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Requests for comment

RfC: Tasnim News Agency

(Initiated 96 days ago on 12 February 2024)

Closure request for this WP:RSN RfC initiated on February 12, with the last !vote occurring on March 18. It was bot-archived without closure on March 26 due to lack of recent activity. - Amigao (talk) 02:33, 1 May 2024 (UTC)

RfC: Change INFOBOXUSE to recommend the use of infoboxes?

(Initiated 64 days ago on 15 March 2024) Ready to be closed. Charcoal feather (talk) 17:02, 27 April 2024 (UTC)

Before I try to close this I wanted to see if any editors believed I am WP:INVOLVED. I have no opinions on the broader topic, but I have previously participated in a single RfC on whether a specific article should include an infobox. I don't believe this makes me involved, as my participation was limited and on a very specific question, which is usually insufficient to establish an editor as involved on the broader topic, but given the strength of opinion on various sides I expect that any result will be controversial, so I wanted to raise the question here first.

If editors present reasonable objections within the next few days I won't close; otherwise, unless another editor gets to it first, I will do so. BilledMammal (talk) 04:43, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

I am involved in the underlying RfC, but my opinion on the issue is not particularly strong and I am putting on my closer hat now. Per WP:INVOLVED, "[i]nvolvement is construed broadly by the community". In the Rod Steiger RfC, you stated: [T]o the best of my knowledge (although I have not been involved in these discussions before) every recent RfC on including an infobox has been successful. From this it is clear that the topic is settled, and insisting on RfC's for every article risks becoming disruptive. Although the underlying RfC was on a very specific question, your statement touches on the broader question of whether editors should be allowed to contest including an infobox in a particular article, a practice that you said risks becoming disruptive because the topic is settled. That makes you involved—construing the term broadly—because answering this RfC in the affirmative would significantly shift the burden against those contesting infoboxes in future discussions. That said, if you can put aside your earlier assessment of consensus and only look at the arguments in this RfC, I don't see an issue with you closing. It wouldn't be a bad idea to disclose this at the RfC itself, and make sure that nobody there has any objections. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:43, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Pinging @BilledMammal. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:45, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Libertarian Party (Australia)#Conservatism

(Initiated 50 days ago on 29 March 2024) RfC template expired. TarnishedPath^talk 01:22, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

 Doing... voorts (talk/contributions) 21:49, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

 Done. Courtesy ping @TarnishedPath. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:56, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

@Voorts appreciated. TarnishedPath^talk 00:48, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk: Elissa Slotkin#Labor Positions and the 2023 UAW Strike

(Initiated 50 days ago on 30 March 2024) RfC expired, no clear consensus. andrew.robbins (talk) 04:05, 30 April 2024 (UTC)

WP:RSN#RFC:_The_Anti-Defamation_League

(Initiated 42 days ago on 7 April 2024) Three related RFCs in a trench coat. I personally think the consensus is fairly clear here, but it should definitely be an admin close. Loki (talk) 14:07, 6 May 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Enforcing ECR for article creators

(Initiated 41 days ago on 8 April 2024) Discussion appears to have died down almost a month after this RfC opened. Would like to see a formal close of Q1 and Q2. Awesome Aasim 00:11, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Brothers of Italy#RfC on neo-fascism in info box 3 (Effectively option 4 from RfC2)

(Initiated 40 days ago on 8 April 2024) Clear consensus for change but not what to change to. I've handled this RfC very badly imo. User:Alexanderkowal — Preceding undated comment added 11:50, 1 May 2024 (UTC)

 Comment: The RfC tag was removed the same day it was started. This should be closed as a discussion, not an RfC. voorts (talk/contributions) 22:03, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Havana syndrome#RfC on the presentation of the Havana Syndrome investigative report content

(Initiated 24 days ago on 25 April 2024) No new comments in 12 days. {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 08:52, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

Deletion discussions

XFD backlog

V	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Total
CfD	0	0	18	12	30
TfD	0	0	0	3	3
MfD	0	0	0	2	2
FfD	0	0	0	0	0
RfD	0	0	17	55	72
AfD	0	0	0	2	2

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 8#Category:French forts in the United States

(Initiated 58 days ago on 22 March 2024) HouseBlaster (talk · he/him) 20:38, 4 May 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 10#Category:19th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in Réunion

(Initiated 56 days ago on 23 March 2024) HouseBlaster (talk · he/him) 13:39, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 27#Category:Unrecognized tribes in the United States

(Initiated 42 days ago on 7 April 2024) This one has been mentioned in a news outlet, so a close would ideally make sense to the outside world. HouseBlaster (talk · he/him) 13:56, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 24#Category:Asian American billionaires

(Initiated 25 days ago on 24 April 2024) HouseBlaster (talk · he/him) 20:38, 4 May 2024 (UTC)

Other types of closing requests

Talk:Maersk Hangzhou#Second merge proposal

(Initiated 115 days ago on 24 January 2024) Merge discussion involving CTOPS that has been open for 2 weeks now. Needs closure. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 04:46, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

@WeatherWriter: I would give it a few days as the discussion is now active with new comments. GoldenBootWizard276 (talk) 00:00, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

As nominator, I support a non consensus closure of this discussion so we can create an RFC to discuss how WP:ONEEVENT applies in this situation. GoldenBootWizard276 (talk) 21:56, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Talk:1985_Pacific_hurricane_season#Proposed_merge_of_Hurricane_Ignacio_(1985)_into_1985_Pacific_hurricane_season

(Initiated 109 days ago on 30 January 2024) Listing multiple non-unanimous merge discussions from January that have run their course. Noah, AA^Talk 13:50, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Pharnavaz_I_of_Iberia#Requested_move_6_February_2024

(Initiated 103 days ago on 6 February 2024) Requested move open for nearly 2 months. Natg 19 (talk) 17:46, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

Has now been open for three months. 66.99.15.163 (talk) 19:23, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:12 February 2024 Rafah strikes#Merge proposal to Rafah offensive

(Initiated 96 days ago on 13 February 2024) The discussion has been inactive for over a month, with a clear preference against the merge proposal. CarmenEsparzaAmoux (talk) 19:35, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Rupert_Sheldrake#Talkpage_"This_article_has_been_mentioned_by_a_media_organization:"_BRD

(Initiated 32 days ago on 16 April 2024) - Discussion on a talkpage template, Last comment 6 days ago, 10 comments, 4 people in discussion. Not unanimous, but perhaps there is consensus-ish or strength of argument-ish closure possible. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:24, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

It doesn't seem to me that there is a consensus here to do anything, with most editors couching their statements as why it might (or might not) be done rather than why it should (or should not). I will opine that I'm not aware there's any precedent to exclude {{Press}} for any reason and that it would be very unusual, but I don't think that's good enough reason to just overrule Hipal. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 01:01, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Weaponization of antisemitism#Requested move 21 April 2024

(Initiated 27 days ago on 21 April 2024) No new comments since 12 May. Graham (talk) 06:07, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Forest_management#Merge_proposal

(Initiated 21 days ago on 28 April 2024) As the proposer I presume I cannot close this. It was started more than a week ago and opinions differed somewhat. Chidgk1 (talk) 13:46, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Press_Your_Luck_scandal#Separate_articles

(Initiated 16 days ago on 2 May 2024) Please review this discussion. --Jax 0677 (talk) 01:42, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

Talk:Agroforestry#Merge_proposal

(Initiated 15 days ago on 3 May 2024) As the proposer I presume I cannot close this. It was started more than a week ago and opinions differed somewhat. Chidgk1 (talk) 13:46, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

Pages recently put under extended-confirmed protection

Report

Pages recently put under extended confirmed protection (23 out of 7758 total) () WATCH Page Protected Expiry Type Summary Admin Poppay Ki Wedding 2024-05-18 20:42 2025-05-18 20:42 create Repeatedly recreated: request at WP:RFPP Ymblanter Joseph Sam Williams 2024-05-18 11:59 2024-05-22 11:59 move Persistent sock puppetry; requested at WP:RfPP Robertsky 2024 University of Amsterdam pro-Palestinian campus occupation 2024-05-18 06:32 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Edcel Greco Lagman 2024-05-18 03:31 2024-07-18 03:31 edit,move Persistent disruptive editing: Removal of sourced content, per a complaint at WP:ANI EdJohnston User:DatBot/Filter reporter/Run 2024-05-17 21:34 indefinite edit,move Persistent vandalism: request at WP:RFPP Ymblanter User talk:BabcocksRhodeIsland1700s 2024-05-17 16:17 2024-05-24 16:17 move Don't move your User talk page except by a Renamer Liz User:MayNard Keith Batiste, Jr 2024-05-17 15:29 2024-05-31 15:29 create Repeatedly recreated Liz Komail Anam 2024-05-17 13:36 2024-11-17 13:36 edit,move Edit warring / content dispute, per WP:Articles_for_deletion/Komail_Anam OwenX 2024 Radboud University Nijmegen pro-Palestinian campus occupation 2024-05-17 02:44 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Talk:Speedcore (Punk) 2024-05-16 23:02 2024-05-23 23:02 create Repeatedly recreated Liz Comedy Shorts Gamer 2024-05-16 18:08 indefinite edit,move This subject is still on WP:DEEPER and the title blacklist and should not have a standalone article without approval through DRV Pppery ComedyShortsGamer 2024-05-16 18:06 indefinite edit,move Restore salt Pppery Template:Fl. 2024-05-16 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2585 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II Reform Zionism 2024-05-16 17:50 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement WP:PIA Rosguill Progressive Zionism 2024-05-16 17:46 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement WP:PIA Rosguill Nagyal 2024-05-16 17:42 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Justlettersandnumbers British support for Israel in the Israel–Hamas war 2024-05-16 12:54 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement: WP:AIPIA Malinaccier Neil Hartigan 2024-05-15 17:16 2025-05-15 17:16 edit WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Buzzards-Watch Me Work RoySmith Tad Jude 2024-05-15 17:16 2025-05-15 17:16 edit WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Buzzards-Watch Me Work RoySmith Minneapolis 2024-05-15 17:15 2025-05-15 17:15 edit WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Buzzards-Watch Me Work RoySmith Draft:CaseOh 2024-05-15 02:40 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Dennis Brown Poot 2024-05-15 00:14 2025-05-15 00:14 edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; requested at WP:RfPP Daniel Quinlan Spore (2008 video game) 2024-05-14 23:39 2024-11-14 23:39 edit,move Persistent vandalism from (auto)confirmed accounts; requested at WP:RfPP Daniel Quinlan

Proposing a temporary measure to assist in protecting the Main Page

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

---

As many Wikipedians have noticed, several accounts have recently been compromised. Three of these compromised accounts have been administrator accounts, and all three compromised admin accounts focused on vandalizing the Main Page, the public face of the project. The most recent compromised administrator account is that of a highly active administrator. I am part of the team investigating this series of events, along with stewards, other checkusers, and WMF Security and Trust & Safety staff. There are several actions taking place in the background, mainly for security and/or privacy requirements, that will not be discussed in this thread.

One proposed temporary measure to mitigate the damage being caused by this vandal is to restrict editing of the Main Page to administrators who also hold Interface Administrator permissions. There is rarely a need to edit the Main Page itself — almost all of the work is done in the background using templates — so the impact of this temporary measure is minimal.

As noted, this is intended to be a temporary measure that will give both the community and the investigating team some "breathing space" to focus on the vandal rather than the impact of the vandalism. It was suggested that we bring this change to the community for discussion prior to implementing it. Does anyone have any feedback on this proposal? Thanks for your participation. Risker (talk) 21:30, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

Is it technically possible? The Main Page itself may not need many edits but the templates transcluded on it which are cascade protected are a different matter. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 21:32, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes. Adding a protection level is relatively trivial to do in the MediaWiki back-end. Just needs consensus. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 21:35, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes. This can be done by private filter from what I’ve been told. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:36, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, I wasn't clear: Is this possible without all the templates transcluded on it also becoming it-protected? Because that would be hefty collateral damage. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 21:51, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

@Jo-Jo Eumerus: what @TonyBallioni: said been added. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:00, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Survey

• Support enough is enough. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:36, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Take this c**t down. —Jeremy v^_^v ^Bori! 21:37, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support could be done in MediaWiki, or possibly with an edit filter. --Rschen7754 21:41, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• As the front page of the site, the Main Page is arguably an interface page in spirit. Reasonable protection mechanism. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 21:41, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - and once this current outbreak has died down, an RfC should be run to make this change permanent. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:42, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Yup, filter please - TNT ^💖 21:43, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• (edit conflict)x4 Support No need for this nonsense. (Please make sure there are some intadmins checking out the errors page every once in a while.) Natureium (talk) 21:44, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support, even with an option of protecting other higly visible pages such as Donald Trump for a short time.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:45, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  This was already done earlier. Killiondude's account compromise rendered it useless. —Jeremy v^_^v ^Bori! 21:47, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  Exactly my point. I mean moving these pages into mediawiki namespace so that only interface admins can edit.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:05, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Ymblanter: sysops can edit MediaWiki pages already. The only pages restricted to interface admins are cascading style sheets and javascript pages. — xaosflux ^Talk 22:09, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  Thanks, and as an interface admin on three projects I should have thought well before writing this. Anyway, my point is that the main page can be protected such that only interface admins can edit it (e.g. by adding a new protection level), then other highly visible pages can only get similar protection for a short time.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:16, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  Striken the option. In view of the office action requiring TFA for all interface admins, it is absolutely not ok if only users who can afford a smartphone (or at least a laptop) will be able to edit articles such as Donald Trump.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:04, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Yes, but I'd like to hear that the cascading protection issues have been fully considered. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 21:50, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  Oppose (temporary position), it's clear from some of the objections that the cascade issue hasn't been fully considered, and that this will either prevent updates to the main page or won't be at all effective. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 10:44, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support I support all reasonable measures to protect the encyclopedia against this vile attack and similar incidents in the future. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 21:51, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per WP:CREEP. This is not what the interface admin right was introduced for and the talk of this measure being temporary is already being subverted above. So far as I can see, the recent incidents have been handled just fine, with no significant impact or press coverage. The main page says that Wikipedia is "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit". Limiting access to a tiny handful of people is blatantly contrary to this fundamental principle. Andrew D. (talk) 21:56, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
  • It's already restricted to only admins. How is restricting access to intadmins "blatantly contrary to this fundamental principle" if limiting it to admins isn't? Natureium (talk) 22:22, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Andrew, please. I'm glad you have an opinion on everything, but that these very incidents happened means things are not "just fine". Drmies (talk) 01:41, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• At least temporarily some additional WP:BEANS controls have been added, these are far from perfect but may help and should not be in the way of daily workflow. — xaosflux ^Talk 22:00, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Seriously Andrew, "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit" does not mean "continually replace Donald Trump's article with a picture of an ejeculating penis". I think just about anyone knows that. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 22:17, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support I disagree with Andrew Davidson's comment. The Main Page already isn't editable by 99.999999999999% of the world's population; what will restricting access even further do anything more to the fact that the Main Page already doesn't fit with the whole "anyone can edit" philosophy? As for how the incidents have been handled, you may very well commend our team of stewards for acting quickly to stop further disruption, but in the case of admin accounts getting compromised it seems to be a better solution to prevent such events from happening in the first place rather than having an "oopsies" moment when the Main Page is replaced with Commons porn, even if it's reverted within ten seconds. —k6ka 🍁 (Talk · Contributions) 22:26, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support – fairly obvious, really. SNOW-close, please. Bradv 22:32, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support, but let's not let "I need to edit the Main Page" become a new reason to hand out intadmin rights. What the attacker could do with an intadmin account is much, much worse, and I'd like to keep the number of such accounts as low as possible. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:34, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  Didn't really think this one through. I'd oppose but I don't know how to explain my rationale without getting BEANsy. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 07:17, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support solely for the main page; I agree with the comments that due to the nature of transclusions, that page is already similar to an interface page (and assume that transcluded pages would not be affected). I don't think this will be effective for other pages; rationale withheld per WP:BEANS. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:35, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
  • There seems to be some discussion that this would also affect transcluded pages. In that case, I'd only support if it was a separate permission from INTADMIN. Ideally, it would be a permission that could be given to trusted non-admins, specifically The Rambling Man. power~enwiki (π, ν) 17:41, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support. Regardless of what the best approach should be, there are times when one has to use whatever tool is at hand, and build better tools later. Perhaps we should start looking at a scheme of progressive protection where "anybody" can edit at the bottom of the pyramid, but increasing experience and trust are required to move up to vital or more developed pages.

As a side note, I have long thought that "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit" – which isn't even true – should be changed to "the collaborative free encyclopedia", emphasising working together. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:38, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

I could be wrong, but I don't believe that the WMF uses that tag line anymore. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:03, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

