Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
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Damiens.rf, incivility and Wikihounding

Hello, I find myself here after stumbling with this little jewel and examining the root of the problem with more depth. The conflict, as usual began as a simple matter of perspective between him and the creator of Tony Santiago, Mercy11. Apparently, Mercy closed their discussion despite being involved, something that was very sorely received by damiens.rf. The violation of WP:CIVIL is very straight forward, Mercy tried to discuss with him (as seen in the diff) and he lashed back. However, there seems to be more than meets the eye here. For those unfamiliar with Tony's work, he is known as long-standing sysop Marine 69-71 in this project. He is the "Marine" referenced in the diatribe (notice how he directly links Tony's user page, despite the fact that he was uninvolved in this particular argument). I am not sure from where all of this sudden aggressiveness is coming, but it appears to be unilaterally coming from damien.rf's side, since Tony was quite cordial during their last talk page interaction. When damiens.rf talks about "Marine-fan boys", he seems to be referring to the majority of WP:PUR, WP:MILHIST and several other users throughout Wikipedia. This is a rather thinly veiled attack, nothing compared to the one below it, but one that exposes the fact that his edits to this article may have a more personal motivation to them. To understand that, we need to go to the very genesis of their relationship.

I believe that the first encounter between damiens.rf and Tony was one of his infamous "deletion streaks", where he would frequently overwhelm users/WikiProjects by nominating several dozen images at once. That was actually the first time that I remember seeing his name, since he quickly became the topic among members of WP:PUR due to the fact that nominations were being done too quickly to really be attended or discussed. This notably exhausted Tony, who had uploaded images since the early 2000s, when the protocol to upload fair use images was more lax (not requiring detailed rationales, for example) and tried to talk one-on-one to solve the issue. I actually encountered him as well, since damiens'rf's super-strict definition of "copyright enforcement" could apparently overcome the consensus to keep a single image. Shortly afterwards, he was edit warring with the entirety of WP:PUR, which I noted. It was eventually moved to AN/I where I noted the issue, the speed and volume of nomination. WP:PUR was not alone, notice the other topic discussing exactly the same pattern above that one. Eventually, this lead to the creation of a subpage, where damiens.rf continued to nominate more of Tony's images. From the look of it, both of them were cooperating and reaching agreements without trouble. However, from his subsequent edits it is somewhat obvious that damiens.rf had taken an interest to anything related to the Marine. I was inactive during most of the following years, but a quick browsing tells me that at least one user felt that damiens.rf has some sort of ongoing "beef" with the Marine, desfite the fact that he was actively trying to cooperate. As a matter of fact, after an article was created for Tony, damiens.rf made emphasizing how "non-notable" he considers him a very recurring point. Which is also the reason that damiens.rf felt the need to weight in during the AfD despite his history of conflict with its subject (COI).

He very frequently edited the articles authored by Tony, to the point of even being suspected of anon sockpuppetry at least once. His frequent "concurrence" with Tony can be easily seen here, but there are several examples. (here are a few diffs: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) Apparently, damiens.rf just followed Tony around tagging or frequently modifying his edits. And from the looks of it, damiens.rf also felt a need to question what Tony did within his own userspace in a rather confrontational tone, once even claiming that keeping the "hard copy" of a deleted Wikipedia article constitutes copyright violation (???). Damiens.rf went as far as claiming that Tony forged an OTRS ticket, despite the fact the he personally knew the incumbent Secretary of State of Puerto Rico (i.e. The "man" when it come to copyright enforcement in PR). Even when the excuse were not copyrights, he removed a public domain image because Tony was in it, possibly because he considers that it had something to do with vanity (note that at the moment that this list was moved, Tony was featured in it). The fact that he has continued to "oversee" the Marine for several years, even when Tony has avoided direct contact with damien.rf is concerning. This is WP:HOUNDING and it is completely unwarranted. Furthermore, I am concerned that damiens.rf tried to pressure Tony into giving up his admin tools and even "warned" him despite the fact that he was nowhere near a "neutral" party. This seems like thinly veiled extortion to me. Also of note is that his animosity extended to other members of WP:PUR, there are quite a few examples of him discussing with Cerejota and this one where he completely fails to assume good faith and accuses another member of possessing double standards. An examination of his edits indicates that he also had a subsequent encounter, not with Tony, but rather with his son Antonio.

With matters becoming increasingly personal, I think that we should make sure that both stop encountering each other. The diffs above clearly show that despite the best efforts of Tony, Cerejota and Mercy, damiens.fr is not interested in dialogue when it comes to the Marine. Since Tony almost exclusively edits Puerto Rico-related articles, a topic ban for those seems appropiate to make sure that damiens.rf stops hounding him. That would do it for this particular case. However, I believe that a more profound analysis of damien.rf's edit history taking his block log under consideration should take place as well. - Caribbean~H.Q. 13:47, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support. Support topic ban for Puerto Rico-related articles and images. This has been going on and off for years. Wikihounding and uncivility should not be allowed to fester as the offender will simply keep pushing the limits as it is ahappening here. Before this was posted (on 13:47, 3 January 2014), I had responded to Damiens HERE (on 22:40, 2 January 2014‎) and clearly he does not want to follow policy. Mercy11 (talk) 15:03, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• WP:TLDR. GiantSnowman 13:53, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

I am sorry, but since the case dates back five years, this is as short as I could post it while keeping it concise. Telling people to browse his edit history would take them a while, since he nominates at least 25+ items for deletion at once with regularity. - Caribbean~H.Q. 13:58, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

In a very abbreviated summary, the text above describes how a user that has been blocked for Wikihounding in the past is back on the prowl. - Caribbean~H.Q. 14:19, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose. My "something isn't quite right here" detector is going off. Apart from the first diff presented above (which is between damiens.rf and Mercy11), every other one is more than a year old. What issue is happening now between Tony and damiens.rf that requires a topic ban? Black Kite (talk) 15:58, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• Regarding your "detector", I'm afraid you're behind the times. According to this thread the intuitions of veteran editors that "Something is rotten in Denmark" are of no value. Apparently, only evidence suitable for a court of law is now considered worthy of consideration by the community. Beyond My Ken (talk) 16:11, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• The first diff shows him taking a potshot personal attack at Tony, besides the fact that the conflict is taking place in the talk page of Tony Santiago. The other diffs are there to prove that this has been happening for a while. That when combined with their history, makes it hard to dismiss it. Not only that, but he was tailing Tony just last week, coincidentally, a few hours before posting that. To what purpouse? Why has he been doing it for years? - Caribbean~H.Q. 16:21, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• Agree with Black Kite. Old diffs. The complaint at the beginning of this section, about hatting of a conversation, seems well-warranted. Coretheapple (talk) 21:06, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• The other diffs are there to display damiens'rf's personal "interest" in the subject, not as complaints. I can't say that someone is Wikihouning a user without going back and showing that he has been tailing him for a while. What about the fact that he was tailing Tony just last week? - Caribbean~H.Q. 12:31, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

What was tendentious about those edits? Coretheapple (talk) 17:19, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

The fact that he has been selectively following him around since they had their first conflict, apparently for the single purpose of annoying him (or at least that is what it looks like based on his attitude towards Tony and the constant dismissal of his work). Of course, if that is not damiens.rf's intention, then he can easily delegate the monitorization to someone uninvolved. Right? - Caribbean~H.Q. 02:56, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

I have no idea what you're talking about. Coretheapple (talk) 15:19, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

If damiens.rf is simply overseeing these articles (without personal interest) and encountering Tony "coincidentally" after the Marine edits them, then he can surely let someone else do it. That way no one can misinterpret that he is tailing another user. - Caribbean~H.Q. 01:55, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Maybe, but there's not a peep out of the editor who was "tailed." I don't think it's right in something like this that a group of editors functions as a kind of "attorney" for another editor, speaking on his behalf, when he is perfectly capable of speaking for himself and hasn't. I don't think that's fair to Damiens. If he feels "hounded" then he should say so himself. If he doesn't then this is a waste of time and should be closed. Coretheapple (talk) 03:13, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose any sanctions for Damiens.rf, cleaning up fair-use violations is frequently a thankless task with fightback from the uploader & his friends/wikiproject buddies. It appears that they have not forgiven Damiens.rf for his part in the deletion of the first incarnation of Tony Santiago's hagiography, and are resisting further cleanup/verification work on the recreated version 194.150.177.10 (talk) 16:42, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I know Tony, but I never edited his biography or was involved in either AfD (the first took place before my arrival and the third during a period of inactivity) I only knew damiens.rf from the one time that he flooded the project with IfDs and just learned that he opposed the third AfD after he was already tailing Tony. This has little to do with the biography. - Caribbean~H.Q. 16:51, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
    • With that said, I don't think that anyone in WP:PUR (including Tony himself), would oppose the cleanup of the article by a neutral party. - Caribbean~H.Q. 17:06, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

(←)"The important component of wikihounding is disruption to another user's own enjoyment of editing, or to the project generally, for no overriding reason. If "following another user around" is accompanied by tendentiousness, personal attacks, or other disruptive behavior, it may become a very serious matter and could result in blocks and other editing restrictions."

If we ask Tony, do you think that he will say how "joyful" being tailed makes him feel? - Caribbean~H.Q. 16:56, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

• Perhaps we should ask him. I have notified him of this discussion, since you didn't. Black Kite (talk) 20:37, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I notified damiens.rf out of etiquette since he is the one being discussed. The notification system should have notified Tony when his username was linked. - Caribbean~H.Q. 12:31, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose for now, or at least until we hear from Damiens.rf. I think highly of Tony so I'm likely if anything to be biased in his favor. But I'm concerned we're not hearing the full story here. You present a lot of evidence here, so I picked one of the more serious sounding charges, that Daminens was "claiming that Tony forged an OTRS ticket". But when I went to look at the linked discussion, I saw no accusation of forgery, but instead a reasonable-sounding question regarding the status of the ticket and the appropriateness of the PD label for these images. So I wonder what else in this complaint is not represented accurately. Gamaliel (talk) 21:11, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Point granted. Perhaps it is difficult to asume that the 'question' was done in good faith knowing his stance regarding the contributions of Tony. - Caribbean~H.Q. 12:31, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

• • User:Gamaliel, I don't believe Damiens has any interest in presenting his side of this. It's been 5 days since he was notified of this discussion and he has been actively editing, yet has failed to comment here. Mercy11 (talk) 01:15, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
    • Since he's had ample opportunity to respond, I see no problem proceeding without him. But I have to reiterate my oppose due to my concerns about the misrepresentation of evidence here. Misrepresenting a serious allegation is not an absence of good faith, it's something else entirely. Gamaliel (talk) 02:01, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
      • I agree with Gamaliel. My oppose also stands. Damiens seems to have dug a hole for himself by incivility that he has not retracted. He also seems to be following around another editor, though I don't see any actual tendentiousness. I sometimes watch what other editors do too, not to annoy them but because I'm interested to see what they're doing. But I am uneasy. The supposed victim of wikistalking has not uttered a word, which I think cancels out somewhat Damiens' nonappearance. The overriding issue here seems to be that this article is kind of a COI-squared situation. A Wikipedia article about a Wikipedia editor, written by his friends and, according to one edit summary on the talk page, with involvement by a relative. The problem is that this has festered in one article with no utilization of dispute resolution except for this seemingly overblown complaint. Coretheapple (talk) 21:35, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
• Is this about the fair-use violations or Damiens.rf's wikihounding of Tony? Epicgenius (talk) 21:14, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Its about the fact that he continues to tail him even after the fair use issues were taken care of. - Caribbean~H.Q. 12:31, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Plus, as the title states, it is also about Damiens's lack of civility via the profanity he spitted out and found in the "little jewel" link the submitter provided above. I don't know what low-life corner of the world some of the editors participating in this thread come from that they have grown so used to uncivil behavior, but where I come from to tell someone else to "go fuck yourself with a chainsaw" is not considered civil - particularly if Mercy11 had not been abusive to Damiens first. Mercy11 (talk) 15:56, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I went to the "little jewel" cited at the very top of this section, and what I found was a sliver of this conversation in which Damiens.rf was upset about a user closing a discussion he was a part of. Carribean H.Q. says "Mercy tried to discuss with him (as seen in the diff) and he lashed back." But that is not an especially full or complete recounting of the conversation. If you look at the conversation in full, you can see that Damiens was initially quite civil and received a less than satisfactory response. While there was subsequent incivility, the concern itself seems well warranted and I have an uneasy feeling about this. Coretheapple (talk) 21:27, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

So your Opposition is based on the fact that "Damiens was initially quite civil". However, being initially civil is no grounds to be uncivil later when, and if, someone continues to disagree with an outcome. Wikipedia has a well-defined appeal escalation process to deal with dissatisfaction - and it does not involve incivility by any of the parties as you are suggesting. Mercy11 (talk) 16:51, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

No, that's not the reason. Coretheapple (talk) 19:20, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose Backtracking we find this from Mercy11. That an insult is couched in snark, attacking another contributor's intelligence and/or education ("dark ages") and motivation, instead of sexually referenced profanity doesn't make it less of an insult, and Mercy11 should not have closed a discussion she was a participant in. (I'd revert the close right now if it wasn't 5 days stale.) I urge both Mercy11 & Damiens.rf to refrain from commenting about the other. NE Ent 01:59, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Receiving a snarky, "less than satisfactory" response is now enough to randomly tell someone to "go fuck [himself] with a chainsaw"? - Caribbean~H.Q. 12:31, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
    • No, and I admit that I haven't gone through all your diffs. However, if anyone had hatted a discussion in, say Talk:BP or any actively edited article there would be an unholy row. Are you sure there aren't WP:OWN issues here as well as COI concerns? Coretheapple (talk) 18:52, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
      • There are likely COI concerns regarding the fact that users that know the subject are editing the article. At the very least, I don't edit it based on that. But that goes for both sides, I doubt that damiens.rf would even be interested in this particular biography if Tony was not a Wikipedia user (i.e. if they never encountered each other). - Caribbean~H.Q. 02:56, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
        • • Would there be an article on this person if he was not a Wikipedia editor? Coretheapple (talk) 15:19, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
            • • Is that really relevant? The article had several incarnations, yet damiens.rf only became interested in the subject after locking horns with its subject. - Caribbean~H.Q. 01:55, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
                • It's the elephant in the room, right up there with the supposed victim not saying that he is in fact a victim. I think it's time to wrap this up and call it a day. Coretheapple (talk) 03:13, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
        • I edit A LOT of biographies. It's my favorite subject, indeed. --damiens.rf 14:30, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

• WP:OTHERSTUFF. Mercy11 is not under scrutiny here - Damiens is. If you think Mercy11 has violated a behavioral rule you can go ahead and start a new thread. Equally important, using Mercy11's comments as a reason for a Support/Oppose determination is, IMO, poor use of judgement. Mercy11 (talk) 16:05, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

• Note that I have taken WP:BLP enforcement action on the article Tony Santiago, removing the poorly-sourced BLP statement against whose sourcing Damiens.rf was rightly objecting. The discussion that led to Damiens' outburst clearly shows that some people, including Mercy11, were evidently not understanding what "reliable sources" and "self-published sources" mean. Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:36, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Good. This thread is about the user's conduct, not his enforcement of policy or perpetuating a particular revision of the article. - Caribbean~H.Q.

• Good for you, Future Perfect, to have taken enforcement action on something involving an ongoing discussion and then justifying it on WP:BLP. When the dust settled your rationale makes sense based on the lesser of two conflicting policies. However, your judgment there is overshadowed by your use in this same thread about Damiens' behavior by your use of phrases like "Damiens.rf was rightly objecting". In particular, your use of phrases such "The discussion that led to Damiens' outburst" can be interpreted as justifying his behavior. May I suggest, next time stay neutral and don't mix the two as it could be read as support for Damiens uncivility. Mercy11 (talk) 16:27, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

• Strong support. It doesn't matter if he is "right", his way of going about things is wrong. Contribution history shows Damiens.rf targets Puerto Rico articles in order to troll Tony. Furthermore, Damiens.rf is not here to build an encyclopedia. He is only here to rules-lawyer over the existence of articles and images and to upset content editors until they leave the site in frustration. Not only do I support the proposed topic ban, I also recommend that the community take a longer look at editors like Damiens.rf who seem to focus only on deleting the work of other editors, not in contributing work of their own to this project. Some might argue that contributing content and deleting are two equally valid aspects of the project, but I do not agree with that assessment. It takes far more energy and work to research, create, and contribute than to tear down and destroy. Viriditas (talk) 08:42, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

Comment The removal/deletion of copyright/fair-use violating and/or non-notable content is an essential component of improving the wiki. 194.150.177.9 (talk) 16:19, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

Oh yeah? At any cost - including uncivility? Look, I don't know if you are new in these circles or what, but we have been down this -entire- road before, and to be part of this community we have to abide by All the 5 Pillars - not just 4. We don't justify uncivil behavior on the basis of protecting anything - we have other volunteers who protect Fair Use, BLP, et. al., and do so while abiding by All the 5 Pillars. Mercy11 (talk) 16:38, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

How 'new' I am as an editor is irrelevant. As FPaS notes above, your understanding of wikipolicies is incorrect..or perhaps you are willing to disregard policies when they get in the way of writing hagiographies for your wikibuddy. In any case, the proposal to sanction Damiens.rf is clearly failing (only attracting support from previous opponents & Santiago's wikibuddies).194.150.177.9 (talk) 15:37, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not irrelevant if you are making statements that are (no pun intended) irrelevant to the case. At best, two wrongs don't make a right. No one if saying your copyvio/FU statement above was false; it was more a "preaching to the choir". As for the "As FPaS notes above", please note that's included in WP:PERNOM. As for the "the proposal to sanction Damiens.rf is clearly failing", please note that's included in WP:MAJORITY. Mercy11 (talk) 01:15, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, cleaning images is important (the manner in which it was done is debatable, but that is not the actual topic here). The problem is that damiens.rf is tailing Tony everywhere. Nowadays he is following his edits in biographies that are not remotely controversial. Why the persistent interest if not to troll him? - Caribbean~H.Q. 03:00, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Comment When an editor has a history of poor editing practices, it is absolutely fine to examine his edits on other articles. To do so cannot be remotely called harassment or trolling. BTW Mercy11, you are demonstrating a shaky understanding of policies/guideline by invoking wp:pernom as this is not a deletion discussion and FPaS (who's he?) is not the nominator. 94.194.24.46 (talk) 02:35, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment: New anonynympus IP account that --from his summary comments-- seems to know his way around WP extremely well. Dubious? Maybe even a disengenuous sockpuppet perhaps? Mercy11 (talk) 16:30, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support I support the topic ban, I have seen it before with him. He did not even take a break from requesting deletion of Puerto Rico related article while this discussion is going on, in my humble opinion that should have been the prudent thing for him to do. El Johnson (talk) 18:02, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment. It may be of interest to contributors here to know that, in what appears to be retaliation for Caribbean HQ reporting him here, yesterday Damiens started Targeting Puerto Rico-related articles, particularly Biographies about Puerto Ricans. Note that he had never been to the bulk of the articles in question before. Mercy11 (talk) 19:52, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
• oppose. I do see some snark & incivility from damien.rf but it is in the face of obstruction from editors keen to be cheerleaders for a favoured colleague. BTW I find that invoking civility violations as a basis to ban an editor doing otherwise good work leaves a bad taste in my mouth, especially when the most vocal proponents are clearly aligned against him for personal reasons. 94.194.24.46 (talk) 02:35, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment: A New anonynympus IP account that --from his summary comments-- seems to know his way around WP extremely well. Dubious? Maybe even a disengenuous sockpuppet perhaps? Mercy11 (talk) 16:30, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• "some people ask me to tag insted of removing. some people ask me to find-the-sources-myself instea of tagging. I say Fuck you all." Unless you are non-people, that was meant for you too. Then check out the community's definition of Fuck and argue if it ain't a profanity. ...Or perhaps you disagree with the WP:Civility policy in that, "Even a single act of severe incivility can result in blocks; for example, a single episode of extreme verbal abuse or profanity directed at another contributor," Mercy11 (talk) 14:37, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Perceived WP:OWN issue

I would appreciate third part opinion here. I'm having a hard time in trying to cooperate. Again. It may be my fault. I'm open to directions. --damiens.rf 14:50, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• Interestingly, in Damiens' 5-year history with Wikipedia he has created ONE (1) article, just ONE, and only ONE [SEE HERE] (Assuming I am using the Wiki tool correctly). His love and joy appears to be his goal of interfering with other editors' enjoyment of the encyclopedia by disrupting their work, and do so under the disguise of improving things (such as tagging articles left and right). While I admire some of his work, there is a serious problem with someone who behaves as disruptively as he does. Mercy11 (talk) 16:52, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• As was explained to you by several other editors in the other and more recent section that you created toward the bottom of this page[1], "wikignomes" like Damiens do not create articles, but contribute to the project in numerous other ways that are essential to the project. If you think that such people are worthless, that says more about you than it does about Damiens. It is unfortunate that Damiens was incivil to you, and I agree that he should apologize, but the "wikihounding" charge is belied by the silence of the supposed victim, and does not seem to be supportable anyway. The most serious problem that I see here is not that anyone is "tailing" anybody, but that there is an article that is a veritable wasp's nest of COI, which quite frankly appears owned, lock, stock and barrel, by friends of the subject of the article. At a time when Wikipedia is under a microscope for paid editing, sometimes involving Foundation employees, it's really questionable that such an article exists. Coretheapple (talk) 23:21, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• The "As was explained to you by several other editors" leaves much to be desired. The several other editors = exactly 2. So please let's not exaggerate. And the the alleged "explanation" that you happened to read, did not yet have my response. (which is, in part, a weakness of Wikipedia forums). It is not generally good judgment to make up your mind until you have had a chance to see both sides. No offense; I am using "you" in a generic, not personal, form.

No one is saying Damines work is worthless, and in fact, as for me, I can give you proof I have applauded his work more than once before. It is not just "unfortunate" that Damines was uncivil, it was a violation of policy that doesn't seem to get thru to some editors here, and that you now appear to be perpetuating. Nothing personal. Mercy11 (talk) 00:23, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

It's now up to several. No offense, nothing personal, but I think it's time to move on. Coretheapple (talk) 13:57, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

In reply to Mercy11's original point, I want to point out that many editors in the guild of copy editors, of which I am a member of, may take umbrage at your statement. Many editors in that group create no articles but dedicate their time to improving existing articles and as a result of their efforts many articles are promoted to the next class of articles. As an example, several articles I have copy edited have seen pass GAN and another I finished working on last year encouraged the requester to seek FA status for it, which it passed. I suggest you think before you speak. Blackmane (talk) 10:24, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I, too, reject that editors who primarily remove text are somehow unworthy Wikipedians. That's like saying Michelangelo wasn't very much of an artist because all he did was remove some rock from David. The internet has an estimated 5,000,000,000,000,000,000 bytes of data [2]; readers value Wikipedia because they have come to expect concise, balanced coverage of a topic. In the human body there's a name for unregulated growth: cancer. Please see fancruft and be concise. NE Ent 11:21, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

What a shock to find the usual hypocritical process wonkery here. If someone provides diffs going back awhile they get slammed for providing old diffs. If all they present are current diffs then they get a bunch of people saying "Well, this is just so current let's wait awhile and see what happens and then call these diffs old". Diffs are provided to show history and on-going patterns of behaviour, they're extremely relevant to actually solving issues, assuming one wants to do that.--211.215.156.184 (talk) 09:21, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not that the diffs were old, but that they were a trumped up case against an editor who, while in one instance incivil, was making perfectly proper edits. Coretheapple (talk) 14:32, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Trumped up implies that it's false. Were the older diffs provided somehow false? Did another user write them? The point of the old diffs was to show that this was not "one instance" which is of course how some would try and pass it off, but an issue that's been going on with an editor for years. It's showing that the behaviour existed in the past, it exists now, and so long as there are people sitting around willing to excuse it, it will exist in the future as well.--211.215.156.184 (talk) 08:52, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Requesting removal of a stigmatizing ARBCOM case log entry

Yesterday, Roccodrift (talk · contribs) placed a discretionary sanction notification on my user talk page after I made this edit restoring content supported by an RfC consensus and at least a majority of involved editors. Roccodrift then added my name to the Log of blocks, bans, and restrictions under the subheading notifications at WP:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Tea Party movement. I objected, asked for an explanation and then removed my name from the ARBCOM log. Roccodrift failed to explain why he had singled me out for this warning, or what I allegedly did to run afoul of the discretionary sanctions. I also asked on Roccodrift's talk page. I can only conclude that the intent was to shame me by associating me with the ARBCOM case.

According to WP:AC/DS: "Warnings should be clear and unambiguous, link to the decision authorising the sanctions, identify misconduct and advise how the editor may mend their ways;" It further states, under logging, that "All sanctions imposed under the provisions of a particular arbitration case are to be logged in the appropriate section of the case page." There is no provision for logging warnings or notifications, and certainly not spurious notifications from a user that has supposedly only edited on Wikipedia for 72 days.

This morning, admin Thryduulf (talk · contribs) restored the notification log entry listing. When I asked why I was singled out and what misconduct I had committed his response was that he didn't know why I was notified, but now that I had been, "It is correct that this awareness is formally recorded in the appropriate place". Neither policy nor WP:AC/DS documents any such requirement. In fact, the case page states: "Once the case is closed, editors may add to the #Log of blocks, bans, and restrictions as needed, but the other content of this page should not be edited."

I have a clean block log and, as far as I know, I have never even been the subject of a noticeboard discussion, and certainly never an ARBCOM case. Out of almost 38,000 edits I have been warned for edit warring twice, and one of those warnings came from indef blocked user Belchfire. I think my editing at Political activities of the Koch brothers has been constructive, and I think my talk page participation have been mostly collegial and consistent with WP:TPG.

This ARBCOM sanction notification, and especially the conspicuous logging of it, besmirches my reputation. I respectfully request that it be removed from Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Tea Party movement.- MrX 15:02, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

MrX, being notified is not a big deal and does nothing to besmirch a reputation. All a notification says is that you've been made aware that an article you've been editing is subject to special sanctions as a result of a particular ArbCom case. It does not indicate that you've done anything wrong at all. This is pretty normal, see for example the notification list for ARBPIA here: Wikipedia:ARBPIA#Log_of_notifications. The only consequence of a logged notification is that if you behave badly in editing in the area you've been notified about, you can't claim you didn't know about the sanctions. This is truly "no biggie". Zad68 15:10, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you for your perspective, but I believe that the notification was fallacious and that it does indeed imply that I have misbehaved.- MrX 15:20, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

MrX I'm sorry you feel that way about the notification. Actually you're not the first editor I've seen feel the notification implies more than it does, but all it means is that you've edited an article subject to special sanctions. It's just an informational notification. I thought the message you received about it had the right tone, "be advised that discretionary sanctions have been placed" in effect at the article you edited. OK, you're notified. Feel free to remove the section from your User Talk and go about editing. Zad68 15:40, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Several things you have stated above about the arbitration process are either incorrect or misconceptions. For example, there clearly is a provision for logging notifications, or there wouldn't be a "Notifications" section on the case page for people to log them. Furthermore, you say that notifications shouldn't be edited because only the "Log of blocks, bans, and restrictions" section is to be changed; the latter part of that is correct, and since you'll notice that the Notifications subsection is actually in that section, the editing of it is explicitly allowed. Anyway, to address your actual request, the warning does not besmirch your reputation at all. If you're certain you've done nothing wrong, then you're honestly better off just ignoring the situation and carrying on. Nobody else will care about the warning. For example, there is a user on Meta-Wiki that follows me around making all sorts of grandiose claims about abuse from the checkuser team, and in particular myself. He recently even tried to derail a discussion I was having by saying that checkusers like to out people to shame them. However, since I know I did my due diligence and that I did nothing wrong, I just ignore it. It's not worth the effort. I suggest you try to do the same. --(ʞɿɐʇ) ɐuɐʞsǝp 15:13, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

I fail to understand how the existence of a section heading supersedes documented guidelines and processes. More importantly, this has a chilling effect on my ability to participate in editing controversial articles, and for no good reason. I see no legitimate reason why this notification logging should stand.- MrX 15:20, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

My point was that the rules you're saying that explicitly disallow it actually explicitly allow it, and that you've misread the rules; as a subsection of the Log section, the Notifications subsection is explicitly covered in the wording that says it's allowed to edit it. Anyway, it seems that you wish to pursue this more despite my insistence that it's futile since nobody will really care about it, so I have nothing further to say here, except to wish you luck. --(ʞɿɐʇ) ɐuɐʞsǝp 16:12, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I concede that that section can be modified, but there is nothing requiring that notifications be logged.- MrX 16:23, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

I can do little more than repeat what I said on my talk page, "If you have not and do not engage in any improper conduct in the topic area then the fact that you have been warned is completely irrelevant." It even has zero relevance if you act improperly in other topic areas. You might be interested in the Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions/2013 review (which is still open for comment on the talk page), which will make this explicit, "Any editor may alert any other editor that discretionary sanctions have been authorised for the area of conflict. These alerts are advisory in nature and cannot be revoked or appealed. The alert links to the Committee's authorisation and is issued by placing the standard template message – currently {{ArbCom-Alert}} – on the talk page of the editor being notified. Alerts must be logged." Thryduulf (talk) 15:38, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, the notification by Roccodrift appears to be a quasi-retaliatory thing and I believe it needs to be removed from the logs. However, MrX did question why Roccodrift who is not an admin was warning (reminding) him, but the same could be said of MrX who has issued spurious warnings himself to others and I would remind him not to do that again himself.--MONGO 15:51, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

I erred in believing that only an admin could issue DS notifications. If there is some spurious warning that I have issued inappropriately, then I'm happy to discuss that elsewhere, and if necessary, retract any such warning.- MrX 16:02, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

@Thryduulf: Your argument is based on a proposed draft? As I said on your talk page, this 'is relevant to me, so I would appreciate it if you would not dismiss it and perhaps actually address the substance of my complaint. I believe the notification was retaliatory and meant to have a chilling effect on my editing. I'm also still waiting for someone to comply with "Warnings should be clear and unambiguous, link to the decision authorising the sanctions, identify misconduct and advise how the editor may mend their ways;"- MrX 16:02, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

I just removed the log entry "as a malformed log item of a malformed notification". For what it's worth, I'll be recommending to ArbCom that the requirement for logging goes completely in the next version of the DS procedures. If, in the meantime, that triggers a de facto relaxation of logged notifications, then so be it.  Roger Davies ^talk 16:11, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Roger Davies I'll defer to your experience in this area, but so that I don't make the mistake again in the future: What is the actual rule here? Who can notify, and when, and how? Thanks... Zad68 16:19, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Anybody can notify (or "alert" as it's likely to be called) anyone under the new arrangement and it explicitly carries no association of stigma. Completing the DS review ran into the lame duck period of the 2013 committee but is high on the agenda for the 2014 ArbCom. It'll take a while for the new arbitrators to settle in to the mountain of stuff and get round to reviewing the DS procedures but it should be completed with a month or so.  Roger Davies ^talk 16:30, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Meh....anybody to me sounds like an invitation for trolls...who came up with this idea anyway?--MONGO 16:49, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

If it's simply a vanilla notification that DS applies to a topic, who cares if trolls want to waste their time?  Roger Davies ^talk 17:04, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Golly gee...I dunno...maybe editors that don't want to be trolled...as may have happened in the case right here. Not everybody has your patience or should be expected to have it, especially when dealing with jackasses. Lets not make it easier for jackasses to abuse process.--MONGO 17:22, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

DS arbitrary break

There appears to be widespread misunderstanding on this matter. I asked AGK specifically about this: "Is the discretionary sanctions warning for misconduct, as it says?" AGK: "Yes". I also asked if the 2013 draft is applicable now, and the answer was no. Currently there are no such things as mere informational notifications. All DS warnings are warnings for misconduct. AGK says that you may appeal the warning once the new draft is in effect. vzaak 17:06, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

(ec):This is not *just* a notification. It is the *last* notification before a block or ban. If you have one of those, anyone can complain about you to Arbitration Enforcement and they can block or ban you in a heartbeat, for a year, with no talk page discussion, and with no warning. I'm relatively new too, and I got one of these in February. Nobody can tell me anything that I did wrong, and nobody can tell me how to get it removed. Regards, —Neotarf (talk) 17:47, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it is a notification. It's a notification that any of that can happen. It tells you the environment you are engaging in. It's like, if you go to beach with jellyfish, there will be a sign that says "WARNING: THERE ARE JELLYFISH HERE" and you know to watch out for the jellyfish. That's all it is. If you get stung, you had fair warning that there were jellyfish in the water.--v/r - TP 21:37, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

In the future, yes, but according to AGK the 2013 draft isn't in effect yet. See my comment directly above Neotarf's. vzaak 23:38, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

