Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive313

Proposal: General sanctions on post-1978 Iranian politics

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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The administrator noticeboards have seen a seemingly endless stream of discussions related to conflicts in post-revolutionary Iran, and more specifically, on conflicts between the current government and entities challenging it. Examples include the following; AN, July 2019, ANEW, June 2019, ANI, May 2019, ANI, March 2019, ANI, February 2019, ANEW, November 2018, ANI, September 2018, ANI, August 2018, ANEW, January 2018, ANEW, January 2018, and ANI, November 2017. As a point of interest, the conflicts in this topic are not new; see this discussion from September 2015, for instance. There have also been a series of caustic arguments on various talk pages; see, for instance, the archives at Talk:People's Mujahedin of Iran. These discussions have tended to become bogged down as a result of mudslinging between involved parties: attempts by uninvolved users to intervene are few and far between.

As a result, very few sanctions have been issued, and disruptive behavior continues unabated. The one exception is that participants at Talk:People's Mujahedin of Iran were persuaded by El_C to accept the terms of WP:GS; in my opinion, that is too small a set of editors, and too restricted a locus. To curtail further disruption, I believe it is now necessary for admins to be able to issue sanctions, including topic-bans, without extended noticeboard discussions. I am asking for community authorized general sanctions, rather that ARBCOM-authorized discretionary sanctions, because I think the evidence for disruption is clear enough that the community can act on this immediately, and because ARBCOM is a little busy at the moment, and so filing a full case request would be doing the community a disservice.

I have discussed this previously with El_C, who is one of few admins to have issues sanctions or warnings in this area outside of ANEW, and El_C agrees with me about the necessity for such sanctions. @Deepfriedorca, EdJohnston, Drmies, Black Kite, Nyttend, and Oshwah:, you have also participated in some of these discussions as admins; your thoughts would be welcome. Regards, Vanamonde (Talk) 16:44, 3 August 2019 (UTC) @Drmies, Oshwah, EdJohnston, and JzG: Apologies for the bother; I've amended the proposal to post-1978 politics, following a discussion with Nyttend and El_C below; I doubt it makes a difference to you, but procedurally, I think I ought to let you know. Vanamonde (Talk) 00:22, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

• Support, as proposer. Vanamonde (Talk) 16:44, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
• I support--I think it's worth a try. Drmies (talk) 16:47, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support - I agree that this is an action that's necessary in order to assure that an acceptable and collaborative editing environment is maintained consistently throughout this topic area. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 16:49, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support – This sanction, if approved, could work like WP:GS/SCW which I think are reasonably successful in keeping the topic of the Syrian Civil War under control. EdJohnston| (talk) 17:06, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support — To reiterate, I think agreement to apply the specific GS to People's Mujahedin of Iran, an article which suffered from chronic edit warring, has proven to be quite successful. Slowly but surely progress is being made, whereas edit warring is now approaching zero (note that I did try to suggest applying the same thing to Fascism in Europe and did not even get a response from participants — so, you win some, you lose some). At any event, Vanamonde93's proposal to extend GS to other post-1979 Iranian politics articles, I am confident, would aid editors, article quality, and reducing conflict on the project overall. El_C 17:42, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
• Question Why post-1979? Is the revolution itself free from these disputes? If this area needs general sanctions, I would guess that it should be post-1978, unless you believe that items specifically from 1979 aren't being disrupted. Nyttend (talk) 18:57, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

  @Nyttend: I don't think there's a political topic free of disruption on Wikipedia. I was trying to draw a line between a topic that has egregious localized disruption, and other related articles that merely have pedestrian levels of bad behavior. So far as I can tell, the conflicts on Wikipedia that prompted me to propose this stem from real-life conflicts between the current theocratic government of Iran and its opponents. As such, I haven't seen the same conflicts spill over into the revolution itself, yet. I'm not necessarily opposed to a broader regime of general sanctions; but I think that if a line must be drawn, it must be drawn at 1979 or 1953 (or 1905, when the constitutional revolution occurred); and it has been my impression that the community favors narrower areas of broad admin discretion. Vanamonde (Talk) 22:46, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

  Vanamonde93, if we're drawing a line at the Islamic Revolution, that's perfectly fine, but the revolution happened in 1979, and your proposal is post-1979, i.e. beginning in 1980. For example, the proposal doesn't cover the beginning of the Iran hostage crisis or any of the December 1979 Iranian constitutional referendum. That's the reason I'm confused. Nyttend (talk) 23:54, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

  I agree with Nyttend. The revolution should be encompassed as well, since a lot of the disputes are rooted in it. El_C 00:03, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

  @Nyttend and El C: Okay, fair enough. I'll amend it to "1978", as that is more concise that trying to spell out post-revolution, and ping the others. Vanamonde (Talk) 00:19, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

  Thanks for amending, Vanamonde93. Looks good. El_C 00:33, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

• Support for sure. In fact I'd cover anything where the troll of all trolls is involved - North Korea, China, US trade deficit, and so many more, but this one is obvious and long-standing. Guy (Help!) 22:22, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support – per nom – Levivich 15:43, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
• Comment If further evidence were required that this is getting out of hand, there's these two conversations in the last week. Vanamonde (Talk) 18:34, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• Vanamonde93: I was surprised to see this discussion where, I think, active editors had to be pinged to comment. Also, El_C's intervention is shown to be pretty excellent, but slow. Surely much better than the previous condition. Now, your arguments are really seen and considered. --Mhhossein ^talk 14:20, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Second look at the scope of the sanctions

Following my discussion with Vanamonde93 I think the scope of the sanction are too wide and requires further discussion. Just see the examples brought to our eyes by Vanamonde93; Nearly most of the cases are related to MEK and the OP, I think, fails to raise his concerns, which I think are quite right, on proper ground. The remedy should be devised for areas with continued and repeated disputes. So, just asking for sanctions on "post-1978 Iranian politics" is not really fair without showing how this wide topic need such a thing. Multiple examples from various cases of 'continuous dispute' should be the minimum requirement; that said, I think the major issue lies with the MEK-related articles at the moment which was nicely handled by El_C for the main article. (pinging involved parties for attention @Drmies, JzG, Levivich, Nyttend, EdJohnston, and Oshwah:). --Mhhossein ^talk 13:06, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Why too wide? What is in scope that should not be? Guy (Help!) 13:43, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Guy: I think this is the OP who needs to prove the scope contains enough articles with diverse subjects making the scope wide enough. But as you requested please see Assembly of Experts, 2016 Iranian legislative election, Guardian Council, Assassination of Iranian nuclear scientists, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Iran), Combatant Clergy Association, Islamic Consultative Assembly and etc., though there are plenty of other examples. Please note that we're talking about continuous conflicts requiring remedies. --Mhhossein ^talk 18:53, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Guy: Any more comments on my recent examples? --Mhhossein ^talk 12:47, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

• I would oppose any proposed reduction in scope, because there are severe conflicts within this topic that are unrelated to the MEK. As exhibit (a) I present to you 2019 Persian Gulf crisis, where the conflict is indubitably a spillover from Iranian politics (rather than from US politics). There's also Hafte Tir bombing (only peripherally related to the MEK); and somewhat lower levels of conflict at Manshour Varasteh (also only peripherally related), Mohammad-Javad Azari Jahromi, 2017 Iranian presidential election, and Ebrahim Raisi. Reaching further back, there's others; and those aren't conflicts that have been resolved, it's rather that the locus of conflict has temporarily shifted. Also, fundamentally, these conflicts are driven by people with strong opinions being unable to set those aside and edit within a policy-based framework. Reducing the scope of the sanctions will allow far too much opportunity for anyone sanctioned to continue problematic behavior in a closely related area. Vanamonde (Talk) 16:49, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

For your information, both Hafte Tir bombing and Manshour Varasteh are heavily related to MEK. Also, can you show us what conflict there's in Ebrahim Raisi for instance? Please note that conflicts between editors are often seen in various articles, but here we're talking about continuous disputes/conflicts requiring remedies. I mean come with something please! As for people having "strong opinions" regarding subjects; what's the relationship between this and making the scope of the article unnecessarily wide? --Mhhossein ^talk 18:14, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't buy that. Unless our article grossly misinterprets the subject, Hafte Tir bombing is only related to the MEK because they were accused of it without evidence; that's a tenuous connection at best, and it's exactly the sort of connection that has been endlessly wikilawyered at AE. When editors are sanctioned for an inability to follow NPOV, they need to be removed from the area of conflict. A very narrow scope for a general sanction does not help with this. Why are you so strongly opposed to the current scope? If you edit within policy, it should affect you at all; if all of you people editing in this topic edit within policy, the sanctions have no consequence whatsoever. Vanamonde (Talk) 18:59, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

I'm not going to list the sources here, but your latest comments on Hafte Tir bombing, i.e. "a tenuous connection at best" and "is only related to the MEK because they were accused of it without evidence", are just personal viewpoints regarding the subject which probably contradict numerous high quality reliable sources (comments special:diff/867882764, special:diff/904031175 should be enough for list of sources saying MEK did the bombing). Also, I'm not suggesting a "a very narrow scope", I'm just saying the the remedy should be as wide as necessary, but not wider (to make it unnecessarily wide!). I strongly oppose the current scope, since "writing laws is easy, but governing is difficult!" and it's just meaningless for the remedy to cover areas which does not need such an attention. Needless to say that I, having been edited withing policy, don't fear the consequences of the remedy and that I was of the first users who welcomed the restrictions which was then placed over MEK article, so your argument is not applicable. Instead, please show that all articles lying under post-1978 Iranian politics need to be sanctioned. --Mhhossein ^talk 13:06, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

These sanctions are just fine, it was about time. Sanctioned users actually have to edit within policy, what an outrage /s. Seriously though, post-1978 Iranian articles have been plagued by disruption for years now, this is the right step. --HistoryofIran (talk) 23:27, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

I'm afraid, in that case, reverts which are nither discussed nor justified, would be with tough consequences. --Mhhossein ^talk 16:52, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

I also fully agree that it's about time something of this sort was implemented. This needed to happen a long time ago, but either way it's a step in the right direction. Bless. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 17:22, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

I also agree that this is a great idea. Long overdue. The scope is commensurate with existing and expected disruption. In any case, noone loses. If there is no disruption, it doesn't matter how wide the scope is, noone will be sanctioned. If disruption arises, then the sanctions come in and save the day. This is a win-win situation if I ever saw one. Kudos to the initiators of this great idea. Dr. K. 01:55, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Off topic. Take it elsewhere if you really must continue. Vanamonde (Talk) 20:02, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

@Mhossein; I simply restored the original revision which was suddenly changed by the same user whom you have been accused of collabrating with and whom along with yourself have been warned for to refrain from IRI pov-pushing. Not to mention you have also defended a Khomeinist user who was banned due to anti-semitism and much more [1]. Thus, your "Needless to say that I, having been edited withing policy" is highly invalid. Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones (btw [2]). Not interested in derailing this thread, so this is my last message in this section. --HistoryofIran (talk) 18:15, 24 August 2019 (UTC) What did these bizarre comment had to do with this discussion? Your comment, being fulled with baseless accusations, is itself demonstrating you need to review our Wikipedia:Etiquette (for violation which you were blocked). This message is a warning against casting aspersion. With this edit, I wanted to show you need to be more careful after the sanctions. As for this discussion, there's an intervention by a 3rd party (who's an admin) with the comment saying "In my experience with Mhhossein, I've found him to be a conscientious editor who is genuinely trying to improve the quality of the encyclopedia" and " Also, Mhhossein's suggestions of the portrayal of Agha Soltan in the media seem to me to be good to include as well." --Mhhossein talk 13:46, 25 August 2019 (UTC) So much for this being my last message; These aren't baseless accusations, thus there's no aspersions being cast ([3] [4] here's two pieces of evidence for starters). Also, you don't need to show me anything, instead you should focus on your own edits within this encyclopedia. Furthermore, I was referring to literally everything else that was going on in the Neda discussion, which you interestingly enough ignored. I assume I don't have to quote them here? At last but not least, please try to keep a proper tone, calling my comment "bizarre" was uncalled for. --HistoryofIran (talk) 15:50, 25 August 2019 (UTC) You were successful at transforming a general discussion into this irrelevant discussion (see WP:BATTLE). Nothing to add here, except that my concerns regarding Neda page was right, as the admin said. --Mhhossein talk 10:15, 26 August 2019 (UTC) Actually this is more relevant than anything. Regarding the Neda article, people are free to check the link [5]. --HistoryofIran (talk) 19:24, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Extra Eyes Please on The Epoch Times

The article is the subject of a current and critical piece from Brietbart. (Can't post the link due to blacklist.) This could generate some attention from people who are either unaware of (or unconcerned with) our WP:PAG. -Ad Orientem (talk) 22:47, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Breitbart and Breitbart.zh are fighting? MichaelJacksonPopcorn.GIF

All joking aside I'll make sure it's still on my watchlist. Simonm223 (talk) 14:12, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Breitbart-induced insomnia, the worst kind of all.

-BMK

Not-so-thin Kong

-EEng

Wow, Breitbart really hates me. It's such an honour. Simonm223 (talk) 14:53, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

They can hate me too. I just SP'd for 4 days. Feel free to unprotect at discretion.-- Deepfriedokra 15:51, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• Interestingly, the article on Breitbart is slugged as by "T. A. Adler", which, we are told, is a pseudonym for User:The Devil's Advocate. Now Breitbart says (jn something that was undoubtedly written by TDA) that TDA was banned from Wikipedia because he "privately report[ed] conflict of interest editing by one of the site’s administrators." But the banning block notice points here, where it says:

  In remedy 8.5 of the GamerGate case, The Devil's Advocate was 'strongly warned that should future misconduct occur in any topic area, he may be banned from the English Wikipedia by motion of the Arbitration Committee.' Accordingly, for continuing harassment of other editors, The Devil's Advocate is banned indefinitely from the English Wikipedia.

  My problem with all this is that now I'll be up all night trying to figure out which version is accurate, and which is a wishful-thinkong fairy tale made up by a long-term disruptive editor. Oh, woe is me. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:49, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

@EEng: I beg to differ. There is another. -- Deepfriedokra 08:20, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Deepfriedokra: HUH? EEng 14:46, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Your pardon, it was Beyond My Ken that added the picture.-- Deepfriedokra 14:54, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

My fault, for usurping EEng's gig. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:04, 30 August 2019 (UTC)

I agree it's good to keep an eye on possible Breitbart meatpuppets, but it's equally important to scrutinize edits for SPA editors like SecretRussian (talk · contribs), who popped out of nowhere to post the "information package" in the article. Due to the 2019 Hong Kong anti-extradition bill protests, pro-CCP shills are out in full force, with The Guardian reporting thousands of pro-Chinese shills being suspended in Twitter and Facebook. --Pudeo (talk) 15:59, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

• A more charitable reading is that these edits by SecretRussian (talk · contribs) were, for no apparent reason, copying the existing rendered text of the article back into the wikitext. I wouldn't put it past being an utterly fumbled attempt to undo the immediately prior section blanking. Uncle G (talk) 17:38, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

Edit warring on Chernobyl (miniseries)‎

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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• Chernobyl (miniseries) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
• 24.60.1.17 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

An ip editor seems to be unaware of the ordinary phrase "for dramatic purposes"and has taken against it for an unclear reason, despite it being the precisely correct phrase in context. They have repeatedly changed or removed it despite being reverted by myself and others, and encouraged to engage on the article talk page. I posted on the talk page here and on their user page here. They chose to delete that. Their first edit here, and my reversion, with edit summary. Their subsequent edits:
here
here
here
here
here
here
here

Their latest edit is to imply on my userpage that I have not considered the matter (pot calling kettle imho). Captainllama (talk) 18:30, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Without prejudice to your request, I believe that it is more appropriate for the specialized edit-warring board. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 19:34, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

There are multiple reverts going on here. From what I can see, the IP's edits have been reverted by several different editors. Without getting bogged down with who-did-what-to-who, isn't page protection the best way forward for the short-term, and the IP can go to the talkpage? Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 19:35, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I fully protected the article for three days. The IP is technically speaking not at WP:3RR, and their edits, though clearly edit-warring, are not vandalism, and a discussion must happen whether they are appropriate.--Ymblanter (talk) 20:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Agreed, I've not claimed 3RR or vandalism. I'd have taken it to WP:ANEW had I noticed its existence! Captainllama (talk) 20:32, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Petition to Amend the Arbitration Policy: Interim Elections

I have started a petition to amend the arbitration policy on interim elections at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Petition_to_Amend_the_Arbitration_Policy:_Interim_Elections. All are invited to comment. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:59, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Recurrent vandalism to TFA

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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There has been recurrent vandalism to Effects of Hurricane Isabel in Delaware today. Three unconstructive edits were not spotted in more than 20 minutes before I reverted them. Please consider semi-protection or pending changes protection. Thank you! 2607:FEA8:1DE0:7B4:E42E:97B9:E2A6:6B69 (talk) 19:23, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Done. Wikipedia:Requests for page protection is often backlogged, but that's the best place to request page protection. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 19:45, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Arbitration motion regarding Eric Corbett

The Arbitration Committee has been made aware of and has independently confirmed that Eric Corbett (talk · contribs), since his public retirement, has been abusively misusing multiple accounts and disruptively editing while logged out. Eric Corbett's accounts are hereby indefinitely blocked by the Arbitration Committee. Accordingly, the case request involving Eric Corbett, which has been accepted by majority vote, will be closed.

Support

• Courcelles (per mailing list)
• GorillaWarfare (per mailing list)
• Joe Roe (per mailing list)
• KrakatoaKatie (per mailing list)
• Mkdw (per mailing list)
• Opabinia regalis (per mailing list)
• Premeditated Chaos (per mailing list)

Oppose

Recuse

• Worm That Turned (per mailing list)

– Katie^talk 14:29, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Arbitration motion regarding Eric Corbett

Request to override Global range block

Ajraddatz suggested me to post here again my request so i created this new section because the previous had already been archived

I would like a local admin to whitelist the ip range 151.48.0.0/17 so that users from that ip range can edit again from ips

The ip range was globally blocked because an abuser used it to create many fake accounts in many projects so the problem was account creation not anonymous editing

Please unblock locally this ip range by allowing editing from ips and keeping blocked the possibility to create accounts to protect en.wikipedia.org

Semplicemente Agghiacciante Semplicemente Agghiacciante (talk) 08:33, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

It isn't possible to block account creation and not anonymous editing, but it should be possible to whitelist the global block locally. I confirm that the block is needed at the global level, but recommend that local admins/CUs look into whether it can be whitelisted here. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 11:30, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

• Please note this was just requested a few weeks ago with the locally blocking admin declining to make additional changes. There is a current local block which appears superfluous to the global block, which may no longer be needed. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:16, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

• It is accepted that a local override can't allow account creation if it is already disabled globally. The only quesion being raised here is whether it is worth it to re-enable anonymous editing (not account creation) on enwiki from the range Special:Contributions/151.48.0.0/17. Anyone who advocates this might try to click on that contributions link and try to find any useful IP edits from the six months prior to June, 2019. See if you think that anything positive was happening then. Unless some data is presented, I would go with the view of User:Anachronist whose name appears in the block log and so far has not decided to re-enable the range for IP editing. The user Semiplicemente Agghiacciante has an account now, so the block is not impacting them personally, provided they are willing to log in to edit. Simply allowing one person (who has an account) to edit anonymously from that range doesn't sound like a good enough reason to lift the block. EdJohnston (talk) 10:24, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Anachronist blocked that ip range on my request because he told me he could set account creation allowed instead of anonymous editing but it did not work

The ip range 151.48.0.0/17 does not cointain any more non constructive editing than any other ip range but more important the global block was set to stop an abuser from spamming accounts and messages across the wikipedias not to stop anonymous editing in en.wikipedia.org

And if that ip range is unblocked here it would be even easier to find out any disruptive editing from there because administrators would have just to have a look at the ip range once in a while

Semplicemente Agghiacciante Semplicemente Agghiacciante (talk) 15:45, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

(I've been away for a while.)

Yes, I experimentally changed the local block settings for this range to allow for account creation, but it seems the global block settings take precedence. I have no idea if this is intentional or not. ~Anachronist (talk) 00:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Anachronist, I believe you have to use this as well to whitelist the range. SQL^{Query me!} 01:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Long term sock problem

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Louispogi0012 (talk · contribs)

Can someone block this account and semi-protect these articles? We are going round in circles on literally a daily basis with this person's sock farm.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 08:38, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done. El_C 08:46, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Vandalism on Bais Rajput article

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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On the article , Bais Rajput, a user who was previously involved in edit wars is continuously trying to add Pakistan to the lead section. His source is a unrelated medical journal which mentions the term "Bains". Clearly Bains has no relation to Bais as all sources that mention Bais, place them in the Baiswara, Awadh (Oudh), Uttar Pradesh region. Neither is there a source showing Bains to be synonymous with Bais. Furthermore, this user has previously been blocked for sock puppetry and edit warring. Even this week, he received a warning from an admin and is clearly not here to contribute in good faith. I request administrator assistance in some form. Thank you.HaoJungTar (talk) 18:06, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

The source given does not say they are only solely found in uttar pradesh either also I found this website talking about bains rajput in mirpur but its a health report https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4216966/and the spelling is a bit different so what and I am not notoriously known to have sock puppets and your statement that real rajputs can't be found in punjab just shows your mentality are you even a real sri lankan and this dispute got settled why did you bring up again. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bais_Rajput Admins look at the site for yourself the sources given don't mention that they are only found in uttar pardesh the health report I gave also mentions them in pakistan and there is no crediable site that talks about tgem as thery are either blogs or facebook groups that talk about them nothing creiable but surely a health report is valid here.Arsi786 (talk) 18:15, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Your edits are based on a fundamental misunderstanding of how Wikipedia works. The only sources mention them being present in Uttar Pradesh. The absence of a source indicating their existence elsewhere means that only UP is relevant. Furthermore, you can't even speak English properly and regularly engage in edit wars and personal attacks. Your only source mentions some distant group called "Bains".HaoJungTar (talk) 18:20, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Personal attacks by Arsi against me:

Accusing me of not being Sri Lankan (as if that's of any relevance):

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Bais_Rajput&diff=914477693&oldid=914476874

Accusing me of hating Pakistan:

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bais_Rajput&diff=914475196&oldid=914470174

HaoJungTar (talk) 18:16, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

How are they personal attacks your sri lankan and yet you claimed real rajputs are not found in punjab (Most of pakitan's population is in punjab) https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bais_Rajput&action=history Yes there are a lot of indian trolls on here who hate pakistan it was more of a accusation rather then a attack because and what sri lankan cares about pakistani and indian caste's. Arsi786 (talk) 19:21, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Violation of the 3-revert rule by Arsi786

In the talk page, we find that Arsi has violated the 3-revert rule:

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bais_Rajput&action=history

Just how many chances will he get? Accusing me of being an "Indian troll" as well.HaoJungTar (talk) 18:28, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Let the admins deal with this.Arsi786 (talk) 19:33, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Attack page

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I just discovered this attack page, presumably made by the WMF-banned user User:Projects. He called me an "idiot" and one of the users called me a "moron". A person who banned him from a wiki powered by MediaWiki also replied to the comment, against them. Nigos (talk • Contribs) 08:37, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

There's no jurisdiction over off-wiki forums here. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 09:03, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Islamic Republic of Iran users and destructive behavior

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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SharabSalam and Benyamin-ln Controlling all articles related to the Islamic Republic of Iran. This two are campaigning for the Iranian regime and dont let other users to add or remove anything from related articles of Islamic Republic of Iran and ali Khamenei. The last one is: Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Please set Wikipedia free again. You Persian (talk) 14:08, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

@You Persian: looking at the recent article history of Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, this looks more like a content dispute than an issue needing ANI attention. Please note that, whenever you are making changes on Wikipedia and you are contested by other editors (as you were here [6]), please discuss the changes on the article talk page, per WP:BRD and WP:ONUS. Best. SamHolt6 (talk) 14:17, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

They have many accounts and have high access. Like before, they win and censor the contents of Wikipedia. They support each other and i will try... okay! You Persian (talk) 14:22, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

I would add that saying any user is a government agent or acting on behalf of a government("campaigning for the Iranian regime") is a serious accusation that needs evidence(while not violating WP:OUTING). 331dot (talk) 14:25, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia is free for everyone to edit in a constructive way. It is not free for adding biased point of views, vandalism. I am trying to protect the article from that sort of thing. You are adding point of views and refusing to collaborate with other editors. Instead you believe that you only has the right to freely edit Wikipedia. Also you are again accusing me of using sock account as a puppet, that is not true, this is the first time I see Benjamin, I have your userpage in my watchlist and I went to see what you are doing and I found it disruptive and not neutral point of view, so I reverted.--SharabSalam (talk) 14:27, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

I am allowed to do that like you. And that's interesting that you removed all of my content not just a few. Is this neutral? You Persian (talk) 14:34, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

• Here is the POV content you added to the lead!! I don't know why you haven't been banned yet, you are editwarring and adding POVs unsourced content, if that was me I would have been banned long time ago!!

Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran has been likened to ISIS by many Iranians and foreign governments. Many countries believe that this government provides financial and weapon support to the terrorists. Also, It has good relations with China and Russia.

The government constantly violates human rights in Iran. The government is using executioner to kill prisoners in public places and in front of people. The government also executes children. Atefeh Sahaaleh and Mona Mahmudnizhad are children executed in Iran for religious reasons. Journalists who do not work for the government may be imprisoned and executed. Many foreign journalists have been imprisoned in Iran and many other have been executed.

The government has strict laws against Iranian women, including mandatory hijab. The government holds large mourning ceremonies in Iran (Most of them are religious mourning ceremonies) and prevents people from dancing and celebrating.

--SharabSalam (talk) 14:44, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

And just an information, I have been to Iran and none of what you added about Iran is true.--SharabSalam (talk) 14:47, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Talk:Midland–Odessa shooting

Would an uninvolved admin please close the discussion in Talk:Midland–Odessa shooting#Naming the perpetrator. There is overwhelming WP:SNOW consensus there but one editor refuses to drop the stick and reopened the discussion. Thanks, Nsk92 (talk) 01:58, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

It'd be nice if we could continue to discuss, the content in dispute has already been added back to the article, but there is potential for broader discussion... and perhaps a compromise at some point. —Locke Cole • t • c 02:00, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

There is overwhelming consensus already that you are refusing to acknowledge. Drop the stick and move on, please. Nsk92 (talk) 02:03, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

I have closed the discussion accordingly per WP:SNOW. El_C 02:06, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you, much appreciated. Nsk92 (talk) 02:10, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) x2... There were two !votes that offered alternatives worth discussing. The WP:INVOLVED editor closing the discussion prematurely ended the potential for those discussions to bear fruit. Explain to me how leaving the disputed content in the article but not wanting the discussion closed constitutes "refusing to acknowledge" the !voting so far? Remember: this discussion started in the last 12 hours... —Locke Cole • t • c 02:11, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

I think 12 hours is more than enough time when consensus is this overwhelming. El_C 02:16, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Half the world was asleep for most of that time. It was a strong pattern, no doubt. But a day should be the minimum, just to be surer. InedibleHulk (talk) 02:34, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't think so. It sounds like a bit of a stretch. El_C 03:17, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

It's not exactly half, and factoring in our userbase complicates the logistics beyond my skill level, but we do have people who schedule Wikipedia time for certain blocks of their days. Some are Alaskan, some Okinawan. I think it's a good idea to go a full turn unless completely consensual; knowing a dead guy's name isn't urgent, like having an active shooter's description (or a tsunami warning) should be. InedibleHulk (talk) 03:36, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

That's if we accept your notion that this wasn't clear enough, which I do not. Seems like that 24-hours rule you made up is bureaucracy for its own sake, in this case. A few hours is enough, however, when the preference ratio is ten to one, I challenge. El_C 03:43, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

No rule of mine, just a suggestion. You're free to use it or forget it. Can somebody hurry up with the Virginia Beach shooting one, though? Six dead folks have been waiting three months (180 times longer) for this same courtesy. Seems a bit too relaxed. InedibleHulk (talk) 03:53, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

A bit less whimsy would be the respectful way to bring attention to this. El_C 04:03, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

You have a strange notion of "whimsy". I'm saying six people were shot to death, identified by police, popularized through the media but swept aside on Wikipedia. That's tragedy in my books, and the respectful choice is remembering how they died for an article about their killer counterpart. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:12, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Six dead folks have been waiting three months seems a bit tone-deaf, is what I'm getting at. El_C 04:14, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Sorry about that. If I knew how many living people are still waiting, I could've invoked them instead, but I don't. I could name more than six, though. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:26, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Leaving the name of the shooter out of a shooting article? Yeah, right. Now, I've seen it all. Wow. Just, wow. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 03:08, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

This is the norm per BLPCRIME. Until they are convincted (Which will probably happen quickly in this type of sitaution), and the person otherwise unknown, it is better to leave the name out. --Masem (t) 03:48, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

He is dead; there will be no trial or conviction. He was killed by the police. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 04:12, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Until this is spelled out for mass shooting perpetrators (and victims), local consensus is going to decide. El_C 04:06, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

I meant that our default position is to omit, but yes, local consensus can override. --Masem (t) 04:08, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Ah, I see. Indeed. El_C 04:11, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Always best to check the facts on a specific case before opining on a case where the specific facts are dispositive. The death of the suspect in this specific case changes the equation. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 06:50, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

How can I request a deletion of a revision?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I want for example an admin to remove this diff Special:Diff/914510886 because it is very insulting to a BLP.--SharabSalam (talk) 21:36, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done. El_C 21:38, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Nevertheless, requests for revision deletion should not be posted to highly-visible public pages like AN -- see WP:REVDELREQUEST for more details. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 21:53, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

WP:Draft

Administrator Deb unilaterally moved the page Mohamad Barakat to draft without specifying any reasons and did not react on my complaint even though as I now saw the rules clearly say

"The aim of moving an article to draft is to allow time and space for the draft's improvement until it is ready for mainspace. It is not intended as a backdoor route to deletion. As a matter of good practice the editor moving a page to draft should mark its talk page with the tags of any relevant projects as a means of soliciting improvements from interested editors. ...

Requirements for page movers

To unilaterally move an article to draft space, you should:

• notify the author (this is facilitated by the script User:Evad37/MoveToDraft.js),
• be accountable for your draftification decisions per the standard described at Wikipedia:Administrators#Accountability

If an editor raises an objection, move the page back to mainspace and list at AfD."

I find it very rude to move an article that has numerous reliable secondary sources and to which several users contributed for more than a year to draft without even specifying reasons on request. Ironically this was the reaction to a complaint about repeated vandalism on the page by single purpose accounts Rafaelbernardes, 2804:14C:36:8B7A:E436:A2AA:BB32:F8B, and Nicolegomesa who so far were not sanctioned in any way.[7] I don't remember the cases but this is not the first time I see articles being moved to draft without following due process. Apparently not everyone is aware of the rules - I wasn't until I read them but I am glad they are the way I think they should be rather than how some users would prefer them to be. Regarding accountability I think it would be good to keep track of such incidents. Omikroergosum (talk) 16:30, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

We can delete it as blatant advertising if you'd prefer? Guy (Help!) 19:11, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Well Deb is I believe an administrator, but it's far more likely this was draftified as a function of WP:NPP. And Guy is absolutely correct. The other alternative is speedy deletion as unambiguous advertising. John from Idegon (talk) 19:40, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Actually it only got up to the level of advertising because the BLP violations were removed. There might be enough sources out there to write an article which is policy compliant but it will take an editor who understands Portuguese and does not want to write a hatchet job on the subject. Jbh ^Talk 20:04, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Jbhunley nominated the page for deletion,[8] it was speedily deleted and then recreated after Phil Bridger contested the speedy deletion because "the negative content is reliably sourced"[9] (immediately reverted by Jbhunley).[10] It was then again moved to draft by JzG [11] ignoring the rules that I pointed to above.

It was advertising when the vandals about which I complained deleted the parts on the internationally reported doping scandals and put Portuguese content, links to his social media pages and amazon links to his books.[12] Draftifying it again without discussion even after I pointed to the rules here clearly saying this is not allowed is scandalous, in particular with the justification that it lacks reliable sources given that even after you deleted the content on the scandals 11 sources remained even though the main content on those touching the doping was censored [13] and everything in the article is based on the sources. I tried to move back but JzG now protected the page from creation. I expand my complaint to include administrators Jbhunley and JzG whou should be held accountable for breaking wikipedia rules in the same way as Deb. It is also erroneous to point to new pages control given that the article is more than a year old and in a previous deletion it had been decided to speedy keep the article and the user nominating for deletion was blocked for sockpuppetry and accused of paid editing.(User:2Joules). Jbhunley even writes in his own edit summary that he doesn't have sufficient language skills to make qualified judgments on the sources but still deletes well sourced content over speculations.[14] JzG even reverted a nomination for draft revision [15] and threatens me with a block for "disruptive editing" [16] although all I ever did is adding content based on high quality reliable sources and I showed here that he broke wikipedia rules. The draft was reduced to non-negative content that to me seems barely notable [17] and those who did that refuse to specify which parts they object to and why. Special interest accounts and administrators who think they need to help them but don't follow the rules should not make contributing to wikipedia such a difficult experience. Omikroergosum (talk) 21:55, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

I am not an administrator. Jbh ^Talk 22:45, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. Would still be nice if you could help to follow due process and refrain from deletions based on poor foreign language skills. Omikroergosum (talk) 22:54, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Omikroergosum, In the past hour and a half you've edited the comment Jbhunley replied to nearly a dozen times. Do you have your reply sorted yet? SQL^{Query me!} 00:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• My more detailed reply is on the article talk page to keep content discussion there rather than spreading it all over WP -- per my reply to the OP's comments on my talk page. Jbh ^Talk 01:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

SQL, I carefully did not edit parts of my post that Jbhunly had replied to. I felt I had to add difflinks and give more context as apparently readers are misled by single purpose accounts to believe that the very well sourced article is in violation of rules for articles on living people.

This discussion here is not about the content of the article but about the repeated abuse of admin powers by circumventing draftification in order to circumvent deletion discussions (which in this cases had already been held). Omikroergosum (talk) 06:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Given that JzG deleted the draft even after I showed the rules clearly say draftification is to be undone if a user objects (in this case two users did), a formal deletion discussion had come to the decision to speedily keep and JzG was accused of abuse of admin powers but still kept acting on the case I have to bring this up at the Administrators' Incident page. Omikroergosum (talk) 07:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

There are two competing versions of the article: a blatant advertisement, or your version, which is an attack page. Your seem pretty determined not to hear anything that contradicts your opinion. Guy (Help!) 07:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

OP has now opened a thread at ANI on the same topic. John from Idegon (talk) 07:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing to this that I had announced above already as the repeated abuse of admin powers unfortunately converted this into an urgent case rather than a general discussion on apparent lack of knowledge about the rules regarding draftification. JzG aka "Guy", please stop repeating your empty claim over and over, specify your argument in a deletion discussion if you so much want it and follow due process. Omikroergosum (talk) 08:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I have moved the ANI report back here as a subsection. El_C 08:13, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think the discussion should rather be moved to ANI because this is now an urgent case of repeated abuse of admin powers rather than a general discussion on apparent lack of knowledge of rules on draftification. Omikroergosum (talk) 08:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

No, the discussion should not be split, regardless of the perceived urgency — which does not really factor here, anyway. El_C 08:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I meant to move rather than split the discussion. And repeated abuse of admin powers is clearly an urgent incident. Omikroergosum (talk) 08:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• A reasonable solution may be:
  1. Undelete and merge all revisions of the article and draft into a singe edit history;
  2. Nominate the result for regular deletion under WP:notability (people).

  But actually I don’t expect the establishment to desire any solution like it – scores of such cases could in the future deter sysops from thoughtless clicking on [delete] in disregard of the policy. The policy would become more important than the establishment. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 09:23, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Repeated abuse of admin powers

A deletion discussion on the article Mohamad Barakat had come to the decision to speedily keep the article and the user nominating for deletion was blocked for sockpuppetry and accused of paid editing.(User:2Joules). However, administrator Deb unilaterally moved the page to draft without specifying any reasons and did not react on my complaint even though as I then saw the rules clearly say

"The aim of moving an article to draft is to allow time and space for the draft's improvement until it is ready for mainspace. It is not intended as a backdoor route to deletion. As a matter of good practice the editor moving a page to draft should mark its talk page with the tags of any relevant projects as a means of soliciting improvements from interested editors. ...

Requirements for page movers

To unilaterally move an article to draft space, you should:

• notify the author (this is facilitated by the script User:Evad37/MoveToDraft.js),
• be accountable for your draftification decisions per the standard described at Wikipedia:Administrators#Accountability

If an editor raises an objection, move the page back to mainspace and list at AfD."

I find it very rude to move an article that has numerous reliable secondary sources and to which several users contributed for more than a year to draft without even specifying reasons on request. Ironically this was the reaction to a complaint about repeated vandalism on the page by single purpose accounts Rafaelbernardes, 2804:14C:36:8B7A:E436:A2AA:BB32:F8B, and Nicolegomesa who so far were not sanctioned in any way.[18] I don't remember the cases but this is not the first time I see articles being moved to draft without following due process. Apparently not everyone is aware of the rules - I wasn't until I read them but I am glad they are the way I think they should be rather than how some users would prefer them to be. Regarding accountability I think it would be good to keep track of such incidents.

After I brought this up at the Administrators' Noticeboard, administrator JzG claimed the article was "blatant advertising" although it was only advertising in the versions by the single purpose accounts I had complained about when they put Portuguese content, links to his social media pages and amazon links to his books.[19]. A user erroneously justified administrator Deb's action pointing to new pages control although the article was more than a year old, numerous editors had worked on it and there was the result of the deletion discussion. The article was then speedily deleted and users claimed it was an attack page. As another administrator pointed out that the negative content was well sourced it was recreated. However, ignoring the rules, administrator JzG draftified it again. The draft was reduced to non-negative content that to me seems barely notable [20] Jbhunley admitted in his own edit summary that he doesn't have sufficient language skills to make qualified judgments on the sources but still deleted well sourced content over his speculations that things might be different.[21] He refused to specify which rules on biographies exaclty had been broken by which part of the article.

JzG then even blocked the article from recreation, [22] reverted a draft revision nomination, posted a warning to block me on my talk page for "disruptive editing" [23] although all I ever did is adding content based on high quality reliable sources and I showed here that he broke wikipedia rules. JzG then even deleted the draft along with the discussion even after I had complained about his violation of Wikipedia rules, which should have stopped him from acting on the case. He also uses a different name in some of his messages, which can make other users think that there are two different users who share his opinion. It was claimed that the artile lacked reliable sources although there were 17 of them from top quality media like ARD, Veja, Globo... Everything in the article is based on the sources. Administrators JzG should be held accountable for breaking wikipedia rules in a much more flagrant way than Deb who has abstained from the discussion after I brought up the complaint at the Administrators' Noticeboard. Special interest accounts and administrators who think they need to help them but don't follow the rules should not make contributing to wikipedia such a difficult experience.

Please block the single purpose vandals Rafaelbernardes, 2804:14C:36:8B7A:E436:A2AA:BB32:F8B, and Nicolegomesa, restore the article and start another proper deletion discussion if you so much want it, warn admininstrators Deb and in particular JzG, as well as user Jbhunley. Omikroergosum (talk) 07:30, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The final version of the article—i.e. the version from which the BLP violations and irrelevant PR puffery had been removed—in full read Mohamad Barakat is a Brazilian physician of Lebanese descent practicing in São Paulo. He has been sharing his daily life on social media since 2014. He has more than a million followers on Instagram. Barakat has published a book on how to live a healthy life and is a frequent guest talking on the topics on radio and television.! Barakat and his wife have a daughter. If you can write a version of this page that complies with Wikipedia's rules, feel free, but we're not a general webhost; the deletion was completely correct. ‑ Iridescent 07:39, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Please be specific in how far the well sourced content was in violation of BLP and follow due process, which is to nominate for deletion if a user (and in this case several users, including administrators) object to deletion and draftification. How ironic to claim that an article is an attack page and "PR puffery". He also published two rather well selling books, both of which were well sourced and with ISBN. Omikroergosum (talk) 07:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Can Iridescent explain how is it G10 then? Incnis Mrsi (talk) 07:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

It was a blatant attack page; the material quoted above is what was left behind once the inappropriate content had been removed. You can complain all you want, but you're not going to find any admin on Wikipedia who is willing to restore this. ‑ Iridescent 07:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

All content was extremely well sourced. Please explain how an "attack page" can at the same time be "PR puffery". You cannot just make a wild claim to justify that due process was not followed and the article was already restored by an administrator and another administrator had decided to speedily keep. Omikroergosum (talk) 07:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

As I pointed out above, there were two competing versions. One was your attack page, the other was an advertisement. Given the obvious marginal notability of the subject, we don't need either. Guy (Help!) 08:30, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

That is your opinion that you repeat over and over. As already at least two administrators and several other users expressed they share my opinion that this is a valid article (Count Count and Atlantic306 in the deletion discussion ruling to speedily keep, the administrator that reverted your deletion yesterday, those users that had edited the article before deletion, and Incnis Mrsi above) and as the rules clearly state a deletion needs to be justified by a proper deletion discussion please undue your violations of Wikipedia policies. Omikroergosum (talk) 08:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, zero administrators have agreed with you on this. But you can add me to the list who think deletion was the right call. This was a straightforward violation of WP:BLPCRIME, and getting over that hurdle requires showing that the subject of the article is either WP:WELLKNOWN, or that the crime of which the subject is accused is obviously notable, rather than WP:NOTNEWS. In any event, this is by no means an urgent issue, nor is there any admin abuse going on. You have all the time you want to put together an argument for undeletion. Someguy1221 (talk) 08:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

You cannot see what was deleted: The administrator who recreated the article after JzG deleted wrote the negative content is well sourced. You apparently also did not read the deletion discussion whose final decision was speedily keep and in which I convinced that Barakat is not notable for a crime but for being a celebrity doctor omnipresent in Brazilian media and accused of questionable practices by several journalists as well as a singer who won a defamation case started by Barakat. Those actions may or may not be illegal. As I pointed out at the time, Eufemiano Fuentes of course also has his article even though he was even acquitted. Your argument that the guy is not well known shows you have not looked into the case as there were 17 sources, most of them highly reliable and some even international showing he has more than a million instagram followers, published two well selling books, is near omnipresent in Brazilian media and even raised the attention in far away countries like the UK and Germany. Admittedly seeing this became difficult after the repeated deletions by JzG. This is clearly an urgent case as administrators repeatedly violated the rule that deletions and draftifications need to wait for a decision in a deletion discussion if a user objects, and in this case not only I objected but an administrator had even restored and a deletion discussion had come to the result to speedily keep. Omikroergosum (talk) 09:47, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

A couple items of note Omikroergosum. Someguy1221 is an admin and can see what was deleted. Also the speedy keep was because the AFD had been "Nominated by confirmed blocked sockpuppet" and the non-admin closer did not comment on the content of the article. MarnetteD|Talk 09:56, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The administrator who had wanted to delete wrote himself in the deletion discussion that he changed his vote to weak keep.[24] If Someguy1221 read the deleted content and still claims no administrator agreed with me the article is well sourced or that Barakat is not well known or that he is only notable for a "crime" I am afraid I have to see he must be either extremely careless or he is just lying. And even if he were right this would still not be a justification for the flagrant violation of the wikipedia rule that a draftification is not acceptable as a means to circumvent a proper deletion discussion. Omikroergosum (talk) 10:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Given that you appear to have now moved on to outright lying, I've temporarily undeleted the talk page in question so everyone else can see that your claims are untrue. ‑ Iridescent 10:03, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Please show me where I lied and I apologize right away. Otherwise I take this as a personal attack. Thanks for undeleting as I never had a chance to see the finally specified objections by Jbhunley [25] as they were deleted before I could see them. Omikroergosum (talk) 10:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Well, there's at least two administrators and several other users expressed they share my opinion that this is a valid article when you've not provided an example of a single admin who feels this is valid (as I've already explained on my talkpage, because of the way Wikipedia operates it would only take a single admin objecting to the deletion to get it restored), If Someguy1221 read the deleted content and still claims no administrator agreed with me…, where I've just restored the deleted talk page complete with all its history and it's clear nobody (admin or otherwise) agreed with you, the wikipedia rule that a draftification is not acceptable which you seem to have just made up… ‑ Iridescent 10:11, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

A) Count Count is not an admin. B) I did not say that Barakat is not well known - I said that it needs to be shown that this is the case. C) You are making an assumption that your own conclusions are so obviously correct that no reasonable person who saw the same evidence could disagree with you. Whether you choose to keep thinking that way is up to you, but it's not a great attitude for collaboration. I don't think you're lying, but I do think you are confused about some things, have made some colorful interpretations of other things, and overall are approaching the situation with an unhealthy intensity. Someguy1221 (talk) 10:18, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Someguy1221, quite. I am seeing distinct shades of WP:RGW here. It reminds me of the guy who got banned for trying to blaze the trail in publicising Lance Armstrong's drug use. Guy (Help!) 10:30, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

If Count Count is not an admin I admit I got that wrong. I assumed if someone can close a deletion discussion it must be an admin. Getting something wrong is not a lie. The article was restored yesterday and a user reverting wrote in his edit summary that the negative content was properly sourced. I assumed if it was restored this must have been done by an admin but as the history is still deleted I cannot even see who it was. I take writing that negative content is properly sourced as an agreement with me. I also take the above question by Incnis Mrsi how the article violates G10 as an agreement with me that it has not been shown how it violates such rules. I also take those several users who edited the article after his creation without deleting content and without asking to get it deleted as an agreement with me that the article has its value. I showed very clearly that Barakat is well known with 17 sources, most of them reliable top quality and several even international, they clearly show he published two books that he presented at many prominent venues, he has more than a million instagram followers and has posed with dozens of (even international) stars. If you claim that does not show he is well known I don't know what to say. And I repeat, even if you were right, that does not justify to abuse admin powers to flagrantly violate the wikipedia rule I pointed to above that draftification is not an acceptable means to circumvent a deletion discussion. I would call it an unhealthy intensity if an admin draftifies a page after he was shown this violates the rules, then deletes it twice even after it was undone, blocks the page from recreation and threatens good faith editors who contribute with top quality sources to block them. This while three single purpose vandals who repeatedly posted Portuguese advertisements and refused to discuss still remain unpunished. I have to admit that I cannot stand injustice and authoritarian condescending behavior at all. I believe wikipedia has its great value because numerous editors respectfully work together. Unfortunately this is not always the case. Omikroergosum (talk) 10:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC) PS: Thanks for the interesting link on Righting great wrongs, JgZ. I hope you have read it. "if you want to ... Explain the "truth" or "reality" of a current or historical political, religious, or moral issue ... on Wikipedia, you'll have to wait until it's been reported in mainstream media." As you will see from my contributions I used to edit on quite a variety of topics so I don't see explaining the truth on anything as my mission here but mainstream media started to report on the questionable practices by Barakat 6 years ago... Omikroergosum (talk) 10:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

In fact, administrators are empowered to act unilaterally in the enforcement of WP:BLP, and so even the sequence of events you describe is not prima facie evidence of misconduct. In other words, you are describing something that an administrator is allowed to do. Administrators are also empowered to evaluate whether there is or is not consensus, and whether that consensus is or is not based in policy. If an administrator has a good faith belief that an article exists in violation of BLP, he is permitted within reason to boldly act on that belief even in the face of opposing voices. There is a process to dispute the deletion of an article. It starts with opening a civil dialog with the deleting admin, and follows with a post to WP:DRV if that does not satisfy. If a single admin is shown, by reversal at DRV, to be habitually out of touch with the community with regards to speedy deletions, then there would be a reason to start talking about warnings or sanctions against them. Someguy1221 (talk) 10:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Omikroergosum You keep lecturing me on how I am not allowed to do things because you have pointed out the "rules". Have you noticed that you have zero admins supporting your position here? You have 500 edits, largely pushing this "drugs scandal". I have 120,000. It might be that I know the rules better than you do. Ort it might be that I am wrong, but your style is simply spectacularly counterproductive. Guy (Help!) 11:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

As you may have seen, I only started to get drawn away from my other activities by the repeated vandalism of this one article I once created and then the refusal of you as administrator to accept the wikipedia rule that a draftification is not an acceptable means to circumvent a proper deletion discussion. Please explain how the article was restored (twice if I understand correctly?) if there was no admin who disagreed with you. The whole article is entirely based on reliable sources as someone (I thought an admin) that you will be able to identify yesterday confirmed in his edit summary and you refused to specify what exactly you object to. Your zillion edits don't justify a condescending way to react on a well explained complaint about clear vandalism by three single purpose accounts and a clear violation of wikipedia rules (Deb never claimed the article was violating rules on biographies of living people) by abusing your powers and repeatedly keep acting on a case in which you were accused of abusing your administrative powers.

