it. Suthasianhistorian8 is quite familiar with these socks and deliberately trying to prevent from this findings. This user needs to stop his harassment of other users. 2601:547:B00:CD18:346B:4FFA:4E40:834D (talk) 15:03, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Please stop accusing other people without proof. If you have evidence of any socking activity, filing it to WP:SPI will be the best to clear it up, instead of repeatedly accusing the editors without bringing any evidence.
Previous investigations for context: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Kamal Afghan01, Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/HaughtonBrit. ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 15:13, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I did and see what this user Suthasianhistorian8 did. To prevent sock investigation, he deleted my request and falsely accusing. [70] 2601:547:B00:D373:613C:D03A:DCD9:EE6A (talk) 16:14, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

It's absolutely unbelievable that this immature troll gets to disrupt Wikipedia for weeks on end without any consequences. Southasianhistorian8 (talk) 16:33, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

funny how an immature user calls other immature. Preventing an investigation of suspected sock accounts speaks for itself.2601:547:B00:D373:78E2:D552:EDCE:D74C (talk) 16:43, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Please, both of you, just let admins, CheckUsers and SPI clerks sort this out instead of going into petty fighting. ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 17:55, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Yamla, ST47, I saw you two at the SPI--can you have a look? Thanks, Drmies (talk) 16:49, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• I blocked a /64 range for, basically, harassment and disruption that seems to me to be consistent with the BritHaughton socks, but that's about all I can do right now. Drmies (talk) 16:59, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

User:WacoBell, chronic disruptive editing

Seeking Administrator intervention against the user WacoBell. This user previously used the account Sirhewlett and the IP address 100.14.8.37.

• Trying to keep it concise, user under previous account and IP made large scale disruptive edits for a number of months from late 2022 to early 2023, receiving a number of warnings in the process as seen on the user talk page.
  
• User received 24 hour block for disruptive editing as a result of a report I made.
  
• User around the time of increased observation by myself on their Sirhewlett account, created the WacoBell account and when caught and reported received an indefinite ban for sockpuppetry.
  
• User proceeded to make numerous appeals on their talk page, the latest in December, all of which were declined[71].
  
• Despite in their appeals stating how terrible they felt and promising to change their ways, they engaged in deliberate block-evasion via IP address to continue disruptively editing on at least one known occassion.
  
• User was unblocked by appeal to ArbCom on 6th January. User immediately reverted back to previous disruptive behaviour, making edits to the Rhett & Link and Smosh where they inserted statements regarding the nature of Mythical Entertainment's involvement with Smosh that were not backed up by the source they claimed supported it (namely turning the source statement of "as minority shareholders, Rhett & Link will remain involved with Smosh in an advisory capacity" into "only allowed to intervene in financial situations").
  
• I placed a warning on their page yesterday, but they have clearly taken no notice, their most recent edit today to edit an article under BLP rules to declare a band in the past tense (implying having broken up) with no source to support this change.[72] while instead article is still at present sourced to support an on-hiatus status.
  

Clearly this user shows no interest in changing their disruptive behaviour, request indefinite block be reinstated and extended to the IP address associated with them. Rambling Rambler (talk) 15:10, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• Maxim, you unblocked on behalf of ArbCom. I ran a quick CU and it's all over the place in a few ways. I have no doubt there's a ton of logged-out editing, but I'd like for another CU to have a look. Materialscientist, I know you looked at this one too. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 15:21, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  I agree there is logged out editing going on. Maxim (talk) 16:07, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  There is nothing involving that going on. I am not the only one using this IP address. And for the record, there was no disruptive editing going on, I have only edited Smosh and Rhett and Link with a reliable source, please close this down. WacoBell (talk) 17:52, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  Most of all "their most recent edit today to edit an article under BLP rules to declare a band in the past tense (implying having broken up) with no source to support this change.[277] while instead article is still at present sourced to support an on-hiatus status." When the years active section says 1993-2023, they never once said (on hiatus),that is my bad. WacoBell (talk) 17:56, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  I have taken notice of the warning, I just did not answer until today. WacoBell (talk) 17:58, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

@Rambling Rambler I did say that I would change, and I have tried my best to do exactly that, please do not reinstate the block. When I said I would do better, I meant it, give me six months, and I will prove exactly that. WacoBell (talk) 18:01, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I would just break down how you're admitting to using that IP that was used for disruptive editing, that you had six months while banned to change your behaviour so clearly six more isn't going to make a difference, and that it's frankly ridiculous to accept that you didn't see the sourced lead saying the band was still around when the infobox you're claiming as a reason to change the page is further down the page, but I think the most pertinent piece of evidence about your lack of contrition is that while you're now here and on your talkpage apologising profusely you've changed your userpage to read:

I'm wrong, i haven't done anything wrong, but that doesn't make me less wrong.[73] (emphasis mine) Rambling Rambler (talk) 18:36, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I said I was wrong for causing trouble with the Sirhewlett WacoBell TRANSITION, not the IP used, once again, I am not the only one using that IP. WacoBell (talk) 19:50, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

and another thing. i am semi-retiring for about six months, i wish not to cause any trouble and get blocked again, please read my profile again, also, the I'm wrong bit was a joke. my apologies. WacoBell (talk) 19:55, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Despite all this claiming to wanting to learn their lesson and now claiming they're "temporarily retired" they are now continuing their behaviour again, this time with no source adding in a claimed birth date for a living musician.Rambling Rambler (talk) 20:14, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I have a source, please let me know if this is wrong, and I will take myself out of the situation starting now.. https://gingerroot.fandom.com/wiki/Cameron_Lew WacoBell (talk) 20:29, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

@WacoBell, fandom is not a reliable source. Schazjmd (talk) 20:31, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Alright then, see you soon. My apologies. WacoBell (talk) 20:32, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Further update: WacoBell has now just tried to submit an already existing article they copy and pasted into their sandbox and then pass off as a new article with the only difference being an unnecessary, unsourced infobox. The only reason I can surmise they did this is they thought they'd copied it from a different wikipedia site. Can an admin please deal with this as a matter of urgency at this point.

User:بوكوس edit-warring with disruptive/nonsensical edits

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

This user has been edit-warring to introduce obviously incorrect changes to Battle of Hattin ([74],[75], [76], [77]) and Siege of Jerusalem (1187) ([78], [79], [80], [81]) that are WP:OR at best and WP:HOAX at worst. (i.e. Adding Almohads to the infobox, a northwest African empire irrelevant to these battles, with zero evidence of this in reliable sources.) They've been warned multiple times ([82], [83], [84]) but are of course continuing to edit-war, even after the last warning ([85]), and have not responded or communicated in any other way.