It has always been that way. Consensus and common procedure determines policy, not the other way around. We take good practices and we codify them. This is one of those cases.--v/r - TP 23:54, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

If the notification is as perfunctory as you imply, why not task a bot to alert every new editor that has made a first edit in such an area? Is not the jellyfish sign meant for all beach-goers in that area? The alert MrX speaks of is for not simply editing within an area, but having done so in a manner requiring modification, hence the requirement to "identify misconduct and advise how the editor may mend their ways". It is disingenuous to suggest this element does not exist, and disquieting that so many, of esteem, would imply otherwise.—John Cline (talk) 00:19, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

No, if the right template was used ({{Uw-probation}}), the template itself says something to the effect of "you did nothing wrong". It's a notification so a user who is otherwise a good editor who gets caught up in an edit war can't say "Well, I didn't know there were general sanctions in this topic area." It's a heads-up and I think it's actually a courtesy to give someone a heads up. This is all just a bit of bad faith preplanned wikilawyering so when the user gets slammed later they can say they didn't get a notification first. Notifications are not warnings, never have been, never will be, are not treated like warnings, arn't given out like warnings, arn't a punishment, arn't negative, and arn't any sort of black mark. When I patrol topic areas with discretionary sanctions, I notify everyone who has more than a few minor edits of the sanctions.--v/r - TP 00:48, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

TP, article probation isn't the same thing as discretionary sanctions. In the current system, there is no such notification-only mechanism for discretionary sanctions, there is only a warning for misconduct. That is what the DS page says, that is what AGK has confirmed, and that is how the warning is used in practice by e.g. Sandstein and EdJohnston. Take a look at the pseudoscience log, which had only 3 to 15 per warnings issued per year until 2012. Obviously more users than that had edited pseudoscience articles during that time. It is only a recent phenomenon that admins have begun to use the DS warning template as a non-warning notification, something which has caused tremendous confusion. I notice Neotarf announced retirement after receiving the warning. My reaction was nearly the same -- seeing my name listed alongside the various pseudoscience pushers was revolting, and I was ready to retire right then. vzaak 08:37, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

(ec)Oh, TParis, there certainly are jellyfish in the water, but where? Discretionary sanctions can be used anywhere--talk pages, RFA's--and not just in some topic area. And on the flimsiest excuse. If someone has a content dispute with you, as appears to be the case above, all they have to do is log one of these against you, then make a complaint in a venue that has a reputation for not checking diffs, and poof! their opponent is blocked. With no talk page discussion, no warnings. And it goes without saying that DS will never be applied to admins. A number of long-time valued contributors have left over this. —Neotarf (talk) 01:00, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

No, discretionary sanctions can't be used anywhere. They require community consensus or Arbcom to determine that a topic area is incapable of being productive without a stricter enforcement of policy. So if a user is used to editing in Power Puff Girls and they happily get their 3 reverts and then suddenly they revert twice to Paul Ryan and get blocked, they arn't taken off guard.--v/r - TP 01:18, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it has been used at RFA, against an editor who has been given one of these notices, since saying anything negative about a candidate can be construed as "casting aspersions". It has been used to block someone who posted on a user talk page. It has been used to ban someone for filing at AE. It is a speed-banning notice, and replaces the policy that requires warnings. I received one of these notices without anyone ever bothering to find out if I had even edited the page in question. —Neotarf (talk) 08:01, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

@TParis: "This is all just a bit of bad faith preplanned wikilawyering so when the user gets slammed later they can say they didn't get a notification first." - I'm not sure if that's directed at me or not. Would you care to elaborate?- MrX 01:02, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not, this didn't start with you.--v/r - TP 01:18, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Neotarf is correct. TParis is correct, John Cline is correct, and so on. Wikipedia is not black and white but shades of gray. Arbcom is not a single collective, but an evolving, shifting collection of editors -- editors join and leave arbcom, and their perspective can't help but change over time. Discretionary warnings were, at first, primarily that -- warnings to be placed in reaction to perceived misdeeds. In time it became apparent that this caused problems: the concern that some warnings were not appropriate and the illogical of "unnotifying" an editor. This is being addressed -- AC 2013 made large strides in improving the process and I'm hopeful AC 2014 will bring it to closure. Remember, all that really matters is mainspace -- the Wikipedia:: space is definitely not just. Maybe Neotarf got a raw deal, maybe they didn't. I honestly don't care about them because I don't care terribly much about any single editor; the 121,919 {{NUMBEROFACTIVEUSERS}} is what's important. In general Wikipedia:: has the attention span of a gnat and is long on forgiveness; any editor can choose to put the stick down, figure out the rules and edit as long as they like. NE Ent 02:47, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

• I'm sorry, but why is ANYONE concerned that they were basically shown a sign that says "by the way, you've stumbled into a minefield" and then added the name to a list of people who have been notified? It's a GOOD thing to be warned, and by adding you to the list we can say "hey, don't say we didn't tell you about the minefield". Someone is very poorly looking at this from the exact wrong angle. Nothing to get knickers in a knot - you should actually be saying "thanks for the heads up". What a load of heat > light ES&L 12:36, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

A nicely worded notification at the top of the talk page and at the top of the edit window would take care of that. There's no need to whack people with the "stay away from jellyfish sign" unless they're playing with jellyfish. There's no justification for publishing a random beachgoer's picture in the paper next to mug shots from the county jail.- MrX 12:55, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Every single fricking article would need one then, for all intents and purposes. Think how that would look to the average reader of Wikipedia. You're really looking at this as punitive, when it clearly is not ... so much for WP:AGF it seems ES&L 12:59, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Problem is people don't AGF and whack people with bans who have "been warned" despite the prior warning was for absolutely fine behavior. Let the user know there are sanctions. Warn (and log) when they are on or over the line. 129.9.75.252 (talk) 15:45, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

NE Ent. You are close, but missed a step. DS warning started as simple notifications without implication of wrongdoing. At some point early on, someone altered the standard template to include the words "if you continue to misconduct yourself". It was at that point the notification added an implication of wrongdoing. Since nobody noticed for some time, this was believed to be the way it always was. The perception of the DS warning being for misbehavior stems from that action and was a good faith mistake. 204.101.237.139 (talk) 16:27, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

If giving and logging of the DS warning is as perfunctory as has been suggested, why not task a bot to alert every new editor that has made a first edit in such an area? Conversely, if we are opposed to bot-notificating/logging, does this not refute the notion that the warning/logging is purely perfunctory? NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 06:49, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

@User 204: Just the opposite. The template has long been used for official accusations of misconduct, and carried a notice that it was meant to be a hostile template: "The template is intentionally worded to apply only after an editor begins to misbehave; preemptive warnings are considered hostile." It was only recently changed [3]. This is what it looked like a year ago. It is a last-notice-before-sanctions speed-banning notice. The only reason anybody would have for using this template is because they want someone blocked. —Neotarf (talk) 07:43, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Well its not like I don't already know what my foot tastes like. Can't argue with diffs, I suppose. I do remember lurking back when DS were just a gleam in arbcoms eye and know the warnings were intended as a fair way to inform people of the rules before sanction. I also remember the temple not really jiving to that intent... But I thought for a brief shining moment it did. Probably better to crawl back in my hole now. 204.101.237.139 (talk) 15:45, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Oh, no, IP 204, don't crawl away. The only reason I had those diffs at my fingertips was that I spent quite a few hours pouring over the changes for that particular template, in preparation for a special arbitration report on the topic, that for a variety of reasons got deep sixed. And I only went back 2 years. There are two different things in play here, the ideal of how people think the arbitration enforcement works, and the actual way it works with real users. Not surprising, really; this is how organizations work. What happened to make it change, I think was the elections, and the need to be able to deal rapidly with politician's articles that were being rapidly cycled. Admins could not take the time to issue warnings required by the policy, so this was a stop-gap measure. So now there are 27 topic areas under discretionary sanctions and 713 pages under article probation. And nobody can even explain why, or whether they are working. Such is Mission Creep. <sigh> —Neotarf (talk) 13:44, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Template:Uninvolvededitor Um...where is this going? Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 06:31, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

A good question: it's going nowhere, and I fear my wikifriend Neotarf is spinning around in circles. Neotarf, you appear to see ill in every nook and cranny, probably because you got emotionally burned from the system yourself. I'm sorry about that, but now is the time to see the proposed new system for what it is, without the conspiracy theory overlaid. Tony (talk) 09:39, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Discipline page: habitual edit warring and trolling by member

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

---

14.198.220.253 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)

Please forgive the lack of procedure on this. It is a bit confusing to me. Also, this issue is not so much about the edits themselves. They are not horrible or vandalism. The editors opinions were not shared though and were thus regected. Not really a big deal. The behavior of the editor when his/her edits are unwelcome, however, shows habitual edit warring and disruptive edits over the last few months. <http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Discipline&action=history> 138.163.106.71 (talk) 22:24, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Whether or not the IP's edits are disruptive is debatable, despite the warnings (although calling this vandalism is rather ridiculous), but all in all, this seems like a content dispute, and thus should be handled at WP:DRN (worst-case scenario, s/he should possibly be topic-banned from the Discipline article). OAN, I find it interesting that you warned him/her about a possible block, yet in this thread you didn't mention anything about a block. (BTW, the dispute seems to be completely between different IPs; have any of you considered creating an account?) Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 01:04, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

 Comment: Striking my earlier comment per my comment below. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 09:13, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you Erpert for confirming that "whether or not the IP's edits are disruptive is debatable".

Therefore, it reveals the fact that 138.163.106.71 does not engage in discussion nor a single reason (not even a single line..) to decide that s/he should disrupt(rv, s/he claims) the edit, the claim that the multiple rvs is not in good faith(hence vandalism) is appropriate.

138.163.106.71 in my talk page you claim that,

It is clear that the reasons for this have been explained to you by multiple people multiple times.

It sounds like you are doing justice, but I would love to see if you are able to quote even one explanation out of the 2 (multiple, you claim) editors, you and 24.16.101.56. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 09:03, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

This is just inanity. Did anyone try to post on the article's talk page to work this out? Epicgenius (talk) 13:16, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Inanity, I agree.

They have questioned me on my talk, but not even a single line does WP:FOC. They ask me why I feel authorized, ask me to justify my "authority", ask me how old I am. I ask them that my edit is legitimate and I don't know why they revert the edit (except for vandalism, of course), so I ask them to present argument(s) against the content of the edit. They may do so on the talk page on Discipline. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 04:38, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Discussing this on the article's talk page would make the most sense, actually; I didn't realize that no one tried that yet. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 09:13, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

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

Duck Dynasty

Duck Dynasty (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) I am concerned that Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Belchfire, user Belchfire is again using another account to edit. I don't know the right steps to take but the Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Belchfire investigation has sat for a few weeks with no action. It's fairly obvious that both LyricalCat, and Roccodrift, are acting in concert. I'm not sure what can be done, but it is odd the LyricalCat is now doing the edit that Perusteltu has been lobbying for. I'll notify these users now. Sportfan5000 (talk) 08:22, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

You tried appending LyricalCat to the Belchfire SPI which had already been checkusered. Make a new one -- but posting here and at SPI etc. looks like forumshopping, alas. Accusations of socks belong at SPI and not here. Cheers. Collect (talk) 14:02, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't agree that LyricalCat is Belchfire. You should pursue the disagreement at Duck Dynasty based on policy arguments. Binksternet (talk) 14:01, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes - while it has appeared to many that Roccodrift is an obvious Belchfire sock, there's not enough to go on with LyricalCat, however suspicious they look. Black Kite (talk) 22:23, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Sportfan5000, can you explain more specifically what you think the suspicious behavior is? I didn't start following the page until my first edit on it on January 7, so I'm not familiar with the history of Roccodrift's opinions on the article. I'm also wondering why you have twice reverted my edits, which I think are clearly in good faith, and are almost entirely grammatical improvements (for example here). Is it just because you incorrectly suspect me to be Roccodrift? LyricalCat (talk) 09:43, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

If you want an administrator to attend to SPI, post on WP:AN or the SPI talk page. CU at the SPI have said they are unable to compare accounts because they no longer have information about the older accounts. In those cases, behavioral evidence may be used. However, that is often hard to prove. Suggest you close this thread, as wrong forum. TFD (talk) 19:40, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

User talk:Sportfan5000 should be careful about throwing stones in glass houses. His earliest contributions show him to be anything but a new user. In fact he pulled some chicanery via page moves in a possible attempt to evade scrutniy of his talk page. While we don't know who is is (possibly User:Lionhead99 or even more likely User:Benjiboi), one thing we can be sure of is his report here is certainly ironic.2401:1800:7800:101:8517:1279:FF1C:50E (talk) 19:45, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Template:Uninvolvededitor You know what else is ironic? The fact that this is your very first edit yet you seem very well-versed about sockpuppetry and even noticeboards. I don't have an opinion on this thread in itself, but, well, this is something for you to think about before you call someone a hypocrite. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 02:46, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Repeated spamming of utterly non-notable awards on porn star biographies

A large number of porn-star BLPs have lately been spammed by a number of IPs who have repeatedly added utterly non-notable purely promotional "awards", named for porn video producers and distributors (Juliland Award, AEBN VOD Award, TLA Raw Award, with the recipients being selected by those companies) and intended as promotion for the sponsors of the awards. All of the edits sourced only to the porn business magazine AVN Magazine, a trade journal that covers the adult film industry. As a result of the repeated spamming multiple IPs were warned, at least one IP was blocked and several porn star bios were semi-protected. Today a recently created now auto-confirmed single-purpose account, Hanswar32 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), resumed the spamming, with even more intensity than before, and refuses to stop in spite of being pointed to WP:Notability and WP:Notability (awards), instead edit-warring over the material. So since I have no desire to break the 3RR-barrier on any of the articles I would appreciate if one or more admins would look into the matter, and do whatever they feel is needed... Thomas.W ^{talk to me} 12:02, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

I've blocked for 24 hours for edit warring across articles. I'll talk to the user about appropriate means of dispute resolution. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:34, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

User indicates a willingness to stop edit warring and engage in discussion. I've unblocked him so he can get on with it. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 15:24, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

@Moonriddengirl: The core of the problem isn't the edit-warring as such but the user's total unwillingness to accept that the promotional "awards" that were spammed aren't notable, and thus shouldn't be added to the articles. But I see no acceptance by the user of being guilty of spamming (see ES&L's message on the users talk page, just above the block message, which clearly states that the awards aren't notable; which is also my opinion). What we will probably see now is repeated attempts to establish the notability of the "awards", possibly through sock/meat puppets achieving "consensus" on each article separately for adding the awards. Something that would be easy to achieve since the only ones who ever edit the articles are SPAs with obvious strong connections to the adult video industry. So IMHO the best way out of it would have been to give Hanswar32 a much longer block than the few hours they got. Also please note that Hanswar32 seems to be very familiar with how Wikipedia works, how to make edits/reverts, WP guidelines etc, which contradicts his/her claims of being a totally new user. So what we're seeing is most probably an experienced user who out of necessity, i.e. because of semi-protection of several articles, created a throw-away account for the spamming, instead of continuing to use IPs for it like before... Thomas.W ^{talk to me} 16:07, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Thomas.W, I understand your frustration. If you believe he is a sock, you can report him at WP:SPI. However, in the absence of evidence of that, giving him an opportunity to prove good faith is the proper thing to do. If he attempts dispute resolution and fails to gain consensus for any changes, future repeats of this behavior will be a clear signal that working in good faith isn't what he intends. What's important is that he has now agreed to stop warring in the articles, and we will see what he does towards resolving the issue properly. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 16:39, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Hello, I've just become aware of this ANI and I would like to offer my observations and comments. First, there appears to be several issues at stake here. One is the inclusion of sourced content in articles for porn actors for awards they've received, and second, is the Notability of the awards. The title of this ANI is IMO an indication of the biased opinion that some Users have in this matter

With regard to the first issue, several times I have observed User Thomas and another User consistently removing sourced content for awards that have been won either without any Edit Summary or one that includes something to the extent that their opinion of the award that it's "spam" or "marketing" or that the award is such that its mere mention should not be allowed. This brings me to the next issue, the Notability of the awards themselves. I have seen several sourced "wins" deleted such as the AEBN VOD Award and Raw Award. In the former's case, its been around since 2006 and regardless of who its sponsored by, its still factual information thats its been won by one or more actors. With regard to the latter, its brand new and started in 2013. Unless the Users making the complaint can predict the future, no one knows if the award will become Notable by WP standards, but the fact remains, a win is a win and if there's a source for it it should be allowed in the article. Other Adult awards have come and gone, such as the Venus Award, and those wins are allowed to remain in articles.

Lastly, unless the complaining Users are somehow experts in the Adult industry or actually working in it (and have sources to cite), I fail to see how they can make these accusations about the intention of the respective award programs, or, expect anyone to respect their edits when they refuse to substantiate the claims they are making about the award programs they are trying to systematically delete from the site. --Scalhotrod - Just your average banjo playing, drag racing, cowboy... (talk) 03:21, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

@Thomas.W: I am not guilty of spamming and it’s painfully obvious that I’m not the only editor who views these awards as notable (both Scalhotrod and Rebecca1990 agree with me). I’ve replied to both you and ES&L's message on my talk page and neither of you have been able to successfully defend your “opinion” on the matter. I never claimed to be a “totally new” user but clearly stated to be “relatively new”. Yes, I have some experience on Wikipedia as an IP user but I’m still learning about the policies and compared to the rest of you, have considerably less experience. Why would I continue as an IP user when Wikipedia offers several benefits to encourage a user to create an account? Again, I’m not spamming and at least 2 other editors agree with me. It’s sad seeing you try to distort reality over a dispute instead of engaging in a meaningful discussion in order to resolve it. What’s sadder is your repeated assumption of bad faith, clearly against Wikipedia guidelines. Thankfully, we have level-minded and reasonable administrators that make just decisions and prevent biased editors from silencing those who disagree with them. Hanswar32 (talk) 04:44, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I haven't been back to your talkpage since I fully, completely, and successfully defended my position - I was very polite, non-threatening (if I remember correctly), and a sincere attempt to be helpful towards someone who I believe is also sincerely trying to be helpful. There most certainly was no attempt to "silence", and I'm certainly not "biased" - indeed, I don't believe I've ever edited nor read an article in the porn world (unless it's something that came up here at ANI as urgent). The overwhelming WP:CONSENSUS (one of the pillars of this project) appears to be that non-notable awards do not belong on anybody's page - whether it's porn awards, minor book awards for an author, local gallery awards for an artist of photography, etc. Yes, it's nice to win an award of some variety - I once won a really nice award about an article I contributed to in Afghanistan, but it's not a notable enough award to include someday on a biography both on-Wikipedia or anywhere else but my résumé and on the wall in my den. ES&L 10:28, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• First, I can't condone edit warring for any reason. Second, if an award ceremony is truly "notable", then it would have its own Wikipedia article about it. However, I don't know what citing something like Wikipedia:Notability (awards) does for anyone's argument, since it appears to have been labelled as irrelevant to the entire Wikipedia project as of around 2007. If the concern on the part of some in this dispute is that certain pornography-related articles will be "kept" at AfD because of someone winning a non-notable award...well, I've yet to see that actually happen at AfD (maybe someone else has though). Lastly, I don't personally have a problem with award content being added to any Wikipedia article...as long as it has a reliable citation attached to it. Guy1890 (talk) 08:49, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• GUY, please do not fall victim to the kind of WP bias that you just exhibited. Any subject's significance or importance in the real world is not determined by the presence of a Wikipedia article. That logic is flawed and backwards. I like and appreciate WP just as much as anyone here, but I have never based my impression of a subject on whether or not it has an article. --Scalhotrod - Just your average banjo playing, drag racing, cowboy... (talk) 16:42, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• "Any subject's significance or importance in the real world is not determined by the presence of a Wikipedia article." No kidding, but, here on Wikipedia, we have this thing called notablility, and things that are truly notable (for whatever reason) will eventually end up with their own Wikipedia article at some point. Does that mean that subjects that don't have their own Wikipedia article aren't important in the real world? No, it just means that, for the purposes of Wikipedia only, that they aren't notable. Again, I'm not opposed to including non-notable infomation in Wikipedia articles, as long as a reliable citation exists for that same information. For instance, being married doesn't make one notable, but including the reliably-sourced information that someone is, in fact, maried in a Wikipedia article isn't a problem with me.

I'd personally like to see where the "overwhelming consensus" exists "that non-notable awards do not belong on anybody's page" on Wikipedia. I'm not saying that that consensus doesn't exist, but I haven't come across it yet. Was this decided somewhere else at another time? Guy1890 (talk) 22:21, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

We tend to put things differently, but I agree on both counts and would like to see evidence of the "overwhelming consensus" as well. --Scalhotrod - Just your average banjo playing, drag racing, cowboy... (talk) 03:48, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I think that any award an individual has won should be allowed to remain on their page. I definitely wouldn't use an award that isn't notable enough for a WP article to try to establish an individual's notability and keep their article at AfD, but I don't see why it shouldn't be mentioned in the article. I don't see whats promotional about the awards. Do you really think that someone who's reading a porn stars WP article is suddenly going to go out to purchase their films just because they looked at their awards section and saw these awards? Rebecca1990 (talk) 09:58, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

@ES&L: I recognize your sincerity and for the record I wasn’t referring to you at all with regards to “silencing” other editors or being “biased”. Congratulations on your award and I fully understand the viewpoint on the inappropriateness of including non-notable awards on a person’s biography. The dispute here however differs due to the nature of these awards and the issue is summarized quite nicely by Scalhotrod.

I agree with everything Guy1890 said except I’d like to point to his attention that on my talk page I mentioned 3 types of awards and know of at least 2 others that don’t have Wikipedia articles of their own, yet are allowed to be included on all Wikipedia articles for which there is a recipient. To touch on what Guy1890 said about reliably-sourced information, I’d like to reinforce that all of the awards being disputed have reliable citations.

I’m also joining Scalhotrod and Guy1890 in their request to see evidence of this so-called “overwhelming consensus” which has so far proven to be a myth. The only thing I’ve seen thus far is consensus shifting towards the side of including these awards as I agree with both editors, along with Rebecca1990. The only talkpage that I know of which exists about this issue Talk:Tanya Tate shows consensus of including the award.

@Moonriddengirl: This issue affects over 40 articles that I’m aware of, am I supposed to open the same discussion on every one of their talk pages? Or is it sufficient in light of the above support, to go ahead and return the removed content in the absence of any consensus against such a move? Hanswar32 (talk) 20:29, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi, Hanswar32. I wouldn't actually recommend opening the discussion on every talk page, but instead finding some central and appropriate point to resolve the discussion. This is not the place to establish that consensus, though, as WP:ANI is not intended for ironing out content questions. Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Pornography might be a good place to start a discussion, perhaps an WP:RFC if the scope is wide enough, since that may attract more contributors to the discussion. Personally, this is the approach I would take before adding or removing any content related to this award from any articles, so that consensus is clear. Once edit warring has started, things can blow up rather quickly. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 20:44, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I'd suggest opening this up at an appropriate policy noticeboard, most likely BLPN. The pornography project is pretty much moribund. This wasn't a controversial matter until very recently, when a few accounts that do little or nothing beyon adding borderline-promotional and promotional content to porn-related bios began bulking out bios with well-below notability-threshold awards. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 14:44, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Harassment by Safwwefe sock

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

---

Safwwefe (talk · contribs) has been community-banned since 2009 for making a graphic death threat against President Obama. For the better part of this fall and winter, he has seen fit to troll on my talk page, as I was the one who indef'd him while I was still an admin under the moniker Blueboy96. By way of this edit, he has admitted that all socks flagged in both his own SPI and the SPI for Darkstriker152 are all him. This morning, I come home from work to discover an email from his latest sock, Blueboy96sucks (talk · contribs), saying that the trolling and harassment will continue.

I'm here asking that all socks of Safwwefe be reblocked with email and talkpage access disabled. Also, if any available checkuser would be so kind as to lower the boom on the underlying IP, it would be much appreciated. HangingCurve^{Swing for the fence} 13:30, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Ok, I went through the SPI and made sure they all had talk page and e-mail access revoked. Mark Arsten (talk) 16:22, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

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

Interesting that the actual threat was never rev-deled. If nothing else, I would think it's a BLP-vio. Joefromrandb (talk) 05:54, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Probably because it needed to be visible in order to be shown to the authorities. If the guy that did it was brought to court but the threat was revdeleted, well, there goes the evidence. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 08:22, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Damiens.rf refuses to engage in Discussion and insists in edit warring

User:Damiens.rf is starting an edit war over the article José N. Gándara Cartagena. I have reverted his edits and invited him to discuss his edits first (the evidence is HERE) and his response is that he does not need "my permission". (See HERE.) Then, contrary to standard procedure, he went to my Talk Page (HERE) to discuss there, seeking safe harbor under WP:OWN. Beyond the fact that there is no proof of my violating WP:OWN (I have the articles in my automatically added to my Watchlist as I edit them), any discussion seeking Consensus, as is the case here, tradionally occurs in the article's Talk Page space, not at an editor's personal Talk Page, so other editors can contribute as well. Perhaps someone can go to my Talk Page (or his) and talk some sense into Damiens. Thanks.

What is going on in this case cannot be judged without This Sorely Needed Background: Ever since User:Caribbean H.Q. reported Damiens to this ANI HERE for uncivility and Wikihounding of other editors in the Puerto Rico WP:PUR project (I was one of the affected Puerto Rico project editors), Damiens started a campaign to target only Puerto Rico-related articles, especially biographies, as shown HERE. I reverted Damiens edits at the biography of Raúl Gándara Cartagena (the brother of the José N. Gándara Cartagena above) and Damiens did start a discussion in the Talk page of that article, Raúl Gándara Cartagena's, AS SHOWN HERE and Damiens and I are now discussing that matter there. (BTW, Damiens had failed to start similar Talk Page discussions in other two PR bio articles (I eventually did) that he edited, but I won't get into those details here.) However, when it came to the José N. Gándara Cartagena article, Damiens now appears to have changed his mind about getting engaged in any discussion on other articles (See Talk Page at José N. Gándara Cartagena.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Jos%C3%A9_N._G%C3%A1ndara). Just for the record, these are both articles Damiens had never edited before.

BTW, in his 5-year history with Wikipedia he has created ONE (1) article [SEE HERE]. As such, his love and joy appear to be interfering with other editors' work by disrupting their work, and do so under the disguise of improving things, especifically WP:TAGBOMBing as can be seen at José N. Gándara Cartagena. While I admire some of Damiens work (admittedly very little of Damiens work), there is a serious problem when someone chooses to behave as disruptively as he is behaving. Basically, Damiens started tagging Puerto Rico articles in retaliation for someone reporting him to ANI as linked to above.

I don't want to raise any false alarms here, and Damiens may in fact come to grips with the fact that not discussing is not an option. But since Damiens and I are already involved in an edit war over Raúl Gándara Cartagena as seen here and appear headed for a second edit war yet as can be seen HERE, hopefully third party involvement will prove it unnecessary to file a 3RR. I have informed Damiens of this Discussion about him. Thanks. Mercy11 (talk) 19:51, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Wikignomes typically don't create articles on their own. They tend to focus on cleaning and doing minor changes to existing pages. Content Creation != Editing Wikipedia. Please consider trying your report again listing concrete "He Did This which is against THAT policy" instead of throwing a great many disorganized arguments against the wall in hopes taht something sticks... Hasteur (talk) 20:21, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

That's a beautiful categorization of Damiens work! However, the link you provided Wikignomes doesn't describe at all what he does. We all love editors who are fixing typos, correcting poor grammar, creating redirects, adding categories, and repairing broken links, etc but nothing in that Wikignome article describes what Damines does - and which infuriates editors as seen on the Other Section Above. Mercy11 (talk) 04:45, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I see nothing particularly contentious about Damiens's editing on this article, which appears to be mostly a consolidation of references into a more compact display, consistent with community practice, and noting sourcing issues over geocities references (which generally raise SPS issues). I suggest the OP review WP:RS and WP:REFNAME. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 20:21, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Which article are you referring to when you say "see nothing particularly contentious about Damiens's editing on THIS article"? Because THIS ARTICLE HERE shows 13 points of contention. Perhaphs you care to elaborate Here and There as well, but and answer on the "this article" would solve some ambiguity. Mercy11 (talk) 20:34, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, that's the article. Your tendentious wall of text, however, does not make Damiens's rather routine and consistent=with-community-practice contributions contentious. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 20:42, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

You are missing the point: The issue here is not whether Damiens's "rather routine and consistent=with-community-practice" edits can justify his engaging in an edit war. (That's a collorary of "engaging in an edit war because he thinks his edits are right and has already been addressed by policy at WP:EW.) The issue here is whether or not he is violation policy by not following WP:Dispute resolution protocols already in place.

Also, though 1/2 a screen of text is not what most of us would call a "wall of text", that would be AGF issue because my 1/2 screen "wall of text" was simply intended to facilitate Damiens response. Just because others (you?) wouldn't appreciate that, doesn't mean it is wrong. It's a matter perspective - a matter of seeing the glass 1/2 full rather than 1/2 empty. It's too bad you perceived it negatively.

Unaddressed in your comment above is that you, too, have joined the revert craze, instead of joining the open discussion. I came here asking for wisdom and seeking enlightment - I did not need to come here if all I wanted was to go on reverting, edit warring, etc., but with your revert action you seem to be tacitly saying that revert is what Damien is supposed to do when he sees edits that he just disagrees with (even when the edits come with an open discussion in the article's Talk Page in which he refuses to participate), rather than participate in Discussion that seeks consensus. Mercy11 (talk) 00:12, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Much of what Damien is doing with combining citations (the ''<ref name='' stuff) is so simple and so routine that it can be done with a bot. Tagging the page for citation problems requires human judgement, but Damien's doing just what's routine with Geocities; it's a self-published source that's generally not reliable. Nyttend (talk) 22:15, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

You are right but you seem to be missing the point. The issue here is not whether we can justify Damiens engaging in en edit war because he (or, admittedly, me for that matter - but let's bear in mind I am the one coming here seeking a source of higher wisdom, not Damines who appears to care less), Damiens, thinks his edits are right (combining citations, tagging SPS's and RS's, etc.). The issue here is whether or not he is violation policy by not following WP:Dispute resolution protocols already in place. Mercy11 (talk) 00:10, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Mercy11 makes much the same arguments in a section toward the top of this page[4], which really should be combined with this one and/or hatted, as I think that one has played itself out. Coretheapple (talk) 23:24, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• Except that you are not an uninvolved party yourself, so your proposal may be tainted with self-service. Nothing personal. So I disagree. Instead propose that the page be returned to its per-edit warring form of months ago (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jos%C3%A9_N._G%C3%A1ndara&oldid=562097117) and the page be protected until the parties Discuss. Mercy11 (talk) 00:12, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Excuse me? The sum total of my "involvement" was in commenting on the section that you created above. Coretheapple (talk) 00:28, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• I did not create that section; User:Caribbean H.Q did. Nothing personal, just correcting a fact.