Someguy1221, I don't care if sanctions are taken on Deb or JzG (although in the latter case repeatedly taking action when he himself is accused of misconduct is another violation of wikipedia rules) but I think such cases should be noted somewhere because otherwise users have no chance to see without much effort if an administrator has a history of such conduct. And I think the article needs to be restored to start a proper discussion as it is extremely well sourced and the only ever proper discussion on deletion was to keep it. Please also note that in my attempt to have a civil discussion with the deleting admin he started to threaten to block me and never ever showed precisely why exactly he thinks there is a violation of rules on biographies of living people inspite of another user reverting with the justification that all negative content is properly sourced and Incnis Mrsi asking how G10 was violated and the previous decision to keep the article. Omikroergosum (talk) 11:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Overturn and immediately defer to a new deletion discussion; restore as courtesy blanked - no fault to anyone here but this deletion was botched at several stages and needs to start from scratch. We have a no-prejudice speedy keep in a previous discussion as well as several objections to both G10 and G11 deletion in the deleted page's history; it should have been blanked and left to discussion. Neither G10 nor G11 are listed under criteria which override previous deletion discussions, G10 only applies if the content is entirely unsourced, and G11 is for pages which are blatantly promotional - this was poorly written but not blatantly promotional. As for the real-life situation, I have difficulty Googling for foreign language topics but from what I put together from Brazilian sources, this individual is a notably controversial celebrity doctor ([26], [27], [28]) who became embroiled in a scandal with a Brazilian singer over wrongly prescribing anabolic steroids ([29], [30], [31]) and also made news recently when he accidentally posted to Instagram a video of a lewd encounter between him and his wife ([32], [33]). Someone who actually reads Portuguese should review the sources, I have no idea of the accuracy of machine translations or the reliability of these sources, it's worth noting that I can't find any information whatsoever on the individual in English-language sources, and I'm not really convinced these points establish notability per our criteria for an article (considering BLPCRIME and such) but this is all consideration that should happen in a deletion discussion. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 12:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  I agree. Furthermore, such a restoration would be entirely compatible with policy and is regularly done at WP:DRV (where this discussion should have been held at the first place). Regards SoWhy 12:21, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  I'd support that. To be honest, I wish I had just speedy deleted the thing in the first place, since notability had not been established. I saw that there had been a lot of edit warring, and I made the mistake of giving the creator an opportunity to improve it in draft space. Deb (talk) 12:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  (I'm just participating here because I do speak Portuguese and a Portuguese speaker seems to be needed in this discussion) I read all the news articles pointed out by Ivanvector. Most, or all, of the articles are from reliable sources from Brazil (like Veja and Globo.com). However, I'm not quite convinced that there are "depth coverage" about the person in question. He's cited as "celebrity doctor" with a strong presence in the social networks, but few biographical information is given, about him, on these articles. The articles are more about his involvement in doping cases, his prescription of anabolic steroids and other controversial stuff in which he's involved. He might be barely notable or this might be a case of WP:SINGLEEVENT.--SirEdimon (talk) 14:06, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

It is just a blatant lie that notability has not been established. Read the rules. There are numerous reliable secondary (and even international) sources that have in depth coverage. Notability established. Period. And there was a decision to keep, so no speedy deletion. Accept the rules please. Thank you very much Ivanvector and SoWhy for pointing to due process. Would be nice by Deb and JzG to finally acknowledge that they went wrong on the Wikipedia rules and by JzG to take back the threat to block me (for pointing to the fact he violated rules). Most importantly, as to my knowledge Mohamad Barakat is not accused of a crime but of questionable medical treatment on sports people (that is what he is most notable for as there was in-depth coverage internationally) and using a title he does not hold (which I guess is not a crime but maybe an administrative offence). A source in English is here: [34] This was also reported by quality media in Swedish,(Expressen [35]) Norwegian tabloid Verdens Gang [36] and a Polish sports paper,[37] in case that helps... Omikroergosum (talk) 12:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• @Omikroergosum: STOP continuously editing your comments. It is disruptive. Jbh ^Talk 13:33, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• There is nothing stopping the OP from clicking on Draft:Mohamad Barakat and writing a policy compliant article. I explained to him what I thought some of the issues were and why the article was not policy complaint [38], as they asked. Instead of correcting or working to correct the problems he just kept re-inserting the same text and complaining about "abuse" over dozens of edits, at least four talk pages and hours of time.

  There is no need to undelete the old article. it was crap and WP:TNT is the best thing for it. Jbh ^Talk 13:40, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

If I had not assembled all those difflinks to show you are wrong I doubt the wrong decision would have been overturned. Thanks for acknowledging you went wrong. Please stop shouting and using condescending language like "crap". And as the decision was wrong please undelete immediately so that all the previous work by several editors is not lost and the abuse of admin powers keeps being documented. As three administrators above pointed out (and you Jbhunley as you pointed out are not an administrator although you like to behave like you were) the decision to delete was wrong in the first place. Also please finally block the three single purpose vandals who inserted Portuguese text and advertisements and deleted well sourced content without discussion. Omikroergosum (talk) 13:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• In view of the above, I'd like to request a short block on Omikroergosum for continued personal attacks, such as calling me a liar. I won't do it myself - I'd like to see consensus. Deb (talk) 13:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

You wrote notability is not established although there are dozens of reliable secondary sources, even from international quality media, with in-depth coverage. Where please are my "_continued_ personal attacks"??? Is that an implicit lie? You were shown to have circumvented a deletion discussion by draftification in violation of explicit wikipedia rules and never brought up any even botched justification for this. And now you want me to get blocked? Are you serious? Omikroergosum (talk) 14:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, yes she is and should you continue as you are it will most likely happen. Now, serious question: You seem to have assembled sources enough to write a good article; There is nothing stopping you from recreating the draft and putting it through WP:AFC for an independent review. So why are you not doing that? Is it that you are just incensed and mad or do you expect something else to occur here? If the former, it is just a waste of energy; if the later what outcome are you looking for? Jbh ^Talk 14:23, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The decision was overturned, so I wait for the article to be recreated as per wikipedia rules. I will not allow you to make me redo all that work you tried to destroy. Omikroergosum (talk) 14:32, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

You really, really need to take on board everything that has been said here and elsewhere, not just the parts you want to hear. If you do so I believe you will find that what you assert is not the case. More so, I can pretty much guarantee that, whether the article is undeleted or you recreate it in draft, should you simply replace the BLP violating material without regard for neutrality, the policies for BLP and WP:WEIGHT, you will be blocked or topic banned from editing BLP under the special sanctions regime for living people. You have already received the required notice so please, please spend the time to read and understand those policies rather that blithely asserting you understand them and how they apply to your subject. Jbh ^Talk 14:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I already replied to your largely unfounded claims in the article talk page. If you have nothing else, please just refrain from editing an article for which you don't even understand the sources. If you have any specific concerns, you are very welcome to bring them up on the article talk page rather than here. Your continued use of threats to a user who is contributing with content from high quality secondary sources is disruptive. Omikroergosum (talk) 14:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• I'm just going to point out that any editor can draftify, pretty sure the only special permission involved here is automatically deleting the redirect instead of flagging it for speedy deletion. There is no "abuse of admin power" involved in this draftification. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 14:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Do you seriously want to claim that any editor can draftify articles like Adolf Hitler, Katy Perry or Platypus - without even providing a justification on request??? Have you even read the rules on draftification that I pointed to when starting this discussion? Did you notice two administrators have overturned the decision to draftify or delete the article - even though so far no one has taken action? Omikroergosum (talk) 14:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Don't put words in my mouth. I merely said that any editor is able to draftify (though I will clarify that I mean this in the technical sense - any editor is able to move an article to draftspace or run the draftify script; I have done so several times myself), and so this does not qualify as abuse of administrative tools. I said nothing about whether Deb's action was correct, nor did I mention justifications, Hitler, or platypi. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 15:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Do you seriously want to claim that this obscure person is anything like Adolf Hitler or Katy Perry? This is starting to sound like a WP:CIR issue. Guy (help!) 19:46, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I never wrote Barakat is like Adolf Hitler, Katy Perry or Platypus (!!!!), and I guess, JzG, even you are able to understand that, you are just using a strawman argument because that is easy to beat. I brought the extreme examples to show it is very obviously wrong to claim any user can just draftify any article. I also did not put words in your mouth, creffpublic, I repeated you. You may be right that technically any user could do this, and I would like to stress that I think this should not be allowed at all for any of the three articles I enumerated, and, as I showed at the very start of this discussion, existing Wikipedia rules on draftification clearly prohibit draftification to circumvent a deletion discussion as was done and continues to be in place in this case. And countless others. Omikroergosum (talk) 19:36, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Overall, Omikroergosum, the problem is that you say you are here to argue that process has been abused, but all you are doing is making arguments that the process arrived at the wrong result. This is a distinction that I hope you are able to grasp. If you believe a process (including unilateral process) has arrived at the wrong conclusion, you appeal it. It is understood and widely accepted that no process is perfect, and that there will be mistakes. That is why avenues for appeal exist. But even if you prove that a process got the wrong result, that does not prove that the process was abused. You would have to prove that an admin did something he knew or should have known was incorrect. It's very clear that you believe they should have known the actions were incorrect, because you refuse to believe that anyone could draw a different conclusion than you did. But convincing yourself over and over does not improve your case. Truth is, this never should have come to AN. You asked Deb to undraftify the article, she suggested asking someone else to review it. You went to Jzg's talk page to... really just vent, it looks like. I really think you should just, generally, chill. Whether your goal is to get your article back up, or to "note for the record" that bad admin did bad thing, the first step is the same: get a consensus that the article should be kept. And the discussion to arrive at that consensus does not take place on AN. Someguy1221 (talk) 20:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Someguy1221, I showed very clearly right at the beginning that the process was wrong as the rules clearly say a draftification is not acceptable as a means to circumvent a deletion discussion. The same holds for the current "courtesy" blanking. I don't care about any single admin, I care about repeated abuse of admin powers, and not only in this case. SoWhy agreed with me that draftification is generally used in a way that, as I believe I have clearly showed right at the start of this discussion, is violating the rules on draftification. If you believe my editing here depends on an article on some celebrity doctor who according to many credible sources makes his money prescribing dangerous medication to healthy people, just look at my history (including in other language versions). Omikroergosum (talk) 19:20, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The speedy keep at AFD was a procedural close, and does not represent a binding consensus. Someguy1221 (talk) 19:33, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Note that Luz & Batista Jr 2017 is not about this person's life and works. It is about a general and widespread problem in Brazil of which this person is one case. Shoe-horning it into the biography of a person is quite wrong and grossly misrepresentative. (Wikipedia:Not every story/event/disaster needs a biography) The "Bomba tô fora" people seem to be trying to make the point that this is about the general population, not just sports, moreover. And certainly not about just one person. Uncle G (talk) 23:06, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Luz, Sérgio Ruiz; Batista Jr, João (2017-06-01). "Os médicos que receitam bombas". Veja (in Portuguese). {{cite magazine}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
  • "anabolizantes" (in Portuguese). Sociedade Brasileira de Endocrinologia e Metabologia. 2019. {{cite web}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

This guy is noteworthy as a doctor omnipresent in Brazilian media who treated a Latin Grammy Award winner (without any allegation of wrongdoing), several soccer world stars, a popular singer who accuses him to have ruined his health with steroids and two undercover journalists who showed he easily prescribes doping to healthy people. It is not just some random doctor who does what countless others do in Brazil, and for which it will be very difficult to identify more than 20 reliable secondary high quality sources even from international media, and had you really looked at the case you could have seen that yourself. I agree there should be an article Doping in Brazil as there are already Doping in the United States/Russia/China, and I already suggested it at the page for this and created Category:Doping by country. I also agree that my own article Júlio César Alves cannot remain in its current state as in this case, in contrast to Mohamad Barakat, that doctor maybe also due to his very common name, is difficult to be identified as notable for anything else than the doping, which can be seen as a single event (even though it was reported twice in different cases). Omikroergosum (talk) 19:20, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Just noting here, Omikroergosum, that the claim you made earlier is neither a threat nor anything resembling one. Using fake claims in order to influence the outcome of a discussion is disingenuous if not downright dishonest. I would prefer to AGF and assume you inadvertently selected a wrong diff, but that will be for the community to decide. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:10, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Kudpung กุดผึ้ง, you found a link where I went wrong. Could have just looked at my talk page to find the right one: [39] Is "stop your disruptive editing. ... you may be blocked from editing." threat enough? Omikroergosum (talk) 19:23, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Omikroergosum, you began this ANI discussion therefore the onus is on you to get things right if you are going to make accusations. It's not up to me or anyone else to go hunting for where you might have made a mistake. And it's still not a threat, it's a standard template warning. Perhaps you should look up a dictionary definition of 'threat'. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 20:54, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• I have restored the article and nominated it for deletion; see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mohamad Barakat (2nd nomination). The article is courtesy blanked and full-protected until the discussion concludes. You might call this an WP:INVOLVED action but 1) this path has been independently suggested three times in this thread; 2) a slim majority of editors commenting desire further discussion; and 3) this thread is devolving into partisan sniping. Also 4) an AfD will put a definitive rest to the matter. So WP:IAR. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:25, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Isn't IAR normally for cutting through bureaucracy, rather than adding to it?-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 15:01, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Nope. IAR generally creates more problems than it solves, because we have good reasons for the rules we have. There's an unsolved question of whether this individual warrants an article at all, even one that is properly written, and only AfD can really definitively answer that question. So we can bicker about whether to restore it or not and then bicker about whether to blank it or not and then bicker about whether to have a discussion or not and then bicker about whether this warrants a deletion review before a subsequent discussion (because it was speedy deleted) and then bicker about what is the right venue for that discussion (because it was moved to Draft:) and only then come to a final result, or we can just cut to the chase and go straight to AfD without all the extra steps. Hence IAR. If it passes AfD, or if it doesn't, the rest is moot. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:10, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

False claims

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Musician, Matt Hales is falsely claiming to be the creator of new animation series, "Ricky Zoom".

The creator of Ricky Zoom is actually the well-known and Emmy Award winning Kids TV show creator, Alexander Bar (see alexanderbar.me and IMDb entry).

Matt Hales has had nothing to do with either the creation, development or production of Ricky Zoom.

Some of the sites that have been edited by Matt Hales with these false claims include:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricky_Zoom Ricky Zoom is a British animated series created by rock musician Matt Hales and produced by Entertainment One and video hosting service Youku. It first aired on Nickelodeon as a sneak peek on September 2, 2019, before its official premiere on September 9, 2019.

https://nickelodeon.fandom.com/wiki/Ricky_Zoom Ricky Zoom is a British animated television series created by Matt Hales and produced by Entertainment One and Youku. For the United States, Entertainment One negotiated a broadcast agreement with Nick Jr. US, which previewed the show with a sneak peek on September 2, 2019. The series will officially premiere on September 9, 2019. The show focuses on a red motorcycle named Ricky and his friends DJ, Loop, and Scoot.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entertainment_One eOne is now gearing up for the launch of its newest property, Ricky Zoom, a brand new animated pre-school TV series created by piano rocker Matt Hales and produced by Alexander Bar. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.92.40.214 (talk) 16:35, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

• Blocked indef. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 20:59, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

  Swarm, I think you responded to the wrong thread.... 💵Money💵emoji💵^💸 13:22, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

  No, User:HiddenAgenda213 is the user reported by the OP, and the user indeffed.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 13:24, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Is there a semi-automated tool that could fix these annoying "Cite Web" errors?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Discussion

Per inquiry, I would like to know if any such tool exists to fix errors like these. They just started appearing out of nowhere today, and if it can be helped, I'd rather not fix these errors one by one manually. Sk8erPrince (talk) 12:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

What page is this from? The history might have clues as to why this is happening. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 12:37, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Also ping Trappist the monk who seems to have been playing with Module:Citation/CS1 today. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 12:39, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

(ec)This appears to have been caused by an edit made to Module:Citation/CS1 by user:Trappist the monk; they have changed it so that the templates ({{cite journal}}, {{cite magazine}}, {{cite news}}, {{cite web}}) require a work or periodical parameter. This will of course mean that a huge number of articles (I dunno, millions I bet) are now showing such errors. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 12:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The changes do not seem to be appropriate at all as there are many changes is a widely used template that should not have occurred without a strong consensus, and they should have been widely advertised. I propose that changes to Module:Citation/CS1 be reverted. However rage and discussion is taking place at Help talk:Citation Style 1. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

(ec x2) Those were an unpleasant surprise to me earlier today. I found this discussion which may lead to the answer. BlackcurrantTea (talk) 12:45, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: It's from Pretty Cure Dream Stars!, but I couldn't see a point in its history wheer the refs failed (looking @Citationbot, e.g.). Mind you, it's had some bizarrely massive fanboy edi-warring in uts two-year history. A discussion some-err-four years ago deprecated hyphenated parameters (i.e. |deadurl= rather than |dead-url=), so I guess it's been restarted. ——SerialNumber54129 12:46, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: I've screencapped it from Precure: Dream Stars. Though, this is not the only page that has this sort of problem. Almost every page I watch (I have over 1100 articles on my watchlist at the moment) have this problem. Examples include Funimation, Steve Blum, Shinkansen Henkei Robo Shinkalion, etc. Diannaa's analysis is sound - the change made to the template has indeed affected a lot of articles. Sk8erPrince (talk) 12:47, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

This looks to be a result of Help talk:Citation Style 1#update to the cs1|2 module suite after 2 September 2019 and the discussions linked therein. Sam Walton (talk) 12:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Sam Walton. Tbh, if that's the "discussion", it looks more like a cosy chat between two editors rather than a consensus-building exercise as found elsewhere on the project. ——SerialNumber54129 12:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

So I take it that this is a case of fixing what ain't broke? I'm sure many of us would appreciate it if we were at least notified that these changes will be occurring. Not to mention, as noted above, this change has affected a large amount of articles, so it makes no sense as to why the change was made without consensus. I agree that these changes will have to be reverted for now to prevent even more confusion from spreading. Sk8erPrince (talk) 13:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I have reverted the change to the module due to it disrupting a very large number of articles, pending its maintainer addressing the errors in the recent update. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:04, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: I'm still seeing errors for most cite web templates. Perhaps more than just that edit needs to be undone? Trappist also edited Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration and five other Module:Citation/CS1 pages. Ss112 13:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, he undid IV's reversion. Can Trappist the monk please come here and discuss the changes? ——SerialNumber54129 13:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict × 3) Well now we've got lua module errors coming out the yin-yang. Please look at Adolf Hitler or Schutzstaffel. This needs an Unbreak Now! please. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 13:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• • • (edit conflict) Trappist the monk reverted my change, which had not fixed the problem anyway. Presumably they're working on it. If it becomes clear they're not working on it, someone should block them and roll back their last 24 hours of contribs, as that's clearly the source of the problem. I have notified them of this discussion. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Your revert was ill-advised so I have undone it. What your revert accomplished was to un-synchronize the suite of modules that is cs1|2. When that happens, MediaWiki will emit glaring red script error messages for almost every cs1|2 template (there are millions of those).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:18, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank god that Trapist did revert. IV's edit made the situation so much worse. Everybody calm down. This has been discussed to no end. Sorry you missed the discussion at Help_talk:Citation_Style_1#Italics_of_websites_in_citations_and_references_–_request_for_comment --- Coffeeandcrumbs 13:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I acknowledge that the revert was ill-advised. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

That is a completely different discussion, Coffeeandcrumbs, with no bearing on this issue. ——SerialNumber54129 13:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Serial Number 54129, no it is not. You are just not understanding how one relates to the other. There was an RfC to make all website names italics. That means all instances where publisher= was used to avoid italics should be flagged.--- Coffeeandcrumbs 13:31, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

No I am just not not. It was an extremely narrow topic with extremely broad consequences, and it is disengenuous to claim that because of A = B. ——SerialNumber54129 13:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree, the discussion was on placing url names in italics, a much bigger broader discussion was needed for a module change. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 13:30, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I get the |deadurl= is being replaced (except that it should have been implemented as an alias first, then removed from articles via bot, then deprecated, to prevent errors), but what's with the update to |publisher=, where "Cite web requires |website=" is reported when |publisher= is used instead of |website=? -- /Alex/₂₁ 13:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Yes, a simple semi-automated change of rolling back this template change would fix it nicely. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:21, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• What amazes me is that a change this massive was made with no advance warning to editors! For example, who thinks it's a good to force removal of the dead-url parameter! Even if it's "redundant" now, there's no reason to not just leave it be (and maybe let a bot slowly remove it). The removal of the work redirect is even worse!... The handling of this entire thing has been FUBARed from Day #1. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 20:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@IJBall: I agree. especially because there are other redundant parameters that are ignored.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 20:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Better preparation

Can we please change things back to the way they were UNTIL this mess can be sorted out and fixed? This is disruptive to the entire encyclopedia. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 13:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Agreed, this is now showing cite web requires |website= for sometimes half of all citations on articles now. Unnecessary. Ss112 13:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict × 3) Trappist doesn't seem to want to participate here, but from the discussion and what they seem to be up to elsewhere, I'd say they made this change to the cite templates/modules to improve the documentation and consistency of citation tags (all good things), implemented the change (causing errors because some of the parameters are deprecated), and is now working on a bot run to replace the deprecated parameters with their new equivalents. If that's the case, then presumably this is going to work itself out in however long it takes for that bot to run. Probably the bot run should have been programmed first and this breaking change made after it would no longer break things, but here we are. Do we just wait it out? I don't know what the alternative is - someone has already demonstrated that just reverting the module is a bad idea. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:37, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

See, I was interpreting the "dead-url" change in the same way as Ivanvector above - as a temporary inconvenience that would be fixed by a bot in due course. Perhaps using such a to-be-replaced parameter some kind of special error message along the lines of "Parameter is being replaced, please change to Foo as appropriate" and only after the bot pass is done switch to the normal error message. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I am not ignoring this discussion. The notion that a bot run should have been done before the changes is nonsensical. Before the changes implemented today, cs1|2 did not know about |url-status=. Had I run a bot to change |dead-url= and |deadurl= to |url-status=, the bot would have been quickly blocked because such changes would have caused unrecognized parameter error messages (such a bot would never have been approved anyway because part of the approval process is to show that the bot does as it is intended to do through short trial runs). See Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Monkbot 16.

Where a bot could have been run, I have done that: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Monkbot 14. This particular bot fixes the wikimarkup errors and the periodical requirement for known named periodicals. Running this bot was limited by the ability of cirrus search to provide sufficiently long lists of article names so now that cs1|2 templates with these errors are flagged, the bot can be more productive.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: regarding the newly-required parameters (|website=, |newspaper= and such) and the related error messages, how much work would it be to temporarily code the modules to only display the errors in preview, or to display the message that Jo-Jo Eumerus suggested above? It would still encourage editors to update the citations to the standard format, but would not generate new red error messages on however many thousands of pages that didn't have errors before this morning. And is there a maintenance category for these errors? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:11, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I understand the desire to show error messages only in preview mode. My anecdotal experience is that such messaging is more often ignored than heeded. If push comes to shove, preview mode can be employed for the missing periodical error messaging.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 17:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Definitely true that error messages only shown in preview are more often ignored than corrected. But so are the red notices in reference sections, except for a dedicated handful of editors. The difference is in how disruptive they are to non-editor readers. We can't force editors to fix these errors, and readers just see things that are broken. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Comment: Just speaking as a random editor here, I know that oftentimes citations to, say, publicly-released government documents will include the publisher (i.e., United States Government Publishing Office, United States Department of State) but not the website if doing so would essentially be restating the same information (www.gpo.gov, www.state.gov). This isn't inconsistent with the examples given at Template:Cite web. There's an argument to be made for having website be the preferred parameter, but, as this has the potential to affect a large percentage of the encyclopedia, I think more discussion - or, at the very least, more preparation - is necessary before making this change. Rockhead126 (talk) 20:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: Why are those required and where was the consensus to do so? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

There are four cs1|2 periodical templates: {{cite journal}}, {{cite magazine}}, {{cite news}}, and {{cite web}}. The cs1|2 periodical templates display an article title in quotes and the periodical title in italics. So, the article title: "Newspaper Article about Raining Frogs" in the newspaper title: Local Daily Gazette. All cs1|2 templates produce COinS metadata for readers who consume citation template bibliographic data using reference management software. When periodical parameters are omitted from cs1|2 periodical templates, that important bit of information is omitted from the metadata. A lot of the reason for the error messages arises from editors misusing |publisher= in place of an appropriate periodical parameter – sometimes with, sometimes without italic markup. COinS does not support a publisher object for periodical metadata so while the periodical name information (in |publisher=) may be rendered visually by cs1|2 periodical templates it is missing from the metadata.

A recent RFC determined that website names in citations are to be italicized. For the reasons described above, and because it is the duty and obligation of the templates to do formatting, website names must go in one of the periodical parameters (it doesn't matter which – the error messages only suggest a most-likely parameter name).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 17:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't believe there is any consensus that {{cite web}} describes periodicals. Kanguole 12:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

In the classic sense of something published at regular intervals with volume and issue numbering, à la journals, magazines, etc. strictly defined, websites probably don't qualify. By a less strict definition where a periodical is a collection of individual articles, pieces, texts, whatever, bound into something published at regular or irregular intervals (a website) then clearly there is an obvious resemblance between the website and the classical newspaper, magazine, and journal.