Moreover, all of their edit summaries have been nonsensical garbles: this, which they've repeated again and again in both English and Arabic (e.g. [86], [87], [88]). It might be an attempt to describe their sources in the edit summary, but it's not understandable and it would be unhelpful even if it was.

They edit-warred a couple of months ago at Almoravid dynasty in a similar way ([89], [90], [91], [92]). They were warned back then too ([93], [94]). R Prazeres (talk) 19:18, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Indeffed.. POV warrior, bad sources, etc. Doug Weller talk 11:45, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Persistent block evasion, disruption by Cliff Cash vandal

• Mehendri Parsons (talk · contribs)
• 70.35.179.160 (talk · contribs)
• Jmatzir (talk · contribs) [95]

Most recent blocked account appears to be WikiFan1358 (talk · contribs). More blocks and perhaps page protection for Wiley Cash, as well as speedy deletion of Draft:Roger Cash and Draft:Kristen Hanby for obvious reasons. Once socking is established, general reversions per WP:REVERTBAN. 2601:19E:4180:6D50:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63 (talk) 20:05, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Mrsecurity39 392

Mrsecurity39 392 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Another classical case of a user making WP:TENDENTIOUS edits in Azerbaijan/Iran/Central Asia/Turkic related articles.

If this user was more active (they have 107 edits since 17 January 2022, a lot of which have gotten reverted [96]), they would have been taken to WP:ANI long ago;

1. WP:SYNTH at Hunnic language [97]
2. Long term edit warring and pov pushing at Luandi throughout several months in 2022, removing sourced info about a possible Iranian connection [98] [99] [100] [101] [102] [103]
3. Pov pushing at Blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh, trying to minimize the Azerbaijani role in the event, which was reverted by another user [104] [105]
4. Pov pushing at Jie people [106], changing "other authors have proposed a Turkic language" to "most authors have proposed a Turkic language", despite only one citation being cited and other cited citations saying otherwise..
5. WP:SYNTH at Safavid Iran [107] [108] [109] [110] and Turco-Persian tradition [111] (none of the cited sources mention anything "Turko-Persian"), not to mention altering sourced info (removing "Turkified" in the Safavid Iran article)

Random personal attacks;

1. Go ahead, lying and being dishonest is not w good trait to have, but I, can't say I'm shocked.
2. This is the second time Ermwin don't fabricate information that ISN'T there, just for your own COI and or political goals.
3. .....that you're using to fabricate information that ISN'T there, just for your own COI and or political goals.

Based on this, I fail to see how this user is a networth to this site. --HistoryofIran (talk) 01:32, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

the sources are there and can be checked you stating that I would be lying about the context of the sources is false, which is a form of lying as I told you afterwards you can check the sources for yourself (while I also cited pages), once Again you or anyone for that matter can check the sources (the ones you attempted to remove during an edit war).

You trying to bring up unrelated events (and take them out of context) is a dishonest trait. Mrsecurity39 392 (talk) 01:37, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

How about you try to prove me wrong, instead of keep attacking me? I haven't accused you of anything, did you even read what WP:SYNTH means? HistoryofIran (talk) 01:42, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I can admit, name calling isn't a healthy good way of discourse (or for that matter accusing people of lying about sources that they post which is something you did).

But you're not exactly proving me wrong now by nitpicking & Pov pushing by spreading accusations based on things deliberately taken out of context, it's more the opposite of what you are trying to achieve. Mrsecurity39 392 (talk) 01:42, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

prove you wrong on what exactly? Have I randomly insulted you by calling you a liar after you claimed I was posting sources that don't back up what I edited, even after posting page citations?

I could've refrained from saying you lied and were being dishonest, but to claim I provide sources that don't back up my edits (when they did) is lying and had you known and still claimed I lied that would make someone dishonest.

Now I can apologise for calling you dishonest, however it is a lie that the sources I used don't back up the edit. Mrsecurity39 392 (talk) 01:46, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

This is just a violation of WP:BATTLEGROUND at this rate too. Let's see what the two cited citations say (can't even quote the remaining two because you provided no page, so much for backing up your edit). I'm not going to continue discussing with you further, as it's clearly not helpful. I'll wait for an admin verdict. HistoryofIran (talk) 01:58, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

The two citations that Mrsecurity39 392 used, making no mention of "Turko-Persian" and clearly demonstrating WP:SYNTH

"The origins of the Safavids are clouded in obscurity. They may have been of Kurdish origin (see R. Savory, Iran Under the Safavids, 1980, p. 2; R. Matthee, "Safavid Dynasty" at iranica.com), but for all practical purposes they were Turkish-speaking and Turkified." [112] Savory, Roger (2007-09-24). Iran Under the Safavids. Cambridge University Press. pp. Mazzaoui, Michel B, Canfield, Robert (2002). "Islamic Culture and Literature in Iran and Central Asia in the early modern period". Turko-Persia in Historical Perspective. Cambridge University Press. pp. 86–7. ISBN 978-0-521-52291-5. Safavid power with its distinctive Persian-Shiʻi culture, however, remained a middle ground between its two mighty Turkish neighbors. The Safavid state, which lasted at least until 1722, was essentially a "Turkish" dynasty, with Azeri Turkish (Azerbaijan being the family's home base) as the language of the rulers and the court as well as the Qizilbash military establishment. Shah Ismail wrote poetry in Turkish. The administration nevertheless was Persian, and the Persian language was the vehicle of diplomatic correspondence (insha'), of belles-lettres (adab), and of history (tarikh). ISBN 978-0-521-04251-2.

