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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Frazzydee (talk | contribs) at 04:59, 29 August 2004 (adding [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Uday_Hussein&curid=197978&diff=0&oldid=5513803 (diff)]). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Shortcut

The Wikipedia Recent Changes patrol page serves as a utility which helps the people that scan changes on Special:Recentchanges ask a broader set of contributors to review specific "suspicious" edits.

Function

The scope is quite narrow — an edit should be listed here if it appears to be vandalism (intentional or not) by changing the facts presented in an article. Simple vandalism is obvious to spot and revert, but changes to the facts of an article are often hard to recognise as such. This is particularly the case with articles on specialist subjects (e.g., Lie algebra).

Note that this is not a place to resolve article disputes, or request comments for articles that are being discussed on the relevant talk page. It is meant as a means to bring attention to a specific edit, which would otherwise get drowned in the hundreds of edits we get every hour.

See also: Wikipedia:Verifiability, Wikipedia:How to spot vandalism

Procedure

Just list a "questionable" edit at the beginning of the "Open" section below, giving the link to:

  • the article
  • the approximate time of the edit

Someone who knows something about the specific subject can then have a look at the edit and either correct/revert it or say that it is OK. In either case, just move the edit and details of your verification of it to the article's talk page in case someone becomes suspicious in the future. This will prevent verified pages from being reposted here.

If you report edits by anon users, please reference the user as [[Special:Contributions/<IP goes here>]].

