Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
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Stalking complaint

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

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Permalinks to context, Wikipedia:Requests_for_permissions/Template_editor#User:Magioladitis & User_talk:BU_Rob13#ANI notification; User_talk:Magioladitis#Wikibreak commencement. —prepended later by Sladen (talk) 08:57, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

Latest example here: [1]. Please protect me. Rob has commented in all my BRFA's, my BAG membership and in many more places. Usually, he is the first to comment. I have evvidence that he as been sending emails about me to others. I have evidence that he has been contacting others offwiki about me to others. -- Magioladitis (talk) Note: I corrected my statement after explanations given Magioladitis (talk) 13:24, 19 October 2017 (UTC) Original statement restored and struck, per retraction. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 11:31, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

...then post that evidence. It simply hasn't happened, and the unsupported accusation is a blatant personal attack. This is only being filed because I said 3 minutes ago that I planned to take this to ANI tonight when I get to a computer. He wanted my name in the section header instead of his. Magioladitis has been wikihounding me blatantly for weeks since he was desysopped. I've tried to have little contact with him, but that hasn't worked. I'll post a comprehensive list of evidence (actual evidence, with diffs and stuff) when I get home tonight. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 22:56, 17 October 2017 (UTC)

Rob said for me be removed from BAG member "This has been going on for years, and a bot operator that doesn't comply with the bot policy should obviously not be a BAG member" (06:39, 27 December 2016, emphasis is mine). [2]

Rob comments about me: "The behavior over half a decade is far below what's expected of any editor on the project" (20:04, 19 January 2017, emhasis is mine). [3]

Rob comments in a BRFA 2 minutes after I placed the time stamp: [4].

A list of all of my bot's task in the last month. Rob has commented (usually the first to comment) in the vas majorit of them (pobably in all till Task 50).

I have already warned in the past that this will end in ANI or somehing similar. If I get time I an prove tht people were receiving emails about me.

Magioladitis (talk) 23:05, 17 October 2017 (UTC)

• Noting here that I removed the name from the heading. SarahSV ^(talk) 23:06, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
• I am not that familiar with the context, but I don't think it is necessary stalking if valid points are being raised. Since both editors work with the technical aspects of Wikipedia, overlaps should be expected, and I think it would be wrong to look away if there are pressing concerns. Alex Shih^Talk 01:53, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

I second this. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 02:11, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

That's true in general but something in my communication / interaction with Rob fails. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:01, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• Honestly, Magioladitis' own presentation of evidence here reinforces the impression that there's something wrong with his judgment and needs monitoring: first on his list of complaints above is that BU Rob opposed his reconfirmation as a member of BAG, which you might think was a mean thing for Rob to do until you read the discussion Magioladitis himself links, in which eight out of eight editors commenting shared BU Rob's opinion, citing behavior by Magioladitis which, in the context of a bot operator, is downright frightening. One little passage is especially telling. Someone asked:

Two questions:

1. Why are you running an unapproved bot from your account to make edits like this?
2. Why is this not grounds for yet another block?

Ramaksoud2000 ^{(Talk to me)} 02:35, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

Magioladitis' response was incredible:

The questions are unrelated to my BAG nomination. BAG checks mainly the technical part of the story. The question asked here is if have the technical skills and related knowledge to be part of BAG. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:02, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

No, Magioladitis, it's not just your technical skills that are at issue, it's your judgment (and, to be blunt, your ability to communicate in the English language, from my long observation). And Exhibit A is that you apparently think that, in considering you for membership in the Bot Approvals Group (whose members individually are empowered to approve bot tasks), we should simply ignore the apparent fact that, at the very moment of your application, you were running an unapproved bot. That's shocking.

EEng 02:38, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

EEng I am not complaining on negative commenting. I am complaining on constant commenting'. Robs has supported some of my bot tasks but he has commented in all of them. I thing that I do not like because I feel exposed to a specific person online. -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:13, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

Your long history of going off the reservation is such that someone ought to be watching you. EEng 19:28, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

I have evvidence that he as been sending emails about me to others.[5] If I get time I an prove tht people were receiving emails about me.[6] @Magioladitis: It has been over 36 hours since you opened this complaint. You need to provide evidence for this claim, or you need to retract it. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 12:43, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

DoRD I retracted. It was explained to me that the communication was via the IRC admin channel. Still offwiki but not via emails. I sincerely apologise. If this has been explained to me earlier I would not have written anything about it. -- Magioladitis (talk) 13:33, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

That's not a retraction, it's an after-the-fact refactoring of your original complaint, so I've corrected it. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 11:31, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Response and boomerang

I initially wrote up a long thing refuting what Magioladitis wrote about me stalking, but instead, I'll just refer you to "past me". These claims go back months, and I wrote a very detailed explanation of the interactions I had with Magioladitis in the past. You can find that here. As a brief summary: We interact about the normal amount of times for those editing the same area. I've only ever started a single discussion related to Magioladitis, as I intentionally avoid him whenever possible. I've initiated zero interactions with him since the second ArbCom. Every time I've criticized him, the community has agreed with my criticisms. I think that about sums it up. Now onto the evidence that Magioladitis has been continuously harassing me, as promised:

• During the first ArbCom case, he openly and needlessly speculated about my location on-wiki in violation of WP:OUTING multiple times. [7], Special:Permalink/757731590#Canada.
• In April 2017, he started a discussion about one of my bot approvals without even discussing the concern with me, in apparent retaliation for my criticism of an unrelated third-party bot task that was violating the bot policy. (link) The community concluded that I could fix the bug in my task as normal and Magioladitis was warned by a BAG member (Headbomb) that he shouldn't retaliate against me in that manner.
• In May 2017, he started another discussion about the same bug in the same bot task, despite me not running that bot task at all in between the two discussions. (link) The section was speedily closed with a warning not to harass me.
• In June 2017, he started a discussion claiming (falsely) that I gave incorrect advice to a bot operator. (link) Other BAG members have since stated my advice was correct based on the information available in the bug report at the time.
• During the second ArbCom case, two arbitration clerks had to redact large portions of his evidence section because he made unfounded accusations and personal attacks against me, including the "off-wiki coordination"/email accusation he made above. See here and here.

At the risk of trivializing things, up until this point, we have "run-of-the-mill" incivility, abuse of process to harass, etc. After the second ArbCom case, it was ratcheted up quite a bit to wikihounding me everywhere I go.

• In September 2017, he suddenly popped up on my talk page to demand an apology and retraction for a comment I made during the first ArbCom case. I stand by my original comment, which was supported by the findings of facts in the case. See here. This proves Magioladitis was literally going through 9-month-old edits and contributions to find something to hound me about.
• In October 2017, Magioladitis removed a PROD I placed on a file (now deleted, so I can't show the diff); File:Seleccionada3.JPG. This was his first edit to the file namespace since August 2017, when he (ironically) accidentally rolled back one of my edits on another random file, showing he was going through my contribs at that time as well ([8]). This is an editor who so infrequently edits the file namespace that if you try to retrieve his last 100 file namespace edits, the site returns an error. A discussion on his talk page made clear he had no legitimate rationale for removing the PROD [9].

I'm philosophically opposed to interaction bans, especially one-sided ones. At this point, I just want his harassment to stop. I think a site ban is appropriate given the history here. Magioladitis has had many last chances. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 02:44, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

It saddens me to be editing this response right now... I can understand how disheartened and perhaps frustrated or angry that Magioladitis is feeling since the ArbCom case that recently closed, but I can't help but be honest here... I feel that these problematic accusations by Magioladitis are only going to continue until action is taken and we (the community) put a stop to it. We've gone through complaints and discussions on different talk pages, numerous ANI discussions, two ArbCom cases - how far do we allow this to go? When is enough enough? Do these continued and repeated discussions involving Magioladitis' behavior show that perhaps we've reached a point where he's stopped becoming net positive for the project? I'm not sure how to feel... it's just truly sad and disappointing... :-( ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 03:07, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• Unless there's a serious reason to believe an IBAN would not work, besides any objections anyone personally has to the concept of IBANs, I don't see why we don't try one. Magioladitis and BU Rob13 each claim to want to be left alone. It seems the perfect candidate for an IBAN. So let's do it. If one or the other is the instigator of harassment, then the IBAN will lead us to the culprit far faster than more arbitration, and more empirically than an ANI thread. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 05:52, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Yes, please. It's clear that Rob's replies cause me stress in all cases. I don't even want to have positive comments in my BRFA's from him. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:01, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
    • If Rob13 is "philosophically opposed to interaction bans", both of them work in the small world of Wikipedia bots, Rob13's actions on BRFAs are to validly point out horrific bot-related misbehavior on the part of Magioladitis, and Magioladitis welcomes the removal of Rob13 from BRFAs, that doesn't seem like a very constructive solution to me. It might be possible if we simultaneously ban Magioladitis from anything bot-related, broadly construed, but otherwise no. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:25, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
      • David Eppstein on the bots area we have a cease fire. I am banned from bot policy related discussions and Rob said won't do any BAG action on CHECKWIKI anymore. We have no conflicts there anymore. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:32, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
      • Who cares what benefits either of these individuals bring to the Wikipedia bots world? If they can't work together, and the trouble their interactions cause outweighs the benefits of their work in the bots realm, then why should we give a damn about the benefits of their work with bots? I see no reason to put on kid gloves with respect to either. Things do not simply get this bad and stay this bad for so long based on the unilateral misconduct of a single person, the removal of whom would fairly resolve. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 08:49, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
        • Well actually quite a lot of people care about the benefits Rob brings given there has been no downside. They don't care about the benefits Mag can potentially bring because he comes with a history of negatives which have had a huge amount of community involvement even before it got to Arbcom in order to get him to change his ways. Things do get this bad and stay this bad for so long as the result of a single editor if that editor refuses to change their ways. To disregard all the previous dealings with Magioladitis inability to abide by ENWP's requirements on editing behavior with a hand wavy 'well other people are at fault too' is ludicrous. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:00, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
          • It takes two to tango. Things do get this bad and stay this bad for so long as the result of a single editor if that editor refuses to change their ways. Bullshit. ArbCom or the community would have banned Magioladitis ages ago if this were so simple. Neither ArbCom nor the community is so stupid as you are painting them to be. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:12, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
            • 'It takes two to tango' being the best you can come up with to smear another editor? 'Where there is smoke there is fire' is another good one. So as much evidence as Mag has presented then got it. Do you have any actual evidence other than clichés that 'well everyone is at fault' despite the overwhelming extended evidence to the contrary? Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:19, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
              • You kinda skipped the rest of my response. You might want to strike yours and write a new one. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:21, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                • What? Where you stated I said the community or arbcom were stupid? When I did no such thing? I tend to ignore complete bullshit. The community and Arbcom have wasted far more time on Magioladitis than they are worth in good faith. That does not make them stupid, it makes them extremely tolerant. There is a limit. You on the other hand are implying that tolerance means that there must be other people at fault because they have not decided to outright ban Mag yet. Which is again, ridiculous. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:30, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                  • You can't have it both ways! You indicate below that ArbCom and AN/ANI are extremely effective at topic banning and sitebanning disruptive individuals when it's merited. You indicate above that things could stay this bad for so long purely because of the conduct of a single editor. Magioladitis has been before ArbCom twice and at these boards who knows how many times. Now you say the reason Magioladitis is still around is because of tolerance. But why be tolerant when, as you say, AN/ANI or ArbCom could effectively be rid of the intolerable conduct wrought solely by Magioladitis against innocent bystanders? These claims are not consistent with one another unless you admit that Magioladitis is not solely at fault, or unless you are calling the community stupid. I'll assume good faith on your part, however, and assume you mean to say that Magioladitis is not solely at fault. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 10:07, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                    • You appear to be having trouble reading and comprehending what I wrote. This is the second time you have said I said something that I clearly did not. There will not be a third. To explain further - I said AN/ANI and Arbcom do have a history of cutting editors loose who cause too much disruption. In Magioladitis case they have extended time and again various options in order to keep them around. These are obviously not mutually exclusive positions - the willingness of the community to keep an editor editing is in line with the amount of good work it feels can be extracted from them. The willingness of editors to extend (an overly generous imho) effort to keep Mag editing does not mean it thinks that anyone else is at fault - it merely means Mag has not become disruptive enough yet to be banned. If you actually look at all the past discussions, sanctions, arbcom etc, you will find almost no indication that any other editor has caused any issues regarding Magioladitis other than Mag themselves. You on the other hand seem to think that because they have not been banned so far, someone else must be the problem. This has been a staple of Magioladitis defense for the past few years 'I am not the problem, everyone else is, leave me alone to do what I want to do'. And this has been soundly rejected time and again. You have used ridiculous cliché's like 'it takes two to tango' to suggest sanctioning a productive editor who is currently being harassed by another with a history of bad behaviour. Because an interaction ban *is* a sanction on an editor and requires evidence to justify it. Not 'well it cant just be Mag's fault'. So please in the form of diffs, provide evidence that BU Rob should be sanctioned. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:26, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                      • Stow the attitude. I'm not providing diffs because I'm not arguing Rob has culpability. I don't agree with your analysis and I'm showing the logical inconsistencies in your argumentation. I'm not misreading what you're saying. I understand full well the draconian outcome you're trying to rationalize. As for me, I would rather work for the good of the community and greater peace in the long term, and the way forward is through a mutual IBAN.
                        Both Rob and Magioladitis have stated they want to be left alone. Let's have them leave each other alone. Preserving the atmosphere of collegiality takes precedence over whatever improvements any of us individually could make to the encyclopedia, especially those improvements that could be made at a later date. At the core of your argument seems to be the spurious claim that we shouldn't make an IBAN mutual because it would be an indignity to Rob. This really isn't a credible concern. We're not punishing, we're preventing. If we were punishing, we would care about things like culpability, and the indignity of punishing the target of one user's bad behavior.
                        In any event, by your own characterization of Magioladitis there shouldn't be much of a delay between the implementation of an IBAN and Magioladitis receiving the indef block or community ban you appear to think is necessary. Honestly, this is where I am a bit confused about your position: Do you not believe Magioladitis would violate the IBAN in short order? If so, then what's there to lose? If not—that is, if Magioladitis complies with the IBAN—then how could you argue the IBAN wouldn't work? —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 13:37, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                        • "I'm not providing diffs because I'm not arguing Rob has culpability." Yes you are. You have repeatedly. You have suggested sanctioning another editor based on clichés and zero evidence. You have deliberately twice stated I said something I didn't. So any 'attitude' you receive, like Mag, is entirely of your own doing. Since you decline to provide any evidence another editor deserves sanctioning, I can safely assume there is no evidence that anyone else is at fault. Thanks for confirming it. Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:49, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                          • Um, no. I'm not arguing culpability. I'm suggesting applying a nonpunitive IBAN to two editors who can't get along. Culpability isn't required for a sanction, only that the sanction will cure the underlying behavior. Nor do I have to provide evidence that Rob is disruptive: The disruption caused by their interactions, regardless of how well-intentioned they may be, is evidence enough. You've not provided one substantive reason why a mutual IBAN is improper here, while I've provided numerous arguments why one would work great. All you've done is said it's unfair to punish Rob with an IBAN, but as I've explained, that's flat out wrong. This is not punitive. Moreover, any sanction that Magioladitis receives won't be to provide relief to Rob, but to protect the community. You can go on denying that if you like, of course. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 14:46, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
        • Only in death what ways do you want me to change? The ArbCom case examined the part of my editing and my contact with people. I had no issues with my edits or whatsever after that. I have only one request: The community to find a way that Rob and me do not inteact for a while. Any try to have interaction has gone bad. Maybe it's my fault or I don't know. Rob does not seem to understand that a while I do not want any comments from him in my talk page or in the areas I am trying to contribute. To be honest, I have tried to interact in various occassions but it seems my actions are understood as impollite the same way I understand Rob's actions. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:08, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
          • You are an editor who has no intention of desisting from editing in the BOT area, asking the community to prevent one of the other experienced editors in the BOT area from interacting with you when you have an extended history of causing issues is ridiculous. Per WP:HOUND given your history, every editor with even a passing interest in the bot area could watch you like a hawk and it would be justified by policy. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:15, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
            • Only in death I already have a ban in the bot related area which I respect so any action here is not related to bots and bot policies. I have not even made an automated edit the last month (and perhaps more). I pursuit to change area and switch back to things I 've been doing before bot work. This includes all types of gnome editing, template standardsation and participating in xFD discussions. I already found a compromise with Rob on some parts. I do not discuss bot policy, he does not get heavily involved in CHECKWIKI project. I think we should and can extend that. I think there is field of communication. There is bad faith on the air but we need to find a way (even if it technical in the beginning) to work it out. Something like "no comments to other's talk page" would suit me. It's not the first time I write this. Rob needs to give me space. There are other admins out there to discuss matters with me. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:24, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
              • There are other admins out there to discuss matters with me. I have tried and you didn't like me discussing matters with you, to the point where you ignored and refused to answer questions I put to you, then complained that I might have had your talk page on my watchlist. (The background here is that Rob expressed a concern that Magioladitis behaviour might have been stalking, so I offered to ask). I arrived at your talk page, asked a series of questions to try and get to the bottom of the issue, and I'm still waiting for answers concerning your behaviour, but since we're here and talking about your behaviour - I'll ask again, how exactly did you find the edits Rob had made to some old images proposing their deletion if you weren't stalking his edits ? The reality, as I see it now, is that you don't want anybody to discuss anything with you, you want carte blanche to continue your disruptive behaviour, that you've gone rogue and are now a loose cannon on deck. If you intend to avoid a site ban, you need to think fast and explain now what you're going to do to change your behaviour. Nick (talk) 10:14, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                • Nick I think I replied to all your questions. Check my talk page. The fact that I arrived to this image it was an unlucky coincidence. I stated my comments in the FfD. I offered my email to you for further communication exactly because it was a concern about the Magio-Rob interaction. I am willing to reply to any questions about everything and I never denied an discussion with you at any point. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:21, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                • Nick I am willing to take a wikibreak for a month of needed. I still need someone to ensure that Rob won't reply to other in my talk page. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:06, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
                  • I believe a short break on your part would be useful. It should not be a way to avoid an interaction ban or other sanction however. Nick (talk) 16:05, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• It's quite clear that Magioladitis behaviour is now at the boundary of net positive/net negative to the project. The behaviour on-wiki is clearly a net negative for the project but is offset by outreach and technical contributions to the wider Wikimedia project. I support an interaction ban but I'm also not opposed to a straight site ban (of fixed duration - 6 months to 1 year in the first instance). This behaviour cannot be permitted further. Nick (talk) 06:25, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Nick the interaction ban is the first step to take. If this does not work we will have to think of stronger enforcements. But I am confident interaction ban will work. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:28, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Nick I do not have good interctions with Rob. I don't critise the comments themselves but the fact that I get so many comments by him and that he keeps writing on my talk page even to third-parties. Do you think it's normal that he replies to others in my talk page after all this things that have happened? -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:15, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support one-way I-ban--Notwithstanding Magio's outright false accusations, his terrible on-wiki behaviour and the fact that two ArBCom cases coupled with the general views of the community about his actions have not eased things up, I feel we could give him one very last opputunity before we seek to site-ban him.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 06:55, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
• No opinion on I-ban; site ban doesn't seem justified. Supportive of a bot operation / high speed editing ban on the general principle that running bots is outside of our "anyone can edit" principle, so people who do it should be held to high standards. I wrote some similar things in the discussion sections of Mag's two arb cases if anyone cares. It's also perfectly fine to be a bot developer without operating the bots on the live server. Test the bot on an article or two or in some userspace pages, then let someone else do the production runs. That's how most real-life system software works anyway (the programmers and the operators are separate sets of people). 173.228.123.121 (talk) 07:03, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
• Given the overlap an I-ban is worthless and implies that Rob actually should be restricted in some way - anything that would restrict him from the good work he does regarding bots should be shot down. I would support anything from a one-way I-ban for Mag, up to and including a complete ban from bot-related editing, or even a site ban at this point. Its clear from the evidence presented he has been stalking Rob's edits in order to harass him and is just the last in a long list of anti-social behavior. Only in death does duty end (talk) 07:53, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Only in death where is shown that I am stalking his edits? On the contrary Rob has been even commeting my ta page addressing to others: [10]. My talk page is clarly in his watchlist. What is part of my behavior? I feel that I am being stalked and I came directly to the community. --- Magioladitis (talk) 08:03, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
    • Rob has presented evidence in the form of diffs that indicate you have been going through his past edits - and linked to the relevant discussions where your concerns were investigated and found to have no legitimate reason to do so. You on the other hand have presented.... what? Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:13, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
  • As I state above, if these two cannot get along professionally, and their interactions are so damaging to the community as to outweigh the benefits of their contributions to any particular area of Wikipedia, then who cares what benefits either provides to bots? IBAN them from each other. If one or the other is gaming it to lock the other out of bots, then that person will be sanctioned. The logical leap that an IBAN means that Rob would somehow be restricted from doing "good work" on bots goes too far. Rather, this would let Rob get back to work. I am unconvinced that any overlap here is actually a problem. These are intelligent individuals. If one is obsessed with the other, then that one will violate the IBAN in pretty short order. The implication that this longstanding problem, that has not resulted in a siteban despite two ArbCom cases and untold other drama, can be cured entirely by cutting one person out of the equation is contrary to everything I've ever seen on Wikipedia. Disputes don't last this long unless there's at least some toxicity on both sides. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 08:57, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
    • There is no issue with the two of them getting along professionally. There is an issue with Magioladitis stalking another editor's edits in a vindictive attempt to get revenge for being blocked from playing with his favorite toy. "The implication that this longstanding problem, that has not resulted in a siteban despite two ArbCom cases and untold other drama, can be cured entirely by cutting one person out of the equation is contrary to everything I've ever seen on Wikipedia." Well you clearly have not paid attention, Wikipedia at AN and Arbcom have a long history of cutting disruptive editors out. It stops the disruption extremely quickly. "Disputes don't last this long unless there's at least some toxicity on both sides." Ah the Donald Trump 'both sides' approach. Yeah that argument has no basis in fact. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:04, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
      • Wow. I think we have a new version of Godwin's Law being born here. I'm weirdly honored. Anyway, to get to the logical inconsistencies in your response, compare Wikipedia at AN and Arbcom have a long history of cutting disruptive editors out. It stops the disruption extremely quickly. with the facts. Neither AN/ANI nor ArbCom have taken the step of "cutting out" any particularly disruptive editor here, nor has there been any cure it would seem. As I said before, if these two editors cannot get along professionally, then require them to stop interacting. If Magioladitis is the panting, drooling, unhinged monster you make them out to be, then the IBAN will be violated in very short order, and we'll move to a proper siteban. Honestly, even for ANI, I am stunned with how quickly the torches and pitchforks came out. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:10, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
        • I'm not sure if you are being deliberately dense or you genuinely are unable to read an archive. You do know AN/ANI has handled hundreds of site ban discussions for disruptive editors right? Likewise Arbcom over the years has often site-banned editors. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:22, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
          • As I say above, you can't have it both ways. AN/ANI and ArbCom can't be so effective at handling disruptive editors as you claim, yet impotent to handle what you are painting as a clear-cut, one-sided, obvious case. Come on now. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 10:10, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
• I support an indefinite topic ban from all pages relating to automation, broadly construed. This will resolve the interaction issues, as this is the topic area that the interactions were being made from. The community has clearly, repeatedly, and continuously expressed their frustrations, concerns, and their lack of confidence with Magioladitis' judgment in this topic area, as well as exhausted community resources and time (including numerous talk discussions on many pages, multiple ANI discussions, and two ArbCom cases - and to no avail), and this topic ban will resolve the concerns and put and end to it completely. Most importantly, this topic ban will allow Magioladitis to remain a member of the project (a logical and fair alternative to a full site ban) and give him the chance to contribute positively and be a net positive in other topic areas, while prohibiting him from the topic area that we agree will cause him to become a net negative. This will also place the ball completely in his court; either things will go well and we won't have any more problems, or they wont - and we'll know that the writing is clearly on the wall. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 07:55, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

I would like to put on record that, as a Software Engineer myself and as someone who has a passion for computers, code, scripts, and automation (that probably cannot be matched with the level of passion that Magioladitis has for the same thing)........... this was very very hard for me to write. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 08:07, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

As I have said in several other venues, technical ability without the ability to work with other people is useless. --Rschen7754 02:42, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

I completely agree. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 09:22, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• • Oshwah I recently had interactions with Rob in an FfD and in a rights request. This is outside the automation area. It turns we iinteract in more areas than expected. -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:04, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment apart from a possible boomerang for Magioladitis for filing a completely frivolous case in his section, I don't see anything actionable here. Magioladitis should possibly be admonished, but unless you're willing to agree to a two-way IBAN I don't see anything else that can be done. It's clear you don't like each other, is it possible for you to not like each other without involving ANI in it? power~enwiki (π, ν) 19:12, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

More evidence

• Rob interacts with me in a template: [11]
• Rob comments to other in my talk page on an AWB issue: [12]
• Evidence of ofwiki communication : Rob expressed a concern that you could perhaps be stalking his edits This did not happen in Nick's page.

This shows that the intearaction is not limited in one area. I am requesting i-ban for months now. -- Magioladitis (talk)

I found that template because you showed up in my watchlist converting many pages to use {{Official website}} instead of a regular hyperlink, with some of those changes resulting in errors due to bad data on Wikidata. Your edits were highly visible because you did a large number of them from a non-bot-flagged account, something editors have been trying to get you not to do for years; that's on you. I quietly reverted the erroneous addition to the documentation because I thought that was the path-of-least-drama; the alternative would be to start an ANI or something to get others to do it. As for "off-wiki communication", WP:INVOLVED states to pass issues to uninvolved admins as necessary, which is what I did; I posted openly in #wikipedia-en-admins on IRC, a channel available to every enwiki admin, asking someone to look at the de-PROD. I suggested no particular action for them to take, just asked for eyes on it. This is what the policy tells me to do. I have never privately communicated with anyone off-wiki about Magioladitis' behavior, such as by email, as Magioladitis has claimed (except to the Arbitration clerks when asking them to look at the personal-attack-riddled evidence section). I did it where any admin could see. I was trying to avoid the drama of ANI, though I'll just take it here in the future, given how severe things have become. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 12:41, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

I will refrain from any comments in your talk page. Please, respect me and do the same. I don't want to avoid control of my editing. I only ask you to limit your interactions with me to the minimum. Is that not possible? -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:29, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

I have no problem doing that, mostly because I've been doing it already. The totality of interactions with you since the second ArbCom case have been you coming to my talk page to complain about a 9-month-old comment, you de-PRODing a file I PRODed for no apparent reason, and my intentionally brief oppose to your request for template editor (where you responded by personally attacking me). Where in that do you see a lot of unnecessary interaction on my part? ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 14:52, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

For the first: I believe that you tried to defame my work outside the frame of the ArbCom scope since my work is much more than just the bot editing. I think your comments were negative and unjustified. For the second: I had a reason because I worked in a smiliar way that we do not speedy delete redirects that are too old because of incoming links, etc. The FfD was the right route and as you see I did not pursuit further. The third one was only an echoing of that unfortunate situation. I have good intentions and I really would like that we discuss in a better environment. -- Magioladitis (talk) 15:13, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment what is this supposed to be evidence of? There is no existing IBAN, and this behavior is generally fine without one. Most of these diffs are very stale, and [13] is a very weak argument; I would expect somebody familiar with the case could figure out everything Nick said without detailed off-wiki conversation. @Magioladitis:, apart from the single comment at WP:PERM, do you have any diffs from September or October that are relevant? power~enwiki (π, ν) 16:19, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

power~enwiki I am not sure if there are more diffs since I have done little editing the past 2 months due to my busy schedule. The thing that annoys me is that after my topic ban to bot policy I decided to switch back to other areas I have been editing for long time (xFds, template standardidation, Wikidata transition, etc.) and I still find Rob in all the forums I try to comment or act. So I do not want to see more drama with this person and I would like to protect myself somehow. Seeing the same person commenting in every BRFA I submitted, replying to people in my talk page it's too much. I do not want to see that happening again; at least for a while. Even his nomination for BAG member had a specific mention to CHEKCWIKI, a project I 've been running for years. -- Magioladitis (talk) 18:07, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

OK, I've seen enough. The last BRFA he interacted with you on was in August. Your only interaction with BU_Rob13 at XfD appears to be a response to a file he nominated, after you declined a PROD. This obviously isn't stalking or hounding on his part. I think you're acting in bad faith with this complaint, and after two ARBCOM cases I see no reason to give you more time. I Support any sanction up to a site ban of Magioladitis if this farce continues. power~enwiki (π, ν) 19:51, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

power~enwiki The de-prod led to a complain and then there was on more interaction in the rights page but there is a long history of comments in the past. Rob, I think, has agreed to stay away from my talk page and I'll stay away from his. I think we are finding a solution here. Some other misunderstandings have also been discussed in this thread. Don't you think that the situation de-escalates via this disscussion? -- Magioladitis (talk) 19:58, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment There is no doubt that BURob has been very active in putting the case against Magioladitis in a number of fora in recent years. I think we may also accept without cavil that Magioladitis sees this as going beyond "just happening to be involved in that area", and that even if wrong, this is not an unreasonable belief.

Therefore it would be wise of BURob to avoid this sort of behaviour, unless we are to believe that no other editor is ready, willing and able to present the other side of the coin to that proposed by Magioladitis. I am pleased to see from the above comments that he is trying to disengage, though I have to admit it comes as a surprise given history of these interactions.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 18:45, 18 October 2017 (UTC).

I've voiced my opinion, certainly, but I must insist on noting that I have started a grand total of one discussion about Magioladitis ever. This is compared to Magioladitis starting at least four discussions about me this year alone (two attempts at revoking one of my bot approvals, this discussion, and a discussion falsely claiming I gave false advice about bots). Ever since Magioladitis openly speculated about my location on-wiki, I have not felt particularly safe interacting with him, and so I have taken quite a bit of personal attacks, harassment, etc. from him without comment. It would have been possible/reasonable to take him to ANI after just about any of the incidents I noted above, but I never did, because I don't want to deal with the ensuing interactions. I've tried the "Ignore him and he'll go away" strategy from grade school pretty much since the beginning. No luck so far, although I remain hopeful. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 19:26, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

The location comment came from my will to meet you in person and de-escalate any misunderstandings that have happenned on-wiki. If you check by that time many people were discussing who and how they go to Wikimania. If you think this was insulting or outing attempt, you can request the hide the edit in question. I apologise if you felt that way but my intention is to descalate any situation that has happened with you and not the opposite. I have met many of the people participating in the project offline and I always try to meet the people who contribute to the project. -- Magioladitis (talk) 19:38, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

• I would be very opposed to a two-way interaction ban here. Besides the fact that legitimate criticism != harassment and that BURob13 has done nothing wrong here, it sets the precedent that all someone has to do is cry "harassment!!!!" and the admin is sanctioned at ANI. I would support a site ban for Magioladitis. I just don't think he understands or will listen to criticism. --Rschen7754 02:40, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Rschen7754 Rob has also made supportive comments in my BRFAs and has replied to others in my talk page. I am not complaining about critisism here. -- Magioladitis (talk) 03:18, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Since Rob has said that he won't comment in my talk page (in addition to the fact that he has already walked away from CHECKWIKI bot related discussions), I am OK satisfied that we are finding a way to cooperate in a solution here. From my side we can close the thread. -- Magioladitis (talk) 03:18, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't think it's a coincidence that this thread was filed against me 3 minutes after I said I had reached my breaking point and was going to file something when I got home. I also don't think it's a coincidence the person filing this ANI desperately requesting protection against something that wasn't even happening is suddenly happy to pack up and go home as soon as it's clear the community isn't buying the baseless accusations. Personally, I'm very tired of this, and I'd like an actual solution. This very thread is the latest attempt to target me, and so I just don't buy that this will go away if nothing is done. It's about two ArbCom cases and a half dozen ANI threads late for another chance. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 03:27, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

I have told you that I am going to seek solution even before the second ArbCom. I am not sure why you want to have so much intearction with me. You have commented in all my BRFAs. What was the reason to even reply to others in my talk page? E.g. [14] and one minute later this: [15]. And these examples were during the cases. Do not you think this causes extra stress to me? Can you please name me another person you had so much interaction as with me? Were you just trying to help? Here you commented in m BRFA 1 minute after I posted. Here: [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22] (and in many other places) you were the first to comment and all comments were within less than an hour. Here within 2 minutes: [23]. Sometimes you comment to me that fast you had to reconsider: [24]. Some things I do may seem to be outdated (like my comments about trying to defame me etc) but this is because of my workload. I am trying to find a way to cooperate with you but for reason it fails. I do not try to limit your actions as admin and I would like to find a solution that you keep commenting when necessary but we do not interact that much. Sometimes with your comments you seem to want me out of the project. I have told you already that your actions, whether you wanted it or not, led others outside the project. We would not be doing this. Doing your admins tasks is not a reason to comment that much in the places I comment and participate. Wikipedia has many admins to control. I do not try to defame your work but sometimes you seem to act too much when it comes to me. -- Magioladitis (talk) 03:34, 19 October 2017 (UTC).

Those diffs from the BRFAs come less than week after all of Magioladitis' bot approvals were revoked for cause. He chose to file 25 BRFAs within 48 hours, which was extremely noticeable, since it caused the WP:BRFA page to basically break. Since the issues with the past bot approvals that led to revocation were mostly caused by lack of oversight, yes, I went through as many as I had time to check and evaluated them. I supported many and opposed a few or asked for more details. I think I commented on about half of the 25, which is consistent with the number of BRFAs I comment on generally – I am, after all, a BAG member. That's what the community wanted to happen when the bot approvals were revoked. The only reason there's so many diffs is because he spammed the bot approval process. This was way back in February, for the record, not recent at all. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 14:27, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

This may get me an SPI but I agree with Magioladitis, in part. You've stressed him out a lot, and two of you used this API to argue with each other (ahem, Only in death and Mendaliv, that's not what we do on the Administrators Noticeboard.). I hate to be the voice of doom, but nobody else has commented for hours now. We've had a result already.This API is dead, let's close it. Sorry if this tone offends anybody, it's not intentional. TomBarker23 (talk) 11:47, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't think it "offends anybody", but I do have to confess that I don't have much idea what you're talking about here. -- Begoon 11:58, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

This is perhaps the harshest criticism of ANI that I've ever seen; if we don't implement a sanction without thinking within hours, the whole thread is dead? Harsh (but possibly accurate). In any event, multiple editors have called for a site ban. At this point, if nothing is done, I'll probably kick it to ArbCom as a dispute the community is unable to solve. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 13:44, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

I think it's reasonable to go back to ArbCom honestly. I'm very uncomfortable with the torches-and-pitchforks attitude that has dominated this discussion, as well as the "It's 100% Magioladitis" attitude, which strikes me as hopelessly simplistic. We should seek a nuanced outcome, and the Committee at least provides a structure in which nuance can exist. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 17:06, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

The diffs in Magioladitis's post of 03:34, 19 October 2017 (UTC) are all pretty stale. The most recent one is from July 10, and most of the remainder are from February 2017. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 13:52, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Diannaa Yes. In my first attempts to do something else after 2 months of rarely editing I had two bad interactions after months of a lot of interctions with Rob. That's why I came here. If I want to edit I just need less stress from Rob. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:00, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Outcome

Editors have supported various outcomes above. Can we come to some consensus to avoid having to return to ArbCom for Magioladitis 3? ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 20:36, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Pinging all editors who previously commented on this section, as they likely would be interested in commenting below (except those who already commented below). @SlimVirgin, Alex Shih, Oshwah, EEng, DoRD, David Eppstein, Only in death, Nick, Godric on Leave, Rschen7754, Power~enwiki, TomBarker23, Begoon, and Diannaa: ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 21:59, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose any outcome here. This case belongs at ArbCom. All involved deserve a nuanced decision and a careful look at the facts. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 20:44, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• I think a couple of trout would do better. Rob knows that he need not jump in on anything Magioladitis proposes, and that it will cause drama and stress. Magioladitis knows he should not "rise to the bait" as this exacerbates the situation.

Magioladitis is quite responsive to other editors, in the present case he followed Sladen's advice, and the issue is resolved.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 21:04, 19 October 2017 (UTC).

• I think Rob's evidence of hounding is strong enough that, at a bare minimum, Magioladitis needs to be admonished not to do that. I would prefer stronger outcomes, though. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:07, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment (a) This situation is indeed one-sided; BU Rob has done nothing wrong. (b) Something has to happen here to make Magioladitis realize that he's again wasted a hell of a lot of people's time. Since (other than that) he hasn't done anything recently to piss me off personally, for the moment I'm open to anything from trout on up, and I'd like to hear others' opinions. EEng 22:08, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Well, despite his claim that he does not "initiate" anything, he has initiated this sub-section and initiated a mass ping. He also initiated objections to Magioladitis not being granted TE privileges. That's within the last couple of days. He has also initiated discussions on Magioladitis's BRFAs.

Really BU Rob behaves pretty well elsewhere, but I do find his behaviour WRT Magioladitis lacking.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 22:37, 19 October 2017 (UTC).

Of course he's initiated this subsection. Something needs to be done about Magioladitis' nonsense. EEng 02:14, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

And his initiation of this subsection was more editorial than contributory - notice he hasn't put forward a proposal here, just tried to make one place for summations rather than having it interspersed with the discussion. He didn't say, "Ok, how are we going to get Magioladitis punished today?", he asked to see if the community could find a resolution here before kicking to ArbCom. PGWG (talk) 18:02, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• A few suggestions for Magioladitis. (1) Don't pop in on Rob's talk page and demand an apology in September for a remark he made in January. That's ancient history in Internet years. Likewise, when making your case here at ANI, don't pull up stuff from months ago to demonstrate your point. Time to start fresh and let the auld stuff go. Rob certainly seems to be trying to do that. (2) Don't request any added permissions or such for quite a while. You were only recently de-sysopped. (3) Find something fresh to do that is useful and technical yet outside your previous work. Suggestions: formatting citations such as at Category:Wikipedia references cleanup; working on Category:Wikipedia articles with an infobox request; and the like. Perhaps I'm naive :). Also, see Wikipedia:Old Fashioned Wikipedian Values. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 22:29, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
• Comment my preferred outcome would be for a voluntary two-way IBAN. And, to suggest a new area, perhaps one of you could try to improve the Government article. Don't both volunteer at once. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:03, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
• Comment: (edit conflict) I agree with User:EEng. There's nothing wrong on Rob's part. For Magioladitis, comments like this (and many others) really confirms they are not hearing anything that's being said. I find User:Diannaa's suggestions very helpful, and I would propose to format these suggestions into formal editing restriction. The idea is to get the user to contribute productively without continuously wasting the time of everybody here in English Wikipedia. Alex Shih^Talk 03:07, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
• I also agree with EEng, thus:

• I strongly oppose any sanction on BU Rob, who has done nothing wrong;
• I support an indefinite topic ban from all pages relating to automation, broadly construed for Magioladitis, as suggested by Oshwah, above;
• And a warning for Magioladitis: One can be competent as a bot engineer, and incompetent at Wikipedia, and it is increasingly apparent -- to me at least -- that you may well be the latter. Thus, if a discussion like this comes up again, the only sanction I will be strongly supporting is an indef site ban for you. You have clearly crossed the threshold between net positive and net negative, and only your previous contributions prevents me from supporting that sanction right now. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:38, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• I still support an indefinite topic ban from all pages relating to automation, broadly construed for Magioladitis and for the exact reasons I explained above. Having reviewed this ANI discussion in its entirety, as well as the discussions and pages that started this ANI discussion - I find that BU Rob13 has not violated any behavioral policies or guidelines with his interactions or discussions with Magioladitis. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 05:30, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Oshwah did you get under consideration and the older diffs from February I added? Rob said that one of the reasons h was doing is that he is BAG member dut he was confirmed as BAG member in July i.e. 4 months later. Wikipedia:Harassment#Wikihounding says that "where they contribute, to repeatedly confront or inhibit their work. This is with an apparent aim of creating irritation, annoyance or distress to the other editor. Hounding usually involves following the target from place to place on Wikipedia." I have indicated many places where Rob has interacted with me. For example how does this make any sense? We had multiple interactionsot limited to automation. a) Template documentation b) Policy page c) Multiple interactions in BRFA d) User talk pages e) Rights request f) xFD. And probably other which I forget. -- Magioladitis (talk) 05:43, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Concur with EEng, Alex, Oshwah, BMK etc. I still favour a complete automation ban per Oshwah as a minimum and a strong admonishment to stay away from BU Rob. Only in death does duty end (talk) 07:34, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• Kick to ArbCom - I largely agree with EEng here and on the face of it I support a time-limited site ban for Magioladitis for what appears to be a long-term and ongoing campaign of harassment, false accusations and presumptions of bad faith, and no sanctions for BU Rob13 who is clearly being harassed and nonetheless has tried to minimize the situation and avoid harm to the project. However, Mag apparently genuinely feels that he's the one being harassed, although to be as civil as I can, he's stunningly failed to make that case. There's a lot of evidence to consider here, plus allegedly offline evidence, and this is just the sort of situation that Arbcom is set up to examine and resolve. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:00, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

  Is there a record on how quickly one has gone from receiving a significant sanction from ArbCom, to appearing in front of ArbCom again? PGWG (talk) 17:56, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

PGWG Smooth. I also tried to joke today but you know this situation has caused a lot of stress so please be more carfull with these comments. I am trying to find a compromise where I will cooperate with people. I am not perfect but a) Not seeing any of my contribution appreciated hurts (I am referring to older Rob's messages) b) Seeing that someone follows everything I do because he thinks this way implements some "community demands" is not very nice. You know a small talk would help and this is what I am trying. Some people here deny to talk to me and just pose threats. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Magioladitis (talk • contribs)

Magioladitis None of the concerns being raised here are different from concerns raised multiple times in the past, it's just a new set of diff's. Why are you only now trying to find that compromise? This is an honest question, not intended as a slight in any way. I don't think that anyone does not appreciate some of your contributions, I believe I've seen Rob in the past support and complement aspects of your bot work. But the balance of the conversation at hand has occurred in the past (just in smaller venues or with less participants disagreeing with your behaviour), so what is the difference between then and now? As far as my comment, while I do not feel it was out of line I apologise if it caused you additional distress. PGWG (talk) 19:02, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

PGWG Because after the ArbCom I am trying to make a clean start by moving to areas that have not to do with bots etc. I acted a bit pre-emptive here because I would like to be sure that thy are no hard feelings around and my work from now on won't be judged based on the previous situations. I already have written somewhere that people, including myself, tend to be more impolite when typing an sometimes written text can be read in multiple ways. -- Magioladitis (talk) 19:34, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

It is possible that a case request could be handled by motion considering how recent the last case was. --Rschen7754 18:24, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• I'm very confused as to what Magioalditis is trying to achieve here. I can understand they are well-intentioned but what I also observe is a total failure to get the point. The entire thread has been a trainwreck, with irrelevant issues getting dragged in and out for no reasons at all. I can understand Rob's frustration here, considering they were not intending to send the WP:HOUNDING message, the point being, they too are well-intentioned here. I believe any kind of sanction on Magioalditis will not hold as of now (except a site ban) due to the lack of competence, and the underlying fact is they are at the end of their rope, so either you hang on to the bit you have or don't. --QEDK (愛 • 海) 19:25, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
  • I think it's pretty clear that he was trying to get a break from the scenario where every time he made a proposal, there was BURob opposing it. Having walked a mile in those shoes, I can sympathise. Let us hope, as BURob says, that it is not intentional, but while he states that he is trying to avoid Magioladitis he was I believe the first to comment on his request for TE rights. He also was instrumental in getting Magioladitis removed from BAG IIRC, where BURob effectively took his seat. He also continued to post, again I believe mainly negatively, on Magioladitis' BRFAs, despite saying that he was recusing as a BAG member, and claimed the remarks were in a "non-hatted" capacity.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 20:13, 20 October 2017 (UTC).

Incorrect on all counts. I was the second-to-last to comment on his TE rights, as I only noticed it once another editor also requested TE rights and I saw it on my watchlist. [25] I wrote a simple two sentence oppose to Magioladitis' reconfirmation and was one of the last editors to comment, as opposed to most other editors writing at least a paragraph in opposition. [26] I've repeatedly supported Magioladitis' BRFAs when they've demonstrated consensus and followed the bot policy, as demonstrated by Sladen's diffs below. In the future, please verify your claims and accusations before making them, Rich Farmbrough, as required by WP:NPA. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 14:21, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Just for funsies here are some some figures that show the some of Rob's involvement with Magioladitis (not all of it negative of course). I think people will understand where Magioladitis is coming from better if they take this into account:

Page	Number of edits
User talk:Magioladitis	43
User talk:Yobot	5
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Magioladitis 2	1
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Magioladitis 2/Evidence	30
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Magioladitis 2/Workshop	109
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Magioladitis/Evidence	12
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Magioladitis/Workshop	119
Wikipedia:Bot Approvals Group/nominations/Magioladitis 2	1
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 27	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 28	3
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 29	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 30	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 31	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 32	1
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 33	4
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 34	3
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 35	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 36	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 37	1
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 38	3
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 39	1
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 40	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 41	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 42	5
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 43	4
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 44	1
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 45	6
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 46	1
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 47	8
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 48	17
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 49	7
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 50	4
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 51	7
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 52	7
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 54	3
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 55	2
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 57	1
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 58	2
Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/Template editor	2
Total	429

429 edits directed at a single user isn't even remotely funny. When I started editing Wikipedia this would have put you halfway to the most active Wikipedians list on its own. And this doesn't include comments on pages such as AN/I, Arbcom requests for cases, Bots noticeboard, BAG noticeboard etc..

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 21:07, 20 October 2017 (UTC).

260 of those edits are from a single Arbcom case in which BU Rob was one of the named parties, so it's entirely unsurprising that he'd be commenting repeatedly there. Discount those, and you have a picture of someone who's made 48 talkpage comments and a few comments on BRFAs. You can prove almost anything by running an interaction analysis on two editors who are both active in the same area; using the same methodology, with over thirty thousand matches I can make a far more convincing case that Magioladitis is stalking me. (Note, before someone complains, that I'm not making this allegation; it's just intended to illustrate what a blunt-force approach this is.) ‑ Iridescent 21:32, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes I could have used a blunt force approach, instead I narrowed the cut to items where indisputably BU ROb is addressing Magioladitis. IF you are running the tool, look also at the min time between edits. With you and Magioladitis that is 6 hours, and rapidly rises. With BU Rob in the above (and many other places) it's seconds to minutes. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 21:37, 20 October 2017 (UTC).

(For the record). Clicking and reading the last four BAG links provided by Rich (Yobot 54‒58) gives a date range of five months (25 March 2017‒20 August 2017):

• Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 54 "As one of the harshest critics of Magioladitis, I have to say, I think he's being treated extremely unfairly here. …"" (25 March 2017)
• Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 55 "… I support the use of general fixes in this task provided "Skip if genfixes only" is checked and the edit summary indicates general fixes may be applied. I see no reason to deny the use of general fixes running alongside a main task. …" (24 July 2017)
• Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 57 "… I would be very supportive of running this task from the Yobot account manually to both solve the issue of false positives and prevent watchlist spam. This is an obviously beneficial fix." (6 August 2017)
• Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 58 "… I strongly support this task. …" (20 August 2017)

Four apparently positive comments (speaking in support of a proposed Yobot tasks), across five months.

—Sladen (talk) 22:03, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Actually, the majority of my edits on the last case's workshop were directed at Beetstra, not Magioladitis. I tend to swing back and copyedit my own comments, so edit counts are (as always) less than the full story in terms of total interactions. In any event, you've shown that I was active in the two ArbCom cases and that I'm active at BRFAs – both things I am not contesting in any way, and both things that are in no way indicative of hounding. If you look at all the other BRFAs from the same time periods, you'll find I was quite active there as well. The only difference between other bot operators and Magioladitis is that the latter filed 25 requests in 48 hours, resulting in more edits spent reviewing them. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 10:53, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

BU Rob13. …Q.E.D.. —Sladen (talk) 08:15, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

So there's certainly a history. I agree with the above that numbers alone aren't enough, but this absolutely destroys any arguments that Magioladitis is just roving around attacking anybody. It strikes me that this pretty well supports a conclusion that this is just BAG drama that boiled over because one editor might have been less resilient than the other. This is why I've so firmly opposed ANI action on this: It's clear that this case is far more nuanced than a classic knee-jerk ANI action is capable of appropriately addressing. While I'm typically in favor of people who behave calmly and professionally than those who do not, the attitude I'm seeing among Magioladitis's most vociferous detractors in this thread has more or less balanced the scales in my eyes. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:29, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• Kick to the ArbCom-BAG Joint Subcommittee on Automation-Related Disciplinary Matters. They have the expertise and the time to examine all the evidence and come to the proper conclusion. Smooth alligator (talk) 07:06, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Propose indef ban for Magioladitis

The incompetence shown again, and again, and again, is just staggering. Looking at his edits today, they make a proposal at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Opt-in "Edit source" for new accounts? based on utter bollocks arguments, and continue in the same vein with more nonsense when this is pointed out; and they are "alphabetising" external links to Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and Twitter, with the caveat that they don't even know the alphabet apparently: like here (twice) and here, and here. And here, apparently. here they go from the correct alphabetic order to their own idea of it.

Either they are incompetent, or they are running some badly programmed automation on their account which consistently makes the same error (which would also make them incompetent, but at a different level).