Disruptive behaviour trying to censor free source code and free information in external links

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Licit edits of Internet_security and Browser_security regarding Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) as a vulnerability and that included external links to free source code, free technical explanations and security vulnerability analysis have been repeatedly censored by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:MrOllie in a disruptive manner and without valid reasons.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Internet_security&action=edit&undoafter=1195601169&undo=1195603779 See: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Internet_security&action=edit&undoafter=1195810810&undo=1195826735 See: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Browser_security&action=edit&undoafter=1195592326&undo=1195603699 See: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Browser_security&action=edit&undoafter=1195817202&undo=1195826589 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.54.130.184 (talk) 14:26, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Removing linkspam disguised as a reference is not 'censorship'. You'll have to find somewhere else to promote your 'unofficial WebKit CORS vulnerability patch'. AndyTheGrump (talk) 14:32, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• I've reverted the IP opening this thread twice, but they snuck it back in after I stepped away from the computer. Ivanvector, I'm considering converting your pblock of Special:contributions/109.54.128.0/20 to a sitewide block. Any objections? --Bbb23 (talk) 15:21, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  Nope, I already told them I would if they didn't knock it off. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:25, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

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User: Rockchalk717 and disruptive editing on 2023 Kansas City Chiefs season

This user has engaged in disruptive removal of the “more citations needed tag” with simple bare assertions of citations are fine. Even though people adding the tag have given valid reasons for the addition. This seems like WP:OWNership of the article. The article has a lot of uncited material and the user is disruptively trying to make sure the issues aren’t detected or fixed. 100.12.36.234 (talk) 15:24, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Why not tag what needs a source with {{cn}}? Or better yet, find a source? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:30, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

A lot of the stuff that needs citations is a different column in a box, see 2023 Detroit Lions season as an example. And to why finding a source isn’t practical - they often times demand certain sources. A lot of it is for the NFL Top 100 and for the draft picks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.12.36.234 (talk) 15:51, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure I'd call it disruptive editing and I certainly don't believe Rockchalk has demonstrated ownership. If you have an issue with a specific part of the page then you should add the citation needed tag in an appropriate location. For what it's worth, I've found it very easy and efficient to communicate with Rockchalk and I've found they're flexible and willing to budge when a conversation has been had. Hey man im josh (talk) 16:43, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Given that the entire 81,000 byte article, apart from the Draft section and the game summaries, is completely unsourced - that's something like 24 sections - I think using the header tag is a better idea. Because that's a LOT of cn tags. I'm actually amazed that someone with 42,000 edits thinks this article is suitable for mainspace - it should be Draft until it's fixed. Black Kite (talk) 19:24, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

To be clear, I'm not endorsing the removal of the tag altogether. My reply was more about alternative ways to resolve the issue and to mention that I've had positive and productive experiences when having conversations and trying to work with Rockchalk. I do however disagree that it belongs in draft space until that time. There are external links for all of the game summaries for example, a large part of which make up that 81,000 bytes. Hey man im josh (talk) 19:49, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Let's be honest here, if that article had been presented at AFC it would have been rejected, because most of it is completely unsourced. The game summaries are a small part; to repeat, 24 out of the 26 sections have no sources whatsoever. Since the topic itself is notable, perhaps it might just be easier to delete all of those sections and they can be re-introduced if and when sources are found. Black Kite (talk) 19:55, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

@Black Kite: I just checked and, of the 81,000 bytes, at least 57,000 of them are the game summaries. Some of these sections, such as the staff and current roster sections, are just transcluded templates which include external links that verify the information. I don't want to be seen as trying to endorse the article in its current state, as I do completely agree that there needs to be additional references, but the number of sections unsourced isn't quite accurate.

I agree this would likely be rejected at AfC, but that doesn't mean it doesn't belong in main space as is. The overall number of sources needs to improve, but it's not quite as unsourced as it looks at first glance. The lead, offseason, and transaction sections absolutely need additional references. Hey man im josh (talk) 20:01, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, but they are the majority of the article (not to mention that "Additional references" would suggest there are some references there already - there are none). I've restored the tag for the time being as removing it was obviously wrong. Black Kite (talk) 20:04, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Yup, I agree the tag is appropriate the more I've looked at the article. I just don't agree with OP that Rockchalk was displaying ownership or being disruptive. In the future though, I do encourage folks to reach out to Rockchalk on their talk page instead of heading straight to ANI. Hey man im josh (talk) 20:20, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I am agreeing with all of you. Plus, I think most of that violates [[WP:NOTSTATS]], [[WP:FANCRUFT]] and lots of others. And also, if it is 10 years later, who is gonna remember or know about all of the transcations? Baring important signings/releases/some trades, we will probably not even know about it. Stuff like "cut to 53", "futures contract", "signed and released in the offseason", and many others seems obvious it is violating fancruft. I would say remove unsourced stuff until someone sources it for now. JC2323 (talk) 21:11, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Adding transactions is a regular occurrence on sports season pages. This was discussed a while back and was decided there was nothing wrong with including it. ANI was certainly not the appropriate place for this. I'll add a source. The entire transaction list can be verified with a single source.--Rockchalk717 21:49, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I've added sources, including additional sources that either weren't directly verifiable but the transactions list in the team website or would have been hard to identify in it.--Rockchalk717 22:05, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for doing that, though there are still a few unsourced tables, so you probably shouldn't have removed the tag yet. Can we please (and this applies to everyone reading this, not just the creator of this article) make sure that new articles are sourced sufficiently in the future? Black Kite (talk) 13:07, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

IP hopping at Murder on the Dancefloor

• 92.40.196.0/22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Murder on the Dancefloor (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

The IP range 92.40.196.0/22 has been causing problems at Murder on the Dancefloor, specifically 92.40.196.246 and 92.40.196.238. Could someone please take care of this? ResPM (T🔈🎵C) 17:07, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I added a partial block from the page to the range's existing partial block, and reset the timer to 6 months. Since they were adding snippets of song lyrics I have also revdeleted their edits. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:16, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

User is now adding unsourced information to articles [113]. JeffSpaceman (talk) 17:30, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I've blocked a smaller range sitewide. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:44, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Breast-obsessed WP:NOTHERE user

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User:Readthispage exclusively edits with a prurient focus on breasts. Their very first edits were replacing the images on pornstar bios with ones that had more substantial cleavage and their largest edit by far is creating a WP:FAKEARTICLE about “bouncing breasts”. Additionally they’ve also uploaded a ton of useless AI softcore porn to commons. I don’t think I can realistically assume good faith here, they’re clearly not here to build an encyclopedia. Dronebogus (talk) 00:37, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Just so it's been recorded here, too: I've tagged the "bouncing breasts" sandbox page for speedy deletion as vandalism. Patient Zero^talk 00:57, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

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New WP:NOTHERE novelty account

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• Henry Cerbone Harvard Grad (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

I suppose I must be a little too smart for my own good (I graduated from Harvard) and I must conclude that people are just not on the same level of higher thinking that I am on. I shall think on what you said. Did you graduate from Harvard?