Open

  • Phil Goff (diff): was phil goff's performance considered to be good or bad? -Frazzydee 00:32, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Narcotic-capitalism New article. The term "narcotic capitalism" brings up only one hit [1] on Google, and "narcotic capitalist" only two [2] (both separated by commas as separate adjectives), so it is probably just a neologism coined by the article's author. Livajo 04:49, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Indeed. Narco-capitalism, however, results in close to 100 entries. I have seen the latter term employed in academia, especially as pertaining to Latin American history. Briefly googling, I can see that professor Arno Tausch (Innsbruck University, Austria) uses both the term narco-capitalism as well as well as narco-capital (but not narcotic). See also Rensselaer Lee's The Economics of Cocaine Capitalism where s/he uses the term narco-capitalism, narco-investment, etc. El_C
  • (diff): Anon changed a few words, like person's birthplace, etc. -Frazzydee 03:48, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Scuderia_Ferrari (diff): A bunch of numbers have been changed. -Frazzydee 15:49, 15 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • These are correct. The numbers were changed because the team has just won both championships and one more race. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 06:52, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Battle of the Morannon: An anon has changed the numbers of the orcs from 60.000 to 600.000 (diff). Can anyone check if this is correct please? --Conti|✉ 02:21, Aug 14, 2004 (UTC)
  • All or most contributions by Celindgren to Vietnam-related articles appear to be (a) adding link to POV political website to which the user is apparently affiliated ([3] [4] [5] [6][!!!] etc. etc. - I've rv'd those but there are dozens more & I don't have all day) (the one appropriate instance of this link is in Nguyen Dynasty), or (b) inexplicable removal of other references from articles ([7]). This has also been noted in Wikipedia:Village pump but it seems appropriate to mention here. --—Hob←Talk 17:38, 2004 Aug 13 (UTC)
    • I don't know whether Celindgren is the same person as 198.26.120.13, but the latter is also rather fond of linking everything in Vietnam to that website. I would suggest that this user be blocked, except that he/she has a few legitimate edits on subjects that have nothing to do with Vietnam, which also have much better spelling and grammar than Celindgren's - I wonder if we're seeing two people on the same IP. —Hob←Talk 00:42, 2004 Aug 17 (UTC)
  • An anon has added informations on cats as food to Cat (diff). Is this POV enough to revert? --Conti|✉ 21:58, Aug 12, 2004 (UTC)
  • Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope; 12:00:14 . . 138.130.2.228 changed "opened on 35 screens" to "opened on 37 screens". May be right... but can anyone verify? Iainscott 12:22, 12 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • 209.173.230.37 has been repeatedly adding malicious edits to There. Keeps coming back to make more changes after each revert. 24.155.80.98 22:02, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Patricknoddy (talk · contribs) claims on his user page to be 7 years old. Right now he is creating chains of redirects like WDIQ->WIIQ->WBIQ->Alabama Public Television. I am inclined to think that wikipedia is not a primary school playground. On the other hand some of his contributions are surpricingly well done for a 7 year old (daddy looking over his shoulder?). All contributions should be checked. Thue | talk 22:08, 11 Jul 2004 (UTC)
    • Cleaned Solutia by replacing copyvio material, but it's still a stub. Noisy 07:43, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • user:80.44.187.62 (with the name John) vandalizing or inserting POV in Elan Vital. There is some truth in what he writes but he does it in a very POV way, close to vandalism. Andries 20:21, 11 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • Not sure whether to VfD or not, so I brought it here first. Nutmeg psychosis seems to be a rearranged (not reworded) copyvio from [9] with the addition of the dosage info. Also, regardless of Encarta's definition, is it proper to call this a psychiatric disorder? That's like calling a "bad trip" a psychiatric disorder. SWAdair | Talk 10:28, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • 194.8.54.249 is a rather prolific substub writer, usually about British television and sports stars. Dates of birth, teams, appearances...that's about all. A couple of other users have left polite word on the talk page regarding the manual of style and offers to help, but s/he doesn't answer. These aren't one-tenth as bad as the screwball substubs left by the "B-Movie Bandit." This person is at least making an effort but could definitely use some guidance. - Lucky 6.9 17:54, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)
  • Something Awful, which is a frequent target of vandals, has had a number of changes by anons today. Could somebody check it out? RickK 04:52, Jun 21, 2004 (UTC)
  • User:The Undertones (contribs) is very possibly a User:Michael reincarnation. Right now he seems to be stickint to categorization, but this edit, in which [name of self-titled album] is changed to Self-Titled, is vintage Michael. Watch carefully. —No-One Jones 19:46, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)
    • That specific edit you point out doesn't seem malicious. He seems to use "self-titled" to mean "same title as the bands name". See fx [11]. While I think this is a bad idea, as I don't know the term and the origin of the title was perfectly clear before, it does not mean he is a vandal. Thue 21:52, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)
      • I commented about the edit on his talk page. Thue 21:59, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)
        • I know what self-titled means, thanks, and I wasn't really concerned with that edit itself (which I rolled back), but with the warning signs of Michaelness. If you're not familiar with the history of Michael and the way he trashes music-related articles, see User talk:Michael and User talk:Michael/ban. Anyway, RickK has blocked him now, so no matter. —No-One Jones 23:42, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)
  • [12] appears to be some kind of conspiracy theory POV? — Lady Lysine Ikinsile 11:56, 2004 Jun 20 (UTC)
  • An anon has added the "fact" that Kerry is an avid hunter to the John Kerry article section on gun politics. Can anyone verify this? RickK 03:29, Jun 13, 2004 (UTC)
  • Potential impostor: N User:RickK·; 01:32:46 . . RickK· (Talk) --Gary D 08:42, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)
Good eye, but he has already been blocked indefinitely and his userpage/talk page deleted. :) -- Hadal 08:45, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)
Was this the right page for calling out this sort of thing? If not, where is? --Gary D 08:47, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)
Oh, it wasn't an entirely improper listing; you may also list such instances on Wikipedia:Vandalism in progress as that page seems to get more visitors (I think). Nothing wrong with listing them in both places, though; especially when the case for misconduct isn't entirely clear (although in this case it was: s/he copied RickK's talk and user pages). -- Hadal 08:54, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)
  • User Himself has been deleting the text of several articles and replacing them with short, slightly insulting phrases. See Clear Lake, Illinois for example, which I've already fixed.
  • A user with several different IPs, the latest being 64.252.165.90 insists on posting near-nonsensical and unencyclopedic sub-stubs about B-movies, B-list actors and forgotten TV shows. I've listed the other IPs on the cleanup page and have even gone so far as to create talk pages with offers to help. No response, and the stubs keep coming. They're characterized by a repeat of the article's title in the edit summary, conflicting verb tenses and usually not much more than a brief list of the cast in the case of a movie or TV show or a passing reference to whatever project an actor is or was involved with. Take a look at Problem Child 2, David Naughton, Justine Bateman and Peter Ostrum, all written today by someone with no previous history, at least at that IP. Help! - Lucky 6.9 01:25, 29 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Many WP articles start this short; unformatted and (to put it mildly) terse. Several of us strongly disagree with deleting them instead of fixing them (See page histories for Sixteen Candles, Cradle Will Rock, Universal Soldier, New Jack City, Peter Ostrum, Problem Child 2, etc. etc.). Niteowlneils 15:40, 30 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
  • That's why I listed them here in an attempt to bring them up to par. I even tried fleshing out the Peter Ostrum entry myself with what little I know of the man. I was of the opinion that these entries met definition #4 of the speedy delete policy so I boilerplated them as well. The movies are real enough, but are these entries encyclopedic? And as I said, I tried reaching out to the person, but didn't get a response. I'll move them to cleanup if any more like this come in. - Lucky 6.9 16:51, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Old open