Still, I propose the article (1) be reverted to its original version, (2) be protected from editing, and (3) that a 3-7 day discussion/cool off period be allowed for the parties to discuss and reach agreement. That's not much to ask: that's enforcing Wikipedia policy: Plus it's fair and square - not dictatorial as Wolfowitz did with his revert that was based on his perspective of who was right rather than on the fact that we were both already edit warring. Nothing personal, just facts. Mercy11 (talk) 01:53, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

There's already agreement on this article, from everybody who's weighed in on the substance but you. The Damiens version of the article is better, and more consistent with policy and practice, than yours. Your removal of the tag concerning self-published sources was grossly inappropriate. Arguing at tendentious length and casting aspersions on editors who reject your position is inappropriate. WP:CONSENSUS calls for you to accept the community's conclusion here, not for the community to wait until you accept its position. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 04:34, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Disagreeing with the unfounded charges you've made against Damiens does not an involved editor make. I've reviewed the edits that he made to the article in question and I found them to be constructive, your reverts not to be constructive, and do not believe that what you suggest is necessary. Coretheapple (talk) 02:20, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) I think we should speedily close this thread and merge it with this thread. That thread is long enough, sure, but why have two open threads about the same general situation? Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 03:44, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Why have two threads open? (1) Because the other thread is not my complaint - I am only a opinion voice there. (2) Because this thread is about an edit war in a specific instance of a specific article that needs to be dealt with the specific traditional EW tools, whereas the other thread is about Wikihounding and uncivility. So the two threads, albeit targeting the same editor, are not about the same "general situation" as you state since wikihounding and uncivility (the other thread) are vastly different from a Dispute/Edit Warring. We should really tell it as it is: the only thing in common between the two threads is Mr. Damiens and that to me is not strong enough reason to close anything. In any event that other thread is at the top of the heap and, thus, sure to be closed any minute now anyway. Unless there is a policy/practice about faster than lightening thread-closing as a goal I don't see the need for closing anything before its due time. The other thread is over a week old; this one was born yesterday - thanks, I argue, to Mr. Damiens retaliatory actions. He has done this to his peril. Are we somehow in the mercy business? Mercy11 (talk) 04:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Mercy, the only disruption here is the removal of valid tags and the deletion of reference mergers. On your statement about protection — aside from vandalism by someone with a dynamic IP address, the only time we protect is when multiple people are disrupting the page. In this situation, exactly one person is being disruptive, so if the problem continues, the solution will be someone blocking you rather than protecting the page. Please start listening before it gets to that point. Nyttend (talk) 05:29, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

One might argue that it's already to that point. Consensus suggests that Damien's version is firmly supported by policy, and that Mercy's version is not. There is no support whatsoever for any sort of protection or sanction against Damiens, and Mercy is inching into WP:IDHT territory. The best thing that could happen to Mercy11, at this point, would be the closure of this thread. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 13:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

OK, I came here for enlightment so, for the sake of collaboration, I admit I probably went too far in reverting all of his edits. Frankly, from the start I stated to Damiens I was willing to accept #2, 3, and 6 (after getting his side). As for #7-12, and despite what the WP:PG say, I was willing to WP:IAR and come to agreement there as well. That left #1 and #4 to discuss. So let me get some substance: On #1, where he tagged that 1-paragrapgh/3-sentence lede article for having a lede that was too long? My only assumption there AGF is he meant too short. But even too short makes no sense since the article was only 10K in size. And how about #4, where he placed CN and SPS banners on such a short article after also tagging every single paragraph? Do we encourage that? Wouldn't that constitute WP:Tag bombing? Most importantly on #4, his claim of SPS is not valid since the subject has been dead for 50 yrs and the source is from the library of a school named after him based on newspaper articles with publ dates & pages? Are you guys on this thread supporting that too, and if so, where did I err there? (I ignore #13 because it is procedurally dependent on #4) And, last, what would you have done differently (not, what would you not have done - I have already heard that loud and clear here) or to follow when an editor disagrees with another editor's edits. (I don't need (please) a WP:DISPUTE, I do need specific counsel on this from you more experienced contributors.) Thanks. Mercy11 (talk) 15:55, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Just one point. You seem to misunderstand WP:SPS. A self-published source is not a source-text written by the article's subject. It seems to me that's what you understand of SPS. If I'm mistaken, sorry. My bad. --damiens.rf 16:44, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, an SPS is a source where any user can add content and typically without any editorial control (Wikipedia would be an example of that). You're talking about autobiographical sources which, should one have existed for this person, probably would be okay. --MASEM (t) 16:51, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

comment Mercy11 needs to disengage and stop creating conflict with Damiens.rf. Their poor understanding of not a few guidelines & policies is compounded by WP:IDHT,WP:DEADHORSE, and WP:OWNERship tendencies.94.194.24.46 (talk) 02:32, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment: New anonynympus IP account that --from his summary comments HERE-- seems to know his way around WP extremely well. Dubious? Maybe even a disengenuous sockpuppet perhaps??? Mercy11 (talk) 16:30, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I have edited WP for years, always as an anon ip. Certainly my knowledge of WP & it's policies surpasses yours, as your behaviour across several articles and on this very page illustrate. If you suspect I'm operating as a sock then take it to WP:SPI. As I'm sure you are aware unsubstantiated accusations of socking is a breach of WP:AGF and probably WP:INCIVIL as well. 94.194.24.46 (talk) 02:01, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Badmintonhist again

Badmintonhist has been engaging in uncivil behavior, name calling, personal attacks, and not assuming good faith on Talk:War on Women (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and (the reason I decided to make this post) 6). Specifically, he has yet again targeted Roscelese, telling BullRangifer to resign, and general hostility toward Binksternet and others. Because of this user's multiple past infractions and warnings, and being the subject of noticeboard posts for stalking/hounding behavior targeting Roscelese (1, 2) and general incivility/attacks on talk pages (1) I feel it necessary to report the current behavior. Badmintonhist has been given multiple warnings over 4 years and still continues to violate the conduct guidelines of Wikipedia. Moreover, he has repeatedly attacked and harassed another user despite "final warnings".

Given the history of this user and their recidivism, I'd like to see a subject ban from all political articles and a "no contact" with Roscelese policy enforced (if that is what Roscelese wants) with violations resulting in blocking. EvergreenFir (talk) 19:54, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

• Badmintonhist continued following me after the supposed "final" warning, so I obviously would be very happy with an interaction ban or a block. The community can decide whether or not to ban him from political articles, but at the very least, he should be banned from War on Women and its talkpage, where he's been admonished repeatedly for wasting everyone's time. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:55, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Badmintonhist has been continually disruptive at Talk:War on Women, and in the article space. At minimum, an article and talk page ban should be set in place. Of course, the violations of IBAN with Roscelese should be dealt with. Binksternet (talk) 08:09, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

So admins, how should this particular case of harassment be dealt with? He's had his warnings and ignored them. EvergreenFir (talk) 03:50, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Roscelese, would you be able to supply diffs, please? StAnselm (talk) 08:42, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Er, well, he was even blocked for continuing to follow me after the final warning, and then still did it again anyway (I don't remember if there's even more; as you may guess, it's been a busy few months for me and it wouldn't have surprised me if I just stopped bothering to warn after the admins' failure to enforce). –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:22, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• (Non-administrator comment) Sheesh, is there a kennel for this hound? I'm really sensing some WP:NOTHERE because s/he has continued the very behavior that s/he was blocked for at a faster (and more alarming rate). Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 08:36, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• This is a unfortunate because I've seen Badmintonhist contribute productively to discussions, for example at Focus on the Family where he calmly debates content issues and frequently persuades editors to consider other points of view. However, War on Women has apparently put a bee in his bonnet. He seems to be too invested in the subject to contribute dispassionately. He has repeated the same arguments ad nauseum and refuses to accept the scope of the article that has been established through consensus. His participation sometimes degrades into snarkiness, for example, "How's your eyesight?". It's obvious that Badmintonhist has contempt for Roscelese. Perhaps this could be addressed by a two way prohibition preventing both users from replying to or referring to the other on any article talk page. I don't think that an interaction ban should prevent either editor from editing the same articles, with the exception of War on women.- MrX 15:07, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I propose that Badmintonist be permanently banned from War on Women, including the talk page and any meta discussions about the article.

• Support as nominator, for reasons explained above.- MrX 15:07, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

  Well let's see ol' Binksternet said that I didn't give an "actionable" problem with the article when I restored a template, which I clearly did; so the "how's you eyesight" query, while snarky, wasn't all that unreasonable. My "Resign" plea to BullRangifer was less than serious, and we've had a pleasant chat on his talk page since then. I say "half" because, if you care to notice, he had just engaged in one of his signature "If you don't agree with me, you're not fit to be a true Wikipedian" routines prior to my comment. Roscelese, who hadn't been around much, managed to chime in with a pointless "green spotted flying frogs" hypothetical as if it were somehow analogous to mine, so reminding her of her own ideological contentiousness, which FAR outstrips mine, is at least understandable. All in all, I'd say that I'm being indicted here for giving back as good, and sometimes perhaps better, than I got. Badmintonhist (talk) 15:56, 10 January 2014 (UTC) : Sorry.That was supposed to br "flying spotted green mice."

• Support ban on the topic of the US Republican War on Women, and any other instance of the phrase "war on women". Badmintonhist has been trying to water down the article and diffuse its focus, resorting to disruptive posts and repeated arguments when consensus is already clear. Binksternet (talk) 16:14, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• Comment Declaration that I am not an uninvolved editor. As far as article edits, I haven't seen much of an issue with Badminthonhist beyond the normal disputes that arise on a contentious article. On the discussion page, points made tend to offer opinions shared by other editors. What I think has other editors stressed is the persistence on issues when discussion seems worn out and circular - emotions are high and there is certainly some boomerang. While not clear, the !vote is leaning toward no changes, leaving the underlining issue for Badmintonhist unresolved. In an effort to change the consensus, I think he/she tried to present the discussion in a different context / role reversal and it ended up getting personal as other editors saw it as WP:IDHT. I'd say to Badmintonhist, you fought the good fight - let it go. If the discussion can move on from this topic, I think attitudes will settle down and we can work at improving the article within its current scope. Morphh ^(talk) 17:01, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose This is little more than ideological sniping in order to try and get rid of someone they don't like. Arzel (talk) 16:29, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support topic ban. Having a POV is okay, but pushing that POV to the point it affects editing is not okay. RS determine our content, not our political POV. The added fact that an even worse POV warrior like Arzel supports him does not help the matter at all. They should both be topic banned from all political articles. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:39, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support topic ban per original post. EvergreenFir (talk) 03:42, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support per evidence and MrX. Sportfan5000 (talk) 04:07, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I've never heard of this editor before, and am uninvolved in the article. Looking at this editor's block log, I see only one block, which was for a week several months ago. Assuming that he's the scoundrel portrayed here in this thread, I would recommend either a total block for one month, or a one-month topic-ban from this article. In other words, let's impose graduated penalties, and reserve the most severe stuff as a last resort.Anythingyouwant (talk) 14:33, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support topic ban. Badmintonhist has repeatedly demonstrated an unwillingness to engage civilly on this article, often holding fellow editors in apparent contempt and refusing to acknowledge consensus. Gobōnobō ^{+ c} 20:56, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Draconian solutions rarely work, and there is too great a chance that the editors on WOW will simply wish to remove editors who disagree with them, or retain editors who agree with them .. anyone closing this should discount such !votes from editors active on that page. Collect (talk) 03:01, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose, per Arzel and Collect. And, BS articles like "War on Women" should be free-fire zones where anything goes—it's the culture war, stupid! --71.178.50.222 (talk) 06:44, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

^WP:NOTHERE EvergreenFir (talk) 20:19, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose While I find editors that push a conservative agenda every bit as troubling as those pushing a liberal agenda (even though there's far more of the latter), that article is full of problems (starting with the fact that it's titled "War on Women") and desperately needs a dissenter. Joefromrandb (talk) 20:34, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I propose Badmintonhist be barred from contacting or talking to/about Roscelese. In other words, a zero-tolerance, zero-strike no contact order.

• Support (if not punished for most recent infraction) as nominator per original explanation at top of topic. User has clear history of hounding Roscelese. EvergreenFir (talk) 03:50, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support per WP:HOUND, WP:NOTHERE, WP:POINT, WP:IDHT; take your pick. (BTW, Arzel, I personally think this would be people trying to get rid of someone they didn't like only if Roscelese or Bullrangifer made the proposal.) Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 08:16, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Comment: I assume the proposal is simply a one-way interaction ban. But at this point, I can't see any diffs posted regarding personal attacks/hounding Roscelese since July 2013, when he was issued a final warning. StAnselm (talk) 08:42, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• See the links 2 and 6 in the original post (or read that talk page). Black Kite (talk) 12:09, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support (Note: I issued the original warning). Black Kite (talk) 12:09, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support with the expectation that Roscelese will also not engage Badmintonhist. There is a troubling history of vitriol directed at Roscelese by Badmintonhist. Warnings and a block have not had the desired effect as evidenced by the latest interaction.- MrX 14:27, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose at this point. Badmintonhist was warned in July and blocked in August for harassment, and that has no place on wikipedia. I think wikipedia's biggest weakness is that we let editors get away with personal attacks. Any evidence of recent personal attacks or harassment would make me support this one-way interaction ban. However, at this stage the only diffs presented ([5][6]) are not really enough - especially if this is the only stuff that Badmintonhist has said to or about Roscelese since August. If it isn't, we need some more diffs, please. StAnselm (talk) 19:38, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support per comments and evidence above. People can disagree on subjects without abusing others. Sportfan5000 (talk) 01:41, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose per comments above. Too many here look like combatants and not like editors who follow WP:AGF. Cheers. Collect (talk) 03:01, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support. This user has been warned about this matter before in previous ANI discussions. It's time to start exploring solutions beyond scolding. Gamaliel (talk) 03:36, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. Suggest Roscelese stop editing in a manner that irritates or provokes Badmintonhist. --71.178.50.222 (talk) 06:44, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

^That's victim-blaming and utterly insulting. EvergreenFir (talk) 20:07, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Don't claim to be able to read ol' 71.178.50.222's mind here, but maybe he sees poor, kindly, affable Badmintonhist as the victim of a "fighting word's" comment directed toward someone that Roscelese would presumably stay away from. Badmintonhist (talk) 21:20, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

user:QuackGuru either WP:STALKING me or WP:TAGTEAMing with user:BullRangifer

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

---

User:Brozhnik Recently added a biased study from Media Matters for America to the Fox News Channel controversies article. Media Matters for America, for the record, has been trying to destroy Fox for years and recently claimed that it won. I removed this "study" because it was not accompanied by any other sources to establish weight and because of the inherent bias that MMfA has to begin with. Without any secondary weight this article would be filled with nothing but partisan screed from MMfA as that is almost all that they have done for the better part of the past decade.

It was restored by User:Bullrangifer twice and then restored by user:QuackGuru almost immediately Quack has never edited this page before and it appears to be stalking or at the very minimum tagteaming. Arzel (talk) 05:53, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually, it looks like BullRangifer has never edited this page either. They recently were baiting me on my own talk page. This appears to be related. Arzel (talk) 06:04, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

QuackGuru notified Arzel (talk) 05:55, 10 January 2014 (UTC) BullRangifer notified. Arzel (talk) 05:58, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I added the article to my watchlist last year back in December. QuackGuru (talk) 06:23, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I have no idea how long it's been on my extensive watchlist. Right now my watchlist has this notification at the top: "You have 8,956 pages on your watchlist (excluding talk pages)." (I need to clean it up!)

Arzel, nothing you do on Wikipedia is sacred. You have no right to privacy, or to carry on your only activity, which is to whitewash right wing articles, not by actual editing, but by deleting properly sourced content, simply because it is critical. You have been informed many times that biased RS are proper to use in most articles, especially ones describing controversies, like the one in question. The article could not exist without such content from such sources, but that's really what you want, right?! In fact, very little would be left of Wikipedia if we banned biased sources. We would totally fail in our mission, which is to document the sum total of human knowledge, which includes controversies which are usually documented in biased sources. We'd only be telling one side of the story. You keep refusing to accept that aspect of the RS policy, using "biased source" as an excuse to delete content and sources you don't like. You have thrown a boomerang here, and now highlighted your nefarious activities. Calls for you to be topic banned from these articles have been made numerous times, and each time you have filed an AN/I case, you have lost. It's time for that topic ban. You have certainly received enough warnings. -- Brangifer (talk) 07:11, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

True enough, biased RS can sometimes be used. But the problem here is that Media Matters isn't a "biased RS"; it's just biased. It's not a reliable source according to any possible reading of our policy on sources. Media Matters is WP:QUESTIONABLE, and should only be used with great caution. But I didn't detect a lot of caution in your knee-jerk reverts, Bull.

Also note that Bullrangifer rests his case upon a straw man. Arzel hasn't argued simply that the material can't be in the article; he argues that it needs vetting by actual reliable sources so that a determination of due weight can be made per NPOV. Without that, inclusion of the material in the article constitutes prima facie original research.

Personally, I find it very interesting that we have two editors here who are edit-warring, one at 3RR and the other at 2RR, and one is looking for a topic ban but neither editor has availed themselves of discussion on the Talk page. Jump the gun much? Roccodrift (talk) 07:25, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• comment A quick google search, shows that contrary to the claim by Arzel that the source is not accompanied by any other source is wrong. See http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2013/10/climate-denial-fox-media-matters Prokaryotes (talk) 07:46, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• Arzel dismisses MMA as having an "inherent bias", and Arzel dismisses the MMA report itself as biased, but Wikipedia does not require its reliable sources to be free from bias. This looks like a boomerang complaint which highlights the harmful and disruptive editing practices of Arzel. Binksternet (talk) 08:05, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• (Non-administrator comment) I agree that it looks like we're in boomerang country. Worst come to worst, I would weakly support a topic ban on Arzel for all Republican-centered articles (and this is coming from a Democrat). Yes, Arzel, the references may be biased, but Wikipedia doesn't reject biased sources; in fact, it supports them. (This also works in concert with WP:V.)

OAN: Roccodrift, I don't know exactly what point your comments were trying to make, but please stop stirring the pot. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 08:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Yet more straw man arguments. I see but a single editor here (other than myself) who actually read and understood what Arzel said, and who bothered to address the point he actually made.

Oh, and BTW... pointing out fallacious arguments is not "stirring the pot". Roccodrift (talk) 09:00, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

•  Comment: Can we please add the small "f" in MMfA, as MMA has it own issues, and we sure don't want to accidentally mix them together (although, that would make for an interesting juxtaposition) ES&L 10:31, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
  • We can use MMfA in most cases although of course we should attribute it. Anyone thinking that we can't use a source simply because it has a pov needs to read our policies again. Loads of discussions at RSN by the way - of course those with a pov opposing it would like it banned as a source, but if we did that we'd lose a lot of sources that actually meet WP:RS. Vetting is appropriate for scholarly sources but I don't see it as appropriate here for the MMfA study. But the issue that was brought up was about WP:Hounding (we need to avoid the use of the word 'stalking) which is defined as " threats, repeated annoying and unwanted contacts, repeated personal attacks, intimidation, or posting personal information." That hasn't happened here so this doesn't belong here and should be closed. Dougweller (talk) 10:58, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I see that pretty much every ignored one basic aspect which is that MMfA has a ton of crap about FNC and that they have a dedicated interest in seeing FNC destroyed. Apparently that doesn't matter to the familiar crowd defending this type of partisan editing. I also love that another lefty outlet (Mother Jones) is used to try and give weight. Furthermore, this is WP:HOUNDING then as BullRangifer has not edited this page and was recently at my talk page WP:BAITing me. Arzel (talk) 15:02, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I concur that BullRangifer was at your talkpage and was baiting you...I removed one of his posts from there myself. That said, all of you really need to cease this highly partisan and polarizing bickering that is going on across numerous article spaces, and remind everyone involved in edit warring that 3RR is not an entitlement.--MONGO 15:07, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I thought it was a pretty simple situation of removing a biased study from a biased source which had no WP:WEIGHT behind it. Editors often try to add obscure pieces of information from MMfA that has had little or zero coverage anywhere else, so I was a little surprised to see this response. Without this monitoring that article would be little more than an attack page from MMfA on FNC. Arzel (talk) 18:33, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

The problem here is Arzel. This is an editor that is NOTHERE to build an encyclopedia, but rather to wage ideological battles across a spectrum of politically-related articles. I have tried to discuss this with the Arzel, but he has consistently rebuffed me, usually piling on further insults. His article contributions consist almost entirely removing other editor's edits. It's no surprise that he has such a poor grasp of policy—he hardly ever creates content! That he so often accuses others of bias and POV-pushing ironically exposes his own struggle with objectivity. I am going to start an RFC/U on Arzel the moment I find another user that will certify it, because I'm tired of seeing wholesale deletion of content backed by shabby interpretations of policy and personal attacks.- MrX 15:42, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, it's not just about adding and especially not about coatracking. A valid argument could be made that his removals are fully encyclopedic and the fact remains that the onus is on those adding negative information to use impeccable secondary sources. Media Matters is a highly partisan source.--MONGO 15:59, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Arzel has taken this to WP:RSN where he has taken the opportunity to accuse Bullrangifer again. And we use partisan sources frequently - they don't have to be 'impeccable', they do have to be significant enough to pass WP:NPOV. And, shock horror, we even allow liberal sources as well as conservative ones (calling it 'lefty' just shows political bias). Dougweller (talk) 16:59, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Doug, please do not make false statements against me. BullRangifer tried to Bait me on my talk page and then followed me to that page. Furhermore, I never use conservative sources, so don't give me that crap either. And this is not just a biased source, but an extrememly biased source with almost no other WP:WEIGHT for support and then reinserted by an editor that was following me around. You accept this behaviour? Really? What part of WP core policies am I violating here? Whar part of WP core policies are you upholding? Arzel (talk) 18:29, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I didn't say you used conservative sources. I often follow editors I'm dubious about. I sometimes notice that another editor I respect is concerned about someone and take a look myself. That's a good thing. I'm supporting RNS and NPOV. You are simply wrong about this. Dougweller (talk) 06:55, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Proposal: Topic Ban

• Support Topic ban on Republican and Democrat articles, broadly construed. This is becoming disruptive. KonveyorBelt 17:25, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I get followed around by another editor and I should be banned from Republican and Democrat articles? FNC is news channel, so I am not even sure I understand this logic. Arzel (talk) 18:35, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Democratic, please: note the "ic". See Democrat Party (epithet). Drmies (talk) 18:27, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Ive always throught that oversold as an epithet. Democratic aligned groups, neutral sources regularly refer to "Democrat" or "Democrats" (The democratics? Is a democratic? sounds awful), including a plethora of uses that way in our current article, as well as the party itself http://www.democrats.org/ https://www.democratsabroad.org/ http://www.yda.org/ etc. Gaijin42 (talk) 18:55, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Please tell us what other epithets of groups that you do not belong to are "oversold". — goethean 19:02, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Grammar, dear Gaijin42: it's the use of "democrat" as an adjective that is deemed inappropriate. There is nothing wrong with "Gaijin is a card-carrying Democrat". I think we had this up at ANI, quite some time ago. Drmies (talk) 19:40, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I happen to agree with Arzel that the addition was inappropriate. Media Matters is a highly partisan body and should not be treated as an independent source and in this case it was also a primary source. This is a case of poor sourcing being used to support material unduly favoring a partisan view of a news channel. At the very least the material should have been rewritten given the nature of the source. Repeatedly reinserting it without any change is POV-pushing. While Arzel is overreacting a bit, he is not wrong to take issue with the blatantly partisan edits being made to that article.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 18:49, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support Topic ban on republican/democratic American politics, broadly construed. I'm honestly astonished it hasn't happened already. N^oformation ^Talk 18:54, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• There are two issues here. The first is a content/sourcing issue regarding MMfA. This issue has been litigated endlessly at the reliable sources noticeboard, and it might be useful to review those discussions rather than re-arguing the case here. I'll break my own rule and offer my 2 cents here: MMfA is clearly a highly partisan source and should be used sparingly and cautiously, if at all, like any highly partisan source.

  The second issue is a conduct issue. In that regard, like Noformation, I'm surprised that Arzel hasn't been topic-banned at some point in the past. He edits Wikipedia solely to advance an ideological agenda. Really, check his contribution history, and go back as far you want: that's all he does here. He's also a dedicated edit-warrior who routinely games the system by going right up to 3RR (and occasionally over). There was clear community support for a topic ban from Tea-Party related articles, although that noticeboard thread was subsumed into the related ArbCom case. He's a classic tendentious agenda-driven edit-warrior. MastCell ^Talk 19:16, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) Okay, now I strongly support a topic ban. Arzel, what part of "reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective" are you not understanding? Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 19:18, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• What part of "reliable" are you having trouble understanding? It is a non sequitur to speak to bias before reliability is established. In this case, it is not. Quite the opposite, in fact. Roccodrift (talk) 19:58, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose sanctions against User:Arzel. As User:MastCell said, Arzel is correct about MMFA. I see no evidence that Arzel's other edits have not been equally correct, even if they have focussed on improving Wikipedia's coverage of the conservative rather than liberal POV. There are plenty of editors and admins who already focus on the latter type of cleanup tasks.Anythingyouwant (talk) 19:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• You're conflating the two issues which I took pains to separate, and thus misrepresenting what I said. My personal view of MMfA as a source is, like Arzel's, pretty dim. That's a content issue, to be solved by the usual means. There is no excuse for Arzel's conduct in addressing this dispute, which consists of edit-warring up to 3RR and then posting a risible accusation of tag-teaming. And this isn't an isolated incident; it's his M.O. MastCell ^Talk 19:42, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I am not misrepresenting anything. Either Arzel is correct about MMFA or incorrect, and your comment (which anyone can read directly above) suggests the former. Feel free to clarify your comments, but you might try doing so without flinging around accusations of misrepresentation.

There is no Wikipedia policy or guideline regarding tag teaming, as far as I know. So I would advise caution before dismissing such complaints as laughable. According to WP:Tag teaming, one form of it is to coordinate edits so as to avoid 3RR, and that's exactly what Arzel has attempted to document.Anythingyouwant (talk) 19:59, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Such an accusation (tag teaming) may not have a guideline, but it is covered by our Assume Good Faith policy. Such an accusation, without clear proof of such coordination, is wrong and a blockable offense. Arzel can reasonably expect their edits to be watched by those who have the same articles on their watchlists. POV warriors should be watched, and when their editing violates policy, should be dealt with, both through their edits being reverted, and them being issued appropriate warnings. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:17, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Regarding its status as a RS, the discussion at RS/N is confirming it is a RS, especially for this situation, where other RS are backing them up and citing them. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:27, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment - I think a topic ban would need to be more carefully defined. The proposed ban would not necessarily prevent the same tendentious reverting on articles like Fox News Channel controversies, Phil Robertson, Megyn Kelly, Hydraulic fracturing in the United States, Focus on the Family, PPACA, Ayn Rand, Ender's Game (film), etc.- MrX 19:32, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• A reasonable scope would be "American politics". Such a topic ban would provide an opportunity to see whether Arzel has any interest in this project beyond its potential as an ideological platform. MastCell ^Talk 19:43, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Yes, that does seem reasonable, provided that it is broadly construed to include any article that could be interpreted as having any political aspect to it.- MrX 20:00, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Agreed. Arzel may have potential in other areas, but here their personal political POV controls their editing, and their failure to understand RS is problematic. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:17, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose topic ban for Arzel as groundless and retaliatory. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Roccodrift (talk • contribs) 21:47, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support sanctions against QuackGuru, as his editing is reckless, disruptive and tendentious. Roccodrift (talk) 19:58, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support a permanent topic ban of Arzel from American politics, broadly construed, per my earlier comments.- MrX 20:05, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment MMfA is an advocacy organization and is not independent of the subject. It should be treated as a primary source. Instead, we should be using third-party reliable sources. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:06, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Actually, they're a media watchdog group, which kind of makes them a de facto third party.- MrX 20:13, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Hear here, the fact that they proffer a critical view of a favored source does not disqualify them as RS, in context. if attribution is deemed necessary for controversial commentary, that would appear to be a separate issue.

Since FOX News is itself a recognized partisan news service, it is to be expected that organizations opposing their views would appear. Where does Wikipedia stand, between them?--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 20:25, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Exactly. It's rather odd that Arzel wishes to remove opposing POV from an article about FNC's controveries. Without such sources and content, there would be not article, but that would certainly gratify Arzel. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:17, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

@MrX: Only comment, no, they arn't a media watchdog group. Their own about page says, "Launched in May 2004, Media Matters for America put in place, for the first time, the means to systematically monitor a cross section of print, broadcast, cable, radio, and Internet media outlets for conservative misinformation - news or commentary that is not accurate, reliable, or credible and that forwards the conservative agenda - every day, in real time."--v/r - TP 20:29, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't like their POV but doesnt that page back that they are a watchdog group? (albeit one that only watches one side) Gaijin42 (talk) 20:33, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)(edit conflict)If our article on them is correct, they are "dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation". Advocacy organizations are not reliable for anything but their opinion in articles about or related to themselves. Just stick to third-party reliable sources. It's not hard, guys. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:35, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Ah, but FOX News spins bills itself as "Fair and Balanced", so it's not an advocacy group. — goethean 20:52, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

This sounds like a content discussion and not proper for this page, but it's a primary source. Such a source could be reliable if presenting a POV attributed for stating the opinion of MMfA, but such would need to fall into WEIGHT for the overall coverage of controversies and have it relayed in multiple secondary sources to make it worth any mention. Then you may need to provide a balancing pov that covered other polls regarding media bias. Morphh ^(talk) 20:36, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Huh? The argument to support a topic ban is weak at best. If that is the goal then I suggest an RfcU first so that diffs can be presented to support such a measure.--MONGO 21:29, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• This will happen sooner or later. Mastcell's characterisation is spot on. His allies will cry foul, but if those views are recognised for what they are… Nomoskedasticity (talk) 22:59, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Just so we're clear. It is sad how obviously partisan the voting is on this otherwise. The people supporting a topic ban are seemingly without fail people whose views would be to the left of Arzel.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 23:36, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
  • To be fair, when you are on an extreme end of political leanings, most people will be to one side of you. Sportfan5000 (talk) 23:42, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
    • Being Republican is at the extreme far-right in the context of Wikipedia editors, but (being there myself) I don't think it's really adequate justification for hounding such people into oblivion, or mobbing them with generalized grievances. Arzel is owed a debt of gratitude for not letting the other side trample NPOV at will.Anythingyouwant (talk) 23:54, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
      • Fortunately, no one is suggesting that Arzel be banned because he's a Republican. The issue is that he's a habitual edit-warrior who treats Wikipedia as an ideological battleground. The belief that one's political views are under-represented on Wikipedia does not excuse tendentious editing. MastCell ^Talk 07:25, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
        • People are suggesting that he be banned from Republican- and Democratic-related articles. If Arzel encounters multitudinous editors who are constantly slanting such articles primarily in one direction, and Arzel seeks to counter it and seeks to promote NPOV, then we could certainly label him as a habitual edit-warrior, and remove him as an obstacle. Or, in a case like this, we could thank Arzel for coming to this notice-board instead of perpetuating an edit war, and thank him also for correctly identifying MMFA as a suboptimal partisan source. In other words, this is far from a black-and-white situation. Even if it is decided that Arzel is a tendentious edit-warrior (with which I disagree), I have zero confidence that Wikipedia would deal with the editors on the other side in an evenhanded manner. Additionally, Wikipedia should think seriously about how it can reduce edit-warring, for example by getting more serious about its consensus policy; when there is consensus that a part of a Wikipedia article (that previously was supported by consensus) needs improvement, then that is no justification to start changing the article (following WP:BRD) until there is consensus about how to change it --- people who start doing so ought to be blocked instead of allowed to run rampant. A cynic might say that Wikipedia promotes edit wars so that Wikipedia management can then eliminate the side it likes least. Likewise, we often have editors edit-warring under the belief that some other policy takes precedence over WP:Consensus, but shouldn't the meaning and application of those other policies be determined (during the process of editing an article) by consensus?Anythingyouwant (talk) 14:11, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I don't consider myself a leftist by any stretch but that's the false dichotomy of American politics; from a worldwide perspective, American conservatism is pretty fringe and pretty extreme. Compared to Azrel I might as well carry a red card and be hung for treason, but in any modern, Western society I'm right in the middle. N^oformation ^Talk 00:02, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

If by "modern, Western society" you mean Europe, then I supposed you would be in the middle. Of course, Europe is on average left-of-center so being in the middle would still make you left-of-center. Suffice to say, your political biases are markedly different from those of Arzel and that is the case with the one who proposed the topic ban and others supporting it.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 00:33, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

What ever my political biases are they differ not just in form but in intensity. That is, I don't edit political articles and I really don't care about politics. My support of the topic ban is based on Azrel's behavior as a POV pushing SPA with an obvious agenda. And considering that most Wikipedians are not right wingers, any topic ban support against a right winger is likely going to be comprised of a majority of non-right wingers; what else is to be expected, that people on the right can only be disciplined by others on the right? In any case, that one isn't a right winger does not render their support unfairly biased nor moot, it just means that I'm not blind to the concerted effort of a few conservatives to present right wing perspectives as though they are in the mainstream of intellectual discourse, and to white wash what most normal people can see is in the extreme—it's false WP:BALANCE. And no, I don't just mean Europe. There are plenty of modern, "westernized" countries in South America, Central America, North America (e.g. Canada), the Indian Subcontinent, Australia, New Zealand, etc, in which I'm right in the middle. Even by American standards I'm basically a centrist so long as we aren't defining the moderate right as the tea party. That there exists extreme right wingers in the US who hold power does not shift the mean that far to the right for the rest of the world. N^oformation ^Talk 01:09, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment: while some people are being specific about the target of the Topic Ban, others are not. The subheading is simply "topic ban" - does that refer to QuackGuru, Bullrangifer, Arzel - or all three? StAnselm (talk) 23:56, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• Comment. I haven’t evaluated his edits enough to see whether they individually have merit or are POV violations and I remember ArbCom didn’t find any fault with his edits in the Tea Party case. I will say, however, that the pattern of practically only involve themselves in political controversies (mostly in the form of reverts) is concerning and something that the community should discourage; based on Arzel’s latest edits, I see few signs of Arze actually building the encyclopedia in the form of content building or useful maintainance. Iselilja (talk) 00:17, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