In any case, after the above discussion, seeing how they cause problems and show incompetence at nearly everything they do here, I think it is time to just say "enough is enough" and not bother with further topic bans, restrictions, ... and just end this here and now. Fram (talk) 09:19, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Fram I was mainly moving twitter at the bottom. Seriously now. Why are you so aggresive? -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:23, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

[27] this is not just moving Twitter to the bottom, it switches Facebook and Instagram as well. This one doesn't even have Twitter in it. You simply can't be trusted to edit or comment correctly, and this has only become worse over the years it seems. Fram (talk) 09:28, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Fram OK it was a mistake while moving bullets around and having tabs open to update Wikidata at the same time. No need to scretch this that much! -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:32, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose: I've not seen anything in this proposal that actually merits a siteban. Having bad ideas, which is all I can really gather from this proposal, is not and has never been a bannable offense. Even if we factor in some of Magioladitis's more confusing behavior, it's evident from the above discussion that there's something more going on here that merits a more nuanced approach. That is, this case should go back to ArbCom. This is simply not a dispute suitable for resolving with a community ban. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:30, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
  • It may well end up at ArbCom, but I see very few people apart from you notice anyhing "more" going on here apart from problems with Magioladitis' editing. Fram (talk) 09:32, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
    • (edit conflict)As I said above, were this so simple as there being a clear good guy and clear bad guy, ArbCom or the community would have easily removed the bad guy ages ago. I think there's an emergent toxic behavioral dynamic that needs to be addressed. I don't see the point in shrieking about another editor's incompetence over a handful of diffs. Particularly when it's obvious he or she just used the wrong edit summary when updating external links to rely on Wikidata rather than manual entries. I think that's quite a helpful set of edits you list above. Big deal if the edit summary was wrong. That's not bannable. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:36, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
      • Seems like circular reasoning: because ANI isn't able to solve this, I oppose ANI solving this. Let's not get into the Wikidata vs. enwiki thing though, we had those issues recently with Magioladitis changing the official website to pull the data from Wikidata, even when the value here was correct and the value at Wikidata was wrong. That aspect of these edits is of debatable value: the actual problem is what I highlighted. In itself, it is a minor issue (though rapidly spreading across a lot of pages, suggesting some script-assisted blunder), but as a symptom of everything that is wrong with the editing o Magioladitis, together with the above discussion and the proposal I linked to, it all indicates an editor who can't be trusted in their regular edits, and who is a waste of time in discussions. Fram (talk) 09:44, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
        • Actually, I'd rather not see ANI pull off another pitchforks-and-torches answer to a "problem". And let's not skip over Magioladitis good deeds in order to reach a conclusion of irredeemability. If there's something wrong at Wikidata, you're welcome to fix it. And if Magioladitis is doing something wrong at Wikidata, you're welcome to propose some kind of resolution over there. I see nothing wrong with moving official site link information over to Wikidata so it's synced across languages. We did this with interwiki links ages ago. If you have a problem with doing it differently you're welcome to start a discussion to forbid the use of Wikidata on English Wikipedia.
          I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that Magioladitis is doing something with a script. I think it's far more likely that Magioladitis is just copying and pasting the templates from article to article, or from an open Notepad window or some such. I'm not sure if you've done much scripting, but it'd be way easier to just remove everything after the pipe on a line than to remove all the EL templates and replace them with a block of EL templates in a different order. You'd just use a regex and be done with it. So, come on already. All this looks like is you seeing the wrong edit summary and assuming the worst. You were wrong. Admit it and move on. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:53, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
          • I have made no comments on what Magioladitis does or has done on Wikidata, I don't care, and I have no plans to make any resolution (or any edit at all) over there. Please explain to me where I was wrong in my opening statement? Did they try to alphabetize? Yes. Did they make a total mess of it? Yes. Whether it was script-assisted or totally by hand is not really relevant, the end result is what counts. Fram (talk) 09:57, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
            • You were wrong in that you said Magioladitis was trying to alphabetize. Magioladitis was switching the EL templates to Wikidata and used the wrong edit summary. It's very likely Magioladitis's browser autofilled the edit summary. Big deal. How is this bannable? —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 10:00, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
              • In a series of edits labeled "alphabetize" he switched the order of the templates, and still you conclude that I was wrong believing that he tried to alphabetize them? I start to understand the exasperation felt above with your debating tactics. Fram (talk) 10:30, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
                • I've actually had a browser autofill the wrong edit summary before. It happens fairly regularly that I have to correct it, and a couple times I've hit "enter" before I caught it. I also see lots and lots of editors using incorrect edit summaries by mistake, I believe because of some builtin gadget that suggests edit summaries. Let's compare that with what you're suggesting: An English speaker who doesn't know the order of letters in the English alphabet. Even if you're right, it's not a bannable offense. This proposal is completely off-base. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 10:51, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
                  • Bye! Fram (talk) 11:17, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Fram you mainly oppose my proposal(s). This is not a reason for anything. I can't impose VE to anyone. I made a proposal in the form of question. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:35, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

No: I oppose your false claims against BURob, I oppose your problematic editing, I oppose the false claims in your proposal and the ludicrous (and in one case highly unethical) followup statements you made there, and seeing that the problems with you stretch back for years and only increase in frequency, I see no reason to let you continue editing any longer. Fram (talk) 09:40, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Fram convience me that my claims are false. You stated the percentage of VE edits this morning. There is no comparison data given. I wrote an idea in a place people are supposed to post ideas based on my experience with editors with no epxerience writing. You have many options: you can oppose, say "not for now", etc. I wrote an idea in the Villapge Pump that does not meet your ideas. This is not a reason for drama. We have different expriences and opinions of how people would like to use various tools in Wikipedia (Wikidata, VE, bots, etc). Is this a reason for that? I tried to fix some links and improve templates. If I was wrong just contact me and I'll try harder. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:47, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

No need to ping me each time, I'm following this discussion. Let's see: you make a claim about VE becoming more and more popular, I show that VE isn't popular even after 5 times, and I am the one having to show you that it was even less popular one, two, three years ago? Ever heard of WP:BURDEN? I made an effort to substantiate my comments with actual figures, while you have done absolutely nothing at all to support any of your statements. You made factual claims to support your idea; you are the one that needs to add evidence for your claims or withdraw them. Instead, you add more nonsense and then ask me to provide more evidence for my numbers? You are simply trolling. Fram (talk) 09:53, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

As I said: The popularity it's based in my experience discussing with people who told me that VE is now a good tool in comparison to some years ago. I have no strong evidence but you don't see to have neither. In the VisualEditor pages it writes "Presentation from Wikimania 2013: VisualEditor - The present and future of editing our wikis". It was clearly presented as Wikipedia's future. Still, I hear your concerns but this could be done in a calm way. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:58, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

So you base your claims on anecdotical hearsay and on a promo Wikimania presentation from 2013? The WMF has presented LiquidThreads, Flow, ... countless things as "the future of Wikipedia", relying on that (certainly years later) is worrisome. And in any case, if something is, 5 years after being rolled out and four years after being called the future of Wikipedia, is only being used for less than 5% of the edits, then yes, I see that as strong evidence that the "more and more popular" claim is false. Fram (talk) 10:30, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

For 3 years, VE was incredibly slow and buggy. I think ow it's better. Fram, I made a proposal in the form of question and you know that I am one of wikicode editors and I have used VE only for test reasons. My proposal was honest. I think I understand what user friendly enviroment means and I don't think wikicode is user friendly. Still, I did not even started an RfC. I asked the community their opinion. You can concur my claims on VE's popularity. I would be more than happy to see evidence. Even for academic purposes. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:42, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

What you did was "Should we do this?" (which is a question) "Because of this, this, and this" (which aren't questions but arguments, statements of fact). You are not here because of your proposal, your question, but because you presented some rumors and wishful thinking as fact, and when asked to back these upwith evidence you just started inventing new reasons to support your proposal (and because loads and loads of other things in your editing history, the edits under discussion are just the straws that broke the camel's back). If I asked "should we ban Magioladitis" and then gave as argument "Because he is a reptilian alien" (you may insert a more realistic but baseless PA here, I took a ridiculous one to avoid being seen as calling you anything), no one would accept the defense "but I was just asking a question", and rightly so. You have been banned from discussing e.g. cosmetic edits because your honest proposals were disruptive; the intention of such a ban is not that you start making similar honest proposals on other subjects elsewhere. Your bot and automated editing have been severely restricted; the intention of these restrictions is not that you start making manual series of repetitive but incorrect edits either. Since it has become obvious (from these examples, but also e;g. from the section you started here) that the restrictions you have had so far only move the problems around but don't actually solve them, it is time to bring this to its inevitable conclusion, and ban you. Fram (talk) 11:17, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Fram, I used argumets given to me by people and by WMF's presentations. You may disagree with them (you called them "promo") but I support most of the changes propsoed by Mediawiki developers because I trust that they know to build a user friendly enviroment. The funny thing is that instead of holding thiss discussion in the Village Pump we are holding it her under the threat of ban that causes extra stress and drama. -- Magioladitis (talk) 11:23, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Keep on digging! Fram (talk) 11:41, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Oh what a bunch of garbage. The exact point of an editing restriction is that you expect the editor to do something that isn't covered by the editing restriction. You were dead wrong about the Wikidata edits, and you're dead wrong about this proposal. So what if it's a bad idea? Then say it's a bad idea and then ignore it. This is what I'm talking about elsewhere in this thread about the torches and pitchforks approach. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 11:25, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

"The exact point of an editing restriction is that you expect the editor to do something unproblematic that isn't covered by the editing restriction." There, I've corrected your claim, you forgot a word. Oh, speaking of "dead wrong", I didn't say anything about Wikidata edits, like I already told you above. Fram (talk) 11:41, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Holster the attitude. You talked about Magioladitis's edits regarding Wikidata repeatedly above. That you framed those edits as "alphabetizing" based on Magioladitis erroneously using the wrong edit summary doesn't change that. As for the purpose of editing restrictions, I think you're putting the cart before the horse: A proposal you don't agree with and a few mistaken edit summaries isn't so egregious as to violate any standing editing restrictions. I'm not even sure if what you're proposing is problematic versus simply incorrect. I ask you again, so what? —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 11:58, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

I have not discussed any edits "regarding Wikidata". You invented the "but despite saying alphabetisizing in the edit summary and at the same time changing the order, these edits were not about alphabetisizing and your comment has to be about Wikidata" reasoning. ANd you are trying to have your cake and eat it, it seems: "A proposal you don't agree with and a few mistaken edit summaries isn't so egregious as to violate any standing editing restrictions." No kidding? It's not a complaint about "a proposal I don't agree with" but again, it's easier to frame it like that to make your point of course; but more importantly, I don't claim he is violating his existing editing restrictions, but that if he gets edit restricted, he finds another area to cause trouble in, as can be seen with these edits but also with the section above about BURob. So your reply simply doesn't make sense, just like many of your reasonings on this page so far. We can't solve this on ANI, because we can't solve this on ANI (see your initial oppose here), and because we can't solve it on ANI, there isn't a problem (or at most "it takes two to tango"); and now there can't be a problem with edits outside his editing restrictions, because they don't violate his editing restrictions? It seems to me that whatever arguments are given here, you fill twist logic into some unrecognisable shape to claim that the arguments don't apply because they don't apply, and if they did apply they would have been applied before. I'm done playing that game with you. Fram (talk) 12:16, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

I have not discussed any edits "regarding Wikidata". False. It's not a complaint about "a proposal I don't agree with" False: Your complaint centers, quite clearly, on the fact that Magioladitis made a proposal, and it's pretty clear you don't agree with it. I don't claim he is violating his existing editing restrictions Half-true: You heavily insinuate that Magioladitis's conduct violates the editing restrictions in spirit, in a clear attempt to soften your proposal by framing Magioladitis as some kind of hardened troll. We can't solve this on ANI, because we can't solve this on ANI I'm not sure where you came up with that, honestly: We shouldn't handle this at ANI because it's a problem not suited for ANI, and the outcome would not resolve the cause. now there can't be a problem with edits outside his editing restrictions, because they don't violate his editing restrictions? See earlier: You mention the editing restrictions in a way to unfairly and improperly demonize the conduct you seek to be the final straw in this thread: Some edits related to Wikidata and a proposal you don't like. I'm done playing that game with you. As I said above, holster the attitude. You read way too far into the edit summaries on a few edits and somehow blew it up into a reason for a siteban. You being wrong isn't a reason to siteban someone else. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 12:35, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose Talk about "utter bollocks arguments"! Joefromrandb (talk) 11:12, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
• I can't believe I'm typing this, but Magioladitis is going to be banned, and it's essentially per WP:CIR. They're just moving from one area to another, causing increasing amounts of damage and disruption. I endorse the suggestion of a site ban. I wouldn't want it to be permanent, but Magioladitis ideas and editing patterns are so out of sync with the rest of the community, their edits of such poor quality, so hurried and disruptive and spread far beyond the areas where he was topic banned from, I don't see what the other options are, unless we could somehow topic ban him from discussing technical aspects of the project, making ludicrous proposals, making semi-automatic (hurried, rushed and atrociously executed) cosmetic edits and, of course, the imposition of the necessary one way I-BAN to prevent him from stalking Rob. It's basically a "we'll not ban you if you only write new content" topic ban. The lack of self-awareness and the terrible judgement in all of this that is staggering, and is the core of this problem. When he was trying to explain away his stalking of Rob, he actually posted this I think it's normal for a person that wants to re-apply for admin to resume working in that area. now he's been through two Arbitration cases as the named party, forcibly de-sysopped, voted off the BAG, subject to community imposed restrictions, has a talk page archive which is complaint after complaint, and yet still thinks (a) he has done nothing wrong and (b) as an extension to that, because he's done nothing wrong, that he's going to pass RfA soon. I'm speechless and shocked at all of this. Nick (talk) 11:46, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
  • I would point out that the edits Fram complains about above aren't cosmetic, or at least weren't intentionally cosmetic: They were to change pages to use Wikidata for URLs instead of manually-entered data. That Magioladitis's attitude is less than ideal and unrealistic, I can't deny. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 12:08, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
  • I recognise my mistakes thhat;s way I am moving away from things I 've been doing the last years to things I'v been doing before that. In my last comment I did not wirte that I'll run for RfA soon. I have discussed with people about it. Regaining trust needs time. -- Magioladitis (talk) 23:13, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

So, to reinforce my claim of incompetence, you just posted a link to a copyright violating Youtube clip to my talk page[28]? Keep on digging... Fram (talk) 11:38, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support WP:CIR comes to mind (primarily behavioral competence, not technical), as does WP:IDHT and WP:BLUDGEON. One would think all of the community discussions and ArbCom cases would have given him at least some pause in his behaviour or attitude... in the interests of assuming good faith I'm going to assume he isn't deliberately acting in as incendiary a manner as possible... which brings it right into competence territory. I'm not convinced that any topic ban will be effective in the long term, as the attitude and issues seem to move from area to area. 1-way IBANs are destined to fail (in my opinion), and Rob has done absolutely nothing wrong that would justify a 2-way IBAN placed on him. PGWG (talk) 18:12, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
  • You reasoning that a two-way IBAN requires that both parties be culpable is mistaken. It merely requires that it be a means of resolving a personality dispute. One-way IBANs, you are right, are destined to fail. And honestly, both Rob and Magioladitis have said they want nothing to do with one another, and that they will leave each other alone if left alone themselves. In other words, they've both effectively consented to an IBAN. In many ways, this renders this discussion moot. We should give this agreement time to take effect and see how it works. And, as I've shown in this thread, Magioladitis's Wikidata-related edits and VE-related proposal do not merit a siteban. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 06:03, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose Fram has some decent arguments to make about Wikidata. This is not the place, nor is attacking a fellow editor the way, to make them. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 21:17, 20 October 2017 (UTC).
  
  • Strawman much? Mendaliv is the one who started about Wikidata, and is the one who keeps bringing it up. The ban of Magioladitis is for years of problematic editing, spilling over into more and more topics, like his proposal about Visual Editor. Feel free to oppose this ban proposal, but please do so with something relevant. Fram (talk) 07:18, 21 October 2017 (UTC)
    • Dude, you misinterpreted the Wikidata edits as ones involving alphabetizing because of an erroneous edit summary. I already pointed that out to you. There is nothing villainous about these edits. You should really just drop this already. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 07:39, 21 October 2017 (UTC)
      • Don't "dude" me when repeating your foolishness. Fram (talk) 08:15, 21 October 2017 (UTC)
        • Facepalm That you got things wrong is not my fault. Holster the attitude. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 08:33, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

• Cmt Mendaliv's suggestion "If there's something wrong at Wikidata, you're welcome to fix it." is completely off base. People who want to edit Wikidata know where it is. It has its own standards and we have ours. If Wikidata is serving up bad info, the solution from Wikipedia's standpoint is to not use it (WP:RS anyone?), at least without manually checking the info. Interwiki is different: the crosslinks were maintained by bots long before there was such a thing as Wikidata, and they were not part of article content. It's a useful navigation aid even if there are lots of errors, which there are. Google Translate is also very useful but we wouldn't put its output directly into articles. Wikidata isn't useless per se, but we shouldn't be mechanically inserting its contents into our articles.

  I can't get behind the siteban proposal because we've always treated that as drastic, but Magioladitis, please, take Fram's criticism seriously. 173.228.123.121 (talk) 07:49, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

• I've no opinion either way on Wikidata (it has its uses, it has its issues) but it would be useful if Magioladitis (and indeed, everybody) could clearly explain that their edit now includes data from Wikidata, and also indicate that they've checked what's being brought in from Wikidata (as they shouldn't be changing the source of data to Wikidata without checking Wikidata is correct). Nick (talk) 19:55, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

Nick if you check my Wikidata contributions you will that not only I cheched my edits but I was updating Wikidata at the same time. During checking Social networkd templates, I sent some to TfD and I am updated some so that all social network templates share the same format. -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:18, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

Let me throw my opinion here: Blocks are for preventing damage to wikipedia, not as a punishment. Bans are also not punishment, they should be only given out when an editor is "Unclearly" acting in bad-faith, basically the mythical WP:WikiKraken Terrariola 09:04, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

That's historically untrue. The community has banned many individuals who are contributing in good-faith but doing a poor job of it to the point that they're a net negative. WP:CIR, etc. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 10:56, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

Request for closure

A somewhat biased summary and suggestion for closure:

• (1) It does not appear that there is any appreciable support for any kind of sanction against BU Rob13 for "stalking" Magioladitis, the original purpose of this thread.
• (2) None of the suggestions for sanctions against Magioladitis made by various editors appear to have anything like consensus-level support. The most that can be said may be that general annoyance with M. has reached what appears to be its highest level to date.
• (3) The suggestion to bring this to ArbCom also does not appear to have received consensus, although any editor (preferably one of the two subjects) is certainly free to file a case request at ArbCom whenever they feel it is necessary to do so.
• (4) Given (1) and (2), it might be a good idea for an uninvolved admin to close this with as "no consensus", with the possibility of a trout to Magioladitis for bringing what appears to be a baseless accusation to AN/I. Beyond My Ken (talk) 19:37, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

I concur with this assessment. I don't think it's biased either. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 23:59, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Reading some of this, it looks like it has come to nothing. ^{My name is}not^dave (talk/contribs) 07:45, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

I'd also like this to be closed. There appears to be both consensus that Magioladitis should be sanctioned and no consensus on what that sanction should be (which, of course, makes the consensus that there should be a sanction useless). The community has never been particularly adept at handling hounding issues during my time on the site, so this will need to go to the Arbitration Committee. Hopefully, they can resolve this by motion. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 13:57, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

I also concur with BMK's assessment of the situation, and with Rob's assessment that there's consensus for sanctions, but no consensus on what the sanctions should be. Nick (talk) 14:09, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

• Actually I don't concur with BMK's assessment, in part at least. Its clear from the above that at a *minimum* editors think Mag should be banned from automation completely.

• Nick - Supports interaction ban to Site ban - both of which would restrict him in the automation area heavily.
• Blades of Godric - supports one-way iban - given BU Rob's involvement in automation, this would also effectively restrict Mag future editing in that area.
• IP 173. - supports automation ban
• Myself - Anything up to and including site ban (would settle for one-way or be restricted from automation completely)
• Oshwah - Explicitly ban from all automation
• Power-enwiki - any sanction up to site ban
• Rschen7754 - site ban
• BMK - Strongly supports ban on automation
• Fram - Site ban

• Mendaliv - two-way iban
• Rich Farmbrough - no sanction

• Dianaa - no comment on restriction - advice to mag
• EEng - no comment on restriction - has expressed that it is Mag that is the problem [EEng adds later: After hearing others' comments, I'm totally behind an automation ban as at least a start. EEng 06:30, 24 October 2017 (UTC)]
• Alex Shih - no comment on restriction
• Ivanvector - arbcom
• QEDK - no explicit support but feels any sanction short of a site ban is justified.
• Joefromrand - expletive.

Did I miss anyone? Its clear from the above that apart from Mendaliv, Rich and Mag themselves, everyone else either supports a complete ban from automation or a more serious sanction, with the remaining either no explicit comment but think there are issues. Unless any of those who argued for stronger sanctions are not happy with a less extreme one, I think there is more than enough to support a complete automation ban. Only in death does duty end (talk) 14:41, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Your summary of the !voting appears to be right, but I think your finding of consensus is wrong. Obviously, I'd like to agree with you that the automation ban (which I !voted for) has consensus, but when I look at the listing you made, I see no clear consensus at all. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:12, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

I would oppose a complete automation ban right now as kind of pointless. The harassment/personal attack issues from Magioladitis haven't been in areas of automation lately. They've been in areas that I'm involved in but Magioladitis is not (e.g. files, my talk page, past arbitration, etc). I'm a bit confused on where the idea about a topic ban from automation even came from given that there's no new disruption since the last ArbCom case even tangentially related to automation. Color me confused. Such a sanction would actually be worse than no sanction, because it makes it look like the community is handling the issue when really they are not. That would prevent this from being kicked to ArbCom. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 16:58, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Not only is it not a vote, most of those proposals weren't even on the table. Magioladitis had no fair notice of any of these alternative suggestions, and could not have mounted any real, effective defense to these myriad suggestions. All you show here is that there's no real concrete agreement on what should be done, and claim that one common denominator means that we've got consensus for sanctions. That's just not how it works, and you should know better. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 22:40, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

When you're such a stickler for accuracy, you shouldn't make claims like "Magioladitis had no fair notice of any of these alternative suggestions", a I explicitly posted a note on his talk page about my alternative solution, i.e. a full site ban.[29] Fram (talk) 06:40, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

See below. I'm talking about notice, not service. Your proposal was the unusual exception. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 06:47, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

This discussion is not relevant to the request for closure — Preceding unsigned comment added by Beyond My Ken (talk • contribs) 23:17, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Oh pish-tosh to that: WP:NOTBURO. Once a sanction is brought up in a discussion such as this, it's on the table: M. doesn't need to get a notification of it by certified mail or something. If he's been following the discussion, then he's had more than fair notice that these ideas were being bandied about; if he hasn't been following it, that's his own fault, since he started it. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:17, 24 October 2017 (UTC) (edit conflict)I'm talking about notice, not service. What's being suggested here is the equivalent of saying Magioladitis consented to one or the other proposal by dint of not challenging that specific proposal. In reality, Magioladitis could not have realistically challenged any particular proposal because there was no concrete proposal on the table, except for a siteban at one point. It's simply neither fair nor feasible to require Magioladitis to challenge every single alternative proposal that was made if only because it would require a long, meandering response that nobody would read. It sets up a marvelous catch-22. But, as has been noted at ArbCom recently, using catch-22 situations to remove "the unwanteds" appears to have become ANI's trade. —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 06:46, 24 October 2017 (UTC) You seem to want to turn us into a formal legal system, which just isn't going to happen. Again, WP:NOTBURO. Bringing up a possible sanction in the discussion itself is sufficient notification, IMO. 'Nuff said. As for "removing the unwanteds", I'm totally unsympathetic. If the community doesn't want an editor to be here, the editor shouldn't be here. We're a private community in which all of our participation is at the sufference of the WMF and the community of each project. If enough people think Editor X is a royal pain in the ass, Editor X should be given the heave-ho. Editor X can always ask to be reinstated, which happens pretty darn often, with the exception of the worst cases. It must always be remembered that this isn't real life, this is a project to build and improve an online encyclopedia, and anything that gets in the way of that should be gotten rid of, toot sweet. Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:37, 24 October 2017 (UTC) I think that's an unfortunate understanding of the situation, and contrary both to the longstanding policy of how the community works and the basic rudiments of fairness. If we're going to have civility, a collegial editing environment, and above all, consensus rule, then you can't have an environment where a self-selected group of busybodies (i.e., the ANI brigade) removing people from the project for any reason or no reason. Process is important. Fairness is important. Neither of these are present in the dystopian environment you describe. —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 00:11, 25 October 2017 (UTC) It's not contrary to my understanding of how the community works in the 12 years I've been here. In fact, it is precisely how the community works, and how it should work. We are not a community of lawyers, we are a community of editors, and thank goodness for that. Mag. had more than sufficient due process, notification, service, whatever you want to call it, and was able to participate in the discussion at every point along the way, with no restrictions. If Wikipedia ever becomes a place where hand-wringing about "process" and "fairness" is more important than writing an encyclopedia, we're dead in the water. That's why we have a little thing called WP:IAR. In the meantime, the folks below me are waiting for the information you said was pertinent at the current RFAR. Instead of responding to me again, why don't you provide them with a specific link to that case request that illustrates that "using catch-22 situations to remove 'the unwanteds' appears to have become ANI's trade", which is what you claimed? Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:32, 25 October 2017 (UTC) Wow, bold and italics? I'm honored. 😂 Sadly, you're absolutely 100% dead wrong. We are a community that prides itself on process, procedure, and fair play. IAR is for situations where the documented processes and procedures would seem to deliver a preposterous, unfair, or outrageous result, and where no reasonable person would find the outcome of those processes to be correct. What's happening here is the typical ANI steamroller effect that is so well documented, so widely acknowledged, that it's become a sitewide joke. Process is unimportant, you claim? Why do we have CSD? Why do we have AfD? Why do we have AIV and the tiered warning levels? Why do we have ArbCom? One can effortlessly point to dozens of processes and procedures that exist and clearly contradict the alternative facts you're putting forth in this situation. But let that get in the way of ANI's purging of someone that ANI doesn't like? God help us all. The walls are going to collapse because fairness and process are holding up a hanging. —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 01:49, 25 October 2017 (UTC) (Don't flatter yourself, I use bold and italics all the time.) "We are a community that prides itself on process, procedure, and fair play." Nope. We are a community that prides itself on having built the best online encyclopedia in history. Everything else is entirely incidental. You, for instance, would do well to make some more contributions to the encyclopedia, and do less lawyerly argumentation, no matter how much you enjoy doing it: your 2:1 ratio of Mainspace to Wikipedia Space edits is pretty poor. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:38, 25 October 2017 (UTC) Mendaliv "as has been noted at ArbCom recently, using catch-22 situations to remove "the unwanteds" appears to have become ANI's trade". Diff please. —Sladen (talk) 10:39, 24 October 2017 (UTC) Read the current RfAR and the attached statements. And those are only the most recent examples of criticism of ANI's techniques found in statements by and before that body. —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 11:41, 24 October 2017 (UTC) Mendaliv, please help myself and others to follow by supplying an exact Permalink and quote/diff that is being referred to. —Sladen (talk) 18:11, 24 October 2017 (UTC) Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case. Just read it. It's in multiple statements and the overall tenor of the discussion. I'm not playing the "diffs pls" game with you. —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 00:12, 25 October 2017 (UTC) Mendaliv, please help us out here. A name, or a date-stamp, or a particular phrase, or anything… —Sladen (talk) 00:23, 25 October 2017 (UTC) (Special:PermanentLink/806928850 does not appear to contain "Catch-22" or "Unwanted" or "Trade"). And my statement doesn't purport to be a direct quote of anything at ArbCom. As I said, I'm not playing the "difs pls xD" game. —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 01:50, 25 October 2017 (UTC) You're complaining because Magioladitis hasn't been given enough formal warnings about every proposed sanction in this discussion, and because not every proposed sanction had its own dedicated section with all formalities you consider necessary; but when you make some claim and people want some actual evidence for it, you can't be bothered and are not playing that game? Your double standards (and the similarities with the proposal for VE by Magioladitis and the total lack of evidence they produced, vs. the amount of evidence they requested of others) become more and more apparent. I guess that, if there would be a formal uninvolved close of this discussion, your attempts to obstruct this time and again would be dismissed out of hand. Fram (talk) 06:55, 25 October 2017 (UTC) Some claims don't need evidence. The well-known catastrophe that is ANI when it comes to complex disputes is one of those claims. Sladen tipped his hand with that last response, anyway; it's the old "give me a diff that has those exact words in it" dodge. Both of us know there's no diff with those exact words in it. That wasn't the point of my claim, and it's not my argument. If anything, the responses from Sladen, BMK, and yourself do much more to prove my claim than anything. Look for what appears to be leverage and blast away at it until the discussion has progressed far away enough from the claim that everyone has forgotten it. Well, I'm not doing that. I reiterate my claim that it would have been unfair and infeasible to require Magioladitis to respond to every single alternative proposal that was even hinted at above, or risk any argument against those alternative proposals considered waived. It would have required a wall of text that you and I both know every single reader at ANI would skip over. That is unacceptable and it places Magioladitis at an unacceptable disadvantage when trying to protect himself from the mob rule that presides at ANI. Actually, my learned colleague BMK's response above is far more telling than anything. He seems to argue that fairness does not matter, and that the community should simply be able to remove those individuals that it finds annoying, rather than those who clearly violate well-established norms of conduct. Wikipedia is not an anarchocapitalist society. Our encyclopedia-building community is founded on fairness, respect, civility, collegiality, and cooperation. Your own response, accusing another editor of being an obstructionist when he rises to the defense of another editor who, as here, so clearly cannot adequately defend himself, sums up everything that's wrong with ANI right now. It is shameful what ANI is attempting to do here, and that is why I so seriously want this case sent to the Committee, where it can be presided over with process and procedure. So, no, I will not be providing diffs to prove what an absolute joke ANI is. If you have a problem with that, you are free not to respond further. —/Mendaliv/2¢/Δ's/ 08:34, 25 October 2017 (UTC) Umm, your claims were about a specific Arbcom request which was supposed to be evidence of your general opinion about ANI. That someone (well, multiple people) actually still reads your comments is evidence of the patience and AGF inherent in most editors here; that those people then find your arguments lacking, unconvincing, unsupported by what you claim supports them, is not something that "sums up everything that is wrong with ANI right now", it shows simply what is wrong with your comments here. Your "rising to the defense of another editor" doesn't grant you immunity from the basic rules of discussion or logic. Fram (talk) 11:37, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment Wikipedia has historically been terrible at automation restrictions: it seems unwilling to write them in a way that they won't either be gamed mercilessly (the long Betacommand saga) or else serve as the pretext for draconian enforcement against perfectly good, low-volume editing (Rich F's 1-year block). There were some proposals in the Betacommand 3 workshop that I liked, but none got passed. 173.228.123.121 (talk) 08:08, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

  173.228.123.121, an editor requested template editor status. (At WP:PERM/TE: permalink Wikipedia:Requests_for_permissions/Template_editor#User:Magioladitis—subsequently withdrawn after checking WP:TPEGRANT) . It is unclear how automation would be connected to that. —Sladen (talk) 11:23, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't understand the connection either. Template vandalism is a fairly new thing: it only appeared after we got paranoid about defending against a problem that we didn't have. I edited templates from my IP address all the time before that. I'd go ahead and grant TE to Magio on the theory that it can always be withdrawn if he messes up too much. As long as the volume is reasonable, template errors are mostly easy to revert, unlike when someone gets overenthusiastic with a bot. 173.228.123.121 (talk) 06:34, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't think I agree, It would seem to be foolhardy to give to an editor about whom there have been numerous complaints concerning the accuracy of their work using bots an additional right which would enable them to be similarly inaccurate on templates which may be used in a large number of pages. Template errors may be easy to correct, but, unlike template vandalism, there's no guarantee that they're going to be noticed quickly, and while they exist, they can affect a large number of articles. I would not recommend giving M. template editor status at this time. Beyond My Ken (talk) 16:09, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

I agree with BMK in not agreeing. The problem with M. is that pretty much all he does is gnomish tinkering that at regular intervals does more harm than good. And this, I believe, is to a large degree because he's disconnected from the actual experience of writing and editing content – it's why so often he can't understand why something he's done is pissing off everyday editors. I think he should serve some time not running bots and not tinkering with templates, but just editing actual articles by hand. Then we'll see. EEng 19:27, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

I think EEng's advice is excellent. Beyond My Ken (talk) 19:37, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

That goes without saying. EEng 20:28, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

• Beuller? Beuller? Beuller? EEng 13:27, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Hehe. Ferris really annoys mofos. Oh yeahhhhhh. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 08:41, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

It did not work, and the United Statees sank deeeeper into depresssion... — fortunavelut luna 13:30, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• I'm not an admin, but my sense is that no consensus has been reached for any action beyond a WP:TROUT against Magioladitis at this time. As a contributor, I hope both these users will have the sense to leave the other alone. I would also note that the Simple English Wikipedia offers a lot of opportunities to create content. power~enwiki (π, ν) 01:10, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I suggest we combine my idea a few posts up (re M. sticking to article editing for a while) with your idea (i.e. that Simple would be a good place for him to do that). EEng 19:07, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Assuming their rules on running unauthorized bots on one's main account and on making changes that have no effect on the rendered output of a page are broadly similar to ours, I'm not sure they'd exactly welcome him back with open arms. ‑ Iridescent 19:17, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Iridescent No complains were ever reported for my edits in simple.wp. -- Magioladitis (talk) 20:16, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Size of fish

Magioladitis, what would be your own preferred outcome? Are there any proposals that you could, or would like to offer? —Sladen (talk) 21:47, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Sladen I am satisfied by the fact that we will both try to avoid unneeded interactions. Some answers I got were satisfying I do not wish to limit any admin actions or any critisism to my actions. I'll stay away from editing for a while longer and I hope this will lead to calme situations. Thanks, Magioladitis (talk) 23:01, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

So, M., you don't see the appropriateness of an automation ban? EEng 00:32, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Magioladitis, Thank you (for the reply). —Sladen (talk) 07:52, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

E.M.Gregory's behavior at AfDs....again.

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

---

It is less than 2 months since User:E.M.Gregory behaviour at AfD was brought up at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive962#E.M.Gregory.27s_behavior_at_AfDs

Some people just can't help themselves, I guess. I just pointed out to him, that in view of the above AN/I report, then having 19 comments on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2014 Dijon attack was a bit excessive.

Alas, that didn't help. Presently he has 21 comments on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2014 Dijon attack. I suggest the implementation of the following solution (which has been earlier suggested, but was not implemented): let EMG make !votes on AfDs, but forbid any follow-ups. Huldra (talk) 20:24, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment he has edited 2014 Dijon attack about 70 times since the AfD started, and contributed to the article before the AfD as well. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:25, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Yes power~enwiki that is true but several editors at the AFD discussion told Gregory his recent additions are highly misleading and grossly inaccurate. Note also another AFD discussion following the first ANI thread where Gregory excessively commented. Personally, I am more concerned about his compentency issues with sourcing but the AFD behavior is problematic and ongoing as well.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 20:33, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Note that since starting this discussion, TheGracefulSlick has racked up 20 edits at yet another terrorism-related AfD Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Reuven Shmerling; yet another WP:POINTy AfD she started.E.M.Gregory (talk) 13:52, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

• Note that on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2011 Tel Aviv nightclub attack brought up by TheGracefulSlick, Gregory made 15 edits to TheGracefulSlick's 21 (including some repititions of arguements by TheGracefulSlick). Gregory actually added sources to the article, added text, and demonstrated SIGCOV on the AFD discussion.Icewhiz (talk) 20:42, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Yesterday Huldra came to my talk page to threaten to start this discussion. We have met from time to time, most recently, as far as I can recall, at a perfectly ghastly AfD, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Georgios Tsibouktzakis. Here is the response I made on my talk page yesterday: I have participated in a couple of dozen AfD discussions today alone, searching, bringing sources to the discussion, sourcing poorly sourced pages. I have no idea of how many AfD discussions I take part in in a typical month, but it's a lot. I do know that I spend more time on these discussions than many editors do; I invest time and effort into seeking out sources to make fair assessments on a range of topics. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2014 Dijon attack is an unusual AfD; notice that the Nom has made 14 comments, as has an editor named Pincrete who wants to delete this terrorist attack. And also note that I have made 99 edits to the page 2014 Dijon attack. I don't just opine; I expand and source the articles I find at AfD. Many pages where I make multiple edits are collaborative efforts; recent examples: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Notable Orthodox Churches North America, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Buzz Patterson, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/American King James Version and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Andrew Heywood. But, yes, as with Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Paul Anderson (journalist) I do tend to double back and make multiple comments as I find time to revisit specific AfDs and search for sources, or as some aspect of a recent AfD that bears looking into occurs to me. I believe that my work at AfD will hold up to scrutiny, but it will never satisfy you because you and I differ on the question of whether ideologically motivated attacks on civilians (terrorism) is notable.E.M.Gregory (talk) 20:38, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• E.M.Gregory yes I have commented 14 times but I asked you if we could mutually agree to step away from the AFD. Ironically, you replied simply with "WP:BLUDGEON" and preceded to bludgeon the discussion.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 20:44, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• At the point when you made that suggestion, I had responded to your latest reiterated assertion that "there was no in-depth analysis" of the 2014 Dijon attack by bringing a list of 7 WP:INDEPTH articles from major international media. My earlier comments had included discussions of academic articles discussing this attack, two requests that your restore someone's keep iVote that you had deleted, and, swhen you ignored that, restoration of the keep iVote that you had deleted. The reason that I did not agree, however, was that I did not wish to endorse the wording of your "request" which was, "You give wall of text a new meaning E.M.Gregory. Can others be allowed to comment here without you trying to mislead them? You have already inserted your inaccuracies into the "article" (a fringe piece at this point) and I think the AFD should be spared these long lists and replies." I do not think that adding a list of INDEPTH articles is the equivalent of the comments you made on the page, accusations that I was "manipulating the sources," and, as I was sourcing and expanding the article, teh assertion that, "Even now, with the recent "expansion" (as it will soon be claimed) by Gregory, the article has been bombarded by fragmented quotes and half-truths to create the illusion of ongoing coverage. Gregory has even attempted to frame this as a terror attack despite no evidence in reliable sources. Shameful and shady." I do realize that you are attempting to make me lose my cool, and that you and Huldra are attempting to vote me off the island because I think many low-casualty terrorist attacks are notable and you disagree.E.M.Gregory (talk) 21:16, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• You make it sounds as a conspiracy. Just for the record, I have no knowledge of work of TheGracefulSlick, nor for that matter, of Pincrete. E.M.Gregory: ok, just my 2 cents: if several editors find your work troublesome, it might, just might be because, eh, it is troublesome? And not because there is a vast conspiracy against you...Huldra (talk) 22:36, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Pincrete and Drmies have also noted the inaccuracies and misuse of sources so I am not the only one [30][31][32][33]. "I do realize that you are attempting to make me lose my cool, and that you and Huldra are attempting to vote me off the island" is a clear sign that you think this is some sort of of contest or battle and I would ask you to retract such a baseless statement but I doubt you will. Window dressing the article is not helpful, especially when your additions to do not reflect upon the very sources you use. I apologize but I consider that a serious matter and I -- and others -- had to call you out on it several times.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 21:56, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• Courtesy ping for Pincrete since his actions are being scrutinized by Gregory with being informed.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 21:56, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

• The above, like the AfD, is tl;dr. That's a heated AfD, as all AfDs on this general subject matter tend to be, and I don't think it's fair to single out EM Gregory when the atmosphere in general has been as heated as it has been. Trying to load it all on EMG seems a bit disingenuous. Coretheapple (talk) 21:19, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

EMG's misrepresentation of sources on and during AfD's is commonly SO extensive, that if I did not credit EMG with more intelligence, I would have to question his competency. This is an enormous time-waster and I disagree with Coretheapple to the extent that personally I don't care tuppence whether these articles survive or not, but I do care, that discussions are 'poisoned' by misleading or false information being presented, to skew discussion. EMG behaviour IMO is a very long way from his claim above to be "improving sources". I was unaware of this ANI, and thus unprepared, however I will attempt to put together some diffs in the next 48hrs to illustrate. Pincrete (talk) 22:23, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

This is a content dispute. I went there to !vote (having read about it here, as I have not edited that article) and I was immediately subjected to polite but intense badgering. Let's close this out. Coretheapple (talk) 22:52, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

No, this has turned into a compentency issue. Misleading a discussion with false information is a serious charge and I am interested in the evidence Pincrete will surely provide within the timeframe he noted. Closing this out prematurely would only encourage the behavior.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 22:58, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Please could you explain what part of that essay opinion-piece is relevant with regard to User:E.M.Gregory ? MPS1992 (talk) 23:11, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Certainly MPS1992. Gregory has demonstrated he either does not have the competency to represent sources in an accurate way or he is purposefully adding false information to, as Pincrete says, skew discussions. One can only hope it is not the latter because that would be significantly worse than an editor who perhaps does not understand why including their own flair to content is a problem.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 23:30, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

I see. Well, the essay WP:CIR that you mention, discusses competency issues that would render an editor incapable of contributing constructively. If an editor with proven ability to use the English language and proven ability in rational argument -- evidenced for example by "winning" many of these AfD disputes in which he seems to engage -- merely had a little difficulty in accurately representing sources, then there would still be reasonable hope that he could be taught how to do so. (For example by explaining to them that adding "their own flair to content" is a problem.) Therefore the essay would not apply. If someone is repeatedly misrepresenting sources then we don't need to start discussing opinion-piece essays about competence, we instead need to discuss whether steps need to be taken to prevent damage to the encyclopedia. MPS1992 (talk) 23:58, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

And I certainly agree. This is not a secluded incident where Gregory mistakenly misinterpreted some sources. For months, Pincrete has had the thankless job of cleaning up articles Gregory has grossly misrepresented -- and I highly commend Pincrete for remaining diligent. That is why, and I think you will agree, we need to stay tuned until Pincrete gathers all the diffs illustrating this behavior. The community will need to discuss serious preventive measures to protect the encyclopedia from any more damage.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 00:17, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

By chance, I will have little time/internet acces over next two days. I will attempt to put together diffs, but cannot guarantee to do so, Pincrete (talk) 08:36, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

That's an absurd argument, MPS1992. Since "no consensus" defaults to keep, one can keep a shitty article and "win" by creating enough smoke to prevent a consensus from developing. Not from being competent in accurately representing what one's sources say. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 02:34, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

If you're suggesting that a "smokescreen" approach has been deliberately adopted and repeatedly successful, that actually supports the point being made. Regardless, decisions here need to be made based on policy, not by making vague gestures to an essay that discusses an entirely different issue. MPS1992 (talk) 08:16, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Misrepresentation of sources either deliberately or by editor incompetence falls under WP:V. The information (it is claimed) Gregory is providing is not verifiable. For continually (either deliberately or through incompetence) violating a core policy its perfectly reasonable to restrict an editor from doing so. (edited to point out I have not actually vetted Gregory's contributions) Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:27, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Gregory is not (at least usually per my impression) misrepresenting sources. Other editors in this discussion do however ignore or try to disregard sources who treat the subject matter (i.e. a classification of terror) in a viewpoint that does not agree with them - and not on marginal sources - on good strong RS. They also, instead of relying of SIGCOV to determine notability (assessing amount of sources, strength, persistence, diversity, etc.), tend to apply personal value judgement - e.g. by claiming events are "run of the mill" ROUTINE.Icewhiz (talk) 09:59, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

I am not omniscient, but my conversations with User:Pincrete at Talk:2014 Dijon attack#Describing the UCL academic article, and Talk:2016 Malmö Muslim community centre arson#ISIS involvement do, I think, show good faith on my part and the difficulty of working with User:Pincrete who often makes assertions without having read the material under discussion and without having knowledge of the topic. In the case of the 2014 Dijon attacker, he omitted the lede sentence of the segment of an academic article that we had come to the talk page to discuss: ""In many other cases, when confirmed diagnosis were present, there was a tendency to try to dismiss the possibility of terrorism altogether. For example, on December 21, 2014, an unarmed 40-year-old ran over....", then argued that there was nothing in the academic article beyond a mere rehearsal of news reports, a disingenuous way of failing to acknowledge the point about the mental illness/terroism nexus issue by these two scholars of terrorism. It then got worse. Pincrete made a number of sweeping claims about the insanity defense that are not specific to the French legal standards of insanity; fail to acknowledge that legal standards vary across borders; and conflate the status of this patient with the assertion that "beyond a certain point, the mentally ill are not legally culpable." He then continues by accusing the scholars who wrote the article and me of "seeking to imply is that they/you know more about the threshold of criminal culpability than medical experts who actually examined the individual." This, of course, goes beyond what the authors of the article I was citing, or I actually said, but, more importantly, it reveals Pincrete's ignorance of the fact that it is not the medical experts who decide whether to investigate a case as terrorism. 1.) This, and not the mental status of the attacker, is what is under discussion, and, 2.) under French law whether to investigate as terrorism or not is the decision of the public prosecutor, not the examining psychiatrists. (see:Terrorism in France#Terrorism and mental illness for sources on this. [https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/in-france-the-murder-of-a-jewish-woman-ignites-a-debate-over-terrorism/2017/07/23/4c79fe28-6bb9-11e7-abbc-a53480672286_story.html?utm_term=.5dc004846f3d this 2017 Washington Post article makes it clear that the decision to investigate crimes in France for as terrorism or hate crimes - or not, is a fundamentally political decision). None of us can know everything, but Pincrete's tendency to boldly wade into deep waters and topics he knows little about, aggressively delete and then endlessly argue at talk pages about sources he has not read related to complex topics with which he is not familiar is very troubling.E.M.Gregory (talk) 12:17, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

In the last ANI there was no consensus that Gregory comments on AFD are excessive, nothing has changed so I don't understand why bring this issue again and waste everyone time.--Shrike (talk) 16:59, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Shrike, that isn't the whole story. At the last ANI, one of the conclusions was that "The editor in question has acknowledged the valid concerns raised against his AfD participation, and has agreed to keep his commenting in the future "strictly on point". When I started this ANI, Gregory had made 21 comments to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2014 Dijon attack, presently he has made 25!! He simply cannot stop himself. Oh, and many of this comments have been, frankly, completely useless, like pointing to essays like WP:BLUDGEON. Huldra (talk) 20:35, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

EMG, I made a single error on a fairly minor detail IRO the 'Malmo' source, when it was pointed out to me (by you), I immediately apologised to you. Your many factually incorrect and largely SYNTHed claims about that source dominated the AfD about that article, you continued on an RSN to defend ALL those factually incorrect claims. NO 'new' eyes in either discussion supported your interpretation.

Regarding the 'Dijon' "was it insanity or terrorism" argument, I think it reasonable to ask of any 'academics' that before they advance an opinion on this subject (and I am not persuaded that they DO advance any opinion, rather than YOU selectively quoting an "implied opinion" about this based on half a sentence) that they should have actually inspected the medical records of the accused person and have some knowledge of psychiatry - neither of which is true AFAIK.

Implying that Fr authorities, for political reasons, designated someone as 'criminally insane' and therefore not culpable for a terrorist offence is an extraordinary claim, it needs more than a single ambiguous half sentence to support it. You actively prefer 'headline-y' half sentences that imply much but fall to pieces as soon as one asks what they actually mean. I prefer clear, RS'd neutrally phrased facts. I'm not 'on a mission' to 'nail' every instance which could possibly have an 'Islamist terrorist' element, AFAI can see that is your sole purpose on these articles and in these AfD's. Pincrete (talk) 17:02, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Let's go back to to that 2016 Malmö Muslim community centre arson. Soon after I created the article in July 2017, it was taken to AfD Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2016 Malmö ISIS-related arson where I presume you found it. It looked like this when you arrived: [34]. Whether you failed to read the sources or thought that the New York Times was lying, you reacted by deleting terrorism related categories from the page [35]. It was not a long page; the basic plot was that there was an arson fire at a Shia community center, a suspect was identified, tried and adjudicated not guilty. About a month after the trial concluded, the German police arrested a dude who was editing ISIS's Amaq News Agency website from Germany. I read the most astonishing story in the New York Times, describing how this ISIS editor was actually fomenting terrorist attacks; and the Malmo arson attack on the Shia mosque/community center was described in great detail. I wrote a BASIC aritcle. You began deleting swaths of solidly-sourced material. Removed the descriptor "Shia" [36] with edit summary "the relevance of this is not established." Removed terrorism categories again [37], this time with edit summary "Which bit of "the accused was acquitted of all charges at trial and the fire was deemed not to be terrorism-related" is difficult to understand?). I replaced them with edit summary "Undid revision 790082120 by Pincrete (talk) the part where the German police verify that this was an ISIS attack. You are verging on WP:DISRUPT]" You removed a sentence reading: " however, the subsequent arrest of an Amaq News Agency operative in Germany demonstrated that the attack was directed by the Islamic State."[38] with edit summary: "Report me .... BLP trumps anything and the source does not say this ... moving other quote". And so it went. I can only assume that you failed to read teh sources on which the article was based. Certainly, it was irresponsible, disruptive edit warring. And it all took place during a July 2017 AfD Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2016 Malmö ISIS-related arson where you made 17 comments and I made 7. (Note that the July AfD was started by new User: CrispyGlover.) You made a series of similarly disruptive edits during the August 2017 AfD started by TheGraceful Slick Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2016 Malmö Muslim community centre arson, where Slick and I each made 12 edits. Both AfDs closed as Keep.E.M.Gregory (talk) 19:04, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Whoa. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2016 Malmö Muslim community centre arson. Editors who want the short course should skip the above and just read this AfD. It demonstrates the extent to which TheGracefulSlick and her sidekick Pincrete are so cocksure of their righteousness that they edit aggressively, but without encountering the sources they dismiss, delete, and mis-cite.E.M.Gregory (talk) 19:25, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

I think you need to calm down and remind yourself to remain WP:CIVIL. At this rate, we won't even need Pincrete's diffs to demonstrate your disruptive behavior.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 20:19, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

I would suggest that this entire discussion is an ideologically-tainted WP:BATTLEFIELD mess. One editor creates articles that raise the hackles of another editor or group of editors who seek to delete them. Rinse, repeat. Happens over and over again. The combatants come here, slug it out. Enough. Coretheapple (talk) 21:27, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• Just for the record, I created only few of the many articles on terror attacks that User:Huldra, and User:The Graceful Slick, (together with User:Sport and politics who has moved on to editing other topics) have recently sought to delete in recent months. The articles these editors have tried to delete were created by many different editors over many years.E.M.Gregory (talk) 10:28, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

EMG, I don't intend to reply in detail about Malmo, relevant discussion is at the AfD and at article talk. However which bit of "German police have accused" entitles you here, in the article and at AfD to turn that into a "guilty verdict"? I believe I am correct when I say that German police did not even accuse the 'German' person of 'directing' any attack, they simply accuse of 'contacting' perp and reporting to Amaq. It is not up to German police, nor the NYT, nor you or me to decide guilt of a person in Sweden, and certainly not to expand an accusation of 'contacting and reporting' on behalf of Amaq, into one of 'directing by Isis'. The Swedish court's reasons, (if I remember correctly) for NOT charging with 'terrorist' offences were because under Swedish law, the incident was too trivial to be treated as 'terrorism', so the accused was tried for arson, and found not guilty. He was also, I believe ordered to be deported. So, even if the court had known about the German arrest, they would still probably have tried for arson, since they would still probably think the incident too trivial under their law. In spite of this you claimed repeatedly in the AfD that a new trial was going to happen in Sweden, a source was asked for, but never provided. Innumerable similar claims about the significance of the 'new German' arrest are in your imagination only. The NYT and other articles make no bigger claims than that the German arrest might provide clues as to how Amaq sometimes gets its info. The trial in Germany might uncover many things, but we wait for that to happen not write up the speculations of individual editors as fact. Pincrete (talk) 21:45, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Sorry few diffs. Mainly for time reasons, despite me 'promising' them above. Besides I don't think anyone has any appetite for them and they mainly relate to the Malmo AfD and article talk. I stand by every assertion I have made here about the misrepresentation of sources in that article and at that AfD. Whatever EMG's motives may have been, the effect was to create a huge smokescreen of misinformation during that AfD, but that whole subject is now 'water under the bridge'. Specific diffs will be provided by me to back up any assertion above if requested.

However, since EMG is still criticising my contribution on that article, and that AfD, EMG could earn himself a moral victory (and an apology from me) if he could point me to where in this source there is reference to "However, new evidence showing that he had committed the attack on behalf of ISIS caused the acquitted man to be arrested and charged anew in late June 2017" text which he inserted in the article here, which was still in the article when I first edited it and which he repeated (as I recall) 3 times in the AfD discussion, to emphasise the 'ongoing significance' of the Malmo event. I can see no mention in the source of a Swedish re-arrest nor re-trial and the charging of a man in Germany with 'working on behalf of the ISIS news agency',by contacting the Swedish accused cannot be turned into "showing he had committed the attack on behalf of ISIS" without bucketloads of SYNTH and without completely ignoring BLP (even Islamists get a trial, last time I checked!) I've been asking for the source for the 'Swedish re-arrest and retrial' since the Malmo AfD, AFAIK the Swedish man is, and has always since his trial been, scheduled for deportation. I don't need 1000-word essays, simply where the source supports any of these assertions.