(Any problems in these edits may already have been corrected, but it needs to be checked out)

  • Can someone work out the new pages of User:Migueldelval and I think User:130.206.100.134. Perhaps part of a Spanish school project? Rmhermen 15:26, May 6, 2004 (UTC)
  • An anon has been making questionable edits; some are vandalism, but some are like this: [15], which I'm not sure of. Meelar 15:11, 2 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
    • This one is probably OK. Google finds a lot of credible sources supporting year 1848 (and none supporting 1884). Andris 15:22, May 2, 2004 (UTC)
  • An anon user from UVA has been persistently adding to the John Dewey page a link to what looks like possibly a personal, and at any rate a highly un-encyclopedic and extremely POV site. They are unresponsive to requests for discussion on the appropriate Talk: page. But I don't know whether what's going on qualifies as "vandalism" or not, as there appears to have been discussion of the issue at one point (see Talk:John Dewey). [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], etc. (continued)
The author of the preceeding complaint is evidently the individual who has been persistently deleting the link to The Unknown Dewey on John Dewey -- which is my counter complaint. Whatever this website's faults, it contains extensive quotes from Dewey's work that you can find nowhere else on the web. For example see: Education for the New Man. The real reason, I believe, for his accusing the site of "non-NPOV" is that these quotes discredit Dewey, and the reader can judge Dewey for himself. The link is a fair balance to the other links which present a POV of unalloyed admiration.
I am indeed that individual; your lack of response to my repeated queries (in the edit summary lines, which you must have seen, and also to your IPs' talk pages, just in case) led me to believe you were behaving in a completely rogue way; thus my persistent deletion. Perhaps we can engage in productive discussion, instead. BTW, Simply containing quotes from Dewey is no reason to include a site, the other links don't present "unalloyed admiration," (one discusses Dewey scholarship from a professional standpoint, one discusses a program that has only a tangential relationship to Dewey, and the rest are texts).
  • User:WHEELER has repeatedly made counterfactual and ungrammatical edits to the "reactionary" entry. He is apparently pushing some kind of very personal political points of view. He also has a tendency to insert his edits in inappropriate locations in the entry, like disgressions into the introduction. He also conducts ad hominem attacks other contributors, apparently believing they're in some kind of Marxist, Socialist or Communist conspiracy to silence him. The history and talk pages should say enough. David.Monniaux 15:26, 23 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I read reactionary today and the situation seems stable. Pretty good article actually. LeeHunter 20:16, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • An anonymous individual at 209.151.129.82 keeps on making ungrammatical and counterfactual edits to articles related to Nigeria, Port Harcourt and the Yoruba. I'm of Nigerian origin myself, and am Yoruba to boot, so I know misleading propaganda when I see it. What is more, some of this individual's edits seem to be little more than petty vandalism - see the changes he made to the Port Harcourt population figure. Abiola Lapite 23:13, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Two anon contributors have persistently added misleading (and just plain wrong) material to Conservative Democratic Alliance. I'm trying to keep on top of it - could do with some support. --ALargeElk 14:31, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • I'm warning about one of my own questionable edits here. On a couple of articles - Jacques Lacan, Julia Kristeva, and Bruno Latour, I deleted a line about being criticized in Fashionable Nonsense. All of these theorists are sharply criticized by countless people, and Sokal and Bricmont's attacks on them are, frankly, nothing special - especially not within the humanities, where all three thinkers work.*
Yes, but Sokal and Bricmont's book got much attention in the general press, attracting far more attention than attacks from fellow philosophers. That, I think, justifies the mention of that fact in the encyclopedia.David.Monniaux 17:14, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Hi 68.20.29.146 (you can sign your entry by putting four '~'s behind it). I disagree with the 'nothing special'. After all, the criticism came from outside the humanities, which doesn't happen every day. Besides, I think that relevant criticism of any kind can and should be mentioned in an encyclopedia article about a thinker or a theory. Sadly, it is missing entirely from the three articles you mentioned - and from many others in the Critical (sic) Theory series... High on a tree 03:43, 29 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I am wondering whether mentioning Fashionable Nonsense on the pages of every thinker criticised within it is actually valid. Yes, the book did get a lot of publicity, mainly because it was so controversial, confrontational and, well, new. However, it is the only book of its kind, does not represent a very large body of thought and, frankly, relates more to science than critical theory. Perhaps it is enough that Fashionable Nonsense has its own page which links to the thinkers in question. That the thinkers' pages should link back does give it too much importance, I think, and could lead to comments about POV.--Bookgirl 10:47, 29 Apr 2004 (UTC)