If his edits have merit, then what's the problem with him focusing on his area of interest and expertise? And if we're going to start discouraging people from focusing on political articles, I have no confidence that Wkkipedia would end up doing so in a politically neutral way.Anythingyouwant (talk) 00:23, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

It’s not the fact that he focuses on politics that is a problem; but that he only involves himself in contentious articles/disputes. There is a lot of articles within the field of politics that could need improvement and that a willing and constructive editor would be able to improve without getting into conflicts all the time. Iselilja (talk) 00:37, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

If Wikipedia would like to deal with a particularly contentious article "X" by saying that no one may make more than ten (10) non-minor edits to that article per week, or something like that, then fine. Everyone who exceeds the limit would get topic-banned. No problem. But to select particular editors for that treatment seems inapt.Anythingyouwant (talk) 02:54, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose as retaliatory. GregJackP Boomer! 00:38, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose all sanctions per insufficient evidence. Very few diffs have been provided; the accusations of tag-teaming don't seem to have any substance. Also close this thread since people have been supporting and opposing a very ill-defined topic ban. It has not been made clear who is supposed to be banned. Anyone who supports a ban is welcome to open a new thread with proper diffs. StAnselm (talk) 01:39, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support topic ban of Arzel on all subjects related to American politics, broadly construed (including talk pages, where much of their disruption occurs), per MastCell and several others. Arzel's focus isn't the main problem, but their consistent pattern of whitewashing by deleting properly sourced content, often using the bogus "biased source" excuse, which is against policy. We use biased sources here. Period. Without them we would have no articles about controversies, and we would be violating NPOV by not covering all significant sides of any controversy. Arzel simply lacks competence to edit because of their consistent failure to UNDERSTAND our RS policy, and consistent failure to LEARN when repeatedly told how to apply it. Having a political POV is okay, but when it controls their editing, as it does here, instead of letting the RS control it, we have a POV warrior, and we don't need anymore of them. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:59, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose any topic ban of Arzel. Just noticed this in looking over the accusation against me. Normally I try to avoid this page since I'm not a particularly litigious toward fellow editors. What's going on here? Some sort attempt to purge politically conservative editors? Nasty business. Don't know the specifics of this situation but looking at BullRangifer's comment above I see that he's on one of his If you don't agree with me about Wikipedia policy you are not a true Wikipedian rants. To address his point. Sure, we can use clearly politically biased sources at times but that doesn't free us to ignore other rules and guidelines. We still prefer more neutral sources to less neutral ones for factual information and we still observe due weight in crafting our articles. Badmintonhist (talk) 03:35, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Nowhere have I said that you have to agree with me; just agree with policy. There are just some very fundamental policies and attitudes which are required of experienced editors which demonstrate that they have competence and are able to edit in an NPOV manner, none of which require using sources without a POV or bias. We use biased sources all the time. When in doubt, we attribute them and frame the content properly, but simply deleting them because they are "biased" (Arzel's favorite excuse) is not according to policy. That's policy he's disagreeing with, not me. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:52, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

NOPE. What you are really saying is agree with my understanding of Wikipedia policy and I have no reason to believe that your understanding of Wikipedia policy is any better than Arzel's. Badmintonhist (talk) 06:03, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Duh! Is there any other possibility? Can you name a single person on the planet who doesn't mean it in that manner, including yourself? The important point is that my understanding of policy seems to be backed up by most experienced editors, and it is the consensus of editors which creates and defines our policies. I've been around here (starting with a few years of wikignome IP editing before creating an account) long enough to build that consensus and define some of our policies, IOW I've been here since before some of these policies were even formulated. I can remember when there were less than 500,000 articles on the whole of Wikipedia, in all languages. It was a big day when the English Wikipedia passed the 200,000 article mark. For me it was great to be able to contribute in my English mother tongue, since my daily language had been (and still is) Danish for many years. Those were the days. Things were very different then. Now wikilawyering has taken over and yet we still have editors who are far from newbies, like you and Arzel, who still don't understand basic policies. You should understand these things. Dang, one should be required to pass a Wikipedia Drivers License exam before being allowed to drive here ! (sarcasm) -- Brangifer (talk) 07:24, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Ah the good old days!! Problem is being here from the beginning tends to induce feelings of OWNERSHIP that even great white hunters aren't entitled to. Badmintonhist (talk) 07:46, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment: MMfA is a reliable source and widely referenced by other RS. It's the first time i read claims that MMfA would be biased (above by some users). MMfA is reporting on the content of Fox here and there appears to be nothing wrong with this study. Affords to remove information regarding content evaluation appears disruptive and i don't understand the point. If Fox wants to change their image in those regards they could do this. But hiding facts is just a lame way to enforce an agenda. Prokaryotes (talk) 05:10, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment Although I agree, this is at WP:RSN and should be discussed there. This thread should probably be closed and an RfC/U started. Dougweller (talk) 06:46, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• I tend to agree, but the boomerang has been cast by Arzel (for the umpteenth time at various AN/I threads, all with him losing), and it has definitely circled round and hit him big time again. This time it really needs to end with a topic ban. We can't just drop this and allow him to continue. (BTW, the RS/N consensus is that Arzel is wrong, yet again.) -- Brangifer (talk) 07:31, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• That's a strange thing to say given that the RS/N discussion is trending towards it not being a reliable source. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 12:27, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Okay, this has all become downright confusing, so let's start over and keep things separate (and Badmintonhist, your baiting really isn't helping). Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 08:06, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Oppose any topic ban of Arzel., media matters is about as fair and balanced as fox, using one to sling mud at the other is absurd. [7] by his own admission been a drug user, who has been delusional and who reportedly is playing with guns and thinks there are assassins out to get him Darkstar1st (talk) 14:27, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

What is truly mind-boggling is that you think that adding that link and those comments contributes to this conversation. — goethean 16:32, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Proposal: topic ban for User:Arzel on political articles

• As listed above, I support a topic ban if not on all political articles, just Republican-centered articles. Biased sources are allowed on Wikipedia, whether s/he likes it or not, and s/he has gone to great lengths to challenge anyone who doesn't agree with him/her regardless of consensus; in fact, his/her starting this very thread appears to have made him/her yet another victim of the boomerang. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 08:06, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

By the way, a simple glance at Arzel's user page shows that he identifies as male. StAnselm (talk) 08:16, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose per the reasons I gave above.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 08:11, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Comment- A slightly different TBAN proposal is unlikely to be productive. I suggest closing this entire thread and using a structured RFC/U to present the case. I am going to start drafting something today.- MrX 13:51, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Arzel is an energetic advocate for what he sees as greater neutrality in politically charged articles, opposing the liberal/progressive assumptions that tend to pervade many of them. At base, that is the reason for this politically inspired proposed ban, not any supposed failure on his part to understand Wiki policies. Badmintonhist (talk) 18:13, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
  • "Opposing the liberal/progressive assumptions"? That's exactly my point; Wikipedia is here to show all viewpoints, not just viewpoints that he (or anyone else) specifically likes. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 19:21, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, well I guess I should be more explicit. By "liberal/progressive assumptions that tend to pervade" many articles I mean the tendency of many editors to accept liberal/progressive opinions, and descriptions of fact as the "norm" and thus to be far more hospitable to them than to conservative opinions and descriptions of fact. To be blunt, their tendency to push liberal/progressive sources and to suppress conservative/right-leaning sources. Badmintonhist (talk) 21:33, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose as retaliatory. GregJackP Boomer! 19:38, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support Arzel's central contribution to Wikipedia is to fight against the inclusion of any information he perceives as negative in articles about U.S. conservative individuals, (e.g., Glenn Beck, Ayn Rand, Mitt Romney, Pamela Geller, Mark Levin, Paul Ryan, George Zimmerman, the Koch family) and organizations (e.g., Tea Party Movement, Fox News Channel, the John Birch Society, the Ludwig von Mises Institute, the Christian Right, the United States pro-life movement, the Family Research Council), while supporting the insertion of negative information about individuals (e.g., Paul Krugman) and groups (e.g., the Southern Poverty Law Center, Occupy Wall Street, the Democratic Party (United States)), he perceives to be liberal or left-wing.

His comments archived in the talk pages of the JBS illustrate his reasoning, "I removed the claim of Anti-Science.... If the JBS has as a founding member Fred Koch's then it really doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Chemical Engineering plays a huge role in the petroleum industry. Why in the world would a clearly scientific person like Koch be involved with an anti-science organization?" The JBS opposes climate science, evolution and fluoridation of water.[8]

This editor is unable or unwilling to accept the policies of neutrality and reliability. Accordingly his net contribution is negative and a waste of other editors' time spent in discussion threads.

TFD (talk) 23:20, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Arzel's JBS talk page edit was this:

“ I removed the claim of Anti-Science, which should really have an easily checkable source. Additionally, it fails the face validity check. If the JBS has as a founding member Fred Koch's then it really doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Chemical Engineering plays a huge role in the petroleum industry. Why in the world would a clearly scientific person like Koch be involved with an anti-science organization? Correction, I see Collect was addressing the same issue. Arzel (talk) 20:39, 10 October 2011 (UTC) ”

I admonish TFD for deliberately omitting the hoary nature of this evidence, and for carefully tailoring the quote of Arzel to omit this critical part that supports Arzel: "which should really have an easily checkable source", and also for omitting the last sentence indicating that Arzel was not alone. Next time, please try to be straightforward, and just lay out the pertinent facts, both pro and con.

Here is Arzel reverting the material in the article, with the following edit summary: "Undid revision 454921525 by Will Beback (talk)Claims like that need to be easily checked." Indeed, the footnote that Arzel deleted gave no page number and no link to the claim that the JBS was "anti-science".

It so happens that the cited source is now online here. The "anti-science" assertion was in reference to fluoridation, so Arzel's revert would have been 100% correct even if the footnote had provided a page number and link (which it did not). Whoever made the anti-science assertion with that footnoted source should not have tried to generalize beyond the context. Arzel was not alone in making that objection, as anyone can see from reading the Wikipedia histories.

Obviously, both Arzel's talk page comment as well as his article edit were supported by much more than his out- of-context remark that "Why in the world would a clearly scientific person like Koch be involved with an anti-science organization?"Anythingyouwant (talk) 23:59, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

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

Disruptive editing from University of Adelaide IPs

A few days ago, Gareth E Kegg reported longstanding disruptive editing from many IPs to Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and as a result the article was protected. It has become clear that this is not the only article targeted by this vandal, who is using IPs in Australia, many of them on the servers of the University of Adelaide.

Articles affected include Women in the United Arab Emirates, Addams Family Reunion, Thing (The Addams Family), Indian, Diana, Princess of Wales, Mercedes-Benz W140 and several others, all of which have seen repeated identical disruptive edits from the same IPs. IPs making these edits have included 129.127.54.164 (talk · contribs), 2403:7900:ADE1:A1DE:250:56FF:FEA6:3B1F (talk · contribs), 2002:817F:36A3:0:0:0:817F:36A3 (talk · contribs), 2403:7900:ADE1:A1DE:250:56FF:FEA6:404 (talk · contribs) 129.127.54.163 (talk · contribs), 129.127.54.168 (talk · contribs) (all tracing back to the University of Adelaide), 203.26.123.208 (talk · contribs) (tracing back to the Office of the Chief Information Officer in Adelaide), 203.122.223.123 (talk · contribs), 203.39.81.8 (talk · contribs), 150.101.89.130 (talk · contribs) (other Australian IPs) and many more.

It is evident from the nature of these edits (which have been repeatedly reverted by numerous editors) and the location of these IPs that these are all the woerk of one obsessive vandal, probably working or studying at the University of Adelaide. Is there any action which can usefully be taken to stem this time-consuming disruption?

Yeah… either semi-protection if it's just these articles being vandalized, or blocking if it's just these IP users who are abusive. Or a combination of these, if it's a whole range of users vandalizing a lot of articles. Epicgenius (talk) 18:20, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

There are several more articles, and an apparently inexhaustible series of IPs. So semi-protection may be a better option. But I wonder, since so many of these are from the University of Adelaide and one is from the state government, whether these institutions can/should be contacted about misuse of their service? RolandR (talk) 19:59, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) I think that, from the list here, that some IP addresses can be at least rangeblocked (e.g. 129.127.54.161/29). Others would have to be plain old tag-and-bag blocks. Semi-protection may be appropriate to the articles most vandalized by these IP users. Epicgenius (talk) 03:20, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

A charge of wikihounding**

Lukeno94 (talk · contribs) feels they're being hounded by Jaggee (talk · contribs). This all started with an ANI thread, now archived at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive824, "URGENT: potential serious copyright policy violation". Jaggee is a new editor who noted a possible problem in an article Luke had been working on; a somewhat lengthy thread with some animosities was closed without action toward either editor. As a result, Jaggee made various comments on their user page (now changed, but see this version). It is noteworthy that they took the supposed copyvio to ANI, claiming that's what WP:DCV suggested they do--but read Jaggee's talk page, "A second welcome to Wikipedia", where I remarked that this is the last thing it suggests, not the first. The only article edits Jaggee has made were to that particular article, Allard J2X-C-- Luke's work, and passed as a GA by Resolute. They they went on to comment on that article's talk page and on a related thread at WP:RSN ("Car racing websites"), pertaining to a DYK nomination by Luke. They made no other edits besides on my talk page and a few others, nothing in article space.

Further unpleasantries are found on my talk page, where you may find Luke being a bit brusque, accusing Jaggee of being a sock (that evidence does not yet need to be hashed out here, in my opinion). But essentially, it seems to me that Jaggee indeed has no other interest as of yet besides Luke's work, and that fits our definition of hounding, a type of harassment:

Wikihounding is the singling out of one or more editors, and joining discussions on multiple pages or topics they may edit or multiple debates where they contribute, in order to repeatedly confront or inhibit their work. This is with an apparent aim of creating irritation, annoyance or distress to the other editor. Wikihounding usually involves following the target from place to place on Wikipedia.

Both LadyofShalott and I suggested that each find their separate corners in which to edit, so to speak, advice that Jaggee did not follow given their edits to RSN, for instance, and what I am asking for here is confirmation that this means that Jaggee should find another corner, not one where Luke is already editing. This shouldn't be a difficult thing to do given the large number of corners available. Thank you. Drmies (talk) 18:19, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• I'm perfectly happy to have myself and Jaggee kept separate, as I've said publicly a few times. Maybe that way I'll be able to return to editing in peace (or be able to take a break in peace, equally) Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 18:26, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• (ec) I affirm my prior advice, which as Drmies points out has not been heeded. Luke seems to want to stay away from Jaggee, but the reverse is not true. Perhaps a formal interaction ban is what is needed. LadyofShalott 18:27, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
• I had previously given Jaggee similar advice, likewise not taken. Perhaps indeed it needs to be set up as an editing restriction. Yngvadottir (talk) 19:12, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Luke feels they're the one being hounded?!

Luke on Jaggee at Talk:Allard_J2X-C yesterday: "Wrong, and since you're only here to disrupt this article, you've yet again failed to look into anything. " (and more of the same in the past).

I don't know Jaggee from a hole in the road. But I do know that we have AGF. They're also a new editor. Even if they have acted entirely wrongly and excessively over the very minor off-wiki copyvio issue in this article, they have acted reasonably over that issue. Their actions could be mistaken, over-reactions and mis-placed, but while there is the slightest belief that they are a new editor trying to find their way through the impenetrable forest of WP:ALLCAPS, then we have to give them leeway to get it right or wrong, as best they can. We DO NOT leap on them and accuse them of being bad faith socks, troll and Luke-taunters. Even if they are, we have a strong policy that we act to editors as being genuine, until it's demonstrated beyond doubt that they aren't. Yes, this lets us be exploited by the real trolls from time to time. It's also overall a key means for us to improve access for genuine new editors (which I still do believe Jaggee to be).

Jaggee: please find some motor-racing articles to work on that are some distance from Luke. I'm sure this will improve the editing experience for both of you.

Luke: please lay off Jaggee and act as if they're genuine. I can't ask you to believe this, but please act towards them as you would towards any GF editor. If they're not, lots of other people will spot it as well, so don't worry about it.

Andy Dingley (talk) 19:15, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• I refuse to act like I'm blind, deaf and dumb; which is how I would have to act to assume Jaggee was new. Everything they have done screams of a returning editor, and things well beyond your own involvement have furthered that case. Don't forget that other users have expressed their own doubts, or, in the case of User:Beyond My Ken, completely agreeing with my analysis of the situation. If Jaggee is a new editor, then I'm Bill Clinton. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 19:21, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Also, yes, I am the one being hounded. Everywhere they've visited has been either somewhere I've already contributed in, or something directly related to something I've been involved in. I haven't followed them anywhere. To claim otherwise is ludicrous. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 19:26, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Andy, you are essentially asking for the same thing I'm proposing here. That initial ANI thread, pshaw, not the biggest deal. It's the rest of it, the recent edits, that brought me here. If it hadn't been for those Luke wouldn't have had any reason to say anything but as it is, I think they are right to feel as if someone is breathing down their neck. Drmies (talk) 19:37, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

This is a very one-sided account of my, so far, short career as a registered Wikipedia editor.

On my first day, I spotted a potential copyright policy violation in Allard J2X-C. My first edit, a nervous and hesitant attempt, to alert those responsible to what I thought was a serious problem in that article, was totally reverted - as "Unconstructive and unhelpful."! Determined to right the wrong, and after reading through numerous paragraphs of dense policy text, I stumbled across the suggestion that, if the "contributor has been previously clearly warned of copyright infringement but persisted", as was clearly the case here, the contributor should be "reported for administrator attention to the administrators' incidents noticeboard" - which was exactly what I therefore did - with my second edit.

One well informed administrator, ignoring the pleas from those ignorant of copyright principles and without even a working knowledge of the applicable Wikipedia policy, did take the initiative - and swiftly purged the article of the dodgy material, thus vindicating my action. Note that Lukeno94 continued his fight to keep it though.

What followed was an astonishing series of personal attacks against me, including a tirade of irreverent bile peppered with puerile profanities from Lukeno94. I won't quote them here, but here are links to a few of them: [9], [10], [11], [12].

Upon viewing further results of a search of links to mulsannescorner.com, I came across discussions about another articles (Template:Did you know nominations/Lavaggi LS1 and [13]) which also involved Lukeno94. Having seen the comments about the ureliability of the website, I added it to this discussion. That addition was swiftly pounced on and bad-mindely removed by Lukeno94. I added it back the next day, convinced I was right, but was again [14] swiftly reverted by Lukeno94 (note the inflammatory summary). Another editor restored my point, vindicating my action.

Lukeno94 seems to be paranoid that I am "hounding" him. I AM NOT, I don't know (or care to know) him from Adam. What I am doing is highlighting poor use of poor references, nothing more. And I am beginning to regret signing up now. But this storm in a tea cup has aroused suspicions of cover-ups and back-scratching too, and I am not going to be intimidated it. Lukeno94 seems to be here to boost his ego, not to create great, policy compliant, articles, and I think he needs a serious slap on the wrist for reacting so badly when his infallibility is challenged. Jaggee (talk) 20:23, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

If you stay away from each other, and agree to report any issues like the previous copyright issue to an uninvolved administrator, we can put this to bed pretty quickly. Nick (talk) 20:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

My only interest, so far, is the use of the mulsannescorner.com website as a reference, whether Lukeno is involved with it, or not. Jaggee (talk) 20:34, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Plus, I'll happily contribute via an intermediary - if you can name one or tell me where to find one. Jaggee (talk) 20:46, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Jaggee, if I have to put together a comprehensive report of how you are clearly a returning user here just to abuse me, then I will do so. Until then, you can drop the lies like the one about how you came across the DYK nomination; you didn't edit for four days, and yet magically cropped up again to appear there. Just like you've lied to several admins; claiming you want no further part in this and would disengage. If you want me to take you apart piece by piece, then I can put together a case that will make it obvious that you are not legitimate. I have an idea of a couple of people who you could be, but that doesn't actually matter. I never claimed to be infallible; in fact, at the very beginning, I stated that had you actually come to talk to me with the issue, then there would've been no problem. Instead, you didn't, and you've made it ever more apparent that your claim to be a new user is a flat-out lie. And I'm not even the one who initially used the term "hounding". "contributor has been previously clearly warned of copyright infringement but persisted" is a flat out lie as well; I received no warning, and in no way can a template in an article count as a warning; but then you know that already. Just one more example of your lies. I've made thousands of good contributions here; you can justifiably claim one, so who is the egotistical one, acting as if they know better than everyone else? Is it myself, who has admitted to mistakes, or is it the "new" user who acts like they know policy inside-out and has only ever edited in things involving me? I wonder.
• And claiming that to be your only interest is a lie. Claiming that I have some involvement in the website is beyond a joke. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 20:41, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

That is nothing more than additional unnecessary, and to be ignored, intimidation. And no, you can't convince us that I am accusing you of being involved with that website, just of being involved with some of the articles that have used it. Calm down - stand back and look at look at my modest contributions again - then review your (over)reactions. Perhaps you do need a break from this. Jaggee (talk) 20:56, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I think both of you need to stay away from each other as much as possible. While Luke is obviously frustrated by the fact that Jaggee, currently a single-purpose account, is stalking him (which can be verified by a quick look at the latter's contribs), Luke has also been rough towards Jaggee as evidenced by his comments regarding the latter. Epicgenius (talk) 04:35, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• I'd be perfectly happy for that to happen (particularly when I'm not dangerously overtired, like I was yesterday). I have no problem with genuine editors bringing up issues in things I've done; but I strongly object to this SPA. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 12:04, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

@Jaggee: - either disengage and edit in other areas, or you will be blocked as a disruptive single purpose account. Your smug, patronising tone towards Luke is not welcome here and is unnecessary. I'd suggest giving you a week to demonstrate you're happy to edit constructively without following Luke around or editing the same content (although I'm going to stop short of a full topic ban since we don't really know your editing interests). If we don't see any evidence you're capable of normal editing, I'd propose we indefinitely block your account.

The issue you raised has been dealt with and resolved, administrators are aware of what has happened and Luke will undoubtedly take more care in future not to link to a potential copyright violating content, so there's no need for further action. If you do have any other issues you wish to report in connection with Luke, I'm happy to handle them as an uninvolved administrator. Nick (talk) 12:25, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

That sounds like nothing more than gratuitous victim blaming. This is not a "single purpose account", in your sense anyway. This is an account that, after spotting, and reporting, a violation, has been blamed, victimised, vilified and dragged through the streets. And for those reasons alone, I have not had a chance to spread my wings, yet, and now you seem to be seriously suggesting they be clipped, and an artificial restriction applied, because another editor cannot control his own temper and behave civilly towards someone who has criticised his work here.

Btw, thanks for the offer to handle the issues with Lukeno - perhaps you will look at the other unresolved issues that I have already raised. Jaggee (talk) 22:32, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• We've had plenty of people contribute here saying that Jaggee should disengage from me; can someone wrap this up with some kind of binding solution? I really don't care if the ban is one way or two way; I just want to be able to contribute effectively in peace, or actually take a break. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 19:30, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
  • It's probable that Nick's warning above is about the best you're going to get at the moment - but you've now got an uninvolved admin keeping an eye on his editing, which should help. BMK, Grouchy Realist (talk) 21:38, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Proposal

Propose interaction ban between Jaggee (talk · contribs) and Lukeno94 (talk · contribs) (listed alphabetically) to expire 30 days three months after imposition.

The purpose of an interaction ban is to stop a conflict between two or more editors that cannot be otherwise resolved from getting out of hand and disrupting the work of others. Although the editors are generally allowed to edit the same pages or discussions as long as they avoid each other, they are not allowed to interact with each other in any way. For example, if editor X is banned from interacting with editor Y, editor X is not permitted to:

• edit editor Y's user and user talk space;
• reply to editor Y in discussions;
• make reference to or comment on editor Y anywhere on Wikipedia, whether directly or indirectly;
• undo editor Y's edits to any page (whether by use of the revert function or by other means).

• Support as proposer. As a general rule, I don't think ibans are the best tool in the wiki toolbox -- hence the suggested expiration date -- but I think one might be useful in this situation. NE Ent 21:53, 11 January 2014 (UTC) (amended 14:50, 12 January 2014 (UTC))
• Support interaction ban, but make it longer (probably three months initially, I wouldn't entirely be adverse to an indefinite one), and obviously clarify that this means Jaggee needs to not snoop around my edits and attempt to create more drama, not that it just means they cannot contact me, or directly edit an article/article's talk page that I have already edited, or have written. Obviously, the same would happen in reverse. Anything to remove potential loopholes that they could use to carry on the abuse that has genuinely been making my life a misery for the last few days, and has taken out all of the enjoyment I had editing. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 21:58, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Time period adjusted. Oppose any modification of standard iban terms. NE Ent 22:33, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• A few more have voted since the 3-fold increase, so "adjusted" time again to the next order of magnitude - as there is very clearly an appetite for revenge here. Jaggee (talk) 09:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• I'm not proposing any modification, I'm proposing a clarification. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 22:41, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose as that would be pandering to the wish of the bullies. I found fault, and am being vilified as a direct result. The main aggressor here would, in effect, be protected against further similar, vindicated, scrutiny. Jaggee (talk) 22:17, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• You found one thing that was a grey area, and have hounded me ever since, trying to make out as if I am the biggest sinner on the planet/project. And that's disregarding anything regarding the true nature of your identity. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 22:38, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

That's bollocks, and you know it. Shame on you for behaving so sanctimoniously and playing to the gallery the way that you are. Jaggee (talk) 22:46, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Well, what else have you done? Pointed out that someone else was unsure about the reliability of a source, which was something I was already aware of, and that source is on a list of reliable sources for the Motorsport WikiProject? Those are literally the only two things you have done, that aren't purely hounding me. That's not "playing to the gallery", that's the facts, sunshine. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 22:52, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not what else I have done - it's that I have not done most of what you claim I've done. Yet many here seen prepared to swallow your apparently intentionally misleading account without question. And it is the clear clamour for blood here that you are playing to, with your ever more deceitful contributions. Jaggee (talk) 23:01, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Supprt - speaking as someone who a few days ago told them to find separate corners of this very large website in which to edit. LadyofShalott 22:50, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support - @Luke: I believe the standard interpretation of an interactive ban will cover your concerns. BMK, Grouchy Realist (talk) 02:36, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support Jaggee is clearly the aggressor in this case; Luke's frustration and occasional bluntness is understandable. Jaggee's combative refusal to accept any fault at all - his recent changes to his user page make clear that he thinks he is being baited and bullied by the community - are a bit much even for a new user. The community ought to think about penalties should the interaction ban be violated, as a deterrent. MezzoMezzo (talk) 04:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I still see this as just as much about bullying by Luke as I do about any hounding by Jaggee. If such an interaction ban were introduced, then it would first of all exclude Jaggee from motorsport, an area that's obviously of great interest to both of them. That's an excessive restriction on such a flimsy accusation. Secondly, I just don't trust Luke to act with a reasonable collegiate approach to Jaggee under such a restriction. It's all too easy for such a ban to be used as a very one-sided future excuse to drag Jaggee back to ANI on the slightest pretext, blowing that up into "Already banned user disrespected the state of WP by abusing his ban conditions", the crime of lèse majesté that is one of the few things WP ever does act upon. Such an action is unlikely to work against an established editor like Luke, but it's a very common way for new editors to be driven off the project. Just look at Spmdr (talk · contribs) who was hounded off for disagreeing with Luke over the Sunbeam Tiger article. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:49, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Yawn, change the record. No-one was hounded off at the Sunbeam Tiger article, and I wasn't the only one being highly sceptical of the claims made by this user. In fact, I wasn't even doing any hounding at all, so you can cut that bullshit claim out right now; most of my comments were made to you, and I reverted a grand total of once. Thanks for reminding me exactly why you're holding a grudge against me, though! Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 14:31, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• And I am so guilty of hounding Spmdr that my name appears a grand total of 0 times on their talk page, whilst the other editor disputing their sources, and who was rather more active in reverting their edits, has 10 mentions (including one comment by Eric). So you're as bad as telling the truth as Jaggee is... Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 14:34, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• It would not exclude Jaggee from any topic area. As there seems to be a misunderstanding of the terms of a iban, I've copy-pasted the applicable text from the policy to the top of the thread. NE Ent 14:50, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• The problem is, as the wording stands, it would still allow Jaggee to come and manipulate articles I have written, and I would then be unable to remove the changes if they were detrimental (like adding in maintenance tags that have been resolved - I couldn't remove those, and would have to get a third-party involved), and this would worsen the existing situation, in some ways. This is why the user should be restricted from editing any article (but be free to edit the talk page) which I've had a heavy involvement in, and the reverse would be true as well. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 14:54, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• As is often the case, the "letter of the law" hasn't quite caught up to actual practice. There have been several instances where an editor has followed another editor's contributions to various articles where the first editor had never worked before, and, without actually deleting or changing the second editor's contributions, has edited the article. This behavior has then been found to be a violation of the IBAN, as an indirect form of WP:WIKIHOUNDING. It's like having a 150-foot order of protection, and the person shows up and stands exactly 151 feet away over and over again. It's not a violation of the order, and it may not be something that the law can deal with easily, but we're not a legal system and we can make - and have made - the determination that such behavior is a violation of the purpose of the ban. BMK: Grouchy Realist (talk) 17:59, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• I guess that'll do then. I would also like Andy to stop spreading lies, but that's his prerogative for now - at least I've stated the truth in public about that situation (it's a long-term grudge that he seems to hold). Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 19:24, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Luke, please back off. I don't think your continued comments are helping any of this either. LadyofShalott 22:29, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

He has reverted to type. Anyone who takes the trouble to look-up the history to this case against me will see that his belligerent response to my naive first edit was the root cause of all this. He came over all indignant since, but it was all a front I'm sure. He is not able to handle criticism civilly and is thus not cut-out for this type of work where close cooperation is necessary. Jaggee (talk) 22:45, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Jaggee. Seriously, you thought that was an invitation to get in another dig? Both. Of. You. Need. To. Stop. Acting. Like. Children. LadyofShalott 22:59, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• This is less than I proposed, I guess, but I will support this at a minimum. Drmies (talk) 15:12, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikihounding by User:Sobiepan

User:Sobiepan follows and removes my edits within seconds (e.g.[15], please take a look at his last 100 edits, most of them are removals of edits I made [16]). Gives no explanation for his behavior and removes all kind of warnings from his talkpage [17] [18]. HerkusMonte (talk) 21:11, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Comment: Please check the contribution of this user... https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions/HerkusMonte&offset=&limit=500&target=HerkusMonte That will explain my edits... ---Sobiepan (talk) 21:15, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:HerkusMonte/Archive_1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:HerkusMonte/Archive_2

...and his aggressive and offending behavior...--Sobiepan (talk) 21:15, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

A link to my archived talkpage - what is this supposed to say? Sobiepan started hounding me right after I sent him a "Gdansk vote notice" [19] about the practice of double/foreign names regarding towns in Poland. HerkusMonte (talk) 21:23, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Diffs? The archive shows us nothing, although a look at your contributions shows a blanket unexplained reversion of helpful contributions (like this, mostly removing the German language translations) while completely ignoring warnings. Admiral Caius (talk) 21:30, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Edits made by HerkusMonte are not helpful. Its your POV. BTW the Gdansk vote ends in no consensus.--Sobiepan (talk) 21:41, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

And it's just as unhelpful for you to be removing these additions all over the place without discussing your removals. For the lazy: Sobiepan wants to keep the German names for locations that are now within modern Poland out of the locations' articles. Much of HerkusMonte's work appears to be adding these names. I literally couldn't care less about German names for what are now Polish towns, but merely reverting the additions and not attempting to discuss this with the other editor is disruptive. 205.166.218.66 (talk) 22:00, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree, but the questions is: why is he doing that? His edits are not in good faith. Please see his contribution and talk page.--Sobiepan (talk) 22:19, 10 January 2014 (UTC)--

This is not the case of wikihounding. Wikihounding is personal retaliation by meritless contesting conrtibutions at random. In this case it is clearly localized content dispute similar to Gdanzig. While Sobiepan should have started discussion somewhere instead of reverting German name everywhere, this is not a civility/personal attack issue. Staszek Lem (talk) 22:03, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

P.S. this kind of communication by HercusMonte was hardly helpful for content dispute. Staszek Lem (talk) 22:06, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Thats the reason why I removed his comments (warnings) left on my talk page.--Sobiepan (talk) 22:10, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Few examples of HerkusMonte problems with other users in the past:[20], [21], [22], [23], [24]

"while completely ignoring warnings. " - which is not prohibited, see [25] - Interesting that you are doing the same only 6 min after your comments here... see: [26] --Sobiepan (talk) 22:43, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Reverting every addition of the German name isn't constructive. The two of you need to actually discuss this. Discuss this on a talk page, go to WP:DRN, create an WP:RFC, whatever. Stop just blindly reverting these additions; at least provide some sort of rationale for why you're doing what you're doing. 205.166.218.66 (talk) 22:28, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

The above does seem to echo a bitter taste of censoring for whatever the reason might be. What we feel individually as contributors or editors is not relevant in Wikipedia articles. The question is what the "reader" wants. A person, who perhaps has a German place name at hand, maybe found in personal historical records, will throw that place name in a search engine and see what it throws up. If Wikipedia can come up with the answer and/or additional information and say it is the former German place name for the now Polish village or town of... then that IS valuable to the reader. Nightsturm (talk) 06:23, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

In my opinion HerkusMonte should be banned from editing on Poland related articles (which are 95% of his edits...). His mass edits seems to have nationalistic reasons... of what importance are the German names of small Polish villages (with few residents) which never played a role in the history? Of no importance for a reader--Sobiepan (talk) 07:24, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

It is a well-established practice (compliant with WP:PLACE) to mention the German names of towns and villages in Poland which had been part of Germany until WWII. I don't do this for "nationalistic reasons" but I learned here at wikipedia that many Polish nationalists would prefer to suppress such facts. All my messages had been removed by Sobiepan from his talkpage, he never gave a rational for his edits and is obviously not interested in any kind of discussion. Instead he continued and reverted my edits.