Wrong! Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:38, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support (x10,000). Porn on the main page by compromised accounts is a severe problem. We have active interface admins and as others have mentioned, the main page itself doesn't need editing frequently, so I think this would clearly do more good than it would harm. But is there a way to protect a page with cascading protection at a certain level, but then have a higher local protection level? If it isn't possible, then I definitely would not support intadmin-protecting all pages transcluded onto the main page.--SkyGazer 512 ^{Oh no, what did I do this time?} 22:41, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  We've done that now, but it is more of a speed-bump than a road-block. — xaosflux ^Talk 23:13, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support I've been an admin for 11 years, and never needed to edit it (well, apart from this evening, and someone even beat me to that by fractions of a second, so thanks for that). Black Kite (talk) 23:50, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oh yeah and... an inability for an admin to unblock themselves would be useful as well. Black Kite (talk) 23:52, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Black Kite: You may want to check out this proposal I made at VPR. ^Semi_Hypercube ✎ 00:58, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support temporarily as proposed for the Main Page. -- KTC (talk) 00:31, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support as a temporary measure (but how would this work? A new form of protection, since this isn't in the MediaWiki namespace?) ^Semi_Hypercube ✎ 00:41, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Also, I don't think using an edit filter will be completely effective, not saying the weakness per you-know-what, but one could figure out what it is. ^Semi_Hypercube ✎ 17:08, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support The attacker is doing us a favor by highlighting the weaknesses. They will move on to the next weak link but protecting the main page is obviously required. Re "how would this work?": developers can do anything and they will quickly fix the problem. Johnuniq (talk) 01:35, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support, since I just got back from dealing with this guy. GAB^gab 01:52, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - I wouldn't dare to touch it, anyway. Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 01:55, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support I wouldn't mind if this is a permanent change; the Main Page itself doesn't need editing very often. funplussmart (talk) 05:00, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support  temporary measure. Orientls (talk) 05:00, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Support, Sensible measure. –Ammarpad (talk) 05:53, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose Upon further reflection, I understand this will not solve the problem without cascading and with cascading, it creates bigger problem. –Ammarpad (talk) 12:32, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support as if I'm reading this right, only the actual Main Page will receive this additional protection, not T:DYK etc. I'd be willing to support this as a permanent change, too. Anarchyte (talk | work) 06:36, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Weak support I think Andrew's comment is being wrongly ignored as the discussion above seems to be the creation of a new level of page protection which I do not think should exist or be used on this project except for this specific instance. I do not think having or applying IAdmin protection to anything except javascript pages is something that I would ever want, and the only reason I would be in favor of this is because of the recent security concerns. I do not think we should ever have a protection level that restricts editing to 14 people. For comparison, twice as many people are in the staff group (a little over 30), allowing them to edit superprotected pages, than are IAdmins on enwiki. The admonition against WP:CREEP should be taken more seriously and the temporary nature of this use emphasized. Wugapodes [t^hɑk] [ˈkan.ˌʧɹɪbz] 07:38, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
  • My weak support has now become Oppose given a lot of the subsequent discussion. Jimbo's account has been compromised before, IAdmins can be compromised, and restricting editing to these few people, while more likely to prevent abuse, will make resolving any actual abuse more difficult. I'd rather greater risk but quicker response than less risk and slower response. I also think this whole thing has turned into a catch-22. I'm opposed to cascading protection for the Main Page, since it would turn IAdmin into something it was never supposed to be, but not cascade protecting the main page would result in the vandals moving on to the templates themselves. I really think this is just generally a bad idea the more I think about it. Wugapodes [t^hɑk] [ˈkan.ˌʧɹɪbz] 01:05, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment I have been busy so I'm not up to play. I'm not opposed to the idea although I'm not sure this will help a great deal from what's been said. I appreciate per BEAN etc that maybe details can't be discussed for this very reason so maybe there can be no clarification. But I don't think what I'm saying here is likely to be reveal anything not already obvious to prying eyes. It sounds like the plan is to still allow admins to make changes to the templates without requiring an interface admin to approve them. In that case, it seems like the vandal will just move on to vandalising the templates. I mean they're probably already working out what to do. While I appreciate they have been directly editing the main page so far, they haven't had a reason not to. And while trying passwords from previous leaks (which I assume is probably what's happening) is not really that technically demanding if you only have a few to try, it seems unlikely to me anyone capable of this won't figure it out fairly fast. Again maybe no comment can be offered, but is it believed the templates can somehow be protected against this vandalism in ways the actually main page can't? Nil Einne (talk) 10:38, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Weak support only until a stronger solution is determined. The attacker (or an attacker, maybe not this one) has already demonstrated they can compromise 2FA-enabled accounts. Restricting access to intadmins reduces our security exposure, but will just focus the attacks on a different class of user. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:19, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Wait which 2FA account got hacked? I hope what you're saying isn't true, it would mean that even 2FA isn't enough to stop the attack. funplussmart (talk) 21:23, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  I don't know which accounts specifically. 2FA is a good solution but it's not perfect. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:34, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Hi, none of the accounts compromised in this attack had 2FA. We currently believe all compromises in this attack were due to people using the same password on other websites which presumably got hacked. 2FA is of course not a magic bullet - it won't fix every security problem (e.g. If someone steals your computer well logged in, 2FA is not going to stop that. If you add malicious Javascript to your special:mypage/common.js, 2FA can't stop that) but 2FA would have stopped this attack if the admins in question had enabled it. I strongly encourage all admins to enable 2FA. BWolff (WMF) (talk) 22:49, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• No, come on. Really? I'd much rather have compromised admin accounts announcing themselves to us by editing the main page than do other things. As it is, I don't think this is worth anywhere near the community time or consternation we have all spent on this. Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 06:07, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
  • ^^^This. Compromised admin accounts used to be immediately detectable to every other logged-in admin on the site back when they announced themselves by making "Main Page" go red on every page. Now that it isn't deleteable because of the same sort of technical measure being proposed here, they have to "settle" for goatseing it. Some improvement. The last thing we want to do is make them settle for one of the couple dozen ways you can cause real and/or irreversible harm with a sysop bit. —Cryptic 11:11, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose int-admin cascading protection, but I do support a MediaWiki imposed int-admin protection to the Main Page itself, and perhaps a few others, as is the status-quo with filter 943. The filter was an emergency measure. Using interface admin isn't really the right way to go. I agree with others below that there shouldn't be non-technical people in the technical user group. We either need a new user group, or only int-admin protect the main page itself, and not the pages transcluded on it. Better yet, phab:T210192#4771932, phab:T150826 and phab:T150576. Sorry if I misled anyone — MusikAnimal ^talk 06:45, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support until other security measures can be implemented or the vandalism subsides. GorillaWarfare (talk) 06:37, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose in contrast to the discussion about removing the unblockself permission this would create a real problem if one of the accounts with interface-editor were to be compromised, it would leave us with little means to reverse their actions. For this to work it would also need to be cascading protection as otherwise something could just be added to a page transcluded to the main page, that severely restricts the number of people who can put anything on the main page. Fix that by adding more people to the usergroup and we're back where we started. We should be looking at a technical solution to solve the problem, maybe some sort of double confirmation by two admins to put things on the main page (similar to pending changes in a way, but without auto accept). Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 06:49, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Callanecc:. It seems to me you're opposing based on wrong assumption that: the protection must propagate (cascade) to all transcluded pages, DYK, ITN etc... thereby limiting placing items to only less than 10? techadmins. But from what I understand that's not what will happen. Only the "Mainpage" will be protected with this above-admin level, this will be done via MediaWiki backend and question of "how" is beyond the scope of this discussion. What's is just needed is the consensus. –Ammarpad (talk) 07:23, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  Thanks for asking Ammarpad, my point was that the only way for protection like this to be effective would be to protect transclusions at the same level. I'm opposed to protecting the transclusions so also to protecting the main page in this way. However, maybe something like pending changes for admins to edit the main page (or transcluded pages) where it required two admins to make a change (one to initiate and one to approve) would be a good solution. In the meantime the status quo should prevail so that we can more easily deal with any further compromised accounts. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 09:14, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  The notion of there being less ways to revert vandalism is one of the only reasons I'm partially reconsidering my support vote. However, I do think that if we have a mandatory 2FA enabled intadmin account hacked, we have more on our hands than just the main page being changed, and the person behind these attacks know this. Unless they just want to make a statement for publicity, they can do a lot worse (which is why intadmin exists in the first place). Anarchyte (talk | work) 10:58, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  Anarchyte, There are a number of ways a 2FA-secured account can become compromised - and while I won't list them all here, physical theft of device (most likely a phone or chromebook/laptop) would be the first one that would come to mind for me. SQL^{Query me!} 01:12, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

  @SQL: I'm aware. I'm saying that given WMF Office has now forced all intadmins to enable 2FA, if they get hacked we have something bigger on our hands. An intadmin can do real damage and I'm sure that's what a hacker would do with one, unless they only want to change the main page for publicity. An admin account can do a lot but we can no longer truly break the site. Anarchyte (talk | work) 07:03, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

• I'm not "opposing" but I would just like to ensure this is thought through fully before being implemented.

1. If the protection cascades then we have an issue:

a) The existing small number interface admins will be responsible for all DYK, OTD, POTD, FA, FL updates. this is clearly not going to work, so:

b) We will have to make a bunch of new interface admins. Not a good idea, the whole idea of the role is to minimize the number of people with that kind of access.

2. If the protection does not cascade then it's not actually going to prevent a compromised admin account from vandalizing the main page, without specifying details, and in fact might make it harder slower to track down and resolve the problem.

I think rather than misuse the interface admin permission, which sounds like a neat idea in principle but a bad one when considering the detail, something else would need to be done. I am not in favour of uncoupling admin permissions, because we have a small pool of administrators anyway and adding further obstacles to admins who (for example) have never edited the main page but want to help when they see a backlog or an issue arise will silo things up even more and make things less flexible. I don't have the right solution, but I have concerns about the proposed one for the reasons above. Fish+Karate 09:56, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support Non-essential admin area and page that generally requires minimal change. Restrict to those who actually need it. talk to !dave 14:48, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• I have the same problems that Fish and karate has. Everything on the Main Page – DYK, ITN, all of it – is cascaded. We're about to make a very small group of people responsible for carrying out all the updates to the Main Page, If those people are prepared to do that, including updating DYK however often it has to be updated, I'm fine with it. If not, we either have to make more intadmins, which kind of defeats the purpose of having intadmins in the first place, or find another solution. Katie^talk 16:01, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - Per all supports and K6ka - FlightTime (open channel) 17:55, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose - For starters, this is not what the intadmin permission was intended for. And when one of those accounts becomes compromised (intadmin isn't a magic flag that makes your account unhackable), there will be even fewer around that can undo the damage. Additionally, Fish and karate makes a fantastic point about narrowing who can work on the main page. SQL^{Query me!} 18:08, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose if we keep the cascading protection then you will need to be an interface admin to work on WP:DYK, WP:ITN/C, WP:ERRORS, etc. This massively restricts the pool of people who can work on those processes. The people who are interface admins were chosen for their technical skill at HTML/CSS/etc and don't necessarily have any interest in or ability to deal with those processes. We could appoint a load more interface admins to do this work, but that would rather defeat the point of the proposal. On the other hand if we turn cascading protection off then we make the whole of the main page much less secure, and even if we manage to manually protect everything transcluded on the main page I'm sure the attacker is capable of going after one of those pages instead. People I talk to about Wikipedia in real life usually have little or no idea that the main page even exists, I don't think it's a huge problem as advertised. Hut 8.5 18:34, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support if temporary. Should be reverted to be only admin when the compromised accounts are taken care of. Kirbanzo (talk) 19:12, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose This creates more problems than it solves. I think Callanecc is on the right track with a modified PC. Crazynas ^t 19:47, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support but via the already made EF. Optionally support int-admin to MP by way of the same backed protection system that prevents move/delete. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:49, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  And if anyone wants to say but what about EFM issues - I think we should make EFM be along the same process as int-admin, including expiring it from admins that haven't actually used it in a while. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:52, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  Agree on both counts. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 22:57, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support would support this as a permanent measure --Tom (LT) (talk) 23:30, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Support in principle, however oppose practically until the casacding issue described below is resolved. --Tom (LT) (talk) 00:49, 29 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Aside from the bits that I'm seeing below, about admins being able to edit the component content (or requiring interface-admin rights to edit pages like On This Day), remember that Jimbo's account was compromised two years ago and used to vandalise the Main Page. (Admin-only link, and someone appropriately uses rollback on that edit.) Even super-admin accounts with rights like interface admin or founder can be compromised, and when it requires super-admin rights to edit the Main Page, it will sometimes take a good deal longer to revert vandalism: it's easy to find an admin to revert vandalism to a protected page rather quickly, but finding an interface admin or a steward may take a good number of minutes. We mustn't pretend that interface admins, stewards, or founders are 100% immune from compromise, so we shouldn't imagine that restricting Main Page editing to them will prevent this kind of vandalism. Nyttend (talk) 00:54, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Nyttend: Though "super-admin" accounts like int-admin and founder are much less likely to be compromised, since int-admins are required by the WMF to use two-factor authentication, and Jimbo probably uses 2FA (does anyone know this for sure?) ^Semi_Hypercube ✎ 13:36, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. After reading this through, I'm unable to see a resolution to the cascading protection issue. I would support the main page being protected without cascading protection being applied, to slightly reduce the target for any potential vandals, but I doubt that would do much. I suspect the best option here would be to create a new user group and new protection level intended purely for the main page and its constituent elements. I would also support making 2FA mandatory for this group. Vanamonde (talk) 04:51, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose, beyond the measures already taken. The cure is worse than the disease here; while I'd be willing to help out as an intadmin with maintaining the Main Page, there just aren't enough of us to go around, and increasing the numbers of intadmins to do off-mission stuff like this defeats the purpose of spinning intadmins off in the first place. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 13:43, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose (go PC) - the cascading issue is too major. Int-admins are, by design, a tiny group (they didn't even let in 4 trusted technical non-admins). Without cascading we don't really do anything. With it we'd need far more to cover everything, including blocking certain areas that were the main reason some admins actually joined up. Additionally, it seems bold of us to add such a job to the int-admin remit without at least half of them saying yes (this is a secondary concern). Getting an admin-only Pending Changes approach seems much better. Obviously more than 1 admin can have their account compromised but it should significantly reduce the frequency of issues. Nosebagbear (talk) 16:01, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

A note - an alternate mooted strategy of main-page admins (functionally granted on request, though presumably after a delay to stop immediate requests than vandalism) would seem less preferable because of a patient vandal to abuse. That said, it would also be an alternate potential method. Nosebagbear (talk)

• Oppose per Andrew D. Enterprisey (talk!) 20:23, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose until someone comes up with a solution to the cascading problem and allow timely updates to ITN and DYK.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 20:51, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - per my comments below - in essence, concerns about DYK and that the Main Page remains vulnerable thorough its various templates and that this is WP:CREEP. Best, Mifter (talk) 02:38, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
• Split vote. I was almost swayed by the original proposal but L235 convinced me otherwise. If an admin account is compromised, we want it to be obvious. I strongly oppose cascading IAdmin protection of Main Page itself cascading IAdmin protection on Main Page, because that's exactly the opposite of what IAdmin is for: protect interface, don't protect content. We've finally managed to move WP:Geonotice to a space where all sysops can update content and now we want to stop admins updating content? No. I would weakly support non-cascading IAdmin protection of Main Page, with cascading standard full-protection (argh, full protection is no longer the highest level of protection) for things that are directly transcluded onto Main Page, considering that the Main Page itself is basically an interface container rather than content. Deryck C. 18:13, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose abuse of the IAdmin right. There are many other ways for compromised admin accounts to disrupt Wikipedia while creating a large impact other than vandalizing the main page, protecting the main page is only going to encourage hackers to move to other areas. I agree with SQL's concern as well. feminist (talk) 02:53, 30 November 2018 (UTC)
• Neutral - permanently move the Main Page to Mediawiki namespace, but remove the cascading protection and manually template-protect the individual MP templates instead. Kamafa Delgato _(Lojbanist)^{Styrofoam is not made from kittens.} 23:58, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

  Lojbanist, Why would we move the main page to the mediawiki namespace? SQL^{Query me!} 01:25, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose vandalism would shift to transcluded templates. Protecting the main page won’t stop ompromised accounts. Stephen 05:53, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Without cascading, protection would be toothless and they could just vandalize the transcluded templates. With cascading, well, that's totally not what the interface admin role was designed for. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 06:17, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Yet another slippery slope eroding WP:EDIT. If even admins are not allowed to fix problems or improve content in certain pages of Wikipedia, who will be denied editing next? jni ^(delete)_{...just not interested} 06:44, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - If transcluded pages are also protected, it makes fixing WP:ERRORS impossible. If they aren't transcluded, compromised admin accounts will simply abuse those. O Still Small Voice of Clam (formerly Optimist on the run) 13:58, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose the hacking of the compromised accounts was carried out by someone who new how a) Wikipedia works to a certain extent and b) is "fluent" enough with computers that they were able to hack several accounts. Just protecting the Main Page will just make potential vandals, who have hacked into a administrator account, focus their vandalism over to the templates and subpages (which in this proposal won't have the protection the Main Page would). Although protecting the Main Page is a good idea in theory, to implement the idea properly and to stop vandals who can hack accounts, these templates and subpages would need IAdmin protection too. This limits updating the Main Page in its entirety to IAdmins and IAdmins are limited in numbers. Many admins who maintain the Main Page (and would want to continue to) would also need to apply for IAdmin permissions, which is something which requires an admin to use 2FA before the right is granted (which for several admins is infeasible per comments by admins in this RfC on admin inactivity).

In short, I in theory support the idea of IAdmin protection for the Main Page, but for this to be effective subpages and included templates need to be also, which stops non-IAdmin admins maintaining the Main Page. Dreamy Jazz 🎷 ^{talk to me | my contributions} 22:26, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose – people are bringing up a lot of good points here, especially those about the proposed changes making the number of people who can fix these problems as they pop up even smaller. Sadly opposing. cymru.lass (talk • contribs) 03:04, 4 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose – If it doesn't cascade to templates, all the templates can get hit instead. It's unclear to me that's much better. If it does cascade to templates then it blocks routine work. However more significantly, we're assuming a case where an admin account is compromised. Under that assumption, the proposal merely diverts them to do something less obvious. It sucks if the main page gets hit, but it's going to be spotted rapidly, it will be reverted rapidly, and the compromised account will be immediately identified. The actual impact of the main page being hit is just some brief annoyance/embarrassment/offensiveness. Are we really sure it would be preferable if we divert a compromised admin account to be abused in some other manner? Alsee (talk) 04:30, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per above. Not a good solution, especially since vandalism can, and will shift to the transcluded templates. -FASTILY 08:35, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

How temporary?

There seems to be support for the measure above but several supports are predicated on it being temporary. Seems like it would be worthwhile to have some form of consensus of how long temporary is prior to any implementation. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 06:08, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

That's a pretty good question, Barkeep49. I think it can be said for certain that this change would be reverted as soon as it's fairly certain the vandalism issue has been resolved and the editing restriction is no longer needed. It's difficult to predict this; we've only been working on it for 72 hours, and it's a long weekend for US WMF staff (who have been very responsive), so the investigation is in its very early stages. Once we have more experienced eyes looking at things, including those who have the knowledge to suggest other options or methods for addressing the issues we're seeing, it's possible that a different/less intrusive option will be identified. It's also possible that after we've tried this for a few days, we find out that it's not really working. There's also the possibility that it becomes necessary to consider a permanent solution, either because no other less intrusive means has been identified to prevent this kind of vandalism, or because the efforts at vandalism haven't abated. Would it be reasonable to suggest that, if it still seems necessary to keep editing of the main page very restricted by 7 January 2019, it would be time to have a further community discussion about what options are available? These situations often take a few weeks to resolve, and there will be some extended holiday breaks in the next six weeks, so early January feels right. I'd be happy to hear other suggestions. Risker (talk) 07:45, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes, that sounds good. The problem with emergency/quick fixes to a crisis situation is not coming back to it once the urgency is gone. I think we have enough editors watching this to avoid that. And, incidentally, thanks for keeping us informed. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:39, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• 07/01/19 seems a reasonable time - so long as it is agreed that the consensus appearing for this is not a consensus for a permanent introduction - i.e. if the problem hasn't been resolved or an alternate solution proposed, a new RfC must be introduced in January to retain this mechanism Nosebagbear (talk) 19:29, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

While there is some support for having this as a permanent fix, I don't believe anyone would accept that without further discussion. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:15, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• As far as the EF goes, any arguments for not leaving indefinitely? For an analysis of 2018's MP edits see my notes at Wikipedia:Interface_administrators'_noticeboard#Int-Admin_Main_Page_Proposal. This part should not have any workload issues for int-admins. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:29, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

• People are identifying negatives, and there are things efforts are being put towards in the interim - like reducing the number of admin accounts that keep being compromised. Also you are making a functional assumption. Generally it is always better to trial something than require a majority to turn it off again. Nosebagbear (talk) 22:25, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

How long do we have to debate this before it's implemented?

This has nearly unanimous support and it's only a temporary change. What are we waiting for? Natureium (talk) 19:27, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

First, it has to be open for at least 24h, and possibly, since now it is a weekend, possibly longer. Then it needs to be closed by an uninvolved administrator. Then some technical issues need to be implemented, for which a fabricator ticket should be opened.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:32, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Note: From the technical side - as an emergency measure I can implement it as soon as (if) you all agree that its the right thing to do (weekend or not). BWolff (WMF) (talk) 19:40, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Great, this is good to know.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:45, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

@BWolff (WMF): can you clarify whether, if this is implemented, admins will still be edit pages transcluded onto the main page? -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 19:47, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Answers to some questions and statuses that keep coming up:
  1. We have already done something about edits to the Main Page.
  2. If a new "higher" protection level is applied and cascading protection is enabled, then all of the cascaded items will be protected at the new level. Tested at testwiki:Main Page2 and its template testwiki:Template:MPtemp1 using the "centralnotice" protection level
• — xaosflux ^Talk 20:18, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Thanks. So we're either going to need a bunch of new interface admins or check in with the existing ones. This needs to be done before implementation. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:28, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Zzuuzz: "A bunch of new interface admins" would be a step backwards in security. Would it be possible to create (yet) another protection level (call it "Main page protected"), and another user group ("Main page editors"), then quickly add the ITN/DYK/etc. regulars to that group? Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 20:33, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Also pinging @Xaosflux and BWolff (WMF): Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 20:46, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  I don't disagree; I'd also point out that one of those admins in potential new user group was compromised 24 hours ago. I'd want to see 2FA compulsory for whatever is implemented, which I think needs a little more thought. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:55, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Yes, all these things are possible. We don't have automated ways to require 2FA for a specific group, but its definitely possible given a list of people in a group to manually check which have 2FA enabled. BWolff (WMF) (talk) 21:12, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Does anyone know if the MediaWiki software could be changed so two protection levels could be applied simultaneously? (int-admin, non-cascading protection for just the Main Page, with full cascading protection for protecting transcluded templates) We've never had to deal with anything similar, since cascading protection with anything lower than full-protection is impossible and we haven't had a protection level higher than full-protection. With one infamous exception. ^Semi_Hypercube ✎ 02:18, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• I fell that the language used here is too relaxed. A: If a new "higher" protection level is applied and cascading protection is enabled, then all of the cascaded items will be protected at the new level is only a definition of cascading. B: Tested at ... is only checking that cascading is correctly implemented. C: If this is implemented, will admins... is a question that should be answered by: the proposal is to enforce this and that, and the result for this_kind_of_people (should the proposal be applied) will be this and that while the result for that_kind_of_people will be this and that. A great advice about this kind of wording is RFC2119. Best regards. Pldx1 (talk) 10:56, 26 November 2018 (UTC)/ modified Pldx1 (talk) 11:00, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• A note - while an early close probably would have been justified on, say, Sunday, there have been a fair number of recent opposes plus 3 conversions from support to oppose. I obviously have at least some bias (since almost all participants have cast a !vote I suppose that's fairly universal here) but would say it's worth leaving open at least another 48 hours to see if that's a sea change or a blip. Nosebagbear (talk) 16:19, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

Post (initial) closure

Clarification of the closure requested. I'm not seeing the mechanics of this finalized, especially in light of active discussions about them still taking place. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:29, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