  • Take a look at Graham Hancock - somebody called the previous version POV, but I think this version is a little too the opposite direction. RickK 02:34, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Please keep an eye on 24.19.6.250. S/he is adding articles about every single little character that ever appeared on Zena: Warrior Princess, and seems not to have any idea what the difference is between fiction and mythology. The user also likes to replace existing text with his/her own text. See the history of Shasta, for example. RickK 03:21, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • User:Barracks23 has been making a number of changes to Aryan and Aryan invasion theory, especially to the External Links section, which links to an apparently Nazi site. Also, zir's posting on Dr. Watson introduced a Muslim doctor that *I've* never heard of as an alleged peer of Arthur Conan Doyle, but that might be right. Given other posts by this user, I'm suspicious. Kahn 02:02, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Please see the changes by an anon to Sumner Welles. Seem slightly POV. RickK 01:47, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Please check out the user talk page on User:Cautious. I believe this person to have conducted several nasty campaigns of vandalism. Many people have politely complained to this person, to no avail. It's time something were done.
    • One example is Prussian people, where Cautious seeks ever to disguise the genocide on the non-German, non-Polish Prussians, and even to confuse who they are by submitting ridiculous information. These include, that they lived only in the small peninsula between the Vistula and Curonian Lagoons, that they were already extinct 400 years ago, etc. Regardless of Cautious' feeling toward these people, they do exist. Moreover, the language, grammar, and style are consistently woeful. I will try to revert, but I don't expect it to last.
  • [22] - trivial edit: correction or misinformation? - Fennec 15:29, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • user Kenneth Alan is adding unverified statements as fact about the prehistory of Germanic tribes to Vanir, Aesir, Germanic Languages, Norse Mythology, etc. On occasion they are snuck in as minor edits or with misleading comments. Generally the gist of his ideas is that the Vanir were a non Indo European people ancestral to the Germanic people living near the Vanern lake in Sweden. Later on an Indo European people merged with these and this new people was then supposedly ancestral to all the Germanic tribes, migrating into Europe from Sweden, presumably. I do not think this a consensus theory, but is added as fact to a number of pages, without previous explanation or even caveats that this is mere theory. Kenneth Alan seems to be the source of all I found so far. Martijn faassen 23:07, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Note to whoever is reading: since my first note here some of the contested contributions have been moved by me to Vanir/Aesir theory, with the consent of Kenneth Alan. Since Kenneth has indicated his good intentions, we'll see whether we can figure it all out together. Martijn faassen 02:16, 9 Apr

2004 (UTC)

Vanir/Aesir theory has been deleted after VfD. I'm removing refs to it, without worrying about whether the articles containing them are otherwise OK. Non-Indo-European roots of Germanic languages is among them but not on the above list. --Jerzy(t) 03:17, 2004 Jul 20 (UTC)
  • anon user 200.207.9.18 has been changing all references to Roman Catholicism to Catholicism, and other assorted POV changes (John Calvin -> Jean Cauvin, various Ireland/Scotland issues). Reverted Roman Catholic Church, others have got to the rest, I expect more. RichL 01:50, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)
  • anon user 64.123.150.45 has been systematically changing the Simpson's TV show articles. The latest stated that Marge's twin sisters were in fact triplets: Patty Bouvier. I have reverted but am not sure about some other contributions this user has made. Samw 01:24, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)
  • [23] anon edits like this make me nervous. Anybody verify? Meelar 05:21, 27 Mar 2004 (UTC)
    • Looks OK, see e.g. [24]
  • Red mercury--"this substance, which may not exist"--???Meelar 03:10, 25 Mar 2004 (UTC)
    • I did some copy-editing and POV work on this. I think it's currently good enough to keep. -- Khym Chanur 04:20, Mar 25, 2004 (UTC)
  • Auskerry - I don't believe the communist experiment tale, as the same user claims Tony Blair executed his opponents. andy 23:02, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)
  • [27] -- IP removed a large chunk of the article, claiming it was "irrelevant," but the content looks pretty relevant to me. -- Seth Ilys 00:10, 19 Mar 2004 (UTC)
    • I think that that text is relevant. I say put it back. Quinwound 07:18, Mar 25, 2004 (UTC)
  • [28] did invert a sentence comparing Maya ceramics with greek ones. Obviously only one version can be correct.
  • [29] --I want to find something wrong with this; it just doesn't smell right. Never trust anon edits to FOX News.
    • It's POV and a non-sequitur, but then so's the rest of the entire paragraph. The article really needs a "Supporters" section to stop these kind of edits to the "Bias" section. Sjorford 22:48, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)
  • Possible minor problems at Pueblo - user Rainchild picking up where Bird left off - adding in what looks to me to be an irrelevant ref to "King of Spain" (William M. Connolley 09:51, 2004 Mar 12 (UTC)).
    • Sorry to discuss this here, but hating bird does not change American history, nor the law that established jurisdiction in Native American Communities. The matter is explained on the talk page. Considering the pre-edit state of the article, which elicited laughs from a group of pueblo youth, Mr. Connolley should resond to the content of the article as it has been edited, and not the identity of the editor who made corrections that stood for weeks before he began reverting and campaigning to maintain his ill-informed edit.
And note that Mr. Connolley had no complaints about the article until Bird was popularized as a targetable figure after a conflict involving unrelated articles. If it is necessary, we will produce the legal documents to repudiate Mr. Connolley's claim that Spanish monarchy is irrelevant to the English language construct that Pueblo is a Native American village, or that Pueblo communities can be described by law in any other way than that they were the communities established by the King of Spain not by the United States Congress. That legal fact is what brought the term to those communities and that is what has preserved the term in history. Kareem 10:59, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)
  • Anything by 66.185.84.208, with particular emphasis on rather blatant copyvios of text about Canadian TV shows. -- The Anome 15:10, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)~
    • [33] gives both sets of figures - assuming they are right, I suppose it doesn't matter one way or the other. Sjorford 22:26, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Showing below 50