How exactly am I supposed to react when a user refuses to discuss or explain his edits, follows me around and blindly reverts literally every single edit I make? I would call that WP:Vandalism but just learned that I'm wrong[27]. However, such kind of behavior shouldn't be tolerated. HerkusMonte (talk) 08:40, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Meanwhile Sobiepan has reported me for "vandalism" because I sent him messages and used his talkpage without his permission [28]. HerkusMonte (talk) 09:15, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

towns and villages in Poland which had been part of Germany until WWII - Thats not correct. Before 1945 they had been part of several states including the Kingdom of Poland and Duchies which were ruled by the Polish Piast...--Sobiepan (talk) 11:04, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Example of HerkusMonte offensive behavior: He reverted my user talk page 2 times within 30 min without my permission and left aggressive comments, which should be considered as vandalism according to [29]. After I removed his comment on my talk page:[30], he 1. attacked me [31], 2. reverted my talk page [32] 3. reverted my talk page [33]--Sobiepan (talk) 10:56, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Ok, this has become childish.

1. Regardless of the merits of the addition of German/Polish names, WP:BRD exists for a reason, so follow it;
2. If you accuse someone of vandalism when it's not, you're going to piss them off - so understand the definitions, please;
3. A good faith warning is NOT a personal attack;
4. When an editor removes a warning from their talkpage, that's explicit notice that it's been read - do not re-add it, and especially do not edit-war to re-add it

Neither of you have shone in this situation - in fact, you've both acted pretty dimly, and your sniping at each other on this very board is simply a continuation of the same. ES&L 11:05, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Just for your info, HerkusMonte accused me firstly of vandalism (including for reverts on my own talk page...)...[34]--Sobiepan (talk) 11:11, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Obviously, I know that. My statements above are not directed at either of you individually, but both of you collectively. Learn from them and move on. Recognize that now you're both being watched now, so act like adults, and go forth and edit ES&L 11:25, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Still wonder how one should react, when your edits are reverted within seconds without any explanation and all warnings ignored. Regarding Sobipan's talkpage - I wasn't aware of WP:BLANKING, sorry for that. HerkusMonte (talk) 11:47, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with you it is childish. HerkusMonte continuing the revert war today... which shows his real intentions: [35]--Sobiepan (talk) 12:01, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes Sobie, you just proved that you're acting just as childishly. For frick sakes, would the both of you just STOP trying to get the last word in here, and go off and behave? This is NOT fricking rocket science. You've been told how to proceed - now proceed and shut up. ES&L 12:37, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

user:Arms Jones and abuse of non-free media

I have removed non-free files from Gallery of country coats of arms several times, and Arms has continued to re-insert them against our policy of non-free files in galleries, the user has show that they do not understand WP:NFCC the user neither needs blocked or given a clue. Werieth (talk) 21:27, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

These images are not non-free in the manner you mean. To use them in this form of gallery is fair use. Read the fair use information on the file page for each image. I do understand WP:NFCC; it seems you don't. If fair use is not deemed applicable for some of the images in this gallery, then the same goes for all of them and the gallery should be deleted totally. Arms Jones (talk) 21:32, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

The files that I left are free, all non-free files where removed. Werieth (talk) 21:33, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

The use of them in that gallery is fair use, even if the images would be non-free. Arms Jones (talk) 21:36, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia's policy on non-free media is far more strict than fair use law. According to our policies the files cannot be used. Werieth (talk) 21:39, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Please explain why you do that interpretation of the policies, since that is not what the policies say, at least not explicitly. Arms Jones (talk) 21:47, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Kick it to WP: NFCR (Non-administrator comment) Whether the image is valid or not is not appropriate for this noticeboard; take it to WP: NFCR to discuss that. Otherwise, I see nothing actionable here. Admiral Caius (talk) 21:43, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

What is actionable is Werieth violating 1RR on image reverts. He is not permitted to revert more than once on images because of prior edit warring but nevertheless he did so on Gallery of country coats of arms. freshacconci talk to me 21:53, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• This is a clear case violation. WP:NFCR is kinda pointless, its just one user refusing to follow policy. Werieth (talk) 21:45, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

  This is in no way a "clear case" violation. Arms Jones (talk) 21:48, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Of course, this is an easy fix and doesn't require a ANI report, but someone likes drama. Any image on the coat of arms page that is not public domain can have a fair use rationale added. In the context of Gallery of country coats of arms, that is acceptable. The policy is not black and white as Werieth claims. There's always ways to work things out. Rather than deleting the images from the page, the rationale can be altered or added. The Canadian coat of arms file is a good example. It has a fair use rationale for one page. Simply copy that for Gallery of country coats of arms. WP:NFCC clearly says that is acceptable. Stating that using images in a gallery is limited does not make sense in this particular article, since it is a gallery, in and of itself. If Werieth doesn't like the article, he can take it to AFD. freshacconci talk to me 21:50, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

• Adding a template to a file page isnt some magic way of ignoring WP:NFCC. Usage of non-free media in galleries has nothing to do with rationales. Werieth (talk) 21:53, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

"A file with a valid non-free-use rationale for some (but not all) articles it is used in will not be deleted. Instead, the file should be removed from the articles for which it lacks a non-free-use rationale, or a suitable rationale added." [Bold mine]. Have you ever actually read that link you plaster everywhere? freshacconci talk to me 21:58, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

The issue has nothing to do with rationales, That refers to WP:NFCC#10c, I am making reference to other WP:NFCC points (specifically 1,3,8). Yes if the only issue was 10c then you may have an argument, however in this case it has nothing to do with 10c and the other points. Werieth (talk) 22:24, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Again, reading comprehension. What I quoted is under "enforcement" and has to do with all the numbered points, not just 10c. Do you believe that because it falls right after the last numbered point? Seriously? freshacconci talk to me 22:44, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually because it has to do with rationales, which is what point 10 covers. Other points address different issues. Werieth (talk) 22:49, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Yup - Wikipedia:Non-free content is a guideline, not a policy. It states that "The use of non-free images arranged in a gallery or tabular format is usually unacceptable, but should be considered on a case-by-case basis. Exceptions should be very well-justified and alternate forms of presentation (including with fewer images) strongly considered." I'd say that 'considering' it needs to be done at WP:NFCR before anything else is done - the onus is on Arms Jones to provide a valid justification for use though. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:52, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I could have cited WP:NFCC#1,3,8 (policy) which is what WP:NFG tries to explain in those cases. Werieth (talk) 21:54, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

As has been pointed out to you by multiple editors umpteen times, NFCC is not black and white. There is room for negotiation but for the mall cop who likes to prattle on about "policy" without actually understanding it and is only interested in deleting stuff, I guess pointing it out again is fruitless. freshacconci talk to me 22:03, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Some areas can easily be negotiated, this is not one of them, This is a purely decorative article in which non-free files will not meet WP:NFCC#8 Werieth (talk) 22:31, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

According to you and your interpretation. Your interpretation is not the final word (I can't believe I have to actually say that). #8 reads in full: "Non-free content is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the article topic, and its omission would be detrimental to that understanding." Arms Jones is arguing that its omission would be detrimental and I agree with her. Again, we are talking about our individual interpretations. None of us, including you have a single voice in this matter. Stop throwing guidelines and policy around as if you have the only correct point of view because you definitely do not and your interpretation leaves much to be desired. freshacconci talk to me 22:40, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

How is removal detrimental to understanding the article text when that text consists of 43 words and zero sources? Links to the primary articles on the coat of arms would serve the same educational purpose (failing WP:NFCC#1), usage on additional articles fails WP:NFCC#3. Just because you prefer non-free eye candy doesnt mean that it is acceptable under policy. Werieth (talk) 22:47, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

If you don't like the article, take it to AFD. But I suspect it's the drama you really like. I've never worked on that article, so my likes or dislikes do not enter into it. You have violated 1RR, you had many, many other options to choose from when dealing with this, and the simplest and least argumentative choice would have been to add proper rationales. But again, the drama seems to lure you. Oh well. (And really, you do need to listen to pretty much everyone else that there are differences between policy, guidelines and in both cases, there's wiggle-room, (i.e. WP:IAR -- which is policy. D'oh!) freshacconci talk to me 23:10, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

To be fair to Werieth, based on past discussions on non-free galleries, he's probably right that this page fails policy and this would not be an exception case of allowing non-free galleries. But there is wiggle room and the point should have been discussed first before edit warring over it. --MASEM (t) 23:24, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

The article is a gallery of the coats of arms of the sovereign nations of the world. To show the coats of arms of all the sovereign nations of the world there is encyclopedic and fair use, just like the use of flag images is in the correspondent gallery of flags and the use of portraits is on lists of people. Werieth is not reading the policies thoroughly or seems at least not interested in explaining the interpretation made. Arms Jones (talk) 22:00, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Such visual galleries (free or not) are generally not appropriate on WP in the first place; it harms accessibility and if there's no content going along with it, it's just excessive (per WP:IG); a link to a Commons category for the free CoA would be appropriate. And of course, the NFC side, this is a pretty cut and dried invalid use of non-free in galleries when it's just a giant index/navigation page without any contextual information. That said, it is not a 3RR exception from editing, and the matter should have been brought to NFCR to review first. Assuming NFCR closed as for removal of non-free, and Arms continued to reinsert, then Werieth would have reason to break 3RR per the consensus. --MASEM (t) 22:51, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Thats why I brought it here, this is a clear case of multiple NFCC failures and a user who refuses to get the point. Instead of taking it further I brought it here. Werieth (talk) 22:55, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, as pointed out, fairly by others, NFG is not policy, so you shouldn't be edit warring, even if I'm 99% sure that at NFCR we would have agreed for removal. No NFCR has happened so this is technically edit warring without the appropriate NFC exception. --MASEM (t) 22:57, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Werieth, this is not a "clear case" of NFCC failures, and if you could look at it objectively I think you could see why. We have different opinions about how to interprete the Wikipedia guiedlines in this case and you still haven't been able to explain your point. You are just stating it is without wanting to explain why. You are even interpreting a part of the guideline as strict when it literally isn't. Arms Jones (talk) 00:34, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

For those interested, here is what Werieth says he agreed to when a recent AN/I discussion about his NFCC behavior was closed:

I will only remove a file once if it is a case where the removal is questionable or subjective if it is re-added Ill file a NFCR (aka 1R). However in cases where the removal isnt subjective (WP:NFC#UUI#14, NFCC#10c,#9 and other similar cases) multiple removals are often needed before the user re-adding the file gets the point. I think this is a very reasonable middle ground where both sides can move forward from there. Werieth (talk) 19:52, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

He made that statement in response to a request for clarification from Slim Virgin. The AN/I thread is here. It was closed by Mark Arsten with the statement:

Werieth has agreed to limit himself to one revert and then take the issue to NFCR except in exceptional cases, and Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Betacommand has been opened. It does not look like any other admin attention is needed at this point, so I'm closing this. Mark Arsten (talk) 18:09, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

BMK, Grouchy Realist (talk) 10:58, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Some rationale

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia which may have articles about everything which has notability. Every independent country in the world is notable enough to write about. I think everyone would agree on that statement.

The most prominent symbol of an independent country is its coat of arms. It may not be the most well-known symbol (that is normally the flag), but it is arguably the most prominent, as it stands for the government and its power, is displayed at central government buildings, at embassies, at border crossings, on official stamps and on the cover of passports etc. So I think the coat of arms of an independent country is notable enough to be displayed on Wikipedia. To display these coats of arms together and with links to the articles about each one of them is what an encyclopedia should be about, in my opinion.

Then of course, we have the matter of images and image copyright, which, according to some, should prevent us from showing some (but not all) of the coats of arms together with the others. So, in that case, should we display the coats of arms in other ways than in images? We could, since in heraldry all arms are described in a blazon. We could rewrite the gallery to be a collection of written blazons instead. That would be equally fine for me, who is quite used to read and understand blazons, but would it be fine for the average reader? I think not. So there is a reasonable and fair reason for this gallery and for it to display all the national coats of arms of the world. Arms Jones (talk) 01:08, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

"The most prominent symbol of an independent country is its coat of arms" Very few people care about a country's coat of arms - in fact, only people interested in coats of arms in general do. In actuality, the most prominent symbol of an independent country is its flag, and the majority of the people in the world who have ever considered the question would, I think, agree with that. (Not that the majority of people in the world would recognize the flag of any particular country, except for a few very prominent ones.) In any event, you're operating from an extremely skewed POV regarding coats of arms - in reality, no one (statistically speaking) cares about them. (Which is perhaps why, like academic disputes, people can get so riled up about them). BMK, Grouchy Realist (talk) 10:34, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

There is no point in posting your rationale here, admins don't make decisions over such issues - take it to Wikipedia:Non-free content review. AndyTheGrump (talk) 01:16, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I was expecting Werieth to take it there, if someone would. Arms Jones (talk) 02:07, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I think that in general, with the "few exceptions" sort of writing in the policy, we as neutral admins need to assume the answer is "no" until your case is proved on the appropriate specialized discussion or noticeboard. As Andy writes, this is the wrong venue for that discussion. (edit) And, the burden of proof would be on you under the circumstances to show that the proper discussion board consensus was with you. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:54, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Lg16spears and disruptive edits

User:Lg16spears has been warned multiple times for his disruptive editing by adding poorly formatted website references which are frequently accompanied by poor grammar. This has been a months long problem that I recently reapplied myself to trying to fix and there has been no change in his behavior. I think the only way to get him to change his behavior is to use temporary blocks. Hopefully one block will be enough to get him to correct his behavior Spidey104 00:30, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• I agree that this user presents some problems. I have no solution right now other than the old "block for refusing to talk", and I'm not feeling that at present. I hope someone else has better suggestions or more will power. Drmies (talk) 01:22, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• This is the only time I can find where he has actually responded on his talk page. All of his other edits to his talk page are removing warnings, and despite all of his removals he still has an extensive list of warnings on his talk page. With all of those warnings with no response and no change in behavior I think it is actually long past due to start the "block for refusing to talk" and "block for refusing to change disruptive behavior". I am open to other suggestions, but I am here because I have run out of solutions that I can try on my own. Spidey104 01:14, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• This one kind of sealed the deal for me. Temporarily blocked: if this behavior returns, we can block for longer. I hope they start talking. Drmies (talk) 01:01, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

WP:AGF - WP:NPA

Ronreisman

Huldra has been attacked by User:Ronreisman (with some clues about a potential export or tag team) on his talk page: after she warned him to take care with WP:1RR. Ronreisman :

• "given the infamous reputation y'all have on the internet."
• "I'll take this as confirmation that y'all do, in fact, work together to suppress and distort facts in the service of propagandistic POV."
• "You sound like a spider, daring a fly to enter a trap. Thanks for the invitation."

I add he had already been informed very kindly about WP:1RR : here and that I was myself attacked the same way by him 4 weeks ago:

• [36] "@Pluto2012 : You disruptively reverted my edit because you are a politically-motivated propagandist who is corrupting and vandalizing WIkipedia articles by improperly suppressing relevant and well-sourced information in order to promote your own partisan goals."

I complained of this to him (next edit :) "And you insulted me strongly, violating WP:AGF." but he considered himself as acting right:

• (edit summary) : "Dishonorable and dishonest action breeds disrespect.")

He went on (with Ykantor [37]) so I just left it and removed the article from my Watchlist.

There are other examples of misconduct in his edit summaries (in interactions with Hudra, Nishidani and I):

• [38] Please stop POV-pushing, OR, propaganda on Wikipedia,
• [39] Nish is also misrepresenting the refs;
• [40] so that he is not misrepresented by misleading wording by a Wikipedia editor;
• [41] Untrue info was introduced;
• [42] Now, please stop the anti-Zionist POV-pushing, and please stop vandalizing the article;
• [43] Request to Pluto2012 to stop violating WP:AGF and WP:RS, and to cease pov-Pushing that is detrimental to the articles veracity and quality.;
• [44] (...) propaganda when it actually praised the book's veracity;
• [45] Reply to Huldra's misrepresentation of a referenced source (...) and discusses politically-motivated *untrue* accusations against this source;
• ...

Ronreisman doens't seem to understand that his behaviour is not acceptable and he doesn't mind about WP:AGF and WP:NPA and if he is not strongly warned to stop, there is no reason why he would do so as proven in his recent interaction with Huldra.

Pluto2012 (talk) 11:40, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Notification to Ronreisman. Pluto2012 (talk) 11:42, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

While [46] is somewhat confrontational, I don't see problems in all those diffs you provide alleging misconduct in edit summaries. I suggest you try WP:AGF yourself. Toddst1 (talk) 13:49, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

You mean he is "Good Faith" when he performs these "Personal Attacks" and you claim that "Now, please stop the anti-Zionist POV-pushing, and please stop vandalizing the article" or "you are a politically-motivated propagandist who is corrupting and vandalizing WIkipedia" or "You sound like a spider, daring a fly to enter a trap" to someone after he made WP:1RR is in compliance with the 4st pillar of wikipedia.

Could you argue how I should "try WP:AGF myself" ? Pluto2012 (talk) 14:39, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I read through a bunch of the cited edits, and Ron's edits look reasonable to me. Greg (talk) 23:32, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

In general the controversy seems to be about one side that wants information deleted, and another side that wants information added. Since the added information is reliably sourced, and nobody has demonstrated that it is a tiny minority's viewpoint by citing a plethora of other sources, there seems to be no good reason to delete it or to threaten to delete it.

I have read all of the edits listed above. The article edits themselves look fine to me.

I did not understand why User:Pluto2012 and User:Huldra claim that User:Ronreisman has to follow WP:1RR. WP:3RR is the default rule throughout Wikipedia. WP:1RR only applies in particular circumstances that seem to be absent here. They offer no justification, neither here, nor on Ronreisman's talk page, of why Ronreisman should have to follow WP:1RR. However, it turns out that WP:1RR DOES apply to all pages concerning the Arab-Israeli conflict. This is not obvious from the simple link to WP:1RR posted on Ronreisman's talk page. Instead you have to follow that link, then click on the fourth link in that paragraph (to Wikipedia:General sanctions) and then search that long, long page. You won't find anything about Fawzi al-Qawuqji or Haj Amin al-Husseini there, but if you search there for "Arab", "Palestine" or "Israel" you will eventually find a summary (that does NOT mention 1RR). But! If you then click on the "full text" link there, it leads you to a paragraph of text in strikeout font, which seems to be some 2008 sanctions that are no longer in effect. That text is followed by a link to alternate sanctions that still doesn't mention any 1RR rule for pages like this. But if one scrolls down three more sections in that page, finally, under Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Palestine-Israel_articles#Further_remedies "Further remedies / General 1RR restriction" there is, finally, a mention of a 1RR rule:

All articles related to the Arab-Israeli conflict, defined as: any article that could be reasonably construed as being related to the Arab-Israeli conflict falls under 1RR. When in doubt, assume it is related.

It is not clear that that rule is actually in effect, because that paragraph ends with "Suppressed on 18:44, March 10 2012 (UTC)". It appears that the suppression only refers to PART of the 1RR rules, but even that is not clear. I hope that some editor or administrator who knows how to clean up that page can revise it to make it 100% clear what the current rules are.

Given all of the above, it can hardly be said that User:Ronreisman was warned of the WP:1RR rule about these two pages. It took me most of an hour of research to even believe that 1RR applied! To clarify for him and others, I have today added the Arab-Israeli Arbitration Enforcement template to the talk pages of both of the relevant articles. This template directly states that 1RR applies, and links to the policy discussion in which that policy was decided upon.

There also seems to be a "sudden death" rule in effect throughout Arab-Israeli articles. It allows any "uninvolved" administrator to sanction any editor who violates any rule of Wikipedia, or even the purpose of Wikipedia, after the editor has been warned and counseled. This applies to the editors on both sides of this issue:

The Arbitration Committee has permitted administrators to impose discretionary sanctions (information on which is at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions) on any editor who is active on pages broadly related to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Discretionary sanctions can be used against an editor who repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, satisfy any standard of behavior, or follow any normal editorial process. If you inappropriately edit pages relating to this topic, you may be placed under sanctions, which can include blocks, a revert limitation, or an article ban. The Committee's full decision can be read at the "Final decision" section of the decision page.

Please familiarise yourself with the information page at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions, with the appropriate sections of Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Procedures, and with the case decision page before making any further edits to the pages in question. This notice is given by an uninvolved administrator and will be logged on the case decision, pursuant to the conditions of the Arbitration Committee's discretionary sanctions system.

Regarding WP:NPA, I do see that in some of the listed edit summaries, Ronreisman wrote about people rather than content or actions. For example [47] Request to Pluto2012 to stop violating WP:AGF and WP:RS, and to cease pov-Pushing that is detrimental to the articles veracity and quality. But in other summaries, he correctly referred to content or actions, such as [48] Untrue info was introduced or [49] Now, please stop the anti-Zionist POV-pushing, and please stop vandalizing the article. Saying that an edit is "POV-pushing" criticizes the action, not the person, and is not WP:NPA. However, it would be kinder if Ronreisman had said, for example, Improve misleading wording about XXX or Try for NPOV on topic YYY by including material about side ZZZ.

In summary, the listed edits by User:Ronreisman in Haj Amin al-Husseini and Fawzi al-Qawuqji are largely reasonable and well-sourced contributions to controversial topics. He tended to provide new information on the topic in talk page discussions. Ronreisman should pay careful attention to describe his edits in a constructive way, even when frustrated.

Gnuish (talk) 09:51, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

If 1RR was the issue, he would have been reported at WP:AE and not here. Zero^talk 11:03, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Pluto2012

User:Pluto2012, on the other hand, wrote things in talk pages like [50] Until we can find confirmation that what L&C states, I will remove this from the article, and either deleted well-sourced statements, or threatened to delete them. It is not appropriate to delete someone else's contributed text from an article "until we can find confirmation", unless it is negative material in a biography of a living person. The people that these pages describe died in the 1970s.

Pluto2012 also claimed that

This is primary source and it cannot be used if not supported by a secondary reliable source. That's well known and basic rule. Pluto2012 (talk) 06:41, 28 November 2013 (UTC) Pluto2012 (talk) 06:41, 28 November 2013 (UTC)

to Pluto: This is misleading. wp:rs:"While specific facts may be taken from primary sources, secondary sources that present the same material are preferred.". Ykantor (talk) 09:31, 28 November 2013 (UTC)

I will delete this if I don't find any secondary source or if none is provided. Pluto2012 (talk) 11:18, 28 November 2013 (UTC)

Pluto2012 is wrong and Ykantor is right. Pluto2012 should not be deleting, or threatening to delete, other editors' contributions that come from primary sources "if I don't find a secondary source or if none is provided". What WP:RS actually says is:

Primary sources are often difficult to use appropriately. While they can be both reliable and useful in certain situations, they must be used with caution in order to avoid original research. While specific facts may be taken from primary sources, secondary sources that present the same material are preferred. Large blocks of material based purely on primary sources should be avoided. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors.

Pluto2012 also claimed that another policy applied when it clearly did not: this claim that when inserted information doesn't describe every point of view on a topic, the right answer is to delete it under WP:UNDUE rather than to insert additional well-sourced information to put the original information into better context: [51]:

Another point is that dropping a quote without contextualizing this is not acceptable because it doesn't comply with the first pillar : we write an encyclopaedia. Pure quotes are for "wikiquote". In an encyclopaedia, the context is what is around this quote and why historians think it's worth mentionning it. And of course, the contributor who would add this has to add all the points of views from all wp:rs here regarding this context

It is completely legitimate to add a single quote to an article, if that is all that one has at hand or all that one has time to add today. Others who have other quotes with other points of view should add those too, rather than deleting the first quote. Wikipedia is not written by historians or encyclopedists; it is written by ordinary people who are individual editors in a collaborative process. Pluto2012 also made several false and tendentious statements about Ronreisman. For example, immediately above this edit, cited above by Pluto2012 as the sixth "other examples of misconduct", Pluto2012 said

You put back the "Nazi allegence" tag whereas you faild to provide the battles to which al-Qawuqji participated for Germany. You had promised to do so.

Ronreisman had never promised to do so, nor was he required to do so. The whole issue was made-up by Pluto2012 inventing another illegitimate rule claiming that an infobox can't include a flag indicating military service under a country unless the proponent can state what battles the subject fought in. Many people who served in the military never fought in any battles; battles are irrelevant to military service. Ronreisman's alleged misconduct in this citation was that he defended himself in the talk page against Pluto2012's false statements about nonexistent rules.

User:Pluto2012 should pay careful attention to the purpose of Wikipedia, seeking to add article text to describe areas of conflicts more fully, rather than inventing fanciful rules and applying them to other editors. Pluto2012 should not delete article text that he sees as one-sided or primary source material.

Gnuish (talk) 09:51, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

You are entirely wrong. It is perfectly reasonable to expect good sources for contentious claims. In an area like I/P not doing so would be disastrous. You also missed the point. It was never about whether he fought in any battles but whether he served in the military at all. He didn't. (And congratulations for finding a way to shout in 24pt type.) - Zero^talk 11:13, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Huldra

User:Huldra also cites a Wikipedia rule that does not apply, [52]

In: "Morris; 1948", al-Qawuqji is mentioned on pages 61, 68-69, 89, 92, 133-138, 157, 278, 280-283, 338-342, 348. Of all those pages, "someone" has seen fit to quote (in extenso) p. 61, and only p. 61. Why? ... There is one word for this, and that is "cherry-picking". (Or WP:UNDUE, do be more wikipedia formalistic).

In order to insert a quote from a reputable source, an editor does not need to justify why they did not insert every other possible quote from that source, under penalty of having the quote deleted. If there are a majority of reputable sources that disagree with a quote, then someone who thinks it is "cherry-picked" like Huldra should insert balancing material (from the same or additional cited sources), rather than arguing for the deletion of material inserted by others.

Huldra also deleted 1800 bytes of relevant, reliably sourced material in this edit, with the summary saying only "undo propaganda; see talk". Calling someone else's edits "propaganda" is not showing WP:AGF, nor is reverting them appropriate. Even if someone, somewhere called a cited source "propaganda", and even if you personally think it is propaganda, it does not mean that it IS propaganda. And even if it was "propaganda", edits that cite that source are not a category of information that is subject to immediate deletion from Wikipedia. Propaganda reveals one side of an issue; instead of deleting, add other sides to the discussion. In addition, it came out later in the discussion in the talk page that the single blog source that referred to the Mallman book as being called propaganda went on to defend it against that charge, arguing that it only seemed that way because the publisher had changed the title to make the book more provocative-looking. Ronreisman dug up the context and posted the whole paragraph. It turned out that Huldra herself had "cherry-picked" the propaganda accusation out of context and in a way that tended to mislead any reader who didn't follow the link to the actual source.

User:Huldra should pay careful attention to the purpose of Wikipedia, seeking to add article text to describe areas of conflict more fully, rather than deleting text that she sees as one-sided.

Gnuish (talk) 09:51, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Nice how you elided the part of Huldra's comment where she explained it in detail. Zero^talk 11:21, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Ykantor

This description:"You disruptively reverted my edit because you are a politically-motivated propagandist who is corrupting and vandalizing WIkipedia articles by improperly suppressing relevant and well-sourced information in order to promote your own partisan goals" is accurate but, in my opinion it is too mild. As presented in a previous wp:ae, user:Pluto2012 is cheating and lying too, in order to delete other editors contributions and to force his view. Ykantor (talk) 23:02, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

If again no action is taken against Ykantor for this provocation and attack, he will feel free to go on again and again. So what ?

Anyway, the case of Ykantor is different. He is a particularly problematic contributor who refuses to make his behaviour evoluate and who has no collaborative spirit. He is just "right" and the remaining of the world is "wrong":

• see the "famous" WP:A/E that he launched and where it would be presented that "I am cheating and lying" too.
• his behaviour at the end of a km-long discussion he launched at the article Adolf Hitler. And still today he refuses the consensus (he is alone against the 5 contributors who have been editing this article for years) and despite this go on to edit the talk-page again and again.

Pluto2012 (talk) 07:54, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

You do not understand what is a personal attack. Saying e.g. "Pluto is a lair" is a personal attack, but stating that you are cheating and lying is a fact, backed by a list of such events.

* You mention the Hitler talk page. Looking at the opposing parties there , you may learn how to behave yourself. None of them is lying or cheating or attack personally.

*Concerning Arab Israeli conflict articles, you repeatedly delete a well supported text and images, because it is not to your anti Israeli taste, although the NPOV rule states that you should not delete it but rather add a supported opposing view (provided there is one) Ykantor (talk) 11:19, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

See also this Dilbert cartoon, which expands on the importance of criticising the behaviour, not the person (comment on content, not on contributors). --Demiurge1000 (talk) 11:31, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

@Demiurge: there is of course a difference between criticising the behaviour and the person but in the current case, these are the persons who are criticized and not (alleged) behaviours.

When Huldra warns Ronreisman of 1RR and when you see what Ronreisman answers, there is a problem. When you see that a Ykantor dares to writes "you are a politically-motivated propagandist who is corrupting and vandalizing WIkipedia articles". If this is not personal attacks then there is no more personnal attacks.

A personal attack is not just a childish insult.

@Ykantor: you go on with personal attacks. That is not acceptable. And yourself should see that all contributors critisized your behaviour, asked you to stop and some even invited you to read some of my comments.

Pluto2012 (talk) 14:19, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I wish I would be able to write such a nice and accurate English:"you are a politically-motivated propagandist who is corrupting and vandalizing Wikipedia articles", but unfortunately it is a quote only. I wonder if you can guess who is the source? Ykantor (talk) 16:07, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Dilbert is great, as always. However there is a difference. The chief there says:"You are terrific, but..." while I am not saying that. Moreover thanks God, I am not his chief.

* In your user page, you refer to the "Pcount" excellent tool . How does it count? are minor or major edits considered the same? Is there a tool that count article text deletions only ? (i.e. negative contribution? I would like to use such a tool to check Pluto's contributions. He is unique since it seems that his main article space activity is deleting other editors contributions.

Your user page states: " ...occasionally venture into more contentious areas.". I will appreciate it if you have a look at 1948 Arab–Israeli War. I have listed some problems here- Talk:1948 Arab–Israeli War#the article has POV and .22dubious.22 problems, and the major problems cannot be dealt with, because of Pluto's repeated deletions of a well supported text. Ykantor (talk) 16:07, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

If your accusations were true, your proposals about the article about the '48 war would have received positive answers from other contributors. On the contrary, you received negative answers and more on your side, you didn't consider worth participating to any of these discussions.

The problem is that you are WP:NOTHERE to contribute in respect of wikipedia rules as proven by the fact you just refuse to agree complying to WP:NPoV in reporting all Pov's on the difficult issues of the I-P conflict : [53].

Pluto2012 (talk) 21:00, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Pluto's incivility (again, sigh). Why must you show your incivility by dragging my reply to another location?

I followed the rule: If you are responding to someone else's remarks, put your comment below theirs and placed my reply to Demiurge1000 in the proper place. I will appreciate it if you drag it back to the initial and right location. Ykantor (talk) 21:36, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Paid editing again

• InternetUser25 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Whisper (app) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

This user looks very much like a throw away sock puppet of the type that have been used by paid editing agencies. The article it created looks like a PR piece, written in glowing terms, totally free of anything negative or critical. Newbies typically don't understand wiki syntax so well to be able to create a polished article like this in just a handful of edits. The article was promoted at T:DYK, generating millions of pageviews views of the blurb, a very substantial value of advertising. I have tagged the article with {{COI}}, and removed it from DYK, until concerns about neutrality are addressed.