From its earliest days, {{cite web}} has supported a work title parameter. In the present day cs1|2, work title parameters are |journal=, |magazine=, |newspaper=, |periodical=, |website=, and |work=. While there may be no formal consensus that declares {{cite web}} to a periodical template, our long-standing (15 years) treatment of {{cite web}} as a periodical template indicates that a silent consensus does exist.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I would argue more, based on the talk page discussions over the years at MOS:ITALICTITLE, that more people, in using cite web, jumped onto the "work" parameter because it italicized the name when the website name was usually italized, and publisher when the website name wasn't to be, but otherwise producing the "site title" in the expected location in the template. I suspect 90% of the editors that use cite web/cite news are doing it blindly without any real care in terms of precision that would be important to those in informational science (eg the distinction between website and publisher), as long as they visually get the result they want - which includes that not all website names are italicized per MOS - and that complies with referencing consistency needed for quality articles. There really needed to be an open discussion on this change beyond the technical group's scope, because we're dealing with that 90% being told they were wrong in a rather harsh way. --Masem (t) 13:36, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

MOS:ITALICTITLE fails to acknowledge that citation style is not subject to MOS. I wrote this elsewhere on this page but will write it again here: "MOS cannot override citation style else the provisions that allow editors to choose any of the various different citation styles, per WP:CITESTYLE, would not be permitted." I suspect that "Other types of websites should be decided on a case-by-case basis" (from WP:CITESTYLE) also contributes to the confusion problem because now editors must make a decision without any substantive guidance (what is meant by "type of site" and "kind of content"?) There are no examples or descriptions of website titles that should not be italicized.

Editors tend to go all glassy-eyed when I mention metadata, but that is important to those who consume citation templates via the metadata. Periodical templates that do not use a periodical parameter deprive those users of that very important bit of information that is the periodical name (website name).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:19, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I think this is what it comes down to: it is a good thing to be concerned about metadata now that we have Wikidata and the like. We want things to be computer-legible so that we can improve on how information is used, so there's nothing wrong with trying to standardize a citation template to use that. But, that is coming at two points: people who have adopted their understanding of citations from the MOS or via example, not from citation template needs and desires, and those who are now wondering why all their references have red text that don't seem to match with current expectations. Being "right" does not overrule creating disruption for a lot of people, especially when most were not aware of this. There should have been a longer period of discussion on that specific changes (not just italicizing "website" but also making it mandatory for wikidata), as well as getting editors to start updates before introducing the lack of "website" as an error. I still think there needs to be wholly separate discussion if websites are periodical citations (perhaps there's actually a new class here of a data source that is based on a web site but not considered periodical, I dunno), and if that decides that cite web needs "website", great, let's notify en.wiki and give editors 3 or so months to make changes to their cs1 templates before marking it as an error. --Masem (t) 15:29, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

{{cite web}} has always been used in a wide variety of situations. The fact that some of these situations called for |work= does not mean that all of them did, or that all uses of the template represented periodicals. Kanguole 23:43, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

My mistake, I didn't realize you intended to ask that question of me; thanks for clarifying. I have no idea, I'm just intending to propose a path forward without trashing everyone's work on it and generating new errors in pages that have already been updated to the revised format, but I don't know the technical ins-and-outs. Also, note that pings don't work unless you re-sign your edit. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:40, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

So there was a change that effected millions of articles done without consensus? I mean its okay if you have no idea, but this is now a big problem. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:43, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

It is also confusing with the inconsistence in Template:Cite web/doc, which currently ([40]) lists dead-url= as the parameter to use (in the parameter list and examples), and does not mention url-status=, except for the part that includes "csdoc", or Template:Citation Style documentation/url, which has been updated with the new parameter url-status= ([41]). Oceanh (talk) 16:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: - Please stop making changes while the discussion is ongoing as its only leading to more confusion. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:46, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Imagine how the references section of 2019 Papua protests, which is currently on mainpage, is totally defaced because of these changes. This disruption appears worse than I initially thought. – Ammarpad (talk) 17:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Fixed. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Your edits are in good faith but there is no way you can undo the damage done to millions of articles. If the changes are allowed to stay then editors are going to be spending months on it. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 17:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Where was the testing that is supposed to occur before something like this goes live? If there was any testing why didn't these problems show up? MarnetteD|Talk 19:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Proposal to overturn the mass change made to Module:Citation/CS1 (closed)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

The (now-hidden) problem

Since Wikipedia operates on consensus, making such a mass change that affects a large number of articles is, as noted by many contributors, disruptive to the project. For now, the mass change should be undone so that other users could continue editing without having to worry about fixing problems that don't have clear instructions. Sk8erPrince (talk) 13:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
EDIT: Per request, I will now clarify which changes that I would like to see reverted for the time being:
1) |newspaper= and |website= errors [1]
2) |dead-url= error [2] Sk8erPrince (talk) 18:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support: As proposer. Sk8erPrince (talk) 13:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support: Not every cite web template should require website= (although a majority should use it), but we should not be forcing this upon everybody without a very broad discussion considering it affects a very broad number of articles. Ss112 13:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - This needed to be taken to the WP:PUMP, not discussed casually. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 13:37, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Point of order - I already did that. It didn't fix anything. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Then we need someone to undo all of the changes. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 13:39, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• User:Ttm synced from his sandbox. ——SerialNumber54129 13:40, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  Serial Number 54129, what does that mean, "synced from his sandbox"? – Levivich 17:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose The website in italics inconsistency issue exists and we have ignored it for too long. There are too many articles that have websites in italics and not italics in the same article. This will effectively end the messy practice. There is no point to just brushing the mess under the rug. What is more constructive is to have a bot fix all instances of |publisher= with no |website=--- Coffeeandcrumbs 13:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  This can be fixed by placing the "title=" in italics. (title=''example'') - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 13:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  @Knowledgekid87: Kindly, you are continuing to spread FUD and disinformation, whether you know it or not. Please take a look at where I pinged you at Help talk:CS1. Thanks. --Izno (talk) 13:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  No, it will not. You are misunderstand the issue. It has nothing to do with |title=. The issue is that some people avoid using |website= because it is in italics but an RfC has concluded that it should be. --- Coffeeandcrumbs 13:50, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  Can we all agree that asking for a website when a website is already clearly in the source is considered redundant? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 14:19, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  You shouldn't just assume that every citation across wikipedia that does not use the work=/website=/newspaper= parameter does so because "the editor wanted to avoid italics". Many of them that only have a publisher parameter actually include a publisher in that parameter and that publisher is generally not the same as the website/newspaper title and now unnecessarily produce error messages. Whether or not italics would be used was almost never considered by the editors who added those citations.Tvx1 21:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  It's not possible "to have a bot fix all instances of |publisher= with no |website=", because one can't assume that the name of the website is the same as the name of the publisher, and it can't be derived from the URL. It would have to be done and checked manually. --IamNotU (talk) 01:11, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support - utterly fed up of the continual fiddling that goes on with these templates, each time introducing bazillions of red "errors" that then require bots to flood watchlists in order to fix. - Sitush (talk) 13:43, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Absolutely agree with Sitush. The recent changes lists are often cluttered with pointless minor edits of this nature, which often remove (or add) things that were automatically removed (or added) by a previous automatic edit. It's a silly way to do things and worse, clearly wastes an extensive amount of time of some editors. --Tom (LT) (talk) 23:44, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - A change that makes most every cite on the Wiki go red is bonkers. The initial discussion made reference to a bot that would resolve this, but there is no sign of it having happened. Surely the bot should be run and allowed to get the number of red cites to a manageable level *before* the parameters are put to red. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 13:45, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • See Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Monkbot 16. For your information only. Please don't go there just to complain about the change (WP:NOTFORUM applies) but if you have a constructive comment about the operation or approval of the bot, feel free to add it. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Comment (|website=) This change to the module is correct, and long overdue. A website is not a publisher. It is a medium (like a journal, or a book) through which information is conveyed. Its "title" (represented by the parameter website) is important. The website domain's publisher (usually the owner/operator) is the information publisher of record, just like a journal or book publisher. 108.182.15.109 (talk) 13:47, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support as suggested in the section above, there is a policy-compliant method of dealing with historic problems such as this. Broad discussion as VPP followed by consensus which then, if necessary, leads to back ups first and change second. If this—particularly the latter—had been followed today, we would not be in this situation. And per WP:NODEADLINE, that an issue has been problematic for too long does not override the need for discursive consensus building. Cheers, ——SerialNumber54129 13:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support If I'm sourcing the City of Potsdam webpage, why do I have to put website=potsdam.de as well as publisher=City of Potsdam ? or yadvashem.org when using Yad Vashem's website? It's redundant and it looks amateurish. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 13:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

This is obvious if you know what "Potsdam" or "Yad Vashem" is. Does the average Wikipedia citation editor know? 108.182.15.109 (talk) 13:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Surely "City of Potsdam" is self-explanatory. "Yad Vashem" can and should be wikilinked on first occurrence. Regardless, how does adding yadvashem.org to the citation make anything clearer? — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 14:04, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Diannaa, correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the "website" parameter has always been for the name of the website, not its URL, though I think this is widely misinterpreted, understandably given the name of the parameter. For example "website" wouldn't be "potsdam.de", but Landeshauptstadt Potsdam (or State Capital Potsdam if you're citing en.potsdam.de), according to the "og:site_name" property in the html source. The publisher in both cases is the corporation of the city, Landeshauptstadt Potsdam, which is not translated on the English site. When the website and publisher are substantially the same, the publisher should be omitted. Similarly, the "website" is Yad Vashem. The World Holocaust Remembrance Center, not "yadvashem.org", and the publisher is the same and should be omitted. So for these two examples, you should already have been using "website" only, and omitting "publisher", and nothing is different with the new change requiring "website". Not to say there are no problems with the new change, just that these examples don't really show them. Hope this helps... --IamNotU (talk) 16:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The above is broadly correct. There is need of a required |website= as this is explicitly presented as the "work", i.e. the source. This parameter carries more weight than |publisher= in identifying the source and verifying the material. To me, as a reader of a citation, there is definite and useful semantic information in making these distinctions. In any case, in both examples given, the publisher could also be given as "self-published". The website name though (i.e. whatever the page title is of the index/start/etc. page) is critical. It is like citing a chapter of a book but omitting its title. 24.105.132.254 (talk) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

IamNotU, thank you for the useful info. However most of our editors will not know how to view the source html of a webpage, and though I do know how to do that, I did not know that the page name was encoded there (or how to find it) until you told me just now. The majority of people upon seeing this parameter will just paste in the url or a shortened version of it, creating a different kind of error. In fact that's what they are often already doing. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 19:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Diannaa: Just to clarify: the "og:sitename" is not a standard part of an Html page, nor of the Html recommendation. It is a proprietary tag suggested by Open Graph Protocol for use in social media. So, looking for that property won't help for lots of web pages. Otoh, the Title property is part of standard Html, and is present on practically every web page. In your example, it is: <title>Landeshauptstadt Potsdam</title>. HTH, Mathglot (talk) 23:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Correct. And even though the documentation of |website= at {{cite web}} does not explicitly say so, the html property title is what is meant to populate this field. Previous documentation of the citation templates was not uniform, but was more template-specific. A better thing imo. In older documentation, this was the suggested treatment of |website=. The one size fits all approach to the documentation of these templates can generate unnecessary confusion. 108.182.15.109 (talk) 00:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

[Edit] The html property title of the website's index page (or equivalent) is what was meant above as the content of the |website= field. 108.182.15.109 (talk) 00:49, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

A common idiom is for the HTML page title to contain title and publisher eg. "The History of AARNet | AARNet" [42] We place the former in our |title= field and the latter in the |publisher= field of the template. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 01:46, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The "og:sitename", when present, is more authoritative in explicitly specifying the website name, and is present on all pages. But it's true that it's far more common to find it in the HTML <title>...</title> of the site's home page, which has the advantage of displaying in the browser's tab or window title while on the home page. However, that sometimes includes other things like the word "Home", etc. I opened a discussion at Help talk:Citation Style 1#Better explanation for "website" parameter in docs to suggest adding (back?) this information. --IamNotU (talk) 00:57, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support - Evidently not a fully thought through change. It's not worth creating huge number of errors for the sake of correcting some incorrect italicisation. SmartSE (talk) 13:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support In many cases, using the |publisher= parameter is sufficient, and also creates the proper (lack of) italics. GoingBatty (talk) 13:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support per the multitude of above comments. I'd say it's snowing... -- /Alex/₂₁ 13:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • It is not snowing. This is an echo chamber. I have placed a notice at Help talk:Citation Style 1. --- Coffeeandcrumbs 13:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

    One oppose. We don't fix thousands of articles by breaking thousands/millions more articles. -- /Alex/₂₁ 14:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

    I already placed a notice there Coffee, and I don't see this an echo chamber. There are clearly editors with valid concerns that should be addressed. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 14:03, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support - Creating a massive problem to solve a small problem is never the way to go. Came here due to confused editors at the Teahouse, and my attempt to help them only exposed what a mess this is, with confusing and incomplete documentation suggesting this hasn't been considered properly and planned out in a methodical way to minimize disruption. Hug^syrup 14:03, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  • Comment: I don't know what's right or wrong, just get it fixed. But I hope something is done so that publisher fields are replaced with website fields as should be. Publisher fields should NOT be used for websites. Kailash29792 (talk) 14:04, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
    • That's true for many but not all sources. See my "City of Potsdam" example above for one example. There's many more like that. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 14:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

      If "Publisher fields should not be used for websites", then why does the paramter exist, and not get deprecated even by this mess of red in reference lists? How is "www.thing.com" a more useful piece of displayed information for a reader than a wikilinked "Thing Enterprises" or whatever the company is actually named? I use Cite web for an enormous diversity of online material that is not "news". Why do I suddenly find every article has a sea of red in the references? --Scott Davis ^Talk 14:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Kailash29792, as Diannaa points out, Publisher fields should NOT be used for websites is not correct - though in the "City of Potsdam" example it is. It should be omitted if it is substantially the same as the website name. Otherwise both should be included. ScottDavis, "www.thing.com" isn't what |website= calls for, it should be the plain English name or title of the overall website, usually found in the title of the home page, displayed in the browser tab or window title when on that page. If that title is "Thing Enterprises", then 'publisher' should be ommitted as redundant. If the website name is instead "The Great Big World of Things", then both should be included. "www.thing.com" should only be used if no plain English website name can be found (or it is actually used as the title), but that doesn't happen very often. --IamNotU (talk) 01:28, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

IamNotU Of the six examples currently in the documentation for {{Cite web}}, two have |website=Encyclopedia of Things, one has |website=NFL.com and three do not use that field at all. My usage has generally been to cite the URL, page title, publisher (which goes to credibility of the source), author if identified and date if identified. I have sometimes used |work= for what it appears now |website= might be required, but work is generally more specific than the entire site which might contain several "works". I've been using {{cite web}} since before the website parameter was added in 2013, and apparently hadn't re-read the documentation carefully enough, nor been corrected by other editors. I shall try to update my practices. --Scott Davis ^Talk 03:12, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

ScottDavis, I've just updated that NFL example, which had a broken link, I hope it's more clear now. |website= is an alias for |work=, they're the same thing. The documentation doesn't precisely say what it means I guess. The way I understand it, it's normally the name of the overall website at a particular (sub)domain, and works within that are specified by |title=, though I'm sure there are many valid exceptions. --IamNotU (talk) 11:02, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support. Per Sitush's "utterly fed up of the continual fiddling that goes on with these templates ..." (and GoingBatty's "In many cases, using the |publisher= parameter is sufficient, and also creates the proper (lack of) italics"). I wish some editors would stop playing with functions that effect the entire encyclopedia as if it's their own personal toy. JG66 (talk) 14:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Change ignores the discussion of MOS:ITALICTITLE (which has been brought up several times in its archives). Not all "cite webs" use a website that should be italized, eg things like IMDb, etc. --Masem (t) 14:07, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Question I'm far from an expert on templates but couldn't they have been updated to recognise both the new and old parameters, had a bot run to move data to the new parameter, then remove the old parameter? Wouldn't that have avoided filling every other article with error text, or am I missing something? Sam Walton (talk) 14:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  Exactly what I suggested above. That is, for the deadurl parameter. Not sure what it is that they're doing with the publisher parameter. -- /Alex/₂₁ 14:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support - Should have been much more widely noted, and given instructions to editors on how to fix this error. Was working on 2019 World Snooker Championship, which now has around 80 ref errors with no notes as to how this happened, or how to fix these issues. The "errors" in turn also are still written as being in the correct in the cite web template. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 14:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I fixed the "dead-url" errors on that article for you. There's a few "website" and "newspaper" errors left that someone more familiar with the topic should look into. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:32, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose (notwithstanding my "point of order" comment above) - changes are in good faith and clearly intended to implement consensus and best practice. The errors related to the "dead-url" parameters are temporary and being addressed by a proposed bot run, AFAICT. The errors related to cite web requiring a website parameter are unfortunate but valid, since these refs are in error based on the recent discussion on the module talk page linked from a few places already, and for the most part they require human intervention to correct. I just went through and corrected the errored refs on Canada jay (a featured article), I suggest fixing any featured articles you are familiar with is a good place to start. Reverting the updates to the modules doesn't improve the encyclopedia.

(edit conflict × 4) If Trappist the monk (or anyone familiar with the citation modules) could write in code to hide the "dead-url" errors until after the bot runs, that would be helpful. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:19, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

With all due respect, there appears to be a nearly solid consensus here to undo the changes as redundant. A lot of editors have problems with the changes as I have mentioned above. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 14:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think you're wrong there. There's a wall of "support" comments here but it's pretty mixed between editors wanting to roll back because of the error messages, editors wanting to roll back because the change was hasty, and editors wanting to roll back because they disagree with the result of the RfC and want to use this opportunity to contest its result for a wide variety of procedural and creative reasons, as well as the usual pile-on "I fear change" and "per everyone else" comments. The end result may be that we end up rolling back the changes, but that will hardly solve anything. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Well maybe then we can all have a proper centralized discussion then at the WP:PUMP where a more broad consensus can be reached. I don't think editors are against change, I think its how things were done is the issue here. You cant expect something that effects millions of articles to go unnoticed. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 14:39, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

It is possible and relatively simple to hide the deprecated parameter error message. That is not my preferred choice but if compelled to do so I will after Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Monkbot 16 is approved so that the BAG editors at can confirm without a doubt that the bot works.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:31, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The problem with saying that refs using |publisher= as an alternative to |website= are errors is that many people are not going to fill in |website= correctly. So unlike this {{cite web|url=http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=birdviewing.backyardbirds&species=jays|title=Alaska's Backyard Birds — Jays|website=[[Alaska Department of Fish and Game]]|publisher=[[Government of Alaska|State of Alaska]]}} "Alaska's Backyard Birds — Jays". Alaska Department of Fish and Game. State of Alaska. which is the desired output as I understand from your changes to Canada Jay is that an awful lot of editors will produce {{cite web|url=http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=birdviewing.backyardbirds&species=jays|title=Alaska's Backyard Birds — Jays|website=www.adfg.alaska.gov|publisher=[[Alaska Department of Fish and Game]]}} "Alaska's Backyard Birds — Jays". www.adfg.alaska.gov. Alaska Department of Fish and Game. if they include the |publisher= parameter at all which looks even worse. Nthep (talk) 14:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Editors using the parameters incorrectly is something that should be solved with better documentation, or an error identifying URLs entered in the |website= parameter (which IIRC already exists for other parameters where this has been an issue), not continuing to make the template work in ways that it should not. I admit I'm not sure that my change to the Alaska's Backyard Birds citation was correct, I just saw the discussion regarding the use of those parameters and did something to resolve the error. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:18, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Actually |website= already throws an error if you put a properly formatted URL in it (one that starts with a protocol). |url= throws an error if you don't. Therefore editors familiar with the templates ought to already know that we use full URLs, and you get errors if you don't or if you put them in the wrong place. Editors who aren't familiar will just get used to doing things the proper way. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:23, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose as written. There were many changes introduced in this module update. The proposal should clearly state which of the changes listed in this announcement should be reversed. The rest of the changes should remain in place. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Specific change/reversion accept |publisher= as an alternative to the periodical parameters already listed. Nthep (talk) 14:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support -- from another confused editor, who is puzzled on how such profound changes are being implemented. Rfassbind – talk 14:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Looks to me like a change to the templates was made in order to impose the results of a small discussion upon a vast number of articles. Since it has broken things, it should be thoroughly reverted, tested in a sandbox with testcases, and discussed before it is implemented again. If a bot run has been "proposed" to correct the alleged "errors", that run should receive consensus and be completed before the template is updated to cause errors to appear on articles. ST47 (talk) 14:33, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - I have not been this angry at a change for a ling time and it has taken every inch of my resolve not to swear lots. An idiotic change. Undo the change ASAP and start a proper discussion to make any amendments. GiantSnowman 14:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose in favour of having these particular parameters that are deprecated & can be solved by bots throw some kind of "X is being replaced, please replace with Y as appropriate" custom message until the bots are through. As I said on Help talk:CS1 the normal deprecation error message is confusing in these circumstances where a parameter is being changed, rather than simply being wrong. This was a "social" error, not a technical one. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 14:37, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - there are 38000+ pages affected, and became visually disturbing. These shall be fixed first then when the majority is fixed shall it be changed, hopefully according to consensus. I may reconsider my support if this number gets lowered by a magnitude within a week, which I don't see as feasible, but I can't know what was the idea behind. --grin ✎ 14:37, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose: Too rash, too fast. We, the people that don't understand the changes, shouldn't be jumping the gun to undo them merely because we are pissed at the way they were carried out. The ones that oppose it on the basis that it's an undesirable change in itself irrespective of the way it was implemented, are apparently in opposition to consensus, established via an RfC, no less. Usedtobecool ^TALK ✨ 14:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose mass revert, but certainly support fixing the two main issues. a) |website= shouldn't be a required parameter, and b) |dead-url= shouldn't be emitting a red error either, but rather maintenance categories until is not just deprecated but unsupported. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Why not roll the whole thing back and re-implement it when the fixes are made? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 14:45, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Because any LUA coder, especially of Trappist's skill and familiarity with the CS1 templates, can easily code this in 5 minutes. I would do it myself, but it's LUA, in which I have no skills. Mass reverts would be a fall back that causes new errors due to the new parameters now being used in articles. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Something has to be done though so at least "website=" and "newspaper=" aren't mandatory. This would get rid of a lot of the red error messages. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 15:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support: A mass of red error messages on most of the pages I am working on, that don't actually need "fixing", e.g. Cite web requires |website=. There often is no such thing. Michael Goodyear ✐  ✉ 14:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Millions of pages are showing cite errors. Please don't do this kind of thing without first running a bot to make sure most existing content continues to display as before. Guy (Help!) 15:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose as written. Trappist the monk is being blamed for these changes, but it wasn't even their fault in the first place that all the changes were blocked for months. No deployments could happen for months until a long-proposed change was removed from the sandbox, which only happened after a months-long RfC was closed. You cannot demand that consensus be followed and at the same time make remove the tools used by those who do their best to implement said consensus. However, I hope the most controversial changes can be taken out sooner rather than later, to be given a broader look. Nemo 15:15, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• I would argue that WP:CONLEVEL can apply here as this discussion is getting more attention on the matter. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 15:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support: While the change, in code is small, its effects on Wikipedia articles are massive. We have thousands of articles affected with red "errors". For one thing, they look ugly. For another, such an importang and big change should have been discussed extensively before being implemented. I, and I'm sure many other editors, didn't even realize what was going on. At first I thought I screwed up the citation and kept editing it to fix it. Imagine people trying to do that with every citation and not even realizing that it wasn't their fault. I also don't think it's necessary that, when using the {{cite web}} template that we should also include |website=. For one thing, the website itself is obvious from the url. For another, sometimes the publisher is more important than the website. And if part of the changes are going to occur, such as |deadurl= being changed to |urlstatus=, a bot should have being created to change those things, preferably before they had been implemented. PanagiotisZois (talk) 15:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, especially reversion of cite web requires |website=, cite news requires |newspaper=, and anything similar. This is not always available or relevant, it sometimes duplicates other parameters (e.g. |title=, |url=, |work=, |publisher=), and it messes up millions of otherwise complete citations with red text. The other changes should wait unless/until provisions for adaption on millions of pages (e.g. cleanup bots) are ready and there is consensus in favor of implementation. ComplexRational (talk) 15:27, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support absolutely: Have no idea why no clarifications or discussions were had about this prior to its implementation. I saw these two new errors on an article I created and attempted to "fix" them before I arrived here and realised they were new botched changes. SUM1 (talk) 15:31, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose but support the changes mention by HeadBomb Nil Einne (talk) 15:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Comment: Even {{cite tweet}} generates the error - {{cite tweet|last=Dovere|first=Edward-Isaac|user=IsaacDovere|number=1120717175743045632|title=Biden's team has been fundraising in recent days, and he has been personally reaching out to donors himself - but without so far filing any paperwork with the FEC.|date=April 23, 2019|accessdate=April 23, 2019}} Dovere, Edward-Isaac [@IsaacDovere] (April 23, 2019). "Biden's team has been fundraising in recent days, and he has been personally reaching out to donors himself - but without so far filing any paperwork with the FEC" (Tweet). Retrieved April 23, 2019 – via Twitter.
  • This is easy to fix. Change the instance of | via = →→ | website = in {{cite tweet}}. Any template editor can fix this now. --- Coffeeandcrumbs 15:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
    • Yes, but your proposed fix would incorrectly italicize "Twitter". GoingBatty (talk) 16:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