Not much else to say here, should probably nip this one in the bud. — Remsense诉 01:46, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Similar naming pattern to User:Dylan Florida's numerous socks. Zaathras (talk) 01:50, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Man clearly isn't familiar with this website if he thinks ivy leaguers are a rarity. Mach61 (talk) 01:50, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

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On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog, or a Harvard graduate. Cullen328 (talk) 01:56, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Accusations & AGF issues

Alaska4Me2 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

I have had a series of civility issues from @Alaska4Me2, primarily in the form of baseless accusations and questionable AGF, going back into December, when I had to open an ANI report for edit warring in which I was accused of colluding with another editor to game the system.[114] After that previous ANI, she made additional accusations against me without evidence, and rather than drag it into ANI again, I instead sought guidance from an admin (Doug Weller) directly regarding whether I could have handled it differently.[115]

From what she posted on my user TP,[116] it appears that she presumes that this is some kind of a grudge on my part. I specifically told her it was not, and I was not sure how she got that from my question for Doug (which was summed up as "I'm trying to figure out if it's the other editor (my opinion) or just me (humble enough to say that's a possibility), if I could have done something better (like drop it altogether), or maybe my approach as the other editor indicated really is 'off-putting and rude'.")

At that point, I asked her to cease and that anything else was unwelcome unless it was constructive to the conversation.[117] But instead, after an anonIP reverted one of her edits (assuming this one [118], although she didn't say specifically) she returned to accuse me of sockpuppetry.[119] I shouldn't have to say it, but not only was that not me, it's not even from the same part of the country (which any checkuser could determine) and that obviously, openly accusing someone on that flimsy evidence is not only WP:UNCIVIL, but shows an assumption of bad faith.

As noted, I didn't want to rehash the entire history and make this unnecessarily long. The bad faith assumption and the baseless accusation of sockpuppetry were my biggest concerns. The diffs above, especially what I shared with Doug, link to the history. But if anything else is needed or requested for context, I will assemble it upon request. ButlerBlog (talk) 03:38, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I looked at this yesterday but was distracted. So far as I'm concerned, the only question is the type and length of the sanction. Probably an NPA block but gotta run as dental apointment. Doug Weller talk 09:54, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

@Doug Weller:, a block is wholly unnecessary. I said my piece and will be doing all I can to avoid the complaining editor. He pushed me to my limit with starting to follow me to at least one article he's never edited previously AND then actually admitting it. If I'm wrong about him logging out to change one of my edits at another article he's never been to previously, he has my apologies. My hope is this entire incident will convince him to leave me be. If he doesn't, and this happens again, I'll come here in the future for more eyes on the issue rather than deal with it at his talk page. A4M2 Alaska4Me2 (talk) 14:06, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

If you're wrong? I can't see why you have made such a serious allegation against an experienced editor.with a clean block log. If I find an editor who seems to be making problematic edits, esp. when they are violating our policies and guidelines, I often look at their edits and if appropriate revert them. That's allowed. What isn't allowed is doing that to harass an editor, and I see no evidence of that. You haven't convinced me that your personal attacks are going to stop. Doug Weller talk 16:48, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I said I'm going to avoid the complaining editor as much as possible, that if there is another issue with him I will come here first (and probably last, as well) and not to his talk page (or other talk pages). I'm not sure what more you want or need from me. A4M2 Alaska4Me2 (talk) 17:13, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I was just reading Alaska4Me2 classic non-apology apology to Butlerblog on New Year's Eve ("I'm genuinely sorry you are so heated", "I'm sorry you feel that way", "If you were escalated-angry or even mildly upset-escalated by my actions, please [accept] my humble apology.") And above in this thread, I see yet another non-apology apology - the infamous "if-apology", compare WP:NOTSORRY. Alaska4Me2, you're cheapening the very concept of apologizing, and I advise you to read my links. Anyway, nobody should have to put up with these real attacks and fake apologies. I suggest a 48-hour block. Bishonen | tålk 17:19, 16 January 2024 (UTC).

I thought blocks are supposed to be preventative, not punitive. [120] What is being prevented by blocking me? A4M2 Alaska4Me2 (talk) 17:24, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

The behavior hasn't stopped. Read the link you gave. I was thinking 72 hours but will only block for 48 per Bishonen's suggestion. Doug Weller talk 17:43, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Protection for the Zamorin page due to persistent disruptive edits by anonymous US IPs

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The Zamorin page needs some level of protection, the same anonymous IP user keeps reverting without discussion, removing sourced content and conflicts with WP:MOS. The user has 3 known aliases: Adithya Kiran, 2600:4040:4527:3b00:79d9:76fe:230:4cfe and 68.33.4.126.

He was reported and reverted by other users on the Samantan page as well recently. HölderlinRem1 (talk) 05:08, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

@HölderlinRem1 You have failed to notify 2600:4040:4527:3B00:79D9:76FE:230:4CFE (talk · contribs · WHOIS) of this ANI report, as the red notice on top of this page clearly requires. Shirt58 has done so for you this time. In fact, you haven't even attempted to discuss the revert with them at all. Is there any reason why you have gone straight here rather than trying to ascertain their intent? Also, if you want to make allegations of inappropriate use of logged in and out editing, you will need to present evidence that justifies that as well. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). 11:44, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I have taken decisive action against explicit caste promotion in Zamorin. Each edit I made is accompanied by a detailed summary to ensure transparency. To foster constructive dialogue and prevent edit wars, I've initiated a dedicated discussion section on the article's talk page. This measure is aimed at encouraging open discussion and collaborative resolution rather than resorting to blind reverts or edit wars.

I urge fellow editors to engage in this dialogue for the integrity and accuracy of our content. 2600:4040:4527:3B00:7C68:B92C:9057:6057 (talk) 03:03, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

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

User:Favorite girl68 - potential PAID issue

Favorite girl68 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) This new user has been creating articles about people of questionable notability, some being translations from articles on other language projects. (list) They also created FxPro, which was deleted, and then recreated it at FxPro (investment company). That article was plainly promotional. A review of the logs reveals a consistent pattern of creating these pages in userspace and moving them to mainspace in a defined pattern, which is odd from a 'new user'. It's also worth noting the account was first created on ruwiki, and has been blocked there for block evasion (link).