I request a checkuser look at the account to see if it is related to any others, and if those others might also be engaged in forbidden types of paid editing (COI, non-neutral, advertorial writing). Thank you. Jehochman ^Talk 15:02, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

"Millions" of pageviews? You mean hundreds? --Demiurge1000 (talk) 16:00, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

With a throwaway account like that, simply looking at diffs can't tell us which other accounts are associated with this one, but checkuser is more likely to work. bobrayner (talk) 16:36, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Demiurge1000: Jehochman definitely got his figures wrong, but typical figures are a few thousand. Matty.007 17:26, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

The home page gets millions of page views per day, in fact, about 12 million.[54] Each time the home page is loaded, the Whisper (app) is appeared in the DYK list. Whether the user clicks through is another matter. In any event, an appearance on the home page of Wikipedia is worth thousands of dollars.Jehochman ^Talk 17:35, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Given there is no policy against paid editing this should not be at ANI, and the original poster should both know and, being an admin, properly model correct suspected sock reporting (i.e. WP:SPI). NE Ent 17:58, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I would point out that the account has broken policy - the obvious one being NPOV, and WP:SOCK seems likely too. We're not a bureaucracy; socks are often dealt with in other venues, including WP:ANI, rather than solely SPI - the latter is structured around cases where the sockmaster is already known. bobrayner (talk) 18:28, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

The user disclaims any paid editing or socking.[55] Unless a checkuser comes along and says otherwise, I have to accept the user's explanation. The errors in maintaining NPOV could just be a newbie mistake. That can be fixed with editing. Jehochman ^Talk 18:36, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• comment: Mabye just extend the article if you think there is content missing? Prokaryotes (talk) 18:41, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Please send this to SPI. --Rschen7754 19:28, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

SPI is useless unless there is an account to file it under. A clear reading of this thread will indicate why that is not possible. BMK, Grouchy Realist (talk) 21:35, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

The question asked by InternetUser25 at [56] about creating multiple related redirects to the article in question indicates Search engine optimization for additional hits. How did this obvious puff piece make it to DYK, anyway? I put an "Advertising" tag on the article, took out some of the peacocking language per WP:PEACOCK, pointed out that Whisper, the messaging program, and Whisper Systems, the company, are unrelated, and added a "Criticism" section. But it still reads like an ad. John Nagle (talk) 08:35, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Anyone know what's happening here: 1990 FIFA World Cup

1990 FIFA World Cup There's a copy of File:Vandalism San Francisco.jpg there that blocks the lede and much of the top. I can't see how it got there or even why it's there. Walter Görlitz (talk) 15:50, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

It appears to be coming from the vcalendar class. Walter Görlitz (talk) 15:54, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

The file page states that more than 100 pages now have this image. -_- MercenaryHoplite (talk) 16:00, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I removed two parameters from the infobox and it was gone. I then restored the parameters and it was still gone. Why did it show up? Walter Görlitz (talk) 16:02, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

See this edit by User:DoomedToVanish (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs).--Auric talk 16:17, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually, this edit was the one that caused the problem in this case. Graham87 08:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Threat

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

---

In this edit, Lawann is posting huge walls of uncited, biased text in the Violence against Indians in Australia controversy. The user is also threatening to report this to the media and to "shut down my account". I don't know if any admin intervention is needed at this point, but it sounds like a credible threat to me. Epicgenius (talk) 16:48, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Blocked per NOTHERE. GiantSnowman 16:52, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

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

Russavia threatening to block evade

Following on from last week's discussion of whether Russavia's talk page access should be revoked, he's now threatening to evade his block to do something about some copyright issue. This is absolutely unacceptable, and it's now time to shut off his talk page access. I would do it myself, but I have a history of disagreements with him that I'm pretty sure would rate as involvement, so I'm requesting any other admin to. — Scott • talk 18:28, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Done. Jehochman ^Talk 18:35, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. Regarding the comment you left there, he is indefinitely blocked, not banned, so you may wish to make a correction. — Scott • talk 18:41, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

He is de facto banned, not welcome to participate. If he wants to use his talk page to appeal his block I will be happy to restore access. He can email me. If he wants to use the page to stir up disruption, as he was doing, he does not need access. Jehochman ^Talk 00:41, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Incorrect NE Ent 00:52, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

How exactly does suggesting he would sock to fix issues that need fixing warrant removal of talk page access? Jehochman's revocation seems based off him asking others to handle issues on his talk page, which has repeatedly failed to gain approval as a basis for removing talk page access. For what it is worth, I just dealt with the copyright issues Russavia noted.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 18:53, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

The consensus of the prior ANI discussion was that Russavia could maintain talk page access. Unless there's evidence the requests he's made on his talk page are specious, the facts that he has a) made the request b) waited a week for someone to take care of them indicate a willingness to abide by the block. It's most illogical in this context to remove talk page access and the most likely result is not that he won't ip edit, but rather that he'll ip edit sooner. NE Ent 19:48, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

This must be some kind of a joke, all he was suggesting to edit as IP to fix copyvio stuff nobody seemed interested to fix. This could be hardly seen as block evasion, especially if the report is made by a user having a dispute history with Russavia. --Denniss (talk) 20:07, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

No, that would most certainly be block evasion. We don't just pretend it isn't because one thinks the potential edit might be useful any more than we permit edit warring because one thinks they are right. Resolute 20:16, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Is there any evidence that Russavia showed any concern over copyright issues prior to being blocked? Frankly, this sudden interest in the topic, combined with threats to evade the block to fix these issues looks very much like attention-seeking to me. And we all know how Russavia craves attention... AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:52, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

He is an admin on Commons so it makes sense for him to have such concerns and I don't believe such concern over copyright issues is something that merely arose following his block here. Presumably, he would have just dealt with them himself with little fanfare prior to being blocked.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 21:06, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support revocation of talk page privilege for indef-blocked editor abusing it. As discussed previously, R. was on the knife's edge, and threatening to sock for whatever reason is sufficient to cut him off. No amount of Wikilawyering will change that. BMK, Grouchy Realist (talk) 21:32, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose: this is a classic example of us cutting off our nose to spite our face. If there's genuinely a problem (and reporting copyright issues sure as hell ain't it) then short temporary page protection until the issue resolves itself is the way to go, rather than permanent talk page and e-mail disabling. Hell, it's an ineffective and stupid thing anyway, given all Russavia needs to do is ping, say, me or another editor via Commons, but at least this gets more eyes and is more transparent. Nick (talk) 22:33, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

  I suspect Russavia's desire for attention is a more likely motivator than transparency. Resolute 01:10, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

  I couldn't care less why he's doing it, but if he's reporting copyvios that's a good thing. Legoktm (talk) 07:57, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

  Wait, why is he even blocked if what he's doing is good? Epicgenius (talk) 16:02, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose – if Russavia's talk page privs are kept, then we may be able to be informed of some potential copyvios, as he is still a net good to the project (however small), even when blocked. If his privileges are revoked, we will receive nothing of benefit. Epicgenius (talk) 01:00, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I do not think we should have in between statuses. If he can do beneficial work, he should be unblocked. If he's going to be disruptive, then he should not participate at all. When blocked the talk page is used to request unblocking, to discuss the reason for the block and that sort of thing. It is not used to edit by proxy, to grandstand, to bait other editors (such as by threatening sock puppetry), or to incited repeated ANI threads. I am not opposed to discussing conditions for Russavia to be unblocked. Jehochman ^Talk 01:38, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Why do we have WP:TBANs then? Someone not using his real name (talk) 02:14, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't know. They tend to be humiliating. The same objective can be achieved by directing an editor to avoid a conflict and let them know they will be blocked if they cause further trouble there. If RussAvia wants to be unblocked and restricted to working on copybook issues only, I wouldn't object, but he has to indicate a willingness to follow the rules, and avoid past trouble. He can also use his Commons talk page and any editors who want to help can go there and read that page. We have no power to restrict his activity there. Jehochman ^Talk 02:45, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Comment, maybe find a go-between email just for copyvio issues on a trial basis? It's such a hassle to work on an article and then realize some or all of it is a copyvio and can't be used. Or find a subpage just for copyvio issues for a few months to see if these concerns can be posted, and transferred to those who specialize in copyvio issues. Sportfan5000 (talk) 01:50, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Per DD2K's comment below, this does smack of putting the cart before the horse. Sportfan5000 (talk) 06:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose, in this particular case agree with comment by Nick, above, the rationale is logical and sound when applied in this instance. Cheers, — Cirt (talk) 02:52, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose - The indef knife has already been stuck in to the hilt, no need to twist it. Pointing out copyvios is a positive action that helps the project. Why make it harder or more complicated to do so? There are plenty of people watching his talk, so anything like disruption would be quickly caught, and all other posts will be closely monitored too. He should have talk priviledges. INeverCry 04:20, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support Pushing at the edge of his block is a drama inducing tactic and blocked users shouldn't be encouraging anyone to proxy of them. If they are worried about copyvios they can sort out the cesspit that is commons without worrying about our problems. Russavia is no longer a member of the en community and should butt out. Spartaz ^Humbug! 04:41, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• WP:BLOCKBANDIFF clearly states indefinitely blocked users are "Still a member of the community" NE Ent 12:17, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose revocation We are shooting ourselves in the foot here. Finding and reporting copyvios is always good for the encyclopedia, whether coming from a blocked editor or not. KonveyorBelt 06:18, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• This isn't a vote. Russavia is indeff blocked. Which was reaffirmed twice(ANI/AN). It's absurd to claim he needs Talk page access to rescue Wikipedia from Copy right violations. Come on now. There are several venues to report such violations, and Russavia is not the only person in the fricken world that can do it. So Support revocation, or whatever. If Russavia wants to appeal his block, there are ways to do that. This vote here is a waste of time. Dave Dial (talk) 06:38, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

  And yet....no one else reported those copyvios until Russavia did. I don't think you're aware of how bad of a copyvio problem we have. Maybe you should take a look (and hopefully start helping ;)) Legoktm (talk) 07:57, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support revocation. Russavia's playing games with the limits on the very limited set of things indeffed users may do here, and announcing the intent to sock/IP edit unless his requests are promptly complied with crosses the line. There's also rather curious off-wiki incident where someone who has been alleged to edit as Russavia made comments to a publication not quite admitting the allegation to be accurate in a way which seems to me designed to increase the chances of another WP:OUTING dramafest. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 06:59, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support revocation. OTRS is a perfectly acceptable alternative for addressing for copyvios if Russavia cannot be bothered to address the reasons surrounding their block. As such, Russavia is in no position to request improvements to the project, even those as serious as copyvios, until the reasons for their block are acknowledged and an explanation is provided on how the problematic behavior will be avoided in the future. I, JethroBT ^{drop me a line} 07:09, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

  No it's not. OTRS is already backlogged, and on-wiki communication is always preferred to off-wiki ones if possible.Legoktm (talk) 07:42, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

The number of requests we get and the ability of OTRS agents to address those requests are not really relevant here. What is relevant is an editor who is making demands on other editors when their rights to edit have been revoked, and evidence that the editor has threatened to skirt around their indefinite block. I don't really care how high-and-mighty the cause is; the editor has an obligation to address the terms of their block before they continue to contribute as an editor. I, JethroBT ^{drop me a line} 08:02, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

The copyvio queue doesn't generally have much in the way of backlog issues.©Geni (talk) 17:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support revocation Deny attention. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 07:12, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• This is stupid. Revoking a user's talk page when they're pointing out copyvios is a terrible idea, and is just going to make our backlog of unaddressed copyvios even worse. Legoktm (talk) 07:42, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Russavia has several other methods available to report copyvios. Let him use them. People's concerns about his record of disruptive behavior is not "stupid". Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 07:49, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
    • Like what? That's not what I was calling stupid, I was saying that restricting a user's ability to report copyvios is stupid. We need all the help we can get in resolving copyvios. Legoktm (talk) 07:53, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
      • OTRS. His Commons talk page. Emailing his friends. Starting a blog called "Wikipedia Copyright Violations Report". Paper, a pen, a stamp and an envelope. A Western Union telegram. Fax. Telex. Sadly, the Pony Express has gone out of business. Anything but English Wikipedia. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 08:28, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support revocation Anybody interested can watch his COM talk page. No need to encourage this funny game. (There was a user User:Pieter Kuiper who was very expert in reporting copyvios but blocked for other reasons. But I didn't see Commons allow to use his skills for that particular matter under the block. The same should be applicable here. If one person is blocked; he is blocked. Period. It pains, but slowly, someone will fill the gap.) Jee 08:19, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support revocation, essentially per Cullen. From his behaviour, Russavia clearly has difficulty letting the project(s) go - this is a pretty big blocker on getting perspective on the problems that led to his block. Deny attention, give him some space, and if he wants to solve for copyvios he can work out why his behaviour was a problem and mature so that an actual unblock is possible. Ironholds (talk) 08:55, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support revocation The good nature of those wanting open season at the talk page is noted, but the user went to a lot of trouble to produce an article that trolls his adversary Jimbo, and is now going to a lot of trouble to find something to post guaranteed to raise more trouble. There are other ways to assist the project which avoid WP:DENY violations. Johnuniq (talk) 09:03, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support revocation per Cullen, et al. - although, as Dave Dial correctly points out, this isn't a vote - admin action was requested, admin action was provided. Not sure why we're still here, given that... close this and just WP:DENY seems more sensible - maybe that doesn't have enough dramaz though....Begoon ^talk 10:50, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Comment In his comment linked above, Russavia admits to already having block evaded is block, "as an "IP editor" as I did on the LAN Colombia article many months ago". IMO this needs to be dealt with first, and secondly blocks and bans are meant to protect wikipedia, removing his tp access isnt going to protect while letting copyvios go. Its a balancing act, his tp access is meant only to appeal his sanctions. Murry1975 (talk) 12:37, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Comment - I've been far too involved in things in the past regarding this user, so a vote would be a bit unseemly. There are things for both sides of the battleground here to consider, though. On one hand, if the project is hosting copyvios, then it is in the best interests of all that they are corrected, regardless of the how's & why's of how it is done. On the other, the project is not dependent on one person to correct problems, and these will be found and corrected eventually without this user's input. Tarc (talk) 14:30, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Heh - the last part of your comment makes sense. Of course the project is hosting copyvios - thousands of them. The other part implies we should allow unrestricted TP access for <<insert your least favourite blocked user here>> when they want to post about them, regardless of other considerations. Complete the sentence yourself. Maybe it's right. I don't think it is though. It would certainly make for some interesting appeals, and some award-winning gamesmanship. Fascinating thoughts though, and drama potential unlimited. :) Cullen gave a comprehensive list of communication channels if the need is there. Begoon ^talk 15:08, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Access should be removed for:

• abuse of {{Unblock}}
• abuse of notifications
• personal attacks on other editors

• Editors who don't find blocked users comments of benefit can simply unwatch the page. Russavia's comments about copyvios were so "disruptive" that no one noticed for a week, it seems. NE Ent 15:23, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Didn't say they were disruptive. This section might say that, though. Lots of ways of looking at it. Mine is it's deliberate gaming for attention from an indef blocked user and undesirable for that reason. You obviously disagree. Happens. Succesful though, I'll give him that - got himself another 5 minutes of "fame". I'm done here now - per DENY. Begoon ^talk 15:27, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• I don't think that Russavia is a vandal. People generally tend to spit in the faces of indef blocked users. Maybe it's not "five minutes of 'fame'", but rather, legitimate concerns. Epicgenius (talk) 16:07, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Ah, ok. In that case all I can recommend is some research. The search function should be enough - failing that Google. Sorry if I can't be any more help than that. Begoon ^talk 16:26, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Talkpage access should be removed for abuse of talkpage privileges, not constructive use of them. Do we really want to be accused of closing our ears to someone for reporting copyvio? ϢereSpielChequers 16:24, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Dose of reality here people, revoking his talk page access is not only going to fail at addressing his threat to sock, it is actually going to encourage him to sock and it is unlikely that there would be much of a way to stop him from socking successfully given past experiences. The most practical option is to just let him use his talk page to point out issues. At least then it is one of us non-ebil editors doing the work and not an ebil sock.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 18:08, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Let's revoke access if and when he does sock – this may be an empty threat. As WereSpielChequers says, talk page access should be removed for the abuse of the talk page, and Russavia is not abusing his talk page access, at least not yet. There's no reason to revoke that access unless abuse actually does happen. Epicgenius (talk) 18:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
  • He already has socked. He admitted this in the very comment which triggered this ANI report. —Psychonaut (talk) 09:27, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

break

In the above section it is incorrectly asserted that I disagree with the assessment that "it's deliberate gaming for attention from an indef blocked user." In fact, I neither agree nor disagree with that assessment; I actually just don't care. All that really matters is mainspace. All this "stuff" behind the Wikipedia:: prefix is supposed to be about keeping that going smoothly. Editors who chose to focus their time here -- especially folks with sysop bits -- really ought to have some idea of the lay of the land before taking action.
More than being a single collective community, Wikipedia is a collection of overlapping communities. One subcommunity cares more that disruptive editors be prevented from continuing to disrupt; another cares more about mainspace quality issues, specifically copyright. Both bring value to Wikipedia and should be respected. So the question becomes: when an indef blocked editor flags a copyvio, what's the best way to deal with it?
From the motivation of the blocked editor standpoint, the likely possibilities are:

• legitimate concern over copyright violation
• attention seeking behavior.

The best course action is one that doesn't require speculation to what the motivation is; there are actually two good choices. One is to fix the copyright with a neutral message: i.e. "rm copyvio" not "remove copyright violation that indef blocked editor flagged..." The second is to ignore it. The former is win-win in that the content is improved and the flagging editor gets minimal attention. The second doesn't benefit mainspace but provides total denial.
Staring another ANI thread when it was already hashed through five months ago is not the way to "deny" attention; it's more like, as David Bowie sang years ago, "putting out a fire with gas-o-line".
There's a non-archived discussion at blocking policy on this very issue; three months old and not many comments. We're much better at participating when we have a specific individual to attack/defend than an abstract principle. In WIkipedia-as-it-should-be, we'd all comment on the blocking policy talk page and come to a consensus on talk page unblock only yes or talk page unblock only no. In Wikipedia-as-it-is, I honestly and regretfully expect that that discussion will end in the usual "no-consensus" muddle and we'll just keep doing this again and again ... NE Ent 17:17, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

It's a lovely, long answer, and much of what you say is true. Read my answer above to Tarc though - if you don't want ongoing drama, which you say you don't, this is a hell of an odd path to choose. Begoon ^talk 17:25, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

He's not blocked exclusively for reporting copyvios. The deciding factor is that he's grandstanding and baiting by saying that he's going to evade the block if people don't hop to it and do what he wants them to do. This is manipulative, and it's an abuse of the talk page. Removing talk page access prevents the grandstanding, baiting and manipulation. It also shows Russavia that he has to grow up and act responsibly if he wants to get unblocked. If he doesn't want to be unblocked, he should completely leave the project. If he wants to report copyvios, he can do so via alternative channels that have already been enumerated. Jehochman ^Talk 17:31, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Indeed. I concur with all of that. And in case anyone missed any of the channels Cullen enumerated, here they are:

OTRS. His Commons talk page. Emailing his friends. Starting a blog called "Wikipedia Copyright Violations Report". Paper, a pen, a stamp and an envelope. A Western Union telegram. Fax. Telex. Sadly, the Pony Express has gone out of business. Anything but English Wikipedia. Begoon ^talk 17:47, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

But yet en-wiki is where these copyvio problems exist, and where they should be handled. Not a whole lot of people will take notice if he starts broadcasting copyvios on an external site, especially if he can't tell us on en-wiki about it now that his talk is removed. People will take notice if he posts them on en-wiki precisely because the issues are on en-wiki. KonveyorBelt 18:07, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• The stupidity of this is painful. Removing copy-vios from Wikipedia is a good thing. Full stop. I'm glad to see some reasonable editors amongst the usual torches-and-pitchforks. The fact that some editors view a removal of copy-vios by a blocked editor no differently that a blocked editor adding copy-vios is simply mind-numbing. Joefromrandb (talk) 19:07, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• Socking or threatening to sock is a very bad thing. Full stop. Fixing copyvios without socking or threatening to sock? Priceless. And if R. and just continued to do that, he'd still have talk page access. Instead.... BMK: Grouchy Realist (talk) 20:29, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Evading a block to vandalize is socking. Evading a block to continue an argument is socking. Fixing copy-vios is not socking. Vowing to fix copy-vios on one's talk-page is not "threatening to sock". Wikilaywering with the argument: "well it's technically still socking" is far more disruptive than anything with which Russ has "threatened" us. Joefromrandb (talk) 21:08, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
    • How about an indef blocked user grandstanding and baiting on his talk page? Do you think that's good? If Russ were to quietly sock and do good edits I would 100 percent ignore him. It's the grandstanding and baiting that's the problem. Jehochman ^Talk 21:52, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
      • @Jfr&b: Wikilawyering? The only "wikilawyering" going on is from an editor trying to carve out a loophole that exists neither in policy nor practice. Editing with an IP while blocked is evading a block, period, full stop. (No "nudge nudge, wink wink", just "say no more".) BMK: Grouchy Realist (talk) 01:33, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
    • Joefromrandb, for the benefit of everyone reading this, could you please quote those parts of Wikipedia:Blocking policy and Wikipedia:Sock puppetry which support your claim that evading a block to fix a copyvio is permitted? —Psychonaut (talk) 09:11, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support restoration I am not aware of any disruptive edits that this user may have made on his talk page while blocked. Notifying the project about copyright violations certainly isn't disruptive, but is something which is very much needed. Also, some of the comments above do not make sense. Some users seem to have the opinion that he is free to report copyright violations and that people are free to act when the copyright violations have been discovered, but the user should not report the violations to his talk page but somewhere else. What would this achieve? What is the difference between reporting copyright violations on a talk page on this project or on a page on Commons, if the outcome still is that the content will be deleted? --Stefan2 (talk) 21:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

  Do you think his threat to sock unless somebody did his bidding were appropriate, collegial, and helpful to Wikipedia? Jehochman ^Talk 22:40, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support revocation. Russavia's use of his talk page to report copyright violations was both useful and tolerable, up to the point where he started issuing threats. Now that he's making a nuisance of himself by openly flouting community decisions, the benefits of talk page access no longer outweigh the drawbacks. Identifying copyright violations isn't so specialized a skill that we can't do without the trickle of reports he provides; anyone active at Wikipedia:Copyright problems can see that spotting copyvios on Wikipedia is like shooting fish in a barrel. More help there from editors in good standing is always welcome. —Psychonaut (talk) 09:25, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose It often seems that certain Wikipedians have an unhealthy obsession with Russavia. He may have some faults (who doesn't?), but he also has a lot of good points, and from what I can see, he's quite often been wronged against - that's not to say he's a living saint either. If people don't like his talk page, then they have the option of taking it off their watch list and ignoring it. Regarding socking/block evasion, I wonder if that's really a wise path to tread for him and for those who are so concerned about it. When there is a will and an inclination it's just as easy to check user, as it is to sock - so I fail to see why some here are becoming quite so hysterical on the subject.  Giano  09:50, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• I have restored talk page access on condition that he won't use the page to rile other editors. For instance, he shouldn't announce plans to sock, nor insult people nor anything else that would annoy. If he wants to politely list copyright violations, that's acceptable. Jehochman ^Talk 10:58, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• Thank you Jehochman, that's the most sensible solution.  Giano  11:00, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Admin help needed: one redirect, one move request

I reverted the db-g6 on this page, because it seems to be a controversial, non-admin closure on a move request.[57] (I didn't participate in that move discussion, and am not sure what happens in cases of controversial, non-admin closures.)

Separately, related to several AFDs involving off-Wiki recruiting (see for example AN discussion), this seems like an unhelpful, even pointy redirect; "not getting any" was referenced in one of the AFDs.

I don't really know what to do with either of these, but they were raised on my talk.[58] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:29, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Redirect

This one has been all over the place: Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Involuntary celibacy (2nd nomination). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:47, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

And now this; anybody home? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:58, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

I've removed the link from the template per WP:BLP. I'm not going to go as far as to say that any mention of the blog is a BLP violation, but I do think putting it at the top of a controversial AFD is a bad idea and brings unneeded attention to the blogger.--v/r - TP 01:43, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

TParis, thanks for the help on both of these messy messes. Because I (unwisely) posted a two-fer, the main issue may have been missed: is this a reasonable redirect (part of that messy AFD situation)? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:22, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Oops, sorry, I see you got that too. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:25, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Move request

Re: the Cannabis (drug) → Marijuana WP:Requested move debate, you cited "non-admin close, best have that reviewed" in your edit summary reverting Red Slash's edit. As I suggested on your talk page, since you appear to be the one who's not satisfied with the WP:RM discussion outcome and thinks a review should be done, it makes sense that you should initiate the process by requesting a WP:Move review. Msnicki (talk) 21:48, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually, if you had mentioned WP:Move review on my talk, I would have gone there. But since I've never heard of the place, and you didn't mention it, here we are. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:51, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, we are here now but this is the wrong place. There's no help for you here except just the advice that if you want your concern heard, you should request a WP:Move review. Msnicki (talk) 22:44, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi. I closed the move request. Most of those who opposed the move stated their opposition in terms of it being less common or an Americanism, both of which are demonstrably untrue (as far as the sources show). Unless I am badly misreading WP:NATURAL, we choose even less ideal titles if they disambiguate naturally from other possible topics. Unless I am badly misreading WP:COMMONNAME, we choose the demonstrably more common title over, as one editor later commented, a title asserted by some editors to be preferred in certain technical fields. There is no policy or guideline to suggest keeping the article at Cannabis (drug) and two very good ones to move it. Regardless, we don't re-fight move requests at this venue in most cases, and only the most flagrantly misguided closes would be outright reverted. Red Slash 21:58, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Red Slash: and you don't consider it fragrantly misguided to close a move discussion when you can't perform the move yourself? You're a non-admin, which means you can't move it, it's discouraged that you close the discussion at all if the result is to move (or where any administrative action is needed), and any administrator is free to revert your closure. Considering there was actually more opposition to a move than support at the time, your close certainly is misguided. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 04:19, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

"fragrantly misguided" ← you mean something smelled fishy about it? Alexbrn ^{talk|contribs|COI} 15:52, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Indeed I don't, Moe Epsilon. Happens all the time at WP:RM. (See the backlog at the bottom of the page? Imagine what it'd be like if we left all of the requests to the administrators! Often, the regulars can't close them anyway because they're involved.) As the closing instructions for RMs state, at Wikipedia, we judge consensus by weighing the strength of the arguments--in other words, it's WP:NOTAVOTE. I don't get the idea that there was "more opposition than support"--how is the number of !votes relevant? There were two policies in favor and a bunch of "it's an Americanism" arguments against, which were untrue (demonstrably so) as well as irrelevant (WP:ARTCON). Second, I've never witnessed any admin reverting a closure by a non-admin closer. (Is that different at WP:AFD?) I've closed probably thirty or so move requests and had two taken to move review (one stood, and I self-reverted my close on the other) but never had one reverted. I've been at Wikipedia for nine years and have in fact never even heard of a move closure being summarily reverted by an admin, ever. Red Slash 05:39, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

...and you'll notice that no one has reversed you here :) My comment below reflects the fact that articles are to be considered on their own merits, including titles, in move discussions. I disagree with your assessment that the weight of COMMONNAME outdoes user reservations, but disagreement is a fact of life. I don't think you did anything wrong, I just disagree with the reading. Keegan (talk) 06:29, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you, Keegan. I appreciate that. I filed a move review at WP:MRV (and also slightly rewrote my comment here) and will probably take a bit of a wikibreak--man, this was exhausting. Red Slash 06:43, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

It hasn't been recently, but I've closed my share of controversial requested moves over the years. Thanks for filing the MRV, take some time gnoming, but really it's all water under a very large bridge. Keegan (talk) 07:11, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Moe Epsilon, may I request that if you wish to question the close, that you do so by requesting a WP:Move review, stating your guidelines-based reasons (which, so far, you have failed to provide). That is the process we have for registering an objection and it allows a full debate. This is not the appropriate forum. We cannot suspend the rules because you're an admin and Red Slash is not. Admins are not God. They are expected to follow the guidelines, the same as the rest of us. Msnicki (talk) 05:48, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Msnicki, it's not so cut-and-dry as policy, guidelines, and process. The article has not been moved, so is move review the appropriate forum? It seems to me that it's more reasonable that an admin review a closure that, since it involves admin buttons to make happen, should have been closed by an admin.

A further thought on the closure: Guidelines are guidelines, they are not binding and when there is clear and equal division on a discussion over such a guideline the guideline does not trump how the community feels about a particular article. Please don't let bureaucracy interfere with community consensus or lack thereof.

That being said, I recommend rebooting the move discussion if the proponents feel that they have compelling evidence and can provide consensus. Short of that, I decline the move. Keegan (talk) 06:12, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Red Slate should have participated and not deemed him or herself as closer as they clearly support the move request. More people opposed than support this move but Red Slate has taken it on him or herself to discount the arguments of long term editors who have been editing the cannabis articles for years for reasons that arent clear or affirmed in any policies or guidelines. This is a completely unsatisfactory close, I do fully agree that the RM should be re-opened for at least 1 more week and a serious effort made to involve more people in the naming process as this is one of wikipedia's most popular articles and we havent even had 20 ppl participating. Given that the Americanization of this article is a core argument against the RM (and one unbelievably discounted by the closer) that all US editors should recuse themselves from closing. ♫ SqueakBox talk contribs 15:36, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Msoamu just doesn't learn

User:Msoamu is no stranger to this noticeboard. Or some other noticeboards, for that matter. To keep it short:

• Msoamu's block log
• ANI discussion which lead to his topic ban
• The topic ban notice

The problem now is stipulations three and four. Point three states:

3.If Msoamu edits appropriately for the next six months, but continues the same disruptive behavior after the expiration of the topic ban, any admin may reinstate a new topic ban to be of at least one year.

Msoamu did not edit properly for those six months; he didn't edit at all. That's fine, that's his choice, though it would have been better for him to adhere to point four:

4.Msoamu is strongly encouraged to obtain a mentor, ideally while the ban is still in place, so that Msoamu may be guided to editing that conforms with Wikipedia policies and guidelines.

Now, Msoamu has committed an infraction of Wikipedia:Canvassing at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Muslim Students Organization of India MSO. It's an article which was once deleted under another name (AfD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Muslim Students' Organization of India). The organization, known by its acronym MSO, is supposedly at Aligarh Muslim University, also known as AMU. Not making this up.
Anyway, after commenting at 07:16, 9 January 2014, he then canvassed three other users at 07:25, 9 January 2014, 07:29, 9 January 2014 and 07:29, 9 January 2014.
On top of that, straight off of his topic ban he was already irking myself and a few other users with his literal copy-pasting of sources into his non-notable article Mawlid celebrations around the World in addition to providing random citations which didn't verify the text he was adding at another page.
Given his long term history of edit warring, personal attacks, POV pushing to the point of competency issues and his running of a sockpuppet account for six years (again, couldn't make that up - see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Msoamu/Archive)...it really just seems hard to assume good faith at this point. This user just doesn't get it. I'm not sure what needs to be done, but something needs to be done. This user offers no positive contributions to the encyclopedia and the rest of us are always stuck cleaning up these messes. MezzoMezzo (talk) 04:39, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) (Non-administrator comment) What I don't understand is that if s/he was confirmed to be a sock, why was s/he ever allowed back? Anyway, I definitely think an indef-block would be in order now (btw, s/he is engaging in some pretty creative votestacking at AfD). Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 06:04, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Put simply, the Msoamu account is the sockmaster and the other accounts were its socks. The account should've been indeffed in the first place, but no admin was willing to do so right off the bat, and consensus didn't lean that way at that time. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 17:58, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Protection and suppression needed at Elizabeth Katz

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

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A string of IPs (likely a single editor) have converted this article about a Mexican TV actress into an attack page targeting a minor and nonnotable "internet celebrity" with a somewhat different name. Could someone please semi-protect the article at the point of my last edit and RevDel all (other) edits since August 13 2013, including one recent edit summary in particular. Thanks. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 06:02, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Listed at WP:RPP. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 06:09, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

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

Talk:2014 Formula One season

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

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Can I request an intervention in the discussion regarding the subject Explanation of the system being used - Subsection Time to decide. Discussions including a handful of editors including myself have been taking place regarding said matter. A rough description of what has been discussed is in regards to an outdated system in place that lists the current Formula 1 drivers by their given car numbers allocated to them by their 'then' current teams retrospective finishing position in the previous years WCC (World Constructors Championship). Recent changes by the governing FIA however have resulted in the old system being scrapped whilst giving place to a new system which gives drivers their own specific permanent career car number of their choice. Seeing as how in previous (But not all) years the system being used also subsequently listed the participating teams in their previous WCC order (Excluding certain cases such as 2009), This new system now effects that original in a manner of inconsistency between the understanding of placement and the purpose of car numbers within F1. Talk involving many of us have come to two opinions on which way forward would be officially correct in it's purpose. One being the continuing use of listing by car numbers whilst the other continuing use of the current WCC rankings. I/we feel due to the nature of the sport itself, sport ranking in general and the changes issued by the FIA playing major parts in such a system suggests the use of the latter listings as the way forward whilst others feel there is no need to change such system do to an outdated consensus and using old pages as justification. Agreement still has not yet been reached and has resulted not only in heated argument within the discussion page but an edit war between myself and another editor, Specifically user Prisonermonkeys, whom seems to fuel his own consensus from personal opinion; that which has since changed 3 times since the beginning (WCC > Alphabetical > Numeral). Similar edits he has forced into place have since been changed due to much needed proof over otherwise outdated and poorly misunderstood claims/sources whilst ignoring the opinion and factual evidence from others ( "(Name) Grand Prix" vs. "Grand Prix of (Name)" & a now removed discussion over Sergiy Sirotkin), even so including official listing of teams by the FIA and the Official Formula 1 Website supporting current discussion. I request someone to please use logical sense and understanding in this matter to resolve it. Yes I am mainly trying to focus my own opinion to be the correct one but only for the good of the page, the sport and the readers as WCC listings give more information and sense to the reader as apposed to a simplistic and otherwise unneeded numerical system which would also confuse the entire issue more so in regards to most recent years. Joetri10 (talk) 09:01, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I believe that a prelinary consensus has been formed in favour of the numerical system. Joetri10 and another editor, Eightball, have refused to observe this consensus, and have resorted to increasingly aggressive an unacceptable tactics to force through their preferred version of the page. Together, they have edit-warred, attempted to characterise edits they disagree with as vandalism, repeatedly removed 8,000KB of undisputed content from the page, threatened admin intervention on numerous occasions, and have generally held the page hostage until their demands have been met. Their edits have been nothing short of disruptive. Whether an editor changes their opinion on the subject, how often they change their opinions, or what their opinions were in other, unrelated discussions were is of absolutely no bearing to this issue. Joetri claims that his own opinion is in the best interests of the page, and has incorrectly assumed that this gives him the right to ignore and override a consensus.