EMG, as I said above I made a single error on a fairly minor detail IRO the 'Malmo' source, when it was pointed out to me, I immediately apologised to you … you continue to defend ALL these factually incorrect claims, and are happy to use them as arguments at AfD (and here), to "get off the hook". Earn yourself an apology from me, and if you can't please stop repeating that I failed in some sense to correctly read the Malmo source, I'm tired of reading it, and one day soon others are going to get tired also. Pincrete (talk) 12:35, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

• The first trial, the one where he was acquitted in April/May 2017, got a lot of coverage, I have just added material form 2 English sources showing that when he was acquitted he was immediately transferred to custody of Säpo so that they could start a new set of legal procedures (may be a "hearing", not a "trial" - most sources are in Swedish and I am not a Swedish barrister) to deport him. I'm unclear why you state that he was in Sweden illegally; he seems pretty clearly to have been a legal resident. What the New YOrk Tiems article states is: "The statement from the prosecutor explains that Mohammad G. had been communicating via social media with a man who went on to carry out a 2016 arson in Sweden."'.E.M.Gregory (talk) 13:14, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

EMG, precisely as I have always claimed, no trial. No relationship claimed by source between the Swedish re-arrest (for deportation) and the German arrest, the Swedish deportation is going to be decided by its 'Migration Agency'. I didn't mention anyone's presence in Sweden being illegal (he was asylum-seeker I believe).

If I really believed you could not understand why accusations of "communicating on social media" with someone in order to feed back info to Amaq, was synonomous with "directing the same someone on behalf of Isis" ......! No apology for you then. I've long since abandoned any hope of ever receiving one myself. Pincrete (talk) 15:00, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

The organized deletion of information on terrorist attacks is now so bad that editors are being muzzled and threatened just for trying to stop the afd wikicide against coverage of obvious terrorist attacks. I've been threatened just for complaining about whitewashing of terrorism and advocating that any terrorist attack is notable and non-routine and rules for notnews and routine need to be revised to stop disruptive prods and afds Bachcell (talk) 13:17, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

If an administrator were to grow a pair of gonads, enforce policy, and muzzle you, I would hold a parade in her or his honor. Sadly, it will never happen. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 03:24, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Agreed. I tried bringing Bachcell's behavior to the community's attention (again) Malik Shabazz but apparently the new diffs and months of others from the prior thread is "not actionable" so I closed it before I could somehow be landed with a block. I'm afraid Gregory's behavior is just going to be left unnoticed as well.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 04:36, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

• Indeed, it does seem possible that repeatedly dragging editors who disagree with you to ANI could land GracefulSlick or other editors with a block. Some editors might think that such behavior was WP:DISRUPT for WP:POINTy reasons.E.M.Gregory (talk) 13:47, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Double agree with MS and TGS, if something is an "obvious terrorist attacks", why do editors have such difficulty finding sources that say that? Actually this is an area of WP where editors regularly ignore BLP, PoV and V with impunity, frequently imagining that poor coverage of terrorist articles is somehow magically going to do something to stop these incidents. It ain't I'm afraid. Pincrete (talk) 09:30, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment just pointing out that this seems to be a recurring topic at ANI that the community is unable to solve, and one that I suspect will be back here again if this ANI closes without any resolution. If this is the case, the likely next step would be ArbCom, which also has the benefit of having a structured format. I'd suggest to all editors involved that it might be best to come to some sort of agreement on a mutually amicable way to settle this, otherwise I see this headed to a case request sometime in the future. TonyBallioni (talk) 14:01, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
  • It further points to the rising conflict that I've been trying to resolve in P&G between WP:NOT#NEWS and articles rushed to creation on current events, which unfortunately the community seems very divided on, making any type of movement to resolve it (either direction) impossible, include clarification of supposed practice into policy & guidelines. That itself is slowly building to a head (this above issue just one extension of it) and it's going to get worse before it gets better. --MASEM (t) 14:05, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
    • I've been involved in several non-news related AfDs where the same behavioral concerns occurred. I hate ANI worse than I hate contentious AfDs, so I've never brought them here, but I think there is likely merit on the bludgeoning issue with this complaint that is unrelated to the NOTNEWS issue. I'm not familiar enough with what has transpired since the last ANI to give any thoughts as to an ANI resolution, but I would encourage E.M. Gregory to limit themselves to the minimum necessary comments at an AfD to get their point across. Short of that, unless this ANI closes with a specific resolution (which I don't think will happen), this is headed for an ArbCom case, which is even less fun than ANI. TonyBallioni (talk) 14:16, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

• TonyBallioni and I clashed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Salvation bracelet, and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jared Andre Sawyer Jr., on the question of when a Christian newspaper or book is primary if used to source Christianity-related article.E.M.Gregory (talk) 15:06, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

• I'd actually consider it to be more about when local sources count towards the GNG, but thats a side issue. I didn't try to have you sanctioned either time, and nor do I seek it now because I really don't like the idea of restricting the ability of someone to comment in a discussion. My comment here was simply noting that this is an issue that several editors have brought up, and since we're getting specific, has been discussed at ANI at least five different times.
  Yes, I'm aware of the issue of the sock and that you've never been sanctioned in this regard, but especially after the last ANI closed There is consensus on the editing behaviour of E.M.Gregory in AfD discussions being very concerning, in particular the inability to keep arguments "concise"., I think you would be wise to follow that advice. A long trend of ANIs that close as no consensus or no action but advice to do avoid doing something is, IMO, the definition of an issue the community is unable to solve, and that is the purpose of ArbCom. I'll repeat again that there is no attempt by me to get a sanction or weigh in on the situation since August, but simply to urge everyone here to find some amicable solution, because the next time an issue is raised, I suspect it will be as a case request. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:33, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Proposal

I do not want to see this go to Arbcom -- too much work for the same result. I propose what was actually a remedy from another ANI thread. From the previous discussion, There is consensus on the editing behaviour of E.M.Gregory in AfD discussions being very concerning, in particular the inability to keep arguments "concise". Despite his promise to address this concern, Gregory has either unknowingly or willfully continued to engage in this behavior. And, considering how he has reacted towards others at AFD and here, treats this as a WP:BATTLEGROUND. He should be limited to three comments per AFD for six months and can appeal the restriction after that time. The three comments allow him to !vote, respond to a critique of his !vote, and/or reply to another editor's !vote but it is up to him on how he will distribute his opportunities.

Unfortunately, this does not address his intentional misrepresentation of sources. To me, that should result in a topic ban on terrorism-related articles but I will not propose that at this time. Anyone else may do so if they find it appropriate.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 16:19, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

User E.M.Gregory stands accused, repeatedly, on this thread, of misrepresentation of sources, yet no diffs are provided. I am of the opinion someone should look into the behaviour of his accusers. Cheers to all, XavierItzm (talk) 05:29, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

Diffs have been provided. If you know anything wrongly done by me, you are welcome to bring it to the attention of ANI.Pincrete (talk) 16:24, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

• Note that User:TheGracefulSlick is a highly unreliable editor on the topic of terrorism. She was deliberately misleading in her AfD nominaiton of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Reuven Shmerling (a discussion she BLUDGEONed with 20 comments). In her nomination for deletion TheGraceful Slick states: " This incident was in the news, mostly regional, for about four days because it was called suspected terrorism. However, it appears to have been a monetary dispute." [39]." This Nominating statement was posted on 18 October, and the linked article dated 6 October was from the first round of news coverage. However, by 8 October [40] the AP was reporting that "Israel’s domestic security agency says it has arrested two Palestinians suspected of killing an Israeli man found dead last week, in what it says was a 'terror attack.' " [41], and reports asserting that it was a "monetary dispute" has ceased. This is disingenuous BATTLEGROUND editing.E.M.Gregory (talk) 11:46, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

• Probably not a good idea to accuse me of being disingenuous when it has already been proven you deliberately misrepresented sources on seperate occasions even as experienced editors pointed it out to you several times. I read a source for what it literally said. Perhaps if I did not have to depend on unreliable news sources, such a mistake would not occur.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 18:29, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

• Err ... perhaps if the news sources are unreliable, you should consider not depending on them? Ravenswing 08:03, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• Ravenswing you missed the point. It was breaking news coverage and it all tends to be unreliable. It is not something I prefer to do but when the subject is not covered by anything else, I do not have much choice. That was one of the points I made at the AFD; I do not want to re-open that discussion here.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 14:57, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• I didn't "miss the point" at all; I made the point I wanted to make. As far as not having much choice, of course you have a choice: no one compelled you to make any edits with unreliable sources. We are not in a race here, this isn't a contest, and Wikipedia doesn't hand out any prizes for being first out of the blocks with an edit. We can always (and should always) wait for events to be reported in reliable sources before making edits on breaking events. Ravenswing 04:03, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Ravenswing you do realize I never edited an article with an unreliable source, correct? I was not "first out of the blocks" with an edit because I never touched the article and I never do touch an article on a breaking news event. I wait a few weeks before I even consider doing that. So, I apologize, but I think you did miss some of the point if you thought I was editing with unreliable sources when, in fact, I wasn't editing at all on the page in question.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 05:38, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose any action This nomination seems to be driven by a desire to force editors to stop participating in discussions about deleting certain articles. We need more detachment in AfD, and less people trying to hound a particular point. However this will not be brought about by hounding people you disagree with, but by showing some civility, and speaking kind words to those you disagree with, as well as trying to understand their point of view.John Pack Lambert (talk) 04:59, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Thank you, Johnpacklambert. I see this whole discussion as WP:POINTy. The complaint is that I make too many edits. But discussions in which editors make multiple comments are not at all unusual: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Catalan supremacism. Long discussions can end productively and with collegiality: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Presidential Village, Maynard, Massachusetts. However, TheGracefulSlick has brought our difference of opinion over the interpretation of WP:GNG to this board in a WP:BATTLEGROUND effort to "win" the AfDs she constantly starts on terrorist attacks.E.M.Gregory (talk) 11:50, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Johnpacklambert notice how my proposal never mentioned forcing anyone out of discussing. For months Gregory has hounded editors he has disagreed with at AFD, commenting over and over to provoke a response. The problem has never been "understanding" Gregory's POV -- he has made it abundantly clear.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 16:10, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• That is highly creative inversion. I ranan editor interaction analyzer, and it clearly shows that I look regularly at the list of terrorism-related articles for deletino, and edit most of them, including the ones that TheGracefulSlick starts. It also shows that TheGracefulSlick goes through lists of terrorism related articles, so that while the analyzer may show that she edited Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2013 Paris attacks or Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2016 Hurghada attack, the fact is that these are articles that I created I began editing years ago. I am not accusing her of hounding me, only of having a different interpretation of notability and combing through old articles that I started or edited while searching terrorism articles to delete. Then, because so few of them are deleted, of dragging me here. This discussion really should be closed as POV/BATTLEGROUND aggression by TheGracefulSlick, and a handful of editors who share her BATTLEGROUND style and POV.E.M.Gregory (talk) 18:57, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• You do realize I didn't open this thread? Huldra did. How could I have been the one who "dragged" you here? And I don't "comb" through articles that you edit. I look at the several lists devoted to terror attacks. You just so happen to edit them but I couldn't care less if you did or didn't touch them. You are just throwing mud and hoping something sticks. It's getting old.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 19:37, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Editor Pincrete says that he has provided the diffs which prove misrepresentation of sources by EM Gregrory. I don't see any on this thread. I think unfair accusations of misrepresentation of sources should be looked into. XavierItzm (talk) 14:28, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• I wonder if a hard cap on EMG's participation at AFD is what is called for: Say a limit of 250 words for a main argument and no more than two responses of 50 words or fewer per deletion nomination. It seems that "wall of text" and badgering seem to be the main complaints voiced. Carrite (talk) 16:42, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Carrite great condition to add to the proposal. But unless I am directly mentioned or pinged, I will step away from the discussion. I think it would be better for uninvolved editors like you to deliberate on the nature of a hard cap of some sort.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 19:37, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• I stand corrected. You dragged me here in August, Huldra dragged me back here.E.M.Gregory (talk) 19:47, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Proposal 2

E.M.Gregory is hereby limited to 250 words for any nomination or initial comment relating to a nomination for deletion at AfD. In addition, E.M Gregory is limited to no more than two follow up comments to any nomination, with these follow up comments each not to exceed 50 words. This restriction to remain in effect for 12 months from the date of implementation of this sanction. — (This hopefully fixes the problem without robbing AfD of EMG's valuable participation.) Carrite (talk) 19:30, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Carrite has urged that low-casualty terrorist attacks be merged to lists or deleted: [42], [43], [44]. I found these by checking our editor interactions =, which were always civil and on a very wide range of articles; what I did not find was that we had interacted at terrorism related discussions where he had iVoted to keep.E.M.Gregory (talk) 13:36, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support, 1st choice. If you cannot express your opinion in a vote, plus two follow up comments, then you are suffering from what we in my country call "mouth diarrhoea". Enough. Huldra (talk) 20:09, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• To see the essentially BATTLEGROUND nature of Huldra's attitude at AfD, consider the tone of her nominations: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Georgios Tsibouktzakis, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Bloody Day in Jaffa, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Palestinian stone-throwing, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Killing of Sergeant Almog Shiloni, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Ibolya Ryan.E.M.Gregory (talk) 22:10, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

AfD shouldn't be a battleground, I think we all can agree. This remedy should allow you enough space to weigh in while putting up a first barrier to the sort of dysfunctional back-and-forth that can sometimes result when people get worked up over controversial topics. Other people might need to be reined in at the same time, I can't speak to that. Carrite (talk) 03:49, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• If you think my edits are problematic, feel free to open a new AN/I proposal about them. We are here because of your extreme "word diarrhoea" resulting, e.g., in 25 comments (!) on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2014 Dijon attack. As I said above: Enough. Huldra (talk) 23:07, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps you might consider the term "Verbal Diarrhoea", or perhaps "Word Vomit". "Mouth Diarrhoea" summons a unpleasant messy image to mind. Blackmane (talk) 01:45, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support - I forgot to mention this. And considering Gregory's battleground mentality and general dishonesty at AFDs, here, and elsewhere, he is getting off extremely light; unfortunately, this will probably not change his attitude. He has put editors he disagrees with or doesn't like in a basket of deplorables and claims they are all coordinating a POV-pushing effort. If so, Pincrete, K.e.coffman, AusLondoner, Kingsidian, Huldra, Sport and Politics, Malik Shabazz, Nishidiani, and me -- literally everyone he argues with -- needs to be brought here and tbanned. Here is something to contemplate: if I pinged these editors (and more) they could all share an account where Gregory disrupted a discussion, pushed a POV, and/or misrepresented sources. Are they all part of the conspiracy? Or is it just a case of an editor who did not listen and blamed everyone else?TheGracefulSlick (talk) 04:14, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose Like it was mentioned before I don't see any problem with EMG behaivour and no real proof of any wrong doing was provided.If someone don't want to read his comments he can just skip it.--Shrike (talk) 07:35, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - Gregory stands accused of misuse of sources, yet the diff refs cited are clearly not misuse of sources at all! Read the full discussions and refutations : in the first two diffs, Gregory was correct and the other editor was unable to interpret a complex research paper. In the second two diffs, both IceWhiz and Gregory effectively refuted the objections raised. In any event, deficient misreading of sources by others does not make Gregory guilty of the very serious accusation of misuse of sources.
  Furthermore Gregory stands accused of misrepresentation of sources, w/o diffs provided. If anything, there should be WP:boomerang on the discussions on this Notice. XavierItzm (talk) 10:17, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. I see no problem whatever with EM Gregory's behavior, certainly in terms of use or misuse of sources. He posts a lot in AfDs but these are heated AfDs on difficult subjects, in which such behavior is common and acceptable. One-sided ANI actions by content opponents is untoward, and this definitely falls in that category. Coretheapple (talk) 11:39, 30 October 2017 (UTC) I agree with the boomerang suggestion below. Coretheapple (talk) 14:32, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose as per Coretheapple and Xavier, and I think I might agree with the Boomerang. This does seem to be ideological and not behavioral. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 13:40, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. Gregory has been perfectly reasonable in AfDs in recent months, and has been providing important sourcing. If at all we have seen a problem with spurious terror related AFDs (this bunch by Sport and Politics comes to mind - but this hasn't been the only one).Icewhiz (talk) 16:05, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support No one editor should have a de facto veto on deletion discussions. It is not reasonable by any standards to make close to 30 comments on one AfD as seen at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2014 Dijon attack (where he accused another editor of bludgeon!). This took place just a matter of days ago, for those who suggest this is not a recurring problem. E.M.Gregory adopts this tactic as a way of destroying discussions with a wall of text and ensuring they close as no consensus. The fact that so many editors of good-standing have raised concerns time and time again suggests this is a problem that is not getting better. This proposal is a very light restriction and I am baffled that anyone would suggest otherwise. How hard is it to limit yourself to 250 words and two follow-up comments? I am also concerned about the editorial dishonesty displayed by E.M.Gregory which includes misrepresentation of sources, conduct which misleads less experienced and drive-by editors at AfD discussions. E.M.Gregory's conduct is a classic violation of WP:BATTLEGROUND - "Wikipedia is not a place to hold grudges, import personal conflicts, carry on ideological battles, or nurture prejudice, hatred, or fear. Making personal battles out of Wikipedia discussions goes directly against our policies and goals". I am surprised this behaviour has escaped any sanction as of yet. AusLondonder (talk) 18:18, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support -- E.M.Gregory tends to dominate the discussions on a few select topics. This potentially has a chilling effect on other participants. Two additional comments is plenty and will help the AfD process to be more efficient. K.e.coffman (talk) 01:39, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - There's a leap between a limit on the number of comments that can be made and a limit on the number of words in a comment to be made. The only place that I know of that has this sort of restriction is ARBCOM with a 500 word limit. I practically never make AfD !votes that are less than 400 words and replies of fifty words?!?! This comment here is longer than 50 words. So... hell no. Mr rnddude (talk) 01:44, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• support this is a reasonable solution to a problem. I used to see EM Gregory as a high quality editor but something has happened, and now they have started to dig in irrationally and make terrible arguments to save articles. I was building an SPI case which led me to the terrible article Scholars for Peace in the Middle East - a sea of name-dropping, did a BEFORE and found a bunch of passing mentions, and AfDed it. I have been really surprised by the low quality arguments being made there, particularly by EM Gregory, whose original vote! was:

"Take a look at this [45] search on Inside Higher Ed, or this [46] one in the Chronicle of Higher Education, or this [47] one at Haaretz. Solid sources on the page and out there in all the places where you would expect to find them.

(the links are to raw search results... always a bad sign).... and has made several terrible arguments following that, and generally has has come loaded for bear, making personalized remarks like this. EM Gregory you probably should give yourself a timeout from AfD but if you won't, Carrite's proposal is a reasonable step. I don't know what happened with you but am not happy to see it. Jytdog (talk) 03:22, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

There is some serious GANG/BATTLEGOUND going on here. Woke up this morning to the bottom three items on my Talk page and Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Jytdog. Good morning! Or as they say in the south, good night. Jytdog (talk) 13:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Break

I read this, and sigh and go "again". I have personally chosen very deliberately not to get involved. I have though seen this go on and on, and feel that I cannot stay quiet anymore. I used to edit on terrorism articles, and made some good faith if ill judged AfD's. I though by the end gave up on any interactions where E.M.Gregory is present.

E.M. Gregory has been on different noticeboards multiple times; multiple different issues, and multiple different users. Some of the time E.M. Gregory is on the receiving end, and sometimes E.M. Gregory is the person dishing it out. The discussions are all enormous, and all volumous. The question I have to ask the community is when does the editing style, AfD contributions, and BLP style become such that the project is being disrupted? It is a forgone conclusion that Afd's will end in no consensus unless E.M. Gregory view is accepted. As it stands AfD's on anything related to terrorism, are not able to take place. Previously it was some BLP articles.

There needs to be a looking at the whole contribution of E.M. Gregory. Is E.M. Gregory's current way of engaging allowing the project to function?

The fact E.M. Gregory is both on the receiving end of negative behaviour, as well as being reported for their behaviour, must indicate a problem with the users conduct. It shows, they rub people up the wrong way and incite poor behaviour, and respond in kind. The wider E.M. Gregory user profile needs looking at. Looking at each incident and report as it arrives in isolation, will never solve the behaviour issues on both sides which seem to be stuck like super glue on E.M. Gregory.

I expect E.M. Gregory to attack me, as they have already previously mentioned me negatively in this discussion. I would though say that is indicative of the issues with E.M.Gregory, they are antagonistic and confrontational.

I can provide a compiled list of all the reports to all noticeboards if that is requested. E.M. Gregory is though now taking up so much time, of so many users on certain topics and noticeboards. It is getting to the point of disrupting the ability for Wikipedia to function properly in some areas; namely AfD's on terrorism articles. Sport and politics (talk) 02:43, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• User:Sport and Politics, and I met when he started a series of AfDs in August and September. I guess there were ~ 20, almost all with the same copy-paste nomination rationale. Here is an example Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2016 Magnanville stabbing. I opposed probably all of the deletions he nominated. I believe that they were all kept, many were speedy kept. E.M.Gregory (talk) 10:50, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• The expected Ad Homenim, as forecast. E.M. Gregory just doesn't seem to get it. This will in all likelihood be going to ArbCom. E.M. Gregory has to respond to everything, and bears a WP:grudge against everyone they have interacted with who they disagree with. This goes against WP:consensus and goes against trying to act in the best interests of Wikipedia as a project to build an encyclopedia. E.M.Gregory treats Wikipeidia as a battleground no better than a mudslinging set of attacks, designed to veto anything they disapprove of. The community needs to take action, or decent users, here to further the cause of building an encyclopedia will simply take one look at interactions with users who are allowed carte blanche to behave badly, and simply leave. Sport and politics (talk) 15:50, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Where is the ad hominem? Sir Joseph ^(talk) 03:05, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm waiting for there to be a dispute at Talk:Homonym so we can have a thread headed Ad hominem at Homonym. EEng 03:08, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment I completely agree with and endorse this. In my opinion, having participated in several AfD's and discussions involving E.M.Gregory, their actions amount to gaming the system. They effectively have a one-user veto over the deletion of any article on the project; that is unacceptable and is driving away other constructive editors. Another thing that I am always astounded by is their blatant, unapologetic dishonesty every time they participate in a discussion. E.M.Gregory sees Wikipedia as purely an ideological battleground and is willing to cynically engage in whatever dishonest tactic necessary (whether personal attacks or outright lies) to achieve their political goals. I, frankly, cannot understand how E.M.Gregory has got to this point without people raising serious concerns about WP:NOTHERE. The problem here is, just like at the AfDs, admins can't be arsed to properly read and go through all this (I don't blame them) and take the action we desperately need. AusLondonder (talk) 03:49, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• AusLondonder and I met at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Palagonia double homicide and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2012 Paros (Greece) rape (linked with Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Waqas Ahmed). I was still wet-behind-the-ears and that pair of discussions with his gonzo editing style was my baptism-by-fire, a new editor hit by someone who knew all the rules. It was memorable. I should perhaps add that yesterday, I followed an editor to Auslondonder talk page, was surprised by the comment that editor had made, so I weighed in [48]. i fear that my comment may have provoked AusLondonder to come here.E.M.Gregory (talk) 11:09, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

The biggest thing shown by E.M.Gregory's comments are they believe every user has an axe to grind. The thing I am seeing here is the users who keep on reporting E.M.Gregory here simply want to move the project forward. E.M.Greogry is welcome to come along, as can been seen by the multiple proposals put forward to allow everyone to try and get along. E.M.Gregory it would seem does not want to get along with others as proposed, and by extension is not putting the Wikipedia project at the centre of their editing on Wikipedia. Sport and politics (talk) 15:50, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

You already said your piece, and you made sure to do it in a new section so everyone can see it. Your bias is showing, same as many of the support votes. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 15:58, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Call it bias, call it looking to put the project first, either way This and all the other reports surrounding E.M.Gregory are taking up way too much time here on Wikipedia from a pure procedural point of view. AfD's are so volumous, they are unworkable. I do not understand how this simply trying to put the project first is playing second fiddle to all of the other ephemera. Sport and politics (talk) 16:18, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• E.M.Gregory's comments above are just another confirmation of the big problem we have on our hands here. E.M.Gregory is a compulsive liar. E.M.Gregory has suggested they were a new, innocent "wet-behind-the-ears" editor who was attacked by a rabid policy genius. By the time of the AfD mentioned E.M.Gregory had been editing for more than six months longer than me! E.M.Gregory said they were "a new editor hit by someone who knew all the rules" - how strange then that my arguments did not succeed at the AfD and E.M.Gregory's did. I encourage everyone to read Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2012 Paros (Greece) rape. You will be astounded by the blatant, cynical and totally dishonest misrepresentation of the discussion now by E.M.Gregory. Just remember, E.M.Gregory says my editing at that AfD was "gonzo" and "baptism-by-fire" of them. All this is nothing new, though. This is a long-running pattern of editorial dishonesty, smears and mud-slinging that makes it impossible to collaborate with E.M.Gregory. AusLondonder (talk) 17:37, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• AFD Stats Just for the record, he has a 77% match rate with the close of the AFD. Just thought that should be pointed out. [49] Sir Joseph ^(talk) 19:45, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

What a foolish comment! No one is disputing E.M.Gregory is enormously successful at rigging AFDs in their favour. AusLondonder (talk) 09:21, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Ah, you must mean then that the admins are dumb? Sir Joseph ^(talk) 13:19, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Boomerang Proposal

There are now three 'Support votes for boomerang. I propose a formal boomerang and admonishment regarding future ANI complaints. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 16:00, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Sir Joseph on who and on what grounds? Carrite for writing a proposal based on the discussion? Huldra for filing a complaint based on behavior Gregory said he would improve upon but didn't? Me, because...why not? The oppose !votes are hardly from a group of neutral peers: all of them regularly take part in, or defend Gregory's actions at AFD. Of course they would oppose, he is the main advocate for their POV. And of course they would think he is reasonable in disrupting discussions and misrepresenting sources if it in the end it kept an article.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 16:34, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Eh, that's not exactly correct. I've sided with him in AfDs but haven't been gushing with support for his verbosity. You all are guilty of that, if "guilty" is the correct word as a tendency to over-post is endemic in such AfDs. What I do believe, however, is that those who oppose him in content disputes and AfDs have knives out for him, and are seeking to "criminalize" his behavior so to speak. Therefore I support a boomerang as that needs to stop. Coretheapple (talk) 17:25, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Strong Oppose Very serious concerns have been raised about E.M.Gregory's unacceptable behaviour. This includes constantly disrupting AfD's with close to 30 comments. E.M.Gregory cynically uses that tactic to overwhelm and derail a discussion to ensure they have a one-user veto on all deletion discussions. E.M.Gregory is constantly and incredibly dishonest and their comments at AfD's (and elsewhere) are misleading, deceptive and deceitful. E.M.Gregory exhibits constant battleground behaviour and a refusal to engage constructively with other editors. The level of dishonestly makes it very difficult to work with E.M.Gregory in good faith. The fact that so many editors of good standing, such as Carrite and Huldra have raised concerns suggests this "proposal" is nothing more than another shameless diversionary tactic from E.M.Gregory's fellow political warriors. AusLondonder (talk) 17:45, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• I guess if we disagree with you, we must be a political warrior? You need to AGF. It would indeed help your cause if those who support sanctions against EMG were not all of the same political ideology. As it stands now, it's just a diversion and one side of the viewpoint trying to silence a different side. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 17:55, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Your comment serves as an admission you are here to defend E.M.Gregory not on policy grounds but because he is your political ally. That is utterly shameful and violates WP:BATTLEGROUND ("Wikipedia is not a place to hold grudges, import personal conflicts, carry on ideological battles, or nurture prejudice, hatred, or fear. Making personal battles out of Wikipedia discussions goes directly against our policies and goals"). I reject your assertion that I have displayed any political biases. I don't care about E.M.Gregory's personal views, I care about the disruption of AfDs, constant blatant dishonesty and battleground behaviour. AusLondonder (talk) 18:04, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Have you not read your comments? Sir Joseph ^(talk) 18:49, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Comment. Anyone who can say the 2012 Paros beating and rape had no lasting significance in an AFD should be very, very careful about accusing anyone else of disingenuousness. Anmccaff (talk) 18:04, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for using another one of E.M.Gregory's tried-and-tested tactics, mud-slinging! How about we talk about how many comments I made at that AfD? Was it 30? AusLondonder (talk) 18:21, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

There's no mudslinging involved there; you opened an AfD on a premise that is completely, and patently untrue. Whether that is because of ignorance of the circumstances, or simple dishonesty is a question, but either suggests that it might not be Mr. Gregory who needs a little extra scrutiny here. I haven't read much of the background to this filing (yet), but if this is a typical example of what you are complaining about you need a WP:BOOMERANG, with serrated edges. Anmccaff (talk) 18:39, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

If, as you admit yourself, you haven't read much of what is above should you really be opening your mouth? And just to be clear, I didn't start this ANI thread, I purely commented on my own experiences. Your criticism of my editorial judgement at that AfD is especially ironic given E.M.Gregory is actually accusing me of being too clever and well-informed. So I am both "ignorant" and too well-informed. We are really entering fantasy-land now, aren't we? AusLondonder (talk) 19:01, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Since my writing was conditional - if this is a typical example of what you are complaining about - damn right I can. This is a blatant example of either ignorant or tendentious use of AfD, and, if it's typical of what is being discussed, then a WP:BOOMERANG is clearly in order. So, is this a typical example? Anmccaff (talk) 20:03, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose they are both good faith proposals, undertaken after multiple ANIs in an attempt of finding a resolution short of ArbCom. I'm not commenting on them, because my preference is still for an amicable way of working this out, but a boomerang would not be appropriate here. TonyBallioni (talk) 18:32, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Comment - This is a Carte Blanch proposal to prevent any complaints being made. This is a chilling effect proposal.

a formal boomerang and admonishment regarding future ANI complaints

Complaints are viewed on their merit and stating future complaints are to be admonished, is making one user untouchable and god like. This cannot be allowed. The user proposing this should themselves be admonished for such an outlandish proposal. Sport and politics (talk) 18:36, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• No, the way it works at ANI is that if you continuously bring bad faith complaints, you do indeed face a boomerang. Trying to game the system and have someone blocked or banned for being on the other side is not what ANI is for. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 18:49, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Well E.M.Gregory has pretty much become the untouchable God of Wikipedia through unrelenting battleground editing, and doesn't he know it. We may as well make it official. AusLondonder (talk) 19:03, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Why don't we save ourselves an awful lot of time and effort and just exempt E.M.Gregory from all accepted standards of behaviour now? AusLondonder (talk) 19:04, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Why are we allowing him to game AFD? Heck, it gets so bad he literally opened an AFD to write a rationale for keeping and get it on terrorism-alert list where editors who support his POV would see it. This, after I proposed a merge that was gaining support. Another "no consensus" and you wonder why. It certainly wasn't because everyone followed standard procedures.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 19:11, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Propose BOOMERANG for USER:Huldra. Although Huldra is not a frequent contributor to deletion discussions, these diffs are limited to her contributions at AfD.
• Although AfD is supposed to be a discussion, Huldra's typical iVote at a terrorism-related AfD is: "'Delete, pr nom" [50], [51] or Delete pr WP:NOTNEWS: [52]
• Huldra flings assertions that other editors are biased against Muslims: Here: "there are some editors on Wikipedia who thinks that each and every murder committed by a Muslim (the vast majority of Somalis are Muslims, after all) is notable", [53]; and here: "Delete per Malik Shabazz. Seriously; if this had´t come in the "a Muslim did something very bad"-category; who would ever have thought of making an article about it?" [54]
• She disparages the process and fellow editors with comments like, "'the usual suspects' will all vote keep" [55].
• She provides political commentary in her iVotes: [56], and here:[57] There are many of Palestinians killed, just in the last couple of weeks. Like 22-year-old Kheir Hamdan, in Galilee, or 21-year-old Mohammad Imad Jawabra . None of these are given a Wikipedia article, so why one for Almog Shiloni? Are all Jewish victims notable, while Palestinian victims are non-notable?"
• However, the great problem with Huldra at AfD is that she has starts discussions with wildly POV / BATTLEGROUND nominations:
• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Palestinian stone-throwing, Huldra's nomination statement: "This is simply a neologisms, just a collection of random sources. We could just as well have an article on Israeli child killing, Huldra
• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Georgios Tsibouktzakis, Huldra's nomination statement: '"Mr Tsibouktzakis is not known for anything, AFAIK, except his murder. Compare him with, say Bassem Abu Rahmeh of Bil'in (who was internationally known at the time of his murder), then wonder why one has a Wikipedia article, why the other one doesn't?" The AfD was a doozy. I made 58 edits, Huldra made 14, and many other editors made multiple edits and "revisited" to affirm their keep votes as the weeks went by. The tone of Huldra's edits was problematic. In response to an assertion of "ongoing attention" in sources, she wrote "Yeah...ongoing attention ...... by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel. While for Bassem Abu Rahmeh, the Israeli court conveniently looses all the evidence. Oh, and I forgot, who told us that we should be the parrots of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel?" [58]

*I propose a 3 month ban from joining AdD discussions for Huldra, who, when she comes to AfD is WP:NOTHERE but build an encyclopedia, but to score some sort of political points with BATTLEGROUND editing.E.M.Gregory (talk) 23:21, 30 October 2017 (UTC) Crossing that out, I don't edit this board often, perhaps I should just leave the diffs and let other editors weigh in.E.M.Gregory (talk) 23:54, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Strong oppose this retaliatory proposal which is largely based on Huldra calling a spade a spade. Cjhard (talk) 23:31, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comments, heh, when it quacks like a duck, walk like a duck, look like a duck, well, then I am in the terrible habit of calling it a duck. Sigh, I suppose this is heading for arb.com (And no: E.M.Gregory, that is not a threat, that is a promise.) This madness has to end. Huldra (talk) 23:48, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Huldra set up the Arbcom case and I'll gladly contribute to the evidence phase; long has this gotten out of hand. Every editor here who hasn't outright ignored Gregory's behavior -- you, me, AusLondoner, Pincrete, TonyBallinoni, Sport and Politics, etc. -- have had an immediate response from Gregory, which can be whittled down to "it's not me, it's them". I am dissappointed, but not terribly shocked, that editors ignoring the glaring evidence have tried to twist this into a disagreement over content -- it never was about that. No one here cared that Gregory disagreed with them at AFD but we are rightly concerned with an editor who misrepresents sources, bludgeons discussions, and throws a bunch of smoke in the air to taint any chance of a consensus that isn't on their exact terms.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 01:26, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose -- these were good faith proposals; they aim to address an on-going concern that has been previously discussed here. K.e.coffman (talk) 01:39, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support The strong impression left is this filing is an attempt to use ANI sanctions as a bludgeon to push a POV, although the sheer volumes of words from EMG have me hearing "the long and the short and the tall" in the back of my mind.

Very Loudly. Anmccaff (talk) 02:02, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• given that the "boomerang" proposal has no object (who is being proposed to boomerang on?) the support and oppose votes are ... baffling. This subthread is kinda ANI at its, well.... lamest. Jytdog (talk) 03:25, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

The filer, by definition. That's what a (metaphorical) boomerang does, you know, returns to the thrower...and frankly, the restriction on verbosity looks appropriate enough on some of the supporters of this filing, as well. Anmccaff (talk) 03:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Anmccaff actually in Sir Joseph's original proposal I was the subject of the proposal. So the direction of the boomerang was questionable until Gregory created a seperate proposal. A good-faith filing by Huldra, however, is hardly worth a boomerang. It's just a diversion from Gregory's behavioral issues.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 03:39, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

...but he did create it, and only withdrew, by striking, part of it, and SJ's stands. I think it has more merit than anything else proposed here, albeit not by much. A "formal boomerang" is about the filer, for reasons etymological and ontological, despite the dif you kindly provided....although that dif obviously says a great deal about how poisoned this well is. Anmccaff (talk) 03:52, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Propose BOOMERANG for User:TheGracefulSlick
• We met, best as I can recall, this past spring when she began weighing in at I/P related AfDs on terrorist attacks with accusationsof ethnic bias on the part of fellow editors "unfortunately bias exists here where any attack on a non-Arab by an Arab is considered notable" [59], (April)

• She made some hasty, ill-considered nominations such as Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2013 Paris attacks (April), but she and I agree that articles on minor news events should be deleted Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2017 Munich shooting, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2017 Avignon shooting, or redirected, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/July 2017 Petah Tikva attack. However, even in an uncontroversial deletion of such an event, TheGracefulSlick's CRUSADE to enforce her personal interpretation of NOTNEWS leads to uncollegial remarks, "Probably going to be kept because enough editors fall for sensationalism over recent events" [60].

• GracefulSlick can be a highly unreliable editor on the topic of terrorism. For example, she was disingenuous and misleading in her AfD nominaiton of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Reuven Shmerling (October, simultaneous with this discussion.) In her nomination for deletion TheGraceful Slick states: " This incident was in the news, mostly regional, for about four days because it was called suspected terrorism. However, it appears to have been a monetary dispute." [61]." This Nominating statement was posted on 18 October, and the linked article dated 6 October was from the first round of news coverage. However, by 8 October [62] the AP was reporting that "Israel’s domestic security agency says it has arrested two Palestinians suspected of killing an Israeli man found dead last week, in what it says was a 'terror attack.' " , and reports asserting that it was a "monetary dispute" has ceased. This is disingenuous BATTLEGROUND editing. Slick BLUDGEONED the page with 20 editors (no other editor came close.) There was police press gag in place, and editors were arguing that page should be kept at least until the press gag was lifted.) Here: [63] she asserts that official finding of terrorism "has no bearing on notability," here: [64]. In particular, she BLUDGEONed each editor who is an occassional at AfDs on I/P or on terrorism, and when called out for BLUGDGEONing not only here but at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tapuah Junction stabbing (2010) and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2017 Yavneh attack (2nd nomination) , responded [65] by attacking both me and the editor who had called her out.

• Some of the many AfDs that she has nominated in recent months closed as keep, some were deleted, many closed as no consensus. She appears to have begun nomination non-terrorism pages for deletion as NOTNEWS, perhaps to "prove" her point about how this guideline should be interpreted. Her nomination Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2017 Arkema plant explosion illustrates the WP:DISRUPT impact of her NOTNEWS crusade. This story about a significant event at a Houston chemical plant during Hurricane Harvey certainly looked significant to me at the time, and recent coverage upholds that view. GracefulSlick's nomination, which echoes her usual arguments for deleting terrorist attacks "Wikipedia is not news. There were -- thankfully -- no significant deaths or injuries from this incident." appears to be a WP:POINTy continuation of her NOTNEWS crusade. And, as with her other AfDs, she BLUDGEONed editors who dared disagree with her, "Ugh, what an utterly pointless comment on your part." [ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/2017_Arkema_plant_explosion&diff=799325922&oldid=799324667] ans with a typical Graceful assertion of her personal infallibility "My nomination still proves the subject is not notable for a standalone article" [66] and admonishing long time administrators like User:Bearian. Then, when User:power~enwiki closed the discussion as keep, GracefulSlick scolded him.

• WP:FORUMSHOPing

• After Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2014 Dijon attack, Graceful Slick asked User:Sandstein to revise his closing opinion, arguing that fellow editors had made "false claims on coverage and impact; worst still, participates realized this but you appear to still be giving equal weight to those arguments." [ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Sandstein&diff=806355177&oldid=806345306] and " the answer seems obvious to me. That is why I'll need to take this to DR later today unless I have broken through to you. In my experience however, I've only ever done that a handful of times with admins." [67], before taking it to Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2017 October 21.

• Forum Shop by merge discussion without and RfC: Rather than take 2017 Orly Airport attack to AfD, GracefulSlick shose to start a Merge discussion on the talk page, but stubbornly resisted suggestions form other editors that she should make the discussion an RfC. (I was reprimanded for calling it "a sort of stealth delete." [68].) As GracefulSlick BLUDGEONed her way down the page, an administrator began to lose patience with her editing style: [69], [70], [71] , finally saying "I don't consider this to be a valid or appropriate use of merging. " and "recommend(ing) one last time that you start the RfC" [72].

• Forum shopping WP:FORUMSHOP, by starting two discussions at The Village Pump [Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)[# Small addition to WP:NOTNEWS]] and Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#WP:NOTNEWS (Part II):

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#WP:NOTNEWS_.28Part_II.29 advocating changes to make it easier to delete articles on recent events.E.M.Gregory (talk) 13:19, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Closure request and forward to ArbCom

This is going absolutely nowhere. It is clear An/I is not going to sort out this issue and the only place left take this is ArbCom. The An/I needs to be able to get back to being able to functioning for its purpose, and keeping this going is preventing that from really happening. I mean the discussion has devolved into the definition of a boomerang. This shows there is no hope of finding a solution here. ArbCom, is the only place left. Sport and politics (talk) 04:04, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Forward what to ArbCom? We have a proposal to limit EMG to votes but no followup, by Huldra, which generated a great deal of heat, but no visible light: no one supported it save them.

Then we saw a proposal that EMG be limited to three comments per AFD for six months and can appeal the restriction after that time. The three comments allow him to !vote, respond to a critique of his !vote, and/or reply to another editor's !vote but it is up to him on how he will distribute his opportunities. by TGS, which saw only one comment, by JPL, Oppos[ing] any action

This was followed by TD's E.M.Gregory is hereby limited to 250 words for any nomination or initial comment relating to a nomination for deletion at AfD. In addition, E.M Gregory is limited to no more than two follow up comments to any nomination, with these follow up comments each not to exceed 50 words. This restriction to remain in effect for 12 months from the date of implementation of this sanction. — (This hopefully fixes the problem without robbing AfD of EMG's valuable participation.) which got 5 supports, 6 opposes.

The somewhat amorphous suggestions of a boomerang, on the other hand, seem to be running five to three....

Seriously, what is there to bring forward to ArbCom, aside from two schools of WP:IDLI? Anmccaff (talk) 04:29, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Support Closure and Oppose forward to ArbCom. There are clearly no consensus on anything in this discussion if someone want to file ARBCOM case it their right of course.--Shrike (talk) 07:13, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment This is likely the only course of action available to us. E.M.Gregory has a fan-club of terrorism/Israel battleground pov-pushers who recognise EMG is their most valuable asset, despite having much less experience and service than them. They know E.M.Gregory is such an important asset not because of a deep understanding of policy or because of enormous intelligence but because of the unrelenting disruption and dishonesty pursued in advancement of their shared cause. They will always go anywhere in numbers to defend EMG. But their mistake is believing Wikipedia is a popularity contest. Voting is no substitute for policy-based consensus. AusLondonder (talk) 09:20, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
  • You'd think that closing admins who frequently see E.M.Gregory at AfD (as he is a quite regular participant in several topic areas - terror included) - would be able to see through any such alleged disruption and dishonesty if it is a recurring pattern, no?Icewhiz (talk) 09:25, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
  • It's always funny how the "other side" is always the battleground pushers. AusLondonder, you do realize you are doing the same thing. Huldra, you, TGS, etc. aren't all tag-teaming here and in AFD's? But God forbid someone be against terror or pro-Israel and suddenly that's a violation of Wiki policies? Sir Joseph ^(talk) 13:22, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Katerina Kolozova

What can we do to improve it? It is not an autobiography, although my student did use my account as he doesn't have one. As you can see, there is very similar page in Macedonian dedicated to me years ago, and this one is an improvement. Yes, by my graduate student who knows me well, but this is not an autobiography and there is not biased praise. All information is ACCURATELY REFERENCED!15:12, 21 October 2017 (UTC)Kkolozova (talk)

Sorry, what is all this? Meatpuppetry? Sharing accounts? Conflicts of interest? Hello, Kkolozova, what's up? — fortunavelut luna 15:18, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't think ANI is the place for this (and you don't need to place the notice here, don't worry!)- but before it gets closed, I have to say I have trimmed your article, Katerina Kolozova, of various bloat and cruft. If you want to promote your works and career, there are better places to do this. And regardless of whther you wrote it yourself, it does come under our policy regarding living people, which is rather strict, and requires serious referencing to support all claims made. The article fails to do so. Unfortunately- contrariwise to what you have suggested above- it is not ACCURATELY REFERENCED." — fortunavelut luna 15:30, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

I have added a couple of secondary sources. — fortunavelut luna 16:10, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

I removed the ANI-notice template that OP unintentionally added to this post. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 15:29, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

I have stripped out all non-sourced information from the article as a violation of WP:PROMO. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:34, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Correct me if I'm wrong but this user's admittance of allowing their 'student' to use their account counts as as a compromised account does it not? --Tarage (talk) 20:47, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Technically yes, but in this case, there could be some good faith applied, perhaps, and advise Kkolozova that their student needs to register for account. Blackmane (talk) 23:25, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

It's certainly a compromised account if it's an admin account, and letting someone else have access to your account is no defense to vandalism or other intentionally disruptive behavior. Are you asserting that either's the case here? Ravenswing 08:05, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

They have been warned not to do so, the student(s) ha(s/ve) created their own account(s), and there is no on-going disruption. So the question is somewhat moot. — fortunavelut luna 08:29, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

BrightR

• Tulpa (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

User:BrightR doesn't want to resolve a dispute in a peaceful way. Every time a consensus is attempted, they just roll back the edits, without any proper discussion done. In their rollbacks they apply the tactic of rolling back everything to the latest revision they find acceptable, ignoring any feedback.

While some of their rollbacks might be correct, they do not want to discuss anything, rolling back attempts to remove unverified sources, grammatical and spelling errors. A few attempts were made to discuss this with a third editor, and the issue was escalated to DRN. The user ignored the rules set by mediator and rolled everything back again without any discussion made.

The ignorance and abuse user shows is in clear violation of the Wikipedia:Five pillars#WP:5P4, addressed towards several other editors, at his point. Farcaller (talk) 16:47, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

I can confirm this. I recently became interested in editing the article in question, and had all my edits reverted without explanation. They constantly argue that sources are illegitimate when they aren't, and raise WP:fringe concerns that don't exist. Even going so far as to start a dispute resolution process to prove all us other editors wrong, then declare the process failed when things don't go according to plan. Tulpabug (talk) 17:14, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Hi fellas! When making AN/I complaints, it is customary to provide diffs! Let's provide some!

• The dispute started over what I considered POV edits, spending a paragraph emphasizing tulpa practitioners' POV, giving it undue weight.
• A third opinion agreed it was undue weight.

Three (or four?) more editors joined in, adding frivolous sources and using weasel-words to make claims that are not attributable to the provided source:

• Using an undergrad paper published in a predatory journal as a source (see "Uncertain that the journal's predatory" for predatory journal info)
• Presenting an internet survey about the social composition of tulpa practitioner communities as A study on the subject of tulpas conducted in 2015 classified them as "imaginary companions who are said to have achieved full sentience after being conjured through ‘thought-form’ meditative practice". This unattributed claim is indeed quoted verbatim from the survey, however it's still unattributed and, more importantly, the survey itself is not a scientific study on the "classification" of tulpas, it's a survey of the population of some online communities, nor is the quoted material a classification or conclusion made by the study. It's simply an unattributed claim in the introduction.
• Synthesis (read more on Wakefield section)
• Using social media references for original research purposes.

And that doesn't even take into account trying to pass off a work of fiction as a non-fiction autobiography. At first I assumed good faith, but as more and more frivolous edits accumulated, it became clear that there's POV-pushing going on here. Mistaking a work of fiction for non-fiction? Could happen... Using a social network as a reference? Let's link to WP:PRIMARY and move on. Referencing a paper by an undergrad in a predatory journal? Oh well, mistakes happen... Synthesis? Let's link to WP:SYNTHESIS now... Are we done yet? No? Using weasel words to incorporate unattributed information from an online survey, and skew a paragraph or two towards the tulpa practitioners' POV? Not going to assume good faith any more, this is POV-pushing. Bright☀ 19:10, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

And, specifically addressing Tulpabug's complaints (for which they didn't provide diffs!), the dispute resolution failed because, while it was still going on, the editors reintroduced the references to social media and misattributed claims with weasel words. From the closing comment:

Closed as failed. Participation here is voluntary, and if an editor says that it has failed, it has failed. Resume discussion at the article talk page. Do not edit-war. Do not use unreliable sources such as Reddit and blogs. If discussion at the article talk page is inconclusive, the editors may make one more try at compromise via a request for formal moderation with a more experienced moderator, or may bring any specific issue to the reliable source noticeboard or the neutral point of view noticeboard. Disruptive editing may be reported at WP:ANI or the edit-warring noticeboard, but that will eliminate any possibility of friendly or neutral resolution. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:25, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Note that the closer specifically asked not to use social media as sources. When using them as sources failed, one of the editors decided to add them as external links instead. This might be a good place to note that external links are excluded by default, and that the article had issues before with repeated attempts to insert external links to tulpa websites... Bright☀ 19:20, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

As an added bonus, I'm being told there's consensus to add external links a few seconds after removing them and asking for consensus to be formed... all the while a POV dispute relating to these very links is going on and even being discussed on AN/I. Bright☀ 19:32, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Almost forgot! I was accused of "shaming a murder victim" because I wrote Must be hard to review "scientific" papers posthumously. Bright☀ 19:52, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

On prompting by BrightR, I went to the history page only to find the diffs buried behind another literal massive edit war with a fourth editor. There are so many revisions. Edit: format error, sorry. Tulpabug (talk) 20:43, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

• Farcaller and Tulpabug, you need to provide WP:DIFFs to prove your assertions. otherwise this ANI report is going nowhere. You haven't even linked or even named the article(s) in question. Softlavender (talk) 21:22, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, got sidetracked. I've never done this before. Lots of reading. I'm not the primary editor in this dispute, so I am not familiar with the vast history of POV conflict being engaged here. This: [73]] is the one which took out all my edits, and also several discreet edits by Farcaller. The edit reason is also offensive. article: Tulpa Tulpabug (talk) 22:13, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm going to respond to some of what BrightR wrote, as it was presented out of order. First, The moderator of the dispute resolution told us to edit the article. He made a special exemption, saying we should edit boldly, to fix the deficiencies in the article. But explicitly forbade pure reverts. Second, we did so, believing that we were told to do so. Third BrightR did a pure revert, with a rude edit message. Fourth, BrightR declared the dispute resolution a failure. Fifth, the dispute resolution was closed. Tulpabug (talk) 23:54, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

There was a DRN case at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard#Talk:Tulpa#Usage of references to reddit and social networks which was closed by the moderator as Failed at 16:25 on 22 October. Since that time it appears that User:Seteleechete has been edit warring to add an external link to reddit.com and a link to tulpa.io. It may be time to apply full protection to Tulpa, since people are not waiting for consensus on Talk. EdJohnston (talk) 04:47, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

The moderator suggested bold editing, to which I responded This will bias the edits completely in the direction of unreliable sources. The mediation has failed. Same when one mediator suggested incorporating the social media sites in external links; consensus should be formed on whether the external links should be added. A suggestion is not the same as a blanket approval, just like not disqualifying a source by WP:PRIMARY doesn't automatically qualify it for inclusion in the article. As for the edit reason being "offensive", it's in bad faith to incorporate disputed material in the middle of a dispute. Stop and wait for a resolution. Bright☀ 08:00, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

I seriously advise you to read things more carefully. Why can't you just follow the rules? The article is being choked to death. I wish everyone would just take a break. Tulpabug (talk) 09:12, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

I reverted synthesis, original research, claims sourced to predatory journals and social media, and POV-pushing. I discuss and cite the relevant policies. Then I get accused that I "never commented on" those changes or that I'm "shaming a murder victim"; the person who added a work of fiction as a biography is accusing me of removing material "without making any proper research themselves"... An IP-address-editor claiming to be you tried to justify using an undergrad paper published in a predatory journal. Seems like I'm playing whack-a-mole; whenever one frivolous source is removed, another is added. When one policy is explained, another is tested. Bright☀ 09:28, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

My concern rises up from the following issue: the user in question tends to rollback edits disregarding any reasoning on them. E.g. this edit rolled back the change to the first paragraph, that BrightR commented on as being unfit, but also, rolled back other edits that BrightR never comments on: this edit by Tulpabug (no comment was ever given), this edit by myself (previously removed by BrightR as irrelevant, after their editing removed the actual citation), this edit by myself (after thorough discussion in the Talk page and quoting the exact parts of the cited article to show it's irrelevant, and bringing this issue up to DRN, BrightR keeps reverting this edit with no comments), this edit by Tulpabug (again, never commented on). It is impossible to discuss anything with said user as they choose to reply to only those parts of the statements they like, if though I made specific attempt to raise these issues in dedicated sections of talk page.