This also seems a bit rushed. Regarding the 2FA notes for interface admins, WMF is going to deal with that for now under OFFICE rules. I'm also a bit concerned about greatly increasing the number of interface admins and forcing 2FA (via the OFFICE rule) on to people that want to maintain things like DYK and ITN can have negative impacts: (a) non-technical people with technical access (b) removal from editorial tasks for admins that can't or don't want 2FA at this time. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:35, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Closure review requested as this was a very early closure while discussion was still active. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:37, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
• Given the nature of the proposal concerning yet another security incident, third one in the last 60 days, and the near unanimous support after 24 hours of the proposal as worded, I felt it appropriate to expedite closing this proposal. If this is a mistaken thought, I will happily reverse the close.—CYBERPOWER (Around) 03:42, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  I think the early responses here are enough to give credibility to what is going on with filter 943, but that's it so far. For example, do we really need User:DYKUpdateBot and its operator to also become 2FA required int-admins right now, every contributor to Template:In the news, etc? — xaosflux ^Talk 03:46, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  Nevermind, I re-opened it again. If there is concern with this close, I'd rather just re-open it, as I'm headed to bed and don't want to leave it as is.—CYBERPOWER (Around) 03:48, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• I'm probably harping on the point by now, but if this proposal results in more intadmins, we're doing it wrong. Either the existing intadmins need to take up all the main page responsibilities, or we need a new "Main Page Editor" right. I suspect maybe 1/10th of admins will even express an interest in this, so even without any 2FA requirement, this will do away with 90% of the attack surface. We can talk about requiring 2FA later. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 04:10, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Again I don't disagree, though it still wouldn't have prevented the latest attacks and it would have prevented any admins fixing it in a hurry. Another alternative, which I'd prefer, is a bespoke software solution similar to how admins can't delete or move the main page, without all the cascading issues. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 05:34, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Good point about the slower response, but I don't see evidence that Esanchez7587 or Garzo had ever edited anything MP-transcluded, so it would have prevented 2 of the 3 latest attacks. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 05:57, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

I've now had some coffeee and a chance to think this through a bit, and I can see how this could work without a software change. We already have a number of main pages lying around which cascade-protect the main page content. I don't properly know how the system works, so someone will need to confirm, and we'll probably want more. So then we basically remove the cascade from the main main page, and apply the new protection level to the main page only without cascade. This would leave the main page content editable by sysops, which doesn't really provide any benefit. So we once again return to the question of how to protect the main page content whilst keeping it updateable without making security actually worse. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 10:18, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

I think at this point, the most likely feasible idea should be a new protection level roughly based on what Callanecc said above. All edits to Mainpage directly and templates it pulls from (ITN, DYK...) should be subjected to four eyes principle; that means they must be approved by another admin before going live. It will be very hard and unlikely for a vandal to get two different admin accounts solely to bypass this restriction. Its efficacy will be the same as if all admins enabled 2FA. And with this protection level, we can safely apply the cascading and simultaneously allow all admins to edit the Mainpage and its templates normally. And the vandal's edit... will surely be caught waiting to be "approved"–Ammarpad (talk) 13:27, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

You're basically describing a version of WP:pending changes. Is it feasible to implement an admin-only version of that? ‑‑ElHef (Meep?) 15:05, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Indeed I am. If you know the basic framework of PC2 you'll know this is feasible, though I don't know how simple or hard that implementing it will be. –Ammarpad (talk) 15:53, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• Q: How many of the (currently 13) human interface administrators stand ready to take up the workload that will be created? –xeno^talk 19:22, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Xeno: as an int-admin I think its safe to say most of us would have no issue dealing with formatting of the wikitext on Main page or certain included templates (via edit requests). I know I don't want to do things like manage the "content" (e.g. placing the Featured Article, updating DYK, updating ITN, etc). — xaosflux ^Talk 20:31, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  FWIW the current EF is already enforcing that. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:32, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

  Xeno, I will answer any edit request that comes by.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 20:58, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Cyberpower678: (and anyone else who believes IntAdmins will be able to handle all main page content): With respect, you're greatly underestimating the number of tweaks made to the main page every day. There have been 40 edits to the various main page sections in the last week alone: most of these are fixes or clarifications of some kind, that need to be made fairly quickly. Many of these are also not quick tweaks but require assessing consensus, at ERRORS or ITN/C or WT:DYK or elsewhere. I suspect that if the 13 IntAdmins are the only ones able to make these changes, we're going to have some trouble. Vanamonde (talk) 04:37, 27 November 2018 (UTC) Resigning to fix ping. Vanamonde (talk) 20:45, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
• You would also need to grant additional permissions to the DYK update bot, as mentioned above, which might have some technical hurdles and also comes with the discussion of if we want to have a bot with interface access. Such a plan also would have to look at protecting the DYK queues which could be edited a minute before the bot switches DYK. In general with this proposal, I understand and agree with the goal of increasing security but highly doubt that this would a) remain temporary, and b) stop the issue without major collateral damage. We are a wiki, and with a project our size and the number of admins we have, there will always be an attack vector. I'm active in Main Page and DYK work when I am around, but fully acknowledge I come and go. There was a period for months when I promoted almost every queue to be sent off to the Main Page, and while I'd like to think my fellow DYK admins and editors find my, currently somewhat sporadic, work helpful, I doubt I would be granted a new "main page" right or interface editor with my current activity level. I am also concerned that the interface editor right seems to be being expanded beyond its original intent to a new class/level of administrator instead of just a technical safeguard. This is a game of whack-a-mole, as we lock down attack vectors, attackers will move further up the chain. The next logical steps for an attacker are the MediaWiki interface generally, scripts to mass perform an admin action, going after an interface administrator directly, etc. We need to win 100% of the time to prevent an attack, an attacker need only "win" once in unlimited attempts to get through. While we should absolutely reduce the attack surface, increase security, password requirements, etc., mathematically it is clear what happens in the long run. I am also concerned that if we concentrate major, time sensitive, responsibilities from our approximately 500 active admins (any one of whom can jump in) to a group of just over a dozen interface admins that things will be delayed, and we will almost certainly burn out users - not to mention potentially drive away trusted users who work in this area. Best, Mifter (talk) 02:38, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Cascading

One of the three main oppose reasons is the cascading issue - I thought it worth splitting out the issue of discussing whether this Int-Protect would cause knock on protection to be implemented, if those qualified to discuss such could answer. Nosebagbear (talk) 20:24, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm not exactly following your question @Nosebagbear:. In the current software if "cascading" protection is applied whatever level is applied also gets applied to everything transcluded. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:29, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

There is a query in the discussions above on whether all the constituent aspects of the Main Page (DYK etc) are going to have to have this int-protection (presumably enacted via cascade) for the main page to actually be safe. It is disputed, but I wouldn't say it is made precisely clear. Since the MP is primarily made up of a bunch of transclusions, presumably more than just the MP itself will need this protection level. Nosebagbear (talk) 20:37, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

This is answered in the section just above, and we have a choice: Without cascading protection, admins can still edit the content, so there aren't any real benefits to the new protection. Using cascading int-admin protection will greatly reduce the number of people able to edit ITN/DYK/OTD and other things which are regularly updated. Alongside this is a really bad idea - increase the number of int-admins. An alternative has been proposed which is to create a new user group, and a new cascading protection level, which only allows editing content displayed on the main page. No decisions have been made, and it's not always clear above exactly what people are agreeing to. The proposal itself contains this sentence, "almost all of the work is done in the background using templates — so the impact of this temporary measure is minimal", but with cascading protection that's simply not the case. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:51, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Wow, clarification is needed. Adding lots more intadmins to handle all details of what is transcluded on the main page would be very dubious. Further, some templates/modules are used frequently and often appear somewhere on the main page, and people would need an intadmin to update them. Johnuniq (talk) 00:49, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

Closure

Could an uninvolved admin please formally close this? Thanks.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:09, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

 Done. 28bytes (talk) 06:30, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

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

Pages in Category:AfC submissions declined as copyright violations

Am I missing something, or all drafts in that category must be speedy deleted as copyright violations? There are several dozen drafts there, I have seen some a month old, and apparently it is customary to decline AfC as copyright violations without rolling the copyvio back and asking for speedy or revision-deletion? Please tell me there is something I am missing here.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:07, 4 December 2018 (UTC)

Yes you are missing that many copyvio declines get speedy deleted but some get cleaned and the record of the copyvio decline stays on the live page and then in the category. The other case is occasionally pages are declined for minor copyvio with a request to reword. Anyone is welcome to work that category and help AfC out. Legacypac (talk) 19:12, 4 December 2018 (UTC)

I did not check all of them but the couple I checked seemed to have major copyvio issues which have not been in any way addressed.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:19, 4 December 2018 (UTC)

If they are clearly copyright violations, and there is no prior clean version to revert to, they should be deleted per WP:G12. Otherwise, if a page has been AfC declined because of a copyvio and the page has subsequently been cleaned, they should end up in Category:AfC submissions cleaned of copyright violations. So where's the breakdown: is it a tagging issue or are we not cleaning up copyvios? (I don't have time to investigate today but this does seem to be an important thing to figure out) Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:51, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

I guess the related question is: are AfC reviewers identifying copyright violations but not doing anything about it other than declining? We can't host copyvios in draft space either. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:52, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

Indeed, my impression from a very limited sample is that some AfC reviewers decline submissions as copyvio but do not follow up either by CSDing the draft or by cleaning the copyvio and asking for revision deletion.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:08, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

I forgot that I have also seen cases where the text was free but not attributed. Whereas this is technically copyvio, it can be easily fixed by attributing the text.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:08, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

Good point. I'm not an expert in this - is a revision which contains material copied from a free source without attribution also a G12/RD1 copyvio? Or do we just supply the attribution in a subsequent edit and move on? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:15, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

The best practice is to provide attribution in a minor edit.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:52, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

Who knows exactly. The AfCH script has a box to check to also G12 the page and a place to fill in the source copied from. It's an optional thing in the script and like everything, there is some range of practice among reviewers. Similarly last I looked there were 3000+ advertising declines, sampling of which suggests 90% are G11 worthy. AfC stops a lot of inappropriate pages and anyone willing to help delete them is encouraged to help. Legacypac (talk) 17:18, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

I am not here to accuse AfC reviewers in anything, I think most of them are doing an excellent job. However, there is a difference between G11 and G12. It is strictly speaking illegal to keep copyright violations in the project in any form, be it articles, drafts, userpages or talk pages. For the advertisement, well, it is of course not good that we have a lot of drafts which are just advertisement, but it is not illegal to host them, and also revisions containing advertisement do not get revision-deleted. If there is a systemic problem at the side of the reviewers (which I am still not sure about) we probably need to discuss what is the best way to modify the process to make sure copyright violations do not stay in drafts for a long time.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:46, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

We all agree copyvio should be deleted, the question is at what urgency. Thousands of other declined but not yet deleted AfC pages are likely copyvio but declined for other simplier to assess reasons. There are also thousands of undiscovered copyvio pages at Wikipedia:WikiProject Abandoned Drafts/Stale drafts The ones in this AfC category will be swept away in 6 months or so regardless and are at least tagged as copyvio already. Legacypac (talk) 18:23, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

It looks like indeed we have different perspectives on the question how soon copyvio must be deleted after it has been discovered, and it would be good to have more opinions, but unfortunately this topic so far did not attract too much attention.--Ymblanter (talk) 12:07, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

I tag for deletion 100% of the time, but the script makes it optional and the cat exists with pages so evidently there is a range of opinion and practice. Legacypac (talk) 18:19, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

• I decline a massive number (proportionately to my AfC work) of CV drafts because I use ORES to specifically look for them. In about 85% of these cases I speedy it. In the other 15% I clean it. In 1 case I declined then decided I wasn't sufficiently sure in a complicated case so I sent it to the appropriate board for consideration. Since they're deliberately sought out I sort of fall in the "immediate" category by default, and I think I would back that position in any case. As to how much effort should be expended on making other AfC reviewers act on copyvio more rapidly (beyond declining), I'm unsure. Nosebagbear (talk) 19:59, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
  • 99% of the copyvios that I find in drafts are entire pages with no other salvageable content. As soon as I find one, it gets tagged for speedy, and usually, if the draft has been submitted, I'll also take the time to decline it so it leaves the usual schpeel on the user's talk page. In my opinion, tagging for speedy is most important; then if the draft has been submitted, I'll decline it. Home Lander (talk) 20:17, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Block...

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

---

Could somebody please perma blocking (email, t/p access disabled) User:St james school, User:WIZRADICAL and User:FRadicalCOI all of whose passwords I have forgotten. Please consider this a long overdue preemptive measure against an account compromise. If I will need them again, I will ask via this account. — fr ⁺ 17:56, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

Done. Vanamonde (talk) 22:15, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

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

Seraphim System and the page mover right

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

---

Having noticed a move dispute pop up at WP:RM/TR about Suleiman the Magnificent, I have come to the conclusion that Seraphim System (talk · contribs) has abused the page mover right. According to WP:PMRR, the right should never be used to gain the upper hand in disputes, or to make controversial moves. The edit history of the 'round robin' part has been deleted now, but Seraphim System made a bold round-robin page move to Süleyman the Magnificent on 18 November. This in and of itself should not've happened, because that's not what the page mover right is for. When he did this, he modified the redirect at Suleiman the Magnificent to prevent anyone without the right reverting the move. A user that noticed this requested a reversion at WP:RM/TR yesterday, as he or she could not've reverted the move. When the request was filled, Seraphim System reverted that reversion with a round robin page move via the page mover right, modified the redirects to prevent further reversion, and accosted the person who carried out the technical request at his talk page.

This is completely out of order for someone with the page mover right, and what's even worse was the abuse of AlexTheWhovian (talk · contribs), who actually used the right as it is meant to be used to fill technical requests. While the edit history of the round robin moves was deleted by TonyBallioni (talk · contribs) when he finally put a stop to this mess, administrators will be able to the verify that the tool was used in this way. As a result of the above behaviour, I propose that Seraphim System's page mover right be revoked. It's quite clear that Seraphim System doesn't understand how the right is meant to be used, and I don't think the community should allow someone to use advanced permissions in this manner. RGloucester — ☎ 20:56, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

Good job, you guys have lost another editor. Seraphim System ^(talk) 20:59, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

My comments on this can be seen here. I considered removing Seraphim System's page mover permission for move warring, but didn't as I wasn't sure if there was any history of it. No objection to any other administrator taking actions that they deem necessary. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:09, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose no malicious intent, a respected editor, and not something worth fighting over. Time we treat established editors with the respect we treat Admins with - allow them to make the occasional mistake without revoking advanced permissions. Legacypac (talk) 21:19, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
  • @Legacypac: So we're throwing WP:VESTED out the door? Hasteur (talk) 00:36, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose This would be unhelpful; I find myself agreeing with Legacypac (possibly for the third time in as many years!); the intent of whose argument, and the positive philosophy it brings to the project, should not be lost on anyone. ——SerialNumber54129 21:27, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Legacypac and Serial Number 54129. I don’t see any malicious intent in their actions. OhKayeSierra (talk) 21:34, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
• Well, I guess we can throw criterion six out the window then...to me, someone who uses an advanced permissions to gain the upper hand in a dispute, to push his own point of view about what article titles should be, and has such poor judgement with regard to our policies, considering where his proposed title falls with regard to usage, and his prior claims, this should be a no brainer. RGloucester — ☎ 21:57, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

  I've reopened this - RGloucester, you can withdraw it if you wish, but as the person who started it and who has a very clear opinion, you should not close it with a critical judgment of those who disagree with your request. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 00:00, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• Warn Seraphim at this time, but don't take any further action as we'll let this go as a one off error of judgement, which all editors are entitled to. Hasteur (talk) 00:36, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Legacypac tony should be warned and revoked ass punishment211.27.86.17 (talk) 03:17, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• The IP editor above has made a total of 16 edits, including one blanking their talk page and the complaint on it, beginning on 3 December. Further, their comment here makes no logical sense: they're "opposed" to the proposal to remove SS's page mover right, but call for a warning and for something -- what? the only thing under discussion is the page mover right -- to be "revoked ass [sic] punishment". So, they oppose revoking the page mover right, but call for it to be removed. Their comment should be entirely ignored. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:16, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose the removal of the right, but warn strongly that it may occur if this sort of issue happens again. I have no beef with Seraphim System (talk · contribs), bar the message they posted to my talk page in opposition of my correct use of the right to revert the move when it was listed at WP:RM/TR, where I am a regular contributor. The editor stated: The reason for disputing a justified change needs to be explained on the talk page by the editor who is challenging the move. If that had happened, I would have started the RM discussion myself. No, this is not how moves are done, and anyone with the page mover flag should know this. The article existed where it did for twelve years; a move executed one month ago should not automatically be considered "stable", that is not a satisfactory reason to revert the move. If the editor opposed the revert, they should have started a discussion themselves once they noticed the revert, and then gained consensus for their move. Hopefully they can come to understand this. -- Alex^TW 07:25, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
  • I definitely did not mean to question your competence in any way, so Im sorry if it came across that way but I was very upset. I can read the policy for myself and it says undiscussed moves are allowed where It seems unlikely that anyone would reasonably disagree with the move. Despite above comments that this was poor judgement on my part, I'm not sure investing large amounts of time in a project where moving the article for Süleyman the Magnificent to the title Süleyman the Magnificent turns into a huge ordeal is a good use of my time. This is the spelling used by Britannica, and even the link RGloucester posted shows that use of Suleiman has been declining and use of Süleyman has been increasing since 1991. This is very much along the lines of what I gave as a move rationale and it seemed like a straightforward move to me. This topic area breeds and suffers from rampant disruption, vandalism, sockpuppetry and every other type of ill borne of a decade of dereliction so, yes, if editors are challenging something completely non-controversial as controversial they should have to at least give a reason why they believe it is controversial. That is all I am going to say about this. Not likely to change my mind or otherwise argue with whatever decision you all end up reaching here.Seraphim System ^(talk) 08:10, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
• Neutral It seems to me the initial move was a minor but in itself largely inconsequential mistake. I think with a bit of experience it's quite easy to know that any move which introduces diacritics into a title has enough potential to be controversial that it's best to start a RM. Note that personally I support the inclusion of diacritics in most cases, so this is not related to my personal opinions. But as said, I consider it too minor a mistake to worry about. While I appreciate that 1 month is a while it's still a reasonable timeframe for objection to an undiscussed move so the reversal was quite correct and this should have easily proceeded to RM without fuss. In fact, in an ideal world, someone could have just left a message on Seraphim System's page saying they disagree with the move and feel it should go to RM and Seraphim System would have replied, 'sorry I thought this would be uncontroversial', reversed the move and opened an RM. So when instead, the editor tried to reverse the correct technical reversal, that's much more serious. IMO it is in itself sufficient grounds for removal of the right, although it doesn't mean it has to happen. I've laid out before my strong concerns when an editor doesn't understand why it's quite wrong to use their additional technical abilities inappropriately. Sadly I'm seeing this here as well. The only reason this isn't a support or even a strong support is that it sounds like the editor concerned is going to at least try and avoid this again. The problem is when they don't understand why what they did was wrong, I'm not sure how successful that will be. Nil Einne (talk) 13:10, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
  • Yup, introduction of diacritics is controversial for transliterated titles, where there are multiple possibilities, but thats not what happened here. There is one correct way to spell Süleyman and it is even used by Britannica. Suleiman is pretty much archaic in this day and age, like Musulman. Used by Britannica is pretty much the definition of non-controversial in my book. At the moment I don't really care about losing the page mover right which I use to clear backlogs and for the benefit of this project. Having the page mover right does not do anything for me on a personal level. I'm perfectly happy never using it again, if that's what you guys think would be best for the project. Right now, I am working on Vikipedi instead, where I think my time is better spent and I am not even sure I want to continue editing here. Though I may get over it, I expect it will take a few months at least. The issue is that these types of incidents take huge chunks to time away from productive work and I find it happens all the time such that I am seriously questioning whether this is a good use of my time. Life is too short.Seraphim System ^(talk) 15:57, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