In simple terms, the Formula 1 WikiProject has always edited season articles like this one to contain details that are only pertinent to that season. Prior to 2014, car numbers were assigned based on championship positions from the previous year. As a result of this, when the team and driver tables were created for those season articles, and they were organised in numerical order, they naturally reflected the championship standings from the previous season. However, from 2014, the numbers are assigned based on driver preferences, and when the table is organised in numerical order, it no longer reflects the championship standings from the previous season. As it no longer reflects the standings, the 2013 standings have absolutely no bearing on the 2014 season article. Despite this, Joetri10 and Eightball insist that the table must be arranged according to those standings, and are refusing to consider any alternative, hence the aggressive tactics.

It is also worth noting that arranging team and driver tables in numerical order is not only standard practice on Formula 1 season articles, but in the majority of motorsport season articles as a whole (though some do have their own idiosyncracies that have been adopted by their respective WikiProjects). 2013 International V8 Supercars Championship does it. 2013 World Touring Car Championship season does it. 2013 FIA European Formula 3 season does it. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 09:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

There is no consensus but the one you made up yesterday when everyone else was gone. The old consensus of listing by Car Numbers refers to a system that has otherwise been completely changed. The numbers now hold a entirely different value. It now makes no sense to anybody. An example is if Footballers were given the chance to choose their own jersey numbers. They have these numbers to allocate their position, though more-so within the entire team itself, it still serves that purpose of belonging. Would you suggest continue use of listing by numbers then? even though the official order would be off.

It has not just been me or Eightball but others that have disrupted your claim of agreement towards the numerical system nor have you suggested any reason for your consensus other than "Because we have done it before". TvX1 also was in favor and you dismissed his opinion also (On several occasions) There's 3 of us and 3 of you who have continually debated with this.

I have threatened admin involvement once and look, here we are. As for deleting information on there, that is a misconception due the bulk of what is trying to be changed. It appears that with every bulk change to one section, small edits are made to another, coincidently creating a problem when reverting back. If someone then only targets a specific area to be reverted back, someone changes it back with more small edits. It's a poor trick of justification to use against someone.

"Joetri claims that his own opinion is in the best interests of the page, and has incorrectly assumed that this gives him the right to ignore and override a consensus." I say the exact same thing to you. We have discussed this before and the only thing that resulted in a change was new proof. Otherwise no matter what, your opinion stayed on the page. My opinion does not change but yours certainly does, it's clear as day at the start of the topic. The only reason you are even in favor of a numerical value is because we now have these numbers. Before it was to organize them alphabetically. Before that you had no problem of the WCC. You can be quoted saying that.

As for taking the page hostage and multiple edit wars, that is not me. I have reverted edits only today which for that sake resulted in this, otherwise I do not make the edits.

What other pages do are irrelevant — Preceding unsigned comment added by Joetri10 (talk • contribs) 10:37, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• The discussions on that talk page are often an embarrassment to the website; I hold my hands up and say that I didn't help matters earlier on. With regards to this ANI thread, this is a content dispute that should be at WP:DRN, not here. Prisonermonkeys, Joetri10 and User:Eightball have all smashed 3RR to pieces; I count 5 conventional reverts from Joetri in 3-and-a-half hours, 6 from Prisonermonkeys today, plus 3 yesterday, and 4 reverts have come from Eightball (the first deletion of nearly 8K of content counts as a revert, particularly as it was a continuation of one of the previous reverts. User:Tvx1 only reverted once yesterday, and User:Deaþe gecweald only once today. The best analysis of this situation came from User:Bretonbanquet here. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 11:26, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

If I was edit-warring - and I do not deny it - it was because a consensus had been established. I was simply restoring the article to the state supported by the consensus in the face of an onslaught of edits from people who seemed to think that they could ignore whatever edits they disagreed with because they disagreed with them, and then turned around and got upset when they felt someone had done what they had just done. Even now, they will happily drag up other, unrelated discussions to make their case, and then insist that the format used by other related articles is irrelevant. All I am trying to do is keep the article in a state supported by a consensus, but instead two editors seem to think that if their preferred edits are in the article, then their case is stronger for it. This is the kind of behaviour I expected from User:DeFacto, and I am seriously considering going to SPI because both Eightball and Joetri10 are displaying some of his most disruptive behaviours. A fixation with minor details, trying to force his preferred edits through by edit-warring and attempting to discredit other edits by accusing them of vandalism is precisely what he did at Red Bull RB10 under one of his many, many sock accounts. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 11:48, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm not a sock puppet, get over yourself. Eightball (talk) 15:05, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

As someone who has been involved in the discussion but not the editting on the article (since Jan 5 since then there has been two pages of edit history worth of edit war), I do not see a consensus forming but rather two opposed blocks of opinion. Now we have multiple edittors violating 3R because they believe they are right to do so, completely ignoring that you are not supposed to edit war in return for any reason and giving no respect to each other. And now we have the implied accusation of sock-puppeting. I'm ashamed to be involved.

You stop the editting and thrash it out on the talk page. You DO NOT fight it out in the article. --Falcadore (talk) 13:17, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

There is no consensus as of yet and I am tired of hearing that there is one

Yes, I did do an edit war in the hope that I wouldn't have to do so. As it carried on, I came here. Joetri10 (talk) 13:43, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

You are required to live by the OLD consensus (as you call it) until consensus for change has been reached - even if it doesn't fully apply anymore. So yes, there is consensus - the default consensus is status quo ES&L 13:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

If that's the case then there is only "consensus" for sorting the table alphabetically, as it long was before the official numbers were released. THAT is the status quo. There is absolutely no consensus supporting the numerical order of the table. None whatsoever. In addition, I FIRMLY believe it is the worst, least useful way to sort the table, and I will NOT sit here and watch you people intentionally make an article worst. This problem will not be resolved unless a solution other than numerical sorting is reached, end of story. I'm not going to edit the article for now but it all but pointless to try to actually reach consensus. We ALMOST reached consensus on alphabetical order, then we ALMOST reached consensus on WCC order, and both times Prisonermonkeys kept pushing the issue until he got his way. It is absolutely infuriating that I am being scapegoated here when all I am trying to do is enforce the agreement that was reached before one selfish editor inexplicably decided we needed to stop editing the page the way it's always been edited. This is ridiculous. Eightball (talk) 14:53, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Also, the official FIA entry list is sorted in WCC order. How are we continuing to ignore this? It is by far the most important source we have and you're completely throwing it by the wayside. Eightball (talk) 14:55, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

How about this Prisonermonkeys? These are the reasons why I want to sort the table in WCC: It's the way all the recent articles have been sorted (ain't broke, don't fix it). It puts the most successful and most notable teams near the top (inverted pyramid). It's the way the FIA sorts their own entry list. Reasons you want to sort the table numerically: It's the way other, non-F1 articles do it. Do you realize now why I am as angry as I am? Can you at least attempt to give me one objective reason why sorting the table numerically would make this page better? Ignore the fact that we're on Wikipedia. Ignore all Wikipedia policies. If you were creating this table to pin on your wall for your own reference, how would you sort this and why? This discussion shouldn't be about consensus, or edit warring, or false accusations of sock puppetry. It should be about how we can make our articles best. Eightball (talk) 15:19, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• I've locked the article for a week. It was either that or a handful of blocks. BTW, content disputes should not be worked out on ANI, so this should be taken back to the talk page and dispute resolution if it can't be resolved there.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:52, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

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

User:Yambaram:Incivility, slurs and accusations of antisemitism

In this presentation for the deletion of an article, User:Yambaram has made a very serious attack on my work, and bona fides by presenting a slur. I notified him and the page that he was mistaken in these assertions, and had engaged in a WP:AGF violation. He has not changed his text, (though from his subsequent edit to the page, he has read my protest) or provided evidence for these absurd claims, so I presume he sticks by the smear.

I have notified him of my complaint here, on his talk page.

The slur runs that I am 'spread(ing) this belief (that Ashkenazi Jews are "fake Jews"). In addition Yambaram insinuates that I am promoting on wikipedia a theory,' a theory 'often regarded as anti-Semitic and used for anti-Semitic purposes.'

He provided no diff for the first generalization.

The second point makes no bones about suggesting I am promoting antisemitism on wikipedia.

I would like an administrator to intervene and ask him either to prove his assertions (in which case he should take me to AE) or strike them out.Nishidani (talk) 10:48, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• I wouldn't call this the damning evidence that Yambaram claims it is. It can be interpreted the way Yambaram has, but it certainly doesn't look too terrible to the uneducated eye. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 11:30, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not evidence for anything except the fact that demographics is a notable issue in arguments about origins in the I/P area, and cannot be interpreted as Yambaram does except with malice. I've been on wikipedia for 8 years, and have generally ignored the frequent attempts to get me off one area of it by people who play the 'antisemitic' card as if that trumped all argument. It is as vile a practice as antisemitism itself, poisoning the well by smearing editors simply from dislike of their inability to share a POV (which they take to be a failure to observe WP:NPOV). It should not be tolerated anymore than we should tolerate the usual racist zanies round here. Nishidani (talk) 15:29, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

You complained about accusations of racism, then accused others of being racist. Howunusual (talk) 17:13, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Previous topic ban: Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive123#Nishidani --Guy Macon (talk) 17:50, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Correction: two previous topic bans.

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive114#Nishidani

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive123#Nishidani

--Guy Macon (talk) 20:45, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• I fail to see the point, except as an implication of the type de te fabula narratur'. My occasional errors for 1R infractionsa year or so ago surely have no bearing on my complaint about Yambaram. One AE case does. I was accused, precisely, of antisemitism not too long ago, and the plaintiff, after close scrutinty, had his complain boomerang and was sanctioned severely. The last time this antisemitic slur was thrown my way was here Nishidani (talk) 21:46, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Good grief, Anon(Howunusual) please learn to construe English correctly. I didn't accuse 'others' of being racist (meaning my interlocutor). I compared intolerance for misusing labels like 'antisemitic' of editors to our healthy contempt for the many 'brief candles' who flicker into wikipedia with the usual racist cant, and are reflexively and justly banned. than is quite disjunctive, while correlative. Sigh.Nishidani (talk) 18:17, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Yambaram's comment: Amazing, Nishdani, what you're doing is called hypocrisy - should I remind you of this edit where you blatantly accused me of being some paid Israeli Zionist Wikipedian?

First off, I have never accused anyone on Wikipedia of being an anti-Semite, for I naturally respect one's opinion and because I know what the consequences of such words would be. And thankfully, I haven't been accused of anything similar so far either, hopefully rightly so. You're clearly exploiting things I wrote.

To answer the points you raised (quote: "He [Yambaram] provided no diff for the first generalization. The second point makes no bones about suggesting I am promoting antisemitism on wikipedia") -

It's true that the theory is often regarded as antisemitic, as is the fact that you're constantly working to expand it on various article on Wikipedia. However, I did not say that you're doing it intentionally for antisemitic purposes, and that's a huge difference. I'm concerned about the actual theory, not about what you think of it.

Secondly, no specific diffs are needed to prove my point, let me please quote what User:Tritomex said on in the deletion discussion of The Ashkenazi Jews/Khazarian origins theory article: "Nishidani is censoring all scientific and reliable sources which he believes could question the "Khazarian theory" (which btw do not have even a scientifically established name.) He also added (or participated in addition) of this theory in at least fore other articles: Genetic studies on Jews, Shlomo Sand, The Invention of the Jewish People and Ashkenazi Jews".

Even Einstein was wrong a few times during his life, but every time a user criticizes you, he/she is always the one to blame... What an interesting phenomenon. -Yambaram (talk) 20:40, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Again, now you cite this diff for the assertion that I 'blatantly accused (you) of being some paid Israeli Zionist Wikipedian.' Well, the diff does not even mention you. It provides ample evidence that a government actively promotes editing wikipedia in conformity with its idea of what the truth is. I'm not surprised at this. Most governments manipulate or try to manipulate free media like wikipedia, suffice it to look at the Chinese wikipedia. I commented that this may account for why I have been the subject of so many attempts to have me permabanned in the I/P area. You have once more misused diffs which do not substantiate what you argue from them.

To return to the substance of my complaint. You wrote of an article I 'created' (actually half of it is what you composed):-

The article was created recently and is solely is an attempt to promote a widely spreading theory often regarded as anti-Semitic and used for anti-Semitic purposes. The creator of the article, Nishidani, spreads this belief (that Ashkenazi Jews are "fake Jews") in other places, even in articles that have absolutely no connection to it, as he did in "Talk:Palestinian people" here for example

I was raised on grammar, and am old(-fashioned) but I think the art of construing the obvious meaning of English sentences is not quite dead. I would appreciate any administrator commenting directly on this particular remark, in terms of its consonance with WP:AGF. To me it is not only defamatory, but much worse, false and undocumented, and requires attention. I don't mind the abuse. I do mind having my intentions misconstrued to create an impression I work with malice against one of the 5 pillars. Nishidani (talk) 21:31, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

As I was asked by Nishidani to show the list of his bias revisions regarding his removals of every source that challenge the so called Khazarian theory. He removed an academic article from the journal of Donetsk National university dealing with the biggest archeological excavation of Khazar sites. The article written by the director of the project, who details the findings of archeological excavations and challenge the base of Khazar theory. [59] and [60] The link of the article is here: [61]despite the fact that other editors supported its inclusion [62], [63] and no one beside him at that time gave any objection on talk page. He claimed that the view of Dr. Flyorov were fringe. Similarly, Nishidani removed an entire section dealing with the criticism of Khazar theory [64] and again [65] and when it was reinstalled he deleted it again, [66] by moving to sub-page which he created, named and written unilaterally. This has been done contrary to opinion of 3 editors. He copied there both the text of Khazarian theory (created by himself) and the criticism, while he removed only the criticism from the article, keeping his text in both the article and the sub page. [67], This was all done without any consensus and as I showed by reverting 3 editors. Previously he removed an academic article written by famous Israeli historian Moshe Gil, which claims invalidity of Khazar theory. Among reasons for removal he stated that Prof. Gil was too old and that his views are fringe.[68] Nishidani removed and replaced the entire genetic section, placing one study, the only study which gave some support to Khazar theory in at least 3 places of the Khazar article. Other studies (more than 20) which directly or indirectly are dealing with this question, and do oppose this theory, he summarized in 2 sentence. All but one genetic study were wiped out or summarized in 2 sentence with his own wording. He removed all criticism of Elhaik study which was widespread and came from scientific sources although it directly questioned the sources of his edits .[69] The controversial book "The invention of Jewish people" by S.Sand was used as source for numerous historic claims, while he removed criticism of Sand, even those directly related to this question. Sand is being criticized by numerous historians for denying Jewish nationhood and origin. I removed a hexagonal star image from the article, as the capitation bellow did not match any source, and the image itself came from disputed source. Also the majority of editors on talk page, at that time, asked for the removal of this dubious image with the problematic capitation. Nishidani reverted me, leaving the source he added (K. A. Brook) and his own wording on capitation. I asked for direct quote for the capitation, as the source he gave claims that the hexagonal star was likely unrelated to Judaism and represent a pagan sun disc, however I was again reverted and the capitation written now by Nishadani tells now that the meaning of the symbol is uncertain.(sourced by Brook who claims that the symbol likely represents a Pagan sun disc. This creates an impression that this hexagonal star represents Jewsih symbol although the only source found regarding this image tells otherwise. [70] and [71],

He continually edited the Khazar theory, day by day and removed in same way all sources challenging it. Recently have revriten the entire article, removing all/most sources which challenge the historicity of so called Khazar Theory. [72].[73] Nishidani removed the template challenging the accuracy and neutrality of his edits, [74] while the discussion was ongoing, the same he use to do in other articles when the neutrality of his edits is questioned [75]. He interrupts and censor my texts on talk pages [76] [77] and violates WP:CIVIL by replying me with "blah, blah, blah" [78] use profane words including the F word in conversation with editors who do not share his opinion. He also has special opinion about "Jewish genes" and "Jewish markers" [79] and openly promote his political views on talk page, namely that the State of Israel carries out apartheid in West Bank and Gaza or as he said "(Apartheid) tends to begin to work as the intrinsic tendency of policy, settlement and development in colonization of the West Bank".[80]. He edited the Khazarian theory or as he called it (The Ashkenazi Jews/Khazarian origins theory) (as this theory does not even have scientifically established name and definition) in many other articles beyond the Khazars and the sub page he cretaed. This articles are Genetic Studies on Jews, Ashkenazi Jews, Shlomo Sand, Invention of the Jewish people etc.--Tritomex (talk) 03:58, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

The above spray shows a breathtaking unwillingness to read what Nishidani actually wrote, or is it an inability to read it? The claim He also has special opinion about "Jewish genes" and "Jewish markers" is extreme as it uses code words to suggest that a racist and anti-semitic line is being pushed. However, reading the diff shows nothing of the kind. Likewise, the comments on apartheid are much more nuanced than Tritomex seems able to discern, and are not a promotion of a political view. I checked some of the other links and while they will probably achieve their aim of smearing mud because others have little incentive to investigate, the links show a completely different picture from that imagined by Tritomex. Johnuniq (talk) 04:32, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Comment: Nishidani wrote, In my family, we also have a genes that are Jewish markers, which however, since we have a fair understanding of logic, does not mean we 'originated in the Middle East',

There are no such thing as Jewish marker and Jewish genes.--Tritomex (talk) 04:50, 13 January 2014 (UTC) Nishidani than wrote: "What these geneticists keep doing to define the Jewish type is excluding the logical deduction one could equally make from the other 30-55/60% of the genome which hails from other lands."

Nowhere geneticist ever defined the "Jewish type" .--Tritomex (talk) 05:05, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

That sounds as if you agree with Nishidani who wrote "That is why I am completely indifferent to whatever geneticists say about history, unless they are practiced historians as well who observe the methods of professional research in that discipline" (in this diff which you included above). Let me translate—Nishidani believes that the views of a geneticist (who is not also a historian) should be ignored in matters relating to history. Johnuniq (talk) 05:23, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

No I do not agree, while there is no such thing as Jewish types, marks and genes, and no geneticist ever claimed such thing, population genetics is a legitimate science and individual editors are not entitled to ignore or disrespect it as a science. Also, as Nishidani edited the Elhaik study about Khazar origin of Jews in many articles, I guess he have changed his mind on this issue.--Tritomex (talk) 09:45, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Good grief! Can I get someone to look at my complaint. What is happening here, derailing a legitimate request for supervision by shifting the goalposts and ignoring my evidence, is extraordinary. I registered a complaint, and there has been zero attention given it. Instead, a pseudo-AE list of factitious diffs, by several people, has been mugged up to argue I'm a lousy editor. Perhaps I am, but what has that got to do with the price of fish? All you are doing, Tritomex, is listing your grievances against me for insisting that wiki policies be scrupulously applied, esp. in controversial areas, so I won't reply to them.

To return to the substance of my complaint. Yambaram wrote:-

The article was created recently and is solely is an attempt to promote a widely spreading theory often regarded as anti-Semitic and used for anti-Semitic purposes. The creator of the article, Nishidani, spreads this belief (that Ashkenazi Jews are "fake Jews") in other places, even in articles that have absolutely no connection to it, as he did in "Talk:Palestinian people" here for example

These are serious accusations,-I am said to be using wikipedia to spread ideas, associated with antisemitism, that the majority of Jews are 'fake'. Yambaram himself should be called to account to justify them by evidence, translate them into a complaint about my behaviour at AE or to strike them out. Or is it now permitted to make outageous accusations and insinuations with impunity, under the benign eyes of administrative oversight?Nishidani (talk) 07:52, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• agree with Johnuniq, basically. This old giezer Nishidani tries to maintain an article that is clearly notable in terms of WP:NOTABLITY, and whence he has the occasion to make a rare recourse to the drama boards, he gets double-reverse hoodwinked on a non-level playing field. One can only cringe an object to such highly partial and non-policy compliant moves to censure a proven editor. --Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 18:06, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Ninham9_Gary12

This user, blocked by User:Mark Arsten, has created hundreds of stubs which need to be deleted as violations of the sockpuppet block. Some, but not all, are tagged for SD. It'll take me forever to delete them all individually. Any ideas? Jimfbleak - talk to me? 13:46, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Some time back I asked for a deletion bot: it would operate off a fully-protected page, you'd have to give a separate link to every page and provide a deletion rationale for every page, and it would delete them with the rationale you gave and mention that it was operating under your orders. I envisioned it primarily for large group AFDs, but mass speedies would also be useful; and since it would be doing precisely what you told it, rather than determining what needed to be deleted, the only false positives would be the result of typos by the admin giving the instructions. Unfortunately, my request was denied because there was some sort of semiautomated tool that can do this, but that doesn't help those of us who don't understand the coding required for these tools. Nyttend (talk) 14:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

This is what Special:Nuke is for. I bulk deleted his page creations with it, but a user in good standing had made edits to some of those, so I restored a few pages per his request. Mark Arsten (talk) 17:44, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Mark, I thought there was a tool out there, but I didn't know where it was Jimfbleak - talk to me? 20:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Aschwole and repeated copyright violations

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

---

User:Aschwole is the same editor as User:Yid and User:Nuklear who were blocked after repeatedly adding copyrighted material about chemical syntheses to drug articles. See Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/Yid, Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive615#Repeated_copyright_violations, and Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Nuklear for some of the history. I have reverted some of the recent contributions of Aschwole because they were lifted word-for-word from chemistry books. I haven't yet checked older contributions, but if the pattern holds, many (most?) of them will also be copyright violations. ChemNerd (talk) 15:02, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I am just adding the synthesis to drug compounds to give me something to do. I have a masters in chemistry but am just lying around the house all day with nothing to do, no job to go to etc. I am not "vandalizing" the pages etc. If you think it is copyright vio or not is open to debate since Lednicer himself has copied the synthesis out of the journal articles and patents that it was linked to. I am just doing it because it gives me something to do. Obviously I would prefer to be in a real job that is offering me decent pay but they have just left me alone at home with nothing to do.

I just want to add also that I am quite insulted that you are accusing me of copyright vio etc and trying to get me blocked/revert my edits etc. I was trying to do a favour and actually improve the pages here, on a voluntary basis, so my work should be regarded and not just try to erase it. This was my serious work, I was not just messing around.--Aschwole (talk) 18:40, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Your most recent edit [81] appears to be a CopyVio of this text [82]. JoeSperrazza (talk) 19:41, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Also, see Wikipedia:NOTTHERAPY#Summary "one's psychological state is not an acceptable excuse for disrupting the encyclopedia". JoeSperrazza (talk) 19:46, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Um has anyone considered that this is a troll? The username pronounces like "asshole". GiantSnowman 19:55, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it has been considered. There was a previous noticeboard thread concerning this editor's previous name -- "Yid" -- which he vociferously denied was a pejorative term for a Jew, and then either another or the same thread where I pointed out that "Aschwole" seemed to have been chosen as a new name because of its similarity to "asshole". I can look up the thread(s), but the end result was that Aschwole was not blocked, not even for a username violation, which it clearly seems to be to me. BMK: Grouchy Realist (talk) 20:14, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

OK, here's the AN thread about "Aschwole", who is a self-admitted sock of indef-blocked Nuklear as well as of Yid. The discussion with Yid about their user name took place on their talk page here. Why has an editor who used "Yid" and "Aschwole" as usernames, who is the self-confessed sock of an indef-blocked editor, and whose previous screen names have all been responsible for adding copyright violations to the encyclopedia been allowed to run free for so long? Other editors have been hammered for much less. BMK: Grouchy Realist (talk) 20:23, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I'd happily support an indef block - or even a site ban. Obviously a long-term pest. GiantSnowman 20:30, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean that my username is offense. What about the user named "Battybot" (possible word play on "Battyboy") for instance that I saw this morning.--Aschwole (talk) 20:53, 12 January 2014 (UTC) Please do not insult me trying to ban me. This is seriously offensive to do this. I hope that you are able to understand the offense that this has caused me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:BattyBot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:GoingBatty

See on his userpage, he getting lots of awards & medals etc, not just treating like he is some kind of a troll that is here just to cause trouble.

OK, I'll play along - in what way is "Battybot" being similar to "Battyboy" like "Aschwole" being similar to "Asshole"? You do understand that having chosen an extremely pejorative term for a Jewish person as one of your previous usernames, your hands are hardly clean where usernames are concerned? And you do recall that every one of your previous IDs - or at least the ones that we're aware of - have been cited for adding copyright violations to the encyclopedia, which, incidentally, is what this thread is about. How about a little less about your supposed feelings of "offense" and "insult" and more about why you keep violating a very important Wikipedia policy, despite having been warned numerous times not to do so? BMK: Grouchy Realist (talk) 23:03, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Good question. I'll answer with an indef block. Drmies (talk) 00:06, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• It would be helpful if an admin with some knowledge of this content would look to see what needs to be removed--I can't even read {JoeSperrazza's linked book. Drmies (talk) 00:09, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

While you're at it, after their last couple of edits to their talk page a revocation of talk page and email access is necessary. Blackmane (talk) 12:20, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

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

Sockpuppet investigation of kentatm

Can you any one please check this account for WP:SPI ? Thanks Nechlison (talk) 19:23, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Why do you suspect sockpuppetry? Kentatm has only edited 1987 Texas A&M Aggies football team, and no other person has edited that (apart from you speedying it), so what other accounts are involved here? bobrayner (talk) 19:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Benrudin using Wikipedia for fundraising

Benrudin has been using the Melissa Ann Young article to promote a fundraiser. See his repeated edits here: [83], [84], [85].

He has been warned to keep his fundraising out of Wikipedia: [86]. Please put a stop to this ASAP. 70.134.227.84 (talk) 20:15, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Have you previously edited with a different account? It's unusual to see somebody subst a template in their third edit and create a new AN/I report on their fourth edit.
• Benrudin's last edit doesn't even mention or link to a fundraiser. Benrudin's edits aren't entirely constructive, but that seems to be through inexperience rather than malice; has anybody tried explaining rather than warning? bobrayner (talk) 20:36, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Not all IPs are idiots, inexperienced editors, or sockpuppets.
• Did you read the edit summaries and the comment added to the warning?
• What do you think the links in the standard warning are for? Hint: The reader can click on them to see a fuller explanation of WP's policy.
• Are you just going to blame me for another editor's violation of WP policy, or are you going to do something about it?

70.134.227.84 (talk) 20:53, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

If you're concerned about Benrudin "promoting a fundraiser", what exactly would you like other editors to do? Benrudin's last attempt to edit the article didn't mention the fundraiser at all, so where's the problem?

Meanwhile, an inexperienced editor seems to have made several good-faith attempts to add content to an article, failed to meet our standards, got reverted every time, and got three templated warnings. What made you think that the next step should be punishment rather than advice? bobrayner (talk) 00:59, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

You're really not paying much attention, are you? Benrudin has repeatedly ([87], [88], [89], [90]) inserted libelous, unsupported material and spam into the Melissa Ann Young article. He has been reverted by three separate editors ([91], [92], [93]), demonstrating blatant edit warring, and turning a blind eye to the WP policies that have been cited by all three editors. He's already been given "advice" by three editors, via their edit summaries. This is a biography of a living person. We have standards about such articles, don't we? 71.139.156.126 (talk) 04:40, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Ok, you need to relax. First time, I didn't know it violated the rules, second time I thought someone was just removing it out of personal preference, third time I removed any reference to the fundraiser, so your objections should be mute. I could handle your anonymous trolling, but when you accuse me of libel, I feel a need to respond. The only statements I added are in the last paragraph, and are all true. Given libel requires a false statement, my statements are not libel. As for the statements being "unsupported", I would cite them but my source is the fundraiser page and I don't want that information to get deleted again. Finally, for the record, the fundraiser is not mine. benrudin (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 06:48, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

So the holder of a state-wise pageant title who competed nationally in 2005 is gravely ill. No mention in local news, no facebook groups, no tweets. Just a fundanything.com page, marketed as a "Start Raising Money Today - FOR FREE!" site? This is why we ask for reliable sources for material like this. Tarc (talk) 13:48, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Benrudin - Your protestations of innocence are a bit disingenuous. It was always perfectly clear why the material was being removed. Edit summaries of the removals read: "rm unsourced promotional materkal [sic]", "WP is not the place to promote a fundraiser", "rmv unsourced addition per WP:BLP", "rm unsourced information". Moreover, a warning explaining WP policy was issued on your talk page after the second removal, the one you say you thought was done "out of personal preference", the one with the edit summary that said "WP is not the place to promote a fundraiser". You need to pay attention to Wikipedia policies. As Tarc has said, WP requires reliable sources. Please read the WP policy on this. It doesn't matter whether the fundraiser is yours. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a place to promote a fundraiser. As to the libel allegation, any time someone accuses a physician of being negligent without one single shred of evidence, that's libel, as was done here and here. 70.134.226.94 (talk) 15:27, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Silicon Valley is not connected with the Porn industry, nor is there any confusion about it

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

---

This is my first use of this process, so please bear with me...
Over the last several years or so a hatnote (or similar link) has been added and repeated removed from the Silicon Valley article that draws a comparison between it and a very similar nickname "SiliconE Valley" (my emphasis added). Initially the latter term was used to describe San Fernando Valley and the copious amount of adult related and pornographic videos that are produced there. The hatnote was deleted and reverted several times until finally a discussion ensued (several times) here and here.

Later, the case has been stated and made that there is likely confusion of the terms "Silicon" (the element, Si) and the substance "silicone" (that is used in a great many products). The result of that discussion was to redirect Silicone Valley to Silicon Valley primarily because of the confusion of the terms as substances, but not in regard to any slang or nickname usage.

That said, over the last several week User:Thryduulf persists (to the point of violating 3RR), in adding a hatnote to the Silicon Valley article claiming that there is "confusion" regarding the use of the terms and the locations. I do not dispute that there is evidence that the term "SiliconE Valley" is one of many nicknames for the San Fernando Valley, but no source, evidence, or support have ever been offered that anyone confuses "Silicon Valley" (one of the primary -if not the- technology centers of the planet) with the area where porn is produced.

I am calling for a ban of this hatnote from the Silicon Valley article and a ban of User:Thryduulf from editing the same article. --Scalhotrod - Just your average banjo playing, drag racing, cowboy... (talk) 20:39, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

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

Hans Adler and Circumcision

Hans Adler has clearly stated his personal disgust with circumcision, and unfortunately his personal feelings interfere so much that his editing has become disruptive both at the article and in other areas regarding the topic. Hans has made his personal views on the subject will known, for example in his use of the article Talk page here plus other places. Hans has also used the article Talk page to engage in general commentary/soapboxing about the topic here. I am disappointed that an editor as established and as experienced as Hans would disregard WP:TPG like this.