Another example of blanket rollback can be seen here, including statements coming from a research paper, typographical fixes.

My overall concern with this user is that while they are fast to blame other editors (including myself) in the POV-pushing, their actions fall under the exact same concern. All the recent reverts were done without any proper discussion done in the talk page, and were pushing the article back to the state which they only find acceptable; rolling back not only attempts to add new content (which is discussable), but rolling back existing statements that do not belong to the article, without making any proper research themselves. Farcaller (talk) 08:36, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

There were reasons given, and the talk page is littered with them:

• Wakefield was removed because of WP:SYNTHESIS, see talk page. Seems incredibly in-bad-faith to claim I "never commented on" that.
• Dalai Lama was also discussed on the talk page, you sure I "never commented on" it? You were part of both discussions; the information is sourced, but, as I said in the talk page you take the words sprul-pa and tulku, which three sources in the article say were translated into "tulpa", and you refuse to acknowledge this. Note that the synthesis isn't done by me, it's by a reliable source cited in the article.
• Moving on, this is unsourced information. See "Original research and POV". Just because that particular piece of unsourced information was never discussed doesn't mean it's inappropriate to remove it. In fact it's the opposite; it's inappropriate to include it. The rest of the edit was exactly the kind of POV that's under discussion, and you should wait for the discussion to conclude.
• Isler is not a reliable source. Discussed on the talk page again and again. It's a paper by an undergrad published in a predatory journal.

So what are we left with? "blanket rollback" of "typographical fixes" that were reverted in the course of removing the Isler paper? I apologize your typographical fixes were removed, however did you notice the large amount of discussion about each and every revert? Your claim that I rollback edits disregarding any reasoning seems to be in very bad faith. Continuing to pursue these changes while they're under discussion is a huge problem. Bright☀ 09:07, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Look, the issue is not that they weren't discussed. The issue is that the discussions were post-hoc, which is in violation of general guidelines, and you are actively barring us from reimplementing changes to the article that you are unable to give sufficient reason for excluding within those discussions. One editor against several, and somehow the one is getting control of how the article looks and stays. That's the definition of disruptive editing. Tulpabug (talk) 10:04, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Look, the issue is not that they weren't discussed don't speak for Farcaller, he just said "All the recent reverts were done without any proper discussion done in the talk page." The issue is that the discussions were post-hoc That cuts both ways. You are suggesting that you should have discussed the changes before implementing them. In that case, see WP:BURDEN, the onus for consensus is on including disputed content. you are unable to give sufficient reason For which one? The Isler source? The synthesis? The Dalai Lama? The POV which was agreed on by a third party? The "typographical fixes" which are extremely minor and irrelevant to this discussion? One editor against several - see WP:LOCALCONSENSUS. Just because the three (four?) of you agree that the Isler paper is fine and dandy, doesn't mean your consensus overrides Wikipedia policy. Additionally no such consensus was reached because you were quick to make bold edits while the mediation process was still going on! Same with the external links, as soon as someone merely suggested they're okay, someone else claimed consensus and pushed them back in the article.

If you want consensus, please wait for the consensus process to be over, before making further changes to the article. Bright☀ 10:17, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't understand why the content is disputed. I removed disputed content with the edit you used as an example because it is a controversial claim considered offensive by some and I couldn't keep staring at it in the introductory paragraph. I replaced the controversial claim with a more generic statement. This generic statement contained no controversial claims at all, consisting of generally known facts about the tulpamancy community. I was rather careful to include no extraordinary claims at all. So you removed no disputed content when you did that revert. I can cite all sorts of documents that support the claims made there, because practically all of them state the same thing. Trigger happy editing kills articles. You should have added a citation needed tag if you thought the statement needed support. (edit: oops forgot signature) Tulpabug (talk) 10:45, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Finally we are getting to specifics. I take it you mean this edit? (Please supply diffs so I can know exactly what you're talking about.) The claim Parallels can be found in the related concepts of spirit possession and multiplicity (psychology) is original research; the other information is exactly the disputed POV information which was removed previously from further down the article. Both were removed, discussed, and before any consensus could be formed you reintroduced them, worded slightly differently. Local consensus cannot "validate" the quoted original research. Broader consensus might suggest the rest is not undue weight, but for the time being, in the middle of a POV/undue-weight dispute, it's in bad faith to restore disputed material. Bright☀ 11:10, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Unrelated, but I do agree with the original research. The tulpa phenomenon shares much with automatic writing or spirit possession, but this cannot be incorporated into the article without a reliable source. Bright☀ 11:22, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

You are very hard to argue with. I give you credit, you are a good debater. I was worried about that part, yes. Those are generally accepted claims, but not in most of the sources. I take it back. The earlier sentences were the ones I was confident about. As to the earlier sentences, are you seriously saying that you believe that modern tulpamancers have not formed an internet subculture, the concept has not evolved considerably over time, and that modern practitioners tend to spiritual interpretations of the phenomenon?

Anyhow, I know how the administrators like rules. So I'll just list a blatant rules violation:

"19:29, 22 October 2017‎ BrightR (talk | contribs)‎ . . (13,625 bytes) (-111)‎ . . (Undid revision 806551313",

"19:25, 22 October 2017‎ BrightR (talk | contribs)‎ . . (13,625 bytes) (-111)‎ . . (Undid revision 806550859",

"18:43, 22 October 2017‎ BrightR (talk | contribs)‎ . . (13,625 bytes) (-111)‎ . . (Undid revision 806536404",

"10:26, 22 October 2017‎ BrightR (talk | contribs)‎ . . (13,536 bytes) (-3,343)‎ . . (reverting bad faith edits."

This fall foul of the three reverts rule. Tulpabug (talk) 12:18, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

are you seriously saying that you believe No. I'm saying that the article is in a POV dispute and making bold edits while the issue is being discussed is in bad faith, the same way it's bad faith for reporting me for WP:3RR for reverting the bold edits that were made during the dispute resolution process. Bright☀ 13:31, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

What. WP:AssumeGoodFaith Tulpabug (talk) 16:52, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

I did. You can see that Farcaller and I were getting along fine despite his unusual edits like treating a work of fiction as non-fiction and using reddit.com and tulpa.io for their original research (twice). After these misapplications and misrepresentations of references, Seteleechete expanded the article in a way that I thought was WP:UNDUE. A third opinion agreed that it's undue weight. After that, when the POV editing and bad-source referencing continued—in particular, CliffracerX and yourself saying I'm "shaming a murder victim" and arguing for the Isler paper despite links showing that the journal is predatory (and Isler being an undergrad); Farcaller introducing their own synthesis; the reintroduction of the POV that was recently found by the third opinion to be WP:UNDUE; and the use of weasel words—I sought mediation, and while both sides were participating in mediation, you and Farcaller reintroduced the bold edits; it's considered in bad faith to restore disputed content while dispute resolution is in progress. Were these all innocent mistakes and misunderstandings? I don't think so. Bright☀ 06:23, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

It also appears that Farcaller's edits were reverted for using self-published sources and social media posts as a reference even before I explained to them that such self-published works cannot be used as a source for those claims. So Farcaller used self-published sources, were reverted by Jeraphine Gryphon with "needs more legit sources", "self-published book", "WP:OR"; Farcaller used self-published sources again, they were reverted and had the issue explained to them in the talk page; Farcaller used self-published sources again, and restored their synthesis, while dispute resolution was in progress. Hardly good-faith edits.

Regardless, I didn't think any of that merits a discussion on AN/I. When mediation failed, I suggested reliable source noticeboard or the neutral point of view noticeboard, because the issue is of reliable sources and undue weight:

• The reddit tulpa sex survey cannot be used as a source
• The reddit tulpa FAQ or tulpa.io FAQ cannot be used as a source
• Isler cannot be used as a source (undergrad paper published in predatory journal)
• Synthesis of several sources cannot be used to make claims that do not appear in the sources
• Weasel words cannot be used to attribute unsourced statements from Veissière's study to the study itself, nor present them as conclusions or assertions made by the study
• Examples in popular culture need sources that discuss why that particular example is important
• Obviously, a work of fiction cannot be referenced as non-fiction
• The article in its current state cannot emphasize any further the tulpa practitioners' view on tulpas. When the article is expanded with more reliable sources, the POV of tulpa practitioners can be expanded upon.

That last point should be discussed on the NPOV noticeboard; the other points really don't need to be discussed, but could, on the RS noticeboard.

Outside of that, there's a dispute on the proper translation of "tulpa" and a wish to split the article on that basis, as well as the removal of reliable sources that connect the concepts in order to support the split. From Mikles, which is cited in the article: Nawang Thokmey, archivist for the University of Virginia Tibetan manuscript collection, elaborated on the equivalence of sprul pa and sprul sku, confirming that both words indicate an enlightened being’s manifestation. While the modern usage of "tulpa" is distinct from the Buddhist usage, in the Buddhist usage there is no distinction between "tulku", "sprul pa", or "nirmanakaya" and they are more or less interchangeable. There are other sources that equivocate those terms with the phrase "emenation body", all of which were translated as "tulpa" by theosophists. The Wikipedia article does not claim that the Dalai Lama is a tulpa in the modern sense, only in the Buddhist sense, and the word "tulpa" was removed at Farcaller's insistence despite being used in that context in a reliable source. It's true that "tulpa" is mostly used in the West while Buddhists use "sprul pa" or "tulku", but that is a semantic difference which is explained in the sources.

These disputes all lead to the same POV, and several of them lead to the reddit tulpa forum (sex survey, FAQ, Isler). The rush to reintroduce them, while the dispute resolution process is ongoing, is suspect. Bright☀ 08:46, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

Suggest closure as a content dispute, off-topic for this board. Or, if we insist on discussing user conduct, I think the discussion should focus on the users pushing suspect sources, not on BrightR's good work keeping such sources out of the encyclopedia. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:29, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

It's definitely not a content dispute. I feel BrightR is making it look like a content dispute through guiding the conversation. However: Suggest closure with no action taken. I believe that Farcaller has taken a vacation from the wiki due to stress, as he told me he wanted to. And I cannot provide strong evidence of wrongdoing. Tulpabug (talk) 17:48, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

Comment. While this stems from a content dispute, the initial complaint by Farcaller is: "User:BrightR doesn't want to resolve a dispute in a peaceful way." Farcaller also complains of:

2) "roll[ing] back the edits without any proper discussion done";

3) "they do not want to discuss anything";

4) "The user ignored the rules set by mediator" (at DRN);

5) "ignorance and abuse"; and

6) "in clear violation of the Wikipedia:Five pillars#WP:5P4".

To which complaint user Tulpabug immediately chimed in with "I can confirm this", and an additional complaint that BrightR was trying "to prove all us other editors wrong".

What is here is not a content dispute, but matters of behavior. And it gets deeper. E.g., Farcaller says the "clear violation" of civility was "addressed towards several other editors." Which, on its face, suggests that the issue is about a single misbehaving editor versus all the other editors. But take a closer look at Tulpabug (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). That account was created two days after the DRN was opened; it appears to be either a sockpuppet or a meatpuppet. CliffracerX (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (involved at the DRN) is odd, and though activated two days before the DRN opened, it seems very similar to Tulpabug, and indeed, even Farcaller. All three of those users are effectively single-user accounts (on Tulpa, the DRN, and here). A closer look is very much in order. And action should be taken: to deter bad behavior. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 07:27, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

I've got pulled in back in this discussion after being quoted the above statement. As for the original issue we are discussing here, I feel I don't care anymore. I have good faith in that the sources and references that I've provided for the article do have enough credibility to be quoted. I also believe that sources BrightR is using are inappropriate. For one, his quote above saying that "tulpa" and "tulku" are effectively a same thing goes against the primary historical source of the article itself, also "tulku" article has a different definition and is, overall, sourced properly. Still, I don't feel like discussing a neutral point if all my edits are being reverted with no discussion and discussion is sidetracked. I still think that BrightR oversteps his authority in an attempt to enforce their own POV.

As for Tulpabug being a sockpuppet of myself, I won't even discuss that point; while I can confirm that I have discussed the edits with Tulpabug off the wikipedia, I did the same with a bunch of other wiki editors I know. I won't comment on their involvement more than stating that I think it was incorrect and abusive for BrightR to revert simple contextual edits they made to the article in question. Farcaller (talk) 08:15, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

If you had truly quit this discussion then you should have said so, struck your complaint(s), and perhaps apologized for wasting everyone's time. (If you're feeling stressed, as your buddy Tulpabug has related, then perhaps you can feel for BrightR, who has been very patiently dealing with your pettifoggery.) As it is, slinking away when the light is shined on you does not get you a pass on your own behavior, or your associate's. You accused another editor of violating incivility, which is itself incivility.

The timing of Tulpabug's appearance (just after the DNR started) and behavior and pov (mirroring your own) certainly suggests sockpuppetry. While I would accept your denial of that – which, curiously, you have not done – your self-admitted communication with Tulpabug establishes a case for meatpuppetry. That (and other points) shows that you are not here with "clean hands", and all of your comments (here, at the DRN, and on Talk) are thereby questionable. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:52, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

Oh, I was commented on. I was thinking the same thing. My timing of showing up was odd looking. However, I actually showed up a few days before, rather than after the DRN. The claim of sock puppetry is incorrect. However, the claim of meat puppetry actually is not necessarily false. (full disclosure) Some of us shared an offsite chat together, though, I would not call Farcaller's complaining a breach of the canvassing rules. I usually edit anonymously, but it seemed inappropriate as I was invidted to a dispute resolution process.

After having had several days to reflect on this situation, I actually want to retract everything I said about BrightR. I can totally accept that the minor breaches of guidelines were the result of aggravation more than anything else. Sorry. Tulpabug (talk) 00:13, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

It would greatly clarify matters if you would strike through (not delete!) everything you are retracting. And perhaps add a short explanatory note at the top of this discussion so that anyone reviewing this can see at the start how matters now stand. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 02:27, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't think I wasted anyone's time, because I still stand by my claim that BrightR's behavior is incorrect. Yet, as they noted, ANI might not be the best place for this particular dispute (I'm not used to sorting out WP dispute politics).

That said, I think I won't interact with BrightR much outside of the scope of one particular article, and I don't have any incentive to work on said article anymore. I hope we won't get into another edit war soon.

"all of your comments are thereby questionable" I stay behind all the points I made here, on DRN, and Talk pages. While I've been discussing this issue with a wider community, I'm not going to take the blame for other people (and definitely not brigading). If you look through the talk page, you can see that I did everything possible to discuss all the raised concerns in a calm and distinct manner, although later BrightR accused me of stalling things due to spreading discussion to numerous sections. I don't believe that it's correct behavior on BrightR side, but that point was already discussed as part of DRN.

"which, curiously, you have not done". I need to note that explicitly? Yes, I don't own Tulpabug's account. Farcaller (talk) 07:43, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes. When there is reasonable showing of a possible problem you do need to address it explicitly. Otherwise there is a distinct sense of trying to avoid the point, which is (at the least) in indication of an unwillingness to resolve the matter.

I do not see that you "did everything possible" to resolve this matter. While the talk page interactions seem (to me at least) fairly calm, the real issue was in the article edit-warring. And here you missed a really important option: just stop. Yes, it is really difficult to let stand what you think are bad edits (and for as little as I know, perhaps they really were "bad" edits), but there is pretty much nothing done in article space that can't be undone. Reverting others' edits just raises the temperature, impairing discussion and delaying resolution. As to "spreading discussion to numerous sections", that is a common problem (even with experienced editors), so BrightR's request that you not do that is quite reasonable (not "incorrect"). And you are pretty thin-skinned to take offense at that.

However, what brings me here is, first, your initial statement that "User:BrightR doesn't want to resolve a dispute in a peaceful way." I find it hard to believe that you actually know what BrightR (or any other editor) really wants. That is your interpretation of his behavior. Likewise with "ignorance and abuse" and "clear violation": you provided no basis for these characterizations. (And likewise for Tulpabug's imputation of trying to "prove all us other editors wrong".) Your assertion of bad behavior or hurt feelings carries very little weight. You need to show (as BrightR kindly demonstrated) actual statements or behavior.

Second, some of your statements here are, well, let's just call them unfortunate. (E.g.: accusing others of a "clear violation" of civility without providing evidence of same, which is itself uncivil.) And of course there is the apparent meatpuppetry, though perhaps this has been mitigated.

You say you are "not used" to this. Yes, that is evident. Perhaps the best outcome for all of this is for you to recognize your inexperience in Wikipedia process and standards, and be less quick to assume you have the right end of the stick. And certainly not blame others for your own missteps.

Interacting with BrightR might actually be good, but only if you are less confrontational, and willing to try embracing what he is trying to tell you. Alternately, you might look for mentoring on how to resolve these kinds of matters. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:12, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

For whatever it's worth, late as this post is, I've had this account for about a year, maybe a year and a half at this point, but never used it until recently. I'd been watching the debate between Farcaller & BrightR on how best to handle the article for a while before stepping in, as I'm hoping to see it improved for the average reader - e.g, someone who just wants to know what Modern Tulpas are so they have some idea what, say, a close friend has suddenly started going on about. I believe it's already been stated, but Tulpabug was the IP editor in the discussion, they just made an account when BrightR added them to the Dispute Resolution.

While most of my accusations about BrightR's 4th-pillar violations fall apart if, indeed, his violations were a side-effect of frustration (which has clearly been common in this dispute anyway), I will stand by my accusation that he's not acted in good faith on several occasions.

On at least one occasion, he's seemingly pivoted away from legitimate arguments raised against him; for proof, I'd point to this talk page section, in which Farcaller raises a legitimate concern that BrightR seems to have fabricated a research author's name, and BrightR pivots to accusing Farcaller of using "weasel words", which, far as I can tell, doesn't nullify the argument leveled against him. On another occasion, when I raised concerns about his generally-disrespectful attitude towards Farcaller & co, alongside a few others about his arguments against their edits, he didn't acknowledge his behavioral problems, only defended his arguments.

Furthermore, I will also stand by my accusation that BrightR has not been pushing a neutral point of view, but a "scientific" PoV that he uses to discredit the community, which is...insidious, to say the least. Unfortunately, that same science-centric PoV is shared by a majority of Wikipedians, so it might appear to legitimately be neutral to many of them - I hate to admit it, but if I were a new guy on the sidelines who had no idea what was going on, I'd have probably sided with him, as he does a really good job of LOOKING neutral, even if he's not.

On that note, I'm done reiterating my arguments - I would rather not try and continue participating in this dispute, because, frankly, it's exhausting, and it took me over two days just to find a good time/place/way to respond to the apparent request for comment - I don't wanna deal with this any more, on that front, BrightR wins. My final case is this: Wikipedia disputes are not binary; even though BrightR's arguments against the article/editors are legitimate, it does not automatically nullify arguments leveled against him - if you want to "take action to deter bad behaviour", then you may need to figure out something for BrightR, too. — Preceding unsigned comment added by CliffracerX (talk • contribs) 09:09, October 28, 2017 (UTC)

• fabricated a research author's name I got the name wrong and fixed it as soon as it was pointed out to me. This is about on par with my "blanket rollback" of "typographical fixes". What is with these accusations?
• pivots There was no pivot; Farcaller said I was "trying to nitpick on [their] grammar". I explained that attributing an unattributed statement to a "classification" in a "study" is weasel-words.
• generally-disrespectful attitude I extended a lot of good will. Note, for example, how another editor reverted with "needs more legit sources", "self-published book", and "WP:OR". They didn't bother discussing anything because these reverts should be uncontroversial and obvious. On the other hand, I went to the trouble to explain every revert in the talk page.
• discredit the community I'm not discrediting the community, I'm discrediting the sources you provided. They cannot be used to make those claims on Wikipedia. With that in mind, having a paragraph or three on the community's view on tulpas amounts to WP:UNDUE in the article's current state.

This is all unrelated to whether tulpas are neurological, spiritual, iatrogenic, an exercise in creative writing, or internet mass hysteria. Bright☀ 13:19, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Alright, it's on me for not digging deep enough to see that you did fix your mistake - I'll admit I was too quick on the draw for that. Frankly, I'd have still put something in the talk page response for clarification (e.g, "thanks for letting me know, I've fixed it") before targeting Farcaller's issues - without it, it does legitimately read as though you ignored the problems raised, and pivoted straight to accusations of the problem-raiser.

I wasn't referring to your willingness to discuss edits (which you do, thankfully), but rather the tone in which you explained those edits. "sigh. I'll say it again because you missed it the first time" is, simply put, rude. However, I'm willing to let it go now, as I'll take your "too annoyed to edit civilly" response on good faith. At the time, however, it was something I was concerned about, and when I confronted you about it, you did choose not to discuss it - which seemed suspiciously like a pivot.

All that being said, I'm willing to drop my accusations of pivots; there's more info that got buried, and having seen it, I'm willing to let go of the topic, as...frankly, some of it can probably just be traced to blindness on my part, and the general overload of emotions tied up in the topic.

Moving onwards, your actions do seem to suggest wanting to discredit the community (e.g, "Tulpas are a form of imaginary friend"), even if that's not actually your intention. As it stands right now, there's only one sentence I can see with user-friendly info in the entire section; it's currently almost all information on the history of the concept, and on Vessiere's paper, which, while useful, isn't terribly informative to the average reader.

Unfortunately, most editors seem to fall in the "it's mass hysteria" category, likely due to the strong western stigma against plurality at large, and because of it, the acceptable NPoV for the article seems to lean towards "they're just imaginary friends for adults".

All of that being said, I suppose I'm willing to drop the POV issue as well, because it's probably not appropriate for the admin noticeboard; what is or is not neutral is subjective, a matter of opinion, and the admins really don't need to be a part of that. CliffracerX (talk) 21:46, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

In your last paragraph you have grasped a key aspect of all this: in the end POV is (nearly always) subjective. Which is not to say it can't be resolved, but it takes a more nuanced approach than bashing one another with "facts". And to the extent that the issues at Tulpa are about content (including POV aspects), you are right: not an appropriate topic for this noticeboard.

I think what brought Farcaller here was his frustration boiling over. And I think that the frustration all of you have felt arises from not knowing how to handle conflict. That the three of you have closely aligned and self-reinforcing views practically guarantees a conflict with any differing POV. That the three of you are basically inexperienced and unskilled in the standards and ways of Wikipedia only makes it harder, for yourselves and for the rest of us, to resolve this. All three of you might consider that you are not wholly aware of how frustrating, and even exasperating, your behavior is for more experienced editors. (We've seen too much of it.) This is why I recommend mentoring – it's the quickest way of moving past the kind of stuff you will later find embarassing.

If Farcaller would allow that he may have over-reacted (with regrets), and perhaps Tulpabug would strike-through what he has retracted, I think we could close this as an unfortunate but forgiveable incident. And perhaps you all could strive to be little more accomodating, even forgiving, in working these matters out at Talk:Tupa? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:59, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I would prefer broadening discussion to reliable source noticeboard or the neutral point of view noticeboard where other editors can explain, for example, why a self-published survey is not a reliable source, or why focusing on how the tulpa community perceives tulpas is WP:UNDUE with the current state of the article. Compare "demonic possession § In the Christian Bible" which I edited: before and after. A demonologist might claim I'm POVing the article and removing the demonologists' perspective. What I see is removing excessive reliance on primary sources, and separating the original research from the information found in the sources. Bright☀ 09:31, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

More discussion about RS and NPOV is certainly needed, but not, I think, at the level requiring intervention of administrators. (Unless things get out of hand.) I believe the problems (and frustration) here arise from your colleauges blundering about because they are unfamiliar with the principles, standards, process, etc., for which mentoring would be more suitable. To immerse them in a NPOV contest when they don't know the "rules" (like how to use diffs) would be rather unfair (and from their pov, particularly unfair when they can't get satisfaction), and waste a lot of time chasing all over the landscape. By all means continue a discussion, but: not here, and not on the noticeboards. (I suggest Talk:Tulpa, as the substance of your differences is, mostly, related to content.)

And find someone willing to be present as a moderator. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:43, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

@Tulpabug: you said that you want "to retract everything I said about BrightR." Actually doing so would help resolve this incident, so once again I suggest: "strike-through" all of the comments you want to retract. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:49, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

User RAF910

To the administrator, If you agree, could you please apply the appropriate sanctions to user RAF910 for what I consider non-collaboration, incivility, personal attacks, harassment, supposition and aspersions.

I requested the user assume good faith, stated to the user twice, I consider the user's statements personal attacks and harassments, but they continued.

Thank you, CuriousMind01 (talk) 00:50, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Difference files showing the user statements, please click on the link then read the right side.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Automobiles&diff=next&oldid=741118844

"I given you my answer, if you don't like, then find something else to do with your free time".--RAF910 (talk) 14:09, 25 September 2016 (UTC)"

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Ruger_Mini-14&diff=next&oldid=741209444

"I given you my answer, if you don't like, then find something else to do with your free time" RAF910|talk]]) 16:19, 25 September 2016 (UTC)"

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Ruger_Mini-14&diff=next&oldid=742239645

"Who knows, like a Pokémon Go player, maybe you just got caught or carried away in the moment and you don't realize that you've crossed the line."--RAF910|talk 14:38, 2 October 2016 (UTC)"

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Ruger_Mini-14&diff=next&oldid=742344735

my error, a repeat

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Firearms&diff=prev&oldid=792120156

… "CuriousMind01 has a habit of endlessly arguing his position, Wikilawyering and ignoring consensus that opposes his position. So, it will most likely be reverted again." RAF910|talk 17:48, 18 July 2017 (UTC)

"As predicted Curiousmind is ignoring consensus and reverted the changes to the Bushmaster XM15 page, as well as the SIG MCX. He clearly does not care what any of us think, and is pretending that this discussion where an overwhelming majority of his fellow editors disagree with him is meaningless. And as usual, he is trying to intimidate anyone who opposes him by accusing them "personal attack and harassment." " RAF910 Revision as of 11:55, 24 July 2017

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Firearms&diff=prev&oldid=804529223

"CuriousMind01 attempting the change the rules in order to override consensus at the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council page

My fellow editors CuriousMind01 is at it again this time at the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council page, where he is attempting the change the rules in order to override consensus and make the Wikipedia:WikiProject Firearms meaningless. So that he can add "Criminal use" sections to as many firearm pages as he can get away with. I encourage my fellow editor to comment there" --RAF910|talk) 16:24, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Council&diff=next&oldid=804562757

"*OPPOSE CuriousMind01 is a tenacious edit warrior obsessed with adding "Criminal use" sections to firearm articles despite massive opposition. About two months ago he lost a discussion on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Firearms by a 10 to 1 margin. Unfortunately, he has a win at all cost mentality. So, now in typical fashion he's ignoring consensus, forum shopping, wikilawyering, and gaming the system. He even attempted to unilaterally make this change himself, because he believes that silence equals consensus. He will most likely accuse me of personal attacks and harassment again for daring oppose him and pointing at his questionable behavior, a normal intimidation tactic of his. I will inform my fellow Wikipedia:WikiProject Firearms members that he attempting to override consensus and make the Project meaningless." --RAF910 (talk) 16:13, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

Another editor comment to the above:

Please don't inject personality-based criticism and supposition/prediction; it's not helpful... See WP:ASPERSIONS. …. SMcCandlish 9 October 2017 (UTC)

User notified https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:RAF910&diff=prev&oldid=806595798 CuriousMind01 (talk) 00:52, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

• Most of these are a year old. I don't see harassment or personal attacks. I'm curious to hear if RAF910 has anything to offer here. Drmies (talk) 02:09, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Drmies, could you please see recheck, I showed the text below the above links, which I consider rudeness and false aspersions: like obsession, edit warring, ignoring consensus, wikilayering,forum shopping, etc. The statements are all in the past 13 months. Please allow me several days to respond to the comments below. Many result from levels of consensus and local consensus does not override community consensus. (sorry, add the text lost the numbering) Thank you.CuriousMind01 (talk) 14:55, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Oh...I forgot to mention that he is incredibly argumentative and constantly Wikilawyering. See above statement.--RAF910 (talk) 16:28, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

This is nothing more than a case of sour grapes. CuriousMind01 is obsessed with adding "Criminal use" sections to Firearms articles, against massive opposition. He is also very upset that I’ve pointed out that he ignoring consensus and that he is continuously forum shopping.

His most recent activity’s, started in July of this year, when he lost a discussion on the “Criminal use” topic at the WikiProject firearms talk page by a 10 to 1 margin. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Firearms&oldid=803378307

On August 15th, he started forum shopping at the WikiProject council talk page with this edit https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AWikiProject_Council&type=revision&diff=795679904&oldid=793877524. His intention is to overturn the 10 to 1 consensus against him on the WikiProject firearms talk page.

However, nobody thought enough about it to even respond. So, on September 27th he unilaterally made the change himself, with this edit, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:WikiProject_Council/Guide&diff=prev&oldid=802568241 which I reverted.

On October 9th he continued forum shopping and started a new and separate RFC discussion at the WikiProject council talk page on the very same subject. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AWikiProject_Council&type=revision&diff=804434393&oldid=803706627

He also went forum shopping at the Wikipedia Village pump page with this edit. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)&diff=prev&oldid=804435002

Please note, that he is currently losing the RFC discussion at the WikiProject council talk page, again by a 10 to 1 margin.

I am not the only one to question his behavior. Other editors, have also pointed out that CuriousMind01 is ignoring consensus and forum shopping at the WikiProject council talk page discussion.

• ”Oppose this end run around the consensus at the project. Niteshift36 (talk) 17:51, 10 October 2017 (UTC)”
• ”Oppose This is a perfect example of forum shopping. What’s next an appeal to Jimbo? --Limpscash (talk) 04:16, 19 October 2017 (UTC)”

CuriousMind01 has an a agenda. If he cannot respect two separate discussions, with 10 to 1 consensuses against him, then he doesn’t belong here. Therefore, I recommend that he be indefinitely blocked. If not, he will waste more of our time on another page.--RAF910 (talk) 13:57, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

• RAF, this is helpful (though please use fewer paragraphs), but we need more, from more editors, to issue a block per NOTHERE or whatever. Drmies (talk) 15:13, 23 October 2017 (UTC)
• CuriousMinds has battled this issue of including criminal use many times, refusing to accept consensus. Like this RfC result (which had quite a few participants) [74], then again in another discussion at the same article [75]. Continually forum shopping. Niteshift36 (talk) 18:57, 23 October

• If you review User:CuriousMind01 edit history, he seems obsessed with adding "Criminal use" sections to Firearms, Automotive, and other articles. As other editors have noted, he is a very aggressive editor and will endlessly argue his position against overwhelming consensus. I agree with RAF, that he is ignoring consensus and WP:Forum shopping. He is also WP:edit-warring on the Bushmaster XM15 article, with these edits [76][77][78]. He is also Wikilawyering with these edits [79][80], where he basically claims that his fellow editors cannot make changes to the Bushmaster XM15 article. In essence, that he is right and everybody else is wrong. He has launched personal attack with this edit [81]. My experience with User:CuriousMind01 left such a bad taste in my mouth that I stopped editing. Please see "Advice" discussion [82] at User talk:AmaryllisGardener. I also recommend that he be indefinitely blocked.--Limpscash (talk) 03:59, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

Drmies in brief response: I think the comments above may originate from users not knowing some Wikipedia rules.

Like the Recent Example cited above: WikiProjects Firearm project took an internal vote to remove criminal use from gun articles then amended their advice page. I voted no as a violation of WP:NPOV. Then users RAF910 and Limpscash twice tried to delete community/RFC consensus, criminal use text from 2 articles 1, 2, which I and another editor twice restored, trying to explain in edit summaries and project that "local consensus" is not binding.

Having seen wikiprojects incorrectly try to impose their criteria on articles, I thought it would be helpful to add an additional criteria educational example to the Wikiproject "such as" examples, not a rule change. Using proper WP steps, talk page, be bold, RFC, commenters explained my example was not needed, because wikiproject rules already exist, like:

• “WikiProjects are not rule-making organizations, nor can they assert ownership of articles within a specific topic area. WikiProjects have no special rights or privileges compared to other editors and may not impose their preferences on articles.”
• "Advice pages: "projects have wrongly used these pages as a means of asserting ownership over articles within their scope,". "and that other editors..get no say.."because of a "consensus" within the project. An advice page written by several participants of a project is a "local consensus" that is no more binding on editors than material written by any single individual editor. Any advice page that has not been formally approved by the community through the WP:PROPOSAL process has the actual status of an optional essay."
• [[Local consensus]] "among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale. ...WikiProject advice pages,...have not formally been approved by the community through the policy and guideline proposal process, thus have no more status than an essay."

Thank you,CuriousMind01 (talk) 16:11, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

• Wait--if all else fails you claim the others don't know policy? :::I did not mean it that way, sorry if the words read that way.

BTW all y'all REALLY need to learn how to do proper indentation and paragraphing--these sections are clear as mud, esp. when editors start citing other editors. Anyway, I wish y'all had pinged me when that proposal came up (and RAF, I see 8 to 2, not 10 to 1--ansh666 was also an "oppose", and I see only 8 "support"s, but that's by the by. Again, anyway, CuriousMind, "Local consensus" etc, sure, but if you're the only one adding some section that others oppose, you're still guilty of editing against consensus. Drmies (talk) 16:26, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Drmies it is the opposite, I and another editor were restoring the community+RFC consensus, I was not adding any section, and have never added anything against consensus. My understanding of Wikiprojects policy wording is local consensus is equal to a single editor opinion not a group of persons, and local consensus cannot override community consensus like 2 RFCs, if editors wish to change community consensus, they can through community processes, but not just by an internal wikiproject vote unknown to the community, and then try to change community articles. Thank you, CuriousMind01 (talk) 17:29, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I think this is a far more than local consensus. Wikipedia articles about things generally do not center on, or even touch much on, the externalities of their use or abuse. Anmccaff (talk) 20:42, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Persistent WP:OR/WP:V issues with SerM12345

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

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• SerM12345 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• List of terrorist incidents in October 2017 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

SerM12345 has a persistent habit of adding entries to List of terrorist incidents in October 2017 where the sources do not support their inclusion. Recent examples are: [83], [84], [85], [86], [87]. This user was warned on their user talk page repeatedly by myself, DrKay, DeFacto, Doug Weller, and MonsterHunter32. They never have communicated with any other users on talk pages and has only once commented on an article talk page to ask why the article was protected ([88]).

This is a pervasive problem on these terrorism list articles. Given the lack of communication and the persistence of the disruptive behavior despite warnings and attempts to communicate, I am requesting the use be blocked for a bit to prevent further disruption. EvergreenFir (talk) 18:21, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

I have asked him to source his edits properly and not add his own claims. I would like to discuss it, but he seems least interested in responding. MonsterHunter32 (talk) 21:42, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

He hasn't edited for a couple of days, so we'll need to wait to see what happens when he returns to editing. Doug Weller talk 16:06, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

Unfortunately, that seems to be a common theme... Gianluigi02 and Krissmethod... EvergreenFir (talk) 18:13, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

@Doug Weller: editing has resumed but still no communication. They edited just a few minutes ago so I'd give them a bit longer I guess but I'm not optimistic EvergreenFir (talk) 06:10, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

Doug Weller or other admins, the editing has resumed with sources that don't support list entries. Still no communication. 3 of the 4 entries in the previous link aren't supported by source.

Requesting block to stop this disruption. EvergreenFir (talk) 07:55, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes I noticed this half an hour ago while watching tv and using my exercise bike. Will do later. Doug Weller talk 08:00, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Legal threat in edit summaries

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

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Someone using IP 88.98.223.34 is removing text from Alex Reid (fighter) while threatening legal action if it's restored. I don't have an opinion about the material being removed. Binksternet (talk) 00:00, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Blocked for the legal threats. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 00:18, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Just a quick update, after the block User:Reidernater reappeared making similar threats. They were blocked and the page semi-protected by Oshwah. Per WP:DOLT, someone seems to be making sure everything there is well sourced and complies with BLP. (Eventually reverting to a version before the mysterious IPs appeared.) Nil Einne (talk) 14:53, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

• Given the IP's history of edits shows they were editing the same article a month ago, and given that the IP is static [89], I think we can expect this IP to try again. I'll add it to my watchlist. I hope others do as well. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:49, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm keeping an eye on it also. The article is a lot better than it was but is still a bit jumbled chronologically. fish&karate 09:15, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Thejoebloggsblog behaviour at Port Adelaide Football Club

This is a bit two fold, but it is basically a combination of @Thejoebloggsblog: edit warring and acting in an uncivil manner towards another user. I'm also going to ping @TripleRoryFan: and @Jono52795: as they have been involved too.

This issue started in September when Thejoebloggsblog removed content added by Jono52795 without an edit summary. There was then a few days of back and forth [90], [91], [92], [93], [94], [95]. I came across the issue when Thejoebloggsblog used the edit summary "All necessary information included. No need for a crows fan in 'TripleRoryFan' to start an edit war" (to give a bit of a back story for those who may not know, the Adelaide Football Club and Port Adelaide Football Club are rivals in the league). I felt this was an unnecessary edit summary and not assuming WP:good faith, so I left a comment on Thejoebloggsblog's talk page about assuming good faith. Jono52795 started a discussion at Talk:Port Adelaide Football Club#SANFL presence post AFL entry, which TripleRoryFan joined in but Thejoebloggsblog did not.

Fast forward to yesterday, Thejoebloggsblog removed the content again [96] without an edit summary or any discussion at the talk page. There were then a few attempts to try and get Thejoebloggsblog to discuss the issue at the talk page [97], [98] (with notification at user talk page about edit warring), [99] (with talkback template at user talk page). Attempts to get Thejoebloggsblog to discuss were answered with edit summaries questioning TripleRoryFan and my motives and once again not assuming good faith towards TripleRoryFan with the edit summary "reversing edit of known Crows fan who is starting an edit war. He should be blocked from editing page". Since TripleRoryFan pinged Thejoebloggsblog at the talkpage and used a talkback on the user talkpage, Thejoebloggsblog has continued to edit the section, so I'd say it's pretty safe to say Thejoebloggsblog has ignored this and is not willing to engage in any discussion to try and reach a resolution.

Apart from the blatant edit warring by Thejoebloggsblog by reverting with either no edit summary or baseless edit summaries, and refusing to engage in any sort of discussion, I thought I'd report the issue here rather than Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring due to the edit summaries towards TripleRoryFan. I feel that these are in violation of WP:Civil as there has been zero evidence that TripleRoryFan has ulterior motives and I don't think I've ever seen them edit in a way that could be construed as vandalism, in addition, they have even done a good job of creating a season page for Port Adelaide at 2017 Port Adelaide Football Club season so it doesn't make sense they'd vandalise the main page. I feel Thejoebloggsblog edit summaries border on WP:personal attack towards TripleRoryFan and are nonsensical, because supporting an opposition team does not mean an editor is going to vandalise/disrupt club pages. In addition, the assertion that I "only ever revert [Thejoebloggsblog] edits" is a bit of a stretch, yes I've had disagreements with this user in the past, but nothing more than I've had with any other user and have actually managed to reach a resolution with other users as they've been willing to have an open discussion.

Thejoebloggsblog has been a long term user on Wikipedia, and I feel that this sort of behaviour should not be done by a long-term user. There's been long time issues whereby when something is challenged in relation to the Port Adelaide Football Club that Thejoebloggsblog doesn't agree with, there is nearly never a resolution as Thejoebloggsblog either refuses to engage in any conversation or the discussion starts to become illogical (Talk:Port Adelaide Football Club#Logo is a classic example). It has become nearly impossible for other editors to try and improve the page and no one is suggesting that Thejoebloggsblog can't disagree that an edit by another user is not actually an improvement, but in doing so, there can't be just a revert with no explanation or a failure to engage in discussion. I don't know how many times myself and other users have tried to get Thejoebloggsblog to engage in discussion in the past, but considering this behaviour is still going on for someone who has been on Wikipedia for nearly seven years, I feel that Administrators involvement is needed. Flickerd (talk) 12:08, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

This has been a long-term problem and it's disappointing to see that it's still going on. The most concerning part for me is his tendency to edit war to the threshold of 3RR, see that there is a clear consensus against him and instead of at least accepting that, he will try to make the same edits again a few months down the track in the hope that no one will notice. It's a frustrating situation because Thejoebloggsblog is I think sincere in really wanting to improve the coverage of PAFC-related articles, but Wikipedia is a collaborative project and it is necessary to be able to work with, rather than against, fellow editors. As can be seen by his talk page or a couple of the other trips to various noticeboards this is unfortunately not a one off situation. What should be done about it though? I'm not sure to be honest. I was thinking about suggesting a 1RR restriction but I'm not sure that would achieve anything because I think you'd still have the same behaviour where contentious or outright rejected edits try to get snuck in months later. Jenks24 (talk) 12:34, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

The way he's going about it is quite frustrating. I got involved when I saw he'd deleted a chunk of sourced prose without an explanation and wanted to know why he did it, but it felt like the only reasoning he ever gave to me was directed at the fact I'm a Crows fan, which I think is a bit ridiculous given I've made an effort to improve articles about players from rival teams and, as you said, created an article specifically about Port Adelaide (though it's still a very low quality article). As far as I can tell he still hasn't given a reason why he prefers one revision over another, which is all I wanted him to do to begin with. TripleRoryFan (talk) 02:12, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Slow motion edit warring is still edit warring and should attract blocks as normal. On a side note, AFL rivalry attracts the same level of bitterness as English Premier League rivalry, such as Liverpool vs Manchester or Manchester City vs Manchester United just without the whole attempting to burn each others' cities to the ground and street fights. (Personally, I think rivalry is healthy, but rivalry to the point that it ignites this madness rises to near nationalist levels.) Blackmane (talk) 01:36, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

While it's true that the Crows and Port do have a very strong rivalry I don't think that should have any bearing on whether or not someone is allowed to edit a wikipedia article, especially when I'm just one of three or four people all disagreeing with Thejoebloggsblog's edits. TripleRoryFan (talk) 03:14, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Tending to agree that although the SA rivalry is strong between the two teams, it should have no bearing on whether someone is allowed to edit a Wikipedia page or not unless there is strong evidence that an editor is purposely vandalising a page out of spite/rivalry, which is not the case for TripleRoryFan. In my opinion, Thejoebloggsblog should receive a temporary block per what Blackmane has said regarding slow edit wars. If admins agree, then hopefully it will lead to Thejoebloggsblog ceasing future edit wars and engaging in discussions to reach a resolution. In addition to actually using edit summaries when reverting people's edits. Flickerd (talk) 08:03, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Much to my surprise, it appears User:Thejoebloggsblog has made some edits lately which have gone some way to restoring my original edits which outlined, very briefly, the club's history at the SANFL level since 1997. Though his refusal to even engage in any dialogue either here or on the article's talk page is baffling. There does still appear to be a slow-burn edit war going on though, as evidenced by the most recent revert b/w him and User:Jenks24 on 31 Oct, which Joe is again at fault for in my view. Jono52795 (talk) 04:43, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

The issue is more about his tendency not to use edit summaries and the fact that he hasn't really responded at all to any attempts to communicate with him. The info he's now put in still doesn't have any of the original prose though it is better than nothing, and even then he's never explained why he didn't approve of the original text. Seeing as he never uses edit summaries (except to complaing about people reverting the edits he makes without summaries) or responds on talk pages you can only speculate what his reasons are. TripleRoryFan (talk) 06:01, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

In fairness to User:Jenks24 I didn't realise at first he had standardised all clubs. I am fine with this edit. Thejoebloggsblog (talk) 07:16, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Eyes on Catalonia, please

Catalonia (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) has apparently declared independence. It's already semi-protected, but there's a lot of contentious editing going on.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:33, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

BrownHairedGirl (talk · contribs) has full protected for a week. As you might expect as a direct consequence, Talk:Catalonia has lit up with protected edit requests, ranging from appropriate spelling and grammar issues to outright POV pushing. All admins may need to chip in on the talk page, as I don't think the traffic is going to die down any time soon. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:45, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

See also List of sovereign states (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), Barcelona (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), and Independence referendum (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)... --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 17:02, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

All added to my watchlist, SarekOfVulcan. A Train^talk 17:06, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

You might want to add Carles Puigdemont as well. Martinevans123 (talk) 17:11, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

They've now created a content-fork at Catalan Republic (2017) and appear to have moved on to that as the dedicated edit-war zone. ‑ Iridescent 17:18, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes. If only there was one battle site to contend with, I predict a weekend of turmoil on these pages. Martinevans123 (talk) 17:23, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Very tempted to redirect and full protect that in an WP:IAR sort of way, but I'm not sure I want to deal with... dammit. fine. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 17:25, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Or not. Guess I'm more chicken than I used to be. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 17:26, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Doing my best to hold back the Catalonia is independent related edits, but it's quite difficult. GoodDay (talk) 17:20, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

This is certainly not policy, but my inclination would be to leave Catalan Republic (2017) (which has almost no incoming links, given that it was only just created) unprotected and direct all the nationalists on both sides there to duke it out, to keep the instability out of those articles to which people may actually be coming for information. We did something similar with Guy Fawkes/Gunpowder Plot, in creating Gunpowder Plot in popular culture and pointing anyone wanting to rant about V For Vendetta and Anonymous there, and it worked fairly well. ‑ Iridescent 17:24, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I tagged this article as WP:CSD#A10 earlier today (just after it was created and immediately before my news feed lit up with the independence declaration in earnest), but now I'm with Iridescent - while I personally wish the nationalists would just go to Wikinews or start a blog, I think they're going to have to have somewhere to slug it out (although the article has already been semi-protected). Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 17:37, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

(e/c) That's an attractive suggestion. To really keep the POV warriors busy and away from established articles, we should lift the prohibition on 3RR on that one article as well. (It might sound like I'm sarcastically snarking at Iri, but I'm actually semi-serious. This philosophy has a lot of potential in numerous places, the more I think about it. Maybe a noticeboard where you can make accusations without evidence, can edit war over archiving the thread, say "fuck" as often as you want, and don't have to notify anyone, but which can never result in any actual action being taken? WP:AN/Honeypot? --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:40, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Wow. That's quite an anarchistic solution, isn't it? I guess the five pillars just get ground down to dust there is the process? Martinevans123 (talk) 17:48, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Well, time to resurrect the POUM then  :) — fortunavelut luna 18:13, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

"This is a Catalonian/ Spanish* hat and I am prepared to die wearing it"
* delete as appropriate

I've always assume that this was part of the rationale for the existence of the REFDESKS.--S Philbrick(Talk) 19:49, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

And 2017 Catalonia declaration of independence (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 18:07, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

@Floquenbeam the idea of honeypot pages intentionally designed to keep the editwarriors off pages with high readership and instead tie them up warring over a little-viewed page isn't a new one by any means. Michael Jackson's health and appearance, Personal relationships of Michael Jackson and Cultural impact of Michael Jackson—created before his death to keep all the squabbling out of a highly visible and legally sensitive BLP and instead confined to a bunch of pages no members of the public would ever read—are probably the canonical examples, along with Criticism of Microsoft. ‑ Iridescent 19:06, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Can I at least claim credit for the WP:AN/Honeypot idea? Although a way to attract more of them would be to name it WP:AN/Very important arguments that matter TOO MUCH to be solved at ANI. --Floquenbeam (talk) 19:12, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

During these coming uncertain hours & days, I think we should work with the premise that Catalonia is still a part of Spain, when dealing with these incoming edits. GoodDay (talk) 18:38, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I think that's the only sane option, and we need to stress it's simply because in a fluid dispute like this, the status quo should remain, not because we are all Mariano Rajoy fanboys. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:44, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

What we need to keep in mind here is that Spain will end up taking control of the physical infrastructure of Catalonia, but the Catalans, at least the fraction of them who support the move to become independent will end up setting up an alternative government that only exists on Cyberspace. Spain will try to crack down on that alternative cyber government and Wikipedia will then find itself in the crossfire of that Cyberwar. Count Iblis (talk) 19:03, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Michael Bay filmography GMG^talk 19:10, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Sounds like a a good time to re-read Neuromancer. A Train^talk 19:23, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Heck isn't it close to the time of The Awakening? RickinBaltimore (talk) 19:25, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I was actually thinking that this could turn into an NPOV trainwreck lasting for weeks or longer. Perhaps we should request the community (here) or via Arbcom, grant a temporary authorization for uninvolved admins to impose editing restrictions including 1RR on articles relating to Catalonia and its purported secession from Spain. Thoughts? -Ad Orientem (talk) 19:36, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I like that idea. We should start a formal discussion for community sanctions over on WP:AN. A good discussion would take a week, but I don't think this is going to be resolved any sooner than that... --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:40, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I support this move. ^{My name is}not^dave (talk/contribs) 19:48, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Discussion started at WP:AN#Proposing community sanctions on Catalan independence. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:11, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

• Interestingly, it appears to me that the Spanish Wikipedia and Catalan Wikipedia articles, while busy and with more than their fair share of reverts, are not even semi-protected (with 2-3 exceptions I eventually found). Not sure if that's due to the size of the respective editing communities, the relative power admins may or may not have in all 3 communities, a relatively higher maturity level in their community, it's just more fun to argue in English, or what. But it's interesting. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:40, 27 October 2017 (UTC) although to be fair, they both have the equivalent article to Catalonia protected. But articles about the vote, the claimed republic, the referendum... those don't seem to be. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:44, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

List of involved pages

• 2017 Catalonia declaration of independence (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Andorra (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Barcelona (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Carles Puigdemont (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Catalan Republic (2017) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Catalan Republic (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Catalan independence referendum, 2017 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Catalan independence (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Catalonia (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Els Segadors (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• France (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• History of Catalonia (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Independence referendum (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• List of sovereign states (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Oriol Junqueras (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• List of states with limited recognition (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) added by Legacypac

  There are even more listed at the ongoing ITN discussion. Most have issues that for now prevent them from being linked on the main page. On a side note; it seems like we have a few too many articles dealing with essentially the same subject. -Ad Orientem (talk) 18:23, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Seems par for the course here - creating new content (especially on an important topic) is fun, retrospectively fixing sourcing and POV pushing on somebody else's work is less so. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:41, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Looks like creating a new country is even more fun (?) Martinevans123 (talk) 18:43, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

• Not sure I agree with full protection here. ExtConf, perhaps, but I don't see the disruption that justifies shutting down all editing, as we don't usually do that as a preventative measure. It is overkill. We have hot topics all the time and allow editors to edit them with either semi or extprot in place, I would suggest the same here. Policy seems to back me on this. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 20:45, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Not technically a wikipedia issue (other than that it's used in one of our articles) but File:InternationalRecognitionofCatalonia.svg has been updated to show Antartica as not recognising Catalonia so it seems this isn't restricted to controversy over the unilateral declaration. Nil Einne (talk) 12:14, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Just going to obliviously pop in here with a somewhat related question. On October 27, Catalonia declared independence and it was added to that day's article's events list. That was removed by User:Rlbarton, who might be in the right but definitely should have chosen a less contentious edit summary than "Removed not notable event." It has since been restored via a pending edit I approved. I can't say for sure if it belongs and I definitely don't want to ask at any of these battleground talk pages. (And that said, October 27 looks like another candidate for semiprotection because of this.) Stay? Go? CityOfSilver 22:30, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

I thought it said California declared independence, and said to myself, "Wow, the fallout from Trump never ends!" EEng 23:03, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

@EEng: If I wanted to write one of those fake news Facebook articles about California seceding, what notes would I have to hit? Hammer and sickle on the flag, one-party Communist rule, all military members either get deported or go in the stocks to get pelted with tomatoes... CityOfSilver 23:14, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

No, that's in Valencia, isn't it? Martinevans123 (talk) 23:23, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Just factually describe the Bear Flag Revolt (and its flag) without bothering to mention that it was 170 years ago rather than now. —David Eppstein (talk) 04:38, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

It's not an "Arbitrary break". It's a logical expression of the democratic rights of the Catalan peoples! Martinevans123 (talk) 23:20, 27 October 2017 (UTC) well, some of them anyway...