@Seraphim System: Thre is currently no consensus for the removal of your page mover tool, so I think that is something that you should no longer occupy yourself with. Occupy yourself with, on the other hand, taking some of the concerns exressed here on board, and working into the issues rather than away from them. And—most importantly of all—don't take it personally. "It's not personal, it's purely business", as the feller said. No-one here—literally no-one—is perfect, so all we can do is accept our imperfections and ensure they don't outweigh the good we do. Heck. If I started a thread here requesting a critique of my general demeanour, it would probably double the length of the bloody thing in an hour  :) ——SerialNumber54129 16:08, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Seraphim System, have you read the WP:AT policy? We usually use the most common name in reliable sources for a given subject. We measure this using things like Google Ngrams, which I posted above for this case. We do not specifically follow Britannica, which is now similar to Wikipedia in the way it runs. The concern is not specifically about diacritics. It's that, even a cursory glance at a Google Books search or Google Ngrams search would've told you that your move was way off the mark...and even if you wanted to make a bold move contrary to that assessment for some other reason, using the page mover tool to do so is a violation of that tool's purpose. Instead, you should've done what Ajax did, and filed a technical request at WP:RM/TR, which would've allowed other editors to scrutinise the move, and would've ensured that you did not have an advantage in any possible dispute by virtue of your page mover right. Do you understand that? RGloucester — ☎ 16:44, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• As the granting admin, I'm significantly concerned about the conduct here, and frankly I'm strongly inclined to revoke discretionarily. While we can certainly let a "one off error of judgment" slide, Seraphim's reactions are raising serious red flags. Extendedmover is one of the most restricted and sensitive permissions, and it really should not need to be said that Page Movers are wholly expected to not use the right in any controversial way. We should really not need to explain to a Page Mover that changing the longstanding title of a prominent article is "potentially controversial" and thus should go via RM and not be performed unilaterally. That is questionable judgment. I could not find the diff, but if the allegation that Seraphim modified the redirect so that their move could not be reverted is true, that is abusive, and would show that they knew the move was potentially controversial but did not go through RM and then attempted to manipulate the system to prevent being reverted. However, when it was finally moved back by another extendedmover, suddenly Seraphim became concerned with the stability of the article's new title and the reversion itself being a "controversial" move, amazingly, seeming completely oblivious to the fact that they had completely ignored those factors when performing the original move. Rather than following BRD and starting an RM, Seraphim decided to move back, which was an abusive of the permission per Wikipedia:Page mover#Conduct expectations, which states, among other things: "never wheel war with admins or other page movers". By reinstating their reverted move, they unambiguously breached the Page Mover conduct guidelines. Here, Seraphim not only shows no understanding that they did anything wrong at any step of the way, but suggests that they can't even be swayed to think otherwise, rails against the project, and seemingly threatens to quit the project over this, all because they were called out for not conducting themselves in the appropriate manner.  Swarm  {talk}  16:49, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
  • In my view, the only thing that has reduced wheel-warring between administrators on this project is that administrators have learned from experience that it is better to at least attempt a discussion before undoing one anothers actions. That's what didn't happen here. It turns out editors are people too, just like administrators. I'm not even going to waste time responding to the assumptions of bad faith, you can believe what you want. I don't think its the malicious editors who quit, but those who care most about the project and just get burned out arguing over stupid shit, but it is not all because of this complaint. When I stopped to think about, over the years I have been here, arguing over what I consider minutiae has taken huge amounts of time away from the productive work that I want to do. I think this tends to disproportionately effect editors who hold themsleves to high standards, or who have standards that the community may think are too high or perfectionist, or who have specialized background knowledge in fields like law. Some editors are able to find ways to deal with these things, so maybe I will too, but it's something I have to think about. If I'm not enjoying it, it may be time to move on, you know? I care about things like whether the articles look nice, or whether the article layout uses best practices for white space, but I feel that some people in the community do not give a shit, so we do have to discuss it, sometimes for years, and treat all positions as equally valid. This is one of those things, but it is like one drop in a vast sea of bullshit. Sorry. I know that the most important thing right now is that I show that I understand that I was wrong to use the tool the way I did. I get that. I'm sorry. And I don't know if I think gender makes a difference in whether editors choose to stay or leave, but I know that for me, on an individual level, my reaction after a certain point is to disengage and move on to other things, not to escalate. Seraphim System ^(talk) 18:17, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
    • Just noting that this was not a case of someone else not talking to you. Someone reverted a bold move to a stable title (this can take time as anyone who has been involved in RM can tell you.) You then move warred, and someone else requested at WP:RM/TR requesting intervention to restore to a stable title. I saw it, returned it to the stable title, as is our practice in these situations, and protected it to force discussion. This didn't need to be discussed with you as contesting a G6 as controversial when your original controversial move was what made it that way doesn't force us to hold up the normal way we do things. To Swarm's point above about revoking unilaterally, I think he could be justified in this precisely for the reasons you point out: you did not attempt a discussion before forcing your views on this on others (or at the very least, you forced your views while initiating the discussion at the same time, which isn't much better.) That being said, I think a big enough deal has been made about this that you won't do it again, so I don't see a need to remove personally, but if you were to move war again, it'd likely be revoked. TonyBallioni (talk) 19:12, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

If you think it is important that I see future comments being made on this thread please ping me as I am in the middle of a somewhat challenging translation and only saw that this thread was being commented on because I responded to a ping about an unrelated AfD. I don't agree with you, in general, but when (if?) I decide that I want to continue editing here at English wiki, I will definitely be sure that I don't "move war" in the future. Generally, I'm sorry you feel I am forcing my "views" on others. That isn't my intention. What I am trying to do is disengage. Thank you, Seraphim System ^(talk)

• Just a note: he modified the redirect at Suleiman the Magnificent to prevent anyone without the right reverting the move is technically true (admin-only diff) but modifying redirects is required of any round-robin move, as otherwise the redirect points to itself. Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:02, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
  • Yes, I just followed the procedure at WP:ROBIN which includes the cleanup instructions. It's different from the instructions at WP:ROUNDROBIN but I read everything and tried to follow the instructions exactly. This was my first round robin move, so I'm sorry if I did something wrong. Seraphim System ^(talk) 19:14, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Yes, that's correct. However, this is also the reason why the page mover right, and specifically round robin page moves, are not meant to be used to make bold or controversial moves. Your round robin move prevented regular editors from reverting the bold move without a trip to WP:RM/TR to request reversion. Many editors are not familiar with that procedure, and so will simply be confronted with a 'you cannot move this page' message, and give up. The page mover has a distinct technical advantage in this sort of context, as they can easily create a fait accompli. If you want to make a bold move that requires the right, make a request at WP:RM/TR like any other editor would. You should only make a round robin move to fulfil technical requests at WP:RM/TR, close requested move discussions, and so on. RGloucester — ☎ 19:25, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Is this established anywhere? I don't see where it's written in either WP:RM including WP:RM/TR nor in WP:ROUNDROBIN. It seems to me if RM/TR is allowed for uncontroversial bold moves, then there's no reason why someone with the rights shouldn't make the move without requesting. Requesting it at TR seems to offer little protection since while nominally technical requests can be contested, as there's no minimum time between listing and fulfilling, a technical requests could be fulfilled within seconds if the timings are right. While it does provide a second person to scrutinise whether the move is definitely uncontroversial, this is a minimal amount of scrutiny especially as people with the mover right are already supposed to have sufficient scrutiny. It's not like someone else fulfilling the request makes it easier to reverse if it's objected to. (By the same token, admins don't need to speedy tag articles.) Or it shouldn't. As I said, the key thing as I see it is that the mover should be immediately reverse if it turns out they are wrong and their uncontroversial move turns out to be controversial or of course someone else will at TR and they should not object. I continue to believe the key problem is not so much that a mistake was made in believing this would be uncontroversial, but in the way it was handled when it became clear it was controversial. Nil Einne (talk) 19:57, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Thinking about it more, the TR page itself seems to disagree with you. It says "If you are unable to complete a technical move, request it below." I think it's clear "unable to complete" means, "you do not have the technical ability to do so". And not "you do have the ability but shouldn't because you are conflicted" or whatever. The whole point of technical requests is they ideally should require no scrutiny (although fulfillers should still do so since not everyone is familiar with our policies and guidelines). If there is any possibility you are wrong, you should get scrutiny by starting a proper RM. Rarely, it may be okay to simple ask on the talk page and wait 7 days or something without starting a RM. Probably editors should take slightly more care with bold moves involving round robins given the inability for ordinary editors to reverse them, but my understanding is bold moves much more so than bold edits needs to be done very sparsely because even normal moves can be confusing for others to reverse, and sometimes stuff can happen which stops it anyway e.g. redirect categorisation, whether by the original mover or not. Nil Einne (talk) 20:04, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Last comment, maybe a better comparison than speedy deletions is requested edits. Admins aren't required to make requested edits for fully protected pages. But if the page is protected due to disputes/edit warring, they can't make edits which have any potential for controversy. If there are unsure, the vast majority of the time what they should do is start a discussion not make an edit request. If they start a discussion it may be better to get someone else to close it especially if there is objection. But once a discussion is closed by a third party (or if there's no objection), they still generally don't have to make an edit request but are free to make the edit themselves. Nil Einne (talk) 20:21, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

I don't think we disagree. Bold moves do require careful consideration. However, I am referencing the 'conduct' part of the WP:PMR page. It says: 'This right should never be used to gain an upper hand in page move disputes. You have a privilege that most editors do not have. Editors without the right are sometimes unable to revert your moves (e.g. "round-robin" moves). Therefore, avoid making unilateral decisions, and revert upon request if a page move of yours proves to be reasonably controversial'. This was a completely unilateral move, made without discussion, which a normal editor could not have made without technical assistance, and which a normal editor could not revert. Usually, if a normal editor wants to make a bold move blocked only by a redirect, they make a request at RM/TR, where the proposal would at least receive some form of scrutiny, before either getting carried out or going to RM if controversial. Because of the use of the page mover right, Seraphim System was able to avoid that scrutiny. The right is not meant for that purpose, which is something I think we can agree it. It's meant to be used to help clear backlogs of technical requests and pending RMs, not for unilateral non-trivial renamings. In any case, put that aside, for a moment. Whilst I agree with you that the way this was handled after it became clear it was controversial is the main issue, I also think it is very important that page movers understand the article titles policy. Indeed, the PMR page says that the right is meant to be held by people "who regularly move pages and demonstrate familiarity with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines regarding page moving and naming". As I said above, if SS were familiar with these policies and guidelines, he or she would've know that this would be controversial. Furthermore, SS's continued insistence that 'Süleyman the Magnificent' is the only correct name ("There is one correct way to spell Süleyman and it is even used by Britannica. Suleiman is pretty much archaic in this day and age, like Musulman") for this article, and rejection of common usage as shown by the Ngrams chart above, shows a gross contempt for WP:AT, and demonstrates the problematic nature of his or her possessing this right. I really don't think that SS's actions show the type of good judgement required for the possession of this right. Do you really think that the PMR tool is meant for righting great wrongs? I haven't said this, yet, but I have no prior interactions with SS, and no particular animus toward him or her. However, as someone who has been involved in many RMs, MRs, and who as filled and filed many RM/TRs, I have come to have a marked intolerance for gaming of the system in this manner, and for the common disdain for our policies, guidelines, and procedures...and so, having seen the messes that this type of action can create, I opened this section here. To me, this is a serious issue...but if no one else cares, that's fine. I didn't expect anything else anyway... RGloucester — ☎ 21:01, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

@RGloucester: If you would look at the link you posted to NGRAMS , which I did before moving the article, you will find that the sources for Suleiman between 1993 and 2008 are reprints of older sources like Bridge (1983), Clot (1989), Harold Lamb (a fiction source), etc. WP:RGW means I would ignore source based evidence because I personally disagreed with it. That is not what happened here. Based on what I saw the most authoritative and current sources are using "Süleyman" exclusively - this includes Britannica, Colin Imber, and other Routledge and Cambridge sources. I did not see any sources of this caliber that use the spelling "Suleiman" except for our article, but I will admit that I didn't review every result. Even so, the key part of the policy you quoted says revert upon request if a page move of yours proves to be reasonably controversial. I think the strong implication there is that it should be discussed with the mover before it goes to RM/TRs. Please try to remember that there are real people on the other end, just like yourself.Seraphim System ^(talk) 22:08, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

His first time doing a round robin? Time to go deal with a more pressing problem like an Admin abusing Rollback while a thread about that is still open. Legacypac (talk) 19:33, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• *her. Flooded with them hundreds 19:41, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• Alright. I think it's time to close this, and I'm doing so with a discretionary revocation. For the sake of clarity, yes, I can see that there is no community mandate for this here, and I'm making an independent judgment call, and Seraphim is free to go to PERM and request for it back. However Seraphim did breach the page mover policy, in a fairly serious way, and her own subsequent comments on the incident, even after I spelled out the problems and made clear that revocation was a strong possibility, swayed me to this course of action. If SS is not going to make a good case for continuing to be trusted with this sensitive permission, then they're going to have to make that case at PERM to have it reinstated. Seraphim has made token statements that they "get it" and they're "sorry" and they won't "move war" again, but frankly those statements are overwhelmingly betrayed by their other comments. Seraphim has repeatedly minimized the issue, placed the blame on others, attempted to argue the content dispute itself, suggested that the real issue is this discussion itself, and shifted the focus onto how the project has wronged them, and has made no serious effort to take the concerns seriously and explain that they understand the issues and will take specific steps to prevent a similar situation from happening. As the granting admin, I need to see way more than that to be reassured that my grant was not a mistake, and I'm not seeing it. As I said, this is a highly sensitive and highly restrictive privilege that is only vested in ~250 people. These people need to be responsible and accountable and show that they appreciate the significant position of trust that they have been granted, at all times, but especially if they screw up. Seraphim's failure to take the situation seriously is, frankly, insulting to the trust that was placed in them. We routinely revoke less sensitive rights for less serious violations, and it's usually not a matter of serious time, contention, and discussion. So, the people suggesting that this is excessive discussion are right. Seraphim has been given substantial courtesy in being allowed to make the case that they should be given a break, and instead, they've used the opportunity to dismiss a legitimate complaint in ways that have seriously damaged the trust that I had when I gave them the permission.  Swarm  {talk}  00:27, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

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

Talk:Neil deGrasse Tyson#Request for comment (RfC)

This is a request to review the close by User:Objective3000 at Talk:Neil deGrasse Tyson#Request for comment (RfC) to determine whether the closing process was appropriate.

• The closure was not made by an uninvolved editor, but rather by an editor that was inextricably involved in the previous discussion. The talk page reveals that the closing editor was repeatedly and strenuously opposed to inclusion of the material, invoking arguments that are not part of WP policy (e.g., "impact on career") and attempting to establish a different editorial standard for this biography, which is why the RfC was opened in the first place.
• The closure on this sensitive topic may have been premature (opened 17:35, 5 December 2018, closed less than 60 hours later 01:36, 8 December 2018).
• Although the outcome of the RfC is correct (material must be included per WP BLP policy and per consensus), the closer added substantial editorial comments that do not seem to represent the consensus nor to provide a reasonable summation of the discussion.
• Despite extensive discussion about reasonable and appropriate wording for inclusion in the biography, the closing editor continues to insist on further discussion at the talk page before inclusion of the material and states "Arguments against any addition can still continue."

Thank you. Serpentine noodle (talk) 22:54, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

So reopen it. I said in my edit summary that I wouldn't mind. But, there is only consensus to include -- not on language and that must now be discussed. O3000 (talk) 23:02, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

The talk page reveals that the closing editor was repeatedly and strenuously opposed to inclusion of the material... Actually, this is kinda funny. Filer claims I was "repeatedly and strenuously opposed to inclusion", and yet I closed for inclusion. O3000 (talk) 00:57, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

@Serpentine noodle and Objective3000: I've moved this discussion from WP:RFCL to WP:AN, as this is the proper venue to challenge a closure under Wikipedia:Closing discussions § Challenging other closures. — Newslinger talk 06:51, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• Endorse close - I haven't looked into the NdGT situation, so I don't know how I would have !voted, but it's perfectly clear that O3000's close was a correct evaluation of the consensus of the RfC. Maybe a minnow to O3000 for closing while involved (even though they closed against their own opinion, it would probably have been best to leave it to someone else, who would have inevitably closed it in the same way.) Beyond My Ken (talk) 08:12, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
• Comment The close seems reasonable to me although IMO it was probably a mistake to make an involved close even if it was against the editor's initial opinion. There was no point leaving it open anymore, it doesn't seem likely consensus will developed against the inclusion and the complainant isn't arguing for that anyway. There's no way that RFC was ever going to develop consensus for a wording, it wasn't structured for that. It would indeed be better to concentrate on developing an acceptable wording. People are still free to support or oppose any specific wording. Of course any oppose for some suggested inclusion solely because the editor opposes inclusion of any mention is not going to count for much since we just established consensus for inclusion although if done reasonably it's not likely to lead to a block or topic ban.. Nil Einne (talk) 12:34, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
• Close was fine. There was an overwhelming, uncontroversial consensus that you yourself are not disputing. The user was technically involved, but there's no case being made that they had a COI that unfairly influenced the close, in fact, you're saying that the user argued against the closing consensus they formalized. The close was quick, but it was seemingly a WP:SNOW situation anyways. You say the "editor continues to insist on further discussion", but they're not wrong there. The RfC simply asked "should it be included?" More discussion to hammer out the details is obviously needed. A 60-hour up or down decision is not going to be the end all, be all of discussions. Also, WP:CLOSECHALLENGE instructs you to bring concerns to closers if you have any issues, and only bring it here if you're at an impasse. It doesn't look like you've made any effort to raise any issues with the closer. WP:IAR, WP:NOTBUREAU, WP:5P5 are all fundamental principles here, and this is a prime example of those principles being exercised correctly. There's nothing controversial here. Move on.  Swarm  {talk}  15:43, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

@ResultingConstant: has reopened this RfC with an accusation of WP:GAME. O3000 (talk) 14:45, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@Objective3000: Although I agree with the WP:SNOW situation of the prior close, objections were raised by @A Quest For Knowledge: saying "Any text added to the article without consensus will be reverted. I suggest that for those who are in favor of adding this to the article begin by addressing the arguments against inclusion first" and "RFCs generally run 30 days and are usually closed by someone uninvolved in RfC. Neither of these were followed so that makes the close out of process.". Additionally @Masem: said "Yes, agreed the RS is there, just up in the air in whether inclusion is needed at this time" - but this is ambiguous as to if he is discussing inclusion of the content at all, or inclusion of a particular point. the WP:GAME in this thread is pervasive and obvious, policy standards are being created from the void, goalposts repeatedly moved, and sources being repeatedly obtusely misinterpreted to protect someone from exceptionally well sourced content. The objectors objections were well founded when this was nothing but a blog. It isn't that way anymore. ResultingConstant (talk) 15:30, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

My comment was related to the use of a BuzzfeedNews article (someone said it wasn't an RS, I pointed out BFN is good, BF alone is not), but still had skeptism if the 4th person in the BFN article was needed to be included. (I am broadly against any inclusion at this time, but wasn't looking to overturn the RFC that supported some type of inclusion). --Masem (t) 15:34, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

None of what you say is grounds for reopening the RfC. And your continued claims of WP:GAME amount to WP:BATTLEFIELD behavior. Please stop with the odd accusations against other editors and concentrate on consensus for the text. O3000 (talk) 15:40, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• As I said on the talk page, RfCs usually run for 30 days and are closed by an uninvolved editor. The close was out-of-process as neither of these things happened. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 16:44, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

And, as you can see, that was discussed here and the close affirmed. The reopen is a waste of editor time. O3000 (talk) 17:23, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

BBC podcast featuring its own vandalism of Wikipedia

I hope this is an appropriate place for me to report this: I couldn't identify a better one.

Currently on the front page of the BBC website (here) is a link to an article about a new Wikipedia-themed BBC Radio 1 podcast Clickipedia ([[1]]).

The description of Episode 1 discusses vandalism on Wikipedia, and mentions "To test Wikipedia’s new security procedures, Matt and the team decide to do a bit of Wiki vandalism themselves, altering Nina's page to contain something entirely made-up stuff".

I daresay Wikipedia's administrators might have Views about the propriety or otherwise of such actions, as well as a more general interest in the series. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.202.210.56 (talk) 23:52, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Nina Nesbitt, viewing Special:History/Nina_Nesbitt, possibly Special:Contributions/80.233.44.104 or Special:Contributions/Sikanderhu. —Sladen (talk) 00:08, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

I think it is User:Sikanderhu. If you listen to 9.55 of the podcast they discuss this addition. We should probably be looking for additions added on November 8. HickoryOughtShirt?4 (talk) 00:27, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

What does vandalizing an article have to do with security? Natureium (talk) 00:30, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

From what I have gathered (I haven't listened to it all) they are arguing that it is harder to edit Wikipedia now. They say it used to be a "doodle" but now there are extra measures. I assume they mean the locks (like pending changes and semi) but I am not sure. HickoryOughtShirt?4 (talk) 00:32, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Security against vandalism. Softlavender (talk) 00:52, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I also think there’s a lot more awareness about editing issues, from the “schoolchild vandalism” to more subtle methods, such as conflicts-of-interest, unpaid editing, and subtle vandalism, and I also think it shows in how we handle these issues compared to 10 or even 12 years ago. OhKayeSierra (talk) 00:54, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

The BBC news show Click did a similar thing some years back. IIRC, they had one of their presenters create a bio about themselves with "facts" such as they were the first person to land on Mars. It was deleted pretty quickly, which was shown in the show. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 13:53, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Thank heavens I'm not actually paying for that Radio 1 podcast. But I'm sure Stephen would feel especially proud to be mentioned there. Disgusted of Portland Place (talk) 14:04, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Tagging categories for deletion

My apologies if this is a wrong venue. Could a friendly bot owner please tag the categories in this list, User:Number 57/Elections/Categories, in total about 9000 categories? If the list has a line [[:Category:Foo]] to [[:Category:Foo1]], it means that Category:Foo gets a template {{subst:Cfr-speedy|Foo1}}, similar to the top category in the list. Courtesy pinging @Number 57:. For the background, see Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Speedy#Current requests and User talk:Ymblanter#Speedy CfD. Thanks a lot.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:11, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Ymblanter, try WP:BOTREQ? Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:57, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Not sure if @BrownHairedGirl: could help with AWB? I know she took part in the outcome of the RfC on the page moves. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 13:58, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping, @Lugnuts.