      GoingBatty, Twitter is a website and should be in italics per RfC. --- Coffeeandcrumbs 17:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

      • • Then please change the Twitter article to italicize each instance of "Twitter". Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 18:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
          • That is completely different issue. When in citation, Twitter indicates the source of information (the website) and not the company Twitter. --- Coffeeandcrumbs 18:21, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
            • Then please change the Twitter article to italicize each instance of "Twitter" when it refers to the website and not the company. Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 20:07, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose There is consensus behind most of the changes. Implement the changes, then re-eval with new consensus discussions. In the mean time, suppress some warning messages until the problems are cleared up. -- GreenC 15:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support unless the problems can be fixed in the next couple of hours. This massive disruption will need all the recent changes to be reversed unless it is fixed soon, Atlantic306 (talk)
• Comment - those saying "there is consensus" - 1) where? 2) how was that discussion publicised? and 3) are you aware that consensus can change? GiantSnowman 15:40, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• You have a point as I have seen others cite Help talk:Citation Style 1/Archive 72#Italics of websites in citations and references – request for comment as the reasoning, but I don't see where the closer mentioned changing parameters. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 15:46, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• I think an issue is that discussion here is confusing about precisely what people are unhappy about. The recent changes seem to have been mention here 2 module suite after 2 September 2019. There is a link to discussion for individual changes, and of course you could discuss the whole set in that discussion. From what I can tell, there was minimum discussion on most of them. However from what I can tell, most participants of this discussion do not know or care about most of the changes like "support single letter 2nd level domain for .company tld". I do not believe a widely advertised RfC at VPP or something will have received much more interest, instead it's most likely just a waste of the communities time. Frankly the main thing which people here seem to care about are the two things which causes most errors. Requiring website for cite web and the resulting error when it isn't provided, and replacing the deadurl parameter. But I haven't actually seen anyone here suggesting there is a problem with expanding the parameter to allow more options. While I suspect a widely advertised RfC would have received a bit more attention than this did dead-url= and |deadurl=, again I don't believe it's likely many people would care other than, as here, being unhappy with the errors in the interim. As I understand it, the errors were intentional because it helps to test and run the bot, but IMO it was a mistake since not surprise that a large number of errors suddenly appearing has annoyed people. As for the website issue, that seems to be the one that many people disagree with. I believe it came about from this discussion Help talk:Citation Style 1/Archive 57#4. add error message for periodical templates without periodical parameter. I do think making it mandatory without a more widely advertised RfC was a mistake. Nil Einne (talk) 16:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

May I add, regarding the 2 parameters in question (website and dead-url): there have been re-occurring discussions over the years about these two at the proper forum. There has been broad support by followers of these discussions for addressing link rot in an understandable manner that includes developments such as hijacking of urls etc. Similarly for website, a main impetus was the (inadvertent) misuse of the parameter by editors. It is also broadly agreed that the documentation is confusing and unhelpful. And, the implementation regarding those two is a mess. But: the rationale is correct (to say nothing of the effort to provide a better citation platform). At some point, these changes should be implemented. 24.105.132.254 (talk) 17:27, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support, per many of the above, particularly Diannaa. - SchroCat (talk) 15:43, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, the template {{cite web}} identifies that only the "url" and "title" parameters are required. That other parameters are now (effectively) treated as required is (at best) a bug. And (at worst) unnecessarily and excessively disruptive to almost every article which uses that template. And other/related templates. Effectively negatively impact almost every article on the project. Recommend reverting until the impact can be further discussed/considered. Guliolopez (talk) 15:57, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support clearly this was not thought out well enough. The template {{Cite tweet}} mentioned above is a good example, the template doesn't even use |website= and still outputs an error. Also, the documentation of Template:Cite news makes no mention of the necessity of |newspaper=. These types of major changes to citation formatting need to be done in separate parts over a longer period of time, with documentation properly updated and a helpful explanation to editors prior to being finalised. Otherwise we end up where we are now. S.A. Julio (talk) 16:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Total reversion to the version that did not introduce those unnecessary changes to millions of pages. Consensus for the change should be sought at well-advertised RfC not on obscure module's talkpage. – Ammarpad (talk) 16:19, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Strong support overturning and speedy close. Introduction of hundreds of thousands (or more) error messages across the English Wikipedia is an unprofessional look if nothing else. The parameter was and should remain optional. — Bilorv (talk) 16:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose rollback of new features which do not affect existing code, but the new error messages should be temporarily suppressed and the change should be re-implemented with more consultation. And there is a big difference between deprecating "dead-url", which can be solved by a bot, and requiring parameter "website", which demands a lot of manual effort. Strobilomyces (talk) 16:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Suppress Messages - The deadurl deprecation is easy enough to sort out with a bot, so I'm not worked up about that, but the sudden requirement for |website in cite web, even when |publisher is present, is a massive disruption that cannot be easily fixed with a bot. At minimum, that error should be suppressed. --PresN 16:46, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Comment: These errors feel unfriendly to casual editors. Even if templates were appropriately documented to indicate that parameters are now required, are these missing parameters so essential that it warrants invoking an error instead of a warning? Many editors fill in the information that they can find; calling missing parameters "errors" may discourage them from adding a citation at all if they don't have all the information. If are truly errors, it would likely be helpful to point editors to citation templates with less stringent rules. —Ost (talk) 16:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - An over-hasty and ill-advised change. I have a TFA coming up which is now littered with these errors. Such a drastic change, without an automated way of resolving the millions of error messages caused, cannot be sensible. KJP1 (talk) 16:57, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support total reversion until consensus achieved and better preparation is done, especially for the website parameter which is practically everywhere. This has very bad impact on how articles look and was very unprofessionally done. --Muhandes (talk) 17:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Please unbreak everything. If you can't make changes with software without breaking everything, you should get out of the software business. Excelsiorsbanjo (talk) 17:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support No discussion was held and i was surprised to see errorts in refs that were not there yesterday. Let's discuss and see what's helpful and what is not (this as of now is not). Kante4 (talk) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support This change has widespread consequences that will require extensive work to fix hundreds of thousands of articles manually. There's no reason the articles with empty addresses in webcites can't be in a maintenance category for those who want to do the legwork, but there's no reason to wreck reference formatting like this. Acroterion (talk) 17:15, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. - Dank (push to talk) 17:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support – Widespread damage, and no consensus for the change. Put the template(s) back to how they were yesterday (when they were working fine), and try again. Help talk:Citation Style 1/Archive 72#Italics of websites in citations and references – request for comment is not consensus requiring the |website= parameter, e.g. so {{cite tweet}} shows cite web requires |website=. Maybe I missed it, but I don't see a discussion anywhere about making |website= a red-error-requirement. The implementation problems of, e.g. deprecating |dead-url=–leading to red errors while we wait for a bot to clean it all up–could have been avoided; see the suggestions above by Alex21 and Sam Walton. We should return to the last good version and then proceed again, this time seeking consensus first for making |website= required (an RfC), and with better implementation for deprecating |dead-url (allow both old and new parameters until the bot is done, or at least suppress error messages until bot is done). – Levivich 17:32, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Suppress the error messages, restart discussion—there are many other useful changes that would be lost if the module updates were rolled back en masse. Many editors commenting here forget, or don't know, that changes to the citation templates and modules are bundled together in periodic updates. An update for a map citation-specific issue made in isolation could cause millions of articles that don't cite maps to run through the job queue. Rolling back this month's update just to remove the error messages at issue will also remove and further delay pending updates that have been waiting for months to be implemented.

  That being said, if, however, the error messages were suppressed, then discussion about some specifics could be restarted before the error messages are restored, and the remaining updates would be left in place. Suppression of the error messages won't prevent the forthcoming bot task to convert |dead-url= to |url-status=, and once that bot task completes, that specific error message could be restored in the next periodic update. Imzadi 1979 → 17:33, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  • To be clear, my support !vote is support for rolling back the entire monthly update. We should restore lgv, immediately, for our readers. Then go forward again with the update: remove from the bundle that which needs to be removed, change that which needs to be changed, and then roll out the update. Further delaying pending updates is a good thing. This update caused problems, we probably should take a second look at all the future updates, too, to avoid this kind of thing from happening again. Not breaking the encyclopedia is more important than keeping to an update schedule.
• Support, the recent changes are really unpleasant. I get red errors (i.e. "Cite news requires |newspaper= (help)") even when I cite news agencies (Reuters, Agence France-Presse, Associated Press, etc.) using the cite news parameter agency=.--Russian Rocky (talk) 17:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, red errors everywhere and I can't see the stupid from the OK ... IABot's been using dead-url until recently and maybe still is unless I'm mistaken. Disruptive change needing rollback are more careful implementation and its wasted 30 minutes of my time today before I've got to this proposal! Djm-leighpark (talk) 17:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Maybe people doing maintenance on a massive software system should learn some basic first-week lessons on how to do that? Andy Dingley (talk) 17:44, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support I prefer how it was before, nothing wrong with the citation element before the change and it worked fine. Govvy (talk) 17:50, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support It's beyond me how someone would think plastering thousands of articles with error messages was a good idea. Kosack (talk) 17:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support There are cases where "website" is redundant or provides no value. The domain name is already in the URL, anyway. Dgpop (talk) 18:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Strong Support:This abrupt change to settled practice has wrecked havoc on the Ref sections of many articles and is totally unnecessary. Even Featured Articles are now branded with the shameful scarlet letter stigma of dozens of deprecated‎ tags. What is the reader to think?This ill-conceived, ill-planned, and ill-executed change should be reverted forthwith.  JGHowes  ^talk 18:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Comment for Sk8erPrince, the proposer: By my count, at least 40 changes were introduced in this update to the CS1 module code, including many bug fixes that have been in development and testing for months. Let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Please specify and list in your proposal which of those changes you would like to reverse. From my reading of the comments above, it appears that the following changes may be objectionable to editors:
  • deprecate and replace |dead-url= and |deadurl=; discussion; note that a bot has been proposed that will update these deprecated parameters
  • periodical templates missing periodical parameter error messaging; discussion

Thank you in advance for this clarification. – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:13, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support' - All of this should have been tested and worked out in advance English Wikipedia is not a test wiki. There have been far too many times when a "consensus" discussion involving a small number of people begets ill-thought out changes that the majority of Wikipedians don't really want, and create messes such as this. The message here is clear, whether you're a template editor, a developer, or the WMF: do better homework. Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Strong support - no need to create red error messages. Perhaps just create a hidden category and run a bot to change "publisher=" to "website=" when "cite web" is used and remove Italics where not needed when we have https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:CS1_errors:_markup .Patapsco913 (talk) 19:18, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  The category is Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical, and a bot run to change |publisher= to whichever periodical parameter applies to the template used would be a bad idea since usage is highly inconsistent. These errors need to be corrected by humans. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:33, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  • Most wikipages have more than one error. Look at Barack Obama, List of Jewish American businesspeople, 1000s of biographies Antonio Guerra (bishop). It will take a lifetime to clean up what are basically formatting errors when the information needed for the user is provided. I do not see why we need to red error messages everywhere.20:32, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support undo in favor of a wide discussion. References are difficult but extremely important in maintaining verifiablity in Wikipedia. Major changes to the reference structure need wider discussion than happened here. The current documentation at {{cite web}} does not indicate that "website" is a required field. Indeed, not all of the examples given there use "website" and are showing error messages. I can't find any discussion of making this a required field. It often isn't needed if the link is to the main page of the site and would be the same as the title. In addition any change in a field name, such as dead-url, also needs a wider discussion. StarryGrandma (talk) 19:30, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support too many things broken because of the change. // sikander { talk } 🦖 19:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support This is not a sandbox! Why can't each "enhancement" be implented one by one, so each one can be fully bug-tested? Is there a rush to deploy all this? Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 19:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support The occasional messed up cite that refill or reflinks creates pales in comparison to this mess. MarnetteD|Talk 19:54, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support – As a developer, I'll resist the temptation to explain how to do this properly, in favor of simply stating a fact: there is a navigation path from where we were yesterday, with no errors and yesterday's functionality, to where you want to be when this is all over, that meets your new functional requirements, and which never results in any red CS1 errors showing on any page, anywhere, for even a second. If you don't know how to do that, consult a developer that does. Mathglot (talk) 19:57, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Per my comment above, way more discussion is necessary before making this change. If we find consensus, we can do this in a way that doesn't threaten to disrupt millions of articles. Rockhead126 (talk) 20:06, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support i find it odd that they changed deadurl to dead-url. but recognizes archivedate, archiveurl, and accessdate. I do not agree with this change at all.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 20:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support The {{Cite news}} template has been heavily affected on pages by the change. JSWHU (Talk page) 20:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. If we're going to use templates, the template parameters should contain true values, in accord with the definitions contained in the template documentation. The parameters should not be set to any old values that make the output look the way the editor want's it to look. If all the editor cares about is the appearance of the citation, the editor shouldn't be using templates. Jc3s5h (talk) 20:46, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • The problem I stressed already is that while this forces a website name to a parameter (or for cite news, to a newspaper parameter) (good), it also forces an italics style which is not 100% appropriate for all websites or news sources, this goes against the MOS. Additionally not all urls have "website names", but may instead have publishers, such as various US agencies (Dept of Energy, USGS, etc.) among other examples. --Masem (t) 20:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. The changes mean we can no longer say "publisher=BBC News". Articles I've edited are littered with error messages, and I'm not going to spend time changing them. The templates are fiddly enough without this. And why would "deadurl" suddenly be deprecated? SarahSV ^(talk) 21:03, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Strong Support: The harm of making the entire references section of every article on Wikipedia almost unreadable surely outweighs whatever minor gains were made by tweaking the module. PvOberstein (talk) 21:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - this was badly done, and something so widespread should have been advertised at WP:CENT. I want this rather than the option below because I believe "publisher=" should be accepted as an alias, with bots changing them silently, no indication at all for the editor. No harm was being done in the current setup, fiddling was, and is, counterproductive. Nosebagbear (talk) 21:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support removal, erspecially of cite web requires |website=, cite news requires |newspaper=, which go against the MOS. Don't see the rationale or consensus for any of these changes. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:27, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Reference sections now look terrible all over the place. XOR'easter (talk) 21:31, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support rolling back of the 'website'/'newspaper' requirement especially. Requiring those parameters was not the subject of the RfC that supposedly justified this change, so just downplaying the prominence of the supposed "error" is not an adequate solution. This should not be treated as an error at all unless/until there is a consensus that these fields are required. --RL0919 (talk) 21:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support: There was a better way to roll this out, and a better way to build consensus for the changes. I believe that we should simply revert and try again, in a more orderly fashion this time. JimmyBlackwing (talk) 21:43, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Comment: It's frustrating to see that these largely unilateral changes still have not been reverted, despite the broad consensus to do so. One editor's opinion on the legitimacy of the work= and publisher= params, among other things, should not override the concerns of the entire website. But I guess Wikipedia has long let itself be driven by the often consensus-free actions of a few. It's just disappointing to see it happen again, over something that affects so many editors. JimmyBlackwing (talk) 16:28, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support: This is just ridiculous: https://i.imgur.com/9UKngCm.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-definition_television GlenwingKyros (talk) 21:47, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support per others. Next time, if someone wants to make a change that will potentially affect every article Wikipedia has, it should be discussed with the community first. Or else there's going to be a mass opposition (and confusion) as you can see here. theinstantmatrix (talk) 22:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. I'm seeing approximately 138,000 articles listed in Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical as having error messages from references that were previously non-problematic. That is far far too much. And Trappist appears to be taking the position that a narrow RFC on italicizing websites (when present) should have very broad consequences including that a website always be present and that publishers should be forced to become websites; that interpretation is nonsensical, baffling, and a troubling step from the maintainer of such a key template. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support not doubting that these changes were made in good faith, but as plenty of others have commented these changes have laid error warnings on literally thousands, if not millions, of citations which just a day ago were previously acceptable to both the vast majority of editors and readers. Inter&anthro (talk) 22:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. There seems to be very clear consensus here; can we fasttrack this so we can un-break the site? Morgan695 (talk) 22:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support partially. The dead-url= error is apparently going to be dealt with by a bot, so I have no qualms about that staying in place. However, there was no consensus to make the periodicals parameter (work=/website=/newspaper=/magazine=) mandatory at all. Only that its content should always be italicized if used. The user made a mistake and made a massive change that affected the whole of wikipedia without it having consensus (making those parameters mandatory wasn't even discussed) and it should urgently be reverted.Tvx1 04:58, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Comment. The existence of various alternate and clarified proposals below, should not be used as an excuse to ignore what appears to be an overwhelming consensus here in the "Proposal to overturn the mass change made to Module:Citation/CS1" discussion. Carl Henderson (talk) 18:12, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. The MOS clearly states that we need to use common sense in how we give cites since not everything under the sun fits neatly into an arbitrary one-size-fits-all style. It's impossible to use common-sense judgment when Skynet here forces everything to be the same way and forbids any exception whatsoever. --Tenebrae (talk) 21:09, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support—the mass change was most ill-advised. Tony (talk) 23:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Revert the errors (including improper use of website=aaa.com), not just the error messages. If website= is required, it requires actual editor knowledge to fill in the NAME of the website, not the URL. Changes, where the errors can be fixed by a bot (dead-url) can wait. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 04:02, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support a full revert of all recent changes to the template for now. There was clearly not enough discussion or consideration made for these changes; that puts all of them in a state where they need to at least be slowed down and given broader consideration before they can be implemented. The tiny amount of discussion made for a change to one of the most important templates on the site was woefully insufficient. --Aquillion (talk) 07:50, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Partial support the {{Cite web}} requirement for a website = is throwing over half a million articles into a clean-up category. It's not clear that there is often a use for , for example https://www.aeaweb.org/jel/guide/jel.php is publisher = American Economic Association there seems no value in having this in website = as well. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 08:59, 6 September 2019 (UTC).
  
• Oppose. All of these changes make perfect sense to me. |dead-url= seems trivially fixable by a bot, and if the URL is e.g. http://www.example.com/page.html, the missing |website= could be mass-populated simply with "example.com". In the meantime, there is nothing really "broken". GregorB (talk) 09:24, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

  That's not quite what website = is for - see my immediately preceding comment. Clearly some websites are known by their core url, such a cryp.to and bit.ly, but others would be Wikipedia or BBC News, for a third class of urls the preferred identifier is not clear, at least to me. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 11:14, 6 September 2019 (UTC).
  

  Having the template say e.g. |website=BBC News is indeed preferrable to saying |website=bbc.com, but then again |website=bbc.com is vastly preferrable to saying nothing. GregorB (talk) 13:00, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Voting on clarified proposal (closed)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

The proposal has been edited to clarify that it applies only to reversion of two changes. This modification of the proposal means that Support/Oppose votes listed above this section header no longer apply to the modified proposal. I believe that Supporting those two changes would be equivalent to Support for items 1 and 2a in the alternative proposal below (please correct me if I am wrong about this). Please comment below on the revised proposal. – Jonesey95 (talk) 19:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• That is not correct at all. The proposal below is not for reverting the changes, it's for keeping the changes but hiding the error messages. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:11, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • I think we are splitting hairs, since the proposer has not written a proposal specific enough for a coder to make changes to the module in an unambiguous way. Revised proposal 2 above appears to request reversion of the |dead-url= error messages, which appears to be functionally the same as item 1 below. I suggest that the proposer withdraw the proposal entirely in favor of the alternative below. – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
    • I think "hide the errors" is pretty unambiguous. It also has already been done. Which proposer are you referring to when you say they ought to withdraw? This discussion is a mess. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:04, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support clarified proposal - as proposer. Mass changes affecting the entire project should be discussed first, with consensus, or else we get a mess like this. These error messages are highly distracting (especially since there are no clear instructions), so they need to be hidden/removed. Sk8erPrince (talk) 19:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose (as stated earlier) in favour of the proposal below to hide the problematic error messages pending further discussion without reverting the many other constructive updates to the citation modules. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:30, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose I prefer hiding the error messages as being discussed below. robertsky (talk) 20:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose I'm far from clear everyone is on the same page, I think I've seen a proposal I've voted on changed after I voted on it and I'm concerned about the cite news requiring newspaper= as not all news is from a newspaper ... I appreciate x person years have dilligently gone into this but we currently have y person years of disruption. I'm basically simple. I have been disrupted. and proposals to back out may be hiding a fundamentally bad issue and perhaps more importantly the reasonably clear consensus for an alternative unambiguous proposal to backout is not being presented is a suitably clear way for a stupid mortal like me.Djm-leighpark (talk) 20:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Alternative proposal: hide some error messages and mollify others

In the section above there's mixed support for doing something so that the red error messages aren't peppered throughout the references sections of possibly millions of our articles, whether that's waiting for a bot to fix it, reverting everything back to how it was yesterday, or something else, but it seems that everyone agrees the current situation is unacceptable. The "undo everything" proposal is above; I have a different proposal.

1. Modify the code for the |dead-url= parameter so that it does not show an error. Then let the bot run and replace these deprecated instances silently. Replace the error message when the bot has completed its run, however long that takes.
2. Modify the code for the |website= and related parameters, based on the consensus here and implementation announced here, so that citations using incorrect format do not generate red error messages, but instead advise (in standard black text) that the use of (for example) {{cite web}} without a |website= parameter is deprecated and should be corrected, with a help link directing to whichever Manual of Style is updated to reflect that consensus. (Thanks to Jo-Jo Eumerus for the suggestion)

   2a. Update the code to categorize any page with such an error in an appropriate hidden CS maintenance category, for editors who want to work on standardizing references project-wide. struck, as Trappist the monk has pointed out that they are already categorized in exactly this way Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:13, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

3. Establish a requirement that all future changes to the citation module must be advertised at WP:CENT and ideally discussed through an RfC on one of the village pumps.

   3-alt: Require that all future changes to the citation module be advertised at WP:CENT, wherever they are discussed.