This is why these pages should let me add gifs. I need to add the one of Fred Armisen as the old-timey drummer on SNL. Ba dum PSSH. CityOfSilver 23:36, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

OMG. Fake Catalan news prize?? You really wanna claim that? Martinevans123 (talk) 22:50, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

User Shmayo

• Shmayo (talk · contribs · logs)

The user has been disruptively editing Syriac Christian-related articles for a while now. Back in January, he boldly (unanimously) redirected Syriac Orthodox Christians (Middle East), an article about the ethno-religious community, to Syriac Orthodox Church, the church body. Next, he removed sourced content about how the church leaders viewed of themselves and other ethnic and religious groups (commenting "Superfluous and wrong section"). He continued to revert, and again (this time commenting "Rv POV. Quotes reduntant and irrelevant in history-section, "identity" of specific people irrelevant and not verifiable"). He seems to be following the Assyrian nationalist view that all Syriac groups are Assyrians (POV). This is made clear by the user's intent to merge the article, which has been discussed before and rejected. The user calls the article a fork, which obviously is not the case. I warned him, twice. He removed reliably sourced content which is directly discussing the article Terms for Syriac Christians (very interestingly, with the comment "Discuss first. Wrong section. POV." Do I need to stress that all of my content at said articles follow Wikipedia guidelines of RS and NPOV? I am here to contribute, not remove. And he calls my edits "controversial"... --Zoupan 23:46, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

First of all, back in January, I wrote on the talk page several times. Of course, I should have directly notified involved users, which I stated even back then. Zoupan, I have been the one wanting to discuss these issues. But I have not got any response regarding the particular edits. This version is not neutral, while this one is. But again, you have not commented the actual edits on the talk page, even though I have been asking some pretty basic stuff. You are only refering to the "removal of sourced content", while you are doing the same thing. The difference is that my version is neutral, while you are cherry picking. As for the quotes, they are irrelevant to the history section and belongs to the articles discussing the terms. But even there, quotes favoring both identites, were deleted by Monochrome Monitor, for being redundant. If you can't agree that your edits are controversial, then you have not been following the discussions at Talk:Assyrian people, were special guidelines have been set up. You are even using sources whose reliability have been questioned there. You should take some time reading through the consensus there first. Shmayo (talk) 00:05, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Here I am repeating the same questions regarding your edits again. Shmayo (talk) 00:08, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Here Zoupan is removing a link to the Assyrian people page for no reason, linking it to ACOE. What is your obsession with that? Shmayo (talk) 00:16, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

You have not made much of a discussion. You claim that it is a fork, when I have made my stance clear already last year. Your questions have little or nothing to do with the actual dispute on the talk page. As for the massacres, sources explicitly identify victims as Nestorians=members of the ACOE.--Zoupan 01:47, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I asked you the same questions back in January, without any answers again. My questions are very relevant for what you are actually reporting me for. Shmayo (talk) 23:23, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Could I borrow a couple eyeballs on the Snopes page?

this dif, complete with its accusations of edit-warring and threats of warnings, and a few backwards tell the whole story. I'd ask at AN3, but there really does seem to be something else going on, @Leitmotiv: has reverted something as uncited when it is followed by a cite just this side of plagiarism. Anmccaff (talk) 02:37, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

"Widely" is wishy washy language that sounds "pro". Regardless it isn't necessary to the article. And it isn't cited. Leitmotiv (talk) 02:53, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Widely is accurate – a sky-is-blue fact for a website visited more than 3 million times per week. Binksternet (talk) 03:02, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict)::From page 285 of American Carnival, the work which is cited immediately following the material you [i.e. Leitmotiv] removed: "the most widely known resource for validating or debunking rumors...."

As I said, there really does seem to be something else going on here. Anmccaff (talk) 03:04, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I see we have a conspiracy theorist here. No, I simply reverted your unnecessary edit of "widely". I reverted and that's it. To proactively add that Snopes.com is "widely" viewed accomplishes nothing except leading the reader into thinking that that is a benefit or a positive attribute as if to validate its authority. Wikipedia is supposed to remain neutral. If your goal is to show how much its viewed, then it was already accomplished by the number of views in the last line of the lede. That also means you're being redundant, another reason to revert. It may be obvious as the "sky is blue" but the obvious doesn't need to be stated twice, nor perhaps at all. Neutrality is the name of the game here, we don't need to lead the reader. Leitmotiv (talk) 05:01, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I think the source's "the most widely known X" does not imply "a widely known X", which has some unknown absolute scale unlike the source's comparative. I use snopes, but from my friends' and relatives' reactions when I do, I'd say it's not really "widely known" to the broader audience. So maybe that's what's up there. Changing it to quote the source more closely ("the most widely known") would be better. Dicklyon (talk) 05:06, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

There is an element of WP:PEACOCK and WP:WEASEL in "widely", but Snopes is the best known urban legends site.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 05:16, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

That's one of my main reasons for deleting "widely". Between editors, I get that it's the biggest debunker of urban myths, but that doesn't change the fact that it's leading the viewer as one would lead a witness in a court of law. It's also redundant and therefore unnecessary. Wish washy through and through as far as I'm concerned. The article doesn't benefit from having it and it does just fine without it. Leitmotiv (talk) 05:23, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Please do not call other editors conspiracy theorists. Thank you. — fortunavelut luna 06:20, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi I agree it is bad form to insinuate that there "really does seem to be something else going on here", suggesting another editor has an ulterior motive, just as much as suggesting one is a conspiracy theorist. And hence the joke over something so mundane. Sometimes you have to point this stuff out though when the original editor does not assume good faith and the reason for my light-hearted joke. Leitmotiv (talk) 06:34, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

It seems to be missed that my original edit was to remove the words "widely-used" when everyone here seems to be arguing over "widely known". Why we are arguing over widely known is unknown to me, because what I edited out was widely used. Still, it's a weasel word when Wikipedia has higher standards of being neutral even if a citation supports it. Leitmotiv (talk) 06:37, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I edited it to exactly conform with the source to widely known here; you reverted 4 times afterwards. The fact that you are obviously not reading the works cited is one of the many other issues with your editting.

Another problem is that you describe the ordinary BRD cycle -a single revert of a controversial edit, to be followed by discussion - as "edit warring", as you do here. A single reversion, for what everyone else downthread and here felt was at least arguable, should not be reverted with stop edit warring. That either means a deep confusion of what edit warring is, taking it to simply mean disagreeing with you, or an attempt to poison the well.

And again, both Leitmotiv's edits on Snopes and here seem slightly confused about what strictures apply to Wiki writers, and which apply to sources. It would be a bad idea for some wikitor to call someone the "the Greatest" out of thin air, but he can use Frank Deford's use of it without qualms, or even quotes. If the source calls Snopes widely known, and no other sources substantively disagree, then removing it smells of POV pushing.

@Dicklyon:'s point that something can be widely known within an interest group, a professional group, and so forth, and yet not as well known to the public at large can be legitimate, but that's easier solved with "best known among..." construction. I think given the amount of unwanted attention Snopes received from the Frogboys lately, I suspect this is moot now, though. Anmccaff (talk) 18:26, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

PS:Could any passing closer please leave it open long enough for the (blocked) subject to respond? That's a real problem around here. Anmccaff (talk) 18:26, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

User:Akocsg: Ethnic/nationalistic POV pushing, edit warring and IP-hopping

• Akocsg (talk · contribs) and block log
• Blocked on German Wikipedia [100] (Ethno-POV-Account on a mission)

This user removes the contents which he does not like and replace them with his own personal opinions. He always uses misleading and false edit summaries.

• I mention some of his edits for the comparison:
  • WP:BATTLEGROUND and misrepresentation of sources[101][102]
  • Removing sourced text and replace it with his own POV[103]
  • POV and labeling his edit as minor[104][105]
  • Removing any non-Turkic info which are based on the sources[106][107][108]
  • Disruptive edits like[109]
• The recent issues:
  • Ashina Removed sourced content of article by providing a misleading edit summary,[110] then started edit warring and inserted his personal opinions.[111][112][113]. Then switched to IP-hopping.[114][115] That IP-range is from Germany and since this user was active on German Wikipedia, then I'm sure it's him. IP's edit pattern and edit summaries matches with him too. IP targeted related articles[116][117][118][119][120][121] and finally wrote a personal attack on my talk page.[122]
  • Baghatur Repeated his old way: Removed the content which he does not like and replaced it with a random non-English citation.[123] Then after 2 month, he repeated it again (non-English sources).[124] And this one.[125]

It's a nationalistic mission/quest by him on English Wikipedia just like German Wiki. Is it necessary to provide more evidences? --Wario-Man (talk) 08:41, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I would first like to state how surprised and astonished I am by this deceptive behaviour of this user. None of his accusations are true whatsoever. If you check his recent repeated edit diff in the article Baghatur you can see how he simply deleted a statement which was provided with three different academic sources. They simply got deleted by him with the excuse that they are not English and hence not reliable! That's cherry-picking. And not constructive behaviour at all.

The very same case can be seen in the article Ashina, where again a poorly written and unsourced passage was improved and corrected by me backed with sources. He simply reverted them all with the accuse that it's POV, which is the main accusation based on the same examples here! The result was that my objection got a result and the passage was finally removed after an input by another neutral user in the talk page. See here: diff2, the adding of sources by me: diff, then he does it himself what I said should be done, deletes the whole passage: diff3. As you can see, what he first accused me of turned out to be right.

And those older edits, which I mostly can't even remember anymore, where mostly backed by sources back then. Most of them are minor edits anyway, and not destructive in any way. They were definitely not POV pushing or a "nationalistic mission" or whatsoever. This user apparently wants to simply get me blocked because of personal reasons, it seems. See the Baghatur article, where sources simply get deleted on his whim... If you check my personal histoy here in the English Wikipedia, you will see that I made at least thousand edits and created/wrote many new articles. Most of them in the field of sports. Based on this fact alone one can see that I am not a POV-pushing User on a mission, like this user wants to make you believe.

But this part of his report is the best. Please do check this out, it's important and shows how he is trying to manipulate you (if he is aware that it's not me):

"...and finally wrote a personal attack on my talk page. 23"

That was made by some totally different user. By this one: User:2003:6:212f:ef43:40f0:fbd0:1966:e577 You can confirm that by checking the history in his talk page. That was not by me! But it is simply reported by him as if it was me. This is a serious accusation!

And that IP user is not me nor does not have anything to do with me. Please do an IP check or whatever is necessary to clarify this case. And as a major part of his accusations are based on that dubious IP account, one can see how this reporting is based on practically no consistent foundation. Regards, Akocsg (talk) 15:44, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

@Doug Weller and EdJohnston: Would you (or other admins) please look at this report? 72H has passed and I see no replies from the admins. --Wario-Man (talk) 06:49, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Can the admins please make it clear that comments like "What is it with Turks and their extreme nationalism?" are not acceptable - since when is it ok for IP editors to post racist comments on ANI? I'm not involved in this content dispute but a comment that all Turks are extreme nationalists easily fits the dictionary definition of racism, canard, racial stereotyping, etc. If someone wrote "What is it with the Jews and their shystyness" I imagine there would be a round of objections. Seraphim System ^(talk) 08:17, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I've removed the comment in question. To be clear: No, comments like these are not helpful to resolving a discussion and they not acceptable to make. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 09:57, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Hawkeye75

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User:Hawkeye75 has a long history of disruptive editing. They've been blocked twice before: once by the community under DISRUPT and NOTHERE, and once under CIR. It seems they are back to their old ways: [126], [127]. They've been given more than enough ROPE; request an indef community ban. Pinging admins previously involved: User:Anna Frodesiak, User:Euryalus, User:Huon --James (^talk/_contribs) 09:18, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Looks like same bs as before.Chris "WarMachineWildThing" ^{Talk to me} 09:42, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I looked at the article space edits (to SBNO, Standing but not operating and Roller Coaster DataBase) and reinstated them; the only disruptive thing about them were the inappropriate edit summaries. Still, a name change is needed here as noted in previous discussions; I thought this thread was some attempt at harassing Hawkeye7 at first and almost did something very unpleasant. I don't object to the user retaining the name "Hawkeye" but the number definitely needs to change. 78.28.45.124 (talk) 15:40, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

First off, I'd like to say that James could of discussed the issue on my talk page which is one of the suggestions on the ANI page. I haven't seen James on Wikipedia for a good 8 months? So it's a been of a shock that he would just nominate me on the ANI without any conversation. Second, regarding the 2 edits that James mentioned. The first diff that James mentioned, yes maybe the edit summary was too far, but the edit was correct. The IP user was using WP:R#PLA as a rule, when clearly it was not being used correctly. I already mentioned on this diff the reasoning behind why it was wrong. Then the next day, the same IP user reverted their own changes which just cancels out the whole argument. Third, for James' second diff, I'm not sure what's wrong with that. The IP user went over to Anna's talk page to discuss my edits and then expected me to go over to my talk page. I was just getting frustrated because there have been like 4 different IP's regarding this whole thing and I'm not sure if they are the same person or not, and it's getting difficult to tell each user apart. I'm not sure if they are experienced or not, or what the whole deal is. Here are the 4 IP user's [128], [129], [130] and [131]. I think I have made good contributions recently such as this edit and I wish to continue to contribute to the encyclopedia. Hawkeye75 (talk) 18:51, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure if you are one of those other IP's, but regardless I appreciate your opinion and I do agree that my edit summaries were a bit out of place out of frustration. Hawkeye7 has said in the past that he is okay with my name I think and if that were to change, then I would change my name. Hawkeye75 (talk) 18:57, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

The issue here is not the quality of the edits but the conduct towards other editors. This is not a good-faith reply to polite questions regarding a content dispute. And this? An editor is actively editing without replying within five minutes to a comment that didn't ping them (not sure if IP editors even can be pinged), and that indicates... evasiveness? Sockpuppetry? Hawkeye75 never took the time to answer the IP editor's questions, but he did have the time to repeatedly insist that the IP editor create an account before he'd be willing to discuss. IP editors are people too. Trying to resolve the dispute by getting the other editor blocked is highly inappropriate. I do not think this battleground mentality and unwillingness to discuss the merits of his own actions on request is appropriate for Wikipedia, and it does not agree with what they promised when their indefinite block was lifted: I will not start reverting wars or get angry at the reverted, but rather have a simple conservation about the revert on the talk page or just agree with the revert if it's justified. Thus I will reinstate the indefinite block. I don't think a community ban is warranted at this point, though. I expect they'll find it rather difficult to get the block lifted either way. Huon (talk) 20:09, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

(WP:Notifications: "Registered users can be notified by other users and by IPs, however, an IP cannot be notified by any templates or links.") ―Mandruss ☎ 20:22, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Huon's evaluation of the situation, the stated underlying issues with the user, and the re-instatement of the reported user's indefinite block. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 10:01, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Lack of sources and no communication

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Mathapatirachayya has only been editing since 2nd October 2017. In the last month, they have created around 4 unreferenced articles a day, about 100 in total. These all now require other editors' hard work to read through the long articles and try to verify all the information. Mathapatirachayya has been politely asked to slow down and source on several occasions. Several editors all had our messages ignored, although I was clear that WP:Communication is required. There have been nine messages in the last week expressing concerns about their editing. They are mainly on Indian villages and mainly have an 'External links' section - I have contacted Mathapatirachayya and asked if the external link is actually the source and just misnamed, but no response. I have given several warnings, but they continue to create unreferenced articles - many of them - and not respond. I'm coming here in the hope we can get Mathapatirachayya to engage. Boleyn (talk) 13:15, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Nick Moyes, I saw your warning to this editor, is there particular reason to suspect WP:COI here too? Thanks, Boleyn (talk) 13:17, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

My 'suspicion', if that's the right word, was based on the topics that were being created so rapidly, and the rationale for them. They seemed informative, useful, neutral, and possibly put together from some form of database or list of geographic information (sadly whose sources remain uncited). So I felt that, coming from such a very new user, these articles might potentially have been created by someone experienced, well-meaning, and possibly commissioned or employed to improve awareness of the Karnataka region of southern India. That was a gut feeling, not an accusation, but it looked like a single-purpose account to me, worthy of a WP:CHECK too, so I felt the question merited asking under the circumstances. (I hope I followed procedure by raising this in a civil manner on their talk page - that was my intent). I'm quite happy seeing good pages created on geographic areas such as these, but not if they remain uncited. It therefore seemed a question worth inviting the user to answer - though sadly there seems to be a difficulty in getting any response. ( I should add that I started drafting my comment on their talk page prior to your own warning message being placed there, but, being busy elsewhere, left it unfinished for 24hrs before posting. I didn't feel the need to flag up the edit confict at the time) Regards from the UK, Nick Moyes (talk) 15:17, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, Nick Moyes, it was an appropriate question politely asked, it is unusual behaviour from a new user. Boleyn (talk) 18:17, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• In addition to the lack of sources, copyvio may be an issue too. Diannaa's already warned re copyvios, I haven't yet checked the rest, but if this behavior continues further then a block is in order. —SpacemanSpiff 13:28, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Directly after this ANI was started, the editor created another unreferenced article, Tajapur H, and despite clearly being on Wikipedia at the time, has not responded here or to SpacemanStiff's recent warning. Boleyn (talk) 13:45, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

That article also already exists as Tajapur (H). Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 16:21, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

As Mathapatirachayya have made zero attempt to communicate after nearly one month and 340 edits, I have temporarily deleted all 104 pages (spot check indicates they all share similar issues or being possibly copy and pasted and unreferenced) created by this user until we receive some kind of response from this user. Alex Shih (talk) 16:29, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, Alex Shih, I think that's the best solution. We'll see if the editor will respond. Boleyn (talk) 18:17, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Socked and blocked. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 10:00, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• There are more socks, I'm just listing these here per Bbb23's log of checkuser blocks related to this farm, the following accounts need checking too:

List of socks
Master -- Simple-man-everyday Z4X7KK7F3WX4H Z3S8F6JV4H7 XK4E7HF5XZW X3K3W9ZX4HXK N4K8W3X7FH R6V8JF3G4 G7E3K9FXM7 F7X4E8W9S1 Nammavijayapur Mathapatirachayya E3X78H4K36Z A3F7GH72 D7G1FV49C FM7KE3K9HX4 Mony-Mony R4A2DS5C1 Yellow-leaf

Pinging@Lugnuts, Nick Moyes, Boleyn, and Alex Shih: as an FYI for further clean up. —SpacemanSpiff 11:59, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Soaringbear needs a timeout

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

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This user will not follow policies and guidelines and is abusive when folks try to explain what they are doing wrong. In my view they need a long time out.

After several bad interactions, I posted the following on their Talk page at the end of July:

Looking at your edit count you have made 617 edits to Wikipedia. You have used an article talk page only 3 times, and user talk pages 29 times. Almost all of those talk page remarks have been abusive.

If you cannot adapt to this basic requirement of working here, you are going to find your privileges (and they are privileges, not a right) to edit Wikipedia restricted or completely removed. I am providing a set of diffs below, showing that you have been failing to work collaboratively with others thus far.

Please take this as an unambiguous warning, that you need to change your approach to working with others.

In December 2015, at Sulforaphane:

• 22:57, 4 December 2015 dif, you added content sourced to primary source to an article about a drug, and it was reverted
• 13:29, 8 December 2015 diff insult at user talk page: why would you possibly revert science referenced research? If you didn't like it then edit it, don't just delete (censor) it.
• 13:33, 8 December 2015 diff reverted with no edit note, which was again reverted
• 19:19, 8 December 2015 diff I don't know if I'm dealing with Alexbrn or Zephr but the overly brief and meaningless comment of "poorly sourced" hardly applies to peer reviewed medical literature that I referenced. Edit what I did instead of reverting (censoring?) it.

In November 2016 about Miguel Ydígoras Fuentes

• 17:44, 13 November 2016 diff you added some detail to an article, and it was reverted.
• 15:28, 16 November 2016 diff you restored your remark at the top I don't know how this talk page works but for you to say my few words of clarification "does not fit well" is senseless, which was misplaced, inappropriate, and was reverted.
• 13:58, 18 November 2016 diff at the top of a user talk page, don't know how this talk page works but for you to say my few words of clarification "does not fit well" is senseless. I am still waiting for response; this was moved to the bottom of the page, per convention.
• diff - you were given a very long response to your note, to which you never replied.
• 14:40, 19 November 2016 diff you again wrote at the top of the page I don't know how this talk page works but for you to say my few words of clarification "does not fit well" is vague and senseless - I am still waiting for clarification what specifically you mean? What wording would you find acceptable for adding that little bit of information?
• 16:48, 26 November 2016 diff you restored the content to the article, writing "does not fit" is hardly a reason

in December 2016 you created Gynura japonica, and your response to the nomination was:

• 00:02, 27 December 2016 diff "speedy" deletion of Gynura was un-necessary and DESTRUCTIVE by you
• 00:05, 27 December 2016 diff speedy deletion?? what for? that was destructive of you - losing significant information - I leave it for you to repair by renewing it

This month at Pan-assay interference compounds:

• 13:57, 17 July 2017 dif initial edit
• 16:51, 19 July 2017 diff comment left in the middle of someone else's section at my talk page. PANS page requests pharmacology expert and as PhD in that subject I added something. What is your expertise for reverting?
• 17:55, 19 July 2017 dif, edit warring restoration with edit note: I am pharmacology expert providing useful info and citation - your edit would be appreciated but undo is NOT
• 18:32, 19 July 2017 at talk diff insult at the article Talk page section I opened.
• 22:22, 20 July 2017 diff, revert with no edit note
• 17:42, 21 July 2017 diff revert, edit note Revert destruction instead of edit is unacceptable behavior
• 11:37, 22 July 2017 diff, comment at my talk page in someone else's section: talk page?? I don't know where the fuck you're talking about but you keep destructively reverting useful information which violates everything about wikipedis
• 13:34, 23 July 2017 at talk dif, insult

• They replied with this: DON'T shrink me. I gave you NO authority to examine my editing record to psychoanalyze me. You abused your position. It is obvious now that you were perfectly capable of editing my edit WITHOUT reverting, and the fact that you reverted repeatedly proves that YOU instigated this edit war, not I. YOU are the abuser, and I am disgusted with your abusive manipulative behavior. (unsigned, no indents) there on their talk page, and at my talk page with things like this, randomly inserted: When a page advises need for pharmacology expertise then my question about your expertise is VERY appropriate, and you show how wierd you are to revert me and refuse to show expertise. For you to be snooping through my past is wrong in so many ways and for you to not realize it shows how corrupt you are.

• a week later they responded with this to a standard notice from User:Doc James about using MEDRS refs: you can't kill an idea no matter how theoretical and new; you could have edited this instead of reverting and with this to a followup by User:TylerDurden8823L so why am I seeing an increase of lazy numb-headed reverts in place of editing to improve things?? and with this: I see the same quote over and over: "disruptive editing. this does not belong here. unncessary anyway. Undid revision". That makes it lazy and numb-headed; also autocratic and impossible to talk-reason with. Reflects descent and degeneration and bureaucratization of the whole management and idea of wikipedia.

• today more of the same. again at their talk page in response to Doc James: That was a high quality PRIMARY source. You are mistaken in calling it secondary. Your reversions are NON collaborative. The wiki way is FIXING things instead of ERASING. So I expect you to put my peer reviewed reference back in. EDIT if you want but no more blunt reversions. There is a reason they are seeing people respond to them over and over with requests to stop be disruptive. and at Doc James talk page: your statement to use higher quality secondary sources is nonsense. I provided a PRIMARY source PEER reviewed journal that is as high quality as possible. You can edit for clarity but do NOT revert for nonsense excuse..... You need to express better what your real reason for reverting was because your claim is FALSE. ... answering with a question is NOT an answer. you are VIOLATING the wikipedia way in REFUSING to answer how you would accuse a primary peer review journal report as being secondary nonsense???

Like I said... Jytdog (talk) 13:34, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support block Unless they agree to 1) use high quality secondary sources 2) improve their civility / sign their posts. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:13, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support block Until they agree to 1) use high quality secondary sources 2) improve their civility / sign their posts. -Roxy the dog. bark 15:16, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support block They don't seem to be able understand and follow standard Wikipedia practices. Paul August ☎ 16:17, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support block under the terms outlined by Doc James. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 16:50, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support block I agree with the overall sentiment of this post that there is clearly a problematic pattern of behavior despite numerous attempts to help Soaringbear. As James states above, unless Soaringbear demonstrates a clear willingness to start interacting in a meaningful way with other Wikipedia users and adhere to using high-quality secondary sources, I support a block as well. TylerDurden8823 (talk) 17:33, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Nonvote it's pretty clear where this is headed and doesn't need pile-on. Just wanted to say that I tried to help, too. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:35, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• @Soaringbear: Wikipedia needs pharmacology experts, but a topic expert is not much use here unless they are able to follow standard procedures, and willing to take the effort to do so. Johnuniq (talk) 23:38, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Hello: I think you are missing the point

This Doc James is engaging in classic smothering - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Don%27t_smother_conflict

Straight out of the wiki policy pages: "Reverting tends to be hostile, making editing Wikipedia unpleasant." "Do not revert an edit because it is unnecessary" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Revert_only_when_necessary

Demand for clinical RCT data is simply unrealistic in a world of billions of separate chemicals. We can all wish for it all we want, but it simply ain't happening. I will suggest that there is possibly an element of professional conflict here, between him as physician and me as pharmacologist. I have training and experience in evaluating pre-clinical, non-human studies, that Doc James lacks.

It is unfortunate he cannot respect science outside of his profession of human studies, and thinks he can revert with useless abrasive comments like "nonsense" and rapidly escalating to calling me "abusive" and "several bad interactions" that "need a long time out". In other words he lacks capacity to oversee other scientists and is abusing his authority.

So there are two main issues here. Chrysin is a page that is nearly empty and contains speculation (*under lab research" and bodybuilding) that is far weaker than the reference I added and my edit is just a spark revealing a process conflict that is much bigger. Bear

P.S. I will add that part of the process problem is how ready you are to convict when you hadn't heard from me yet.

Soaringbear, those pages you linked to above are essays reflecting the personal opinions of some editors and those pages most certainly are not policies and guidelines. Doc James has tried quite hard to get you to understand that we insist on sources that comply with WP:MEDRS. If you want to edit Wikipedia, then you must accept that and internalize it and follow it 100% of the time. And you need to start collaborating and communicating better. Are you prepared to accept that?

As for "convict", this is not court of law. It is a project to build an encyclopedia. You were notified of this conversation on your talk page as soon as it started and I told you about it on Doc James's talk page as well. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 18:11, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Even reliable sources are being deleted? The part "It is primarily found in honey, propolis, and the passion flowers Passiflora caerulea and Passiflora incarnata, and in Oroxylum indicum.[1]" was sourced to this citation. QuackGuru (talk) 18:41, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I replaced failed verification content with sourced content, among other things. Let's see what happens. QuackGuru (talk) 02:08, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I am shocked how you denigrate those wikipedia pages as being just "personal opinions of some", since I have nothing else to go on, and neither do you (or you would have pointed me to other pages supporting your conviction). That puts you in the miserable position of opposing other editors. Your one sided argumentativeness is unbecoming of a fair and level discussion, and is a sign of bias and prejudgment of me. There can be no argument as to the serious intent of those sensible guidelines about smothering and reverting. They are there for very good reason and it is improper for you to convict me while denigrating other editors and very sensible policies. Clearly a review of this whole matter is needed at a higher level than among bickering editors.

I see you ignored my point about the limitation of MEDRS, which indeed is useful for the world of some food ingredients and 7000 approved drugs that do have a lot of information (MD's are familiar with this). On the other hand, the great majority of billions of separate chemicals lacking data, require holding to a lower level (that pharmacologists and chemists are familiar with). Same dilemma environmental protection and toxicology agencies struggle with. The lower level of MEDRS was already met by my attempted addition of a report of physiological effect from a prime peer-reviewed research journal, so should not have been reverted. As for attracting pharmacology experts, your nonsense rules for doctors and drugs will NEVER attract those who can handle data gaps of millions of other chemical compounds.

I see you ignored my point that prosecutor Doc James protects that page (smothering) for his own personal kind of unsupported speculation (*under lab research" and bodybuilding) that fails MEDRS, so is only selectively using MEDRS as basis of reverting. By the way, the citation I attempted to add falls very much within the sphere of "under lab research" that Doc James is otherwise protecting.

I was only notified of the initial prosecutor's statement, not of any subsequent remarks. So far this conversation is scattered out over multiple pages (chrysin, DocJames, mine, admin) and it's hard knowing where else. Several people voted to support block with no sign of seeing editing history nor my position, so there is a fundamental lack of fairness, which each of you will have to come to terms with. You are ganging up on me and you do no favors for wikipedia doing that.

I have had long commitment to the wikipedia concept of Jimmy Wales, and when you get in the way by overly restrictive reverting, and violate sensible wikipedia guidelines, then I will challenge you as falling into a bureaucracy nightmare. If censorship is your tool for scientific disagreement then you fail the ideals. No matter how challenging and exasperating I am, I am not undermining. If you're not prepared to revert EVERY ONE of my hundreds of editing contributions over the years then you have no business blocking me.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Soaringbear (talk • contribs)

Based on the comments above, I have temporarily suspended the editing privilege of Soaringbear's account. Explanations have been given at their talk page. Alex Shih (talk) 03:09, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Soaringbear, MEDRS may not be as limited as you think. Compare your edit to my edit. You have to read many reviews, including PDF files to expand the content. It takes time and patience. QuackGuru (talk) 15:44, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Disruptive editing by JavierNF96

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There has been an extensive discussion at the Spanish Empire talk page regarding the maps on the page, including a productive RfC. Nevertheless, JavierNF96 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has repeatedly added maps to the page that have been rejected in the discussions, in some cases because the detail on the maps cannot be read. JavierNF96 added rejected maps six times in two weeks, without engaging in the discussion, and while arguing in edit summaries over topics being addressed in the RfC (see 1, 2). (He was blocked during some of that period as well, and he sometimes edits unlogged, as IP 90.94.208.147, which he has been warned about.) He has been asked in edit summaries and on his talk page to discuss but he refuses. He instead stated that he “will not enter into the absurd discussion.” Today he has changed the map four more times, each time reverted by different editors. This is textbook distruptive editing. We have talk page discussions and RfCs specifically to avoid fruitless edit summary arguments. JavierNF96 disregards the discussion, refuses to engage, and continues to make disruptive edits. Laszlo Panaflex (talk) 15:01, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

The response from JavierNF96: "I will not participate in the absurd discussion," along with his 4RR of the day. Laszlo Panaflex (talk) 15:50, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Under his unlogged IP, JavierNF96 has also been edit warring at Voyages of Christopher Columbus -- see warning here. Laszlo Panaflex (talk) 16:26, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Javier decided to nail his flag to the mast using JavierANF (talk · contribs) as well. I have blocked the sock indefinitely, and a CheckUser has disposed of the IP. As for the master, I have blocked him for a week, that may have been an act of inappropriate leniency, considering the prompt appearance of 37.29.237.226 (talk · contribs · WHOIS). Beginning to look like WP:NOTHERE. Favonian (talk) 18:29, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

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

StuRat's behaviour on the Reference Desks (again)

The recent RFC at the Village Pump (moved from ANI) is depicted as a problem with the Reference Desks themselves, rather than a problem that could be solved by "silencing one or the other side". I would argue however that this is exactly the solution, and that it has been for several years at least: ban StuRat (talk · contribs) from the Reference Desks.

Complaints against StuRat date back to 2006, when the Reference Desks were indeed what people accuse them of being now, just a random place where people gave random answers and treated it like a personal forum. Back in those days some editors turned it into a useful Reference Desk with referenced answers, and StuRat was opposed and has been opposed ever since - Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/StuRat

A second RFC was created along the same lines in 2007, when StuRat was mentioned as particularly disruptive - Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/StuRat 2

(A 3rd request for comment in 2007 was started and deleted.)

Last year there was a proposal for sanctions against StuRat here on ANI - Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive283#Proposed_sanctions_against_StuRat

One recent example of unhelpful answers: [132]

I knew that was utter nonsense, easily solved even with a cursory search of information available on Wikipedia, nevermind outside references. This is just one thing that I happen to be familiar with and StuRat is not; other users can point out where he makes obvious mistakes in their own areas of expertise. (But this is in fact the problem – when he responds to everything, there’s no way to know if he’s being helpful or not.)

If we attempt to discuss this with StuRat, he believes that he is being unfairly attacked. Telling him that he is wrong or doesn’t know what he’s talking about are seen as “incivility”. Calling him out on the Reference Desk is seen as “arguing in front of the OP”, which is apparently a great sin to be avoided. As a result it is impossible to discuss the issue with him in public or in private. Adam Bishop (talk) 17:15, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support Strong support (see below) a topic ban from the reference desks, unsurprisingly. StuRat's incompetence and refusal to admit that there's any topic in which he's not an expert, coupled with his obsessively single-minded focus on the reference desks (this year alone he has roughly 5000 edits to the RDs and 500 edits to all the rest of Wikipedia combined) are in my opinion the primary driver of the RDs' reputation as a hive of trolls and incompetents. (I honestly don't even need to provide diffs to support this claim; just pick diffs at random from his contribution history at the RDs.) Given that he's had a decade to do so, I think we've long since passed the point of hoping that he will develop competence over time. Bluntly, if things continue on their present course the Reference Desks will be shut down or moved off-wiki in the relatively near future; without their most disruptive element present, they at least have a chance of becoming the valuable resource they ought to be. ‑ Iridescent 18:32, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Having now seen the comment pointed out below by MarnetteD, changing to "strong support" for a total ban from the RDs at minimum, and I wouldn't be averse to a complete site ban. "Attitude problem" doesn't begin to cover it; if you really see Wikipedia as a "skirmish" in which your task is to defeat "opponents" you're not welcome here, and if you haven't figured this out for yourself after a decade you're never going to. ‑ Iridescent 09:05, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
    • I think the reference to "skirmish" is minimally problematic if problematic at all. Sorry but I think you and MarnetteD have got this wrong. Bus stop (talk) 16:52, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• " the RDs' reputation as a hive of trolls and incompetents." {{cn}}

I've no disagreement as to StuRat. However do the RefDesks really have such a reputation? Andy Dingley (talk) 18:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Certainly, at least among some. While I opposed WP:VPP#RfC: Should the Reference Desks be closed?, the comments of those arguing in support of shutting it down altogether as beyond salvation—and the not insignificant additional support for allowing it to continue to exist but kicking it off Wikipedia—shouldn't be dismissed. ‑ Iridescent 18:33, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support topic ban. The need to "score points" in regard to a deceased Wikipedian here Wikipedia talk:Reference desk#Passing of a great contributor just exacerbates the concerns mentioned above. MarnetteD|Talk 18:46, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
  • I'm surprised by your saying "score points". You are misreading the comment containing the reference to "skirmish". Human interaction is often adversarial. Honesty and forthrightness with a tinge of sadness is what I read into StuRat's reference to "skirmish". I think StuRat is bemoaning the fact that someone he once argued with is no longer on this plane of existence. I think you've got to cut someone some slack when you encounter a colloquialism in their speech. Bus stop (talk) 16:52, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
    • Or "perhaps" I'm reading it correctly. You are free to "cut some slack" or put Lipstick on a pig regarding that post. I, and others, are also free to see it as offensive and note it as such in this thread. MarnetteD|Talk 17:21, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
      • I said he "will be missed", it was Adam's response to mine that was an attempt to "score points" by baiting me into an argument, but I refused to engage in an argument there. StuRat (talk) 17:27, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
        • Offensive, or in poor taste? In poor taste or clumsy? Bus stop (talk) 17:33, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
          • Or just accurate. MarnetteD|Talk 17:45, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
            • No, it is inaccurate. One cannot score points with a deceased person. This is axiomatic. Bus stop (talk) 17:51, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
              • I should have mentioned that your pointing out that StuRat treats the R/Ds as "adversarial" and a place to "skirmish" is a good reason that he should be topic banned from posting on them. That is also a good argument for closing them as that is not what they are for. MarnetteD|Talk 18:48, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• The process of proposing answers, supporting them, and refuting others is necessarily somewhat adversarial. I, unlike many others, do at least attempt to keep it civil. Compare it to a trial, where each side provides evidence, but neither is allowed to insult the other side. That's the best we can hope for. Incidentally, articles are similar, with a somewhat adversarial atmosphere on their talk pages. Again, the best we can hope for is that everybody keeps it civil. StuRat (talk) 04:46, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment I've gotta say, the complaint rings true. I only drop in at the ref desk once a year if that. About a month ago I popped in at Ref Desk/Mathematics and sure enough, here's StuRat answering a question (one that should probably not have been answered at all) with complete nonsense on something he obviously knows nothing about [133] – obvious to everyone but him, it seems. [134] EEng 18:56, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I've sampled StuRat's other contributions and it's true – it's mostly more of the same. It's amazing how free he feels to just spout off whatever pops into his head (sometimes preceded by "I'm just guessing...", but usually not). A particularly amazing example:

What did the Nazis do to people who were ethnically non-Jewish but who converted to Judaism at some point in their lives? Were they killed immediately, were they forced to do hard labor, or were they allowed to denounce their Jewish religion in exchange for getting their lives spared? I know that ethnicity was the main benchmark that Nazis used to determine Jews, rather than religion. Thus people like Edith Stein and Irene Nemirovsky were killed despite being Christians by religion. Futurist110 (talk) 03:46, 9 September 2012 (UTC)

I suspect that "Aryan" converts would be treated as "traitors to their race", so just as badly. StuRat (talk) 03:57, 9 September 2012 (UTC)

To be blunt, who the fuck cares what StuRat "suspects"? What in the world use does he think his lame-brained armchair guess is? In a later rehash of this elsewhere he asserts

My answer is probably right. If somebody finds a source which says that the Nazis treated those who converted to Judaism significantly differently, then fine, but, failing that, my answer is a good best guess. As such, it's better than no answer at all.

No, see, it's not. His speculations are an embarrassent to the whole project. EEng 22:28, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Did you really need to go back over 5 years to find something I said you disagreed with so strongly ? And that "rehash elsewhere" was on my Talk Page, which is the correct place for this type of thing. StuRat (talk) 02:20, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

That's what so sad about it. I picked a random complaint from your talk page, and that egregious example was it. The fact is, everywhere I look in your contributions and talk page it's always the same. Elsewhere in the thread you refer to the various times you didn't just make something up, but that doesn't help. "Your Honor, in response to the allegation that I'm a terrible doctor who just gives patients random advice, here's a list of some patients I didn't kill." EEng 03:05, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Actually, that would be a great defense. If a doctor is accused of killing 5 patients, and he only had 10 patients, that's pretty bad. But, if he had 10,000 patients, and only 5 died, that's not so bad, especially if they were very difficult cases to deal with. Ideally, we'd have stats about exactly how many OP's were happy with my answers, but we don't gather such stats, unfortunately. (There is the "thanks" feature added recently, but I doubt if most Ref Desk posters even know it's there, much less how to use it.) And note that most mistakes don't involve "killing the patient", or, in Ref Desk terms, convincing the OP to never use Wikipedia again. A typical doctor's mistake, like writing a prescription nobody can read, would be corrected by others asking for a clarification, and nobody dies. Same at the Ref Desk. StuRat (talk) 14:55, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Stu - look up QED. -- Begoon 15:05, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

StuRat, To expand on what Begoon's saying, the confusion in your answer is itself evidence of your failure to get what's wrong after all these years. The appropriate analogy is that you're doctor with 10,000 patients; an attempt to sample various patients' records show that in almost every case looked at your advice is incoherent, outside your specialty, and/or downright dangerous; and in response you list 50 patients who received competent care. So no, that's not a good defense. EEng 18:11, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

If it was truly a random sampling, perhaps (but even then you'd need a large enough sample to avoid sampling errors, which is typically somewhere around 1100, not 5). But, I see no reason to think that any of this is random sampling. Take the diffs from 5 years ago involving NAZIs, am I supposed to think that was just a dart thrown at a board ? No, it's not, it's cherry-picking from a very large base, which can be used to support pretty much any position you want. StuRat (talk) 18:39, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I have a degree in statistics, so you can save your amateur ideas about sampling, given that you were able to assert (as I linked above) that statistics is a "field where you can just memorize formulas and apply them". The significance of the Nazi episode, as with the here's-some-career-advice-though-I-haven't-the-foggiest-clue-what-I'm-talking-about incident, is that even now you haven't the sense to say, "Yeah, I guess I was way off base with those." No sampling is needed to conclude from that that (a) you don't know your own limitations and (b) you just don't learn. EEng 20:08, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Was that an invitation to go backwards from the last week and onwards, in order to find similar but more recent issues? That may not have been a wise move. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:24, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support topic ban. I share EEng's observations. StuRat tends to talk a lot of crap on the RDs, to our detriment. That's damaging, and a topic ban might prevent it. -- Begoon 19:11, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support, with slight reluctance. The thread EEng links to just above is a doozy, and it's not the only one. My slight reluctance arises from the opinion that a greater problem is a few individuals whose dominant activity on en:wp is asking inane questions on the ref desks (I'm thinking especially of one registered user and one IP). But the proposed topic ban would at least be a start at improving the SNR at the ref desks. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 19:28, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Strong Support. I really didn't want to end up supporting this, but Iridescent seems to have it just right here. Looking at the recent history of several of the ref desks, I see them swamped by StuRat, answering everything in sight with little competence in the actual subjects of the questions. I also see personal opinions, speculation, off-topic rambling - and even offering nonsensical life advice to someone he doesn't know concerning a subject in which he is clearly not an expert! It's like he's treating the ref desks as his own personal Agony aunt column. I'm sad to say it, but I think the ref desks would be better with not so much StuRat in them. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 20:39, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

  I just want to add a few thoughts, partly based on comments from User:Baseball Bugs, below. At the village pump discussion on whether to close the ref desks, I commented on what I saw as a similar situation. User:Jayron32 then made the good point that what we're really talking about is moderation, and that's something that's most likely impossible using a community consensus model - a consensus-seeking discussion over the appropriateness of each specific question and answer isn't going to be effective, and I can't see how attempts to reform the way inappropriate contributions are handled as achieving anything other than constant arguing and even edit warring. To get to Bugs' comments, I also strongly dislike the idea of excluding editors from parts of the project - and I'm aware of the fact that many of us here don't contribute at the ref desks and so the view that we shouldn't be telling ref desk people what to do is a reasonable one (though I don't agree with it). The problem I see is that, without the ability to formally moderate the desks, all we have (other than closing the desks) is the very blunt tool of excluding problematic contributors (as identified by community consensus). And as the only real tool we have, I think the only hope for the long-term survival of the ref desks is to use it. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:50, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

  PS: I've updated my support to a strong one, after seeing this update from User:Iridescent and reading the linked interaction. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:53, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support. My opinion has not changed since my WP:AN report from last year (linked by the OP), and this is one positive step we can make towards making the reference desks salvageable. Hopefully the first of many such steps? Tevildo (talk) 20:46, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support. StuRat's contributions to the math reference desk (the only part I frequent) are frequently either wrong or vacuous; misunderstanding the question and providing rambling non-answers after someone else has provided a correct, concise answer with references are common. (Diffs available on request of any administrator.) There's lots of crap behavior on the refdesk, but the sheer volume and consistent poorness of StuRat's contributions makes him an unusually problematic contributor. Also, as several people have noted, he is completely hostile to any attempts to change his behavior. Banning him would certainly be a major improvement. --JBL (talk) 20:48, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose a topic ban. StuRat does seem compelled to answer every question, no matter how inappropriate, posted at the ref desks, but he's not malicious, and he has the ability to contribute constructively when he puts the effort in. He's certainly not alone in the answer every question/tolerate all nonsense crowd, and when these questions are closed, he's not the only one to insist on re-opening them. I'd much rather see an admin close/delete the nonsense threads that he chooses to entertain than punish him for good-faith if over-eager contributions, which can also be handled on an as necessary ad hoc manner. Nothing more than admonishment and supervision is called for. A topic ban means admins have allowed the matter of nonsense questions to fester too long, and reflect poorly on the overseers as much as the bait-takers. μηδείς (talk) 20:53, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Noting Wikipedia talk:Reference desk#Straw poll: Topic ban for Medeis / μηδείς for context. — fortunavelut luna 21:03, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

What is the point of your innuendo? You'll notice that the complaint there (closed) was that I remove too much stuff. Does that somehow preclude me from saying admins should be closing nonsense rather than topic banning just a single user who entertains such threads? If anything, the fact that StuRat even voted in favor of banning me from closing nonsense threads (i.e., we are in strong disagreement, not allies supporting each other) would give added weight to my argument that topic banning him is not the proper solution. μηδείς (talk) 21:13, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose, the problem (which does exist, it's not just StuRat here, most editors there include myself are contributing to the problem to some degree) is caused by the way the Ref Desk is set up, which invites forum like discussions. So, what is happening is to be expected. People who have the time to invest a lot of time in the Ref Desk will end up giving their opinions more. If we take a look at the StackExchange website, you see that the format chosen there works better to address this problem. Comments are separated from answers, answers are judged by a voting system and the OP can choose the best answer. Answerers gain reputation points based on the points they get for their answers. What makes the Ref Desk particularly vulnerable to this problem is the fact that there aren't a lot of questions asked compared to the number of contributors. This makes each new question a de-facto new forum topic for the regulars to start posting on. Perhaps we can do one simple thing to improve things, if all Ref Deskers also start to contribute to StackExchange like I've been doing, then that may change the way answers are given in general. At least that's my personal experience. Count Iblis (talk) 21:04, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Seems worth noting that so far both oppose votes appear to agree entirely with the substantive analysis of StuRat's behavior, they just think disruptive behavior shouldn't be sanctionable. --JBL (talk) 21:13, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

yeah, that's kinda where I stand, but I'm starting to wonder ... Stu: being familiar with your hyperactivity at the desks for over ten years now, and being familiar with criticism of your tendency to shoot from the lip for an equal period of time ... I've hardly seen any acknowledgement, let alone change of behavior on your part. At the same time, I've seen you give correct and referenced replies. If you agreed to henceforth think and research before you post (which we cannot check) and include references (which we can), or not post at all when you're unable to do either, I would oppose banning you from the desks. ---Sluzzelin talk 21:21, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Look, if someone, say me, is posting something on the Ref Desk that is disruptive, then the first line of action should be to remove those disruptive contributions. If this behavior by me would persist, then it would be a simple straightforward AN/I discussion that would lead to a ban. So, the solution is to intervene on the basis of clear red lines that are based on truly disruptive behavior. Now, StuRat's behavior is, I think, more about him not sticking to informal rules regarding references the other regulars want to stick to, it's not like his behavior is chasing away the OPs who actually ask questions there. The last time I looked as his talk page I saw a huge amount of positive feedback from such OPs. Should StuRat slow a bit down, especially on topics he's not an expert on? Absolutely, but as long as his contributions are not causing problems, and OPs are able to skip what he's writing if they want references and he's not giving any, then why bother? Count Iblis (talk) 21:26, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Regarding the a huge amount of positive feedback on his talkpage, check the timestamps as he keeps anything vaguely complimentary on the page forever. As best I can tell working up from the bottom, the most recent post on his talkpage that isn't a complaint about his conduct was from you in December 2016, and the most recent post that could be construed as positive feedback is from April 2016. And no, the issue isn't his failure to reference, it's that if he doesn't know the answer to a question he just makes stuff up and then becomes aggressive if anyone points out that he's wrong. ‑ Iridescent 21:39, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

That's not quite an accurate description of my opinion, JBL. I believe the disruption is at root the allowance of nonsense questions (does this suit make me look overdressed?) and requests for advice (how do I open a business?) that should be referred to lawyers and accountants. If such questions were removed, they wouldn't have answers. And currently when such questions are removed, StuRat is far from the only user who will restore them. If Stu gives an off-topic or non-responsive answer, it can be hatted or maybe even, with consensus, be removed on that basis. But the main problem is IP's and newly created accounts adding bullshit to the desks with no oversight. I thing a pending edit system for IP's and new accounts would go a long way to solving a much bigger problem. If trolls couldn't post without review of their questions, we'd have a lot fewer occasions for this behavior. μηδείς (talk) 22:14, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

An alternative to removing a question is to give a curt but well thought out reply. "How do I open a business?" Response: In the USA you might start at the U.S. Small Business Association website. A google search for "How do I open a business?" reveals several other approaches. End of story. No drama. No need to even hat the question. This requires a behavioral change in those fielding questions at the Reference desks. We should take the blabber out of Reference desk threads. We are not Quora. Our Reference desks are an active extension of the encyclopedia. We should be thinking of ourselves that way. Bus stop (talk) 01:19, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support and I look forward to seeing a few other RD regulars removed too as there is far too much social media chit-chat, original thought, and nothing like a real reference desk where responses to questions should always contain links to Wikipedia articles and/or reliable third-party sources. The ref desks have long been a refuge for users who wish to just give opinion, precisely opposite to what an encyclopedia should be doing. The Rambling Man (talk) 22:38, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support If the refdesks were a separate project, it would be fine for them to adopt whatever procedures work. However, as things stand there are too many refdesk enthusiasts for any reform to be possible and removing particularly troublesome contributors is the only solution available. Wikipedia is not the place to pursue liberty or to express the human right of spouting an opinion for every occasion. Johnuniq (talk) 23:30, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support, as User:The Rambling Man correctly points out, answers on the refdesk should be directly related to Wikipedia, and supported by sources or at the least other WP articles. I've just done a spot check of some of StuRat's contribs and while what he says isn't totally unreasonable, most of it is personal opinion that has no real value in building this project. That being said, removing this one editor shouldn't stop us from removing other editors that may be problematic at the reference desk. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 23:38, 28 October 2017 (UTC).
• Survey continues at "Resume !voting", below.

StuRat's response

1) You start !voting before I even have a chance to make a statement ? Is this proper procedure ? Or are you just ignoring all rules ?