I have an AWB module for such things. I'll take a look at @Ymblanter's list and see if it fits. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:05, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

No prob (I hope). Will do. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:08, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Great, thanks a lot to all involved. I will also try to remember about BOTREQ for the next time (strange that I read Wikipedia:Bots and could not find a link).--Ymblanter (talk) 14:13, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

OK. Test edits successful([2], [3], [4]), so now I will do the rest. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:41, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Thanks BHG! Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 17:25, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

@Number 57, Ymblanter, and Lugnuts: Done. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:25, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Great, thanks.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:29, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Request to lift topic ban

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

---

Hi, I was topic banned on 1 May 2018 for being aggressive on caste related topics. Since then, I have been a good contributor without involving in any arguments and I have made good contributions in other areas. I request you to life the topic ban on me and I promise I will not repeat my previous behavior. Sharkslayer87 (talk) 13:23, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support- I don't see any violations of the ban in your contributions, but quite a lot of productive edits. And you didn't get upset even when the ban prevented you from objecting to a PROD placed on an article you'd started. That counts for a bit in my view. Unless someone can show issues since your 24 hour block in May, I support lifting the ban. Reyk _YO! 17:35, 10 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Looks to me like the topic ban was placed back in May and then immediately breached. That's disappointing, but what lead me to vote to support here, was your reaction once blocked. Back in May, you stepped back, reconsidered your approach, and changed your editing. This bodes very well for you, and I'm happy to see you've been fairly active since then. Unless anyone shows you've significantly breached your topic ban since then (and it does not appear you have, when I looked), I support lifting the ban. --Yamla (talk) 19:40, 10 December 2018 (UTC)
• A ping to Bishonen since she imposed the topic ban. Galobtter (pingó mió) 12:14, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
• Comment. As I said on 1 May, I topic banned the user for "relentless caste promotion and misuse of sources". Their first appeal of the ban, on the same day, was very unpromising, with the kinds of attacks on Sitush that caste warriors typically make.[5] I feel this current appeal is a little vague, and would like to ask Sharkslayer87 to concretely explain what types of sources they would use in this area going forward. With a good answer to this question, I would agree with lifting the ban. Pinging @Sitush: too. Bishonen | talk 16:48, 11 December 2018 (UTC).
  • Reply I believe I took my ban in a positive manner and I changed my editing habits. I have been doing productive edits and have never been involved in any wars since the ban. I have apologized to other editors in case of any mistakes on my part. I did not resort to any wars since my ban and that can be verified from my edit history. I have read WP:RS thoroughly and I will not compromise on any rules set by wikipedia and continue to be a good editor. Sharkslayer87 (talk) 17:13, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
    • You're not answering my question. No more generalities, please. Please concretely explain what types of sources you would use in this area going forward. Give examples of a source you would use, and a source you would not use, and say why. Do you know the page User:Sitush/Common, which is about caste sources? Do you intend to follow the section [6], or do you have any criticism of it? Bishonen | talk 17:31, 11 December 2018 (UTC).
      • I would use sources that comply with WP:RS. I would not use sources like Gyan which are not considered reliable by wikipedia. I would also not use sources from British Raj era which are deemed unreliable. I will use only sources that comply with WP:RS. I know about User:Sitush/Common. I intend to follow it and I don't have any criticism of it. Sharkslayer87 (talk) 17:39, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
      • An example of a source I would use is, it should be reliable. The author should have decent citations. I will avoid using self published sources. I will avoid primary sources. These are a few examples. Thanks Sharkslayer87 (talk) 17:56, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
        • Thank you. I support lifting the ban. Bishonen | talk 01:37, 12 December 2018 (UTC).

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

Additional CheckUser permissions for election scrutineers

The Arbitration Committee has resolved by motion that:

Temporary local Checkuser rights are granted to Linedwell (talk · contribs) for the purpose of acting as a scrutineer in the 2018 Arbitration Committee election. Any additional reserve stewards appointed to scrutineer the 2018 election may also be granted temporary local CheckUser permissions without a further motion of the Arbitration Committee. This motion may be enacted as soon as it reaches the required majority.

--Cameron₁₁₅₉₈ ^(Talk) 18:24, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Additional CheckUser permissions for election scrutineers

Seraphim System mass deletion

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

Just a heads up, it appears that Seraphim System is rage quitting, and in doing so, she is requesting the mass deletion of all her articles per WP:G7. Many of these requests were already tagged and/or actioned by CSD patrollers before her self-block, and she has requested that the deletions be completed. While I'm not sure her intent is "malice" per se, I would argue that these requests should be declined and the actioned ones overturned, as there is a 'good faith' clause in the CSD that would seem to have the intent of preventing incidents such as this. Regardless, I think the community should determine whether this mass deletion attempt is appropriate or not.  Swarm  {talk}  01:52, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

I think it is highly inappropriate and selfish, and an escalation of the WP:PRAM they immediately displayed above (take away my page-mover right and I quit [7]). As I said on Swarm's talkpage, the fact that Seraphim System consequently CSDed all of their own articles out of sheer spite, not caring that they might be useful to readers, is further evidence that the user has a major attitude problem. I recommend halting the process somehow, and allowing anyone to request a WP:REFUND of any of the already deleted articles. Softlavender (talk) 02:12, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

[edit conflict] I've undeleted several of them: two because they had significant edits from other users (thus they didn't qualify for G7 in the first place), and the rest with a citation to this section. I've intentionally left several others deleted, because I question the notability of the subjects; they're cited to blogs, places like YouTube, and primary sources, and (unlike several of the undeleted pages) they're ordinary biographies, not geo-governmental entities or individuals passing WP:POLITICIAN. Nyttend (talk) 02:25, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• I'd be inclined to call this request "in good faith", and allow any deletions that otherwise meet the G7 criteria. (after e/c: I'd assumed the admins who already deleted some checked that SS was the only significant contributor, I see from Nyttend above that isn't accurate, and those were correctly undeleted). If someone wants to recreate the articles, they can. If there is not a consensus for this approach, I'd settle for not characterizing it as "spite" or "bad faith" or "rage quit". --Floquenbeam (talk) 02:39, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• I was wrong to say "rage quit", and like I said, I'm willing to assume there's no malice here, but even if we don't get hung up on whether it's a "good faith" situation, I think this is still what we would nowadays call a "high maintenance" way of quitting the project, and I'm not sure whether a mass deletion of articles accompanying a user's retirement can be classified as a reasonable request, even if it's not directly motivated by spite. The user's reasoning for the mass deletion is that they want a "clean break" from the project, but even if we do assume good faith and accept that explanation, per WP:OWN, we don't even recognize the notion that a user is inherently connected to the articles they create, so it's not really legitimate or appropriate to suggest that one's created articles are some sort extension of oneself, and casually perform blanket deletions in response to an author's own disillusionment.  Swarm  {talk}  03:01, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• Any articles of value should be kept, regardless of whether SS was the sole author. I think we need to write in an exception to G7 for these kinds of situations. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:57, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
  • (replying to you, BMK, but not really directed at you, if you know what I mean.) We have approx. 6,825,219 articles. If we allowed everyone who wanted to do so to take advantage of the G7 "loophole", we would have (to 5 significant figures) approx. 6,825,219 articles. --Floquenbeam (talk) 03:05, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
    • Floq: Point taken, no "fix" for G7 needed, but I still think we should keep any article of value. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:31, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
  • I agree, too many admins don't pay enough attention to the "in good faith" part of G7. If someone is throwing a shit-fit they are definitely not acting in good faith and their requests should be declined en masse. --Laser brain (talk) 03:19, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
• If they're valid G7s, delete them. I went on a G7 spree a night or two ago, clearing out obsolete templates I'd created in 2010 that were no longer being used; it shouldn't have mattered whether I was angry at the time (I was not), because the G7 criteria do not (and should not) take such things into account. What a nightmare a "but not if the author is upset" exclusion would be. 28bytes (talk) 03:24, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
  • But isn't that essentially what the "good faith" requirement is? Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:33, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
    • That's not how I read it. Being upset at the way you've been treated (whether rightly or wrongly) does not mean you are no longer a good-faith editor. Anyway, how would we police such a thing? What if they're only "kinda" upset, do we delete half of them and decline the rest? Or hold a !vote to determine on what line of the "too upset" threshold the author's current mindset falls? When the kind thing to do (let them delete their work if no one's significantly edited it) happens to coincide with the policy (which says the same), why would we do anything else? 28bytes (talk) 03:37, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
      • Why would we do anything else? Because this is an encyclopedia, and it is for the readers, and it is the readers we should think of above all when editing Wikipedia, and if content is valuable to readers, then it should not be deleted, unless created by a banned editor in violation of their ban. Softlavender (talk) 03:44, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
        • So... the readers should only be given consideration if the author is upset? Or are you arguing for getting rid of G7 entirely? 28bytes (talk) 03:53, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
          • My opinion is readers should always be given first consideration. The only exception I find reasonable is ban-evasion editing; in that case, automatic deletion is a deterrent to ban evasion. If you are asking my opinion of G7, I think it's good to have it for userpages and subpages, non-articles, etc. In terms of articles, I think G7 should only be used for the most egregious and/or useless content. In terms of someone deleting a bunch of stuff as they leave Wikipedia, that's common in administrator rage-quits, but they only do it to their own userspace stuff and non-article stuff, never to articles. I don't think mass deletion of articles should be allowed when someone is leaving/quitting; not at all. In my opinion it harms the project, and in my mind it violates the spirit and purpose of Wikipedia, including the TOU cited by BusterD below. Softlavender (talk) 04:38, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
            • In many cases, a G7 request will be for someone who created a page and then realised that there was a mistake. I normally write articles offline and copy/paste them into my browser, and I've requested G7 in the past (or just deleted something myself instead of requesting it) where I accidentally posted a half-written draft instead of a completed article. We don't want such content in any namespace, and it's pointless to have a debate for a rather useless page when the creator knows it's useless and wants it to be deleted. Nyttend (talk) 11:26, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
              • Yes, that's exactly what I indicated: "In terms of articles, I think G7 should only be used for the most egregious and/or useless content." Softlavender (talk) 21:23, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
      • This is not one of those cases (or kinds of cases) where we should try and judge intent. "Good faith" doesn't automatically mean "in the best interest of our readers", as far as I'm concerned, and an explanation was offered which we, pursuant to WP:AGF, should accept. I hate seeing decent content being deleted, but it is what it is. Drmies (talk) 03:57, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
        • Sorry, Drmies, but I disagree with you. Content created by our editors may still be legally their property per copyright, but they have licensed it to us in perpetuity by posting it here, and we are under no obligation to delete it at their request. Softlavender is exactly correct in saying that our responsibility is to the reader -- and the quality of the encyclopedia -- first, and everything else is secondary. When it comes to a conflict between obligations to the content creator, and responsibility to the reader, it is crystal clear to me what we should do. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:20, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
          • Beyond My Ken, I didn't say we were obligated to delete. But the thing is (well, one of the things) that this applies to all cases of G7, and we (admins) really don't want to be considering intent etc. for all the cases of G7. BTW, no, not "legally" theirs--they sign that away the moment they press "Publish changes". Anyway, sure, we can consider whether something is worth keeping, but the default, practically speaking and given what G7 says, is always going to be "delete", unless other factors (like here) complicate matters. Drmies (talk) 04:25, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
            • Actually, I think you may be wrong about the legal part. My understanding is that what editors agree to when uploading their contribution is to license their content to Wikipedia under CC-BY-SA or GDFL, and that license is non-revocable, but the actual copyright to their content remains with them -- this is why it's so important to keep an accurate record of who contributed what, because each editor owns the copyright to their contribution, even if Wikipedia (or the WMF) owns the copyright to the composite whole. At least, that's the way it was explained to me. This means, for instance, that I can write a paragraph for an article here, and still upload the same paragraph elsewhere if I want to, because I own the copyright to that material, and the license to Wikipedia is non-exclusive. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:07, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
            • I just checked WP:COPYRIGHT and (1) I struck the part above about Wikipedia or the WMF owning a composite copyright. It turns out the only copyright they own is on logos, etc. (2) WP:COPYRIGHT says, explicitly: "The text of Wikipedia is copyrighted (automatically, under the Berne Convention) by Wikipedia editors and contributors and is formally licensed to the public under one or several liberal licenses.", so I believe I am correct on my main point above. Of course, I'm not at all certain that this rather novel conception of copyright has ever been tested in a court of law - maybe someone knows. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:12, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

• Reading this discussion I'm reminded of the statement under the edit summary window I see every time I save an edit: "By publishing changes, you agree to the Terms of Use, and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL." When I submit an edit, I agree the work isn't mine anymore. I've released it trusting the community to deal with it appropriately. In pointy cases like this, I'd be inclined to keep everything even if covered by G7. But cases like this are why you admins make the big bucks... BusterD (talk) 04:03, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• I don't understand why G7 should apply to article space at all as their work doesn't belong to them anymore --Shrike (talk) 07:01, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

  • Shrike, see my comment above about articles. Nyttend (talk) 11:31, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

  We do have some moral obligations to our editors, that's why. Incidentally, G7 says "provided that the only substantial content of the page was added by its author" is this the case for the deletions requested here? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 07:07, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

  • Yes, I checked a couple of the still-deleted articles such as Meese-Brennan debate, BioBee, and Iris Zaki, and Seraphim System was the sole editor. G7 also specifies "If requested in good faith", though, and taking your ball and going home is not really a good faith reason for deletion. Fish+Karate 11:01, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
• The very first five words of G7 are 'IF REQUESTED IN GOOD FAITH'. 'I misused a tool, had it removed, so I am going to spit my dummy and get all my content deleted' is not even close to being a good faith request. This is far from being the first instance editors when upset or sanctioned in some way have decided they want all their contributions nuked. Its also irrelevant to G7 if some of the articles fail notability as that is not a criteria for G7. Its a good faith request and sole author. Thats it. These requests didnt fulfil that and should have been declined en-masse, if anything just so when the editor calms down later and has second thoughts it doesnt make more work restoring it. Only in death does duty end (talk) 11:56, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
• Folks, can I please suggest you have a read of the latest comments from Seraphim System on their talk page before you bang on further with criticism of their actions? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:53, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
• We should take Saraphim System up on their good offer to keep the ones wanted. And perhaps change G7 to formalize a denial for wanted articles: 'Any admin may discretionarily deny G7 for a generally policy compliant article, if they determine a keep is in the best interest of readers') . Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:04, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
  • I don't think that needs to be formalized; it's implicit. Anyone is free to remove a G7 tag if they want to. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 13:40, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
    • Then perhaps change the template because it does not say that, and it probably does not say that because that is not how G7 is written, and it would obviate the circumstance for having 'what do we do discussions' like this. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:46, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
      • I mean, it's implicit for CSD as a whole, not just G7. I don't think it's any more or less true for G7 than for any other CSD criterion, and so it seems a little silly to explicitly say that just in this one tag (which might imply that it's not true for the other tags). I doubt it would change whether conversations like this happen. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 13:54, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
        • Then explicitly say that in CSD as a whole, and change the templates - so, people are not confused, since according to your alleged implication it's not suppose to be only for people who claim to have unsaid knowledge, it's for anyone who wants it. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:59, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
        • While it might be implicit that anyone can decline a CSD nomination, I think it is also implicit that a valid decline is only for nominations that do not comply with the specified CSD criteria as written. For example, if someone went around declining valid G12s, I'd expect them to be stopped from doing so pretty quickly - and the same, surely, goes for declining CSDs that comply with the criteria generally. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 14:08, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
          • I don't generally agree. Many of these criteria are "it's expected nobody would object"; G7 falls under that IMO, kind of a speedy PROD. If someone objects, they remove the tag. G12 is not one of those: either text is a copyvio or it isn't, but even so sometimes a G12 results in a large revdeletion rather than deleting the page. Admins are supposed to exercise some clue in evaluating these, not just take all speedy deletion requests at face value all the time. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:13, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

  As for G7 in this scenario, I generally agree that we should put a higher bar on G7 requests in article space, and especially that we should not honour requests from a user to delete all of their article creations really for any reason, per the license (someone wrote this already in better words than I have this morning). I also agree we should probably talk about this somewhere else without it being framed as an issue with one user who seems to have quit (per 28bytes below). Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:16, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• Speedy deletions (all of them) are specific by design and there is supposed to be as little room for interpretation as possible - and G7 is very explicit. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 14:18, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• The tag basically says do not remove, unless the G7 criteria (sole author request) is not met. I suppose it also covers 'good faith' but that's a problem because you actually have to accuse someone of bad faith and find bad faith to refuse, rather then just saying, good or bad faith, this article is worth keeping. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:21, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Given that Seraphim System seems to have agreed to rescind the deletion requests for now, I think this can be closed. Discussion about G7 in general can be done on the appropriate page. Kudos to Floquenbeam for approaching the editor with kindness on their talk page and treating them like a human worth empathizing with. 28bytes (talk) 14:09, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Yes indeed. And given that we really don't have any repeat problems with G7 nominations, I see no need to revisit the policy. If it becomes a repeat problem, sure, but it would be an over-reaction to just one (already resolved) case. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 14:15, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• I've restored most of the rest and there are no outstanding G7s. Unless somebody wants to rescue any of the following, I agree this can be closed:
  • List of foreign companies with operations in Turkey
  • BioBee
  • Arrest of Dov Haiyun
  • Meese-Brennan debate

– Joe (talk) 16:28, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Block request

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Well, since everyone else seems to be doing it, would an admin be so kind as to block my old accounts (without email access) — Ecw.technoid.dweeb, Ecw.technoid.dweeb.2, and Crimsonmargarine? Might as well not leave them floating around with these attacks going on. Thanks! :) —{{u|Goldenshimmer}}｜✝️｜they/their｜😹｜T/C｜☮️｜John 15:12｜🍂 15:51, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

All three blocked and TPA turned off as well. If at any time you'd like these back, feel free to let me know and I'll be happy to. RickinBaltimore (talk) 15:55, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Many thanks! :) —{{u|Goldenshimmer}}｜✝️｜they/their｜😹｜T/C｜☮️｜John 15:12｜🍂 15:56, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

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New Zealand English and macrons

On the New Zealand Wikipedians' notice board, there is endless discussion going on about whether or not to use macrons for words of Māori origin. Even the country's largest newspaper, The New Zealand Herald, has written an article about the affair (see media notice on top of the page). Macrons have been discussed at length in two separate entries (1 and 2) and to me, there is now consensus but that there are two editors who are in an opposite camp. I'm not sure that us Kiwis can resolve this ourselves and maybe it needs uninvolved parties to come along and analyse for us what's been discussed and what can be concluded. Of course this isn't a formal RFC and you may conclude that such a formal step is needed. Either way, it would be good to get some outside assistance on the matter. This page isn't on my watchlist so please ping me if you'd like further input from me on discussions here. Schwede66 17:24, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Complaints

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Hello admins. This IP address is my community college's IP that is assigned to computers throughout the campus. A year ago, there was an edit war between two different users and I have to admit, a six month block is unfair. I asked another admin and he declined the unblock. In August 2018, just another (only one) unconstructive edit was made resulting in a year long block. I consider this unfair. I hope there can be feedback about this IP since I don't want another declined unblock request. I also feel that admins are discriminators who don't care about their editors (unless they are administrators), and I ask you for help. This makes me a user who is nicer than admins in general.

I'm asking for it to be unblocked because there were no warnings given after the block expired. There should have been warnings. And I put in discrimination because of reading on WP:ANI and other admins' talk pages, I have to agree with the editor. Everyone has the right to edit but my college's IP address is not allowed to just for one edit. I haven't been that active and won't be until there is an "admin reform". I notice a lot of admins violating WP:CIVIL and they have done that for years. Some admins are never friendly. And they lie, too; there have been constructive editors on that IP address, including one who restored warnings, some other user just removes them when they pop up. There has also been constructive minor edits from that IP.