• Support as proposer. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:46, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support as a patch while awaiting further action concerning the use of |website=, along the lines of my comment above. ComplexRational (talk) 17:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. I don't think replacing red error text with black text advising a change in as many references as the error is showing up in now is a useful temporary solution either, or that the majority of users would want that. Ss112 17:57, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• What consensus? As far as I can find, there was no discussion at those links or anywhere else of anything being wrong with using {{cite web}} without |website=. Kanguole 17:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Consensus is in the first link, which determined the desired format recommendation for templated citations. The specific change (generate an error when {{cite web}} is used without |website=, and likewise {{cite news}} without |newspaper= and {{cite magazine}} without |magazine=) was proposed in the second link (third bullet point, see link there to further discussion). Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Ivan, the RfC (your first link) doesn't mention in the question anything about requiring template parameters. The implementation thread (your second link, including the discussion link on the third bullet point there) doesn't talk about {{cite web}} or |website= or |newspaper=. Instead, the examples given are of title=. Further, there are two people in that discussion. Further further, it wasn't advertised anywhere except on the template page (AFAICT). Where are you getting that there is consensus, specifically, for requiring |website= in {cite web} or |newspaper= in {cite news}? Those words aren't on those pages?? – Levivich 19:00, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

You're right. The discussion ("consensus") in the first link had to do with whether the names of periodicals should always be italicized, and it appears the consensus was yes, they should always be italicized. There was discussion there that identified that |website= displays in italics while |publisher= does not, and that those were the two parameters most often being misused. The second link was a proposal for how to implement the italics consensus, and seems to have also picked up a desire to correct the usage of the two parameters. Trappist observed elsewhere that |website= populates metadata while |publisher= does not, so to my mind website should always be used, but that aspect in particular was not "discussed", it was proposed and then implemented by the technical team behind maintenance of the module. So yes, there's a bit of a leap of logic between consensus and implementation. I do think that gap needs to be better discussed and probably resolved somewhat differently than what's actually occurred, but I don't think that warrants throwing out all of the changes. Just hide the error and start a new discussion to bridge the gap. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: It wasn't proposed in your second link, which points at discussion that didn't mention {{cite web}} or |website=. Kanguole 20:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Partial Support for ##1 & 2/2a. However I believe that requiring all changes to be submitted to other forums and/or be indiscriminately subject to RfCs is counter-productive. I would instead counter-propose that all discussion about proposed changes to the modules be advertised widely, including to WP:CENT, so that wider input is received. 24.105.132.254 (talk) 18:02, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support 1/2 (sans black text). 3 is overkill. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Note - added "3-alt" per suggestions that the original was an excessive imposition. However, it's my opinion that any changes to a module used in templates that might reasonably be expected to be in use on every article on Wikipedia ought to be very widely advertised. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. There is already a strong consensus emerging above that status quo should be restored (which is simpler to do than any emergency patch). This discussion should not derail that. More in discussion section below. – Ammarpad (talk) 18:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. There problems introduced with newspaper= also. This is a failed changed. Without exploring code details interim are likely to be problematic. Needs back out completely to known good state ASAP. Clean backout and then discuss and test an analyzed and tested change which has consensus.Djm-leighpark (talk) 18:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• hiding deprecated (#1) and missing periodical error messages (#2) is simple; I'm opposed to black text rendering of essentially the same thing as the missing periodical error message (also #2). Articles with these error messages are already categorized (#2.a): Category:CS1 errors: deprecated parameters and Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical. For #3, editors are always welcome at Help talk:Citation Style 1 where almost all changes to the module suite ; alas, most avoid that page because, very often, the talk is technical and so may be difficult for many to understand (we have had that complaint especially about me and my writing). Moving such discussions to somewhere more public is, of course, possible but I suspect will not be very well attended. —Trappist the monk (talk) 18:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: so please implement that. Like you said, it's simple. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:06, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support 1 and 2a only. I believe that item 1 is trivial to implement, and requires a change to only one word in the code. Item 2a is probably relatively easy to do as well; it would allow categorization and tracking of cite templates that are missing these parameters, without putting red error messages in front of readers. Item 2 does not conform to any other behavior of the CS1 modules and would probably result in a different kind of confusion, so I oppose that item. Item 3 seems like overkill; we have been updating the CS1 modules a few times per year for many years without this sort of controversy, adding hundreds of new features and fixing bugs in the process. – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Mu because it's 3 different issues that should be handled in three separate proposals, and Oppose 2. Ivan writes based on the consensus here, but that RfC did not address requiring |website= in {{cite web}}. The question the RfC posed was whether website names should always be italicized. It didn't ask whether the |website= parameter should be required. Those are two very different questions–one about a style policy, the other about when a template should display a red error message. There are other ways to implement the RfC result (website names should be italicized), without requiring the |website= parameter (like amending MOS, or updating templates with a missing website= parameter before changing the code to make it required with a red error message if it's missing). This all needs to be discussed, probably in a new RfC, not at AN. – Levivich 18:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support 1 only On the deprecation of "dead-url" parameter, it doesn't make sense to mark it as such until the bot had had the chance to fix 99% of the uses, leaving the few oddities to be recognized by the warning message. This virtually accomplishes that after the fact. However, I take issue on the "website" parameter for cite web as well as things like "newspaper" for cite news. These are a bit shortsighted. For example, recently I have had to site to data available on Brazil's INPE (the group monitoring the forest fires there). Their site has data on the number of fires, and the like. "Cite web" is the right template for this, and to identify the work, I would expect to use the name of INPE ("National Institute for Space Research") in the citation, but I would not expect it to be italicized. But forcing this to "website", it will be. To me, if the website has an actual "name" (like "Deadline Hollywood" for deadline.com) that's where the website would be needed, whereas in the case of INPE, they would be the "publisher" and there would be no website name. Similarly on cite news, if it is forcing "newspaper", what about online news articles from network news? "CNN" should not be italicized. There's too many gotchas that the website/etc. decision did not seem to consider that that should not be re-implemented until it is further thought out. --Masem (t) 18:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support 1 as it's basically my idea. Oppose 3 as overkill. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 19:04, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support 1 since the majority of complaints seem to mostly take issue with all the error msgs appearing. This should help quell that. And tbh while I was confused when I first saw the errors msgs appear I don't see it as a real problem since a bot is already in place to start fixing this particular issue. Won't comment on #2 because I'll just wait to see how the bug is resolved. Mass reversion to me is unnecessary. -- Carlobunnie (talk) 20:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose – I opppose, without prejudice on whether this is a good solution or not. I oppose it, because we should not be discussing how to fix this. We should be stating what outcome we want, such as for example, "no redlinks showing up during the navigation path from the old to the new functionality". it is improper to have a survey on how that should be achieved; that should be left up to designers and developers. Just vote on what you want them to do; not how you want them to do it. Mathglot (talk) 20:03, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support 1 and Oppose 2: Changing the "error" from red to black doesn't resolve the issue that some here don't think it's an error to use publisher/agency in some cases. GoingBatty (talk) 20:11, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support 1, 3-alt the updated parameters should stay, they are more semantic inline with the intent. Suppressing warning should be more than enough while bot(s) work on updating the articles. As for underlying changes to the citation module(s), they are basically a foundation to the site, would be nice at the minimum to have a notification of upcoming changes at WP:CENT. robertsky (talk) 20:15, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support 1, 3-alt - Stick to the "deadurl"s only. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:18, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose I believe it should be reverted completely until a consensus is met. I still don't understand why deadurl is the only constant in the template that changes when there are also archivedate, archiveurl, accessdate. If there is a bot for dead-url, then there should be a bot for all the others too.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 20:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Because dead-url is marked as deprecated while the others you have raised are aliases. Check Template:Cite web for the documentation. robertsky (talk) 05:30, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• hidden: because there seems to be some modicum of agreement that the deprecated-parameter and missing-periodical error messages should be hidden per items 1 and 2 above, I have done so. The error messages will go away in time. To hasten the removal of the error messages from article where they exist, you can null edit those articles to force MediaWiki to refresh the article. The errors are still detected and are still being accumulated in their related categories. please pass the word.—Trappist the monk (talk) 22:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Thank you! – Levivich 22:19, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
  • That gets rid of the red messages, but I don't think it's enough. We now have Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical with 244,000 pages, most of them because they have {{cite web}} without |website=, when there is no consensus that this is an error. Although the maintenance category is hidden, it will lead to our watchlists filling with well-meaning gnomes trying to "fix" what isn't broken. Kanguole 22:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
    • Exactly - forcing "|website=" or "|newspaper=" (which are then being rendered in italics) breaks the MOS. Neither cite web nor cite news can have a forced website/newspaper parameter because there are alternate ways of naming the originating work that is not necessary a website name or a newspaper name. This is not a sufficient "fix". --Masem (t) 04:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. This merely papers over Trappist's non-consensus declaration that web page references must be described as being part of larger websites and can neither be standalone web pages nor pages with a publishing organization but with no separate identity to the site other than that they are from that organization. This was never discussed (what was discussed was merely to italicize websites when present), is not a good fit for many references, and makes the citation templates even more rigid, unyielding, and hard to use than they have been made under Trappist's direction. These undiscussed changes should be reversed, not merely made more clandestinely. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:03, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. It seems there is a misunderstanding about what a title is. We need to be able to write "publisher=" (no italics):

"Female genital mutilation". Geneva: World Health Organization. 31 January 2018.

{{cite web |title=Female genital mutilation |url=http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs241/en/ |publisher=[[World Health Organization]] |location=Geneva |date=31 January 2018}}

Trappist the monk says on his talk page that World Health Organization must be italicized. That is wrong; it would be a style error. That misunderstanding seems to have driven changes to every article that uses citation templates. It's a concern that the normal consensus process has been overturned so that the people objecting have to show consensus. SarahSV ^(talk) 05:08, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I admit I'm no expert on this and I last wrote a citation in an academic work (not Wikipedia) in 2002, but isn't this citation wrong? I'm going by an internet guide to MLA ([43]) and I don't know if that's the intended style, but it clearly advises that for websites, the name of the website is always included in italics, and the publisher is included upright only if the name of the publisher differs from the name of the website. Therefore, in this style, the proper citation is:

"Female genital mutilation". World Health Organization. Geneva. 31 January 2018.

{{cite web |title=Female genital mutilation |url=http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs241/en/ |website=[[World Health Organization]] |location=Geneva |date=31 January 2018}}

In a cite where the website name and publisher name differ:

Williams, Greg (22 August 2017). "When P.E.I. was the last holdout against the motorcar". Driving. Toronto: Postmedia Network. Retrieved 2 May 2019.

{{cite web |first=Greg |last=Williams |title=When P.E.I. was the last holdout against the motorcar |date=22 August 2017 |url=https://driving.ca/auto-news/news/horse-power-ruled-p-e-i-in-the-early-19th-century |website=Driving |publisher=Postmedia Network |location=Toronto |accessdate=2 May 2019}}

Is that not correct? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 11:43, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Ivanvector, your first example is not correct. The MLA page you cite recommends "Author’s Last name, First name. "Title of the Article or Individual Page." Title of the Website, Name of the Publisher ..." The World Health Organization is not the title of a website, just as CNN is not the title of that company's website. They are the publishers. In the case of CNN, their online material is published by CNN Digital. Again, that's the name of the publisher, not a title, not a work that they have published. (They don't italicize it when they write it.) If you and Trappist are arguing otherwise, please cite a reliable style guide that supports you. The Chicago Manual of Style gives an extensive list of the kinds of things that should be treated as titles and italicized.

The RfC on which these changes are based asked: "Should the names of websites in citations and references always be italicized?" It didn't ask "If the website has no name, should be name of the publisher be italicized?" Or "should the publisher parameter be removed?" As Espresso Addict said: "Websites are works, so should generally be italicised where there's an official website title. Where there isn't, or where an unofficial title is being used, they should not be italicised. Publishers of websites (eg the BBC) should never be italicised." SarahSV ^(talk) 23:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

@SlimVirgin: I don't agree, but I appreciate the discussion. The MLA page I linked to also says to always include the name of the website in italics (as in, this is required) and to include the name of the publisher in regular font only if it's different from the name of the website. The WHO link is the website of the World Health Organization and is also published by the World Health Organization, so I interpret that my citation is correct. Yours is missing the required Title of the Website - only listing the publisher is incorrect. Or, my interpretation again: all websites have a name; it may be that the name is just the name of the organization which hosts or publishes the website, but that's still a website name.

What I find interesting is that MLA seems to treat all web citations as the same media type, while APA seems to recommend that the citation format be based on the actual form of the website content, if possible. APA seems to suggest that a news source should be cited just like a newspaper, a book hosted online cited like a printed book, a blog cited just like a print magazine or other periodical, and only use a specific web citation format when the content doesn't fit some other category (or so it seems to me). The Chicago Manual of Style ([44]) seems to agree with that approach. I've already been doing that to some extent but I'll try to be more consistent. But like I said, I'm far from an expert in this.

Under that approach, I would be inclined to cite the WHO source like a printed fact sheet, which is not a periodical. We don't have a {{cite fact sheet}} (Trappist the monk - hint hint) but according to this and this, I think it should look something like:

World Health Organization. (31 January 2018). Female genital mutilation [Fact sheet].

I can get close to that with {{cite book}} (putting WHO in the |author= field) but I can't figure out how to include "[Fact sheet]" with the URL without it being in italics. The important thing overall, since Wikipedia doesn't seem to conform to any one standard, is that we have consistent and easy-to-follow guidance. We can't have some web citations with website names in italics and others not. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 12:57, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Ivanvector and Trappist the monk, this situation is based on a category error. A publisher of a website is not the title of that website. We would never write University of Cambridge as the italicized title of material found at https://www.cam.ac.uk/. Most websites don't have titles; their publishers have decided not to name them. Therefore, when we cite websites, we usually don't have anything (and don't need anything) for the "work=" parameter. As for the idea of creating a fact sheet template, there's no need. We can use cite web. Just don't force us to pretend that the publisher is the title of the site, when it doesn't have a title.

Please look at The Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition (2017), "Titles of Works" (pp. 525–542) in chapter 8; for websites and blogs, see 8.191–192 (pp. 538–539). Titles of websites are not italicized. "Many websites either do not have a formal title or do not have a title that distinguishes it as a website. They can usually be identified according to the entity responsible for the site along with a description of the site and, in some cases, a short form of the URL." Examples given are Apple.com, Microsoft.com, or "the website for the University of Chicago Press, Books Division". Note the absence of italics. "Titles of named blogs (and video blogs), like the titles of journals and other periodicals ... can usually be italicized." When in doubt as to whether something is a blog or a website, it says, treat it as a website. SarahSV ^(talk) 23:31, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

This article is available in an electronic publication that is a website published by the University of Cambridge. With a simple thought experiment, we can imagine that the same article might be available in a print publication that is a journal or magazine published by the University of Cambridge. Further, it is entirely possible that the name of this mythical journal or magazine is University of Cambridge – that makes rather a lot of sense because corporate branding. So too, an eponymous website is just as sensible, and in fact, it looks like that is just what University of Cambridge has done:

<meta property="og:site_name" content="University of Cambridge" />

So, to cite the article using {{cite web}}:

{{cite web |url=https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/cambridge-university-library-unveils-the-rich-histories-struggles-and-hidden-labours-of-women-at |title=Cambridge University Library unveils the rich histories, struggles and hidden labours of Women at Cambridge |department=Research |website=University of Cambridge |date=5 September 2019}}

"Cambridge University Library unveils the rich histories, struggles and hidden labours of Women at Cambridge". Research. University of Cambridge. 5 September 2019.

The website is an eponymous publication of University of Cambridge.

To cite the article as a news article, change to {{cite news}} and |work=; to cite the mythical magazine, change to {{cite magazine}} and |magazine=.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:24, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

If something is so eccentric and anti-intuitive that we have to do "a thought experiment" to get the point across, perhaps it's out-of-the-mainstream. The Chicago Manual of Style is one common indicator of how things are done in the real world. I don't believe Wikipedia adopting an eccentric style helps our credibility. It certainly would add to confusion: CBS News the organization and CBS Evening News the program are two different things, and conflating them by italicizing both simply muddies the water.--Tenebrae (talk) 00:57, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

As a hypothetical to that, what if this was a report published in the 60s, never made available on the web, but otherwise all details are the same - there's a printed copy. We would clearly be using an non-italic "Cambridge" as the publisher here, and there may be no actual italic portion of the name. There should be no difference between how cs1 handles this printed example and the web example when it comes to Cambridge's role in publication. It's really paradoxical to consider any other way. --Masem (t) 00:37, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Trappist the monk, that is your view, but it is an unusual view, so please find high-quality style guides or professional editors that support it. The writers and editors who work for the University of Cambridge don't treat their website as an eponymous publication. The same applies to the writers and editors at the news organizations you want to italicize: BBC News, CNN, etc. They don't treat the companies they work for as works/titles that need italics. Wikipedia follows the reliable sources. SarahSV ^(talk) 00:39, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

This is not really the place to be discussing the technical aspects of citations (neither is my talk page) but, I agree that what you say is correct. World Health Organization is a corporate entity acting as a publisher of information on its own website. WHO has elected to not give the website name different from its corporate name (which from a branding perspective makes a lot of sense). When we cite an utterance from WHO that is published on the WHO website, we are citing a WHO electronic publication, not the corporate entity (the utterance is 'in' the corporate entity's electronic publication) so we identify that electronic publication (the website) as World Health Organization, the eponymous publication of the World Health Organization corporate entity. |publisher= not required here because it is the same or substantively the same as |website=.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 12:09, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

This is creating magazines out of thin air. The World Health Organization is an organization. It is not a website. It beggars logic that now suddenly Sears, FedEx, Borders and the United States Supreme Court are all "electronic publications." --Tenebrae (talk) 21:14, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Yep, World Health Organization is a corporate entity that has (not is) an electronic publication World Health Organization located at http://www.who.int

Similarly:

Sears is a corporate entity that has has (not is) an electronic publication Sears. Assume that for some reason you need to cite the location of an Illinois Sears (corporate entity) brick and mortar store. You might cite information on this page: https://www.sears.com/stores/illinois.html on the Sears (corporate entity) website (electronic publication) so:

{{cite web |title=Illinois Locations |url=https://www.sears.com/stores/illinois.html |website=Sears |access-date=2019-09-04}}

"Illinois Locations". Sears. Retrieved 2019-09-04.

Same with FedEx and Borders. The United States Supreme Court is a governmental entity that has an electronic publication located at https://www.supremecourt.gov/ and titled Supreme Court of the United States. Suppose that you want to cite something about opinions. You might write:

{{cite web |title=Opinions |url=https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/opinions.aspx |website=Supreme Court of the United States |access-date=2019-09-04}}

"Opinions". Supreme Court of the United States. Retrieved 2019-09-04.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:59, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I can see you're the most vocal and prolific proponent of what I consider an extremist position. I don't agree with a one-size-fits-all formula when even the MOS says to use common sense since not everything fits that formula. I would also suggest that simply because the corporate entity such as Sears has a website doesn't mean Sears is suddenly in the journalism business. Making a non-impartial source like a corporation appear to be a journalistic source does not help Wikipedia, in my view.--Tenebrae (talk) 22:10, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I am not an advocate of one-size-fits-all; more an advocate of one-size-fits-many-or-most. cs1|2 is a general purpose citation tool that is sufficiently capable to handle most citation needs. As a general purpose tool, it will impose some restrictions on what can and cannot be done but that does not make it a one-size-fits-all tool. I've written elsewhere in these discussions that MOS does not control citation style; if it did, WP:CITESTYLE would be meaningless.

Show me where I said anything about Sears being in the journalism business. I'm pretty sure that I did not. So, if there were no other alternative and one had to cite that page on the Sears website and using |website= makes the citation look too much like a journal citation (your position, correct?) then perhaps cs1|2 is not the right tool and the citation should be hand-crafted (minding, of course, the strictures of WP:CITEVAR).

You have declared that making a non-impartial source like a corporation appear to be a journalistic source does not help Wikipedia. I will stipulate that a primary source like the Sears (corporate entity) website is not a preferred source. What is it that conveys the appearance of a journalistic source? Explain how that appearance or style does not help Wikipedia.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 23:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

You said entities like the World Health Organization (and by extension Sears) are doing "electronic publishing", and when the average person knows that newspapers and magazines are italicized and company names are not, then, yes, it looks like Sears magazine or World Health Organization magazine. At base, that's misleading.

If the citation template not only italicizes automatically but also forbids un-italicizing when common-sense exceptions as in the MOS are needed, then that is indeed "one size fits all", which is extreme.--Tenebrae (talk) 22:01, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

The citation example by SarahSV is indeed, incorrect. There is no source specified. The source, in web citations, is a website. The cited webpage is an in-source location. Basically what is cited is an article in a journal, and the journal's publisher, without providing the journal name. We don't normally say "I found it at WHO". We say (or mean) "I found it at the WHO website". In the discussed citation, |website= must be used. It will properly emphasize the source as being the citation's most important item. The publisher (who may publish many different websites) can be omitted in this case, since it is the same as the source. The citation as currently mis-formatted, has it backwards. 108.182.15.109 (talk) 12:35, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The problem is that this decision was done without reviewing the MOS, which presently says websites may or may not need italics, after many discussions there. Maybe the MLA way is right and they always should be, but that goes back to where this change was not at all presented to the larger editor audience of en.wiki before it was added. This type of change needed consensus to be made at the larger scaler, in contrast to something like the dead url one which is more technical driven. --Masem (t) 12:52, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)There was an RFC that held that, in citations, website names should be italicized (you were there as the first respondent). MOS cannot override citation style else the provisions that allow editors to choose any of the various different citation styles, per WP:CITESTYLE, would not be permitted.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:42, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

It is arguable whether citation formats override MOS or vice versa, but I can tell you from the MOS discussions that they were treating those as if they applied to citations as well as prose text (hence my comment on that RFC). There needs to be unity between MOS and citations, not one overruling the other. Any change like that should have been conducted with the envisioned changes at the MOS level as well, and that itself would also affect other citation styles to be consistent with MOS; if the change on citation style is kept, then we absolutely also need to change the MOS to be consistent. Also, that RFC implied it was about the website parameter, but not forcing that the website parameter be used, so as identified above, there's a gap in the level of consensus between that RFC, and the changes actually made. --Masem (t) 13:56, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Hindsight is wonderful isn't it? This edit to MOS:TITLE occurred some two weeks before the RFC started; the reasons for it explained in the edit summary. I do not think that we need or want unity between MOS and citations because doing that would invalidate WP:CITESTYLE which allows editors can use any citation style that they would like to use so we would have to settle on some sort of a 'house style' for citations. Good luck with that.

We don't need to change MOS except to clarify that it applies to prose and does not apply to citations which have their own style rules.

The question posed and the closing statement in the RFC make no mention of |website=. I can only surmise that because the RFC was conducted at WT:CS1, you came to some how believe that the RFC was specific to cs1|2. I disagree. There is no restriction in the question or the closing statement that confines the RFC to cs1|2 and therefore |website=.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:00, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree with Masem. Making the periodicals parameters mandatory was never discussed. The only consensus that was achieved that the contents of these parameters should be shown italicized if they are used. Right now, the change that flags the citations without the periodicals as having a cite-error should reverted. It didn't have consensus (it wasn't even discussed) and causes site-wite disruption. The discussion regarding the fine-tuning of the MOS and citation formats is not one that should be right here right now.Tvx1 15:42, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

It was discussesd, but only for |journal=/|magazine= of {{cite journal}} and {{cite magazine}}. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:33, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Do you have a link to that discussion?Tvx1 02:07, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Trappist the monk, this is neither here or there at the moment. The fact is that there are many articles using the relevant citation templates with a publisher= parameter which correctly includes a publisher name which is clearly different from what would be the periodical title. There was no consensus whatsoever that this is problematic and needs to be flagged as a cite-error, nor that the periodicals parameters should be mandatory. The only consensus that the discussion you based your change on yielded was the the contents of the periodicals parameters should be displayed italicized if those parameters are used. Thus, per the above lengthy discussion, you should urgently revert your change that causes the omission of the periodicals parameters as an error.Tvx1 13:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Yes there are many periodical templates that use |publisher= to correctly identify the publication's (website's) publisher. I have never disputed that. There is no prohibition from adding |publisher= to any cs1|2 template except the preprint templates: {{cite arxiv}}, {{cite biorxiv}}, {{cite citeseerx}}, and {{cite ssrn}}. Periodical templates that use |publisher= but do not use a periodical parameter to identify the publisher's publication (the periodical name) are incomplete and deprive readers of that important bit of information. There are many many {{cite news}} templates out there where |publisher= holds the name of a newspaper but |newspaper= (or any other periodical parameter) is not used so that the citation renders improperly with the newspaper's name in upright font. That is an error. Newspaper titles, as we all know, are to be italicized (MOS:ITALICTITLE – a case where MOS and cs1|2 citation style agree). This same applies to journals and magazines. And I will assert that this same also applies to electronic publications (websites) regardless of whether the publication's name and the publisher's name are the same.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:00, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

However that is just your view. There is no consensus on making the periodicals parameters mandatory. In fact that wasn't even discussed. Your change making them mandatory is thus inappropriate and you really should revert it as soon as possible. Then if you think this is worth discussing you should start a proper discussion on making them mandatory in the proper venue.Tvx1 16:23, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I am in agreement with Tvx1, stop making things mandatory and get a consensus on it. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 17:01, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I also am in agreement with Tvx1. Forcing a one-way-or-the-highway position, making no allowances for common sense, as the MOS in fact allows, is extremist. --Tenebrae (talk) 22:05, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

It is mandatory to require a source for a citation. A publisher is not a source. What is not mandatory is using these templates. If you think that they hinder verifiability (the only reason they are there) then by all means present your sources the way you see fit. However, the entire CS1/CS2 suite has been misused to no end. Part of that misuse resulted from ill-conceived design decisions, some of which are still in effect. There has been a long slog through the past few years to actually put things right and make CS1/CS2 worthy as a citation platform for non-experts. There have been involved discussions about both major design decisions, as well as minutiae, and several RfCs. The present changes hardly happened in a vacuum. They are part of the long process to rationalize the system. I don't agree with everything that Trappist does, and sometimes our views on the overall direction diverge. But he's doing the grunt work in a very important area with help from only 1-2 others. Was the issue at hand implemented badly? I don't think anyone disputes this. But it seems the pitchforks came out to do away with sound citation design decisions. 65.88.88.69 (talk) 17:29, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose. 1 is not that much of a problem that it should be reverted. A bot is going to resolve it anyway in due time. 2 is not in line with consensus at all. The usage of the relevant cite templates without the periodicals parameters is not deprecated at all. On the contrary. The change flagging this as an error should be reverted altogether. I do support point 3 though. That is a no-brainer.Tvx1 13:49, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose 1 and 2, support 3 (obviously). The change needs to be reverted first thing, before anything else; there was plainly not enough discussion and consensus-building before making such a sweeping change to a one of the most widely-used templates on the site. This change essentially forced through one interpretation of the MOS by fiat with almost no discussion; the idea that anyone could think that was acceptable, or that those edits could have a snowball's chance in hell of remaining in place until / unless a clear consensus is demonstrated in favor of them, seems a little bit mind-boggling. Merely hiding the error message is sloppy and insufficient, and the idea of running a bot to make major wide-scale hard-to-reverse changes to back up a plainly-contested change is headache-inducing. People need to stop, revert back to the status quo, then try to build a consensus for the sweeping controversial changes to citations that they're suggesting here. --Aquillion (talk) 07:47, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Alternative proposal (Discussion)

• Not sure why this path instead of simply restoring the earlier version which did not introduce this pollution and then gain clear consensus for any proposed change. But anyway, what's clear from the emerging consensus above is that, status quo should be restored. Things should go back how they were yesterday. Nothing is broken that requires emergency disruption like this. Going forward, we need point no. 4 of course. Even though massive disruption like this whether in good faith or not is already prohibited by the spirit of our policies. – Ammarpad (talk) 18:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

There were quite a few changes in the modules with the latest iteration. If the problematic ones could be dealt with in isolation, without any side-effects, why not? 24.105.132.254 (talk) 18:23, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The disruption is more than the good edits. Hundred of thousands of pages are defaced overnight. To separate the wheat from the chaff we need to go back to the status quo, and that's simpler than any partial solution – Ammarpad (talk) 18:43, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

No, we don't. Of the multiple changes to the templates that have been wonderfully transparent, there are two causing problems: the "dead-url" error notices, and the error notices related to required/suggested parameter usage in the periodical citation templates. It's the error messages that are problematic, although it seems some editors also want to reopen discussion of whether the guidance on italics with the periodicals is warranted, but regardless, the proposal addresses the error messages. Why mass-undo months of work when the two main issues can be easily resolved? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

If the problems are easily solved, why haven't they been resolved by now, and a black warning on millions of articles is still an unwanted invasion, regards Atlantic306 (talk) 20:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Because it requires someone familiar with LUA, and CS1 templates, to do them. Such as Trappist the monk, who is the primary coder of CS1 templates. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 20:11, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

No, what's required the most is to revert the changes and go back to the status quo; the time before this mess. Thereafter the master guru of the LUA should properly test their changes (maybe on testwiki not on production) before disrupting million of pages again like this. – Ammarpad (talk) 20:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• This is taking too long, so I'm going to go ahead and clean up the remainder of your mess now on the pages I care about. If you break them again, I will be back. Excelsiorsbanjo (talk) 16:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Close?