2) My account statistics: [135]: First edit: 2005-08-05 (so I've been here over 12 years) Live edits: 87,634 (of which something like 70,000 are Ref Desk edits)

My point is, with this many edits, a few are bound to contain mistakes. When I spot them, I try to fix them (I delete them if nobody has yet responded to them or strike them out and post the correction if they have). However, I'm sure those who want me blocked will cherry-pick my 12 years of contributions to find what they consider my worst answers. To counter that, here's a few of my good answers:

Science Math Computers and Electronics Miscellaneous Humanities Language Entertainment (Note that I provide the entire Q and all answers, not just a single diff, to avoid having one edit be taken out of context, like if the word "not" is initially missed, then added a second later. I wish everyone would do the same.)

As you see, those cover a fairly narrow range in time, as I only collected a list of my good answers for a short time, or this list would be far longer.

3) I believe in a collaborative approach to answering Ref Desk Q's. That is, one response need not be comprehensive. One person may ask for a clarification of the Q, another may suggest a few possible answers, others may look up sources to support or disqualify those answers, etc. If you disagree with a particular answer, say why, and offer sources to support your view, remaining civil at all times. In the end, we often get to the correct answer, with good refs. I may contribute at any of these steps, depending on the Q. BTW, I often contribute refs which others have missed, such as here: [136].

4) I do, however, believe that attacking other editors does not belong on the Ref Desk. Take that the the Ref Desk talk page or to the editor's talk page. That doesn't help to answer the Q in any way. And, civility is important, although I've noticed a great deal of incivility is tolerated, as long as it comes from Admins, but normal users can be blocked for it. So, leave the swearing and insults at home. StuRat (talk) 02:15, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Howdy StuRat. I peaked at your editing pie chart & my goodness, you need to spend way more time on 'main space' editing. Too much participation in any forms of discussions on Wikipedia, is not a good thing. GoodDay (talk) 03:22, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

The pie chart shouldn't matter. He has more mainspace edits than the vast majority of users, and plenty of people contribute to the project in ways that don't happen in mainspace. The issue is treating the Reference Desk like Yahoo Answers, which is an issue with StuRat on the Reference Desk rather than StuRat on Wikipedia... — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 04:06, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

" a few are bound to contain mistakes." - so show us the good stuff. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:36, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I did, under item 2. Are you actually going to look at any of them ? StuRat (talk) 18:22, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Resume !voting

• Oppose my block, obviously, for the reasons stated, or am I not allowed to !vote ? StuRat (talk) 02:15, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. The crux of the problem is not individual editors. The Reference desks should be thought of as an active extension of the encyclopedia. If such a standard were truly applied many more editors would fall short of it. We have not articulated and broadly promulgated guidelines on how questions are to be fielded on our Reference desks aside from a few suggestions. Doing that would be the first order of business, before we go willy-nilly topic-banning editors. StuRat edits in good faith when he fields questions on the Reference desk and some of his responses display great knowledgeability of a topic. And he edits without a trace of meanness. Bus stop (talk) 02:36, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Um, there are Wikipedia:Reference desk/Guidelines.--Wikimedes (talk) 06:46, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose - My rationale for opposing: 1) StuRat's main interest on en-Wikipedia appears to be the refdesks. If their behavior is so problematic, a total block+ban would be appropriate. I suppose that some could suggest a NOTHERE (to build the encyclopedia) ban, that'd be another discussion. 2) The reference desks are traditionally and de-facto more free than other talk pages and articles. Other comments can correct wrong answers or expand on them and some may be hatted by other editors. 3) I evaluated some of StuRat's comments as intelligent and informative, others were more speculative or unnecessary. People have opinions and make mistakes. 4) Other regulars display similar behavior. Attempting to reform the refdesks may be more constructive than to ban select editors. Clear policy-based reasons could then apply if effecting reverts, hattings or bans. On the other hand, it's possible that an overly rigid environment would ruin the welcoming atmosphere of the desks (for posting requests and/or answering them)... In any case, I don't find that StuRat's presence makes it any harder to ask questions or post answers. —PaleoNeonate – 03:12, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

You can't hat topics at the RefDesk. The number of wrong and pointless responses from StuRat is the problem here. Others are to blame for their own actions and we can deal with them as required. Legacypac (talk) 19:44, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose as nothing but the periodic scapegoating that certain ref desk editors attempt. I've had some issues with StuRat's approach, but I take those issues to his talk page. Too many editors feel free to attack StuRat in front of the OP's, and that is not kosher. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:26, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I prefer to see this as a first step to cleaning up the reference desk yuk yuk comedy club. Let's just "scapegoat" each and every funster out the door, starting with this one, and see what we have left. Carrite (talk) 16:30, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Strong Support--Per TRM and Iridescent.And as Lankiveil says, removing this one editor shouldn't stop us from removing other editors who are problematic at the reference desk.Let the reformation begin with his t-ban!Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 06:45, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Once you've gotten rid of anybody who's not in the clique, who will you go after then? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 07:37, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
    • @Baseball Bugs:--Are you willing to clarify what you exactly refer to by the use of the word clique?Regards:)And, I am not going after anybody.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 08:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
      • The ones who have decided that they own the ref desks. They attack other editors in front of the OP and condemn attempts to rein in BLP violations and the giving out of professional advice. And every few months, they try to get somebody they don't like banned. This is one of those times. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 08:29, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
        • I don't believe any-body who is supporting here believes themselves to be the owner of Ref-Desk.This thread is purely about StuRat's frequently-incompetent-mass-answering at RefDesks.And, please don't post random accusations without corresponding diffs.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 08:36, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
          • That's funny. Well, let's start with Kudpung's attack on StuRat in front of the OP, and your defense of that attack.[137] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 08:56, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
            • Lovely! Any prize(s) for being the owner of the ref-desk? Regards:)Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 09:04, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
              • Yes. As a ref desk owner, you get to violate the rules. Tell me what Kudpung's shot at StuRat has to do with answering the OP's question. Wait, I'll tell you: Nothing. So how does he get away with it? Because his name isn't StuRat. That's how. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:08, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Baseball Bugs, you don't even have the common decency to ping me when you are PA'ing me behind my back. So you finally admit that as a ref desk owner you are entitled to violate the rules. That's really all we need to know.. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 09:38, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, I just assumed you had this on your watch list - and the last time I pinged someone I got yelled at for it. No, I do not own the ref desks. I am not part of the clique. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:00, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

No one owns the Reference Desk and there is no clique, but this reflexive assumption that you are being oppressed by a devious cabal is part of the problem. Adam Bishop (talk) 13:15, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

No one is oppressing me in particular. But the clique raises this red flag every few months, in an attempt to get rid of users they don't like. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:49, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I've never looked at the RefDesk until this thread and yet you User:BaseballBugs have turned to making false statements about how I was allegedly almost site banned in retaliation for me suggesting you are part of the problem. This is not a war by one group of users against another - it is various disinterested users who have looked at the policy violating mess a small group of users have created at the refdesk. Legacypac (talk) 19:44, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Support, per Boing! said Zebedee and others. Before I voted on the RfC, I went to the RD because I had I never been there before. Frankly I was appalled with what I found. Apart from a few intelligent answers from a few genuine subject specialists - that also were not to appropriate questions either - what stood out more than anything else were Stu Rat's incessant chiming in wherever he could just to get his name on the thread. His pie chart clearly demonstrates that he has very little interest in building this encyclopedia. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 10:01, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support I was looking into the RefDesk futher after seeing the RFC on closing it when I observed StuRat’s random advice and opinions. I see this is a long term problem, and that he also abuses the refdesk to ask for shopping advice [138]. The fact other editors abuse the ref desk as a forum is not a valid excuse to not deal with a specific user that prolifically posts on topics they know nothing about. Based on the ownership behavior immediately above, we should look at User:Baseball Bugs’s for the next topic ban. Legacypac (talk) 10:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

@Legacypac:, you've linked to an indefinitely blocked impersonator, giving the impression that User:Baseball Bugs has been banned, when it is the troll User:Baseball Bug that is banned. Please correct this. μηδείς (talk) 15:13, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Thank-you. I’ve fixed the link Legacypac (talk) 15:25, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• In fairness, I think (Baseball Bugs, correct me if I'm wrong) that what Bugs is saying is that those supporting a ban on StuRat are trying to take ownership of the ref desk, not that he's the owner of the RD so should have final say over to whom and when the rules apply, although I agree the wording is ambiguous. Assuming the former is what was meant, that's a legitimate point of view ("why do all these outsiders think they know better about how to solve the problems than someone like me who's spent a lot of time there and is more familiar with it?"), even if it's a view with which I disagree in this case. ‑ Iridescent 10:27, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• I don't know what Legacypac is talking about, although he himself is demonstrating some ownership just within the last hour or two: This, [139] for one; and also this, [140] which was reverted by an admin. I don't own the ref desks by any stretch. I am not part of the clique. When the subject of whether to close the ref desks came up, I gave it a "soft support" on the theory that closing it down would at least remove the recurring scapegoating that goes on there (and here too, at present). ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:04, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I woudn't personally use the fact that they were "closed by an admin" as particularly proof-laden; it was a poor series of reverts, and rather embarassing, frankly, from one with advanced permissions. But I get your general drift. — fortunavelut luna 12:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Unfortunately, this is par for the course. What starts as a small request (get Medeis to stop closing Ref Desk threads for reasons like "this doesn't need to be archived"), spins completely out of control into attempts to close down the entire Ref Desk, and now ban particular users. Asking Admins for help is like summoning a Golem, they end up just trying to destroy everything. This has happened before. And the reason to mention that it was reverted by an Admin is that these reverts will likely stand, while if a normal user dared to revert him, they might get blocked for it. StuRat (talk) 16:56, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support Mainly per Boing! and Iredescent, whose collective reasoning I find wholly convincing. I note too that the opposes are more opposing action against the ref desks as a whole rather than a specific editor; they are not therefore opposing the actual question. StuRat is unfortunately- but clearly- as an editor, one the RefDesks will find themselves the better off without. There are of course others, of a similar vintage- some of whom have commented in these proceedings- and I have no doubt that similar concerns will be raised regarding them in the future. That way, perhaps the desks will remain open and actually contribute to the encyclopaedia. Iridecnt, I think you are correct in your reading of BB's comment- to those remarks I find myself tempted to answer that if those who have been there such a long time haven't yet managed to solve the issues, then they probably never will! — fortunavelut luna 11:19, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support Too many problems. Paul August ☎ 12:15, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support - Wikipedia is not Yahoo Answers. Many people have tried many times to reason with StuRat to stop shooting from the hip to answer as many questions as possible, but to no avail, and this is where things are now. Sadly, I think that StuRat means well and I don't doubt that there are some people he has helped, but he's shown no interest in changing his guesswork approach to the desks. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 15:09, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support topic ban - It's time to clean up the reference desk. I took a quick, random spin through some of StuRat's edit history and saw lots of personal opinions offered to trivia questions, which might be an entertaining pursuit but which certainly doesn't help build an encyclopedia. I also found THIS, in which when someone attempted to remove a thread started by a troll about whether someone can "burn their own fluff with a blowtorch." StuRat reinstalled the garbage with a call for a topic ban for the remover. Well, the shoe's on the other foot now. Let's get this guy out of that section as a first step to cleaning up the shop for what it is supposed to be for — a venue for legitimate questions to be asked and factually answered. Carrite (talk) 16:25, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support TBAN as per above. A reasonable approach to improve the signal-to-noise ratio, and necessary as no lesser remedy is likely to be effective. Procedurally, indef with a 6 month wait before an appeal sounds right. power~enwiki (π, ν) 16:45, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support TBAN. From the diffs below and the comments here, it is clear that StuRat has exhausted the community's patience over many years. Ultimately, his approach to this project and RD suggests that he's WP:NOTHERE, but I'd prefer to give him rope. No reason to ban him from non-RD pages unless he causes disruption there. agtx 18:03, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support temporary ban from the refdesks. One of the reasons StuRat continues to disrupt the RefDesks with wild guessing and providing factually incorrect information is that the community as a whole has never told him that he can’t. Many editors have asked him many times to stop, but he also has his supporters. If the community as a whole finally decides that StuRat needs to reform his RefDesk behavior, he should be given the opportunity to do so.

It should be clear to anyone looking at StuRat’s talk page that there is a problem, but often a problem is brought (inappropriately) to StuRat’s attention in RefDesk mainspace rather than on his talk page, and often his bad answers are simply ignored, so one must go to the RefDesk to really appreciate the scale of the problem. Here’s a recent example of a wild guess that turned out to be wrong [141]. See the hatted portion of full thread for the disruption that it caused.

While many editors have expressed dismay at StuRat’s wild guessing and incorrect answers, few point out exactly which guidelines are being violated. (To their credit, the RefDesk regulars do not seem to be a particularly litigious bunch, or maybe I just don’t frequent the right drama boards). From the Wikipedia:Reference desk/Guidelines: “We expect responses that not only answer the question, but are also factually correct, and to refrain from responding with answers that are based on guesswork.” Everyone is entitled to get an answer wrong once in a while, and even the occasional speculation can be useful. StuRat takes a more extreme position and actively defends his right to throw out wild guesses. Amongst the myriad complaints about StuRat’s RefDesk behavior, try to find him acknowledging that he has some responsibility for the quality of his own answers.

This is already too long to read. More diffs on request.--Wikimedes (talk) 18:52, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

If you have any suggestions for any way to get StuRat to understand what just about everyone here is telling him and to get some commitment to change his ways, I'd love to hear it (and if I thought it was realistic, I'd support it enthusiastically). But every response I've seen so far from him is "I'm right, you're all wrong". You can't get someone to change their ways if they won't even consider that they might be doing something badly. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:53, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't have much to add. I agree that StuRat's inability to admit that he is doing anything wrong is a huge problem. But sometimes people can do what they have to do, even if they don't like it. I don't think anything less than a temporary TBAN will get him to reform, and it will probably take a long one. But as far as I know, in StuRat's decade of problematic behavior at the RefDesk, this obvious solution has never been applied. This is largely due to StuRat's resistance to even the suggestion that a change is needed, but I think the TBAN does need to be given an opportunity to work the first time it is tried.--Wikimedes (talk) 01:09, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose I recognise the problem, for sure. However the ref desks are clearly close to StuRat's heart and I'm unwilling to call for a topic ban on such as yet. Instead I'd like to see some sort of formal advice to StuRat, with their agreement, that they would only respond appropriately to refdesk questions, adding material where they can contribute positively with some degree of accuracy, and/or where they can be this by reliance on external material (either WP or off WP). No specific restriction on asking questions.

If that doesn't work, revisit the issue here after a while, and I'l support a TBAN. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:40, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• OK, on the basis of the section and my comment below, I think this is unworkable and so I'd now support a TBAN. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:46, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• • Comment I would support such a proposal (a form of editing restriction rather than an outright TBAN), provided it was clear that any significant violation would lead swiftly to a TBAN without having to go through this sort of discussion again, and, more importantly, that StuRat acknowledges his behaviour is unacceptable. I don't see him doing that in his current contributions to the discussion, or any previous discussions of the same issue. Tevildo (talk) 22:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support topic ban and StuRat can appeal after six months. If he shows that he has been answering questions appropriately with references at other venues then this would go a long way in convincing the community that he has reformed and could return to the RefDesks without returning to the old behavior. Other venues where he could help include the teahouse, the resource exchange (great place to supply answers that have been looked up) or the help desk if he stays focused on helpful answers without excess commentary. There are plenty of other places to help and folks here might be willing to provide more suggestions. Some have called for the RefDesks to be shut down and others have opposed them but even they call for reform. If the RefDesks mean that much to him, he should be willing to step away from it for its own best interests. In six months time, if there are still problems at the RefDesks no one will be able to blame him for those.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 21:31, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• For those keeping score at home: so far there are 0 people who have stepped forward to defend StuRat's edits as a net positive for Wikipedia. --JBL (talk) 21:57, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
  • To do this right, you'd need to look at all of StuRat's edits for some interval, such as the last few weeks. Then look at the edits of other users for the same interval. Then see what percentage of each user's edits actually help lead the OP to the right answer, assuming there is a right answer. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 07:09, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose I am of much the same opinion as Andy Dingley. I will note that sturat does have quite a collection of barnstars and thankyous for answering questions, so certainly he gets a good answer in there sometimes. However there are also several barnstars for humor. So it would be good if the large number of unhelpful answers are avoided, and answers are only given where he really has a good answer. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:02, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

  As I suggested to someone else, if you have any practical suggestions for how to actually get him to avoid all the unhelpful answers and only reply when he has a good answer, let's hear them - I'll support you if you can come up with something feasible. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:59, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support temporary topic ban: I believe in a collaborative approach to answering Ref Desk Q's (StuRat, above). That means you acknowledge the existence of a Ref Desk community. Nobody can remain a member of any community with impunity from its norms, protocols, procedures, policies, practices, laws or guidelines. Yet your behaviour time and time again puts you in the spotlight of criticism. Yet you always defend yourself.
  I have never seen you say: Hmm, maybe you guys actually have a point. Maybe I could take a look at my modus operandi and see where I could modify it, so that I won't forever be having to defend myself from the complaints of my colleagues.
  If all the critics don't actually have a point, what are their criticisms actually all about? Personal dislike of you? someone they've never met and will probably never meet? Hardly. What else could it be? You tell me.
  But then, maybe you like being in the spotlight of criticism. Some people are like that. They have a deficit need, and will accept - nay, go out of their way to attract - any attention, no matter how adverse, as long as the focus is on them. To prolong the spotlight, they will argue for as long as there is breath in their body, never giving an inch. I suspect that this is the case with you. But whether that's the case or not, one thing is sure: You have to change. If a topic ban is what it takes to get you to see this, then so be it. I don't believe I've ever voted to ban anyone from Wikipedia before. There's a first time for everything, I guess. I do this reluctantly, because you do often play by the rules. But a murderer cannot be excused from the weight of the law by arguing they've been kind to countless little old ladies. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:09, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Actually, I do take advice from others, as I just did here, striking my comments from Baseball Bugs' talk page: [142]. Note that the editor I took the advice from was actually civil, making it far easier to listen. StuRat (talk) 04:54, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Yet you always defend yourself. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 06:07, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• When you're attacked, do you defend yourself? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 07:04, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Not when I realize I'm in the wrong. EEng 07:19, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• The form of defence I'm talking about is complete denial. If 50 editors told me that over a period of 10 or more years I have consistently violated the acceptable practices of the Ref Desk, my response would not be "I'm the only one in step". That is, effectively, StuRat's response to all such claims. We never get to first base with him. We never hear from him that there are things he needs to take responsibility for. He will happily pull out numerous examples of where he has done something other than what is being claimed about him, but that still leaves the multiple cases where the claims are accurate, yet he never accepts any criticism of his behaviour in relation to those instances. It's "I'm right when I don't do X, and I'm right when I do do X". The remainder of the Ref Desk community has a different view.-- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 07:30, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• This sort of argy-bargy, where someone points out in some detail exactly, precisely what is wrong with Stu's posts, and receives a tsunami of denial-based arguments in response from him, has been going on for at least a decade. Here is an exchange from 2012 that shows nothing has changed since then. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:43, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support - RD responders should not draw primarily from personal experience and knowledge. You won't find those words in the RD guidelines, but they clearly can be inferred from those guidelines, the massive amount of discussion over the years, and common sense (i.e. personal "knowledge" is too often incorrect). This has been stated countless times, but some editors either can't grasp the concept or don't care about it for reasons I won't speculate on here. StuRat debatably has been the most "prolific" in that regard (I'm not going to debate that), and his responses here demonstrate that he still can't grasp the concept or doesn't care about it for reasons I won't speculate on here. I stayed out of this until I saw that. This TBAN is an important first step toward reforming the desks that the community, at WP:VPP, has decided we must keep and reform. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:13, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• @Mandruss the guidelines may not have those exact words, but they do have "Do not offer answers on topics on which you are not qualified. If you are unfamiliar with a topic, it's recommended to stay out of the discussion, unless you are posting directly factual information such as link to a Reliable source confirming details previously posted by others. Opinions should generally be avoided unless justified in response to sourced material, or quoted (with appropriate citation) from them". They also have "Our standards on verifiability, neutral point of view, or no original research should be kept in mind on the Reference Desk, as well as the rest of the project … answers should be verifiable, that is, to the extent the questioner wishes to verify that the answer is not fabricated, there should exist a reliable source (or sources) that would give the same answer". If you look back to when those guidelines were written, you'll see StuRat edit-warring to try to remove the prohibition on personal speculation and the requirement for answers to be based on referenced sources (see here for one of many examples), so he can hardly claim he's unaware of what the guidelines say. ‑ Iridescent 22:51, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Wow, you had to go back 10 years to find those. I deny your characterization of that as edit-warring. We were all modifying the guidelines at that time, as we were developing them. StuRat (talk) 00:53, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• StuRat demonstrates the uselessness of "Do not offer answers on topics on which you are not qualified", which presumes that one always knows whether they are "qualified" on a certain topic. "Opinions should generally be avoided" similarly presumes that one can distinguish between their opinions and fact (in my opinion, such a person is in the minority among the general population). But we are in agreement that the words "clearly can be inferred", and that StuRat should have long ago inferred them. ―Mandruss ☎ 23:02, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support topic ban preventing StuRat from participating at RefDesk. As well, the RefDesk procedures should be changed so that throwaway (non-)answers can be suppressed in some fashion, for instance by voting positively on the good answers. Binksternet (talk) 22:18, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support per Iridescent, TRM, Boing! etc and StuRat's very behaviour in this thread. I have no idea how many flying insects may have died as I have researched this issue but I may have been responsible for a few as I've sat here open-mouthed with amazement. - Sitush (talk) 00:48, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support per Carrite and the diff provided. If you can't tell that a discussion about lighting up your own flatulence, or any other bodily excretions/accumulations, isn't the purpose of an encyclopaedia (or a refdesk), then you have absolutely no business being here (or there). It's a shame the RfC to get rid of the RefDesks isn't going to pass. I am aware that not everything contributes to the construction of the encyclopaedia, ahem, we are here after all. Mr rnddude (talk) 01:13, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Neutral - Since it is apparently the consensus of the Wikipedia community that we need Reference Desks, as the RFC to close them down is failing, removing one editor who responds too often when the whole Reference Desk concept doesn't work is an inadequate answer. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:47, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• @Robert McClenon: Of course it's inadequate; I don't think anybody has said StuRat is the only problem with RD, or even the only editor who misuses the desks in that way. Just try to imagine the "fix all RD problems" package proposal. Better yet, just try to put one together. ―Mandruss ☎ 02:06, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment - Now perhaps some editors who strongly opposed closing the Reference Desks see why some editors favor closing them down. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:47, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Baby ——— Bathwater. Carrite (talk) 03:17, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment - The baby is deformed. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:24, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support Diffs are concerning to say the least. The behavior around the ref desks (pointless speculation, disparaging comments, etc.) seem rather out of place when put into the context of the rest of the wiki and the policies which apply to them. Stikkyy t/c 04:48, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support Although I supported closing the reference desks, there is no consensus for that. It is quite clear, though, that there is widespread concern about how the reference desks have been run, and a desire for reform if they are to be kept. A key aspect of reform, in my opinion, is removing all of the highly problematic "regulars" from the reference desks. This discussion has shown a problematic and troubling pattern of behavior from StuRat going back a decade. I actually like the guy and find some of his speculations amusing and thought provoking. But Wikipedia does not need and should not allow speculation. StuRat just doesn't get this, so I have concluded that he should be topic banned from the reference desks. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:16, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose with reservations I don't want Stu to take this as thinking that I approve of his style on the refdesks in general. As others have noted, he seems to feel compelled to answer almost any question, whether he has anything worthwhile to say about it or not. This can be really pretty annoying. He actually does know quite a lot about a wide range of topics, and if he would limit himself to answering only questions where he does have special expertise, I think he would still get to contribute a fair amount, and would be a genuine asset. It's his signal/noise ratio that's way too low. But that's pretty squishy grounds for a topic ban. --Trovatore (talk) 09:35, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Reluctant Support at this point, because User:StuRat is just digging himself a hole. I have seen this too many times, where a user was brought to a drama board and made the case against themselves. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:24, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
  • That's why Galileo was banned, he kept digging when the Church said he was wrong. Count Iblis (talk) 20:19, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support StuRat's behavior in this very thread tells the whole story. EEng 19:03, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support topic ban, with no opinion about the duration between a month and indef, as a way to (1) prevent immediate problems and (2) allow constructive editing of WP. If nothing else, for the exchange with yours truly at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Archives/Science/2017_April_13#Laser_pointer_reflected_light_harmful_to_eyes_in_close_proximity.3F that starts with Maybe you can tape some red plastic sheets to your safety goggle to reduce the amount of red getting through, where it is no exaggeration to say that their advice could get someone blinded.

Their suggestion was based on armchair speculation, which is not great, but is on par for lower half of RefDesk responses; it turned out that it was a very dangerous course to follow, but that cannot be known beforehand (of course, it is still a problem if done repeatedly, but again this can be passed off as "RefDesk tradition" though it is not). The big problem in that exchange is that when told the suggestion was inefficient, dangerous, and that laser safety was a dangerous subject to make uninformed suggestions on, they doubled down on their position.If you know a thing about laser safety, you know who was in the right in that exchange; and if you do not, put yourself in StuRat's shoes when being told that your advice was disastrous with an explanation and links: what would be your reaction? If they cannot admit they did something not only stupid but dangerous, they will keep being a danger to people who ask questions on the RefDesk. This is orders of magnitude worse than just being unpleasant background noise or unhelpful cluttering of the page. Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 20:57, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support topic ban Holy shit. I just read the "advice" that StuRat posted in Tigraan's link above. As someone who has spent over 15 years working with lasers, especially high power ones and 6 of them spent with pulsed lasers with average powers between 20 and 100W, 3 years as a laser safety officer StuRat's responses made me shudder and would have had me immediately revoking his access to all of the labs that I managed. I would also like to state that quite a few of the answers in that thread are actually plain wrong. If this is characteristic of his responses on the Ref Desk, then I support the topic ban. Blackmane (talk) 22:54, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support topic ban especially in the light (no pun intended) of the utter irresponsibility of StuRat's 'advice' on laser safety, but mainly for so many diffs others have presented showing their RefDesk responses are mostly WP:OPINION and Wikipedia:Complete bollocks. These inputs would NEVER be accepted in any Wikipedia article, yet so much boyish/laddish chit-chat on the RefDesk on matters of serious concern ought to worry everyone who cares for the reputation of Wikipedia. Propose indefinite topic ban, or at least until such time as the Reference Desk is itself reviewed by ArbComm and run akin to all other Wiki Projects, with proper checks, balances and tests of competency and appropriate support and administrative sanctions. That wouldn't be bureaucracy - just common sense. Maybe then StuRat could be a useful contributor once more. Nick Moyes (talk) 04:09, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support topic ban. StuRat's presence at the refdesks has been ten years of aggressively defending his entitlement to fill the desks with unprincipled, ignorant and unhelpful ramblings. Enough is enough. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:09, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support as a co-initiator of the 2006 and 2007 attempts to fix the refdesks, 10 years is long enough. Hipocrite (talk) 19:05, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Points of Order

1. Where are the diffs? This discussion was started with links to previous discussions, but not a single diff pointing to disruptive behavior. Afterwards, we get a link to a 5+ year-old comment offering speculation about Nazi treatment of converts to Judaism which StuRat openly admits is speculation (i.e., he doesn't make a bad-faith claim as if it were fact) and a perhaps tastelessly worded but still admiring comment about a deceased editor. There's even a link giving the appearance of evidence offered if you don't follow the link to see it is to the same editor's previous comment. This is hardly conclusive evidence of disruption.
2. Define "disruption". We have a score of assertions above calling StuRat disruptive. Disruption is normally taken to mean edit-warring, vandalism, changing or deleting other's comments in bad faith, deliberately posting off topic, false, or inflammatory comments. StuRat has been accused of none of this.
3. RfC? This is not being conducted as a proper RfC. If this is not a kangaroo court (and plenty of people above have admitted they have their knives out) we should start over with a properly formulated RfC with notifications and so forth, not just a piling on of editors who state their agreement with the opening, not-supported-by-diff assertion that StuRat is disruptive.

μηδείς (talk) 15:27, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Err. No-one says it is a RfC. Some previous RfCs have been mentioned, but this appears to be an ordinary, run-off-the mill report to AN/I in which the usual procedure is report>bollocking>sanction. Which may or may not be the outcome here I hasten to add. Afterall, since when did we prejudge AN/I reports. Hope this helps! — fortunavelut luna 15:39, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

If this is just a normal case, then where are the recent warnings, and where is the escalating series of blocks? What we are looking at here are calls for an indefinite topic ban without any intermediate steps. Again, we need the diffs of the disruption, and to follow the forms, not a pile-on with knives drawn. μηδείς (talk) 15:50, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I didn't say it was a normal case, rather, a normal report. I.e., not a RfC. Cheers, — fortunavelut luna 16:01, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm not aware of any policy requirements for there to be any recent warnings or escalating blocks before the community is allowed to discuss a proposal for a topic ban - but the OP did list some previous discussions of the alleged disruption. Also, there actually are some diffs offered in various places here, but the general consensus so far seems to be that so many of StuRat's ref desk responses are problematic that there's no need to list them separately. Having said that, I'll have a look through his recent ref desk posts and I'll find some for you - I'll post them below, shortly. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:05, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I refuse to believe that you (Medeis) are actually unaware of his issues, but for the benefit of the tape here's a bunch of diffs of him spouting shit of various kinds or talking purely to hear his own voice, taken from dip-sampling his contributions over a randomly-chosen two day period: [143], [144], [145], [146], [147], [148], [149], [150], [151], [152], [153], [154], [155]. (All from 10–11 October; chosen to be recent enough to demonstrate that this is a current issue, but prior to the recent ANI and VPP threads in case those were either causing him to be on best behavior or to double down on his disruption in order to try to prove some kind of point.) You'll get roughly the same signal-to-noise ratio from his contributions over any random period over the past decade. This isn't a case of a single, unambiguously terrible comment that demands immediate action; this is about the cumulative impact of what's literally a decade of inappropriate comments, incorrect answers, and generally treating Wikipedia as his personal blog. ‑ Iridescent 16:40, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I did not in any way claim to be unaware of Stu's infuriating, juvenile, POV-laden, obsessive behavior, Iridescent; only to be of the opinion that those raising charges have to provide the evidence.

That being said, with this diff reverting @Legacypac:'s archival of a WP:NOTAHOWTO violating thread, I am disinclined to defend Stu any further. I still oppose an outright topic ban, but some sort of shot across the bow is called for.

Yet the underlying problem remains the inaction by admins and the failure to delete and salt this trolling by IP and newbie SPI's. μηδείς (talk) 20:31, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

You can't just provide diffs, you need to explain exactly what Wikipedia policy each of those violates. Some were jokes, do you oppose all humor on Wikipedia talk pages, or just all humor on the Ref Desk ? Is there a Wikipedia policy which supports this ? (I believe we did decide to wait for serious answers first, before adding jokes.) Most were serious answers. For example, one person wanted to update Wikipedia to add the term "nose blindness" to it, since they saw that term used in TV ads. I explained why we can't allow TV advertisers to define the names of Wikipedia articles, with examples. What policy does this violate ? I could go on to defend the rest of those diffs, if I knew what you were actually complaining about in each case. StuRat (talk) 17:16, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

And that answer illustrates your lack of self-awareness better than any diff ever could. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:41, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

This isn't an RFC, it is an AN/I complaint. A righteous one. Carrite (talk) 16:35, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

An attempt to WP:CANVASS has been posted here. The wording is non-neutral. That could be changed of course. MarnetteD|Talk 17:29, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I have changed it so. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:43, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Thank you Boing! said Zebedee. MarnetteD|Talk 18:52, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

It wasn't an attempt at canvassing, I didn't say "please !vote for me". It was a notification, and I welcomed them to !vote either way. And why exactly didn't you people think the Ref Desk should be notified, anyway ? StuRat (talk) 00:33, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

If after 12 years you still cannot see why that message was inappropriate, the likelihood is that you should not be editing anywhere on WP, not merely facing a topic ban. - Sitush (talk)

Diffs? try this thread: WP:Reference desk/Science#Hydraulic motors Andy Dingley (talk) 11:05, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Again, you don't say what you found wrong with it, and I said I agreed with you that hydraulic cars are not going to happen. Do you disagree that one of the disadvantages of hydraulics is that they are temperature sensitive, so commonly require a warm up period prior to use ? StuRat (talk) 18:57, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

This is insane. You seem completely oblivious to what people are telling you, and just keep digging and digging and digging. EEng 19:02, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

No, it's not insane because there are two separate issues when examples like that are raised. Normally at AN/I the focus is on behavioral issues, but the problem now is that the examples are StuRat's answers to RefDesk questions and that brings in the baggages about whether he was correct to answer that question in the way he did, you can't just say that he was wrong. The argument that a someone is wrong because many people say so doesn't hold water in science. So, the core problem with this whole AN/I case is that we're not dealing with the usual behavioral case like someone throwing insults all the time, or reverting too often etc.. Count Iblis (talk) 20:17, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Good point. One cannot fault someone for responding with great frequency if there is a high level of quality in the responses overall. Bus stop (talk) 20:41, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Luckily this hypothetical situation is not relevant to the present case. --JBL (talk) 00:10, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Some examples and diffs

As some people have asked for specific diffs, I've been through some of StuRat's very recent contributions to the ref desks and here are a few, with my opinion on what's wrong with them. I'm offering actual threads in addition to specific diffs - as StuRat himself rightly said, context is important:

1. Here we have a first response that is not remotely close to an answer to the question asked, and then a response to a request to get back to the question which simply offers his own personal speculation.
2. Here the question is "Is there any research on the cognitive abilities of seagulls?", and we get this reply which answers a completely different question, and then after further non-answer general discussion it ends up with stuff like this.
3. Here someone asked a very specific question, and we get anecdote about his own PC followed by off-topic discussion that does not address the OP's question.
4. Here we have someone asking of numbers of flying insects are declining, and StuRat pops in to tell us "I've personally killed some 500 box elder bugs in my house this fall". Who cares?
5. Simple question, yet we get this personal rambling that in no way helps to answer the question, followed by this hatting when someone else suggests that his personal speculation is not useful - ironically saying "Meanwhile, we are drifting farther from the OP with such discussions" while excluding his own off-topic chat from the hat and so showing little sign of self-awareness.
6. Here I don't have the faintest idea what the question means, but User:Joel B. Lewis seems to think StuRat's answer is a bad one, and then StuRat gets the last word in while hatting the objection, again hiding criticism of one of his answers. And ironically again, only seeing any off-topic nature in other people's contributions but never his own.
7. This one is more indicative of the problems generally with the ref desks, in that it would have been easy to use weight/calorie calculators to estimate the likely stable weight of someone consuming 3,800 kcals per say at the usual specified levels of activity. Sadly nobody did this, but we also have the unsourced (and highly contentious) claim by StuRat that "all calories aren't the same" - and the "Your best approach might..." does not even attempt to answer the question.

I could go on, but I've no doubt I'd just find more and more of the same stuff. Now, none of the above is, in itself, anything especially egregious - and I'm happy to say that StuRat has provided some good answers too. But the problem is that StuRat's contributions, whether he knows the answer or not, are unrelenting. His approach reminds me of the 'know-it-all' that everyone tries to avoid at the pub (or bar) who cannot resist interjecting themself with unjustified authority into every conversation. Even that wouldn't be too bad if StuRat could listen to others and accept constructive criticism, but he can't - criticism of his answers is "off-topic" and quickly hatted, while he can't see the off-topic nature of many of his own contributions. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:36, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• I'm just going to add this, uncovered by User:Carrite above, which reverts the removal of blatant trolling and shows arrogant ownership of the ref desks = from en editor who regularly hides criticism of his own edits. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:24, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
• I'm also copying to here the selection of diffs found by User:Iridescent, which cover the single 2-day period of October 10/11 - [156], [157], [158], [159], [160], [161], [162], [163], [164], [165], [166], [167], [168].

  Please, don't anyone complain that you have not been given enough diffs now. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:29, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• As I mentioned there (and you failed to copy here), diffs with no explanation as to what Wikipedia policy has been violated are meaningless. As for reverting deletions, everyone is allowed to do that, it doesn't imply ownership.
• Now for those listed above:
• 1) The OP contained a suspect assumption, that all servicemen and women attempt to pronounce foreign names correctly. I showed that this is not always the case.
• 2) The mirror test is one way to gauge animal intelligence. Once they had that term, they can use it in their searches to see if it has been applied by researchers to seagulls. The funny aside at the end is in small text, showing it's not meant to be an answer to the Q. I added this after serious answers, including mine, had been supplied, in accordance with Ref Desk policy.
• 3) This was a serious response about how using a PC to time events on that PC may not be as reliable as using an external timer.
• 4) This is an example of how human population growth can affect flying insect numbers. Multiply the effect each person has on flying insect numbers by world population, and the effect may become significant.
• 5) The OP may have started with the assumption that all, or most, Muslims speak Arabic. I corrected that assumption. My point 2, specifically, was repeated by Jayron later in the thread, because it had been hatted by then. I hatted only the part of the discussion that seemed to be leading off into unrelated territory, namely Bible translations.
• 6) You really shouldn't produce a diff as evidence of something when you admit you have no idea what it means. The issue was whether to provide only an analytic answer to a math problem, or also propose the numeric methods solution. While the OP did request the analytic solution, that doesn't mean they wanted to exclude the numeric solution. I asked him after, on his talk page, and he said they had no objection to my answer. As for hatting, this type of attacking other editors doesn't belong on the Ref Desk at all, but I left it there, hatted, precisely so I wouldn't "delete criticism" of myself.
• 7) The crux of my argument was that trying to determine what people's weight should be, based on calorie count alone, is a faulty method. I listed several reason for this, as did others. So, this Q can not be answered. Here's a source from Harvard saying that not all calories are equal: [169]. I'm going to add it the that Ref Desk Q now, too. (Too late, it's already been archived, so I put it on the talk page of the person who requested the source, instead.) BTW, you seem to suffer from the same error as the OP, in assuming that a given caloric intake will inevitable produce a given, stable weight. There's simply no evidence to support this. Weight is based on many factors, and calorie intake is just one among them. To come up with such an answer would require faulty assumptions. See spherical cow. Now some might argue, that if it's unanswerable, it should just be deleted. I disagree. We should explain precisely why it is unanswerable, instead, so the OP learns something. StuRat (talk) 18:47, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Rather a specific- not to say massy- discussion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi (talk • contribs) 09:39, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The stable weight of a person's body is based solely on mass/energy in and mass/energy out, regardless of any fad bullshit unless you know how to break the laws of physics (and you have completely misunderstood the science behind that article). And it would have been very easy to provide average expectations of stable weight based on a given daily calorific input and various general levels of output. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:42, 29 October 2017 (UTC) That's just the type of answer we don't want to give, and if I gave such an answer, people would use it here as a prime example of why I should be blocked. (MASS IN) MINUS (MASS OUT) isn't quite a correct way to calculate current mass, since the initial mass would also need to be considered. But, the Q was about a constant amount of calories in, not mass, so that's all quite irrelevant. Next, if everyone had very similar levels of calorie expenditure each year, then it might be reasonable to assume some average figure. But the calories burned by each person vary dramatically, and even vary with weight (it takes more calories to do many things when obese), so such as assumption is in the spherical cow range of unreliability, and any answer we came up with would be in the wild-assed guess (WAG) range. StuRat (talk) 22:14, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Oh, come on Stu, you are completely misunderstanding or misrepresenting what I said. I did not say "(MASS IN) MINUS (MASS OUT)". I used "mass/energy", and a steady rate of "mass/energy" in and "mass/energy" out will result in a steady body weight. If in is greater than out, weight will increase until basal metabolic rate increases sufficiently to utilize all of the ingested kcals. Similarly, if out is greater than in then weight will fall until a new equilibrium is reached. And in both cases, we come to reasonably accurate generalizations that form the basis of those weight/kcal calculators. You suggest you are sensitive to the possibility that "if I gave such an answer, people would use it here as a prime example of why I should be blocked" - can you really not deduce from that that when you have no idea what you're talking about you should possibly just shut up? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:35, 29 October 2017 (UTC) You're still using "mass/energy", as if we somehow need to consider the conversion of mass to energy and vice-versa here. There are no nuclear reactions in the human body having a significant effect on weight, and your use of that term makes it look like you really don't know what you're talking about and should take your own advice. StuRat (talk) 22:41, 29 October 2017 (UTC) No, I'm not talking of nuclear reactions at all, I'm simply including all of the mass and the calorific value of food. Food goes in (it has mass and calorific value), and mass (poo, CO2, liquid waste) comes out and energy is burned. The net result is what changes body weight. As for not knowing what I'm talking about, what is your expertise in the subject? This is not an 'argument from authority' thing, but I do have a BSc in Biochemistry. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:50, 29 October 2017 (UTC) But, again, this Q has absolutely nothing to do with how much mass is consumed, and you don't seem to understand this simple fact. You could drink a huge mass of water and not gain weight. This is why the OP didn't ask anything about mass consumed. I am rather suspect that you have such a degree, or you should know this. And you stating that your info is more reliable because you have a degree in the field is precisely an argument from authority. StuRat (talk) 22:58, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Yes, obviously, because you would pee that water out again and the net in/out balance would be zero - duh! But over any studied period, *all* inputs and *all* outputs need to be considered to assess net effect on weight. Please stop embarrassing yourself by exhibiting your ignorance, because it's getting painful to watch - and having said that, I'm going to stop watching and go to bed, good night. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 23:06, 29 October 2017 (UTC) One possible way to calculate current mass would be to look at masses in and out, but, again, THAT HAS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS Q. This Q is about calories in, not mass in or out. StuRat (talk) 23:14, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Sigh, yes, but the point that you are still failing/refusing to understand is that once a mass in/out equilibrium is established (ie when catabolism matches anabolism), a weight equilibrium will also be established, and it will be reasonably close to what the standard kcal/body weight calculators say - and an answer along those lines would be a reasonably factual answer to give. As an aside, have you looked to see how your performance here is affecting the !voting? You should. And that really is goodnight. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 23:23, 29 October 2017 (UTC) But, yet again, this all depends on calories burnt, and the OP provided no way to even estimate this. Thus you are left with a WAG. StuRat (talk) 00:35, 30 October 2017 (UTC) An actual and correct answer would be: E.g. a 25 year old male of 5'10" with a 3800 Calories/day intake could weight about 619.3 pounds taking only the BMR (basal metabolic rate) into account.--TMCk (talk) 21:36, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Exactly, and other variations could have been offered for folks of different dimensions, ages and activity levels. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:16, 29 October 2017 (UTC) And how would you justify ignoring all other metabolic processes ? StuRat (talk) 22:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC) FGS! Click on the fucking link and calculate it by yourself.--TMCk (talk) 22:32, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Then I'd need to make the same highly suspect assumptions you made, or different highly suspect assumptions. Garbage in, garbage out. Just having a button to run a calculation doesn't make the underlying assumptions any more reliable. StuRat (talk) 22:45, 29 October 2017 (UTC) One thousand and one face palms.--TMCk (talk) 23:16, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Depending on what assumptions were used, you would get wildly different answers, and none of them would be of any use to anyone. This is why neither I, nor the others who responded, attempted such a thing. We understand the futility of trying to provide a numeric answer to such an open-ended Q. StuRat (talk) 22:20, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Can I ask you what is the basis for your understanding of "metabolic processes"? Do you have any educational qualifications in biochemistry? Any professional experience in such a field? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:39, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Actually, no, never mind. All of your answers are unequivocally demonstrating the problems that others are seeing in your misplaced sense of infallibility and your inability or unwillingness to listen - I could not possibly support my case for a topic ban better than you are doing for me. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:43, 29 October 2017 (UTC) (I already wrote my reply before you struck it out.) What about your qualifications ? You are making all sorts of arguments on how that Q can be answered, but do you have any qualifications to do so ? From the quality of your answers, I'd wager the answer is no. But, Wikipedia doesn't actually require any given degrees to contribute to articles, since when they tried such an approach, it failed miserable. I believe the same policy applies at the Ref Desk. StuRat (talk) 22:49, 29 October 2017 (UTC) BSc Biochemistry, MA Philosophy. Yours? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:51, 29 October 2017 (UTC) See my response above. StuRat (talk) 23:02, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Ouch, StuRat, that's a boomerang moment. Many of us are qualified beyond standard university degrees, we don't need to prove it to you, because we use articles and links to substantiate our responses. You don't. Your OR is actually what we should be avoiding at the ref desk. Once again I support this motion, and I also support the idea that a few other OR-respondents at the ref desks should be subject to the same sanctions. The Rambling Man (talk) 22:55, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Re: (4). Are the Ref Desks somehow exempt from WP:OR? They shouldn't be. - Sitush (talk) 19:38, 29 October 2017 (UTC) Certainly not in asides, like that was. You need to be able to distinguish between the main answers and when people just add something amusing at the end. Do none of you ever say anything funny, as an aside, ever ? Typically we use small text to show that this isn't the main answer. StuRat (talk) 22:25, 29 October 2017 (UTC) I could speculate that the more people there are, the more shit we produce, and therefore the more flies there are - but I'm not going to try to answer a factual question by extrapolating from the weight of my own shit and counting how many flies I kill. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:47, 29 October 2017 (UTC) If you had measured an actual increase in their numbers as a result of, say, using an open sewage ditch, and had a number to report, then you something useful to contribute. Of course, in that case they may have just been drawn from other areas, too, so that doesn't automatically mean their numbers increase, while the flying insects I killed aren't going anywhere, so their numbers definitely went down. StuRat (talk) 22:37, 29 October 2017 (UTC) So you killed 500 bugs, and you think that is in any way statistically significant when according to some there are an estimated 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 insects on the planet? That the biomass of ants alone exceeds that of all the humans that have ever lived? That there are more insects in one square mile of empty field than there are people in the world? (source = quick Google search). Get a grip. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 23:29, 29 October 2017 (UTC) First, we aren't concerned with all insects, only the flying kinds. Next, people are very unevenly distributed on the planet, as are insects. So, human populations likely have very little effect on insects populations in unpopulated regions of the Amazon, but major impacts in cites. Since this Q was about people noticing a lack of flying insects, and most people live in cities, that's the most relevant place to look at effects of human activity on flying insect populations. Bees, in particular, seem to be having problems, and not just near cities. See colony collapse disorder. StuRat (talk) 00:40, 30 October 2017 (UTC) "Most people live in cities" - really? When > 70 per cent of India's 1.2bn population are rural and urban does not necessarily mean city etc, I think even that statement might need a source. - Sitush (talk) 00:46, 30 October 2017 (UTC) [170]. (And that's 3 years old, and the world is steadily becoming more urbanized.) StuRat (talk) 02:32, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

With respect to point (6), the issue with StuRat's answer is that it is not in any sense an answer to the question asked, something he appears not to understand even at this late date. For the non-mathematical, one way to see this is to note the words "implicit curve" and "partial derivative" appear in the question but not in the pseudo-answer. (Separately, I have changed the reference above to point to my actual username (which is different from my sig, sorry of the confusion).) --JBL (talk) 21:39, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

As you suggested, I asked him if he was dissappointed or angry at my answer. He said he was not, and welcomes all attempts at answers. It's not for you to now go and try to override his response because you didn't like it. I did as you suggest, now accept what he said. (I haven't linked to his response because he really doesn't want to get dragged into all this unpleasantness, but you've already seen it and responded to it.) StuRat (talk) 22:31, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

So, in the last diff everyone acted like StuRat but... "but we also have the unsourced (and highly contentious) claim by StuRat that "all calories aren't the same"". But that's a correct statement that can be easily cited from the literature. The attitude taken by other posters when they see an unsourced statement is see if they can cite it themselves for the sake of providing refs, even if they happen to have a different view about the subject, and if they really care about sources, instead of wanting to use lack of sources as a stick to fight out disputes. Count Iblis (talk) 23:31, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Source. Count Iblis (talk) 00:37, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• On the basis of this last section, TBAN. This was a chance for StuRat to recognise that there was a problem here and to offer some insight into it, with maybe an agreement to observe the stated constraints of the RefDesks in the future. Instead we get a displacement into arguing over calories and a further attempt to demonstrate that his approach of finger-in-the-air WP:OR is right after all.

StuRat, you are not right here. Your approach is not welcome here and will no longer be tolerated. Either it goes, or you do, and from this thread it doesn't seem that you're able to drop the vague unsupportable handwaves. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:45, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

But his approach did yield the most accurate answer, i.e. all calories are indeed not the same, that's actually highly relevant to the question asked and it can be sourced from a large number of sources. If you get most of your calories from fat then you're going to struggle to maintain your weight if you eat a lot. If you get most of your calories from whole grains, you can eat your stomach full every day and you'll not get overweight. The reason is that a high carb low fat diet will contain much more nutrients that your body needs for metabolism, you'll find it a lot easier to exercise thereby burning a lot more energy. Fat is more difficult to burn for the body, it can get into muscle cells and there it will cause the mitochondria to become less active and you'll also lose some of them. So, your metabolism will actually slow down if you increase the fat content of your diet. This is all well known stuff that doesn't need to be cited, and certainly not overruled based on the simplistic "calories in - calories out = weight gain" idea that is not even wrong, and arguably is the cause of the obesity epidemic where you have all these fat Americans who get ever fatter as a result of calorie counting and eliminating carbs from their diets. Count Iblis (talk) 01:08, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Source. Count Iblis (talk) 01:17, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Sure, and if a high fat diet lowers your metabolism, that means it reduces the calories burned over any comparable period. It lowers the "calories out" part of the equation and "calories in minus calories out" still holds. Similarly, if someone is getting most of their calories from whole grains, and they eat their stomach full every day and don't get overweight, that's because they're reducing the calories in, and again "calories in minus calories out" still holds. It can't work any other way, because energy can not be created or destroyed - if it goes in the body and does not come out, what happens to it? Yes, different diets are better for losing weight than others, but that wasn't the question. The question asked what weight people would be if their daily kcal intake was 3,800, and for a person who is at a stable weight at that calorific intake it is possible to work out an approximate estimate of that weight - which is what those calculators can do. And what specific foods they are eating does not make a lot of difference - for a person of stable weight, they are burning all 3,800 kcals regardless of the source. Of course, if the person is in a weight-gain or weight-loss phase, all bets are off, but at least the "stable weight" example would have been a helpful answer - and is probably what the OP wanted anyway. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:07, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I'd like to see a source supporting the idea that a constant amount of calories in will lead to a stable weight. This would require that the individual burn the same number of calories each day, which is a highly suspect assumption, considering how activity levels often change on weekends, on vacations, and in winter, when cold weather forces us to burn more calories to stay warm. The more reasonable assumption is that these increased activities do burn more calories, and that people who manage to maintain a stable weight do so by modifying their caloric intake. That is, just as people get thirsty after sweating a lot, they get hungry, and specifically for high-calorie foods, after periods of high activity. Also, you don't seem to have considered that food can pass through partially undigested, so the "energy in" part is thrown off. And, also, digestion itself uses lots of energy, with some foods requiring a substantial portion of their energy to digest. See negative-calorie food (that name may be overstating the case, but there definitely is an effect of a larger portion of the calories from some foods being used in digestion than others). Also see specific dynamic action. So, again, it's an enormously complex system, and you can't just say if you consume 3800 calories your weight will be X. StuRat (talk) 18:43, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

A double wammy of inaccuracy by StuRat [171]. Problem #1 Asserting commissioned salespeople are not reliable sources of information is dead wrong. While StuRat appears to think he is an expert on every topic with no evident advanced expertise in most topics, I have extensive experience in several areas. I was a realtor working on commission and I always provided the very best info I could dig up. As a developer I bought hundreds of millions of dollars of real estate, goods and services. Nearly every commissioned salesperson I’ve dealt with provided the best advice and info they could, and the better job they did the more likely I was to order. Problem #2 a fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose of Wikipedia project pages including the RefDesk. This is typical of his inappropriate posts at RefDesk, and instead of falling into policy he doubles down. Legacypac (talk) 02:43, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

So you use OR instead of refs to refute my claim, which referenced our conflict of interest article ? Why am I not surprised. And, just to clarify, just because a conflict of interest exists in that they make more money if they sell you additional stuff you don't need, that doesn't always mean they will act on that conflict of interest. But it does mean you should treat their advice more suspiciously than those who won't make a profit from giving you bad advice. StuRat (talk) 02:58, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm not answering any question, I'm pointing out StuRat's is giving worthless incorrect advice on who to listen to. This should not be tolerated. He needs to be stopped by Tbanning. Legacypac (talk) 19:26, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Who's going to stop you, though? Are you still banned from creating articles? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 10:29, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Stay on topic

It's important that this discussion remains focused, StuRat has made thousands of edits to the ref desks, and it's fair to say that most of them are without encyclopedic foundation or verifiable reference. The Ref Desks need a serious shakedown, it's been true for years now, and it has to start with those who use them as social media, or personal opinion galleries. Wikipedia should strive to provide answers to real questions at the ref desks with links to Wikipedia articles or, worst case, external links. We should avoid personal opinions, that's not what encyclopedias are about. The Rambling Man (talk) 22:51, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Ideally, every response should have a reference. But what does one do with questions that are either too vague or are unable to be referenced? Delete them? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:58, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Again, stay on topic. That's not pertinent to this current issue. The Rambling Man (talk) 23:00, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

You brought it up: "Wikipedia should strive to provide answers to real questions at the ref desks with links to Wikipedia articles or, worst case, external links." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:24, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Re: "it's fair to say that most of them are without encyclopedic foundation or verifiable reference." No, it's not. Prove it, or don't make such a claim. StuRat (talk) 23:00, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

You summarily fail to provide either links to Wikipedia articles or links to reliable sources. That's precisely the problem. If you did, this ANI thread wouldn't exist. Simple as that. The Rambling Man (talk) 23:03, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

No, I regularly provide those, you just conveniently cherry-pick those cases where I didn't. You claimed that MOST of the time I don't, so either prove it or retract the statement. StuRat (talk) 23:11, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• So, show some counter-examples.