In short, I suspect this is undisclosed paid editing. I raised this gently on the talk page of the user: See User_talk:Favorite_girl68#Creation of new articles. They responded with a denial, and claiming to be translating the page from the German version. It might also be noted that the user's talk page responses are rather uncivil and unexpected from someone editing in good faith. They also raised a complaint at User_talk:Dcotos#FxPro (investment company), attempting to justify these as being translations from other articles. The obvious question outstanding is - why these completely unconnected articles on non-notable people, as well as a promotional piece on a non-notable company? Local Variable (talk) 14:56, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

User:Spicy CU-blocked them as part of Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Papa2004. DMacks (talk) 15:08, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

@DMacks: Thanks for letting me know. If it's necessary (not sure if it's dealt with at SPI), I've tagged the created articles with db-g5. It appears no other editors have made substantial contributions to any of the articles. Also, in any event, none are suitable for inclusion. Local Variable (talk) 15:37, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

IP user repeatedly making racist comments at ITN/C

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24.125.98.89 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has, several times over the last few days, made grossly racist comments and generalizations directed at Latin Americans at ITN/C, in the replies to blurbs relating to the recent events in Ecuador. Examples: 1, 2, 3.

I don't think this kind of behavior is close to being acceptable here. ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 18:26, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

• You would be correct, blocked for a month, we can do without that stuff here. Black Kite (talk) 18:35, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  Surely this is a permanent ban? Describing human beings as "locusts" and characterising the population of an entire continent as "depraved" shows we are not dealing with someone capable of contributing in any way to this project. Boynamedsue (talk) 18:46, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  It would be an indef if they were a named account. However, they're an IP, and as a rule we don't indef IP addresses. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 18:48, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

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Personal attacks, BLP violations and edit warring by 2A01:CB19:9086:A400:*

2A01:CB19:9086:A400:B957:9836:3246:A41D (talk · contribs · WHOIS) (previously 2a01:cb19:9086:a400:4c6:5a75:59a7:6d4d (talk · contribs · WHOIS), 2a01:cb19:9086:a400:211e:1ca1:f686:d5f3 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), 2a01:cb19:9086:a400:a05c:a22f:64c3:db18 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)) has called me an "idiot" twice ([121], [122]) after they have been introducing deliberate errors to Roger Schmidt (footballer). I have tried to stop their disruptive behaviour by creating Talk:Roger Schmidt (footballer)#Disruptive editing by 2a01:cb19:9086:a400:* and User talk:2A01:CB19:9086:A400:B957:9836:3246:A41D, but to no avail. 2A01:CB19:9086:A400:* is clearly editing in bad faith and, therefore, must be blocked from editing that article. SLBedit (talk) 19:57, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Calling you an idiot isn't on, and if they keep that up the /64 can be blocked. However, I don't think there's any evidence of bad faith editing, or deliberate introduction of inaccuracies; rather, they're adding statistics based on some sources that count wins/draw/losses in ways that you assert are incorrect. I know nothing about the normal way of counting these things, but if there is a consensus for doing it in the way that you say it should be done here, it would probably be useful to add a link to the relevant guideline to the talk page discussion. At the moment, to a football-illiterate observer, it looks like an edit war that is starting to turn nasty. Girth Summit _(blether) 20:04, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Archive 71#Penalty win maked as a draw or win?

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Archive 31#Results on penalties

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Archive 119#Season overview, draw / win or loss representation

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Archive 87#Penalty shoot-outs

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football/Archive 114#Win or Draw? SLBedit (talk) 16:49, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Legal Threat by Vince Pankoke

I think this might qualify as a legal threat "Before legal action is initiated by the author and publisher, the paragraph should be deleted or at least allow us to publish our rebuttal." diff: [123] Please advise. Thanks. DonQuixote (talk) 20:05, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I've posted a legal threats warning for the moment. 331dot (talk) 20:12, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Fmovies and COPYLINKS

Over at FMovies, QuantumZazzy and I have been having a bit of an edit war over whether the site should be linked. I know, I know, ANI isn't for content disputes. But I think this one is a little different because the link would seem to be a blatant violation of our policy on contributory copyright infringement, WP:COPYLINKS. QuantumZazzy has vowed via edit summary to edit war about this. So I am here to ask: is this a violation of COPYLINKS? If I am off base and QuantumZazzy is acting within policy, I'll back off. MrOllie (talk) 20:31, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Blacklist the site, solves the problem. Then they simply can't add it back in. Seems like the site should be blacklisted anyway. Canterbury Tail talk 20:37, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

And they've continued their edit warring after the warnings, as a result I've blocked them for 24 hours. I still think it should be blacklisted and then this problem won't happen again. Canterbury Tail talk 20:45, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Given that all but six of their edits are about this site, it merits a COI/UPE discussion. Star Mississippi 23:01, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Blacklisted. Please keep an eye, this typically runs into blacklist/block evasion. Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 15:25, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Personal attacks and legal threats from IP editing Christopher Rufo and overlapping articles

• 122.171.17.251 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)

• Christopher Rufo

For context, Christopher Rufo is a conservative activist who is notable for his promotion of creationism, the LGBT grooming conspiracy theory, and 2020s controversies around critical race theory.

A dynamic IP most recently at 122.171.17.251 has been aggressively editing the Rufo article. That article was protected due to disruptive editing about how to describe Rufo's education. That protection has expired, and this editing has resumed. During protection, the IP posted Talk:Christopher Rufo#Harvard University - education (leftist bash against Rufo) which is what you might expect from the title. Very few of the sources discussed in that section are both reliable and mention Rufo, but the IP is adamant that none of this is original research, and also, that "liberal" and "leftist" are useful ways to discredit any anything which is unflattering to Rufo.

I had previously cautioned them to assume good faith a couple of times on the article's talk page. Following that, one of their edit summaries said: "...Why are you negative, biased, leftist and have a "hard on" for Mr. Rufo?" Perhaps "hard on" means something else in their dialect of English, but I doubt it. I warned them directly on their talk page against personal attacks, using a template. They responded with a legal threat: "I am a lawyer. If you are threatening me, I can either put a lawsuit against you or put a complaint in a police station against you?" Previously they also describe themselves as ""an on-campus regular student at Harvard". I personally don't really find this threat credible, but it is still a legal threat, and it's not like there is any way for me to continue that discussion, so it's disruptive, regardless.

While addressing this content issue, I also cleaned-up some related, unsourced additions to the Harvard Extension School article and related articles, and credit where it's due, this has prompted improvements from the IP, as well.