Also, I read on WP:ANI (archived) and Gizmodo that some administrators are just plain bad, so bad that it makes some editors want to do self-harm. I don't know why you don't take care of administrators being so rude. They use such a strong tone to hurt someone. Why do you not take care of that? They might have done something but stop biting them. There are multiple policies taking care of this. And some editors complain about admins not following them. I don't want to see an editor commit suicide just because of the incivility of administrators. Do something! Pinging other admins such as @Acroterion, Doug Weller, Drmies, Floquenbeam, GeneralizationsAreBad, Only, Primefac, Ritchie333, TonyBallioni, and Widr: I'm just listing examples, but calling every admin out. Reported users may do something wrong, but can't we all learn to get along? This is why we can't have nice things. Dolfinz1972 (talk) 18:47, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

See this. GAB^gab 18:50, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

The discrimination is not towards a group of people but to innocent editors who seemingly did not get enough chances of warnings. Sometimes a block may be unnecessary but the warnings and blocks are often unjustified. The complaining is mostly on #7 of the revision. Dolfinz1972 (talk) 18:54, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Do not ping me any more just to make sure I read your incoherent rant. --Floquenbeam (talk) 18:56, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

See, I'm referring to this kind of incivility. Calling it a rant? Really? Come on, you know better. I reported you to WP:ANI. Dolfinz1972 (talk) 18:57, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Hmm Dolfinz1972 why do you ping me? Am I good or bad, in your book? Srsly, your long missive doesn't make very strong points. Sure, some of us are assholes, but Floquenbeam's alright, and vandalism from schools remains a serious problem. Don't know about the self-harm--I do know there's plenty of admins who've torn out all their hair by now trying to deal with vandalism of many kinds. And this suicide and discrimination stuff: if you want to be taken seriously, take things seriously. Thank you, Drmies (talk) 19:03, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@Drmies:, you're fine, but I don't agree about Floquenbeam, calling it a rant was disrespectful af. That's why I started this discussion. Dolfinz1972 (talk) 19:04, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

I appreciate that. Drmies (talk) 19:05, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@Dolfinz1972: This isn't unusual; be glad it isn't a longer block. My school IP (which I will not link for privacy reasons) is currently subject to a 2-year block, with varying other blocks since 2015. The pattern in which school blocks are applied is not consistent with standard AGF, and it never has been; it's probably a good idea to accept that and move on. -A lad insane (Channel 2) 19:06, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@A lad insane: Okay, but I am also complaining about how admins treat non-admins. Dolfinz1972 (talk) 19:11, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@Dolfinz1972: I have no comment on that matter; I rarely interact with admins. -A lad insane (Channel 2) 19:15, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

I'd say it's pretty rare for school vandals to read talk pages. Or to be deterred by warnings. In any case they can create an account and edit. Doug Weller talk 19:35, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

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I found this had been hatted when I eventually decided to stick my oar in; well, shoot me. Disgruntled reports that there are bad admins here are also normal. But I think we should consider treating tertiary education institutions, including community colleges, differently from elementary schools when weighing whether and for how long to block rather than lumping them all together under "school blocks". Yngvadottir (talk) 20:31, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Agree. Some distinction should be made when blocking secondary schools and colleges. Miniapolis 22:54, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Yngvadottir, I see wildly different block lengths for schools. I cannot, really, decide which ones should be blocked for how long and on what basis. I'm starting to not block for extended periods of time anymore. Ha, I noticed, while I was doing "article improvement" on the elevator, that Materialscientist had blocked my campus for six months--and going through the range I suppose he had good enough reason to do so. At the same time, it might be a good idea for us admins to get together and throw all of our reasons and arguments on the table and decide on some guidance/guidelines. Drmies (talk) 04:20, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Why, and how, should we make blocks different for schools and colleges?

IP blocking is a very mild restriction. It still permits account creation. Account creation should only be locked if that in turn has become a problem. If the difference is that the pupils are older and wiser, then that should lead to less vandalism. If it didn't, then we still have the same preventative need. I see no reason to relax any blocking policy here, on either schools or colleges. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:01, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

TNT's Retirement

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Anyone know what's going on here? -Ad Orientem (talk) 20:22, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@Ad Orientem: This would suggest it's just a personal matter. General Ization ^Talk 20:24, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Hopefully, this "retirement" is only temporary. We have been loosing far too many top notch editors. Though I am sympathetic to the demands of the real world and the amount of fertilizer that we have to deal with here. It can make one want to walk away at times. -Ad Orientem (talk) 20:26, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

Ad Orientem, agreed, TNT is a significant asset to the project. Lately, I don't think we show enough appreciation here for those who are truly helpful in whatever way they are, and instead tend to focus too much on when mistakes are made. Home Lander (talk) 20:35, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

• While I am sad to see this, I think it is best that we respect TNT’s decision here. If he comes back ever, I will be very happy, but part of respecting him as a person is letting him leave quietly. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:03, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

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Can someone reach out to User:Anthony E. Lahmann and/or sort through his edits?

We have a new user who is making a bunch of edits that are not making sense to me. Perhaps he needs some mentoring. I have gone through some of his edits and undone some of the more obviously unhelpful ones, and have left messages on his talk page, but I will not have time tonight or tomorrow to investigate further or follow up with him. Can someone who's good with new users please help? 28bytes (talk) 00:28, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

@28bytes: I have just been working through some of them right now. A very unusual suite of edits for a newly registered user, and their recent post to the Teahouse about page protection being akin to vandalism has successfully drawn attention to them. They are suggestive of someone who has obviously edited before, presumably under another IP address and, whilst I'm currently trying to assume good faith, I am finding a few of them somewhat disruptive. I was going to reply on the WP:TH page, but will place something on their talk page instead. Nick Moyes (talk) 00:41, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

 Done Nick Moyes (talk) 01:19, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @28bytes: Indeed, multiple edits are disruptive, particularly redirects like this which I reverted. This creation spawned me to think they might have edited over at Simple, but their account is not registered there. Home Lander (talk) 01:21, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

@Home Lander: Under that username, this person has only ever edited en.wiki and made one swiftly-reverted edit at it. wiki. See here. Nick Moyes (talk) 13:46, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

He has now created a new account, User:Anthony Lahmann (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs), and starting up with similar edits. ~ GB fan 21:22, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I've ifdef blocked both accounts as obvious socks and WP:NOTHERE -- RoySmith (talk) 21:52, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Both accounts blocked by RoySmith and I tagged them accordingly. Home Lander (talk) 21:56, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for taking a look and acting accordingly. I had hoped we could establish a dialog with him, but if he's going to just hop to a new account and make the same sorts of edits rather than responding to anyone's legitimate concerns, a block was inevitable. 28bytes (talk) 22:52, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Porny spammy

There've been a few tonight; User:Desmond09Y is the most recent one I've seen. Maybe some of you with some technical skills can have a look. I blocked one earlier, and so did Materialscientist. Drmies (talk) 04:53, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Probably a spam bot. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 08:18, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Here's another one, User talk:BruceCochrane42, just blocked by Materialscientist. Can we filter out the underlying URLs? Drmies (talk) 18:34, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Contact details

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Could an Admin please delete and revdel Draft:ALOK RAJ THAKUR. Thanks, JMHamo (talk) 09:28, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I've deleted it, but it's best not to highlight such things on such a widely read notice board as this, as it says in the big pink box when you edit this page. You should find an active admin and ask them privately, or email the oversight team. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 09:31, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I have now also emailed the oversight team to request suppression. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 09:34, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

 Done OS'd. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 09:42, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

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Proposal to replace "Consensus Required" on American Politics articles

Since its conception in 2016 the "Consensus Required" rule has been applied to at least 123 pages in the American Politics topic area using the template {{American politics AE}}. The rule was originally meant to be (and is still) applied as a companion to a regular 1RR restriction. In its current form the rule reads:

Consensus required: All editors must obtain consensus on the talk page of this article before reinstating any edits that have been challenged (via reversion). This includes making edits similar to the ones that have been challenged. If in doubt, don't make the edit.

I propose that it be replaced with a less restrictive rule:

Enforced BRD: If an edit you make is challenged by reversion you must discuss the issue on the article talk page and wait 24 hours (from the time of the original edit) before reinstating your edit.

Rationale: The Consensus Required rule prevents some negative behaviors, but at the expense of blocking legitimate dispute resolution techniques like making new "bold" edits that address the concerns of the reverting editor. (See the "cycle" portion of Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle and the paragraph titled "However, don't get stuck on the discussion".) Freezing all reinstatements of similar material and requiring a clear talkpage consensus bogs down dispute resolution and article development, and it can even reward poor behaviors like being intransigent and refusing to compromise on talk pages (paraphrasing User:Aquillion [8]).

The bad behavior prevented by Consensus Required (slow or tag-team edit warring) is some of the easiest behavior for admins to identify and sanction, requiring only a glance at an article's history; the tendentious talkpage behaviors rewarded by it are much harder to identify and sanction. I think the Consensus Required rule would be better used as an alternative to topic bans or blocks, to sanction individual editors who regularly engage in 1RR gaming or tag-team edit warring.

Option 2: Another option is to simply remove Consensus-Required and leave just regular 1RR. If you prefer that please indicate so in your !vote. In any case I hope to make "Enforced BRD" an optional parameter in the {{American politics AE}} template.

~Awilley (talk) 16:28, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Note: I have pinged via edit summary all the admins I can find who have created the required edit notice templates while placing the Consensus Required sanction. ~Awilley (talk) 16:51, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Well, I tried to ping the admins in that edit summary, but apparently you can only ping up to 5 people at a time via edit summary. Here's try #2: User:Lord Roem User:Zzyzx11 User:El C User:Ks0stm User:Doug Weller User:TonyBallioni User:GeneralizationsAreBad User:JzG User:Laser brain User:Ad Orientem User:Beeblebrox User:KnightLago ~Awilley (talk) 02:40, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support proposal per my comments in the previous discussion. The consensus required restriction has had some benefit, but it has also been used to WP:GAMETHESYSTEM. The BRD requirement is a good alternative that will allow articles to be improved while fostering discussion. Option 2 would be a distant second choice, but still preferable to a strict consensus required rule. 1RR alone could be abused by POV pushers and editors acting in bad faith, but those instances should be infrequent and can be dealt with at AE if necessary.- MrX 🖋 16:42, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
• On the face of it, this seems to be an improvement, so I support it, but is this the right venue for this discussion? I would suggest it may need a wider audience. Guy (Help!) 23:44, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

@JzG, it's either here or WP:AE. I raised this idea in a thread there a couple of weeks ago and it got comments from 7 editors and zero admins. As for audience, I pinged every admin I could find that has ever placed the sanction. (I'm assuming you're here because you got the ping?) ~Awilley (talk) 01:00, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps if you had taken it to WP:VPP, as I counseled you to do at the time, you might have gotten more feedback. IN any case, this is not merely an admin issue; the community should be involved in this. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:39, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

You're probably right about getting more feedback at VPP, although it would have had to eventually bounce back here in order to effect any change. ~Awilley (talk) 03:51, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose (I'm not an admin, but I don't believe this is an issue for only admins.) There is no rush. This is an encyclopedia, WP:NOTNEWS. We don't need breaking news or the most up-to-date US politics. If it takes a week or a month to obtain consensus, that will likely make the article better both by discussion and the emergence of a wider range of secondary sources. Jack N. Stock (talk) 01:12, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Why 24 hours? This assumes that everyone required for consensus is on WP every day. Why not a week? Jack N. Stock (talk) 03:01, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Because the 24-hrs pairs nicely with WP:1RR and because most disputes can be resolved faster than a week ad don't need the input of all the editors of an article. BRD works well for resolving disputes between just two editors and any consensus formed by them can be examined and modified as other editors log on. ~Awilley (talk) 13:48, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support per above rationals. That said, Guy has a point and I'm not sure this is the best venue for the discussion, though it's not a major issue for me. -Ad Orientem (talk) 02:57, 13 December 2018 (UTC)
• Comment I may very well be 100% wrong on this assumption, but I was under the impression that edits in wording to Ds-related templates had to go through ArbCom first. I also echo the comments above that WP:AE would be more appropriate. OhKayeSierra (talk) 03:09, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

The process for changing these sanctions is outlined at Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Discretionary_sanctions#Modifications_by_administrators. It gives 3 options: (a) AE or (b) AN or (c) ARCA. Because these sanctions (including the template) were created by individual admins (not by ArbCom) it's not necessary to go through ArbCom to modify or remove them. ~Awilley (talk) 03:40, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• I might be reading it wrong, but it seems the new wording could be gamed by an editor going to the talk page, engaging in some pro forma arguments, then reversing the reversion once the 24 hours are up. That sounds like a recipe for slow-moving edit wars. While imperfect, requiring consensus for new additions/changes, especially in sensitive topic areas, aim to encourage the kind of collegial editing environment we're striving for. If the concern is an editor would stonewall and refuse to budge, functionally trying to use the restriction and their objection to veto a change against consensus, then we have discretion to restrict said editor's involvement in the topic area. In short, I'm not convinced there's anything we're losing by maintaining the template wording as-is, and potential risk if updated as proposed. For those reasons, I'd currently oppose the new text. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 07:03, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

@Lord Roem: You you are reading it right: it does allow for the possibility of a slow-moving edit war, and that is precisely what I was talking about in paragraph #2 of the Rationale. (i.e. Slow moving edit wars are much easier for admins to identify and sanction than stonewalling on the talkpage.) Have you ever tried to sanction someone for refusing to compromise on a talk page? I haven't. It takes too much time reading through reams of bickering, and then you have to make subjective judgments because there's no bright-line rule. I think it's better for us to implement rules that naturally encourage compromise instead of rewarding stonewalling. ~Awilley (talk) 13:48, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

@Awilley: I guess my sense is that the proposed change wouldn't achieve those ends and there's no evidence presented that the current wording has been detrimental. For sensitive articles in disputed topic spaces, 'freezing' or slowing down rapid change to await discussion and consensus, while definitely a lengthier process, is by all means a healthy one. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 16:08, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose the consensus required sanction can be annoying but it’s clear what it means: be cautious and don’t just keep doing stuff without discussion. I like it better than any other formula that has been come up with to replace it as you are less subject to gaming or other types of disruption and if I come across American politics articles, I always intentionally use it. TonyBallioni (talk) 14:40, 13 December 2018 (UTC)
• I think the usefulness/necessity of consensus-required varies. On low-profile articles, it is not necessary, and it hampers article development as indeed one tendentious editor can stop article development, so I Support for most of the 123 articles the removal of consensus-required (preferred) or reduction to Enforced BRD (or even remove 1RR and all restrictions); there are quite a few low-profile articles on that list that IMO really don't need the restriction.

However I Strong oppose for Donald Trump per my comments at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive243#Rethinking consensus-required. The consensus-required restriction has granted a great amount of stability to the article. This seems to be criticized as "freezing article development"; however the Trump article does not need to be changed greatly on a day to day basis. What this would instead leave the door open is to more discussion and RfCs, because old disputes that have been settled are reignited as someone can now change, for example "false and misleading" to just "misleading" or "lies", without violating DS, prompting yet another talk page discussion. Or: the benefit of consensus-required is not preventing slow tag team edit warring but granting stability and preventing constant needless changes and disputes on a very very high-profile article like Donald Trump; and the system of Current consensuses with fixed wording that is hammered out over lengthy talk page discussion works quite well. After all, articles are meant to represent consensus and single editors should not generally overturn a consensus garnered through a wide RfC. The Trump article really does not suffer from intransigence, either; because one can easily garner a consensus within a day or two, one or two "bad" editors cannot do much to stop legitimate improvements. Galobtter (pingó mió) 15:31, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Galobtter, well, your comment here raises a few issues with this proposal: namely, discretionary sanctions are just that, discretionary, and even in those 123 articles, there are some where this is likely very useful. While Coffee did place this somewhat indiscriminately, others actually thought hard before applying the now standard AP2 DS in an area. Every article where I placed this on it was intentional, and I don't see any harm in keeping it, and would oppose removing them because we went a bit more active with the template than was necessary. TonyBallioni (talk) 16:07, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, certainly in many cases it is useful; however, I feel that in a lot of cases 1RR itself is quite enough to stop edit warring, and consensus-required adds some extra mental burden to editors editing an article that has to be justified. And certainly, determining which articles consensus-required is useful or not will require individual examination. So definitely, if consensus-required is going to be removed from some of the articles as I suggested above, it will be have to be a carefully considered some. Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:18, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Neutral, leaning oppose I'm mindful of the problems with people gaming the system and with a small group of determined editors stonewalling or disrupting articles, but I'm also opposed to both of the so-far proposed fixes, which sends the message that edit warring is OK. We should be encouraging more consensus-building discussions, not less, and either of the above options turns these articles back to a bit of a free-for-all. The second change implies "You don't need consensus as long as you get enough friends together to ram through your edit war" and the first implies "The same thing, except wait 24 hours". I'd like to see a better option. --Jayron32 16:28, 13 December 2018 (UTC)
• Not an admin, but I oppose any enforcment of something that is not a guideline or a policy. If BRD is deemed important, then it should be raised from the essay level and become a guideline. However, backdooring it into a guideline, like this is just wrong and would be a bad precedent. --Gonnym (talk) 15:02, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

@Gonnym: WP:BRD is not an essay. It is "an explanatory supplement to the Wikipedia:Consensus and Wikipedia:Be bold pages" (core policy and editing guideline, respectively). The consensus-required restriction, on the other hand, does enforce something that goes beyond current WP policy or guidelines. ~Awilley (talk) 15:36, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Same difference. --Gonnym (talk) 16:43, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Comment: Awilley, ArbCom has basically made this proposal moot now. Most of the banners were placed by Coffee, who is no longer an admin, which means they can be modified by any admin. You could undertake a review of articles he placed under DS and selectively modify them as Galobtter has suggested. If you do, I would suggest having a workspace in your userspace where people can comment where they don't think changing the DS would be ideal. This also has the advantage of not changing the sanction en masse, especially when the admin who placed it is still active. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:41, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. My hope in starting this thread was that I could convince the admins who had previously placed this sanction of a better alternative and thereby preserve some uniformity in the topic area. In hindsight I wonder if selectively canvassing only the admins who thought highly enough of CR to appy it doomed this to go down in a pile-on. Sorry, that was rude of me.~Awilley (talk) 15:54, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Speaking as one of those admins, I will not be removing any of the CR sanctions I have placed and will continue to use it with 1RR when I feel active sanctions are necessary. No one has come up with a good suggested replacement for it in any attempt in any topic area, and all of the proposed replacements are substantially worse (including this one.) If modifications were to be made, I think removing all active sanctions from specific articles where they are no longer needed would be much better. The issue with this sanction is that it was overused, not that it doesn’t work. TonyBallioni (talk) 16:04, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Policy on schoolblocks?

Per Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Complaints, we probably need to discuss current practices and see whether we need a policy on what is the duration of schoolblocks.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:51, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I personally, if I block an IP for vandalism (and for this, vandalism must be persistent, not just one edit), I add the talk page to my watchlist. If I see other user posting vandalism warnings, I check the contributions, and if I see IP has no constructive contributions, I progressively block up to a year, and then for a year. I never check whether this is a school or not. Possibly other users have better practices than mine.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:51, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I look at the block history of the IP and the edits. If there is a substantial pattern of vandal edits and blocks, I will escalate to the next longest length of time in the block, especially if the edits are on the heels of a block being lifted. With almost all of the blocks not having Account Creation turned off, this still gives an avenue for legitimate edits, through an account. RickinBaltimore (talk) 17:09, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

My practices reflect the above. I will, first, check to see if the IP address belongs to an obvious educational institution, but even if it doesn't if there is a pattern of frequent vandalism with no intervening good edits, I block (allowing for account creation) with progressively longer blocks. --Jayron32 17:32, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I personally don't dogmatically always progressively increase block lengths, and am not always particularly impressed when this is done. Actually I'm not impressed when any admin behaviour is based on previous admin behaviour. If there's been, say 2 edits in the last 2 years, then I might block for a day or two. If they soon return then they'll soon be blocked again. If a school is always problematic then I don't see a problem with blocks lasting several years. I'll often stop account creation, having seen many checkusers adjust many schoolblocks in the past. But related, I think you need to distinguish different types of school IP. Elementary schools are just going to be stupid when the kids are around but you can probably actually allow account creation. Some secondary schools are usually well behaved apart from one or two idiots who will be caught and punished. Others are just obviously places of eternal anarchy. So no automatic increases for me - take a look at the evidence as a whole. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 18:04, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Pile on here. I don't automatically increase the block length either. I try for the shortest period that will stop the disruption. Particularly in April or May, when the school term is likely to end in North America, I'll only block for a month or two because there's no point in having an IP blocked that won't be used until August or September. However, if there's disruption coming in short order off a six-month block, with a block log as long as my arm, I'll block for a year. Katie^talk 22:17, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Complaints is not a reason to consider anything about policy. You had users edit warring through the same IP with one of the user's asking for it to be blocked. 1 That doesn't fit the normal situations. It was also an anonblock and the complainant had an account but was choosing not to use it. He doesn't make more than a handful of edits per week and nearly none of it is academic in nature. He had no real need so he can edit as anon from home or use his account at the school. The pretense of schools having a different status would be based on academic edits which does not apply here. That complaint is not the impetus for policy changes. Deny the drama.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 01:33, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Deletion of diff

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

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In not entirely sure where to put this, but can this edit be deleted? I don't care about any edits after this that show that this edit was made but I didn't realise that adding this information was actually illegal and I don't want to be liable for anything.  Nixinova  T  C  19:39, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

 Done -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 19:43, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

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

Closure of RfC: Nikola Tesla's birthplace

I would like to challenge the closure of this RfC: [9]

My reasoning is the following:

1. I feel that this RfC was closed prematurely. The closing editor also gives some grounds to that complaintment. To quote him: "The one objection that could be made is that the discussion was closed too early...". I indeed think it was closed to early, as no previously uninvolved editors had time to notice the discussion and join in. Only the editors that I have canvassed have participated.