• I already did, in my response section. Those good answers don't necessarily all reference Wikipedia articles, as some Q's, like finding a math error, don't require refs. But many of them do have good refs. If you want something more recent, we have this: [172]. StuRat (talk) 02:37, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

@Bugs / TRM, what one does with vague questions is to give the best answers possible within a vague scope. But that is a long way from the blanket "I must answer something" woffle from StuRat. They are miles apart. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:49, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Or not answer at all. But just like in real life, if someone asks you a question, you have an innate desire to try to answer it. Maybe StuRat more than some others. From time to time, we see arguments that only answers with citations should be given. But that is insufficient. For example, on the entertainment desk just today, someone asked about umpires overturning reviewed calls. One editor gave a referenced answer, but it was only partial information. I posted the arithmetic which led to the OP thanking the both of us. However, the OP is a ref desk regular, so it's not surprising he gave feedback. If a question is vague, it should be hatted. And then the hatter will get yelled it. It's an endless cycle. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:12, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

And it won't likely be the OP doing the yelling, since he couldn't care less. It will be those who fancy themselves the ref desk owners - the clique. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:16, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

If vague we can ask the OP to clarify, then hat if they don't respond. StuRat (talk) 02:23, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

A good idea, and probably something the clique wouldn't stand for. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:12, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

The question is how bad that really is in the larger scheme of things. The complaints about not sticking to the fine print of Wiki-rules are coming from mostly outsiders and some Ref Desk contributors who are known to be very strict with the rules and for calling out others when their very strict red lines are infinitesimally breached. I've experienced how forums like e.g. Physicsforums went down the drain precisely because the mods and contributors started to fight each other about such issues when there was no real issue w.r.t. the answers to questions given, other than "the rules". Other websites where they take more relaxed attitude w.r.t. to "the rules" became the prominent websites of today, e.g. StackExchange, Quora, Yahoo Answers etc.. Now, we can say that we're not StackExchange, we're not Quora, we're going to stick to our holy rules. But given that the OPs who ask questions at the Ref Deak can just as well go to the other websites, that's a bit like the East German politburo worrying about people not sticking to communist doctrine when the wall has been breached. They took the decision to disband their State, so I think we should just go about the business of answering questions in a more relaxed way as they do everywhere else.

If StuRat behaves in a disruptive way as judged from the perspective of OPs who don't care about the small details pf the rules we have, then that's a problem we do need to deal with. But otherwise, we should calm down and focus on giving good answers. We should not sit in judgment ourselves of what is a good or bad answer, let the OPs decide and listen to their feedback. Count Iblis (talk) 23:16, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

If any. Too often, the OP's provide no feedback at all, leaving it to responders to try to figure out what the OP is asking for. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:34, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Thats true. Perhaps if the "Thanks" button was part of each signature instead of having to go to the edit history to find it, we might get more feedback that way. StuRat (talk) 02:20, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

We should never try to figure out what the person is asking. That is guessing what the question is. Better to ask a question in return. Brevity is also important, in my opinion. I don't think a troll likes a curt answer. A carefully chosen source provided for the potential troll is also a good idea. In my opinion—and I know some will think I'm crazy for suggesting this—but I think we should in essence troll the troll. Turn the tables, at least provisionally, on a suspected prankster. There are problems associated with hatting and deleting a question. I think we need to hone the art of properly fielding all questions. We should only hat or delete when it is utterly clear that there is nothing useful in the inquiry. Even when the question is not a trolling question—and we often don't know from the outset—all benefit from clarifying the question. Bus stop (talk) 17:55, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

If there's a small number of things they could mean, we could answer them all. For example, in this Q, they asked about the "largest" snake species, which could either mean longest or heaviest, so I listed both, with sources: [173]. Of course, if each answer is very long, then we probably don't want to take this approach. StuRat (talk) 19:19, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

That is true. Bus stop (talk) 19:38, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• A corollary of being limited to ten posts a week with a ref for each is that Stu would be prohibited from unhatting hatted discussions, since the act of unhatting does not inherently come with a ref. Are you prepared to accept that implication StuRat? μηδείς (talk) 22:01, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

StuRat's Proposal

I'd think we could come up with some form of "voluntary probation", with rules for me to follow, such as:

1) Provide at least one relevant reference (inside Wikipedia or outside) to each Ref Desk Q to which I respond. (Note that many Q's only need one ref, to the relevant Wikipedia article.)

2) Limit responses to 10 Q's per week.

I'd like to hear other suggestions, but it should be something measurable, like number of refs, to avoid endless bickering over matters of opinion. Also, I'd like to hear time length proposals for this period. StuRat (talk) 19:56, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

StuRat, that's a great pair of suggestions. I'd much prefer you to implement your suggested rule (1) and if you did so, I wouldn't worry at all about rule (2) because your productivity and usefulness would excel, far beyond many of the ref desk regulars. If I had my way, rule (1) would be indoctrinated into ref desk behavioural guidelines so voluntarily adopting it would be an excellent start. Perhaps this could be adopted and the impending Arbcom case could be delayed while we give it, say, a month's trial. If we do adopt rule (1) either just for you or across the Ref Desk as a whole, we should also mandate reliable sources be used, because this is an encyclopedia and we should work hard to avoid giving our readers incorrect information, which I have personally witnessed, horribly, many times in a single response (not from you StuRat, but another Ref Desk regular to which this kind of restriction ought to apply). The Rambling Man (talk) 20:04, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

3) Stick to facts. Never give your opinion. Just like on a Wikipedia article. I'm not sure a voluntary solution is going to fly with all the support for a topic ban already in place though. Legacypac (talk) 20:12, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Yep, while the above two suggestions are welcomed, I'd want to see that too - a major part of the problem is personal opinions, guesswork, speculations and irrelevancies. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 20:15, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Doing 1) will go a long way toward 2) because by looking things up instead of immediately writing up a response from memory, you're going to be slowed down. Count Iblis (talk) 20:24, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• IMO no, it shouldn't be something measurable; I can't believe that despite the wall of text above you still can't see that the issue isn't the number of comments you make but the number of inappropriate comments you make. Either you're following Wikipedia's rules or you're not; we don't issue quotas for disruption. This proposal as it stands would give you a blank check to continue your speculation, joking and off-topic chatting provided you make one referenced statement somewhere in your response. At minimum, I'd expect I will not make any statement at any page with the prefix Wikipedia:Reference desk/ that is not referenced to an existing Wikipedia article or an external reliable source as defined by WP:RS. (Feel free to play around with the wording; Any statement I make at any page with the prefix Wikipedia:Reference desk/ will either be a quote or paraphrase of an existing and linked Wikipedia article, or will be written and referenced to the same standard to which the same statement would be held were it to be included in a Wikipedia article might also be a workable wording.) If I had my way some variant of this would apply to everyone at the RDs, but baby steps.

  I'd also expect any proposal to make it clear that this is a genuine last-chance offer, not a voluntary agreement which you're free to disregard; I'd suggest either Any uninvolved administrator is authorised to place: revert and move restrictions, interaction bans, topic bans, and blocks of up to one year in duration, or other reasonable measures that the enforcing administrator believes is necessary and proportionate for the smooth running of the project (which is the exact wording Arbcom would almost certainly place on you were this escalated there), or Failure to abide by this restriction will result in 24 hour blocks, escalating to lengthier blocks if the violations continue which is a fairly standard wording for community-imposed restrictions, although In the event of a breach of these rules any uninvolved administrator can unilaterally issue a topic ban of up to one year from any or all Reference desks or some variant would also be workable. ‑ Iridescent 20:25, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Strong support This is a very encouraging step on your part Stu. I would strongly suggest we take the approach (in this whole issue) that The Rambling Man (talk) advocates in his post above, coupled with Iridescent's proposals we may be on the way to a solution. I would however, strongly suggest that you adhere to Iridescents' strong and precise caveats and accept them. We may be on the road to a solution not just for you StuRat, but the wider RD issue. Irondome (talk) 20:49, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Moved to Oppose based on Stu's continuation of behaviours which has brought us here in the first place, and what appears to be a 'reluctance' to take on Iridescent's proposals in their entirety. I thought this whole re-opening was predicated on that..Irondome (talk) 19:10, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• I can see that working (with the above wording for infractions), but with both restrictions, not only #1.

The problem is that while the spirit of #1 is sufficient, what can be enforced is its letter, which will be satisfied with wikilinking the first noun of every post. Now, of course, this is not what is intended. But the problem is not StuRat being an evil genius who devised a fantastic self-restriction proposal in the knowledge that only the toothless part will be applied; the problem is StuRat being a human who cannot help but give speculative answers without searching. So I am fairly sure that if only #1 is applied, after a couple of weeks/months of good RefDesk behavior, they will slip into their old habits again, though obeying the letter of the restriction.

Adding #2 will break the "post first, search later" habit because if StuRat keeps doing it, it will be the end of their weekly posting after one hour, and both consciously and unconsciously this will be felt as undesirable. The 10/week threshold may be a tad low, but it must not be much higher either - it must have tooth to prevent the current modus operandi from kicking back in. Maybe it won't work because StuRat will just reduce their presence here and slip back into old habits as I described - but it is certainly worth a try. Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 21:19, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Note that I did suggest "relevant" references for part 1, so that would preclude linking to the first noun (unless that happened to be relevant). StuRat (talk) 21:32, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, I read that, but it is not really enforceable. Here's an over-the-top example:

Imagined exchange with a "relevant" link that does not solve the issue at all.
Newspapers say the Sun will be obscured by the Moon next day. What will I see? --Questioner This phenomenon is an eclipse. If you put sunglasses on, you will be able to look at it and see a ring of light around the Moon's shadow. It is quite beautiful actually. --StuRat <angry uncivil rant about how looking at the eclipse without eclipse-approved glasses will get you retina damage> --Tigraan

The link is absolutely relevant: it provides information the OP probably did not have. The problem is that the part of the answer that really, really needed research is unlinked, so the link is not relevant in the sense that matters. Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 22:14, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment. Having thought a little about this, I think it suffers from the big flaw that StuRat has really still not accepted or addressed the actual problems raised with his ref desk contributions, and has not accepted a single error in any of the examples shown - the complaints really aren't about the lack of sourcing. And the new proposal would still allow him to continue providing opinion, speculation, guesswork, providing he can find a source (and you can probably find a source for just about any opinion out there with a very quick Google search). Again, Iridescent has nailed it pretty well, and his strict interpretation is, I think, the only approach that has a chance of working. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 21:46, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

  I need to just add that understanding and accepting the problems is key here - if StuRat goes back to the ref desks actually still thinking that everything he had been doing has actually been fine, we'll be back here quickly (even under this proposal) because nothing fundamental will have changed - and if that happens, there surely won't be a last last chance (but there will be a lot more drama). Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 21:53, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

In that section StuRat proposed to take on fairly stringent restrictions. Maybe I am naive about their motivations, but I think they heard the sound of pitchforks. Yes, in an ideal world they would admit their mistakes more directly, but I am not sure that forcing a public confession is really productive, especially if (armchair psychology alert) they are too proud to do it and would rather vanish from the project altogether. Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 22:24, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I know what you mean, and I agree with your point about public confessions. But my fear is that through all of this, I've not seen even the smallest hint of any actual understanding. But maybe it is actually there. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:39, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• While I still think your examples weren't very good, in particular #7, I do occasionally misread a Q, and thus answer a Q that wasn't asked. This can particularly be a problem when there's a huge volume of responses to the Q already, which got offtrack, and by the time I get through all of that I should reread the original Q to get back on track. (This can be easy to do, as you yourself got offtrack, talking about mass in and out, when that had nothing to do with the Q.)
• I occasionally reply on topics I'm unfamiliar with. This isn't always a problem though, such as if I just provide a link to our Wikipedia article on that topic and ask if that answers their Q.
• I do occasionally add jokes. Whether this should be allowed is an item of dispute, with some apparently thinking there should be absolutely no jokes on the Ref Desk ever, and others allowing it. I particularly think it's useful if the joke/adage relates to the answer, such as "Don't ask the barber if you need a haircut", instead of a rather dry discussion of the conflict of interest involved in doing so.
• I do occasionally add OR/anecdotes, as do others. Seems like it does have it's place, though, such as "I've found PubMed to be a useful source for such info, so you might want to look there".

However, I do always attempt to be helpful, and remain civil, even when others are uncivil towards me. Incivility on the Ref Desk, and in Wikipedia in general, seems to be widespread and widely accepted. That I don't agree with. StuRat (talk) 22:45, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment I.m.o., StuRat should seriously consider contributing to other sites like StackExchange, Quora etc., doing so will automatically cause him to spend less time here, also the feedback he'll get at these other more prominent sites will come from a much larger group of people. Part of the problem at the Ref Desks is that because it's typically the same few people who are arguing, one tends to ignore that feedback. You get disputes there for the same reason why people at e.g. a base in Antarctica will get into disputes after a few months there. The discussion here at AN/I isn't all that helpful either, while people who are hauled to AN/I for disruptive behavior do get feedback from a larger group, in this particular case the larger group aren't his peers as they're not Ref Desk regulars and the issue isn't the typical sort of misbehavior that's usually discussed here. Count Iblis (talk) 22:45, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment - When so many editors are peeved with one's participation in any given area? it's best that that individual stay away from the area-in-question. It's not a matter of who's right or wrong. It's a matter of there's a lot of angry editors. GoodDay (talk) 22:54, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Comment - Worst-case scenario would be the problem we face everywhere else on Wikipedia: the notion that any source is better than none, and that whatever source the editor randomly picks up is the best and greatest source, even if they have no idea what they're doing or how to distinguish a good source from a bad source. Then Stu will think his job is done, he's provided a source of whatever dubious relevance, and we'll have endless bickering about why he's still giving bad answers to everything and no recognition from Stu that he's done anything wrong, because surely we can all agree he followed his own proposed solution...I'm speculating and predicting the future of course, but can you really imagine it going any better than this? Adam Bishop (talk) 23:45, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - I'm sorry. The time for StuRat's change-of-heart was years ago—before a whole lot of disruption on the desks, before there was a widely-held sentiment to shut down the desks in part because of StuRat's behavior, before it became a TBAN proposal at ANI, before that TBAN was a near-certainty. It's not in the community's interest to encourage editors to ride the system until reasonableness is the only remaining choice, consuming an enormous amount of community time in the process. My Support for the TBAN stands, and I think we would have to get a re-vote from every one of the participants to date, or a similar degree of participation and consensus from others. ―Mandruss ☎ 02:35, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support - I'm sorry. This is not a penal institution. I commend StuRat's ability to suggest his own limitations. I like to give credit where credit is due. I think many of his posts on the Reference desks were at least acceptable. And I think there is a dearth of guidance on how we are to react under a variety of circumstances concerning types of questions that come our way on the Reference desks. StuRat is one aspect of multi-problematic area of editing just as the whole (successful) encyclopedia is riddled with problems. We succeed by addressing problems and resolving to do things differently in the future. Bus stop (talk) 03:07, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose, per Boing! said Zebedee, Tigraan, and Mandruss. StuRat has still not admitted that he's in the wrong, and the proposal would, IMO, openly invite finding loopholes in the restriction - we don't want to get into a Jonathan Wild / Brian Haw situation here, where we try and craft a rule that circumlocutes around "Do not behave like StuRat" and only then ban StuRat for violating it. If this proposal had been made five years ago, then perhaps it would have worked, but that point has long been passed. At best, we'll be back here in a month or two arguing about the precise wording of the restriction; I think we should cut the knot now. Tevildo (talk) 07:37, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Comment While this is a step in the right direction, it does not address the core problems of guessing, speculation, lack of factual correctness, and sharing irrelevant ideas. A rough idea of how to address most of this is:

StuRat

1) will not guess or speculate on the RefDesk.

2) will ensure that his posts are factually correct.

3) will provide a reference or references that clearly show that his posts are factually correct, with the usual exceptions for WP:SKYISBLUE, but be cautious.

4) StuRat’s posts will answer the OP’s question. (StuRat may ask the OP for clarification. StuRat may provide a reference that answers the OP’s question without answering the question himself.)

5) limit his responses to 10 Questions per week.

StuRat’s proposal to limit the number of questions he answers is a good one since it will cause him to spend more time on each question, and (one hopes) give a better answer.--Wikimedes (talk) 08:23, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support StuRat's proposal, and also Wikimedes just above, Though if the other restrictions are followed the 10 per week limit need not apply. However 10 per week limit will also give enough time to research better answers! Graeme Bartlett (talk) 08:39, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

@Graeme Bartlett:, literally nothing has been preventing StuRat from better researching answers and generally not posting low-quality nonsense before now. --JBL (talk) 21:48, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

So it would be good for StuRat to start following his proposal right now, or even better Wikimedes's inclusion of no speculation or guessing. It could give a chance to avoid a topic ban. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose this proposal, support full topic ban as proposed earlier. StuRat's promise to include "at least one reference" is invalidated by the proven fact that he doesn't know (or pretends not to know) what a reference is. I've seen him aggressively defending postings of his that were (as usual) crammed full of personal opinion and speculation, on the specious argument that somewhere in there he had included a wikilink, which he thought constituted a "reference". As long as he shows no understanding that references need to be supportive of the substance of the actual answer as related to the question, not just supportive of some tangentially related factoid that his flight of fancy came up with, this proposal will only lead to continuous testing of boundaries. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:06, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support, the problem with StuRat is analogous to the Atheist who lives in a deeply religious village and who has insulted people because he doesn't bother to go to Church on Sunday. A proposal to kick him out of the village has gotten massive support, but the Atheist has made a compromise proposal, he says he's going to attend church every Sunday. As we can see in this section many people agree that this is good enough but some are saying that since he doesn't really believe in God, he shouldn't be allowed to stay. Count Iblis (talk) 09:23, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Count Iblis, your comparison is puzzling on multiple levels. Do you actually intend to imply that StuRat's entitlement to behave on the refdesk in any way he damn well pleases is comparable to the upholding of freedom of religion, and that people's attempts to stop him from doing this are comparable to religious persecution and bigotry? And are you implying that an offer to make a show of honoring the letter but not the spirit of a sourcing rule should be taken as satisfactory just like honoring church just for show should be enough to placate the bigots? You've got some explaining to do here, mate. Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:48, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • StuRat did not say or imply that he has an "entitlement to behave on the refdesk in any way he damn well pleases". Nor did he say he would only honor "the letter but not the spirit of a sourcing rule". StuRat referred to his proposal as "voluntary probation". Our article on Probation says that "During the period of probation an offender faces the threat of being incarcerated if found breaking the rules set by the court or probation officer." He suggested "rules" that he will follow during a period of "probation". We can't misconstrue his suggestion to mean that he will do as he "damn well pleases" or that he will honor "the letter but not the spirit of a sourcing rule" because if that proved to be the case then he would fail probation.
      What some are failing to understand is that proper functioning on the Reference desks is not a cut-and-dried, formulaic thing. In my opinion this happens to be constantly open to interpretation. That means that anyone fielding questions is on "probation". That is not something to be afraid of. A person's "answers" are open to review. Clearly there is an upswell of critical opinion being expressed of StuRat's functioning on the Reference desks. But the way forward should not be to topic ban him. That is a recipe for our own ignorance. We need to hone our critical abilities as concerns the assessment of responses on the Reference desks. We've got to cut him some slack and use the Wikipedia talk:Reference desk Talk page if further problems are identified. Bus stop (talk) 14:33, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • read this and take the example of someone who wants to be nude in public. That person may well be right but society will likely think otherwise. The nudist then makes the proposal to wear clothes, but some in society don't think that's good enough because he still holds on to his belief that there is nothing wrong in being nude. Count Iblis (talk) 20:45, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose StuRat’s proposal as insufficient. Paul August ☎ 10:58, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose per Future Perfect at Sunrise, Paul August. I could maybe be moved to support if Stu incorporated Iridescent's wording in his voluntary proposal, but all of it, not just a "cherry-pick" of the bits he thinks will leave him more free to post his unsupported opinions and generally irrelevant chatter on the RefDesks. Otherwise that just needs to be imposed. I also note he's still posting irrelevant, speculative blather there, even as this conversation continues. What Stu thinks about how the future of space probe costs will unfold is not anywhere near an RD answer to the question currently asked, it's just self-indulgent forum-like chatter. Looking at that thread does remind me though, that Stu is not the only problem. Iri's "baby-steps" could profitably be speeded up. -- Begoon 11:31, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose per Begoon's diff which indicate StuRat may not actually understand what is happening here: to carry on with precisely the same behaviour during the course of a discussion as the behaviour that initiated that very discussion is, to be charitable, rather ill-considered, and gives no guarantees that SR will be able to abide by his own proposal. Sorry, — fortunavelut luna 12:06, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose as a waste of everyone's time. Even though StuRat has seen the way this discussion is going, he still keeps speculating. agtx 14:26, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

It's rather difficult for me to follow rules, in the interim, which haven't been agreed to yet, until there is some consensus for what they should be, so I think I'd better just stop contributing to the Ref Desk altogether until we get this worked out. I haven't heard many suggestions for length or probation. The one I saw said something like "a bit more than 10 weeks". So, 12 weeks maybe ? More ? Less ? What does everyone think is fair ? As for what to include, we have my 2, an additional #3, then 5 more, and Iri's text. Do we want all that, or is some of it redundant or unneeded ? StuRat (talk) 15:16, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

The message seems quite clear to me. The vast majority want you to stay away from the RefDesks. Likely a good idea, to follow that request. GoodDay (talk) 15:22, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Honestly, what is wrong with you? You're already supposed to know not to speculate, to be sure your posts are factual, to provide references, and to answer the questioner's actual question. You shouldn't need to wait for those things to be specially repeated just for you. And no, not for 12 weeks; FOREVER. Why are you wasting scores of editors' time clinging to your personal hobby of goofing around the RefDesk babbling whatever pops into your head EEng 15:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose, per Boing! said Zebedee, Tigraan, and Mandruss. This is just an attempt to WP:GAME the system. I note that there is no mention of consequences for violating the restrictions. Unless there are blocks of increasing lengths (including an eventual indef) for violations - this is meaningless. Also six months away from the R/Ds is the only way to begin any solution to this. MarnetteD|Talk 18:37, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose, as per others. Stikkyy t/c 18:42, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Comment - @StuRat: I started my TBAN !vote with the statement, RD responders should not draw primarily from personal experience and knowledge. You did not dispute that. To my mind, the statement applies to each individual comment in an RD thread, not only to one's treatment of the entire thread. If a comment draws primarily from personal experience and knowledge, you don't make it. Do you now agree with this and agree to abide by it? Are you prepared to make that dramatic change to how you participate on the desks? Do you honestly think you're capable of doing so? ―Mandruss ☎ 18:43, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Agreed. Is that one of the terms already listed, or do we need to add it to the list ? StuRat (talk) 18:46, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• The whole “I can change myself” facade isn’t really convincing considering that you were previously continuing your behavior when you knew that there was a case building against you. Stikkyy t/c 18:52, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• It's certainly not in the list with that degree of clarity. I think this would exclude about 95% of your comments on the desks; if you disagree, you're not getting the gist. I would like to wait and see whether others think it needs even more clarity, and how many think it's too late for such concessions. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:56, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• I've noted that a lot of the objection to your participation is not that you draw from personal experience and knowledge, but that you're too often incorrect when you do so. I should stress that I disagree with that approach. I wouldn't want Stephen Hawking himself to draw primarily from personal and experience and knowledge in any comment in an RD question about astrophysics. The other approach requires you to know what you don't know, and that is virtually impossible to achieve. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:17, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose, as from his subsequent responses StuRat is clearly not willing to accept the conditions I earlier said would be the minimum I'd be willing to accept (no unreferenced statements except statements so obvious they wouldn't require a reference if in article space; sanctions either in the form of blocks or of an automatic ban from the reference desks should the probation be breached), and is instead trying to haggle about time limits (something which as best I can tell nobody but StuRat himself supports), all while still posting unreferenced speculation at the reference desks. It's becoming obvious there's no potential for a negotiated continued presence at the RDs, as it's now apparent that StuRat doesn't even understand what the issue is. Unless StuRat is willing to accept a ban on commentary, speculation and chatter, enforced by sanctions, the only thing up for discussion is whether there are any circumstances in which a complete topic ban from the Reference Desk could subsequently be lifted. ‑ Iridescent 18:56, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose per everyone else. --JBL (talk) 19:24, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I tried to make better contributions, like this one: [174] but it's tough, not knowing what the eventual restrictions would be. That does contain some OR, as I do work with the blind. Instead, I've decided to halt my contributions on the Ref Desk proper and strike out my current contributions. (We aren't supposed to delete them, in case others have read and/or responded to them, but this gets the point across that "you need not pay attention to this post".) I'm now thinking you want just links, and no commentary whatsoever, as in here: [175]. StuRat (talk) 19:03, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I've tried to help you, but you refuse to listen. Again, stay away from the RefDesk for at least six months. Otherwise, you're only going to peeve folks off even more & end up getting blocks. GoodDay (talk) 19:13, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

So, I think we're up to this:

1) Provide at least one relevant reference (inside Wikipedia or outside) to each Ref Desk Q to which I respond. (Note that many Q's only need one ref, to the relevant Wikipedia article.)

2) Limit responses to 10 Q's per week.

3) Stick to facts. Never give opinion. Just like on a Wikipedia article.

4) Will ensure that posts are factually correct.

5) Will provide a reference or references that clearly show that his posts are factually correct, with the usual exceptions for WP:SKYISBLUE, but be cautious.

6) Will answer the OP’s question. (I may ask the OP for clarification. I may provide a reference that answers the OP’s question without answering the question himself.)

7) I will not make any statement at any page with the prefix Wikipedia:Reference desk/ that is not referenced to an existing Wikipedia article or an external reliable source as defined by WP:RS.

8) Any uninvolved administrator is authorised to place: revert and move restrictions, interaction bans, topic bans, and blocks of up to one year in duration, or other reasonable measures that the enforcing administrator believes is necessary and proportionate for the smooth running of the project

9) Failure to abide by this restriction will result in 24 hour blocks, escalating to lengthier blocks if the violations continue which is a fairly standard wording for community-imposed restrictions, although in the event of a breach of these rules any uninvolved administrator can unilaterally issue a topic ban of up to one year from any or all Reference desks.

Let me know if I missed anything. Now, as for the probation duration, I proposed 12 weeks and haven't had any feedback. Is this sufficient ? I can also reduce the 10 Q threads per week number, if anybody thinks that is needed. Are we ready to !vote ?

StuRat (talk) 19:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Stu, the basic takeaway here is that you should only answer questions that you have a good or excellent knowledge of, and provide relevant and strong sources to back up your answers. Just don't bullshit the punters. Its not hard. Irondome (talk) 19:21, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Agreed, but we need to get this proposal rolling and !vote on it. Is there another point you wish to add to the list ? StuRat (talk) 19:22, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Um, you made your proposal and we're already !voting on it. I understand that you've added some additional proposed restrictions, but that doesn't call for a whole new !vote. The oppose comments above appear to be largely agnostic to what the probation proposal is—they're generally opposed to any such proposal. agtx 20:49, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Re Now, as for the probation duration, I proposed 12 weeks and haven't had any feedback. Is this sufficient ?, are you insane? You've had plenty of feedback on this particular proposal, all of it negative. Any plan that allows you to continue contributing won't be a temporary restriction after which you'll be free to resume disruption; it will be a permanent obligation to do what you should have already been doing. ‑ Iridescent 19:25, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

You know what, StuRat? I'm thiiisss close to proposing an indefinite block for you, simply because there seems to be no limit to how much editor time you're willing to waste. Get a clue, will you? EEng 20:21, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Actually, a great deal of the feedback on this proposal has been positive. User:Tigraan is the one who proposed a bit more than 10 weeks. Permanent probation seems like a contradiction in terms. Of course, after the probation period ends, all the same restrictions that apply to everyone else will apply to me, just not the special restrictions, so accidentally editing 11 Q threads in a week won't get me banned. StuRat (talk) 19:28, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• At no point has Tigraan proposed anything of the sort as far as I can see (I think we've established by now that the concept of "source" appears to be alien to you; if Tigraan did say this anywhere then provide a diff of it), and the only person suggesting "probation" is you; the only question is what the terms of your permanent restriction will be. I'm done wasting my time trying to find a workable mechanism for you to return to the RDs; as far as I'm concerned the only issue up for debate now is whether you're just restricted from the Reference Desk or are banned from Wikipedia outright. ‑ Iridescent 21:53, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Maybe I misread: "The 10/week threshold may be a tad low, but it must not be much higher either - it must have tooth to prevent the current modus operandi from kicking back in." - Tigraan, 21:19, 30 October 2017 (UTC). StuRat (talk) 22:20, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• There is no maybe about it. Talk about digging a hole for oneself ... - Sitush (talk) 22:23, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose - these proposals are just going to muddy the waters and we will end up back here in a very short space of time due to the potential for lawyering etc. StuRat just isn't understanding what is wrong, so forcing limitations like this are bound to result in some overstepping. For what it is worth, I think answers on RD should almost always be in the form of "see our article on name of article" except where two articles contradict each other. In the event that the articles do not address the question, fix the article if the change would be encyclopaedic, and reject the question if it is not. Any fixing should be per our standard policies and guidelines. - Sitush (talk) 19:33, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I think answers on RD should almost always be in the form of "see our article on name of article" except where two articles contradict each other. – I think that's brilliant. After this circus is over that should be the next step in reforming RefDesk (though it's not quite that simple, of course). EEng 20:24, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

That would exclude things like this, which was not only a legitimate use of the desk but a model response (Medeis linked to a wiki article, but the actual source was off-wiki and accessible via the small icon immediately preceding that link). Answer the question and out, no follow-on discussion about how that looks just like a bug one saw five years ago in France, the range of swallowtail butterflies, the fact that those spots are not really eyes, and whatever other tangents can be explored without limit until everybody is tired and moves on to the next such discussion. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:40, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Well, let's not get into this discussion here and now, but like I said, it's not as simple as always just pointing to an article. But it's a great first approximation, IMO. EEng 20:45, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose, and as noted above I'm close to proposing an indefinite block just because he's wasting so much of everyone's time. It's outrageous. EEng 20:24, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose any "probation". The reference desks need a complete reform, and StuRat should be completely uninvolved during that process, which may be a lengthy one. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 21:35, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - This is an attempt at misdirection to avoid an inevitable and deserved topic ban.--WaltCip (talk) 00:31, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Comment this is approaching WP:SNOW territory. I feel the initial proposal (a requirement to include 1 reference and a cap on posts per week) was an alternative to a TBAN that could address the problem, but that doesn't seem to have gotten significant support. I don't feel any of the more complicated proposals are worth discussing. power~enwiki (π, ν) 00:41, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

How to appeal?

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

---

I would like to appeal this decision. We were making good progress towards writing up a proposal but this was halted in the middle. What is the process to appeal ? StuRat (talk) 16:53, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I was also about to strike out all my current Ref Desk contributions as a show of good faith, but I don't know if this is allowed now. StuRat (talk) 16:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

You've just been restricted from the RefDesks & have been given (at your talkpage) instructions (including timetable) on how to appeal. Best you follow those instructions. GoodDay (talk) 17:01, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

We are talking about different things. I am asking about an immediate appeal that the correct process was not followed, and the consensus was not reached, not an appeal 6 months from now. StuRat (talk) 17:18, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Yo, if you want to appeal, then as GoldenRing has said on your page, the correct place to appeal- whenever you choose to do so- is WP:AN, rather than here. But he also gives you excellent advice: don't. Appealing so soon will probably just reinforce any suspicion that the process was not fully understood by you, if there are such suspicions. Good luck! — fortunavelut luna 17:31, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

@StuRat: If I've understood your intentions correctly, that you think my close of this discussion was improper, probably the best way is to request closure review at WP:AN. However, I do urge you to listen to my advice at your talk page and that of editors immediately above. GoldenRing (talk) 17:39, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

StuRat, I really really don't think appealing is a good idea. I would like to see you concentrating for three months or so on content creation and maintenance, because that's what we are here for. I would gladly assist you. It would help your cause greatly. Irondome (talk) 17:44, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I did appeal, and the link is here: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#Closure_review_request_for_.22StuRat.27s_behaviour_on_the_Reference_Desks_.28again.29.22. Maybe the deck is stacked against me, but I still have to try my best. I'm not quite sure what to do about notifications, though. I will notify the closing Admin, but I sure don't want to have to notify everybody in this entire thread. Is this required ? StuRat (talk) 17:54, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Your inability to take advice, StuRat, is almost as strong as your inability to recognise a consensus! The thing is, making all those people effectivey relitigate the case (or be seen to be trying to) will not help your case at all. Why not let it go for a bit? — fortunavelut luna 17:58, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Close reverted

I have reverted the close, as StuRat's own proposal was allowed less than 24 hours (although the close was clearly done in good faith). Whether it was likely to be accepted or not was not for the closing admin to decide, and it deserves to run for longer than that - at least long enough for all interested parties to have a chance to examine it. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:16, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Someone close this ...

PLEASE!

–EEng

...please. Paul August ☎ 23:29, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Indeed. The proposal is just an end run around around a topic ban that was about to be enacted. In fact it was enacted before it was appealed and the thread reopened. Legacypac (talk) 00:40, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

Possible copyright violating links issue

I noticed Nemo bis has been inserting many links to zenodo.org e.g.[176] which appears to host user-uploaded copies of journal articles which may be violating publishers' copyright, as it appears to in the link I noticed. In exchanges on their talk page, Nemo bis seems to think there is no problem. Would be grateful if an IPR-savvy colleague could take a look. Alexbrn (talk) 20:14, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

See below for more context, but Zenodo.org is a legitimate cross-institutional repository for legally depositing papers. Zenodo is not inherently legal for all papers or version of a paper; that determination varies on a paper-by-paper basis depending on the contract, author, institution, journal, date of publication, and version of paper. These rights are nuanced, but generally captured well at Sherpa/Romeo, which indexes precisely this information. Cheers, Ocaasi (WMF) (talk) 23:25, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

This thread is about the approach being taken by Nemo bis which has not been appropriate - I share Alexbrn's concern. Jytdog (talk) 23:52, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

@Ocaasi (WMF): The question is not whether zenodo.org is legitimate, but hinges on the fact that it (no doubt unwittingly) seems to host a lot of illicit copyrighted content alongside properly permitted content. If Wikipedia links to copyrighted content it gets into the area of risking contributory infringement, which is why policy prohibits it. Is this not an issue? Alexbrn (talk) 05:49, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

If the site is primarily a repository for legally-uploaded material, as Jake indicates it is above, then we should assume that links are OK unless links to apparently illicit uploads are discovered, in which case they should be removed on a case-by-case basis. Carrite (talk) 20:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

No, people need to use the tool responsibly all that OABOT does is suggest links and it is up to the user to confirm that the suggested link is OK. Zenodo takes no responsibility either. Nobody should assume anything. Jytdog (talk) 22:43, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• User:Nemo_bis just did it again, in this diff. The link there is to the final published version, and the journal does not permit those to be archived. This person needs a block. We do not make "assumptions" about copyright. Jytdog (talk) 20:46, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

This led me to go through all their edits adding putatively OA links today

not OK - WP:COPYLINK violations

• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not Ok per this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not Ok per this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at university website, not OK per this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at PACEA (scientific org), not OK per this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not OK per this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not OK per this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not OK per this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not OK per this and this
• diff, added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not OK per this and this
• diff and diff added link to final published version of article hosted at Zenodo, not OK per this and this

ok

• diff link to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff link to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff link to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff link to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff link to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff link to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff link to author's website that is a manuscript
• diff link to Zenodo that is OA paper per this
• diff link to Zenodo that is OA paper per this
• diff link to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff and diff links to Zenodo that is OA paper per this
• diff and diff links to Zenodo that is a manuscript
• diff and diff links to final published version, OK per sherpa, confirmed at journal) (surprising in light of this)
• diff, link to final proof at Zenodo. probably not OK per this (is not author's last version prior to journal working on it, but meh)

What is that, about 40% policy violations. Not OK, is it. Jytdog (talk) 22:07, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Related to the above, but OABOT more broadly

This is open access week, and lots of people have been using WP:OABOT to add links to putatively open access versions of papers to articles. LOTS.

I keep finding ELNEVER links being inserted.

I understand that some people are very passionate about OA, and that is fine, but copyright is copyright and WP:COPYLINK/WP:ELNEVER is what it is, which is policy with legal considerations.

Many journals allow authors to post pre-prints but unless an article was published OA, journals do not allow the final, published version to be posted.

Examples of such policies are

• Science's, here which says ... 6) Post a copy of the "Accepted Version" of the Work (the version of the paper accepted for publication by AAAS including changes resulting from peer review but prior to AAAS’s copy editing and production) on the Author's personal website or in his/her Institution’s archival database repository, provided a hyperlink to the Work on the Science website is included and provided the "Accepted Version" is marked with the following notice: "This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of the AAAS for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Science Journal Title {VOL#, (DATE)}, doi: {doi number for your manuscript}"
  • Just now someone did this, adding a link to a final, published paper hosted at an academic lab.

• A different AAAS journal, Science Signaling has a similar policy (pre-prints OK, final published version not OK, see here.
  • here someone links to a copy of the final published paper at Zenodo, a repository that puts the onus on uploaders to ensure the copyright is clear per its its terms of use.

• Liebert's policy is here and says authors can post preprints but says in bold: "The final published article (version of record) can never be archived in a repository, preprint server, or research network." The link there is to the final published article.
  • See this followed this, hosted at author's faculty website. (someone re-added the link, after I removed it the first time)

I have reverted maybe 15 of these in the past couple of days and have not checked all these edits that appeared on my watchlist. I don't have time to review every one of those OA bot edits but am concerned.

Should WP:OABOT be paused until it can be tweaked to better prevent the addition of WP:COPYLINK/ WP:ELNEVER links, or better instructions given to make people double check its suggestions before implementing them? Jytdog (talk) 22:37, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for raising reasonable questions about copyright, Jytdog. The OAwiki campaign (oawiki.org, links to Meta) uses OAbot (oabot.org) to present readers with a "best guess" at a legal, free-to-read version of a paywalled citation.

The tool then lets an individual, logged-in editor add the link after they deterimine: 1) the existing citation is indeed closed access; 2) the suggested link is actually free-to-read and functional; 3) the two sources match; and 4) the suggested link is likely copyright compliant. Those instructions are on every OAbot page where a suggestion is presented, and links directly to our guidance on determining copyright ([oawiki.org/copyright oawiki.org/copyright], links to Meta).

Each paper has to be determined on a case-by-case basis by a human (otherwise it would just be an actual bot), because determining licensing involves variables related to the institution, author, journal, date of publication, and version of an article. The way editors can best assess copyright compliance is with Sherpa/Romeo, a website that indexes these fine-grained re-publication rights: http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/index.php. That link is front and center in the oawiki.org/copyright instructions linked on every page of OAbot.

I hope this helps explain what is going on. This open access week event is nearing a close and editing activity has slowed down dramatically. With all the usage of the tool, we have a new list of features we want to implement over the next year, and are happy to work with any editor on implementing them! Cheers, Ocaasi (WMF) (talk) 23:17, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Hello and thank you for your work on these edits. I run this tool and am happy to collaborate on tweaking the instructions given to its users. We can surely pause OAbot, but it is currently running out of candidate edits anyway (so I suspect we will not make than a few more hundreds of edits for this campaign, reaching about 2000 edits). Pinging Ocaasi (WMF) and Lauren maggio who are involved in the project. Cheers. − Pintoch (talk) 23:07, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

In short no. The bot does its job, and it does it well [tweaks are always possible, however]. If people abuse the bot, it's people who need to be educated about not abusing it. Also, as I've mentioned previously, author's personal pages are not repositories, preprint servers, or research networks, and fall well within fair use. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:15, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

I'd quibble with that. Each edit is made by an individual editor and it is their job to determine copyright compliance as best they can. That doesn't mean OAbot is absolved of responsibility; we should be doing as good a job as possible to present good suggestions in the tool, and to help editors make a smart judgement.

You're right that author webpages differ at times from repositories, but they are no different in being inherently "fair use" (a term which couldn't automatically override ELNEVER). Author webpage republishing rights is also something indexed precisely in Sherpa/Romeo, which again we link to in the instructions on every page of OAbot where you can make an edit. The bot does do its job well, but this is a good time to figure out how it can be made even better. Cheers, Ocaasi (WMF) (talk) 23:21, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Right, so in the instance mentioned here in the section above, the placement of final-form copies of articles from the journal Bioethics is a copyright violation,[177] and Nemo bis linking to these uploads is a no-no - and the flippant disregard for the issue they show on their use Talk page compounds the problem. Digging a little deeper, it appears WMF Italy may have been encouraging authors into incautious uploads of copyrighted content[178] which might have been at least, unwise. Alexbrn (talk) 07:06, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Hi Alexbrn, calling that "encouraging authors into incautious uploads of copyrighted content" is inaccurate as the authors were encouraged to respect the publisher's self-archiving policy. Of course it is possible that some authors disregarded or misunderstood this, so it is totally possible that some uploads have issues. Cheers. − Pintoch (talk) 10:10, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Pintoch I don't see that at all. From the blog post I link: "the message thanked them for contributing sources to Wikipedia, presented them with the dilemma of a simple volunteer editor who wants to link an open access copy for all Wikipedia users to see, and asked to check the publication on Dissemin to read more about its legal status and to deposit it." [my bold]. My first check on Dissemin was the bioethics article I mentioned and the record[179] is wrong (or circularly points to the zenodo copy for a kind of copyright-laundering). As to "it is possible that some authors disregarded or misunderstood this" - it takes two to communicate and all I am seeing from the enablers of this problem is arrogant brush offs and protestations it's nothing to do with them. We have a situation where copyright violating links are now in place. What do we do? Does WP take this seriously, or does it just shrug? Alexbrn (talk) 19:01, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Alexbrn First, the reason why the author was encouraged to deposit their paper is that the publisher's policy allows this, for some version of the paper (preprint, and postprint after an 2 years embargo period). So, it is absolutely fine to encourage a deposit in general: it would only be wrong to encourage depositing the published version (whose self-archival seems prohibited indeed). The message did mention that the user should take into account the publisher's policy (legal status). So, based on this account of the email at least, I don't see anything wrong. Then, can you tell me exactly what is wrong with https://dissem.in/p/90867516/homeopathy-is-unscientific-and-unethical-homeopathy-is-unscientific-and-unethical ? It does point to the Zenodo copy, because the article is indeed available there now that the article has been deposited via Dissemin to Zenodo. That is totally intended: Dissemin tries to assess the availability of this article on the web, so if it knows about a copy, it displays it (and that is by no means an assessment of the copyright status of this copy - I don't really understand why you consider it to be a kind of copyright-laundering). When the user has used Dissemin to deposit the paper, of course this link was not there (because the paper had not been deposited yet) and the publisher's policy was displayed to them (pretty much like https://dissem.in/b/7/wiley, you can try for yourself by attempting to deposit this paper yourself), and they have had to select which of the three versions they were depositing. Most major scholarly repositories are much less explicit about publisher policies than that. So, I really do not see where we have failed to communicate here. If you have any concrete suggestions of changes of wording in the emails or the interface of Dissemin, we can discuss them. Sorry if these explanations read like an arrogaant brush off, that is totally not my intention: I am just trying to help you narrow down your accusation to a concrete breach on our side, so that we can identify it and do better next time. Cheers − Pintoch (talk) 21:14, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't think you're giving an arrogant brush off, but that's what I got when I raised the issue (see section above). I don't know what's in the emails so I can't propose wording - all I know is what is reported in that blog post, which seems - as I said - incautious. I can also see what, in reality, has happened. The breach here is because the journal Bioethics does not allow re-distribution of final-form published articles, but that is what apparently has been done. It is a kind of copyright-laundering because as a result of this apparent breach, the Dissemin site is now saying that PDF is available as a "green" open resource. This is just one example. What's to be done? Alexbrn (talk) 21:36, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Can you please point me to any indication that Dissemin claims anything about the legal status of the PDF files it points to? It's easy to add a section in the FAQ to clarify that if you want. Do you also accuse search engines like Google Scholar or BASE to do some "copyright laundering" by pointing to the files they index? Also, I don't think this discussion really belongs here as Wikipedia administrators don't have much to do with Dissemin itself (but OAbot yes of course). − Pintoch (talk) 09:41, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

The indication comes from having a green icon (which colour is associated with free usage) and a download button which gets you the PDF for free (apparently a copyvio). If authors are directed to dissemin to find out about a document's legal status, what do you think they would conclude from the way the article download is presented in this case? Alexbrn (talk) 10:36, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• The problem here is that the tool (it is a tool) can be used with care or carelessly. My take is that Pintoch and Ocasi are being pretty reasonable and they are saying that they have tried to make it as easy as possible to use with care, but nobody can help it if somebody buys a hammer and smashes someone's head in with it. Or, "guns don't kill people, people kill people".

I encourage people to check out OABOT - it is here.

a) the tool appears to be built to encourage rapid processing of opportunities, and not to build in caution. I think more caution should be built in.

b) for example, there is no warning on the bot working page, that adding a link to an unauthorized version is a violation of WP:COPYLINK, and that adding such links can lead to a block of the user - that the user is responsible for their use of the tool

c) there should also be a warning that it is not common for the published version to be open access, and users should check carefully to ensure that if the bot suggests a link to the final published versions, that the user should check to make sure it is OK.

d) the link to "sherpa" is not right there on the working page. Instead, a link to sherpa is provided in this page that is linked-to from the bot page. That does not encourage use of sherpa. (is it possible for the sherpa results to be presented on the bot working page?)

-- Jytdog (talk) 22:40, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for this constructive feedback! Most of this can be done (including presenting sherpa results on the tool itself), with some work. I will see what I can do. − Pintoch (talk) 09:41, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

User:104.243.168.194

This is probably a sock of an editor who has been blocked immediately in the past. See Dragonrap2 (talk · contribs), 104.243.160.113 (talk · contribs), WXA53 (talk · contribs), Futurewiki (talk · contribs), 104.243.169.127 (talk · contribs), 104.243.167.109 (talk · contribs), Futuristic21 (talk · contribs), Futurewiki2 (talk · contribs), Mega256 (talk · contribs), Futurewiki The Third (talk · contribs), Mega257 (talk · contribs), Mega258 (talk · contribs), Futurew (talk · contribs), 104.243.166.108 (talk · contribs), 104.243.170.125 (talk · contribs), and Mr. Jazz, Rhythm & Blues (talk · contribs). Thanks! Magnolia677 (talk) 23:01, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

Range blocked again, but it's easier to track cases when they're filed at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Dragonrap2. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 06:17, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

BeywheelzLetItRip

This user is being disruptive. I was just inserting harmless jokes into wikipedia that i was going to self-revert after 5 minutes. Then this user starts giving me warnings for “vandalism” when that’s not what i was doing. They keep reinstating them even though i’m allowed to blank my own talk page. -- 161.202.81.220 (talk · contribs)

The problem being that the OP continued to post his junk after being warned. WP:BOOMERANG. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:43, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

The OP's edits were not constructive - nothing to see here. Acroterion (talk) 01:47, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Not quite - the OP is allowed to remove comments from his talk page, and restoring them was not appropriate. However, the OP's claims that his vandalisms were not vandalisms is where the boomerang comes in. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:49, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I am chiefly concerned with the "harmless joke" business - I agree that they can blank their talkpage, but a better course is to simply stop messing with the encyclopedia, rather than wasting everybody else's time. Acroterion (talk) 01:54, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

The OP should be put on ice for a reasonable interval, and the only possible action to be taken against the subject of the OP's complaint is a gentle wake-up that user's are allowed to delete most stuff from their own talk pages. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:23, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Blocked with a note of If you're familiar with WP:BLANKING, [the "allowed" link at the top of this thread] you're familiar enough with our policies to know that inserting jokes is not permitted. Nyttend (talk) 04:37, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Undeclared COI editor constantly adding their website to article

Maceddy (talk · contribs)

Above user clearly has a conflict of interest on Sharon Rich and has now repeatedly readded a link to their website even after I left them a notice on their talk page regarding COI as well as a link to WP:ELNO in one of my edit summaries. They don't seem to understand why that is a bad thing and regardless of my attempts it doesn't seem like they are getting the point as to why that is not acceptable. They also have not declared their obvious conflict of interest. Requesting administrator assistance in this matter. --Majora (talk) 05:49, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

You're probably right that some of the content is not OK, and I think there may be a notability problem here, but what tells you there's a COI? EEng 05:56, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Their username matches the website they keep trying to insert. Which, generally, would be enough for an advertising block (at least in past experience). Ms. Rich is also the President of the Mac/Eddy Club, the official website of which is the same website that the account keeps trying to add.