Grayfell (talk) 00:12, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Bbb23 range blocked 122.171.16.0/22 for 2 weeks. I semi protected Christopher Rufo for one year as WP:AP2. El_C 03:26, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Undisclosed paid editor making spam articles about non-notable companies

User:Galamore has a very strange and suspicious editing history, and I suspect that they are a WP:UPE sock (they fit the description of Wikipedia:Long-term_abuse/Orangemoody although I'm not confident that they are them).

In short, they seem to alternate between two modi operandi: one is to make numerous minor gnome edits introducing errors, including strange comments like "I have added sources and downloaded the template".

The second type of edits this account makes are pasting in fully-written, perfectly formatted articles to mainspace in a single diff. What are these articles about? The most common subject for a new, good-faith editor to spontaneously be interested in: promotional articles for non-notable corporations (perplexity.ai, Holmes Place, . They also add links to said companies in high-traffic articles, with lots of link spam. Here are the articles they've created:

• Perplexity.ai

"Perplexity.ai is an advanced AI-powered search engine, making significant strides in the realm of AI-native search. Valued at $520 million, it has quickly become a notable player in the field since its inception in August 2022."

• Holmes Place

"The motto of Holmes Place, which is internationally attached to all clubs on advertising spaces or glass fronts, is: "Enjoy the Journey". In addition to pricing, the company also wants to distinguish itself from its competitors through its self-imposed corporate philosophy, which is broken down into "Find an activity you like, at a place you like, with people you like". The core element of each club is a large range of courses with yoga, conditioning, Pilates, Zumba and spinning etc."

• GoTo (Israeli company)

"GoTo Group is considered one of the pioneering companies in the world in the field of car and electric motorcycle sharing".

• Jesse Lyu

"The strong response affirms Lyu's vision for intuitive AI transforming consumer tech. With the Rabbit r1, he aims to redefine how users interact with technology."

• JFrog (since deleted as a G11)

"JFrog was established in 2008 by Shlomi Ben Haim (the company's CEO), Yoav Landman (CTO), and Fred Simon (Chief Scientist), with the goal of developing products that enable the automation of software updates, tracking, and distribution, supporting a wide range of leading platforms in the market."

Also note that this same article was deleted multiple times, including once as the confirmed product of an Orangemoody op.

• D-ID (company)

"In 2020, the company pivoted to producing generative AI videos of avatars relying on the same core machine learning algorithms. D-ID’s solution was used extensively by clients such as Softbank, NTT, AXA, Deloitte, PWC and genealogy company MyHeritage"

One of these articles, on their own, would be enough to give me significant alarm for an undisclosed paid editor. They are all spammy promotional articles for non-notable, or marginally notable, corporations. But creating six of them in a row, after having an obviously wildly different person use the account to get autoconfirmed status, is basically unimaginable.

While I am typically an advocate for peace and love and tolerant good faith when a new user seems suspicious, something I really cannot abide is a system where we punish people for following the rules (disclosed paid editors are made to jump through endless hoops) while we simultaneously reward people for breaking the rules (undisclosed paid editors are allowed to bypass all of that and plop their articles straight into mainspace, and then removing them is an endless uphill battle). My recommendation is that this user be blocked as a sockpuppet and their articles deleted as WP:G5. jp×g🗯️ 03:41, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Blacklist the link spam. In my experience, that puts the hurt on COI editors more than blocks. When blocked, they just come back with a new account. —A. B. ^{(talk • contribs • global count)} 04:02, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Okay then. I'm not seeing the connection.

1. When you say "lots of link spam", usually what you link should be instances of WP:LINKSPAM (like the "spammy external links" mentioned in the LTA) rather than four diffs of a user reasonably de-orphaning a new article they've created, as we tell them to do.
2. As to the variable grammar of this seemingly non-fluent Israeli user writing mostly on things related to generative AI, I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that their prose was mostly created with the use of... generative AI. Does that not explain why the grammar would be correct in some edits and not in others? I have seen several immaculately written paid articles, and they did not look like the revisions that you describe here as "perfectly formatted articles".
3. They may very well be a sock of this LTA-er, but I don't see how you've shown that, aside from one common article. Did previously deleted versions of JFrog look similar to what this user added?

SilverLocust 💬 06:05, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I haven't shown that, which is why I said "I'm not confident that they are them". As for why I suspect that this is not their first rodeo: these two edits on January 4th add bare URLs to random blog posts at the end of a paragraph. These edits on January 7 are a fully written article with a lead, an infobox, MoS-compliant section headings, and properly formatted multi-param citations. Like I said, I don't normally go around trying to bust people for "knowing too much", but in a situation where all of somebody's edits after autoconfirmation are to write corpspam, it stretches the suspension of disbelief a bit. I guess we will have to see what the CUs turn up. jp×g🗯️ 06:35, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I saw those two edits where they tried adding two citations for the first paragraph of that uncited article. They were poor attempts at adding in-line references, but that's what they were: links to sources that talk about the meaning of "material flow".

As to your other link (of the article 6 edits later), that was actually my backup "Exhibit B" of emphatically not a "perfectly formatted article" and not "in a single diff". SilverLocust 💬 07:04, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

For reference, those two "random blog posts" are #3 and #5 in my Google results for the search material flow definition. SilverLocust 💬 07:24, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Unless there is private evidence, I am not convinced at all that this is a spammer. In my view, most or all of these topics are notable, but the author doesn't know how to establish notability and made the mistake of using an overly promotional tone. To me, it looks like an editor who is primarily interested in tech companies and AI (which I am too, but as an experienced editor I know the requirements to establish notability without relying on promotional materials).

In general, publicly traded companies like GoTo and Holmes Place are notable. Jesse Lyu and his "Rabbit" company have recently been featured very prominently in the news as inventing a potential AI-based successor to the smartphone.