2. I unintentionally made a case of canvassing here, and if you read the discussion, you will see that even the editors who disagreed with me in the discussion have pointed that out. I feel that it would be a good idea to have an opinion of a few previously uninvolved editors to fix the problem that I have created.

3. Although the RfC started by me posting one source, it was soon agreed by me and other editors that this souce can be viewed as OR or SYNTH. Other editors have asked for a specific source that I need, but when I have provided that source, it was hardly discussed. It would be a good idea to have some more time so this new source can be discussed. I see that almost no one reflected on the 2nd source, now when I'm rereading.

4. The closing editor didn't reflect on the new source at all, but had closed the RfC on the arguments other editors made about the 1st source, SYNTH, OR. The reason he missed to reflect on the second source may be in the chronological order of posts. If you read from the top to bottom, the discussion may look a lot different than when you read chronologically.

5. I feel that the request made by this RfC is pretty simple and it is my opinion that there shouldn't be that much opposition. I have tried to summarize my stand in the last post, maybe you can read that post first and then the whole discussion (if you don't feel that this would temper with the chronology) Bilseric (talk) 19:59, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

• The RfC closure should stand as is. Bilseric indulged in original research to bring in a source that doesn't mention Tesla at all. And the source talks about something that did not happen until after Tesla left the area, so it doesn't apply to Tesla's life there in the Austrian Military Frontier. Bilseric should be aware of the danger of WP:BOOMERANG as his behavior has been disruptive, falsely portraying strong unanimous consensus against him as an unsettled dispute between two editors. Binksternet (talk) 20:46, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

• It seemed an appropriate close to me; it was in SNOW territory and the close adequately reflected the comments of the participants. I get the complaint about people ignoring the second source you added later on, but you can hardly blame them. Modifying an already garbled RfC after it's been running for some time rarely produces the desired effect. In the future it will help if you make the RfC shorter and clearer with just one specific question. ~Awilley (talk) 20:49, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I see your point. It's my mistake, because I'm not that experienced. But what was really frustrating is that they were saying:"what you need is this and that source", and when I spent my time providing it , they didn't reflect on it. I can understand your explanation, but if the RfC was opened for a little more time, new editors would notice the new source. It is still frustrating to see the above post where the user User:Binksternet is reflecting to the old source, and neglecting the new one. If I could redo it, I would put the purposal as I put it in my last post. Would it be possible to leave this RfC closed and open a new one which puts a clear single purposal as I did in my last post? No one reflected on the 2nd source anyways in this RfC. Bilseric (talk) 20:56, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Yes, that is certainly possible, but not necessarily advisable to do it so soon after the first RfC. If I'm reading the situation correctly a lot of editors are getting fed up with all the noise you have been making about this. ~Awilley (talk) 01:03, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Ok. I agree with everything you said. It is my fault for altering the RfC. That caused no one to put opinion on the alternative purposal (the 2nd source). I did it after I have accepted valid objections about the 1st source. I would really like that the alternative purposal is discussed, but I agree that opening this bulky discussion would be just be confusing to new editors. A better solution would be another RfC which is just putting forward the 2nd source that wasn't discussed in this RfC. I really am not in a hurry. It can be opened in a few months. It would be even better if someone else would open it, not me, if anyone would be willing to do it.Bilseric (talk) 08:32, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Yes, you have correctly observed that I was "neglecting" the second source. After your RfC purpose became clear to me, your arguments became unimportant to me. In a non-neutral manner, you want Wikipedia to describe a strong connection between Tesla and Croatia. Looking now, I see the second source has two problems: it's an outlier, different in its terminology than other books on the same subject, and the author says a page later that "the Austrians continued to operate the province as a military frontier." So it contradicts itself in calling the province both Croatian and Austrian. Binksternet (talk) 02:39, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Please. This is not the continuation of the RFC. You don't need to repeat yourself or continue with the dispute. But, how can you argue that "The RfC closure should stand as is" and in the same time say this: " your arguments became unimportant to me.". If the 2nd source and my arguments were unimportant to you, we should definately allow others to participate. You are now basically arguing that only your opinion is important and that we don't need other opinions. It's not in the spirit of Wikipedia. Bilseric (talk) 07:53, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Uploading files without summaries and/or licences continuously

• Itsbasicallyaidan (talk · contribs)

Are there any practices in place for editors who continue to upload files without the respective copyright summaries and/or licences? Especially those who have received dozens of notifications on their talk page and still continue to upload them without the correct non-free rationale? The above user's talk page has 25 such notifications since March (that I can tell), and is still receiving such notices after they don't pay attention to them. -- Alex^TW 23:36, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Looking at the deleted contributions, I think a topic ban from image uploads is in order. Guy (Help!) 23:42, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

I've dropped them a final warning about bad image uploads. If they do it again, let me know and I'll indef them -FASTILY 04:33, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Cheers for that; I've got their talk page on my watchlist, so I'll let you know when I know. -- Alex^TW 06:20, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Maybe it might help to talk to this guy in text if the templates don't work. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 07:05, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Jo-Jo Eumerus, I have already posted on their talk page in a discussion manner concerning this topic, and the editor has edited since without replying to the message. The editor is also known for their disruptive editing, such as mass removals then going in the opposite direction the very next day with oversized additions, and adding unsourced information just because other editors have done it. Looking at their complete contribution history since January, they have only ever used a talk page (their own) once. -- Alex^TW 08:51, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Wow. >1,000 edits, one talk page edit, ever (and that was not a comment, it was the result of him moving a page), and only two edits to user talk, ever. This person is not engaged with other editors at all. Guy (Help!) 16:05, 13 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support topic ban from image uploads. Looks like we have no choice. Miniapolis 22:47, 13 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support topic ban from image uploads - seems a fairly clearcut case. TBAN to remain for the longer of "1 month or when editor engages, indicates understanding of the issue and agrees to obey the requirements" Nosebagbear (talk) 13:01, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Benjaminzyg Appeal

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

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Should you guys let Benjaminzyg welcomed back because he stopped sockpuppetery and he want his account back. I wish for lot of support on this one because I don’t want any bad comment on this one. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 1.159.52.47 (talk) 04:50, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Thanks but no thanks. Tell them (haha) to go to their earlier account. User:Jenulot? Drmies (talk) 04:54, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

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

Drmies, that account is globally locked so no one may log into it and they cannot send emails from it. Same thing for the account that he wants back. I imagine that he might could pull a Lazarus and be resurrected on the MrSunshine83 account which isn't locked....for what that might be worth.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 13:14, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• Aha. Thanks. Let's see if he's paying attention. Also, hell no. ;) Drmies (talk) 15:34, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Reduce a block I placed

Six years ago, I found a proxy IP address, User:87.97.157.121, that was indef-blocked, and since we generally don't block IPs indefinitely, I replaced the indefinite block with a block of a define length: 9 decades, 9 years, 364 days, 23 hours, 49 minutes and 12 seconds. But now I'm informed that we shouldn't place long definite blocks either. Could someone reduce this block to whatever the normal time is for a proxy? Thank you. Nyttend (talk) 19:50, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Creative abuse of policy! ;) I've unblocked, the IP address no longer appears to be an open proxy. Of course anyone is free to re-block if it turns out I'm wrong. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:58, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Blocking_IP_addresses#Open_proxies suggests "several years" as a typical maximum. it's past the statute of limitations, but replacing an indef with a 100-year block is a :/ from me Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 20:03, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

(ec) : I edit-conflicted trying to unblock it. My research shows it is not an open proxy. 6 months would have been in any case more than sufficient.--Ymblanter (talk) 20:03, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. Now I see that I misread something (I placed the indef), but regardless :-) Good to see that it needed the unblock. Nyttend (talk) 20:06, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Digging a little deeper, this address seems to have belonged to a now-defunct ISP, so it may indeed have been an open proxy when you blocked it. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:09, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

According to my calculations, this IP still belongs to the same webhost, and a neighbouring server, alpha.root.bg (http://87.97.157.120) is still up. That said, I don't see any particular need to keep it blocked. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 21:20, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

This thread is ironic. Last evening something led me to this page - Wikipedia:Database reports/Indefinitely blocked IPs - and I messaged a few admins who had placed blocks within the last year. The responses were mixed, ranging from "yes, that was accidental" to that it's fine to leave proxies blocked indefinitely. Is there actual policy that these should not be indef? If so, there's a lot of work to do. Home Lander (talk) 21:32, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

WP:PPP, I'd say; I've never seen it written out, but we've never indef-blocked IPs (as far as I'm aware), except open proxies and truly exceptional abuse cases, and it runs in my head that we've stopped indeffing open proxies in the last few years. (Otherwise nobody would have created the indeffed-IPs report, for example; there's no such report for accounts, as far as I know.) Maybe it could be added to policy, but I don't quite see the point, since policy would have a hard time encapsulating the oddball situations that really do need indefinite blocks. Nyttend (talk) 21:48, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Yes, there's an enormous amount of work to do. There has been for many years. Policy (practice), I think, is fairly well established these days. And the written policy doesn't actually outright forbid indefinite blocks, or blocks lasting 100 years, but it sure discourages them. So any help clearing up these historical issues is welcome. But I'll tell you where there's a sticking point with some of the existing blocks - a number of indefinitely blocked open proxies are still open proxies, or at least webhosts, many years later. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 21:50, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Arbitration motion regarding The Rambling Man

The Arbitration Committee has resolved by motion that the The Rambling Man arbitration case be amended as follows:

In remedy 4, "The Rambling Man prohibited", the first paragraph is amended to read:

The Rambling Man (talk · contribs) is prohibited from posting speculation about the motivations of editors or reflections on their general competence.

and the third paragraph is amended to read:

If however, in the opinion of an uninvolved administrator, The Rambling Man does engage in prohibited conduct, he may be blocked for up to 48 hours. If, in the opinion of the enforcing administrator, a longer block, or other sanction, is warranted a request is to be filed at WP:ARCA.

A note will be added at the top of the Enforcement section highlighting the special enforcement requirements of remedy 4.

The following is added as a remedy to the case:

9) The Rambling Man (talk · contribs) is topic banned from making any edit about, and from editing any page relating to, the Did You Know? process. This topic ban does not apply to User:The Rambling Man/ERRORS and its talk page or to articles linked from DYK hooks or captions (these may be at any stage of the DYK process).

The following provisions are added in the Enforcement section of the case:

1) Where an arbitration enforcement request to enforce a sanction imposed in this case against The Rambling Man has remained open for more than three days and there is no clear consensus among uninvolved administrators, the request is to be referred to the Arbitration Committee at WP:ARCA.

2) Appeals of any arbitration enforcement sanctions imposed on The Rambling Man that enforce a remedy in this case may only be directed to the Arbitration Committee at WP:ARCA. The Rambling Man may appeal by email to the Committee if he prefers. This provision overrides the appeals procedure in the standard provision above.

For the Arbitration Committee,--Cameron₁₁₅₉₈ ^(Talk) 21:05, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Arbitration motion regarding The Rambling Man

Bradv appointed trainee clerk

The arbitration clerks are pleased to welcome Bradv (talk · contribs) to the clerk team as a trainee!

The arbitration clerk team is often in need of new members, and any editor who would like to join the clerk team is welcome to apply by email to clerks-llists.wikimedia.org.

For the Arbitration Committee, Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 22:31, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Bradv appointed trainee clerk

DCsghost‎

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

There's an outstanding unblock request requiring review at user talk:DCsghost, where Bbb23 just removed TPA. Guy (Help!) 23:23, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

I left a note at Bbb's talk ("is this what you meant?"), since removing talk page access and not-handling an unblock request don't normally go together. Nyttend (talk) 00:02, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Guy pinged me and Nyttend left messages on my Talk page. Hence my comments. I revoked TPA because of the disruptive unblock requests. At the same time, it takes more than what Dcsghost is doing for me to remove the unblock request, and as the blocking admin, I can't decline it.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:25, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

I've declined the request. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:07, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Amendment to the standard provision for appeals and modifications

The Arbitration Committee has resolved by motion that:

The following text is added to the "Modifications by administrators" section of the standard provision on appeals and modifications:

Administrators are free to modify sanctions placed by former administrators – that is, editors who do not have the administrator permission enabled (due to a temporary or permanent relinquishment or desysop) – without regard to the requirements of this section. If an administrator modifies a sanction placed by a former administrator, the administrator who made the modification becomes the "enforcing administrator". If a former administrator regains the tools, the provisions of this section again apply to their unmodified enforcement actions.

For clarity, this change applies to all current uses of standard provision, including in closed cases.

For the Arbitration Committee, Bradv🍁 02:12, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Amendment to the standard provision for appeals and modifications

Wikid77

Wikid77 is a frequent commentator at User talk:Jimbo Wales. I have given this editor an indefinite block for "espousing racist revisionism in support of slavery." I gave them a shorter block a few weeks back for similar behavior. Since Jimbotalk is the closest thing that we have to a free speech zone on Wikipedia, I would appreciate a community review of this block. Thank you. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 04:49, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

@Cullen328: this user's history on Jimbo's talk is setting alarm bells ringing for me, and their polemic there is genuinely problematic. Given that this comment (which I assume was the trigger for your block) is essentially revisionist polemic, I think they needed to be blocked. That said, they've made constructive contributions elsewhere, so I don't think we're at the point of a NOTHERE permablock: but I wouldn't accept a "sorry I won't do it again" unblock request either, because the tendency to peddle this sort of crap runs deep. As such, I think we should discuss a topic ban from racial issues and slavery, broadly construed, as a precondition for any unblock. Vanamonde (talk) 05:10, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

His numerous disturbing, hair-raising, and thinly disguised hateful/racist posts on Jimbotalk have come up before. I'd be curious what if anything his unblock appeal states. I think one condition of any unblock should be a topic ban from Jimbotalk. The community has put up with enough of his spewing hatred and nonsense already. Softlavender (talk) 05:53, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Where will he post instead? Legacypac (talk) 05:58, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

How about dev/null? -- Calton | Talk 07:20, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

For those who are unfamiliar with Wikid77's comments on JIMBOTALK, Wikid77 has also complained about not being able to use the N-word; I quote: "In fact to white Americans, the word "nigger" had come to mean a "hardworking servant" rather than an obstinate negro, and a white man might have said about mowing and trimming hedges, "I'll be a yard nigger all morning today" with zero reference to black skin, just the work. Since the "N-word" has been banned, other words have been invented to refer to black people who are organizing against whites (say no more)."

While OTOH they do do some constructive work on the 'pedia (their last 5000 contributions are almost entirely citation fixes with the remaining mostly being comments on JIMBOTALK); however I at-least don't particularly have a desire to someone who espouses such things unblocked (although if so, certainly a topic ban from race and slavery and/or from JIMBOTALK should be imposed) Galobtter (pingó mió) 07:14, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

You're kidding. "hardworking servant"? You can't make this shit up. Drmies (talk) 17:48, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

I wish I was.. Galobtter (pingó mió) 07:15, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

• Good block. Perhaps their pointy redirects from Negro slaves and Negro slave to Free Negro instead of for example Slavery in the United States or Atlantic slave trade should be retargeted as well? In any case, either keep blocked or only unblock with clear topic ban on anything related to slavery and to race. Fram (talk) 07:35, 14 December 2018 (UTC
  • Fram, I am going to celebrate the fact that I agree with you. Thank you for pointing at those redirects. Drmies (talk) 17:50, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Indef--I firmly believe that he is squarely in the NOTHERE territory. A cursory look at his t/p (after Cullen's first warning, few months back) including this thread and Primefac's warning followed by the two blocks of Cullen (which were both for JIMBOTALK; though) leads me to firmly believe that he is peddling his revisionist-theories in mainspace. And there's some mostly-pointless gnoming.∯WBG^converse 12:53, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Good block - Jimbotalk may be a free-speech zone but that still doesn't give you the right to say things like that, If topicbanned I genuinely believe he'd simply go elsewhere and the pointy redirects certainly don't help, Personally I would say he's just over that NOTHERE line. –Davey2010^Talk 13:21, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Good block. We're far too tolerant of "casual" racism around here. He was blocked three weeks ago and returned to the same behaviour; he may once have been a good editor, but what he's doing these days isn't just white supremacist revisionism, it's actively creating a hostile environment for non-white editors. Guettarda (talk) 13:43, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Good block, and turning into an effective community site ban (which I endorse). The word "nigger" is just a term for a hardworking servant and not at all a term of racist abuse? Just, wow! Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 15:24, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Good block, endorse ban if anyone proposes it. I nearly indeffed him a couple of weeks ago for this, but hoped it was just a blip or misunderstanding. It's now obvious that it's a pattern. As I've said before, I have no issue with white supremacists (or people with any other fringe views) editing Wikipedia if they can keep it to themselves and not let it affect their work, but when someone is repeatedly spouting racist views, particularly on high-visibility pages, it creates a chilling effect that discourages others from getting involved. Jimmy Wales is no longer the God-King of Wikipedia, and that he personally tolerates racists doesn't mean that the rest of us are obliged to. ‑ Iridescent 15:56, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
  • Iridescent, please strike your last sentence which is unequivocally a personal attack, unneeded and a false characterization of what happened in that thread. His stated viewpoint is 180 degrees from what you have just stated here. Either strike or produce diffs which support your assertions.
     — Berean Hunter (talk) 16:39, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
    • Like hell will I strike it; Jimmy Wales has tolerated over 2000 posts from Wikid77 on his talkpage and as far as I am aware has never once even challenged his views. (The idea that he hasn't seen them, or doesn't feel it appropriate to challenge views with which he disagrees, doesn't hold water; Jimmy is more than happy to censor posts from his talkpage when he disagrees with them.) Show me a single diff of Jimmy saying anything along the lines of "Wikid77, please don't post racist comments on my talkpage" and I'll reconsider. ‑ Iridescent 16:46, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
      • I see, using your logic the failure to challenge must mean that one tolerates racism/racists. Very well, have you challenged Wikid77 on this before? You stated "I nearly indeffed him a couple of weeks ago for this..." but I don't see any warnings from you on his talk page or in that thread. I also don't see you in his block log either. Have you challenged him on racism before? If you haven't, should we apply your logic to mean that you tolerate racism/racists because you didn't take action even though you saw the above?
         — Berean Hunter (talk) 17:14, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
      • Also, it didn't take me very long to find him disagreeing with some of Wikid77's views so "as far as I am aware has never once even challenged his views" means you haven't looked.
         — Berean Hunter (talk) 17:24, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
        • So I take it that's a "no"? Your strawman argument that because I haven't challenged Wikid77 somehow means I endorse his views as well is laughable; we're talking about Jimmy's talkpage, not mine. If he (or anyone) were to post garbage like to white Americans, the word "nigger" had come to mean a "hardworking servant" rather than an obstinate negro or remember the reports of adventures, joy, and slaves moving back to their owner families on my talkpage they'd be ejected from my talkpage faster than you can say WP:NOFUCKINGNAZIS. ‑ Iridescent 18:08, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• @Iridescent: I second the request to strike. ~Awilley (talk) 18:00, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• FWIW, I have no problem with Iridescent's post. Jimbo isn't fragile; people have said hundreds of worse things about him without incident. And Jimbo has allowed Wikid77 to post thousands of racist posts on his talkpage, without ever removing any of them or asking him to stop. Softlavender (talk) 18:07, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• "Thousands" is over-doing it; Wikid77 also went through a phase of posting regular Florida weather reports on Jimmy's talk (for no apparent reason) which accounts for quite a few of his 2005 posts. ‑ Iridescent 18:15, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Dude, you have misled me. I have forever lost faith in you and your guidance. I will never drink your kool-aid again. Softlavender (talk) 18:20, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Question: How often does Jimbo block/ ban problematic editors? Or even engage with cranky editors to any depth? Someone here with more facility may be able to find a number of, and for what reasons he usually (if ever) "throws down" with other editors. (scary quotes for effect only) I myself am more inclined to ignore obnoxious comments and let them stand on their own "merit," unless the comments are overt attack edits to the mainspace or on talk pages directed at an identifiable target. That's never cool, agreed? In the case of such comments at Jimmy's talk page, other editors are more than happy to "take out the trash" when needs be. We do it for love. Regards, Hamster Sandwich (talk) 05:00, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

​The last time someone tried to "take out the trash" on Jimmy's talk, this was the result. To repeat myself, since that's generally one of the first userpages external visitors and new editors look at, and when it looks like this (permalink to the current revision of the page at the time of posting) they're quite reasonably going to assume that if this kind of racist ranting is tolerated by Jimmy Wales, this kind of racist ranting is tolerated by Wikipedia as a whole, and that this isn't a site with which they want to have any involvement. Because of Jimmy's position and his constant self-promotion as "the public face of Wikipedia", his talkpage is a de facto public-facing page. ‑ Iridescent 06:50, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Site ban or topic ban?