As for notability there already was an AfD. I have been trying to find sourcing when this whole thing came up. --Majora (talk) 06:01, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Got it. I'd like others to look at the sources listed in AfD and opine on notability. I think this is superficial coverage. EEng 06:07, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sharon Rich (2nd nomination) Jytdog (talk) 19:00, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Red accounts on econ-related pages

On econ-related Wikipedia pages (e.g. Protectionism, Free Trade, Balance of trade), a "red" account pops up on regular intervals, only to edit war all kinds of fringe text into the articles (serious violations of WP:FRINGE and misrepresentation of sources). The content is always the same poorly sourced and pro-mercantilist nonsense. The text tends to be written extremely poorly, usually with grammatical and spelling errors. The red accounts appear to be from France (judging by the google.fr and blogspot.fr links). These make the same errors and then play coy on talk pages when other editors point out these errors. They never follow the rules laid out by WP:BRD and make econ-related pages a temporary mess for one-two weeks: bad content is repeatedly forced into Wikipedia pages because other editors are constrained by the WP:3RR rule while these accounts keep restoring the bad text. The user is either unable or unwilling to understand what others are saying on talk pages and either unable or unwilling to understand Wikipedia policy. The users always force content in and then say that "consensus" is required to remove the content. These are the weird accounts:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions/Shharp
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Nebere
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/James_4
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Espe9

I don't honestly understand what motivates this user to switch accounts, but using new accounts seems like a good way to evade warnings and bans that veteran accounts would face if they engaged in this type of behavior. I'm not sure what Wikipedia rules are in place for this kind of behavior, but this is just so extremely frustrating that I wanted to get your take on it. I apologize of this is the wrong board for this. Let me know if there is a better venue for this. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 13:16, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

@Snooganssnoogans: Submit a report at WP:SPI and this can be looked into by a clerk. Using multiple accounts on the same pages is a violation of WP:SOCK. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 16:48, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes, what BU Rob13 said above. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 23:58, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Done, thanks. 14:43, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Investigation into the behaviour of User:Chas._Caltrop

• Chas. Caltrop (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

I'm writing to clarify the validity of the edit history of this user User:Chas._Caltrop. This user has a very strange style of editing and interacting with others. Their edit summaries are extremely uniform (mostly "CE; completed the sentence"), they seem to have little use for consensus or civility, and appear to have been re-structuring articles to their liking since April 2016 (they may have been confirmed too early, without developing the proper skills).

They've recently blown up at me personally; pasting as if from another user (on my talk page, and The Frankfurt School talk page). I've discussed and confirmed this with that user here. This strange overreaction by User:Chas._Caltrop appears to be in response to my politely warning them on their talk page that they should form a consensus before making drastic changes to The Frankfurt School page (due to its controversial nature). I believe this editor is attempting to intimidate me, and that their longer term behaviour may be detrimental to Wikipedia's cultivation of long standing content.

At the very least, they've failed to come to terms with WP:TPG, WP:CIVIL or WP:CONSENSUS.

I'm worried about further examples too. One such being the article on Anti-intellectualism in which they've removed a myriad of sourced material under the 21st Century section reducing it from 8 subheadings, to 3 (and what remains is strangely subjective). They seem to prefer offline or off-brand sources that cannot be readily accessed. This (along with run-on sentences) seems to be a theme in their editing history/style.

This user has come to my attention due to their edits on the Frankfurt_School#Cultural_Marxism_conspiracy_theory page. Where they've broken the section anchor a few times, at one point had multiple "Cultural Marxism" headings, and would prefer the section contain difficult to decipher sentences such as:

Proponents of conspiracy-theory Cultural Marxism claim that the existence of liberal social-ideologies — such as feminism, anti-white racism, and sexualization — are real-world negative consequences of critical-theory, despite such unresolved social problems dating from the 1920s.

...as you can see, they're also including some strange political terms, eg. anti-white racism and claiming it is a liberal social-ideology?

Anyways, their political language and editing style is strange, as is their failure to use talk pages correctly or respect consensus. They seem completely incongruous with Wikipedia's general ethos. I would like to see them banned from further editing The Frankfurt School page, and request they be investigated further (by someone more skilled and responsible than myself) for WP:Tendentious editing. Particularly if they are doing so in partisan 'teams', as this note on their talk page suggests.

Thank you for any help you can render with this strange issue (I've certainly not seen anything like this before). --Jobrot (talk) 14:56, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

It appears other users have also had simmilar issues: 1, 2, 3. --Jobrot (talk) 15:07, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

UPDATE: It seems this user has now started causing similar issues on the Critical theory page, edit warring, inserting their subjective viewpoint, and malforming copy (see the edit summaries here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Critical_theory&action=history). Indeed, on the related talk page they appear to be trying to provoke other users as well.

I suspect this user is very gently trying to vandalize Wikipedia over a long period of time with a somewhat political motive. It's an ongoing problem which has effected multiple users, and who knows how many pages. It will continue on this way without intervention or a remedy of some sort. I personally would ban them for violating WP:VANDALISM, WP:EDITWARRING WP:CIVIL, WP:TPG, WP:CONSENSUS and WP:TEND, but I am not an admin. --Jobrot (talk) 07:10, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Edit-warring to reinsert promotional linkspam

Over the past several days, User:7dcf has been on a linkspam campaign that inserted between 40 and 45 links to film reviews by James Berardinelli of ReelViews. These apparently promotional links — virtually the only edits he made — were reverted and a message was placed on his talk page advising him that these edits were inappropriate. Two more editors commenting on his talk page told him likewise. He responded at 21:22 and 22:51, 27 October 2017‎, and seemed to indicate he understood — yet within five minutes, began edit-warring to restore those same roughly 43 edits.

Not only that, but after having said, "I promise I won't add any new [Bernardinelli] reviews anymore," he did so again here and here here!

Even if his edits were not intended to be promotional, they still wildly violate WP:LINKSPAM. Since he's choosing to ignore not one but three editors, and to both edit-war and break a promise to discontinue his inappropriate edits, I believe it's necessary to ask for admin intervention before this editor creates more unnecessary work to undo promotional links. I thank you for any help.--Tenebrae (talk) 20:21, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I'd like to wait for 7dcf to respond here before I decide on the appropriate action that should be taken. This obviously isn't meant to prevent any other admin from taking action if they feel waiting isn't needed, but I'd like to wait and give the user the opportunity to respond here. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 23:54, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Persistent edit warring and blatant BLP violation

Can someone please (a) fix the article move (from Laura Skandera Trombley to WrinklesTheDog and her amazing adventures) and (b) block Biomimix who initiated this move and has persistently edited this article with a clear POV without any participation in Talk and using multiple obvious sockpuppets (e.g., User:Windwillows, User:FrankDelanor)? Thanks! ElKevbo (talk) 21:00, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I have already tagged Laura Skandera Trombley for G6 speedy. According to the user's contribs, they appear to be a single-purpose account whose only contributions are in this article. jd22292 (Jalen D. Folf) (talk • contribs) 21:02, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Page moved back to original name, editor blocked 3 days. Considered indef'ing as NOTHERE but didn't. If another admin feels more is warranted, go for it. No comment on the possible socking. -- ferret (talk) 21:58, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

Ferret, I think your block duration is fine. If the user continues the behavior, it's very easy to re-instate a longer / indefinite block. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 23:47, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Vnonymous

Hi, I recently came accross Design Village, I checked the edit history and sources, and concluded the main editor, User:Vnonymous may have been a coi editor. The article which was created in one go, contains a detailed "getting here" section, and borderline promotional claims.

Vnonymous

I tagged it with notabilty and coi tags, these were swiftly reverted.

Most worrying is vnonymous's repeated reverts of any edit to the article.

Please look into this, I am certain anything I do to the article will likely be reverted, and I don't want to edit war over it. Dysklyver 23:42, 29 October 2017 (UTC)

I cut out a large portion of the article and made it into a stub. I don't think Vnonymous looks like a SPA paid editor, but they could be covering paid editing activity with legitimate edits. It's worth an explanation about why they are so protective of that article.--v/r - TP 00:09, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Here is another article with questionable content and purpose. See the "pricing" section.--v/r - TP 00:15, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Another article. This honestly looks like an overly enthusiastic and eager novice editor without refinement from experience in widely trafficked topics trying to get as much information as possible into their new articles.--v/r - TP 00:18, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

The signature issue that they were told about in July needs to be addressed. Vnonymous, please get your signature corrected per WP:SIGLINK. Thank you.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 00:16, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

AnonMoos doesn't have to follow the policies

Despite different editors having asked for reliable sources at Talk:Ophidiophobia for fictional additions, one editor, AnonMoos has persistently reverted and *NOT* given any reason founded in policy or guideline but would rather just debate. After I removed the uncited material and pointed out WP:BURDEN, I was told that I had given a tirade that was filled with original research and he repeatedly reverts. The editor seems to have serious issues and I would appreciate more eyes on this. Multiple requests for these sources have occurred in different threads on the talk page but the most pertinent begins here. WP:BURDEN and WP:ONUS need enforcement. And from what I've read, AnonMoos doesn't belong on article talk pages "helping" at this point.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 02:00, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Berean_Hunter is playing an unhelpful role on this article, launching into an inaccurate and shallow ranting tirade filled with non-factual information and original research on the article talk page, and claiming that as a basis for removing material from the article. He's already declared in advance that he will completely disregard any sources that conflict with his inaccurate personal opinions (see this edit), so I really don't know why I should exert myself trying to find any on that basis.

The basic fact is that Indiana Jones is the fictional poster-boy for Ophidiophobia in the same way that Dr. Strangelove is for Alien hand syndrome ("hence the condition's common association with the character"), and anyone with a real interest in improving the Ophidiophobia article would be trying to support the fact, not remove it... AnonMoos (talk) 03:00, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

This is an editing dispute that doesn't need ANI intervention. Indiana Jones' dislike of snakes is well-known, but asking for a reference isn't unreasonable. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:04, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

No. Policy has been violated...WP:BURDEN. I have asked for admin enforcement of that policy and since it is frowned upon when admins engage in self-help, this is the right place. After multiple requests, this needs to be met. "Indiana Jones' dislike of snakes is well-known" means that you haven't realized that this isn't the right article for that claim...and haven't read or understood the threads.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 03:19, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Power~enwiki -- inserting a "citation needed" tag (something that no one has actually done) would be perfectly reasonable, but deleting the mention from the article borders on the unreasonable, and deleting the mention from the article based on Berean_Hunter's inaccurate personal opinions is pretty close to nonsensical. AnonMoos (talk) 03:29, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Your response to another editor's continued polite requests for sources was met with this condescension, "Unfortunately, your abstract metaphysical devotion to the theoretical Platonic idea of exalted Wikipedia sourcing ideals, combined with your complete and utter ignorance of what is actually being discussed, is what I find to be somewhat off-putting (it certainly does not practically move things along in a constructive direction that will clearly lead to the real world improvement of the article)..."

This is a behavioral issue if you refuse to follow policies and just revert.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 03:39, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

You've already declared in advance that you'll completely disregard any sources which disagree with your inaccurate personal opinions, so that sure doesn't provide me with any incentive to find such. The Ophidiophobia of Indiana Jones isn't quite in WP:BLUE territory, but it's clearly verging towards it -- many tens of millions of ordinary viewers of the movies are clear that the character fears snakes, yet people come along on the Ophidiophobia page and don't add a "citation needed" tag, but rather create unnecessary antagonism by insisting on completely deleting any mention of this from the article. AnonMoos (talk) 03:48, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

This is, of course, primarily a content dispute that should be resolved by more collaborative talk page discussion, an RfC, or other forms of dispute resolution. That being said, it is really quite remarkable that AnonMoos has spent nearly eight years defending an unsourced psychiatric diagnosis of a fictional character in an article about a phobia. Berean Hunter criticizes this content quite calmly and reasonably, and AnonMoos responds by calling their argument a "ranting tirade" and "semi-incoherent". Am I alone in perceiving that assessment as just plain wrong and excessively hostile? Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 04:02, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Bingo. That is why there are CIR issues that I'm hoping others figure out. I haven't looked at his other interactions but I really hope he isn't like this elsewhere. I've realized that talking to him is fruitless and that is why I'm here.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 04:10, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Cullen328 -- if you consider Berean_Hunter's article talk page comments "calm and reasonable", then your perception of reality would appear to have few points of contact with mine (I would consider them condescending and error-filled). However, I'm not a psychologist, and I'm not pretending to offer a professional diagnosis -- just stating the fact (which seems extremely obvious to me, and probably millions of others) than the Indiana Jones movies clearly convey the message that the character hates and fears snakes. Deleting material from the article based on ignoring this obvious fact does not seem like a constructive move to me. AnonMoos (talk) 04:22, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

No, AnonMoos. No. Core content policy requires that a factual assertion which has been challenged must be backed by a reference to a reliable source, and in an article about a medical topic, that needs to be an impeccably reliable source. So, I suggest that you either provide such a source post haste or step aside. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 04:33, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

(ec) "you'll completely disregard any sources which disagree with your inaccurate personal opinions"...nope, that is being done to make sure that the sources are quality and not some forum, movie critic or imdb page. Fancruft really works to undermine an article that is supposed to be on a serious subject. However, if you could find a quality source then we should be able to agree collectively. Right now, you have been a consensus of one that has reverted multiple editors who have a collective consensus which is already backed in policy.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 04:10, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

There's been other stuff on the article from time to time which could be called fancruft, but Indiana Jones is not "fancruft", since it's the well-known single phobia of an otherwise almost fearless character who is the main title character of one the biggest-grossing movie series of all time... AnonMoos (talk) 04:30, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I suggested a couple of sources at the talkpage. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:26, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• My 2¢ Pretty much what Cullen wrote ^^^^^. This is not rocket science or something that requires a degree in wiki-law. Any claim of fact that is not obviously non-controversial requires a citation to a reliable source. If a claim of fact that is not cited is challenged then a citation must be added before it can be re-added to the article. End of story. -Ad Orientem (talk) 14:02, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Random people coming along and deleting random passages from an article does not necessarily create a "controversy" when there is no actual controversy in the real world outside Wikipedia. Look at WP:BLUE... AnonMoos (talk) 23:30, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with this. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 23:41, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

IP user repeatedly posting a piece of personal information

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

---

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/203.30.136.34

Highly suspicious edits are being made by an IP editor, who has continually posted similar name and address of what appears to be a private individual and/or company name （in both talk pages and in edit summaries). I'm not sure what the correct procedure is in this case and I lack the rights or the time to be able to revert each individual entry. Would an administrator take the time to look at this case. Thank you. Edaham (talk) 07:29, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• I wrote to oversight@ . Next time, don't post pointers to private stuff like that here. Email as instructed in the edit notice that pops up when you edit this page. EEng 07:38, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Understood, and apologies, I' didn't notice the red box info and scrolled straight down to the text box. I was in a bit of a rush - Do I need to delete any of the info I posted (i.e. the ANI notice at the IP's talk page)? I'm reading that message about privacy related matters and kicking myself a bit now. Thanks so much for taking the time to email the correct channel. Much appreciated. Edaham (talk) 08:07, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Someday, we are going to turn this into a proper structured page. When you go to edit you are presented with a menu. If you click the box indicating you need revision deletion or oversight, it doesn't post here but takes you to the right place. If you want to report some vandalism, it let you do so, but it automatically brings you to AIV. If you want to report something that belongs here, it asks you who is involved, and when you add the names, it automatically notifies them for you. If you really know what you are doing, you can opt out of the menu.

Frankly, I'm getting tired of seeing oversight request after oversight request after oversight request. We tell him they aren't supposed to do with that, but that may sink into the person that made this request — it is in reaching the person who's going to make the next requests had no equally will ignore the big red warning.--S Philbrick(Talk) 15:14, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I'd not heard of an oversight request till this morning. Frankly, here's a biscuit and a pat on the back to get you through the lonely nights you are going to spend coding a more explanatory page. I didn't notice the red warning box partly because I was lazily clicking and didn't look, but also partly because I have my monitor set to display everything in an energy and eye saving gun metal grey color - so some radio buttons and check boxes would be lovely, thanks. Much love. Edaham (talk) 15:36, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I have to say that I think edit-notices are essentially useless. I certainly don't read them and so I don't expect anyone else does, either. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred you don't need to read what's above the edit box and so you just get used to not reading it, even when it's a big red warning. Would it be worth attempting an edit filter to catch reports that should go to oversight? GoldenRing (talk) 17:09, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

It's true, no one reads the edit notices -- they're just part of the blur. I've often had a similar idea to S Philbrick's of a menu or something. In the meantime we just muddle on. EEng 17:58, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

If someone wants to try an edit filter more power to them but it sounds difficult to me. Not every edit containing the word "oversight" ought to be stopped (for example this one), and not every request will use the word "oversight". It might say something like, "someone needs to look at and arrange for removal of this edit…" Plus, doesn't an edit filter simply reject the edit without telling you what you should do? As an reason, oversight request aren't the only misplaced posts here although perhaps they are the most egregious. We often see request for protection or AIV or user bans, which belong elsewhere.

I fully understand that a structured response option would drive some editors crazy, but there's a simple solution. Create a user right, call it "exempt from ANI structured posting" and handed out freely to anyone who requests it, with the caveat that if they break the rules they lose the right. If you have this user right, attempting to post it and I would look exactly the same as it does now so it would be hard for anyone to complain. For other editors, they would be presented with some options, some of which would result in posting to the correct venue, and in the case it does belong at ANI, could automatically do the notification so we would stop the repeated complaints that the relevant parties have not been notified.

As a bonus, a structured data it could help us analyze what types of queries we get at and I without having to do it manually.--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:23, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I think the structured post questionnaire is a good idea. A menu reading:

• are you here to
  • a)report vandalism
  • b)report a user who is posting defamatory material
  • c)etc...

Would be a good way of taking users to relevant noticeboards or having them deliver private messages where appropriate. It's not outside the realm of possibility that a bot like cluebot could be configured to make the reports or even target and remove a percentage of the undesirable edits. I alerted the developers of this bot to this issue (but not this thread) on my talk page Edaham (talk) 00:08, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

@Sphilbrick: I'm no expert, but I'm fairly sure that you can make edit filters give a warning and require confirmation that the edit is what you intend rather than just blocking the edit - the same as what happens when you place a DS notice on a user talk page. But I agree that creating an edit filter to be reasonably accurate would likely be difficult. GoldenRing (talk) 07:50, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

User:Hesselp again

This user has been banned from editing Series (mathematics) and its talk page (see [180]. He has formally respected the ban, but has continued his disrupting behavior on several talk pages where series are discussed (WT:WPM#User:Hesselp again and Talk:Cesàro summation#The series corresponding with a given sequence?). I suggest to enforce the ban to everything that is about some kind of series, and to extend the duration of the ban. D.Lazard (talk) 16:55, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

D. Lazard noticed 'disrupting behavior' on two talk pages: On Talk:Cesàro summation my last edit was on 18 Oct. 2017.
And on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics a new section 'User:Hesselp again' started 15 Oct. 2017. After 10 edits by 6 users, I reacted three times: 22, 24, 30 Oct.
Lacking is any indication of which of this recent edits are seen as disrupting (more disrupting than other edits), and for what reasons. Is it really enough for an extended ban? -- Hesselp (talk) 12:08, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support- I wasn't involved with the original ban discussion but, having read Hesselp's long-winded ramblings at WT:WPM, I can see that this user's obsessive behaviour will not benefit the encyclopedia but will continue to waste the time of those who do. Hesselp really needs to drop the stick but will never do so voluntarily. Reyk _YO! 18:09, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support. Obvious crank is obvious. WP:DENY, etc. Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:08, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support This is becoming tiresome. L3X1 (distænt write) 20:13, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support only here to push his agenda. --Salix alba (talk): 23:56, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support This is a very circumscribed measure against someone who is no help at all to the project. It seems that in the months since the topic ban started, all of this user's edits have remained on that precise topic. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:54, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support He fails to understand that his competence in the history of mathematics and the pedagogy of mathematics does not compensate for his lack of competence in (the theory of) mathematics. Boris Tsirelson (talk) 10:32, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Problematic long-term IP editor

This IP editor has a history of problems going back at least 3 years. For the last 1.5 years, his edits have mainly been confined to the IP range 2602:302:D1A2:C740:*. You can see his full contributions here if you have the "CIDR ranges on Special:Contributions" gadget enabled.

His edits are mostly mildly constructive or neutral, but are frequently peppered with adding unsourced/incorrect/speculative information, POV pushing, name calling, and occasionally outright vandalism. He has received at least 9 blocks and dozens of warnings, but mostly he skates by because his problematic history isn't readily apparent because of his ever-changing IP address.

Some of his problematic edits in the last two weeks: Outright vandalism: [181] Adding wrong and unsourced information: [182] [183] [184] [185] Adding unsourced info: [186] [187] POV pushing: [188] Edit warring: [189]

I linked to more details over at this SPI report, including links to his previous IP's, block history, previous ANI threads, talk page warnings, and some of the behavioral traits that make it apparent that all of the edits under this range (as well as the previous IP's I listed) are the same person.

I would propose a rangeblock on 2602:302:d1a2:c740:*

Toohool (talk) 21:42, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

I blocked this IP back in January 2017 (log). I see that the diffs provided span from today and go back about a week. This IP's contributions include a huge number of edits made today - are these problematic? Or are they good edits? I want to consider the evidence, logs, and history carefully if this IP is making positive contributions as well... ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 23:36, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

The edits from today are harmless as far as I can see, except for this vandalism. It's all the same guy, college football is one of his areas of interest. Toohool (talk) 23:49, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

This range comes back as an AT&T internet connection located in the US. I do see vandalism and disruption by this IP and by this IP within the /64 range on October 30th. I'll also note that, up until just a few hours prior to these edits, the IP range was contributing to articles on the different Notre Dame Fighting Irish football seasons. Only just a few minutes after these disruptive edits were made, the editing resumed on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish football articles and under a different IP under that range. Standard IPv6 subnetting aside, this timeline fits in-line with being controlled by one person. Since this range hasn't caused additional disruption like this since, I'm going to hold off on taking action until they do. However, I'll say that this person is well past their final warnings, as many have been left on different IPs in this range. This range will be blocked without warning if it causes any more disruption like this. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 12:07, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Copyvio at E-commerce

Please note this diff: [190] Prior versions contain a copyvio and I'm not sure how far back it goes, the page history is quite messy. Looks like quite a few revisions will need rev-del. Home Lander (talk) 02:10, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

This could be reverse copyvio: from what I can tell, most of the content was added with this edit in May 2015. An October 2016 version of the page where the claimed copyvio came from had a lorem ipsum as the sole text of the page [191]. The first version of the claimed source that I can find that has the text I can find is in 2017 [192]. I'd like someone else who works in copyright to check my work, but right now, I'm leaning towards this being a copyright violation against Wikipedia contributors. TonyBallioni (talk) 02:35, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) It’s possible of course that it is the statgur.com website that has copied Wikipedia. The first paragraph that has been removed was introduced into the article in July 2010. The second paragraph was introduced in January 2014 by a different editor. The third paragraph was introduced in May 2015 by another editor. Most of the text was properly cited. In other words, it was not lifted wholesale from another website. Plus, a glance through the Wayback Machine suggests that the statgur.com page was created between October 2016 and June 2017. --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 03:04, 31 October 2017 (UTC) P.S. I agree with TonyBallioni. --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 03:07, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict)@TonyBallioni: @Malcolmxl5: Bummer. Upon reviewing this, I originally tagged the above user's sandbox for deletion and warned her regarding copying from another site to there. It was the same content, and she then removed it from the article. If this was actually an internal copy (which it appears it was), and turns out to be a reverse copyvio, I suppose the sandbox content could be restored with attribution to the article. Home Lander (talk) 03:09, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Chris troutman

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

---

Over the last couple years, I've been continually reminded of Chris troutman's recurring and disturbing patterns of interaction on Wikipedia.

Most recently, Chris commented last Friday on long-time editors Montanabw and Atsme. In an edit that he summarized as "maybe you both should rethink your involvement in Wikipedia," he said:

Comments from Atsme like this and this (among others) seem to reveal some sort of persecution complex tending toward BATTLEFIELD-view problems. Clearly this AfD has brought out the worst in her. I think the both of you would do well to seek counseling and reexamine your choices.

He later said that these words—which, let's be clear, told two editors that they should retire from Wikipedia and seek professional help—were "carefully" chosen. He also declined to strike them.

Moreover, in the last couple months, Chris has:

• Called a new editor "illiterate," continuing "Reading is such a key skill on Wikipedia. I'd go back to those institutes and get your money back."
• Threatened Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) earlier this month that "You would do well not to tilt at windmills" (over a redirect discussion, of all things).
• Told Widefox, around the same time, that "The last editor I saw with this sort of WP:IDHT behavior ended up blocked ... It's ok. I forgive your inability."
  • On these most recent two, Chris was given a warning.
• Just yesterday, Chris told TonyBallioni in an edit summary that "your editing is unwelcome," continuing in the actual edit with "You are headed the wrong direction. Nobody asked for your grandstanding. Do not become another new admin that gets desysopped for cause." This virulent response came after Tony kindly told a prospective RfA candidate that they could email him for a private analysis, rather than piling on with additional public shaming. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 05:15, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm all too aware that our civility policies are very unevenly enforced—but if Chris' comments aren't out of line, I'd be hard placed to find what does.

I propose that Chris be admonished for his careless use of invective language, and warned that the use of such language in the future will result in blocks. I'm interested to see what others have to say. Thanks, Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 04:39, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

References

I'm adding the diff links to what Ed was talking about: 1, 2, 3, 4. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 06:19, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support nothing less than admonishment. That comment at the Chris Sherwin AfD was outrageous. Less than a week ago, a different editor was blocked at ANI for calling another person "schizophrenic" and essentially instructing that person to get help, and then refusing to strike or redact on the grounds that the statement was factually correct. It boggled the mind there, and it boggles the mind here. The other diffs are also outrageous. At the very least, Chris Troutman needs a final warning. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 05:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support admonishment, and recommends short-term block if the comments are not struck. I have never interacted with Chris, but observing from distance, the use of illiterate is seemingly not an isolated case ([193]). I find it puzzling that the editor is suggesting other editors of battleground behavior when themselves demonstrate aspects of such behavior on more frequent basis, such as the very comment at Chris Sherwin, which is in no way acceptable. Even if something is allegedly "factually correct" (completely irrelevant; the general approach of this editor can be seen from this stale example), direct personal attacks that goes beyond the scope of Wikipedia should never be an option. I find this to be a persistent behaviour, reflected in a quote from Chris: I have no political friends; I stand alone on policy, guidelines, and essays ([194]). The recent strings of questionable DRV filings (October 2, October 20) suggests that the editor should perhaps think again about their view on policy, guidelines and essays, as some of these views are evidently (including the AfD that initiated this report) being possibly against the consensus. Alex Shih (talk) 05:36, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support admonishment. Maybe we could even give him some fish? I'm generally on the side of giving our constructive users lots of rope prior to harsher measures like wrist-slappings etc, but that's not the same as letting them get away with this kind of behavior completely unchecked. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:01, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support admonishment. The diffs above show a disconcerting pattern of incivility and the recent attack on two experienced editors is not acceptable. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 06:21, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support admonishment. Chris troutman - I'm not gonna lie, man... the evidence presented clearly shows that you have temperament issues that you need to improve. Regardless of the outcome of this ANI thread, I hope that you take this as a positive wake-up call and that you turn this around. If you want to grow and become an experienced editor who's trusted, respected, and looked upon as an example of who we should all be like - having an approachable attitude and demonstrating a solid and professional temperament at all times is a hurdle that you must clear. I really want to see you succeed. Please take time and reflect on the concerns expressed here and work on how you're going to address and resolve them moving forward. I wish you well and all the best with this. My talk page is always open to you if you over need input, help, or just someone to talk to. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 06:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support- he's told me too that I shouldn't be editing Wikipedia, and I don't think that's fair. Reyk _YO! 08:05, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support admonishment of some kind, though trouting is too severe, perhaps consider guppying?. -Roxy the dog. bark 08:10, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
  • C'mon dude, look at his screename. Softlavender (talk) 08:15, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • I know, maybe Tadpoleing then, per my previous edsum? -Roxy the dog. bark 08:23, 31 October 2017 (UTC
    • Softlavender - This isn't the time or place to be making fun of someone's username, please. If we want Chris troutman to improve himself and grow as an editor, we need to take this admonishment seriously. This isn't a comment that will help nor encourage him to do so. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 08:25, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
      • I'm not making fun of someone's username. Softlavender (talk) 08:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
        • Softlavender - I apologize if I misinterpreted your response. I don't understand what you meant when you said, "C'mon dude, look at his screename." Am I missing something? ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 08:36, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
          • I was teasing Roxy the dog. Softlavender (talk) 08:40, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

My apologies. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 09:11, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support given the OP's diffs, except for "You would do well not to tilt at windmills", which in my opinion is not problematical, much less invective or uncivil. I think Chris needs to understand at the very least that these kinds of interaction are counterproductive and do not achieve the ends that he would prefer them to, and that at the worst he could be headed for an incivility block(s) or eventually even a CIR ban. Softlavender (talk) 08:15, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• I noticed the comments at the AFD and felt that they were uncalled-for. As this seems to be consistent behaviour and the subject is recalcitrant, an appropriate remedy would be removal of the WP:NPR right. Per WP:BITE, new editors should not be greeted with such personal attacks. Andrew D. (talk) 08:17, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
  • A quick check of CT's page curation log entries does show a bit of bite, so maybe this is a good idea. Some summaries: Clearly you put no thought into this. (From Oct. 12th [195]) This is a poor-attempt at an article. (From Oct. 16th [196]). That said, I'm not finding a whole lot further back. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 08:36, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Very weakly support. I see no problem at all with "You would do well not to tilt at windmills", and the Chris Sherwin AFD was a unique and unlikely to be repeated set of circumstances. (For those unaware of the back-story, Sherwin had been a long-term Wikipedia editor who had a broad circle of on-wiki friends but also had a lengthy history of disruption and of attacks on other editors, so it's understandable that tempers on both sides of the debate would be more frayed than usual.) Some kind of "please tone it down, remember that Wikipedia contributors come from a broad range of backgrounds and have different attitudes towards where the line between robust debate and offensive personal commentary lies" would hopefully be all that's required. ‑ Iridescent 08:46, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
  • (edit conflict) I'd normally agree with the assessment of the Sherwin AfD given how hot under the collar we tend to get about mainspace articles on our own, but I think the diffs in the OP itself kind of go to show that stuff of similar severity isn't exactly unusual. The case of calling another editor an illiterate is pretty bad. Telling off TonyBalloni wasn't good either, and in fact, goes a good way towards rebutting the argument that we should consider the Sherwin AfD comment exceptional circumstances unlikely to be repeated. The TonyBalloni comment came in response to a longstanding frustration with the ORCP process on Tony's part. So it's another case of a deep-seated behind-the-scenes dispute where CT doesn't exercise good self-control. Fact of the matter is that we have lots of standing disputes and lots of areas where people have strong opinions. I hope CT understands how serious this is. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:25, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • "Friends" is a stretch. "Editors who collaborated well with him" is far more accurate, but neither should be used to excuse disruptive behavior, being bitey or throwing tantrums. I've not seen this side of CT in the past, although I have known him to be outspoken. I just hope that whatever may be troubling him gets resolved soon. ^{Atsme📞📧} 11:44, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support--Something along the line of Iridescent's phrasing coupled with an advice about dropping the stick, assuming AGF and a gentle reminder to shun battleground mentality would be quite warranted.Also, see User talk:Kudpung/Archive Oct 2017#DR.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 09:18, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Comment Some of those diffs above are really shocking. An example of Chris troutman's incivility and unilateral actions is this, when he archived a customised and relevant collaboration invitation posted to a Wikiproject talkpage within less than half-an-hour of its posting. When questioned he used an edit summary which said "reply to Another Believer, who seems to think people that vote right wing also smoke dope" - displaying a total lack of understanding of the purpose of Wikiprojects and instead seeing Wikipedia as a partisan political battleground. AusLondonder (talk) 09:41, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support admonishment. These comments ain't nice. ^{My name is}not^dave (talk/contribs) 10:21, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support per basically everyone. Such behaviour towards others creates what is termed in labour law "a hostile work environment". Nobody should have to put up with this. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 10:27, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support on behaviour. Judgement on the issues I looked into was also wide of the mark. Widefox; talk 10:48, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support, the windmill comment is not objectionable, but the others demonstrate an extremely poor choice of language. I hope that given Chris' other useful contributions that they'll take this admonishment on board in a constructive spirit. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 12:09, 31 October 2017 (UTC).
• Support The diffs provided clearly show behavior issues. Admonishment is necessary, and a short-term block may be needed. ThePlatypusofDoom (talk) 12:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Please keep in mind that blocks are not punitive. What valid purpose would a block serve? A Train^talk 13:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support Administrators should be able to have a good rapport with the editorship of the project at large. It is important for all editors to be civil but in the case of people given admin duties, reasonable congeniality is conducive to being both approachable and welcomed in issues requiring mediation and administrative intervention. A lack thereof, besides being distasteful, serves to further burden an administrator with the additional task of having to overcome interpersonal issues before being able to address the problems at hand. While I do not support any specific reprimand in this case, after having recently found myself getting up some people's noses, my time spent here became much easier after I sent some conciliatory messages to the persons I had had difficulties with and made an effort to collaborate with them in a more positive spirit. It wouldn't be at all bad in this case if the editor being discussed were advised to do the same. Edaham (talk) 12:37, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

@Edaham: Since the editor under discussion is not an administrator, I am afraid that leaves a quantity of your comment making little or less sense  :) sorry. — fortunavelut luna 12:46, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Oh I see! well never mind, I checked the editor's user page, saw the admin's news letter posted there and assumed! Not to worry, although mildly embarrassing. I will leave my post as it stands so that people can remind me of what I said if I am ever uncivil when I become an administrator. Edaham (talk) 12:52, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support admonishment - The windmill comment I don't see an issue with but the rest I obviously do - Telling 2 established editors "they need to seek counselling" is not on and should've been struck when asked, Anyway if those sort of comments don't stop I'd support blocks but for now admonishment is the best and most sensible option. –Davey2010^Talk 13:32, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Support and suggest snow close. Chris is a good editor with years of positive contributions to the project under his belt. He will no doubt take this criticism in its intended constructive spirit, but there's little point in leaving this open for additional pile-ons. A Train^talk 13:37, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
• Observation I'm sure Chris has seen this by now. Let's come back to it if it persists despite that. We don't always need a pound of flesh. -- Begoon 13:43, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

We've collected at least eight ounces already. A Train^talk 13:46, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Yeah.Chris has seen it.Let's close this.Winged Blades of Godric^{On leave} 13:50, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

• I object to the flesh tribute being expressed only in pounds and ounces. Conversion to kilos and grams should be provided in the spirit of internationalism. EEng 17:33, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

  EEng It is nought.23kg and 226.8g respectively. Do you want it in kilo-smoots as well? L3X1 (distænt write) 17:56, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

  I don't want to hear what it's not, I want to hear what it is. Jeesh.

Group of vandalism accounts

Today a group of vandalism accounts have been created and have been engaging in similar behaviors. None have exceeded a level 4 warning, but it is blatantly obvious they are not here to contribute to building an encyclopedia. The accounts have similar names and are very likely sockpuppets of each other, or perhaps a group of friends engaged together in tomfoolery that is not conducive to the project:

• User:Aazer-Baser
• User:Affdul-baser
• User:Abdul-baser

I believe all three accounts should be blocked with ACB. All three accounts have been notified. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:13, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I WP:VOA-blocked all of three. DMacks (talk) 15:20, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HS_Produkt_VHS and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HS2000

edit war

Both articles have been protected by User:Ivanvector- possibly from you?- but in any case, edit warring should be reported there. Incidentally, if that was you, Zagreb IP, edit-summaries such as this will lead to blanket blocks for personal attacks. Cheers, — fortunavelut luna 15:49, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

OP is a long-term sockpuppet. See User:Ivanvector/Serbian Army vandal. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:58, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the gen Ivanvector. Oh no. In my haste to reply, I hope I haven't completely refactored some sock trolling. Cheers! — fortunavelut luna 16:05, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Wiki-linking to a section in an article, with the title of the section and article suppressed

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Can someone help me with this small problem?

I have been frequently using the pipe to force my terminology in a link to another Wikipedia article. For example:

"These locomotives haul bottom-dump hopper cars"

to render as: "These locomotives haul bottom-dump hopper cars."

In this case, however, I don’t want the link just to go to the article "Rotary car dumper" because most of that article describes a different technology. The technology my article is discussing is located in a section titled "Alternatives".

I would therefore like to link to the section titled "Alternatives" within the article titled "Rotary car dumper" but to render as "These locomotives haul bottom-dump hopper cars."

Is this going to be possible? Your advice will be appreciated.SCHolar44 (talk) 17:24, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I changed the link above for you to read "Rotary car dumper#Alternatives" from "Rotary car dumper". That points to the section you were looking for. RickinBaltimore (talk) 17:27, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Many thanks, Rick! Marvellous! (PS: Apologies for hitting the Save button twice with my original post.)SCHolar44 (talk) 17:36, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

No problem, if you ever need to do this for a link in the future, just add the # sign and the section title after the name of the article prior to the pipe character. RickinBaltimore (talk) 17:37, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Abuse of admin authority by User:NinjaRobotPirate

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NinjaRobotPirate, an admin, reverted my edits on Scott Glenn. I added a birth date, I then sourced the information. He reverted and then threatened to block me if I persisted. He then toned down his threat, but that is still, as far as I am concerned, intimidation. I believe the proper behaviour is to completely recuse himself EITHER from editing the article or making complaints about me OR ELSE forego any and all use of admin privileges in any dispute over this article. I would also want an apology for having abused his authority (but I won't hold my breath)

Links to article diffs:

• My first edit.
• His revert.
• My revert with a second source, IMBD.
• His second revert.
• Revert by an unidentified user.
• His third revert.
• My second revert.
• His fourth revert.
• His message on my talk page.
• Protection of Scott Glen page

Links to article talk page diffs:

• My comment.
• His comment.

Links to my talk page diffs:

• His message on my talk page.
• MAIN COMPLAINT IS HERE Abusive use of his authority.
• His toning down of said abuse.

Thank you.Vincent (talk) 17:29, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I have just notified NinjaRobotPirate of my complaint. Vincent (talk) 17:34, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Good work NRP, thanks. -Roxy the dog. bark 17:37, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

You attempted to use 2 unreliable sources (imdb and something called "myhowbook.com") to cite a claim about a d.o.b. in a biographical article. Worse than unreliable, those two sites accept material from anyone who submits it. Add edit-warring to the mix and I would not be surprised to see sanctions come your way. ValarianB (talk) 17:40, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• @Vfp15: I recommend you withdraw this report, as all it will do is attract attention to your editng there. I think you were probably rather lucky that the same uninvolved admin whom your edit-warring forced to protect the page did not issue you with a block. Either way, as Roxy indicaes above, this is only likely to be endorsed by the community, and as Valarian makes clear, BLP violations are about as gregarious an offence in an article as is possible. Just FYI, of course. — fortunavelut luna 17:45, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Not in any way an abuse of admin authority. Vfp15, you've been here nearly 14 years, someone ought to have told you by now that we require high-quality, reliable sources for all information about living persons. The two sites you used, myhowbook.com and imdb.com, are both sites which freely host user-submitted content with no editorial oversight whatsoever; they are inappropriate to use as sources here. The burden of evidence is on the editor wishing to add information, not the other way around, and improperly sourced information on living persons is required by policy to be removed immediately. NinjaRobotPirate was right to revert your additions. You then edit-warred to restore the poorly sourced information, leading a different administrator to protect the page. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:42, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Sigh. Since Ivanvector is being too polite to say it, I'll do so; Seriously, you need to chill and accept the concept of best available source goes completely against Wikipedia policy, and given that you've been on Wikipedia even longer than me you don't get to claim the "I wasn't aware of Wikipedia's core policies" defense. If you continue to add information to biographies of living people without a reliable source as we define it, not as you define it, you will be blocked from editing Wikipedia. ‑ Iridescent 17:56, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Abuse of rollback and warning template, edit war by User:Optakeover

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• Optakeover (talk · contribs)
• matthew_hk (talk · contribs)
• 2601:541:4304:E6B0:218:8BFF:FE74:FE4F (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• Lotte Hotels & Resorts (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Svetlana Forsova (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

The first principle of wikipedia is assume good faith, an ip user was trying to edit [[Russian]], [[South Korean]] (disambiguation pages) to [[Russia]]n, [[South Korea]]n (link to the country) was given a level 3 and 4 warning, while i revert his edit, was given a level 2 and 3 warning, and refuse to reply me. Matthew_hk tc 18:49, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Looks like his warnings have already been struck, and an explanation (confusion) provided. Not sure if there's anything to do here. Home Lander (talk) 18:51, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Pinging Primefac. Optakeover^(U)(T)(C) 18:53, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

It did not struck on the ip user. It looks not assume good faith and abuse new user to me. Matthew_hk tc 18:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• I'm somewhat INVOLVED so I won't go closing this, but I think it was just a bit of a misunderstanding. I think it's been cleared up now and I don't think any action needs to be taken. Primefac (talk) 18:56, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• But should an editor who misunderstands something so basic be entrusted with the rollback tool? Surely that tool should only be available to someone who demonstrates understanding? 86.17.222.157 (talk) 19:01, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• It was a mistake. I wasn't aware of the technicalities that Primefac explained in User talk:Primefac#Regarding Lotte Hotels .26 Resorts. I initially reverted [197] because I felt "[[South Korean]]" being edited to "[[South Korea]]n" didn't make sense, because it appeared like a bad faith edit to a link. I now understand I was wrong, because Primefac has explained this technicality to me. However, at that point of time because it appeared to me as an unconstructive edit, so I reverted it. After Matthew hk reverted my repeated reversions at the article, I thought he was socking at anon, so I reported them both to AIV, and then immediately took them down when I was alerted to his protest, including comments from RickinBaltimore (no ping) and Primefac via edit summary. I had no intention of purposefully edit-warring with Matthew hk or reporting him in maleficence. I sincerely apologise for all my mistakes and for my oversight on this understanding of Wikipedia technicality. Optakeover^(U)(T)(C) 19:04, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm willing to say this was a big misunderstanding and that Optakeover meant no ill will towards your Matthew hk, and that this is a learning experience. Optakeover, please just be a bit more careful when templating users, caution is the best method to use here. RickinBaltimore (talk) 19:18, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

@RickinBaltimore:, he just removed my message without adding to his talk archive, i would say it is a bad behavior (neither moved to my talk page). All i want to say that Optakeover should send warning message carefully, neither easily put the name to AIV and assume good faith. Matthew_hk tc 19:23, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for your feedback, and I am very sorry for my mistakes Matthew hk. By the way, I am allowed to remove anything I want from my own talk page as stated at WP:OWNTALK. Optakeover^(U)(T)(C) 19:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Well, it look misfired everywhere:

• List of suicides in the 21st century (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• 110.93.236.75 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) This edit was totally good faith and have a level 4 warning. Matthew_hk tc 19:37, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• The editor already expressed his realization at [198]. I made the revert at that point of time because he edited an access date of a source, which doesn't make sense, unless there is a clear reason to do so. I understand you would have wanted me to explain it to him, but I was extremely busy at that time and unfortunately I simply couldn't allocate the time to explain it to him. I am not beyond reason, and since he messaged me on my talk page he decided to explain himself fully, and I didn't object to his further explanations. Optakeover^(U)(T)(C) 19:48, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• In any case I fully acknowledge every single mistake pointed out, and I have tried to make amends wherever possible. Optakeover^(U)(T)(C) 19:51, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

User:Pekojima on Deaths in 2017

User:Pekojima is a frequent editor of the page Deaths in 2017. When doing so, he/she doesn't always add entries in alphabetical order, despite being warned about this multiple times. Here are some examples: 1. [199] 2. [200] 3. [201] 4. [202] 5. [203]

Also, he/she also has a habit of sometimes adding the next day too early, i.e. before the LINT time passes midnight. Examples: Too early addition of 1 November: [204] (not reverted since I only spotted it after 1 November started) Too early addition of 21 September: [205] Too early addition of 15 September: [206]

The user has been warned on his/her talkpage but doesn't seem to respond. It is similar to a user I reported a couple of weeks ago, with a username of only Chinese characters. --Marbe166 (talk) 19:30, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

WP:NPA

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I really should not have to deal with having edits reverted because of my national origin, I want admins to make it clear that these comments are not acceptable on Wikipedia. [207] Seraphim System ^(talk) 20:16, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

The editor you're accusing of insulting your national origin appears to be Turkish themselves (this in particular) and seems to have been insulted by your insinuation that people are only looking at the Turkey article to plan a holiday. Number 57 20:33, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Most visitors to this page are probably trying to plan a family vacation is a particularly stupid comment even by the standard of the kind of thing that gets brought to ANI. Do you really want to be drawing attention to your edits on a page that's notorious for WP:BOOMERANGs? ‑ Iridescent 20:36, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

The editor clearly wasn't insulting your national origin because, from the edit summary, they clearly don't know what your national origin is. Capeo (talk) 20:45, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Seraphim System's edit is of... questionable value, that's true. But JimPody is calling editors fools in edit summaries. That is not acceptable. A Train^talk 20:57, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

WP:BOOMERANG for to Seraphim System for - undoing racist revert outside 3RR exception and it seems racism is not within our 3RR exceptions so I will settle for the NPA complaint at ANI In which they call Jim Pody's actions racist, which is definitely a personal attack. Jim Pody is a new account, and he has some issues (and "fool" was directed against Khirurg). Seraphim System should know better.Icewhiz (talk) 21:04, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• I've seen some dumb edit summaries in my time, but insulting an entire nation by saying "most visitors to this page are probably trying to plan a family vacation" and not expecting any comeback is, well, naive at best. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 21:10, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

That's a pretty dumb thing to say but it's well-meaning and I think the idea that it's an insult to Turkey is a bit of a stretch. On the other hand, JimPody is calling people fools, which is just a straight up ad hominem. Seraphim System should be directed to Talk:Turkey where he will be talked out of a bad idea. JimPody needs to be whacked with a trout and reminded of WP:NPA. People are so quick to call for boomerangs these days. A Train^talk 21:35, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I think Jim Pody refered Khirurg in their edit summary, but reverted Seraphim by mistake. 174.3.236.27 (talk) 21:23, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

How is that insulting an entire nation? I have no reason to believe that he is Turkish, as he has not disclosed and admins should not be guessing about his undisclosed national origins on ANI. I have disclosed here and on the article talk page. We are supposed to add content that we think our readers want to access, not some polemic about Turkish history which is the majority of the content in the lede. Apparently, our admins feel they are an authority on what our readers want to read, but I am entitled to my own opinion when making constructive edits - the lede could also use additions based on the other sections like music, literature, dance, architecture. Readers looking for information on the Genocide are more likely to directly visit the Armenian Genocide article, but our admins are the last people who should be starting a content dispute at ANI. This is all basic common sense stuff. Even if he is Turkish referring to my national origin, which has been publicly disclosed (including on the talk page of the article) is not acceptable, just as it would not be acceptable to revert someone because they were a "Self-hating Jew" - a little analogous reasoning would help a lot here. If he explains what he meant, I will withdraw the complaint, but he has not. Seraphim System ^(talk) 21:48, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Doesn't this indicate he's Turkish? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

No, he doesn't have to be Turkish to have an opinion about the Republican reforms and certainly, if he has not disclosed no one should assume that he is. Seraphim System ^(talk) 22:02, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

It's nothing to do with any individual's nationality - your edit summary gave the impression of dismissing Turkey as just a vacation destination for Americans or other English speakers. I'm sure you didn't mean it that way, but can you really not see how it can come across like that? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 21:52, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Uh, Seraphim System, I was trying to defend you but this is an ill-considered post. Consider taking a break from digging. A Train^talk 21:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I understand what you are saying now that you mention it, and it was not meant that way. I genuinely want to add content to the lede that would benefit those who are visiting and direct them to articles they want to see, this is my understand of how to improve articles. I also think that even if it not worthy of a sanction, that the comment of "especially considering wherever the hell youre from" should be explained, and a warning should be given to not make comments about national origin that could be seen as discriminatory (would it be less insulting if I was from somewhere else, or is it more insulting because I am from "wherever"?). I would never make an edit summary reverting a good faith addition with an explanation that the edit was especially offensive coming from someone who identifies as "Israeli" or "Jewish" and not doing this is pretty common sense, I am entitled to the same courtesy I show others. Seraphim System ^(talk) 22:00, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Why is it that your dubious accusations of racism need to involve comparisons with Jews/Israel? Number 57 22:03, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

As you already know, I edit in ARBPIA. I'm not active in any other politics areas, but if I can think of another analogy ... let me see, I would not go into an article on the American South and revert with a summary that "This is insulting because you are from America", either way. You can fill in the blank with whatever you want. I can't really think of any other good analogies, sorry. I did not realize he was a new editor, and if he is the emphasis should probably be on explaining what he did wrong instead of turning this into another discussion about ARBPIA. Seraphim System ^(talk) 22:12, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• If anyone added content or something on London and stated "most visitors to this page are probably trying to plan a family vacation" then I myself would be pretty fucked off ... As noted above you've just insulted an entire nation so ofcourse you're going to be insulted!, I would strongly suggest this gets closed before finds someone blocks per BOOMERANG. –Davey2010^Talk 22:05, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm noting that the London article does have a list of World Heritage sites, which were probably added because someone editing it thought that would be information that visitors were looking for. That was what was removed from the lede on Turkey. I personally would not be offended by this because it would indicate to me an editor was actually thinking about who was visiting the page and what they wanted, instead of turning articles into WP:BATTLEGROUNDS. I can not think of a good justification to remove it, but I certainly did not mean to insult an entire nation and if anyone did feel insulted by this, please know that I sincerely regret any discomfort that may have been caused by these words. Seraphim System ^(talk) 22:27, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• The OP wasn't ANI-worthy but I think we're some way from boomerang block territory, too. How about everyone takes a deep breath and gets on with life? GoldenRing (talk) 22:16, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

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

Persistent removal of maintenance templates

User:WyndingHeadland has persisted in removing maintenance templates relating to factually questionable material at the Scots Gaels article (an article of their own creation): 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

The article talk page details my attempts to engage on the matter. A "Removal of maintenance template" warning was issued on their talk page and reliable sources for the disputed material was repeatedly requested. The user actively refused to provide RSs, the blanked maintenance tags were restored but immediately blanked again.

(Incidentally, I strongly suspect this user previously edited under another identity, as User:Baglessingazump.) Mutt Lunker (talk) 23:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

My dynamic IP address is blocked from editing

My TMobile smartphone's dynamic IP address is being blocked from editing (as anonymous), for "disruptive behavior" (had to look up what that was) by user Graham87, I don't know when.

The max extent of my edits is typos, and occasionally turning plain text to a hyperlink - so I'm confident I'm not the source of the disruptive behavior.

The pop-up that informed me of that, was not formatted (visible formatting symbols) on my Samsung 7 Android phone (default browser), and doesn't stay up long enough - ideally it would stay up until I clicked OK.

Here's my IP info - I'm editing now by connecting via WiFi (different IP), but I hate to think others will be blocked when they are assigned this address: 66.249.79.90 2607:fb90:2928:e8fe:4d16:35c7:d6bf:cd63

Thanks in advance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.230.198.147 (talk) 00:25, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

Most T-Mobile ranges are blocked as collateral damage from a long-term abuse account. You won't be able to edit from your phone unless you're connected to WiFi. 207.38.154.23 (talk) 00:41, 1 November 2017 (UTC)