  • Community of Christ; Terms like "significant" and "majority" replaced with "small" and "some", is either term correct, is this POV? [34] --Flockmeal 20:34, Mar 1, 2004 (UTC)
If you look at other edits User:67.224.59.10 has made it looks a lot like POV. [35][36][37][38] -- Quinwound 07:57, Mar 5, 2004 (UTC)
  • Removal of over 3 proper nouns, without explantion by Anon: [39] --Menchi 02:43, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)
  • Philippines [40] - how many islands are there? Or did just two new vulcanic island surface? andy 08:54, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)
I frankly have no idea. Ever since I was a kid, we've been taught that there are 7,107 islands (7,108 if there's a low tide according to a joke). I'm quite positive that this isn't the accurate number anymore because of erosion and reclamation projects. --seav 21:52, Feb 9, 2004 (UTC)
    • Georgia Byng and Rodman Philbrick. - seems to be some text added to the Georgia Byng article, and the Rodman Philbrick one created at the same time. Looks a bit suspicious? Idril 17:12, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Closed on 30/5

(This section be deleted once people have had a chance to look and agree)

  • User:172.145.2.41 and WikiMD.org

User:172.145.2.41 (contributions) has added to various medical-related Wikipages an external link to WikiMD.org, A new wiki project for building an open source Medical Encyclopedia. Is this ad-placement considered "vandalism" ? Some of these changes have already been reverted by User:Wyllium, who labelled the changes "minor" and "rv spamlink". PFHLai 00:13, 30 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]

  • Can you have a look at User:I am sexy it is an offensive content in german (?) disguished in an apparent innocent one also connected to many others contents via WikiSex.
User:MyRedDice link to this page too and also edit it to correct the link somedays.
I think that Wikipedia is very deeply used ( compromise ? ) by clones but i can not understand how and why at least an active sysop is involved ?
I first write a message in Wikipedia:Vandalism_in_progress#User:I_am_sexy but i saw it was useless while clones are still active and linking to explicit sexual content.I also ask "Martin" and wait an answer...
I'm not a censor myself but children and innocent people are visiting Wikipedia too and i see some very strange practices to fool people and even more... shall i be wrong ? --Neuromancien 16:41, 2004 May 28 (UTC)
It doesn't look like a conspiracy to me, more like a few people who don't care that much about the fact that someone talks about cyber-sex on their user-page. I am guessing that MyRedDice corrected the link because he knows her, but go ask him if you want to know. I don't care much about what is on her user page as long as it stays on her user page. Thue 21:02, 29 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
It is german. The user page have a link to a subpage when she invites people to have virtual sex with her. She says that she was unfairly blocked and her userpages deleted by "the facist" Ed Poor because she was writing useful articles about virtual sex. It also says that she sleeps naked and has pictures, but only for people who deserve it. And of course she calls the sysops "stupid fascist administrators"), but that is in english :). She says (and links to) that she has moved to wikinfo where they are more tolerant. Thue 20:40, 29 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
While it is German, it is the German created by auto-translators like babelfish. Maybe a bit better than babelfish, but still full of strange grammar, untranslated english words and absolutely nonsense words. I doubt very much that that user is a german. andy 21:40, 11 Jun 2004 (UTC)
PS: It is a slightly fixed babelfish autotranslate - here's the original: [44]
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