I doubt very much that somebody is paid to promote RabbitAI [124] on Wikipedia. Marokwitz (talk) 08:42, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

It's true that the evidence is lacking, but I have to say that I found some of User:Galamore's contributions to be somewhat suspect. Others clearly have the same concern and that's why s/he is currently blocked. Deb (talk) 09:27, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Well, we don't block newcomers due to mere suspicion. Blocks are used to prevent damage or disruption to Wikipedia, not to punish users. This could have easily be handled by a warning. Marokwitz (talk) 09:30, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Suspicion is often all we have to go on - we can never be certain. Suspicion arises from evidence, such as editing behaviour, we don't need proof positive in order to block. Blocks are imposed at administrators' discretion, based on what the admin taking action considers to be the balance of the evidence, and they are subject to both appeal and review. In my view, this is a good block - it seems probable to me that this editor is editing in exchange for undisclosed payments, and even if the are not, their editing is so promotional in tone as to be seriously problematic. Girth Summit _(blether) 11:02, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't find much suspicious about an Israeli editor creating articles about companies that seem somewhat significant in Israel and have long-standing articles on the Hebrew Wikipedia (he:GoTo_(מותג), he:הולמס פלייס, he:ג'ייפרוג) or about AI/tech startups with somewhat impressive products. I don't see how it's suspicious that some edits have cleaner English than other ones (a/k/a "obviously [a] wildly different person"), when the blocking admin said before the block that they thought this user seemed to have used AI. I don't see how it's suspicious that an inexperienced editor would confuse "notability" with "including whatever impressive information there is on a topic". Of course I think there was a need to correct the user's understanding of how to show notability while having a neutral tone, but that isn't helped by a sudden indef block that instructs the user to admit to something that is seriously doubtful. SilverLocust 💬 12:24, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Your mileage may vary. Girth Summit _(blether) 12:58, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Irrespective of blocks, prose such as "The Rabbit r1 debuted at CES 2024 to significant interest, with 10,000 pre-orders placed on the first day. By the next day pre-orders exceeded 20,000 units, representing nearly $2 million in revenue. The strong response affirms Lyu's vision for intuitive AI transforming consumer tech. With the Rabbit r1, he aims to redefine how users interact with technology" is completely unsuitable for a neutral encyclopedia and has no place here. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 10:43, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

That goes without saying. My concern is that a newcomer was blocked without warning. Why can't we explain the policies, give them some WP:ROPE and see if their next articles improve? There was no irreversible damage done here ... Marokwitz (talk) 13:48, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Here is the CU's finding at the SPI:

 Unrelated in relation to Bennet43, and  Unlikely for there to be separate sockpuppetry which I also considered possible. Kicking this back to AN/I.

SilverLocust 💬 19:16, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Abuse behaviour User:73.27.57.206

This editor is being a bit abusive at the Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gonzalo Lira (5th nomination) Afd, failing WP:AGF scope_creep^Talk 08:18, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I would have reverted the personal attack but it's been replied to. Anyway, we don't block people for calling somebody a dick once. If we did, a whole bunch of editors, including me, would be indeffed. I think it might be a good idea for you (and anyone else with strong opinions on Gonzalo Lira, which appears to be quite a few) to stay away from the AfD and let consensus play out. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 10:48, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I do note, however that Thegreatmuffinman's first edit was at the AfD, to say "I was in the other discussion." I smell sock puppetry somewhere. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:20, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Blablubbs (or any other checkuser who's around at the moment), I don't suppose you could spare a minute to check some of the "newer" editors on that AfD and see if there are any matches? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:39, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

CU has nothing useful to offer, sorry. If I had to guess, I'd say we're probably looking at off-wiki canvassing. I note w:simple:Wikipedia:Requests for deletion/Requests/2024/Gonzalo Lira, which contains additional... oddities and is probably the "other discussion" being referred to. --Blablubbs (talk) 11:51, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

A brief search (link to twitter mirror) suggests that the topic does have at least some traction on twitter/X, and also in some other places that I'm not going to link here. That doesn't mean that there can't also be socking by individual people who have been canvassed of course, but in my experience it's best in cases like these that closers just weight votes accordingly instead of trying to untangle precise connections. --Blablubbs (talk) 12:04, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Conduct of Chaheel Riens

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

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I would like to post an incident regarding User:Chaheel Riens. The incident started on 8th January, when he deleted, without prior consultations, large parts of a talk page [125], mostly containing my posts. I complained immediately in the discussion here: [126]

A DRN case about the dispute is here: [127]

- Z80Spectrum (talk) 09:43, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I think that, in general, if something's being addressed at DRN, it's not really germane to open a thread at AN/I about it, although it does seem rather unorthodox to remove such large sections of a talk page (wouldn't it be possible to use the {{cot}} or {{hat}} templates instead?) jp×g🗯️ 10:45, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

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

Mediator Comment

On the one hand, DRN is normally a place to discuss article content issues, and the issue here is not an article content issue, because it is an article talk page content issue. On the other hand, I will take the closure of this report as guidance to mediate the talk page removal issue at DRN. I will also note, as I have at the Village Pump, that the talk page guidelines are poorly written with regard to removal of talk page material. They essentially say that material should not often be removed from talk pages, but can occasionally be removed, without giving any further information as to when. I will try to mediate the dispute over the talk page removal. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:48, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks! jp×g🗯️ 19:26, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Sanjay Govil

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

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please can we have banhammers, protection and oversighting at Talk:Sanjay Govil – WP:LTA/GRP is active there. 81.187.192.168 (talk) 12:40, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Page protected and users blocked. Isabelle Belato ^🏳‍🌈 12:50, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

muito obrigado, isabelle. 81.187.192.168 (talk) 13:05, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

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

AdityaSty90

AdityaSty90 (talk · contribs) was blocked recently for repeatedly adding unsourced content to BLPs; they have returned from the block to simply repeat the editing. A longer block is merited? GiantSnowman 19:31, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Promoting Iranian government POV in Wikipedia?

Was told to post this report here, hopefully it won't be ignored.

The Times raises many questions in How Wikipedia is being changed to downgrade Iranian human rights atrocities (paywalled), reprinted in The Australian.[128]

@Smallbones: had asked for information about these news articles, and here is a concise version:

Brief Overview

There is a systematic removal of instances documenting human right crimes by Iranian officials on Wikipedia, accompanied by the addition of misleading information favoring the IRP (Islamic Republic Party) on the platform. From 2015 to 2022, numerous user accounts involved in such edits faced blocks due to sock-puppetry and tendentious behavior. Despite this, a new wave of more sophisticated accounts has surfaced, actively collaborating to eliminate references to human rights violations committed by IRP officials and promote a narrative aligned with the IRP across the entire platform.