Since a number of people have mentioned both possibilities, I'll go ahead and propose them both, and let's see where that leaves us. Note: I've added "ethnicity" to the topic-ban as a preemptive measure against potential arguments that some related topics are about ethnicity and not race. Vanamonde (talk) 16:16, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Site ban: Wikid77 is site-banned from the English Wikipedia. They may appeal this ban after a minimum of six months.

• Topic ban: Wikid77 is topic-banned indefinitely from race, ethnicity, and slavery, broadly construed. They may appeal this ban after a minimum of six months.

Pinging @Cullen328, Softlavender, Legacypac, Calton, Galobtter, Fram, Winged Blades of Godric, Davey2010, Guettarda, Boing! said Zebedee, and Iridescent: from the above discussion. Vanamonde (talk) 16:16, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support a topic ban as first choice, per my comments above; but if there is no consensus for a topic ban, I would prefer a site-ban to nothing. Vanamonde (talk) 16:16, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban, first and only choice. We'll have a de facto site ban anyway if the result above is a community endorsement of the indef block, so any topic ban would be in addition to the effective site ban (which wouldn't make a lot of sense). Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:22, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

  @Boing! said Zebedee: Well, theoretically any admin could still unblock: the topic-ban is to address that possibility. If we're explicitly endorsing the block (and I started the proposal partly to make it explicit) then a t-ban is obviously not required. I'm inclined to give them this chance, but I'm not going to be particularly upset if the more draconian sanction is preferred. Vanamonde (talk) 16:38, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

  With the current consensus that a community-endorsed indef block effectively equates to a community site ban, no, I don't think an individual admin would have the power to unblock without community consultation. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:43, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

  @Boing! said Zebedee: That's only once a formal endorsement has been made, though, which is what this discussion is for; and theoretically, the community could prefer a t-ban over a site-ban. I agree that community sentiment above is reasonably clear—I suspect I'm somewhat more willing to give second chances than most—but I think it's important we go through the proper motions when politically fraught issues are concerned. Vanamonde (talk) 16:47, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

  Yes, I agree with going through the motions (as a sewer worker once said to me ;-) Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:51, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Site ban (or indefinite block on the understanding that no admin will lift it without community discussion, which amounts to the same thing), first and only choice, per my comment in the section above; for a Wikipedian to be openly racist creates a chilling effect that discourages other editors from participating. In the case of a fantastically good editor it might be worth spending a lot of time and effort trying to craft a way in which they can continue to edit in a way that doesn't provide them with an outlet to espouse their views, but looking at Wikid77's recent editing history I'm not seeing anything remotely constructive; just a mixture of racist commentary and largely pointless minor edits. (Because he refuses to use the "minor edits" checkbox, it makes looking for any actually constructive contributions in his history difficult, but I'm not seeing anything in either his contribution history, the "articles edited" section on his userpage, or his most-edited pages that makes me think "this guy is so indispensable, we need to compromise our principles to try to keep him".) ‑ Iridescent 16:32, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Topic ban from all race related topics, broadly construed. GoodDay (talk) 16:40, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban - Having just seen this (which was posted by Galobtter above) - That post as well the defending of the actress's actions alone warrant an indef, They may well make great edits here but that doesn't give them the right to make racial comments, There are just some things you don't say and certainly don't defend ..... –Davey2010^Talk 16:44, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• A note about topic ban: My recollection is that Wikid's crazy disinformation posts on Jimbotalk are not confined to race issues. IIRC, he spews all kinds of alt-right nonsense. So a topic ban from race-related issues is not going to cut it in my opinion, which is why my topic ban proposal was a topic ban from Jimbotalk.

  I support a site ban, particularly in view of Black Kite's comment below. -- Softlavender (talk) 16:45, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Site ban. I was just going to say "Topic ban", but last night, after a block and multiple warnings, creating Negro slave and Negro slaves, both as redirects to Free negro?? Seriously, that's a goodbye. Black Kite (talk) 16:51, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Both. If he somehow appeals the site ban, he should also be prohibited from editing any areas relating to race. These are not mutually exclusive options. Ian.thomson (talk) 16:54, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban per Black Kite. Guettarda (talk) 17:10, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Either, but preferably site ban. He's been trolling JIMBOTALK for ages. In fact I was going to bring this here if Cullen328 hadn't. Guy (Help!) 17:19, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Both per Ian.∯WBG^converse 17:41, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Curiously, does Jimbo still have the power to unilaterally grant un-bans?∯WBG^converse 17:41, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• In theory yes, in practice no. He hasn't exercised his power to unban since he tried to unblock Vote X for Change in 2011, and if he tried to overrule the community nowadays it would probably just result in the 'founder' userright being revoked. ‑ Iridescent 18:20, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Site ban I don't see enough reasons to allow any editing. Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 17:45, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• ¿Por que no los dos? Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 17:46, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban, per Iridescent. I do not want to work in a joint where we allow such racists to work as well even if they're confined to a couple of the floors of the office building. And now I remember having commented on this user's ridiculous ideas before, at User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_228#Battle_for_freedom_of_speech_re_Roseanne. Scroll down to my (rather inane) comment to see what another editor came up with, under the guise of "Maybe I am dumb". And speaking of my inane comments (I did that again the other day, in the thread on Jimbo's page that got us here, thank you Cullen328: you did what I should have done but for some reason couldn't. Maybe I'm still too much in denial, too much in "you can't make this shit up" mode, as if this isn't quotidian enough. I need to step up: thank you for showing the way. Drmies (talk) 17:57, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• First choice is topic ban from everything slavery and race related and Jimbotalk. As usual I prefer a solution that addresses the problem directly and allows for constructive editing elsewhere. Second choice is both. ~Awilley (talk) 18:09, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban. Wikipedia is not a political forum. We are a collaborative community dedicated to writing and maintaining an encyclopaedia. This requires collegiality, and others have explained above the chilling effect that comments like these create. While editors are traditionally given a degree of latitude on Jimbo Wales' talk page, it is not a "free for all". If, after six months or so, Wikid expresses a desire to return to contribute to the encyclopaedia rather than use Wikipedia as a platform for polemics, it would be reasonable to consider an unban with restrictions. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:21, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Both and anything else we can do to him. I have no use for racist trolls. Legacypac (talk) 18:27, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Comment - Let's be careful, we aren't site-banning an editor, merely because we don't like his/her beliefs. GoodDay (talk) 18:29, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• He can believe anything he wants. He may not post just anything he wants on Wikipedia. We block/ban people all the time for postkng ads, spam, hoaxes and yes, racist rants. Legacypac (talk) 18:33, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• They aren't "beliefs", they are delusional polemics and racist POV-pushing. Softlavender (talk) 18:34, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Editors can believe whatever they want. Where it becomes an issue is when an editor is stating a public position of hostility to members of a particular group to the extent that it has the potential to discourage members of that group from contributing to Wikipedia themselves; at that point, we need to start weighing the opportunity cost of lost editors vs the opportunity cost of losing the racist/political-extremist/sexist/homophobic/whatever editor. In a case like this, where the racist comments were posted on an unusually sensitive page like Jimmy Wales's talkpage, the problem is exacerbated, since that's generally one of the first userpages external visitors and new editors look at, and when it looks like this (permalink to the current revision of the page at the time of posting) they're quite reasonably going to assume that if this kind of racist ranting is tolerated by Jimmy Wales, this kind of racist ranting is tolerated by Wikipedia as a whole, and that this isn't a site with which they want to have any involvement. ‑ Iridescent 19:00, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Site ban - Wikid77 already has one topic ban logged at WP:Editing Restrictions, once you start to consider multiple topic bans its obviously not worth the effort involved at that point. And yes, its perfectly fine to ban editors who have beliefs that are actively damaging to a community. Only in death does duty end (talk) 18:39, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban - net negative to the project, as above. Neutrality^talk 19:32, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site Ban - Only choice. Racists go fuck themselves.--Jorm (talk) 19:38, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Wikid77 was one of the very first Wikipedians I had a meaningful exchange with more than 10 years ago, but this is deeply troubling. In addition to the Irish slavery comments that started this, there are others like:

• this thread is shocking, it has been partially quoted above, but that wasn't the only problem there
• continuing the argument regarding Roseanne's tweet on her talk page
• various arguments/myths in defense of the Confederacy
• strange non-sequitur about the shift of language 'from "negroes" or "colored people" then "African-Americans"' (though it's possible I'm reading that wrong)
• starts off with "After many questionable claims of U.S. police "bias" against blacks (not proven by facts)..."

If this were a one-off, I'd be straining to AGF while looking for some explanation and assurances. This, however, looks sadly like a pattern and is incompatible with the environment we want to create here. Thus, site ban. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 20:00, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Argh. I came back to revise the above. I had given it some thought and figured it would make more sense to issue a broad topic ban on all race-related content on any page, with a possible fixed-term block on top of it. Now that I get here and start typing, however, I see this thoroughly tone-deaf comment on Wikid77's talk page. Thought about swapping out "site ban" for "indef" but he just isn't showing any signs of getting it such that the potential for harm here is too great... — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 04:25, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

• Topic Ban My first impression was that this was just another racist troll that needed to be shown the door. But an examination of their editing history clearly shows they have been around for a very long time and they have a solid record of non-controversial contributions. I think banning people because we find their opinions/beliefs to be offensive, even odious, sets a dangerous precedent. No one should be blocked for their beliefs. We block only to stop disruptive behavior, not to punish those with differing views, no matter how repugnant. See WP:NOPUNISH. Given Wikid77's talk page behavior on this subject I think Cullen's block was good. But a T Ban seems a better fit for an editor with their record. This is not a case of NOTHERE. That said, barring some kind of dramatic conversion which would need to include a formal renunciation of their racism, under no circumstances will I support lifting the T Ban. If such an appeal is made I give permission to any editor in good standing to log my oppose and reference this statement. -Ad Orientem (talk) 21:20, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment: In my mind the only way a TBan is going to work is for the TBan to include both race, ethnicity, and slavery, broadly construed, and Jimbotalk. -- Softlavender (talk) 21:26, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

That works for me. -Ad Orientem (talk) 21:29, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Ad Orientem, where are you seeing this solid record of non-controversial contributions, as (per my post above) I looked fairly hard and can't see it? Going over his recent edits, I can see a lot of pointless minor edits (adding/removing whitespace and the like), the racist trolling that prompted this thread, regular weather reports for Florida posted at Jimbotalk (baffling, as neither he nor Jimmy lives in Florida so I'm not sure why the interest), and virtually nothing else in recent years. ‑ Iridescent 21:43, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

He has been here since 2006, amassing 61k edits. 73% of those are in the mainspace. Approximately 5% are on user talk pages. I haven't any means of breaking down what percentage of those are clearly disruptive but I am guessing not more than half. And those obviously being on the subjects of race and slavery. This is not a case of NOTHERE. Their disruptive editing is clearly limited to a handful of specific topics and represents a very small percentage of their over all contributions. In short, this is an editor who has some seriously F---ed up opinions which do not appear to be a major component of their work here. So again, unless we are punishing them for their views, I think the argument for a site ban is pretty weak. This is what T Bans are supposed to be used for. However, I will agree that any violation of the T Ban should end with an immediate indef. -Ad Orientem (talk) 21:57, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Ad Orientem, he may once have been a productive editor (joined more than 12 years ago!), but he has not been for the past several years. Where are any constructive contributions from the past few years? Softlavender (talk) 22:04, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) He has been here since 2006, amassing 61k edits. 73% of those are in the mainspace is true but extremely misleading. He has a high percentage of mainspace edits because he makes so many of the minor edits I mentioned earlier (have a look at his recent history and see for yourself), and because he generally refuses to engage with other editors so he has few talk/usertalk contributions (he has twice as many contributions to User talk:Jimbo Wales than to every other user talk page combined, including his own). As far as I can tell, since the sockpuppetry in 2010 that earned him his existing topic ban, he has almost no substantive edits, and those that he did make seem to be things like this which were promptly reverted as inappropriate. Per my remarks above, for someone who's an obvious positive it's potentially worth wasting the time of everyone else trying to find ways in which a racist can still contribute without being in a position where their racism creates a chilling effect for other editors, but the onus is on those making "we can't afford to lose him!" claims to demonstrate that this is someone we actually want around. As I said above, because he refuses to use the "minor edit" checkbox it makes it difficult to search his contributions for anything positive, but thus far nobody has provided a single example. ‑ Iridescent 22:12, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Comment: A relevant recent quote from Bbb23 regarding another user: "If a users needs two topic bans to be a constructive contributor to the encyclopedia, the waste of time of other editors permitting them to do that is fairly obvious." -- Softlavender (talk) 21:59, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• I agree with broad topic ban that includes Jimbotalk and race, ethnicity and slavery.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 22:05, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Literaturegeek, I have no idea why you are repeating yourself under my post (you already !voted here), because you missed the entire point of Bbb23's statement. Softlavender (talk) 22:18, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• I am not repeating myself for the simple reason that I did not define the scope of the topic ban in my vote. Your comment quoting bbb23 is indented and thus part of a threaded discussion and higher up you suggest the scope of the topic ban if one is applied. I replied to your higher comment saying I agree. If you wanted Bbb23’s quote to be entirely separate from above comments then you should not have indented it, I feel.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 22:29, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• My comment is indented to nest under the post I was replying to, this one. Your post is indented to nest under my quote from Bbb23. What or which post are you actually attempting to reply to or refer to? You should add one more colon to the number of colons in whatever post that is. Ideally, your statement should be moved to simply be an addition to your !vote below, as it in its current form and placement it appears as if you have !voted twice. Softlavender (talk) 22:46, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Site Ban In 2018, this shouldn't even be a question. I don't care if they have been around a long time and made some good edits. ♟♙ (talk) 21:27, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• Indefinite topic ban Largely agree with Softlavender Ad Orientem. The problems are specific to a topic area. He has a clear history of productive non-controversial edits outside the topic area. Siteban is therefore unjustified.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 21:30, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Softlavender is arguing for a full site ban? ‑ Iridescent 21:36, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Hah, I messed up. I misread threaded discussion and misinterpreted Softlavender’s response as being the author of Ad Orientem’s post. Struck and corrected. Thanks!--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 21:42, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• Site ban Although I've seen Wikid77 around, I never thought that they would venture into WP:NOTHERE territory like that. Amazing how racism will drive someone off the rails (or maybe drive them to reveal their true colors). Miniapolis 23:15, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• No block, no ban - What the hell is wrong with you people? Are we now enforcing ideological correctness??? Guess what? Some people are dumbasses about certain subjects — but they are useful and positive in other realms. Figure out how to rein in the dumbassery. Terrible block, Jim. Carrite (talk) 03:58, 15 December 2018 (UTC) P.S. Count this as an advisory for TOPIC BAN, since we've already decided to burn the witch... Carrite (talk) 04:00, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
• Await comment from colleague whose talk page it was posted on - JimboWales the community would like your opinion on this discussion. No one appears to have pinged you and directly asked for your input. I would like to hear from you as a fellow member of the community. I have my own opinion, but as a matter of courtesy it would be proper to hear from you, as the post(s) occurred on your talk page. Many of us I suspect would be grateful for your views. Simon Adler (talk) 04:42, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Actually you pinged a blocked user not User:Jimbo Wales Legacypac (talk) 07:42, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

• Nah, the behavior has spilled over to content edits which are thoroughly reprehensible. This is way beyond Jimbo's purview at this point. Softlavender (talk) 04:46, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

I am aware of that aspect of the situation Softlavender. However, as comments were posted to a colleague's talkpage, I think the talkpage trustee (we don't own T/P's obviously) should be invited to give his views on the comments posted there. Simon Adler (talk) 04:53, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

• I was pinged here but have nothing further to say about the substance of this editor's behavior. My action speaks louder than any words I might write now. The community is also speaking quite clearly, and I am grateful that most of my colleagues seem to think that I did the right thing. Thank you. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:44, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban Their defense is literally "I have black friends"..really? Galobtter (pingó mió) 06:56, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban – in addition to the above comments, there's a long-term pattern of attitude problems, as exemplified by his RFA back in 2013 (particularly see opposes 1 and 10). Also, I can't resist the temptation to post a little light relief. Graham87 09:48, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban - racism and other attitudes that rank people based on external characteristics are far beyond "dumbassery". We don't need editors who spread hateful propaganda designed to exclude groups of people. From what I can tell, their other contributions are at best marginally positive, but if they should ever successfully appeal their site ban they should be topic banned from making any edits that in any way touch on race, ethnicity, and slavery, in any namespace. --bonadea contributions talk 11:15, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
• Site ban - Took a while for me to get aroound to looking nto this. Yes, a site ban is appropriate, per Black Kite and Iridescent and others. At this time Wikipedia is essentially under attack from neo-Nazis, neo-Fascists, and racists of all kinds, most of whom appears an non-confirmed IPs, but others of which have managed to hang on to become autoconfirmed. The last thing we need is an extended confirmed racist stalking our pages. Per Guiy's question below, if a site ban does not gain consensus, a topic ban is the minimum sanction required. Beyond My Ken (talk) 11:20, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Clarification

Two options are on the table: site ban and topic ban. Site ban is unambiguous, topic ban requires clarification. My reading is that the decision is between:

1. Unblock
2. Topic ban with the scope: race, ethnicity, slavery and Jimbotalk
3. Site ban

Questions:

1. Could anyone supporting topic ban above, who does not agree with #2 above, please clarify here what scope you would prefer?
2. Since the original question was either/or, could anyone advocating site ban but not discussing topic ban, please clarify if the topic ban would be sufficient?

Thanks. Guy (Help!) 10:56, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Bomberswarm2

Bomberswarm2 (talk · contribs) has been blocked by 331dot as an apparent sock of Drowningseagall (talk · contribs), based on this diff. Bomberswarm2 claims that this is not the case. 331dot has given the go-ahead to lift the block if a mistake has been made. As I don't see any evidence of WP:GHBH, I feel the block is unjustified, but would like more opinions before lifting it. O Still Small Voice of Clam (formerly Optimist on the run) 10:58, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Already investigated and unblocked; the evidence does not show any relationship between the accounts. Happy to explain my reasoning further if needs be. Yunshui ^雲_水 10:59, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

I'm sure this is not the correct place, but I just checked Drowningseagall (talk · contribs)s' talk page again (where he has again claimed that he is me) and it appears to me he only has a temporary ban for vandalism or something. As I said in my appeal, I couldn't find an appropriate place to report him when he started harassing me earlier this year, So I'd like to request here that he be sanctioned for repeatedly harassing me, stalking me and targeting and reverting my edits and claiming he is actually me.Bomberswarm2 (talk) 11:23, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Oh, and this obvious, actual sockpuppett of his just posted this on my talk page just minutes ago, I better report this to you before I'm banned again for no reason. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Bomberswarm2#Now_THIS_is_EPIC Bomberswarm2 (talk) 11:30, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

ArbCom election results

They're in for anyone not watching that page. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:50, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Friendly discussion welcome at WT:ACE or user talk pages. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 02:27, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Drmies is a sad puppy. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Sorry Mr. Dr. mies💵Money💵emoji💵💸 18:03, 14 December 2018 (UTC) Oh my... -Ad Orientem (talk) 22:06, 14 December 2018 (UTC) Is that "they" as in "the results" or "they" as in "not Drmies and especially not that other guy"? SemiHypercube 22:15, 14 December 2018 (UTC) Yeah, withdrawing from the election after that particular fiasco might have been prudent. ∰Bellezzasolo✡ Discuss 22:21, 14 December 2018 (UTC) (edit conflict)Also, for your amusement, look at the net votes for GorillaWarfare. SemiHypercube 22:24, 14 December 2018 (UTC) As I said on Drmies' talk page, the results don't quite make sense to me, by which I mean that I understand the methodology used, but when I look at the raw numbers, the results do not seem to correspond well to my intuitive take on who the "winners" should have been given those numbers. This is the first year where, for me, I question whether S/(S+O) is the best metric to use; other years the results have made sense. It may be time to rethink our criteria for election. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:55, 14 December 2018 (UTC) Interesting...I only missed one in my win-place-show line-up. Atsme✍🏻📧 23:48, 14 December 2018 (UTC) Can we have a re!vote ? .... I'm genuinely surprised Drmies wasn't reelected tho ....–Davey2010Talk 23:56, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

UTRS downtime

Due to T204565, there will be required downtime for UTRS between Dec 15 20h00 UTC and Dec 16 05h00 UTC. The database will be locked and the interface will be shut down or not responding during this time. I will post here once the downtime is complete. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DeltaQuad (talk • contribs) 08:22, 15 December 2018 (UTC)