A few days ago brand new Norwegian IP editor 84.210.13.40 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) made some pretty disgusting remarks at Talk:Circumcision, airing their personal views on the subject and included comments like "I am sure lots of children will agree to doing blow jobs if they are offered lots of candies" and "I have heard that there is lots of zinc in sperm. Maybe male Jewish doctors should start publishing more to their kids about the nutritional benefits of doing blow jobs." I left the IP a welcome message and explained my concerns at their User Talk. I then also started this ANI thread about the edits. As an outside administrator, Drmies handled the ANI, reviewed the edits and quickly blocked the IP for 31 hours, and later hatted the comments as "soapboxing/trolling" with an edit summary indicating he wouldn't even mind if someone deleted the comments altogether. Hans then undid the hat, edit summary "Totally inappropriate censorship of valid criticism of a biased article", restoring visibility of the offensive comments. Drmies redid the hat, Hans again undid the hat. Drmies approach Hans about this on his User Talk, expressing his disappointment, see the second half of the section here.

Hans was also involved in a series of back-and-forth reverts over the placement of an article-wide NPOV tag [94], which resulted in the article being full-protected for three days by John Reaves after my request at RFPP. There was a lot of discussion at the article Talk page and this WP:AN discussion over the placement of the tag, with no clear consensus in support of it. 20 hours after the full protection expired Hans re-added the tag, which then was removed, Hans added it back (edit summary "your blindness to your own bias is no justification to remove" is interesting), it was removed again and then Drmies ended up having to full-protect the article for a week to stop the disruption.

In that WP:AN discussion I mentioned Hans spent a lot of effort questioning my integrity: [95] [96]. I asked him on his User Talk if we could just stick to the article sources and content; in his response Hans appeared to decline, indicating to me that he would continue to attack me personally in his resopnses.

I've got to say even the Norwegian IP editor I mentioned above has done a much better job of keeping their own feelings in check and respecting Wikipedia's guidelines than Hans. While blocked, that IP editor made some interesting comments on their User Talk clearly expressing strongly-held personal feelings, see for example these comments they added in between my notes, and the status of the User Talk page here (quite visually striking actually!!). Yet even that editor has started to figure out Wikipedia's rules, deleting their soapbox-y commentary here after Yobol pointed out it wasn't appropriate. If this IP can do it, why can't Hans?

Hans' involvement has interfered with the discussion, which is often tense to start with, by using the Talk page inappropriately, casting personal aspersions against other editors, edit-warring with an admin to retain trolling comments and causing the article to get full-protected for a week, and disregarding WP:TPG with soapboxing, which sets a bad example.

I'm proposing an indefinite topic ban of Hans from the subject of circumcision until it can be demonstrated that Hans can edit in areas he feels strongly about without his feelings causing disruption. Zad68 21:29, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

The Norwegian IP's comments were targeted towards improvement of the article, if not in form then certainly in content. It is totally normal for a European to be outraged by the article in its current state. Circumcision is virtually non-existent in Scandinavia because it's considered weird and even for most medical indications there are better alternative treatments. Yet the circumcision article currently presents it as a rational practice that incidentally can also be performed for ritual or fashion reasons. And not a word about children's rights (or religious rights, for that matter). Let alone a big section, as exists in the German Wikipedia, for example. Of course people become angry when they realise this. The solution is not to block the angry editors, it's to fix the article. (But of course it can't be fixed because there is nothing on human rights in Pubmed.) Hans Adler 23:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support topic ban Diffs seem to support some serious soapboxing.--v/r - TP 21:42, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) Support topic ban, but I don't know about indefinite. And frankly, Zad, I'm surprised you didn't mention any of the problems Hans caused on the article itself: [97] [98] [99]. (Incidentally, I'm not too crazy about circumcision myself, but Hans' contributions appear to be a combination of WP:SOAP and WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT.) Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 21:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Erpert, good point about the missing diffs... I just don't like putting these ANI threads together, they take a long time. Sorry I missed those. As for whether it should be indef, I don't know how to come up with a specific time-frame in which it'd be reasonable to expect the issues would be resolved. Hans' editing has been very sporadic. I'd rather go by evidence of behavior. Zad68 22:39, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I guess Zad68 knows better than to present my adding a perfectly valid POV tag to the article as me causing problems "on the article itself". Such statements tend to undermine one's credibility. Hans Adler 23:38, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose Hans calls the ip out for their inappropriate statement "it was unwise in that it can be read as antisemitic", Zad copy pastes it here -- who's actually creating the drama? This whole mess has been pooched up from the get go -- an admin going 3rr on the NPOV tag in the first place, all sorts of ad homimem at Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view/Noticeboard#Circumcision and elsewhere. Obviously the tag should have remained in place since there was an ongoing discussion going on but the wrong version got protected with some awkwardly phrased statements. Now I guess we can't discuss this like mature adults because it involves peckers. No one seem to have a problem with calling female circumcision mutilation, but merely raising the term on the talk page is a cause for a ruckus?? As Mike Godwin said, The best answer for bad speech is more speech" — Preceding unsigned comment added by NE Ent (talk • contribs) 22:20, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

What we need is productive speech. There are plenty of editors at the article who share Hans' views. We need discussion like mature adults, just like you say, but the issue here is behavior, not the views themselves. Zad68 22:39, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Concur. Productive speech; edit warring, page protection, ad hominem, hats, et. al. are not. NE Ent 23:06, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Of course, any behaviour that has a chance of getting some motion into the article so that the fiercely protected current over-emphasis of technical medical matters and American medical sources can be fixed, is disruptive. Whereas the definition of productive speech is that which does not endanger the status quo. Behaving like a mature adult changes nothing, because mature adults are shouted down with appeals to earlier consensus and nobody notices their protest.

It's unfortunate, but that's just how Wikipedia works. Another aspect of Wikipedia is that this kind of discussion usually starts when Europeans are about to go to bed and Americans are beginning to get fully active. (It's past midnight where I am.) Hans Adler 23:21, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Hans states: Of course, any behaviour that has a chance of getting some motion into the article ... is disruptive. ... Behaving like a mature adult changes nothing -- I'm reading this as a plain statement of intent to continue disruptive behavior. I don't think this is sarcasm. Does anybody else read this differently? Zad68 00:11, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Hans is more mature than that. He is just making an observation about what it takes to push through a change in a difficult environment. The meek don't get heard. Binksternet (talk) 00:43, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

An observation or a self-fulfilling prophecy? Not having any prior engagement with the dispute, when I attempted to get an answer out of ScienceApe about what reliable sources showed the POV issue, I got instead from Hans Adler the kind of response described by him above. Was he attempting to be heard, by not being meek? If so, all he did was convince me that the behavior on that article talk would be so contentious and difficult that engaging any further to try to understand what was happening in that article would not be productive. So, at minimum, the approach by ScienceApe and Hans Adler resulted in chasing off one medical editor who didn't whack her sons' willies at birth and was more than willing to hear what sources might need to be represented. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:26, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• Sadly, in only my second interaction with Hans Adler on the talk page, it produced what I would consider assumptions of bad faith and battleground mentality as well as a bizarre analogy asserting decapitation is a medical procedure. This editor may not have the objectivity to neutrally edit this topic area. This topic area needs editors who will stick to sourcing and Wikipedia policy, not editors who soapbox or enable the trolling/soapboxing of others. Yobol (talk) 22:08, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

  Serious misrepresentation. Could you please stop it with the hyperbole and simplifications? Of course decapitation is not a medical procedure and I made it perfectly clear how my argument runs. ("I dispute that WP:MEDMOS fully applies to this article. In particular, circumcision is not just any surgical procedure but one that started as a ritual and still is performed most often as a ritual. The article decapitation is not structured according to MEDMOS, and neither should this one be, as the generic MEDMOS structure for surgical procedures marginalises some of the most important aspects. MEDMOS was not written with such a special case in mind." Later clarification: "Decapitation was just the first thing that came to my mind as a surgical procedure that one could but very obviously should not treat according to MEDMOS.")
  There was a problem on the talk page caused by your sloppy argumentation. You confused sources about economy that mention circumcision and sources on circumcision that mention economic aspects – two very different things for a weight discussion, which that was. And when the Norwegian IP reacted to what you said rather than what would have been reasonable to say, you went ballistic. Now you are doing a very similar simplification with the applicability of MEDMOS to the circumcision article. I am arguing that circumcision is a rich topic which one can't do justice with an overall article structure based on WP:MEDMOS#Surgeries and procedures. Instead of simply saying you disagree with that specific point and arguing for your position, you claim that I want MEDMOS not to apply to the article at all and that this breaks prior consensus. Very bad form.
  Your assessment of my actions seems to be clouded by your uneasiness at that interaction, for which I am not more to blame than you are. Hans Adler 23:13, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I'll let neutral editors read our interaction on the article talk page and come to their own conclusions. Your battleground mentality is unfortunately rather obvious. That you think I went "ballistic" anywhere in my interaction with the IP is, again, bizarre. Yobol (talk) 23:25, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Not bizarre, just wrong. I misremembered and at this time of night I didn't check before posting. There was, however, a miscommunication between you and the IP which I had to clear up. You said, whether you meant it or not, that economics deserves weight in the circumcision article merely because there are many publications discussing the economics of circumcision. This is what the IP questioned, and you lectured the IP ("No, that is precisely how we determine how much WP:WEIGHT to give a topic") instead of conceding his valid point and adjusting your argument.

After that event, I frankly consider it bizarre to be attacked here in this way. Hans Adler 23:34, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

References

• I oppose a topic ban. I see nothing in Hans's rhetoric that should disqualify him from the debate. Obviously the neutrality of the article was being disputed, so the tag should have remained for the duration of the discussion. Circumcision is just as much a matter for philosophy, religion and the social sciences as it is for medicine, so please make plenty of room for notable perspectives from those domains. Hans could be more polite but there is bad form on all sides here. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 23:31, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Tony the issue isn't the content but the behavior. I've dealt with lots of impolite behavior at the article, and usually a reminder or two of "please don't do that" gets things back on track. What Hans is doing is disruptive and he's promising more of it. He's actually making it harder to have a polite, rational, policy- and source-based discussion about the kinds of changes he'd like to see. Zad68 02:24, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• Yes, I hatted those comments and blocked the IP; if I'm not mistaken they've come back with better manners. I did indeed "express disappointment" with Hans's behavior in relation to those disgusting, off-topic comments and the personal insults in them; Zad gave a nice and accurate plot summary. I'm fairly disgusted with being accused of "censorship" and of "hiding comments"--surely I don't have to explain here that such is utter bullshit and a rather low blow, or an attempt at a low blow.

  Having said all that, I don't see why Hans should be topic-banned here (with apologies to Zad); I do not believe that his behavior is so disruptive as to warrant a topic ban. For the record, I have an opinion here, and I'm probably aligned with Hans and the IP; when I protected the article, I protected what I consider to be the wrong version, since I believe the tag to be valid--not just because of possible bias, but also because I believe there are valid comments on the talk page about this bias (well said, Anthony, and I agree that there are bad manners on the other side as well). Drmies (talk) 23:47, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

  • Drmies so what do you suggest as the alterntive? Hans has been pointed to WP:TPG and the like and simply doesn't care. I've made an appeal to him to knock off the personal comments and he told me to expect more of the same. You, an outside admin sympathetic to Hans' views, intervened to remove some disgusting comments and he put them back. You removed them again and he put them back again. Right now the disgusting comments you described as "soapboxing/trolling" are still visible on the article Talk page. You had a personal conversation with Hans on his User Talk and basically gave up. If removing Hans from the topic area isn't what we should do, what should we do? Zad68 02:24, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
    • I don't know, Zad. Maybe some other admin is willing to hat the comments, for instance; I'm not going to do it again since I tried twice and I don't care to listen to more abuse from an adult who should know better. I have little interest in policing that talk page or the article--I'm sorry, but I'm of no use here. Still, I think it way too early for topic ban hammers. Drmies (talk) 02:38, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. I have worked with Hans Adler on difficult and complex topics and I find him quite reasonable. His stance on this topic is strong but he is not deaf to high quality arguments. Binksternet (talk) 00:46, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Like, "hatting is not censorhip"? :) Drmies (talk) 00:49, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose per Drmies. The spat doesn't rise to the level of a ban. Someone not using his real name (talk) 03:02, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. Hans Adler is a welcome breath of fresh air on Wikipedia. While I do not always agree with him, I find his open minded approach and ability to look at both sides of a problem a valuable skill that most editors don't possess. Circumcision is a contentious and controversial topic area, and this dispute exists independently of Hans Adler's participation. Although I greatly respect the work that WikiProject Medicine has performed as volunteers, they have a tendency to don riot gear and wield truncheons whenever their "authoritay" is questioned. They also engage in tag team revert wars to silence their opponents. For this reason, I don't see Hans Adler as the problem, I see him as the victim. I have previously commented on the NPOV dispute touched upon in this thread, and I discovered that members of WikiProject Medicine were to blame for inflaming it. This transparent attempt to silence Hans is more of the same. Although I may not agree with the content of Hans' argument, I will stand beside him and protect his right to speak his mind. Because of militant groups like WikiProject Medicine, Wikipedia is entering a dangerous phase in its existence. We should all be concerned when editors espousing minority positions are facing blocks and bans for disagreeing with the majority. It's time to speak up. Viriditas (talk) 03:09, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose per User:Viriditas.Anythingyouwant (talk) 03:17, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support topic ban per well documented soapboxing, battlegrounding, and general disruption in circumcision-related discussions. Mark Arsten (talk) 03:25, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support per Mark Arsten. BMK: Grouchy Realist (talk) 04:14, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I do not see a pattern of disruption, merely a contnt dispute. Hans Adler has not been blocked for edit-warring, and editors on the other side of the issue have not taken the case to dispute resolution noticeboards. TFD (talk) 04:28, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I believe that the recent issues started less than a week ago, and while I have extreme sympathy for those who try to maintain circumcision-related articles which anyone can and does edit, I nevertheless think that the standard responses should be adjusted when dealing with a highly experienced and rational editor such as Hans. Engaging with his arguments might be tedious, but a better article would follow. It easy for researchers to find evidence that supports their cultural norms, so I doubt that the article can be modified in a manner that suits Hans, but he should have every opportunity to express his concerns. Johnuniq (talk) 05:01, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Support The disruption by Hans Adler on the Talk page and his edit warring in the article go back much farther in time than the recent examples presented by Zad68. This disruption did not start just yesterday. Adler consistently misrepresents sources, twists what editors say to put the worst imaginable spin on it, blatantly ignores Wikipedia rules (especially on Talk page discourse), barks orders at fellow editors, and is apparently unable to distinguish between his personal opinion and the picture presented by the preponderance of sources. He is a culture warrior. He burns with the conviction that circumcision is a moral outrage, a human rights violation, a horrible mutilation inflicted on defenseless babies. He is hell-bent on turning the en WP article into a counterpart of the German WP article on circumcision, which has long been an anti-circ propaganda piece and a horror show, complete with gruesome color photographs of (extremely rare) botched circumcisions out of all proportion to actual reality as well as cherry-picked primary sources and references to web pages from so-called intactivist sites. He needs to be excused from participation in this topic.89.204.155.132 (talk) 06:26, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

And you are? Have you ever been banned from that topic here or on de.Wikipedia? I've just read every Hans Adler post in that article's archive and, on balance, you are full of shit. Hans can be blunt. Get over it. He demonstrated in that archive that he can be persuaded by good argument. In the couple of threads I read in full (all sides) his reasoning was sound and he made more sense than his interlocutors. This is argument on a controversial, emotive topic. It is robust but, so far, not unhealthy. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 06:58, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

No, never been banned from either article. I did manage, though, to get the German WP editors to remove one of the most bogus claims from their article, that of an estimated 117 deaths annually from circumcision in the United States alone. The rest of my well-founded criticism was ignored so I gave up. Adler claims to speak for all Europeans yet in his own country (Germany) the parliament passed a law a year ago explicitly legalizing non-therapeutic circumcision if the interests of the child are safeguarded (it had been implicitly legal for religiously based cases before) by a vote of 436 to 100.89.204.155.132 (talk) 08:24, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

An IP-hopping non-geolocatable Telefonica Germany customer with a pro-circumcision viewpoint that is so over the top, that he makes himself ridiculous. Just like the one who commented on my talk page yesterday. To quote him: "For some reason the circumcision topic attracts some deeply troubled individuals". There may be some truth in that. His reaction to this was to propose on my talk page that the Norwegian IP needs "marital counseling and perhaps a visit to a divorce lawyer". I thought this was a common troll, but apparently he is for real. Hans Adler 13:57, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Hans you describe the German IP as having "a pro-circumcision viewpoint that is so over the top, that he makes himself ridiculous" and "a common troll". And you have no such comments for the Norwegian IP, and actually revert to restore the visibility of their comments on the article Talk page? Doesn't this say something about your ability to maintain objectivity in this area? Zad68 14:10, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Of course it does. But if you really think that the Norwegian IP is as bad as the German IP, then this also says something about your ability to maintain objectivity in this area. The German IP's comment on my past behaviour at Talk:Circumcision was way over the top, as anyone can verify by reading all my contributions there. I just did so, and I found nothing that is disruptive or of which I am ashamed. In fact, I would be pretty proud of my comments in those threads if they hadn't proved completely ineffective.

I also stand by this edit. As proved by the Norwegian IP's later behaviour, this was not trolling but genuine concern about the article's quality. It is normal for an unexperienced editor to innocently start criticism of an article in such a way. Hatting such comments, and even blocking the editor, tends to alienate a possible new co-worker and drive him away before he even had a chance to learn how the community works. The result is a systemic bias against those who disagree with the article. Hans Adler 15:19, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes the diff you are proud of makes the comments "I have heard that there is lots of zinc in sperm. Maybe male Jewish doctors should start publishing more to their kids about the nutritional benefits of doing blow jobs." visible. It also adds a comment from you that includes "I actually agree that inflicting circumcision on a baby is not better than inducing a child to do a blowjob."

The change in the Norwegian IP's behavior was in spite of, and not because of, your actions. I told the IP on their User Talk that Wikipedia is not an Internet chat forum and the kinds of comments they were making weren't acceptable. The short block by Drmies indicated that we're serious. Subsequently when Yobol told the IP not to use the article Talk page for general comments, the IP complied. Your actions only encouraged the bad behavior: by validating it when you restored visibility of the comments (twice) and then by providing a bad role model by using the article Talk page to make the same kind out-of-scope (per WP:TPG) comments. Zad68 15:39, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• Support Hans Adler's comment: Of course, any behaviour that has a chance of getting some motion into the article ... is disruptive. ... Behaving like a mature adult changes nothing encapsulates the problem, here. He has, as shown by the diffs, turned to soapboxing, edit warring, and battlegrounding in what he apparently views as a deeply moral issue to right great wrongs. Sorry, but that approach is directly contrary to purpose and process on this project, and Hans Adler is apparently blind to even the idea that reasonable people can reason together over the representation of reliable sources for this article -- no one is here to discuss Hans Adler's morals, but that is the unrelenting distraction and, yes, disruption, he apparently wishes to engage in. This is just not the place for that. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:26, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose as per Viriditas and others. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 13:31, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Comment I am not taking a vote, but aren't Hans Adler's comments and the IP editor's comments equally offensive? Epicgenius (talk) 14:20, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

  Epicgenius, you may want to clarify your comment, as there is a strongly anti-circumcision Norwegian IP and a strongly pro-circumcision German IP. Without guessing your position on the dispute, it's not clear which of the two you are referring to. Hans Adler 15:23, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

  It's 84.210.13.40 (talk · contribs · 84.210.13.40 WHOIS), the Norwegian one. Epicgenius (talk) 15:25, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose　--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 14:30, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose If anything contributes to making wikipedia articles better it is negative feedback. Hans Adler has given the best negative feedback I have seen on the circumcision talk page. If wikipedia starts to ban all people giving negative feedback to their articles wikipedia will stagnate. It would serve wikipedia better to ban people like Doc James, because he always repeats the status quo and never says anything I find even remotely intelligent. Such people don't contribute to anything. 84.210.13.40 (talk) 18:09, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

  Note: This is the Norwegian IP editor discussed before. Zad68 18:11, 13 January 2014 (UTC) ...adding: And thank you for removing at least the most offensive of the comments from the article Talk page. Zad68 18:12, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Melbourne Derby (cricket)

I've listed this for closure at WP:AN a few days ago with no action. this is an AfD that now has gone over 12 days and requires closure. thanks. LibStar (talk) 23:17, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Listed at WP:ANRFC. Erpert ^{WHAT DO YOU WANT???} 06:30, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

 Done. De728631 (talk) 13:06, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

WP:NLT

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

---

Can someone familiar with WP:NLT examine this edit[100] and decide how best to handle this? All I did was move a new discussion from the top of the talk page to the bottom (as is normal practice), and apparently, when their lawyer is finished with me, I'll be found in violation of copyright laws. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:48, 13 January 2014 (UTC) A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:42, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

The IP has been blocked for 1 week by Drmies. Mike V • Talk 01:34, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Yep, while I was making a delicious bean soup with kale, like it was nothing. Drmies (talk) 02:07, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

You guys have no sense of humor... Anyway, blocking a troll is never too bad. - Altenmann >t 02:53, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Long-term_abuse/Universe_Daily 207.38.156.219 (talk) 02:57, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

@Erpert - Do you honestly think that was the real Peter Capaldi and Steven Moffat making those posts? ;-) Thrub (talk) 11:02, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

This discussion is closed, which means no further comments. Therefore, I am archiving the above comment. Epicgenius (talk) 14:24, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

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

"Latvian mythology" vs. Latvian folklore and Baltic mythology

This article could really use some more eyes and hands, especially from administrators that have the appropriate background. Attempts I've tried to make in improving the article have met with reversion and system-gaming, apparently motivated by either explicit or latent nationalism. The following is my take on the situation.

Some time ago this article was supposedly rewritten to solve its then-numerous issues. Now that I've had a little time to sit down and take a look at where this article is again, I'm afraid that I don't see any improvement, even after the rewrite and attempt at referencing everything out. For example, I’ve just gone through and removed a bunch of unrelated, deleted, and/or nonacademic links in the external links section. Referenced throughout was a website that has been dead for over a year, a website that shouldn’t have been cited in the first place. Xil (talk · contribs), however, has blanket-reverted these changes, only stopping when he reached his third revert. This user seems rather dead-set on presenting an article with the appearance of being fully referenced, regardless of the quality of the references at hand (in other words, websites like “latvianstuff.com” are being linked to).

On top of this, it’s very poorly constructed. Preferred theories are presented as fact, then slight criticism is applied when necessary. Weasel words are peppered throughout. Neutrality is totally thrown to the wind.

However, the main issue is the topic of the article itself: Reading this article, one would think that there was some definitive text about the beliefs and values of the pre-Christianized descendants of the modern Latvian-speaking peoples, or that some body of text describing it in any depth survives. Unfortunately this isn’t the case; it’s all reconstructed either by way of linguistics, the archaeological record, ancient sources, or by way of more modern folklore. Sources are not treated for what they are or outlined in an objective sense—frequently they’re not even mentioned. Instead we get a narrative stitched together from disparate secondary sources on Latvian folklore, and somehow called Latvian mythology is derived from it. This is misleading: Academia, fortunately, no longer entertains extra-scientific racial ideas of people as ethnic products of modern nation-state borders; this material is handled by, for example, Indo-Europeanists as part of a larger cultural continuum, which also includes modern Lithuanian-speakers and once included the now-extinct Prussian-speakers.

What seems to be going on here is a form of nationalism, latent or not; the idea of a modern nation-state of Latvia is obscuring the broader picture of the pre-Christian beliefs of the Baltic peoples (no matter how many isoglosses we’re talking among them). As a result, this article really needs to be rewritten, logically—as elsewhere—with the result of the following:

• A separate article called Latvian folklore that covers the folklore of modern Latvian speakers
• A section covering what can be reconstructed from Latvian sources regarding an earlier sphere of belief at Baltic mythology

In the mean time, this article only promotes the idea of a ‘’Latvian mythology’’; basically the same idea as promoting a Swedish mythology or Dutch mythology instead having an article presenting the pre-Christian history of the land where these modern nation-states exist as a part of the broader picture of North Germanic mythology and West Germanic mythology, respectively. :bloodofox: (talk) 08:33, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Few years ago I came across this article Latvian mythology, which was merged from several articles and not in the best shape. I tagged it as needing expert attention. Last summer another user decided this needed fixing and got several users involved. As there were now more resources I rewrote the article. User:Bloodofox mainly participated in discussion arguing that such article should not exist, refusing to accept that this might be a topic researched independently of Baltic mythology and in the end promised to return and rewrite article. I invited him to study the subject matter closer before doing so, because his comparisons to Scandinavian mythology make me believe he is biased towards situation with that subject matter as he appears to be expert in it and it didn't really appear he is listening although his concerns about this being folklore or belonging directly under Baltic mythology were discussed ad nauseum. Instead he returned today tagged the article as POV and needing a rewrite without much explanation, removed references to a site which is currently off-line and which in the past he has been claiming as unreliable source due to it being online publication, all external links (mostly working) and announced that whole topic has been invented by me (presumably this is were he sees POV). In my opinion Bloodofox is being disruptive and assuming bad faith on my part, I believe the notability of subject is sufficiently proven, if it is not he should take this to AfD instead of trying to destroy the article this way. I did revert him (but he reverted me too), but I tried to initiate discussion on talk page, however he still has not explained why he tagged the article, just that he dislikes those references and want them removed. Also I believe this noticeboard is not appropriate place for content discussion? ~~Xil (talk) 08:56, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• I saw this article yesterday, and some of the exchanges. It's primarily a content matter, of course, but the problem with such articles is often the lack of participation on talk pages from other editors outside of the main interested parties. I agree with bloodofox that the sourcing is very, very problematic: if I remember correctly Xil claims there's academic material to be found on that now-dead website, but that begs the question of what that material was if it's not published elsewhere (if it's not a copyvio)--primary research? non-peer reviewed material? I hope this thread will make some more editors with knowledge of the subject matter look at it but, bloodofox, there's not much for admins to do, at least not that I can see. Drmies (talk) 15:21, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• I think bloodofox also has a good point about the nationalist problem - trying to reshape history (and prehistory) so that it fits national boundaries and national identities which were made very recently. But that's a content problem, of course. bobrayner (talk) 17:04, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• Well, that's the thing. Content disputes can turn into "behavioral" problems. I'm not sure if we reached that stage yet, and it's hard to judge given the paucity of English-language literature on the issues--paucity as far as I can judge, of course (the article doesn't offer much). Drmies (talk) 18:01, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Do we give IPs discretionary sanction warnings?

Looking at the removals and additions of "Zionist terrorism" and "Palestinian terrorism" categories by 85.166.53.217 (talk · contribs), if this were an account I'd probably warn them, not sure what to do as it's an IP. Dougweller (talk) 13:55, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Warning an IP seems reasonable to me, assuming that the IP isn't very dynamic: Can we be confident that the intended person will read the warning? Looking at the edit history, it seems to be the same person for the last couple of weeks. bobrayner (talk) 17:02, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

User:75.104.131.93

Would someone please check the recent history of Zero-point energy and undertake some action if needed. The user was warned yesterday and will be now notified of this thread. I can not really revert everything they take out or introduce to the article, calling it "German propaganda". Note that I am not German. Thank you.--Ymblanter (talk) 15:59, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

{{subst:uw-ewblock|time=48 hours}}, since the user just kept going despite warnings; it's not a 3RR violation (by about six minutes), but an edit-warring block may be levied in non-3RR situations. Nyttend (talk) 16:20, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:22, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Tendentious edit-warring IP

See Special:Contributions/14.198.220.253, a thread at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring [101] and the recent edit history of our article on Richard Feynman where the IP has continued to edit-war over the article. And then see User talk:14.198.220.253, where multiple contributors have raised issues with the IPs behaviour. And then see a thread at Template talk:Hidden archive top, [102] which the IP seems to think is an appropriate place to discuss changes to talk page guidelines, and basically anounces that they are going to change guidelinesregarding hatting unless someone objects on this obscure talk page. Looking through the IPs edit history, I can see little evidence of significant useful contributions, and a great deal of evidence that the IP will argue (in confusing language - see for example [103]) about anything and everything, with little concern for the aims of Wikipedia - to create an informative encyclopaedia. Right from their first posts, the IP had to be warned about their edit-warring behaviour (see this thread [104] at Talk:Scientific consensus - which probably explains the attempt to revise guidelines on hatting). I think WP:NOTHERE just about about sums it up (since WP:ONLYHERETOANARGUE is unfortunately a redlink) and an indefinite block would be for the best. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:38, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

the IP had to be warned about their edit-warring behaviour (see this thread [105] at Talk:Scientific consensus - which probably explains the attempt to revise guidelines on hatting)

That's correct, it is the first time I legitimately fell into edit-war by strongly defective editors (who refuse to comment my edit throughout the discussion) and it is resolved. You can see the discussion over there that it is legitimately hatted due to the fact that the discussion is not WP:FOC. So I legitimately learned that when to hat a discussion is legitimate.

Also, I carefully requested comments from those who (apparently) disagreed with me to talk page before I even touch and edit the template documentation(which no one cares, according to Andy).

See Special:Contributions/14.198.220.253, a thread at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring [106] and the recent edit history of our article on Richard Feynman where the IP has continued to edit-war over the article. And then see User talk:14.198.220.253, where multiple contributors have raised issues with the IPs behaviour.

So I compromised with this one, it is reverted in less than a minute by Twsx, here you can see his/her contribution log that, not only his/her quick decision is suspicious. S/he is making multiple reverts in a matter of minute, as evident as you can verify on the contribution log.

So I finally decided that I should good-faith revert this one and kindly ask Twsx to comment (does it count as tendentious IP edit-warring?) May add more later, thanks. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 17:55, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

[107] which the IP seems to think is an appropriate place to discuss changes to talk page guidelines, and basically anounces that they are going to change guidelinesregarding hatting unless someone objects on this obscure talk page

WP:AGF applies to you, I simply aint proclaiming or discussing a change on guidelines or rules, just template documentation. Maybe you can read the talk 3 or 4 times to see if who stayed correct. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 17:58, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

"strongly defective editors"? If this isn't evidence of a lack of necessary competence in the English language, it is evidence of crass obnoxiousness. And what exactly is "suspicious" about reverting an edit-warring contributor who point-blank refuses to use the article talk page being reverted? This looks to me to be further evidence of the sort of behaviour we can well do without. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:03, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

You can read the funny discussion on SciCon 3 or 4 times you can see that there is no nothing about the edit except "it is not an improvement".

Some editors also violate BRD by bullshiting newcomers(old me) with "consensus version", as clearly documented as invalid in WP:BRD. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 18:07, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

On "suspicious", I have no interest to debate, just take a look at 1. the time taken between the edit and 2. Tswx contribution log. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 18:10, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• Thus far, the contribution history of 14.198.220.253 (talk) is that of a combative, tendentious editor who is having great difficulty in adapting to this collaborative editing environment. I see little or no constructive contribution, and a seemingly limitless capacity to create and sustain conflict. IP editor, do you see any issues with your approach thus far? Is there any reason we should expect things to improve? MastCell ^Talk 18:15, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

It is simple, just count how many warnings that is given out is legitimate. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 18:17, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I see little or no constructive contribution

MastCell, please don't look down on the editors who do rhetoric or small (but thoughtful) contribution, I think these are called wikignome. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 19:01, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

• I agree with Andy that we have a problem here. The IP is aggressive and "always right", making changes to articles and categories without attempting to obtain consensus on talk pages if challenged, and sometimes reacting in difficult to understand English. Looking over the IPs edit contribution, the number of edits that are simple reverts of others' edits is surprisingly high. --Randykitty (talk) 18:19, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Again, my take is very simple, (I note that my contribution that Randykitty disagreed is still legitimately passed and unchallenged, they are there and improved) just count how many times I finally jump into DRN, ANI or whatsoever and legitimately blocked by admin, the warnings are where the warnings go, none of them is legitimate edit-warring. --14.198.220.253 (talk) 18:34, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Block evasion by User:Darkknight68

Now editing as User:HangingCurvesuck. Offensive username intended to harass another editor, completely unacceptable talk page post here [108] which WP:QUACKS rather loudly, as do the ten post-and-revert edits that make up the rest of the account's history. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 18:21, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

How utterly childish behaviour ES&L 18:32, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Blocked. -- John Reaves 18:36, 13 January 2014 (UTC)