User:Ali Ahwazi

User:Ali Ahwazi consistently utilizes sources aligned with the IRP to disseminate government propaganda: ..."considering the continuation of the Zionist regime's aggressions" citing irdiplomacy.ir[129][130] ..."to counter the adventurous and terrorist actions of the United States in the region" citing pishkhan.com[131] ..."The ultimate goal is to achieve complete freedom for Palestinian land from the sea to the river." citing farsnews.ir[132] Many more additional edits mirror this pattern of promoting Iranian government projects using Iranian government press releases: [133][134][135][136][137][138][139][140][141][142] etc,

User:Mhhossein

User:Mhhossein: In the Mahsa Amini protests Wikipedia article, Mhhossein adds: "Pro-government demonstrations occurred across Iran in response to the week long protest over Amini's death. According to live state television broadcast, demonstrators chanted "Death to America" and "Death to Israel."" However, the source cited for this content (this news piece) states: "Pro-government rallies have taken place in several cities across Iran in an attempt to counter a week of mounting unrest triggered by the death of a woman in police custody." "Marchers called for anti-government protesters to be executed, while the army signalled that it was prepared to crush dissent by telling Iranians that it would confront 'the enemies' behind the unrest. Demonstrators condemned the anti-government protesters as 'Israel's soldiers', live state television coverage showed. They also shouted 'Death to America' and 'Death to Israel', common slogans the country's clerical rulers use to try and stir up support for authorities, who claimed the demonstrations of support were spontaneous. “Offenders of the Qur’an must be executed,” the crowds chanted." This editor is an admin at Wikimedia Commons and has leveraged his influence to eliminate images depicting protests against the Islamic Republic Party (IRP): File:Protests against the Ayatollah Khomeini government (20 June 1981).jpg File:Solidarity with Iranian Protests.jpg File:Solidarity with Iranian Protests (52383195713).jpg File:Mahsa_Amini_protest_in_New_York.png File:Mahsa Amini protest in New York.png File:Protesting for Iran (6604931151).jpg File:Mahsa Amini protests in Berlin 06.jpg File:Iranians gather in front of the Islamic Republic of Iran embassy in Berlin to accompany protests in Iran - Jan 2, 2018.jpg File:Protesters Overturn Iranian Police Van.webm File:Graffiti in Tehran refers to Referendum, during 2017–18 Iranian protests - Jan 2, 2018 (2).jpg File:Tehran protests (17).jpg File:Izeh - Traffic police blocks roads - Jan 2, 2018.jpg Etc, Then adds pro-government rally photos and adds content from IRP press releases / removes any content critical of the IRP: [143][144] [145][146][147][148][149][150][151]

User:Ghazaalch and User:Iskandar323

User:Ghazaalch and User:Iskandar323 delete huge amounts of documented human rights crimes by IRP officials: "According to the US State Department, the "death commissions" responsible for the 1988 executions of Iranian political prisoners started on 19 July (1988) and included the current head of the Iranian judiciary and current Minister of Justice."[152] "The executions were carried out by several high-ranking members of Iran's current government. According to the US State Department, the "death commissions" responsible for the 1988 executions of Iranian political prisoners started on 19 July (1988) and included the current head of the Iranian judiciary and current Minister of Justice."[153] "The Islamic Republic answered by "unleashing an unprecedented reign of terror", shooting demonstrators, including children."[154] "In April 1992, Iranian authorities carried out an air raid against MEK bases in Iraq."[155] "Those executed included women and children."[156] "Most of the prisoners executed were serving prison terms on account of peaceful activities (distributing opposition newspapers and leaflets, taking part in demonstrations, or collecting donations for political oppositions) or holding outlawed political views. To eliminate potential political oppositions, the Islamic Republic started "coordinated extrajudicial killings" in Iran. Under International law, the killings were considered a "crime against humanity". The commissions including judicial, prosecution, intelligence and prison officials proceeded executions that were not approved by their own existing legislation, and sentenced prisoners to death despite any proven "internationally recognized criminal offence". The Prisoners were questioned if they were willing to give written repentance for their political activities and beliefs."[157] "In December 2018, Albania expelled two Iranian diplomats due to alleged involvement in the bomb plot against the MEK (where Mayor Giuliani and other US government officials were also gathered) accusing the two of "violating their diplomatic status"."[158] "In 2022, an Iranian official was sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the execution of political prisoners."[159] "The two men pleaded guilty in November 2019 to several charges including conspiracy and "acting as an undeclared agent of the Iranian government". The Justice Department said that one of the men arrived in the US to gather "intelligence information" about the MEK (as well as Israeli and Jewish entities)."[160] "Sa'adati was tried and sentenced to serve ten years in prison. In June 1981 when conflicts escalated between the MEK and Khomeini's government, Sa'adati was retried and executed by the Islamic Republic of Iran."[161] "bombings may have actually been planned by senior IRP leaders, to rid themselves of rivals within the IRP."[162] "After June 1981, many MEK sympathizers and middle-level organizers were detained and executed. Others were sent to rehabilitation camps, while about eight to ten thousand were kept in prison for minor charges such as "possession of copies of clandestine the Mujahid newspaper and similar acts of defiance"."[163]. "The Iranian Ministry of Intelligence (MOIS) cracked down on MEK activity, carrying out what a US Federal Research Division, Library of Congress Report referred to as "psychological warfare"."[164] "In April 1992, Iranian authorities carried out an air raid against MEK bases in Iraq. The Islamic Republic Party claimed that the attack had been in retaliation to the MEK targeting Iranian governmental and civilian targets. The MEK and Iraq denied the allegations, claiming that Iran had "invented this attack on its territory to cover up the bombardment of the Mojahedin bases on Iraqi territory."[165] "According to Ervand Abrahamian, the MEK attacked the regime for "disrupting rallies and meetings, banning newspapers and burning down bookstores, rigging elections and closing down Universities; kidnapping imprisoning, and torturing political activists; reviving SAVAK and using the tribunals to terrorize their opponents, and engineering the American hostage crises to impose on the nation the 'medieval' concept of the velayat-e faqih""[166]

User:MarioGom

MarioGom is an SPI clerk that uses his clerk leverage to remove information which contradicts the narrative promoted by the Islamic Republic Party (IRP):[167][168][169][170][171][172][173][174][175][176][177] (the majority of these edits are accompanied by misleading edit summaries) MarioGom uses his clerk influence to derail reports against pro-IRP users: [178][179][180] MarioGom uses his clerk influence to hound and request blocks for editors opposing these pro-IRP users (including the editors mentioned in the post above this one - Alex-h, Fad Ariff, MA Javadi etc,).

In essence, this is the pattern. While these mentioned editors are not an exhaustive list of those involved in the Wikipedia IRP censorship issue, they currently represent the primary contributors to these activities. 194.50.144.202 (talk) 19:42, 17 January 2024 (UTC)