Can we have this discussion closed so that more attention can be focused on the individual proposals? This may be just me but I see a clear consensus above for undoing the changes. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Agreed. The plethora of ugly red errors have been in place for too long, and no bot is going to fix millions of articles in a hurry. Ss112 20:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Just to clarify for the record, I am not in favor of scrapping anything yet and want this to move into more discussions on the matter. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Also for clarification: there appears to be strong consensus to revert the changes to the templates (at least for now). Should it now be okay to do so and revert to the earlier version while discussions on how to move forward are ongoing? Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 21:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

It appears the revert was executed.Tvx1 21:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Nothing really has been done though as the error messages remain. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Knowledgekid87: it takes some time for the changes to filter down from server caching. If you're on desktop, whatever page you're on, add ?action=purge to the end of the URL in your address bar and say "yes" to the resulting dialog, that should clear the cache and update the page for you. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 22:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @Tvx1: But it isn't. The disputed version is still the latest. Trappist only hid the error messages. Still though, better than nothing. theinstantmatrix (talk) 22:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The error messages were the contentious thing to begin with. There might be tweaks needed to categorization, or some other problematic things that came with the update, but there's nothing requiring a mass revert to before September. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 04:28, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm fine with whatever as long as I don't see those pesky error messages. Sk8erPrince (talk) 04:30, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I have to disagree with that. From what I see in this thread, there was no consensus to make the work=/website=/newspaper= parameter mandatory in the first place. There only was a consensus that its content should be rendered in italics if used. The person who made the change to the module based on that consensus made a mistake and it should be reverted as soon as possible.Tvx1 04:50, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I also disagree. It's not the error messages that are contentious, it's the error in the first place. A blank "website" field in a {cite web} should not generate an error, and there was no consensus for having made that change. It needs to be undone, not just hidden. – Levivich 13:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

And it no longer generates an error anymore since the messages reporting missing websites as errors were disabled. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:48, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

It still populates Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical, which I assume means it's still generating the error. That category has 343,000 articles and growing. – Levivich 22:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

There is still something broken in this new module code even with the suppression of the error message. Take a look at this article Midland–Odessa_shooting and scroll down to item number 26. After that entry all the cites are indented and messed up. Octoberwoodland (talk) 22:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

That's how that specific cite is coded: as a reference embedding several citations in a bullet list. It's nonstandard but it's not an error with the citation module. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 22:50, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Comment I want to note to any passing admin that there has been no closure nor has there been full implementation of consensus. This really needs to be addressed. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:30, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Agree. As evidence that Trappist has implemented the non-consensus "hide the error messages" option instead of the strong consensus "go back to previous behavior" option, I note that Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical has now grown to some 300,000 articles, erroneously tagged by this tracking category as having bad citations. I spot-checked and these are definitely coming from {{cite web}} (which should not require a publisher or web site) rather than from other citation templates where a publisher might reasonably be required. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:20, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
    • People wanted to revert to the previous version to get rid of those error messages. These error messages are now gone, so the need to revert is also gone. Whatever further tweak needs to be done to the template can be raised and discussed at Help talk:CS1 as usual. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:45, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
      • The overwhelming consensus here is to return to the previous behavior where cite web with no website and no publisher was not flagged as an error in any way. Ignoring that consensus and declaring that this must be handled as a "tweak" in later discussions is the wrong way to go. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:49, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
        • Concurring with the need to revert and walk these updates out in a more consensus-driven, careful way, per the massive discussion above. Even without the visible error messages, the error backlog is now needlessly huge, simply because one editor decided to introduce a change (namely, the requirement of "website=") without discussing it first. That, and the unannounced deprecation of so many params all at once, some of them for unclear reasons, has led to mass confusion about how exactly a citation template is supposed to be filled out now. I've been using "work=" since the 2000s, and now it's gone overnight. Chaos like this is not a good practice for the world's most important website. We're big, and that means we need to move carefully, slowly and steadily—none of which happened here. JimmyBlackwing (talk) 19:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

          Perhaps you are mistaken?. You wrote:

          ...the unannounced deprecation of so many params all at once... – two parameters and their aliases (two) were deprecated: |dead-url= & |deadurl=, |lay-summary= & |laysummary=; that's not very many; yes, they occur on a lot of pages but that is not the same thing as so many params

          I've been using "work=" since the 2000s, and now it's gone overnight – none of the periodical parameters have been deprecated or made to go away; none. |work= still 'works'; try it

          —Trappist the monk (talk) 19:53, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

          • My apologies on the deprecation of "work="—I was going off things I'd read in these discussions, and I had no way to test it myself because the error messages have been suppressed and I don't understand the back-end code well enough to check. Nevertheless, what I said about the unilateral implementation of the "website=" requirement still stands, especially per Masem's very large number of words on the subject elsewhere in this thread. I'm also very heavily against the sudden, unannounced deprecation of "deadurl=" in favor of the new format—at the very least, we needed a grace period to adjust before a change that affected over 100,000 mainspace pages took effect, assuming there was even consensus for this change at all. None of this needed to be rolled out as chaotically and forcefully as it has been; there's certainly no rush. JimmyBlackwing (talk) 21:44, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Revert back to the longstanding behavior and then discuss (closed)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

While the error messages have been suppressed, citations are still not displaying properly. It is usual to revert challenged changes and then discuss. Lets go back to the April 20 version of CS1 citations and then discuss the individual changes. The module documentation is at Module:Citation/CS1.

The code change was

• 11:06, 3 September 2019 diff hist +7,443‎ Module:Citation/CS1 ‎ sync from sandbox;
• 11:06, 3 September 2019 diff hist +2,920‎ Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration ‎ sync from sandbox;
• 11:05, 3 September 2019 diff hist -207‎ Module:Citation/CS1/Whitelist ‎ sync from sandbox; current [rollback] [vandalism]
• 11:05, 3 September 2019 diff hist -1‎ Module:Citation/CS1/Date validation ‎ sync from sandbox; current [rollback] [vandalism]
• 11:05, 3 September 2019 diff hist +1,012‎ Module:Citation/CS1/Identifiers ‎ sync from sandbox; current [rollback] [vandalism]
• 11:05, 3 September 2019 diff hist +1,359‎ Module:Citation/CS1/Utilities ‎ sync from sandbox;
• 11:05, 3 September 2019 diff hist -1,550‎ Module:Citation/CS1/COinS ‎ sync from sandbox; current [rollback] [vandalism]

The following changes are what is needed to restore the citation behavior:

• Revert Module:Citation/CS1 to Special:Permalink/893307475
• Revert Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration to Special:Permalink/893779298 (April 23 version)
• Revert Module:Citation/CS1/Whitelist to [[Special:Permalink/893307470
• Revert Module:Citation/CS1/Date validation to Special:Permalink/893310188
• Revert Module:Citation/CS1/Identifiers to Special:Permalink/900551956 (June 6 version)
• Revert Module:Citation/CS1/Utilities to Special:Permalink/893307454
• Revert Module:Citation/CS1/COinS to Special:Permalink/893307448

Thankyou. StarryGrandma (talk) 15:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• • oppose a simple revert like this will introduce another set of errors on pages that have already been worked on by users to fix cs1 errors in general. If anything, my only gripe is the sudden new compulsory fields as it may require more than just an automated fixing. The revert you are suggesting include stuff like deadurl and url-status. robertsky (talk) 15:41, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Actually, some errors are still present, particularly with |publisher=. I just noticed the error when I was browsing Marzia Kjellberg. [1]

Can someone please suppress the error message for this too? Sk8erPrince (talk) 15:43, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Those error messages are actually a good thing and they errors should be fixed instead of suppressing the error messages.Tvx1 16:18, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The right thing to do would be to fix the errors, rather than complain that they're being pointed out. Those errors were the result of someone using the |publisher= parameter and trying to use wikimarkup force it to display in italics, which has always been improper. I changed the parameter to |website= and removed the markup, and added the publisher where I could find one; there's no red left in the refs section. I also updated url-status and fixed the inconsistent dates. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:23, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

But the problem is that calling these "errors" was a decision made by a few that have unilaterally decided that all web citation must follow a periodical format. That's clearly not consensus from this discussion. Maybe the community would decide that should be the case if put to an RFC to specifically address it, but its been stated that this was made based on an assumption from past behavior, and not by a formal RFC. Because this affects citation format, and not just busy work to help with metadata (as in the case of dead-url) this still remains a problem --Masem (t) 18:40, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The errors in this particular case were actual errors, you can't pass style markup in a cite template parameter. Displaying an error message may have been a change in the recent update, I'm not sure, but these were incorrect regardless and needed to be fixed. They weren't "missing parameter" errors. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:45, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

At the core is the fact that with the change, the cite web template requires that the name of the site be in website (which is fine for meta-data stuff) but that will automatically render as italics. There are clearly editors that feel that some set of web sites should not be rendered in italics. Yes, these people (including myself) have habitually used things like work= and publication= to get the italics or non-italics without any additional formatting aids in the past. I fully agree that from a proper citation format that's not acceptable in the long run as it can fail to capture metadata, and getting people to use the unified website= for the web site title and stop "mis-using" publisher= in general is something that needs to be fixed. But again we are then back to the fact that there is clearly a concern about forcing the web site name to be italics with this change - its likely why people came dependent on work=/publisher= since that gave them the right control of how the web site name was formatted. Because MOS does not force web site titles in either direction, it is wrong for the new cs1 templates to force this by a few editors (as well as inadvently calling their choice an "error") Maybe after on RFC on the specific issue we'll have consesus that this behavior is appropriate. Or maybe as I've suggested we might need a separate web citation template for non-periodical-like websites. I don't know, but I do know that discussion was absent before the change was made, and absolutely necessary to have now, and per STATUSQUO, we should be seeing how to revert back to the previous behavior until a better consensus is made, without losing the other changes. --Masem (t) 19:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose the pressing issues were fixed. Concerning citations are still not displaying properly, I'm going to put a big on that. If there are issues with anything, bring those to Help talk:CS1. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:46, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but no issue was fixed at all. The error messages were merely hidden. I agree that a complete revert is overkill, but the change that flags citations not using the periodicals parameters with a cite-error is still very much active (albeit hidden) and should be reverted as soon as possible as there was no consensus to apply that in the first place. In fact it wasn't discussed at all. Surely reverting that one change can't be too difficult?Tvx1 16:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

It's not technically difficult: the cite web/website issue could be fixed by removing , ['web'] = 'website' from Module:Citation/CS1. But it is proving astoundingly difficult in practice. Kanguole 16:29, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The problem was that this caused a dozen billion errors to show up in articles. Now they don't. So yes, the issue is fixed. Further tweaks to the template's behaviour can be discussed at Help:CS1 errors, but reversion does not help anyone. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The issue is not fixed, as a perusal of Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical (291,000 entries and climbing) will show. This bit of overreach needs to be reverted, not stone-walled from a position of fait accompli. Kanguole 16:49, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree it needs to be fixed, and the person who made the changes held accountable. Its upsetting to me to still see editors frustrated over this. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:52, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

It is also forcing the unilateral decision of a few editors that all citations to web sites must be treated as a citation to a periodical, which I think is clear, from this discussion alone, needs to be reviewed and determined at a larger scale. And it is the apparent resistance to revert at least that portion of the set of changes to give time to discuss that raises some questions. Hiding the red sweeps all those issues under the rug, but they're still there. --Masem (t) 16:56, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

If there is a clear consensus above to not make parameters mandatory then why is it not being implemented? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:59, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Among the big singular change made were several bug-fixes and other behind-the-scenes improvements that no one clearly has any issues with, but separating those out from the problem edits is something that takes an expert in Lua scripting to do without breaking anything. Reverting all those throws the baby out with the bathwater. --Masem (t) 17:41, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose - the pressing issue was dealt with, and the remaining issues should be solved through discussion. Reverting will reintroduce errors and break other things. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

No, it wasn't. See Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical. The non-consensus change to make periodicals parameters mandatory is still causing disruption. It should be reverted as soon as possible as it was never even discussed.Tvx1 17:35, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The visible errors were corrected. Articles populating that category still have errors requiring repair, but neither the category nor any related error messages are visible to readers. There is no pressing need to revert, and doing so will create new errors. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:47, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

There is no consensus that, for example, {{cite web}} without |website= is an error – that was a unilateral decision, without even a prior announcement. Placing these in an error category will invite gnomes to "fix" hundreds of thousands of articles that are not broken. I understand you got your fingers burned, but this one is easy to fix. Kanguole 18:01, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

It's not an error for websites, no, but it is one for journals/magazines. But that's trivial to tweak, and does not require a revert to the August version. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:52, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh, I agree with you about journals and magazines (not sure about {{cite news}}), and I haven't suggested a complete revert. It is indeed trivial to fix this item, and I would like to see that happen, soon. Kanguole 21:07, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Question - Why does {{cite news}} apparently require a |periodical= parameter why a newspaper is being cited. A newspaper and a periodical are two completely separate things. This is affecting hundreds of shipwreck lists that newspapers are extensively cited in. Mjroots (talk) 06:20, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose - If this solved anything then I would be supportive, but per Ivan we need to discuss how to fix the remaining issues rather than create new ones. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:57, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Going forward (discussions proposal) (moved)

Moved to #Going forward (discussions proposal) below. Primefac (talk) 19:22, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Markup not allowed in certain parameter

There is still some red ink breakage of some articles from these changes. 2019 Dayton shooting is an example. "Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |website= (help)" listed in red ink in the refs section. Octoberwoodland (talk) 20:40, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

That's not the same error. The source of these refs in that article are using forced italics in the website= field. I fully agree that the website/work/newspaper/publisher/etc. fields should not accept formmatting mark-up to work with the citation templates. That's a fixable error, unrelated to the main issue. --Masem (t) 20:49, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

@Masem, Octoberwoodland, Ivanvector, and Trappist the monk: I made a hack-y userscript for this occasion User:MJL/ARA-light.js. I'm still working out the bugs (the script doesn't know what to do if markup is found in the middle of the work parameter (ex. 中国票房 (China Box Office), but it's somewhat stable at the moment. You just always have to double check it. I'm going to be using it to help me sweep through Category:CS1 errors: markup right now. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 21:24, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Like this one?

{{cite web|url=http://www.cbooo.cn/Alltimedomestic|script-title=zh:内地总票房排名 ("All-Time Domestic Box Office Rankings")|work=中国票房 (China Box Office)|publisher=Entgroup|language=zh}}

内地总票房排名 ("All-Time Domestic Box Office Rankings"). 中国票房 (China Box Office) (in Chinese). Entgroup.

rewrite to use the proper parameters:

{{cite web |url=http://www.cbooo.cn/Alltimedomestic |script-title=zh:内地总票房排名 |trans-title=All-Time Domestic Box Office Rankings |script-work=zh:中国票房 |trans-work=China Box Office |publisher=Entgroup |language=zh}}

内地总票房排名 [All-Time Domestic Box Office Rankings]. 中国票房 [China Box Office] (in Chinese). Entgroup.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:33, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

All of these changes need to be coordinated with the authors of Citer https://tools.wmflabs.org/citer/citer.fcgi and refill https://tools.wmflabs.org/refill/ or all of the wonderful tools editors depend on are going to be busted and not work properly. Has anyone checked out to what extent these changes may render Wikipedia tools editors depend on to auto fill and edit refs unusable? Octoberwoodland (talk) 21:46, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I would also propose that before instituting sweeping changes to the code architecture for refs, a period of time where certain parms and arguments which are slated for change be marked as "depreciated" but still supports the older formats until enough of the refs in the project are converted (maybe by a robot over time converting refs in all the articles) rather than abruptly altering the architecture and breaking the entire project? That's how Linux makes these types of sweeping changes, they flag the older code as depreciated but everything still works. Octoberwoodland (talk) 21:56, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I would encourage the writers of these other tools to mind what is happening at Help talk:CS1, better, I would encourage them to actively participate. cs1|2 is not static. It, like any other project at en.wiki, is dynamic and always in flux. It is not proper to blame me or other editors who participate at Help talk:CS1 when toolmakers do not participate in the decisions that we take as cs1|2. Development is slow-paced at cs1|2, toolmakers have plenty of time to influence and accommodate changes as they are developed.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 22:18, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Well, you are currently the torch bearer for this issue. Perhaps you could contact them and let them know that the tools people depend on are now broken since they are not using the updated parms for constructing refs. I would hope you would be proactive and let them know immediately, and possibly before you pull the trigger on these types of changes in advance and coordinate with them. I depend on Citer and so do a huge number of editors on Wikipedia and it's now out of date as a result of these changes.  :-) Octoberwoodland (talk) 22:25, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Deprecated, not depreciated. Sorry, accountant pet peeve. I agree there should be an announcement and transition period before this sort of change starts generating red error messages. I'll happily review the script in the morning, I'm on mobile at the moment. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 00:01, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

TTM's suggestion for proceeding?

As of this writing, there are 688,560 pages reported in Category:CS1 errors. (Fun activity: click on that category, and then click "update this page" to watch that number rise in real time.) Of those 688,560:

• 190,306 Category:CS1 errors: deprecated parameters (the |deadurl= error) – These, as I understand it, are going to be fixed by a bot that is currently awaiting approval.
• 363,085 Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical (the |website=, |newspaper=, etc. errors) – These, as I understand it, must be fixed manually by editors.

The error messages are hidden right now, per consensus above, so we can't see them, to fix the errors that need to be manually fixed. If we un-hide them, we'll go back to having the red errors everywhere. There's been a lot of discussion above, but I haven't seen Trappist the monk's suggestion for how we proceed from where we are now to having these errors cleared. (If I missed it, my apologies, please point me to it.) Thanks in advance, TTM. (Fun fact: in the time it took me to write this, we went up to 689,788 CS1 errors, 190,588 deadurls and 363,761 missing periodicals.) – Levivich 00:19, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

If you want to see the hidden error messages so that you can fix the problems, add this to your personal css:

.citation-comment {display: inline !important;} /* show all cs1|2 error and maintenance messages */

Only you can see the error messages, they remain hidden for everyone else.

I have made no suggestion for how we proceed from where we are now to having these errors cleared. Why? Because I don't think that you (the collective you) know what it is that you (again collective) want. Some want to rollback the entire change; others are content with the current state of affairs, others are somewhere in between. If it is appropriate for me to make suggestions once the collective have decided, I will.

{{clc}} shows current count of entries in a category. These values refresh at every page save:

• Category:CS1 errors: deprecated parameters (0)
• Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical (37,759)

—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:57, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I feel so bad for the editors that have to go through all of this manually. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 01:03, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick and thorough response and clc template, TTM, though your explanation for why you're not offering suggestions was surprising. I hope you'll forgive my using a dramatic visual aid, but above is the vote graph for #Proposal to overturn the mass change made to Module:Citation/CS1 as of now: 65 in favor, 10 opposed. Would you agree with me that the collective have decided, and it is now appropriate for you to make suggestions? Do you think it will swing the other way if we wait, or what? – Levivich 01:59, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

You know that I don't hangout here so tell me: Are decisions here made solely by vote count where force of argument plays no part? Seems an odd way of doing business for a community where consensus is trumpeted as the way important decisions are made.

If I understand your graphic as support of what you (the singular you) want, you personally, and 64 other voters are advocating for a complete revert of the module changes. In the interval since my last post here, several other editors have commented. I think that their comments support my point that the collective haven't settled on what it wants. There have been a variety of views expressed. At the the vote graph page there are six other 'votes'. Six other 'votes', it seems to me, is indicative of a community that isn't really sure what it wants.

I am not standing on a high horse and I do hear what you all are saying but what I hear is a cacophonous roar and not a choir.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 11:03, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm shocked that you do not understand what it is I and 65 others want. It's written right at the top of the proposal. A full reversion was what I advocated within the first few hours of this clusterfuck, and if you had done so at that time–immediately reverting–you probably could have fixed the issues and pushed out a new update by now. Instead, we have a massive multi-day timesink and rapidly approaching a million pages with errors. Worse still, correct errors, like a missing |journal=, do not display right now, due to the patch you put in to fix the error messages you created. We are not in a better place today than we were three days ago; we're in a worse place. You have offered zero suggestions for moving forward, because you're waiting for us to sing like a choir? And you say you're not on a high horse?

The thing that everybody wants is for you to make it so |website= and |newspaper= are not required parameters. Please either do that or offer an alternative solution. – Levivich 13:30, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Do you not see the contradictions in your own statements? You wrote (just now): ...what it is I and 65 others want. It's written right at the top of the proposal. A full reversion was what I advocated... and then The thing that everybody wants is for you to make it so |website= and |newspaper= are not required parameters. These are two different and contrary 'solutions' to the problem spoken by the same mouth. Do you not see why I described what I hear as cacophony?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:48, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, they are two different solutions. One (full reversion) was the solution I advocated in the beginning. That one didn't have consensus. The proposal was updated. The second solution ("un-require" website and newspaper) is what the proposal was changed to, and what has consensus. The second solution is a subset of the first solution. Anyone in favor of the first solution would also be in favor of the second. Just like anyone in favor of the second solution ("un-require") would also be in favor of your patch (hide the error messages) as an interim measure. And really, we're just talking about {{cite web}} not requiring |work=, right? Yet you have not provided any suggestion for how we're going to make that change to (as of now) 485,000+ pages, manually. Again: Will you kindly either implement the proposal or suggest some other alternative for proceeding? – Levivich 14:00, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)This response is to your original wring before you modified it.

I'm not sure that one can say with any surety that editors who voted for complete revert will accept a 'subset' solution (remove the periodical parameter requirements from {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} for example). Just so we are on the same page, you are talking about Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Proposal to overturn the mass change made to Module:Citation/CS1, right? If so, that modified proposal requires me to revert the periodical parameter requirements test for {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} and to revert the deprecation of |dead-url= and |deadurl=. That is what the proposal says, right?

Now, here you are with this: And really, we're just talking about {{cite web}} not requiring |work= parameter, right? What am I to make of that? This, it appears, is your third (or possibly fourth) position: 1. revert the whole thing; 2. revert periodical parameter requirements for {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} & revert the |dead-url= deprecation (the modified proposal); 3. revert periodical parameter requirements for {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} (expressed here earlier); 4. revert periodical parameter requirements for {{cite web}} (expressed just now). Argh!

And these proposals? Where do they stand?

• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Voting on clarified proposal
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Alternative proposal: hide some error messages and mollify others
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Close?
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Revert back to the longstanding behavior and then discuss
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Going forward (discussions proposal)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § NSH001's suggestions for proceeding

It's becoming increasingly clear to me that what you want is for those parameters to be required so that everyone must italicize websites always. Yet, you do not provide any solution for how we're going to make that change to a million pages or more, manually. I believe that websites, because they are publications, should be italicized; because {{cite web}} has always been treated as a periodical template, emits periodical metadata which needs to be fed from a periodical parameter. I've made no secret of this ever.

Until now, I have understood that when you wanted my suggestion for proceeding, you wanted to know what I suggest be done with the module suite. Now you are asking for a different suggestion. {{cite web}} is commonly misused in place of {{cite journal}}, {{cite magazine}}, and {{cite news}}. I have an approved bot task that can repair many of those misuses. For example, see this diff. For that bot to work effectively, it needs Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical because cirrus searches will return the same unfixable pages search-after-search. If the community here decides that I must revert the whole, or revert per one of the various subset solutions, then Monkbot task 14 is rendered more or less impotent – but then, there will be nothing 'broken' so nothing to fix except possibly {{cite journal}} and {{cite magazine}} templates.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:46, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Well, of course it's my third or fourth proposed solution–I'm throwing out solutions in the absence of you throwing out solutions. It's not like you've presented us with a menu of options, or really any direction whatsoever. You're still dodging the basic question I keep asking: how are we going to clear the 485,000 errors? So here's my fifth proposed solution, in the absence of you giving us any concrete options.

If you're looking for clearer marching orders, then I'm inclined to launch yet another RfC asking for an admin to remove from Module:Citation/CS1 the following string: , ['web'] = 'website'. Once this string is removed, as I understand it, {{cite web}} will no longer require |website=, and that will remove many if not most of the 489,000 (as of now) pages in Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical‎. What are your thoughts on such a proposal? Will doing this have the intended effect? Are there other steps that must be done? Will it break something else? – Levivich 15:58, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I'd also add removing ['news'] = 'newspaper' too in this, eg when citing BBC or the like. That was also identified as an issue. --Masem (t) 16:01, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Masem, I believe somewhere in this mega-thread, someone wrote that because |newspaper= is an alias for |work=, as long as any of the "work" aliases (work/newspaper/magazine/journal/website) are filled out, it won't result in an error for {{cite news}}. I'm not sure if that's true or not. – Levivich 16:09, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Reading the module code and {{citation}} documentation, |work= is a fine instead of |newspaper=, but it still renders that in italics. If I am citing BBC or CNN via {{cite news}}, I will be using |publisher= to get a non-italic version of CNN/BBC. Its the same issue as the |website= (which also can use |work= but still again ends up italicized).

I am not an expect in Lua but know coding and if all that it took to revert this situation is to remove four words of code, I'm extremely concerned here about how many words it has taken to get here. --Masem (t) 16:17, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Ah, that's a good point about the italics, Masem. Also, I share your concern about the number of words it's taken to remove four eight words of code. The way I see it, the first proposal demonstrates overwhelming consensus to remove , ['news'] = 'newspaper', ['web'] = 'website' from Module:Citation/CS1. Not trying to lay anything at your feet or anything, but I'll just sign off by noting you have the necessary permissions and WP:BOLD is our motto. – Levivich 16:37, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I am aware of that, but I would need really strong assurance that removing those would not break 100,000s/millions of pages at this point. I'd be really afraid if we kept toying with something this visible and reused without clear guidance, and I don't know enough of the modules or Lua to know what dependencies there are. My read is that yes, that's all that it would impact but this isn't a case where I'd want to experiment. --Masem (t) 16:48, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, any of the periodical parameters will work in any of the periodical templates. I've been wondering what would have happened if the error message were:

—Trappist the monk (talk) 17:12, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

It would appear that you did not read what I wrote or what I wrote was cryptic enough that I failed to make myself clear.

I have not presented anyone with menu of options because there are already a handful of options on the table from revert-the-whole to do-nothing and other points in between (which are already enumerated above). In this public forum it is the duty and obligation of the forum participants to decide; that is why all of these discussions were begun.

I described what it is that Monkbot task 14 needs. If you delete , ['news'] = 'newspaper', ['web'] = 'website' from Module:Citation/CS1 then {{cite web}} (and {{cite news}}) without a periodical parameter which uses |publisher= to name a news, magazine, journal source will not be correctable by the bot task because finding those offending {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} templates will be crippled by cirrus search's limited abilities (5000 pages max, always starting at the same place). Have I explained what it is that is needed for the bot task to be useful?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 17:12, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

If , ['news'] = 'newspaper', ['web'] = 'website' is removed from Module:Citation/CS1, then the only things that will "break" are certain sub-tasks of Monkbot task 14, otherwise we'll be "fine"? – Levivich 18:04, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Hmm. I know we're edging for reverting but to try to offer a different forward approach: TTM: Is it possible to introduce a new parameter, maybe |no_pi= ("no 'periodical' italiciition") or even |pi= that if set to yes, triggers the change of format of that periodical parameter? (I want to say the default should be for keeping the italics in the cases of cite news/web; the parameter should never be allowed to be used in cite journal or newspaper (I think).

If this is possible, then there's a route forward that keeps the changes, but gives the tools needed to fix things, in that now a cite news/cite web that lacks a periodical field but has "publisher" could automatically be moved to use |work= along with | for example, so that 1) you have filed in the periodical parameter to make metadata and the bot happy and 2) you have editors that didn't want this italicized happy that the source name remains unitalicized. Obviously, this would need to have community approval, and I would keep error messages suppresed until a bot can run through to covert the "broken" cite news/web before the red text can come back. But that would satisify your goals, make the fixes automatically for everyone else with this bot, and then just a matter of unlearning the use of |publisher= as a formatting trick.

I dunno how reasonable this is, but this avoids the revert of the changes, minimizes what can be broken further (this would only be a single change in {{citation}} if I understand it to catch this new parameter) and only requires a "relatively" simple bot to convert |publisher= to |work=. --Masem (t) 19:30, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

There aren't enough unresolved proposals already? I appreciate the suggestion, I do. But ... please, don't raise additional proposals when there are so many here that remain unresolved. Please, please, convince the community here to make some decisions. Once decisions have been made then from whatever results from those decisions, forward progress has some chance of success.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 22:08, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I thought that would be crystal clear by now. TTM needs to revert the undiscussed change that still flags citations without periodicals parameters as a cite-error. That’s the actually contentious, disruptive issue we have all been complaining about.Tvx1 02:13, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

By comparison, the italicize-websites RfC had 27 !votes, 18 of which were "italicize" [45], and that was consensus enough for TTM to make the change. – Levivich 03:18, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

But as pointed out several times, that RFC did not ask about making "website" a required parameter in cite web or "newspaper" in cite news. TTM indicated above they took the fact that we normally have italicized websites that cite web should be a periodical-style format on their own terms, no RFC to discuss. That's where there's a disconnect here because that part of the implementation is what is pushing all the errors. --Masem (t) 03:45, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• The correct way for many of those errors to be cleared is for Trappist the monk to back down from his high horse and revert the changes that caused cite web with no website or publisher to be marked as an error. Those cites are unproblematic and there was no consensus for this change. Or is it time to start treating Trappist's intransigence on this issue as a case of WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT and treat it as we usually treat such cases when they reach AN? —David Eppstein (talk) 01:38, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Agreed, consensus must be respected here. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 03:12, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

The only thing that needs to be done here is to have {{cite web}} stop categorizing things into Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical. There is no need for reverts beyond this. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 03:48, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Headbomb, and then what? – Levivich 04:16, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

And then nothing because that's solves the last remaining issue with the September 3rd update to the templates? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:22, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

That's sweeping under the rug. May make people happy but will not solve the larger problem. One key action is a new RFC on if in cite web , "website" should be required, how to deal with broader MOS consensus reflected here that if website is required it may not always be italicized, how to make sure citation date is presented right to populate wikidata, and so on. Not an issue do deal with here. But until we have that discussion, the current state of cs1 - even by hiding the error - is a broken-but-working implementation, not quite the equivalent of "a broken close is right twice a day", but along those lines. Reverting it would unbreak it. There may be other ways to unbreak it too, but that's what needs to be done in the short term to resolve this. --Masem (t) 04:27, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Perhaps you are mistaken? As far as I know, this is the first time that dates have been brought into these discussions. There was a minor fix to date formatting that removed extraneous space characters around the ndash in Month–Month YYYY dates. cs1|2 does not populate wikidata; where did that come from?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 11:03, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

My apologies, I typoed. I mean "to make sure citation DATA is presented..." Did not mean anything about dates. --Masem (t) 15:51, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Agreed with Headbomb. In software development, a reversion means throwing out the entire set of changes, which includes all the bug fixes and other changes along. Levivich what's next would be carrying out a discussion on resolving the differences between MOS and CITESTYLE and any other prior consensus, arrive at an understanding which TTM can implement out sanely. robertsky (talk) 04:30, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

66 editors have expressed their preference that |website= and |newspaper= not be mandatory. What more discussion to do we need? – Levivich 04:44, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

None. They should be mandatory. They are the sources. You cannot have a citation without a source. And you cannot verify wikitext unless you have a citation. 72.43.99.138 (talk) 13:55, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

which is what Headbomb is advocating for. in order for it not to be categorised as an error, the module has to be modified to make the two parameters as optional. no? This is not a reversion of all the changes that TTM had put in, rather it is specifying what further changes are needed. robertsky (talk) 05:53, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I dont agree that we should hide the errors just because more revisions were made to the template. We deal with revising content all the time. Sometimes revisions are hard work. I understand that working on the code of a template is more complicated but I think an older functional template is better than a broken one. Also, for a template so vital for Wikipedia, shouldn't other Wiki projects should have been informed before making such big changes?Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 06:44, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

The missing periodical "errors" are not errors. This citation is complete and fully correct and it is redundant and visually unappealing to add a work parameter to it: {{cite web | url = https://www.bbc.co.uk/ | title = BBC - Home | publisher = [[British Broadcasting Corporation]] | accessdate = 5 September 2019}}. But it would be put in an error category at present. — Bilorv (talk) 08:32, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Bilorv's example is wrong. First, the citation lacks a title of any particular article within the vast BBC website, so if the cite is supporting the kind of claim one would ordinarily put in a Wikipedia article, such as Boris Johnson's birth date, the title of the article that supports the specific claim should be given. Second, due to the vast quantity of information available at the BBC website, the title of the website should be in italics, not double quotes. In the unlikely event one were making a claim that is supported by the website as a whole, such as "the BBC has a website", one would format the citation as {{cite web | url = https://www.bbc.co.uk/ | website = BBC - Home | publisher = [[British Broadcasting Corporation]] | accessdate = 5 September 2019}} which renders as

• BBC - Home. British Broadcasting Corporation https://www.bbc.co.uk/. Retrieved 5 September 2019. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)

That rendering illustrates a true deficiency of {{cite web}}. Jc3s5h (talk) 19:19, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• There is no website called "BBC - Home" so your citation is not correct. Of course it would be a bizarre choice of reference page but it was simply an example. The website does not have a name, merely a publisher; only some of its subpages (e.g. "BBC News") have a name, which is the point I'm making. — Bilorv (talk) 20:15, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

  In my opinion, the title of the website is BBC - Home. But this sort of difference of opinion about the title of a work could also occur with paper publications if the publisher does not follow normal conventions: stuff like words scattered around the cover at weird angles. Jc3s5h (talk) 20:47, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

  Your opinion is wrong and you should feel bad for expressing such a wrong opinion. It is likely that you are mistaking the title of a single page (the top-level page that one reaches when visiting the BBC site without specifying a subpage) with the name of the whole site (which, I agree with Bilorv, doesn't exist in this case and should not be required to be specified). —David Eppstein (talk) 00:36, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

  you should feel bad for expressing such a wrong opinion — David Eppstein, this is far too harsh. — Bilorv (talk) 16:12, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

decision time for this community

There are various proposals on the table that will require me to do something. Because of the extent and variety of these proposals, I think that I am hamstrung until you, the community, make a decision.

The BRFA for a bot task to convert deprecated |dead-url= and |deadurl= to |url-status= has just been approved. I am unwilling to run that task as long as this community here has not decided what it is that I am to do with the cs1|2 module suite. If I run the bot and you-all decide that the whole module suite should be reverted or, if you confirm Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Proposal to overturn the mass change made to Module:Citation/CS1, then all of the bot's work would also need to be overturned.

Please decide.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:57, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Honestly, Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Proposal to overturn the mass change made to Module:Citation/CS1 seems like a WP:SNOW in favor of a revert. You need to revert now (honestly you should have reverted three days ago, as soon as objections started to appear and it became clear your changes didn't have a clear consensus), then participate in discussion over how to move forward. Changes to a template intended to enforce a particular style guide are obviously controversial (and at this point, looking at discussions, it seems impossible to think that they could ever reach consensus), so they need discussion and a clear consensus before being implemented, not after. As someone only now joining this discussion, I'm baffled to read through all that only to realize you still haven't reverted yourself. This is the sort of backlash that would call for an "oops, my bad, let's go back to the stable version while we work out what the consensus is" if it were, say, a slightly-controversial point on a single article, let alone a significant change to a widely-used template. --Aquillion (talk) 08:03, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

I think it's actually very clear what the community wants. They want you to revert the change that made periodicals parameters mandatory without that having been discussed. The manner in which this should be achieved has different opinions. A number of people call for a total revert of all your changes (which actually is overkill), others request that just the parameters missing being flagged as an error is removed. But the end goal is clear and I think you know well enough what you have to do to no longer make these periodicals parameters mandatory and that's what nearly everybody wants. So do it already.Tvx1 09:24, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

What Tvx1 said. Only the changes that throw the "periodical" parameter error messages need to be reverted. The rest of it is good (per Trappist's usual high standards), specifically the "dead-url" replacement, which is highly desirable (though Trappist should have implemented that one in stages, but that is water under the bridge now). A bot is ready and waiting to fix that one, and should be run ASAP to clear that particular error message. It's time for an admin to close this long thread to that effect. --NSH001 (talk) 11:07, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

I will echo all others above to say yes, the clear consensus is to revert all the new changes and this is something that you should have done since the very first day instead of this prevaricating. If this changes, and the uncanny refusal to revert despite the glaring broad opposition, were by say a template-editor, I am not sure if they'd still be able to technically edit any template for that matter. – Ammarpad (talk) 13:10, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

The Proposal to overturn the mass change made to Module:Citation/CS1 has been closed in favor of some other yet-to-be-determined solution specified by one or more of the remaining proposals. It is evident from the comments here that the community is not yet in agreement about what that solution is:

Editor Aquillion appears to favor revert the whole

Editor Tvx1 appears to favor reverting all of the periodical parameter changes but notes that there are others who favor other solutions

Editor NSH001 appears to favor reverting all of the periodical parameter changes

Editor Ammarpad appears to favor revert the whole

You all need to reach a consensus because this forum especially makes decisions on consensus. You can continue spending words chastising me if you would like, but I would prefer that you spend the time, the energy, and the words in pursuit of a decision.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:13, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Here's the consensus: Neither {{cite web}} nor {{cite news}} require any periodical parameter. This has been obvious since day 1. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:24, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Two editors favor reverting the whole, two editors favor reverting all of the periodical parameter changes. Therefore, all four editors favor reverting all of the periodical parameter changes (as do a bunch more in the thread below). Your comments claiming there is no consensus strain AGF. – Levivich 16:08, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

NSH001's suggestions for proceeding

• In the short term Trappist (or somebody) needs to revert out the changes that are throwing the "requires |website=" or "reqires |newspaper" error messages. Possibly one or two others (I haven't had time to examine all of them in detail).
• Other useful changes should not be reverted out (notably bug fixes and the "dead-url" replacement).

In the longer term, we need to develop a new policy to handle this sort of disagreement. On the one hand, we have a group of editors who would like to see organisations treated within citations (but not elsewhere) as if they were creative works (sorry, this is just a crude summary for brevity). I strongly disagree with this view (and I will revert people and bots that try to impose it in articles I am working on), but it's one that can be validly argued. On the other hand, my view and, apparently, that of the majority above is that it is ridiculous to treat organisations as if they were creative works, whether in citations or not.

We already have precedents for this sort of thing in ENGVAR and CITEVAR. Perhaps we can have a new policy, or perhaps we can merge it into CITEVAR. The key points are:

1. The treatment (or not) of organisations as creative works within citations should be consistent within any one article.
2. Consensus needs to be obtained on an article-by-article basis. It's clear to me that there is never going to be a strong enough consensus to impose one of these styles on the whole of en:wp.

It will obviously take some time and effort to refine the details of such a policy (there's more to it than just the organisations/creative work issue, though that's the one that bugs me the most).

--NSH001 (talk) 08:25, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• support robertsky (talk) 10:23, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Expanding on my vote as I was typing hastily while commuting. NSH001's suggestion is pretty much inline with what I feel about this changeset. Not all should go, only some which are deemed contentious by majority of the editors here. The hardwork done by TTM shouldn't be thrown out totally. Side note: For the past few days, I had been going through references on several pages manually and updating them and realised that many editors (myself included) had been using Cite web template quite liberally and for different classes of references, i.e. AV media, press release, etc, etc. Maybe this happened because previous iterations of Cite web had been loose in terms of what's being allowed or not. This should stop as the metadata derived from wrongly used templates may impact on downstream readers who may rely on the metadata to automatically pick up the refs for whatever purposes. So please, please be judicious in using the cite web template or think twice on using the convenient tool to generate citation in the visual editor, and if you have the time, update some references to the right citation templates while editing your articles. robertsky (talk) 18:09, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• oppose I think that a better route is to hold a RfC on the use of the |website= parameter and possibly a companion RfC on |newspaper=. I don't like using a CITEVAR-like rule here as WP:V and assorted policies and guidelines on referencing indicate that some kinds of information is needed in references; I think that setting some minimum standards in the citation template codes is appropriate, the question is how to decide on them. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 10:27, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't understand: are you questioning the need to display sources in citations? Because when you cite anything in a website or newspaper, the sources are the website and the newspaper. 72.43.99.138 (talk) 14:01, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

No, I am questioning whether that information should always be put into a |website= parameter; sometimes the website is the publisher and sometimes just the platform. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 14:19, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Websites do not publish anything. They are containers of information like books, or magazines, or photos. Other entities publish websites. These entities (the publishers) may be included in a citation. What must be included is the proper (searchable for purposes of verification) name for the information container, whether such is a book title, a journal name, or a website title. 24.105.132.254 (talk) 20:20, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Websites do not publish anything. Oh yes they do, just as blogs do. The lead to our Publishing article makes it clear enough by defining publishing as " the dissemination of literature, music, or information." They don't have to be creators of the content, and I think that is the legal situation in many countries. Moriori (talk) 23:40, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I beg to differ. Information is published in websites, but not by them. Blogs don't publish anything either. A blog author creates content, and the same or a different entity publishes it. But when you claim that something was written in a blog, it is the blog name/address that is important to me if I want to verify it. That is the source, and the pertinent item in order to verify. I cannot verify it otherwise. 72.43.99.138 (talk) 23:57, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• comment For clarity, a website is always a major creative work, and therefore should always be italicised. The beef I have is stuff going into |website= when it should go into |publisher=, organisations being the main example. The |newspaper= requirement is silly, as there are many sources for news other than newspapers. --NSH001 (talk) 12:35, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

  Have you read the error message help text? Have you read it? Let me quote the saliant text from it (emphasis added):

  "The error message suggests a periodical parameter that matches the template, but there is no requirement to use the suggested parameter; any one of [the] periodical parameters may be used."

  —Trappist the monk (talk) 12:47, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

  @NSH001:If that was aimed at me, I don't care about italics-or-not at all. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:24, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support this really has gone on long enough, and the consensus was reached. These changes affect everyone and everyone should be aware before they happen.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 10:31, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• support the short-term proposals as long overdue. To be clear, that does not mean hiding the messages, but rather not making these two things errors at all. The longer term suggestions can wait. Kanguole 12:25, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose more or less per Jo-Jo Eumerus. What needs to happen really before we do anything else is determine standards for how these citations and citation templates are supposed to be used. It's becoming pretty clear from many editors' comments that {{cite web}} is being used inconsistently and in many instances inappropriately when a more relevant periodical citation type should be used instead. But a very significant problem is we don't seem to have any standard guidance on this, and over a very long time concessions and workarounds have been made in the modules so that editors can use the wrong template to make a citation look the way they think it should look. At some point we will have to correct that, and part of that will be making the templates throw an error of some sort (visible or not) when they're used incorrectly, and it will be an enormous cleanup job, but it is the right thing to do. The recent change may or may not have been a step in that direction, but either way, reverting to "status quo" is not going to help. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:10, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

In the meantime, I suggest temporarily suppressing the categorization related specifically to {{cite web}} missing a |website= parameter, per my comments about that template specifically being widely misused, pending a new discussion on how that template specifically should be used. The other periodical citation formats are throwing valid errors which need to be fixed, so let's get on with it. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:12, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support If this was any other type of BOLD or other major change to a template that created disastrous results across the board, it would have been readily expected to revert that change to status quo until the issues were fixed. I understand that the "website" change is but one of around a dozen made in one shot to the code, and no one is asking the cs1 group to kill all that at this point, just stop having website be categories *and* marked as an error. While the "marked as an error" has been suppressed, categorization is still going on, so the problem is still there. And its hard to take the attitudes of TTM and a few others here as collaborative. There is 100% need for further discussion on how to address "website" and other parameters, no question, and that's not a topic for this board, but the continues problems that this change has made and resistance from those that made it to turn it back, that's causing WP:FAIT problems here. --Masem (t) 13:35, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support the short-term proposals - then we can have whatever RfC. No way these errors keep showing while our RfC rolls on for a month. starship.paint (talk) 13:36, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - The dead-url error has bot ready do deal with it, so doesn't need to be reverted. The missing periodicals parameter being flagged as errors is something that clearly has no consensus and that change that provoked that should be reverted as soon as possible.Tvx1 17:27, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support – I think NSH's suggestion boils this down to the core thing that needs to be done (first bullet point). Considering Jo-Jo and Ivan's oppose votes, I think there is no scenario where the outcome is going to be that we have 515,000+ pages (as of now) that show red errors that need to be manually corrected by editors, nor will there be any scenario where we permanently hide missing-publication red errors. So the current situation won't stand no matter what, which means there's no point in preserving the current situation while we wait for RfC outcomes. Per NSH's first bullet point, we should "un-require" |website= in {{cite web}} and |newspaper= in {{cite news}}, then have, as starship puts it, "whatever RfC" or RfCs we need. – Levivich 19:06, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - as long as I don't see any of those pesky messages while editing. I am absolutely unwilling to fix "errors" that aren't even recognized as errors by the majority of this community. Arbitrarily imposing a minority view without a consensus was, and will always be a mistake here. --Sk8erPrince (talk) 19:31, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - As NSH001 rightly points out, the apparent view "of the majority above is that it is ridiculous to treat organisations as if they were creative works, whether in citations or not." --Tenebrae (talk) 22:14, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support : I support the removal of the "missing periodical" citation errors from the {cite web} and {cite news} templates in particular. Many websites are not periodicals; they are other types of content. It took me 45 minutes to fix the 14 errors on Nazi Germany. Granted this was tricky because the ones that needed fixing were for the most part in German, but there's 190 citation errors on or heavily visited Featured Article Barack Obama for example; this represent sa non-trivial amount of time to fix that one article alone if all these have to be manually fixed. And we're looking at 546,726 pages displaying the "missing periodical" as of right now; almost every page I visited today has multiple error messages. This represents a lot of editor time that would be better spent on other tasks, especially in light of the fact that some are bogus errors - an organization (iTunes, Yad Vashem, City of Potsdam, USHMM, etc) is not the same thing as a work, and it should not be forced to be in the "website" field, where it displays in italics. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 23:58, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support removal of the "missing periodical" citation errors. Anything that is mandatory and effects millions of pages needs to be discussed first. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 00:41, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support removal of website/newspaper mandatoriness in cite web / cite news per ridiculously overwhelming consensus and common sense. This should not have to be RFC-ized because it is patently obvious. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:05, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

• We need an admin to go over the major discussions and implement a consensus through a close. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 01:13, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

• No, we need someone to edit the template to bring it in line with community expectations. No one but Trappist the monk wants |work= (or its aliases |website=/|newspaper=) to be mandatory for {{cite web}} and {{cite news}}. That doesn't need an admin to 'close' the discussion, just someone with LUA skills to implement this near trivial change to the template so we can move on to things that actually need to be debated. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:48, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support. The changes need to be reverted. It is a concern that they haven't been already, given the clear consensus above. After that, Trappist the monk can hold a neutrally worded, prominently advertised RfC in a central location proposing the changes he wants to make. SarahSV ^(talk) 01:51, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. There's already a strong consensus to do that above, which the author of the changes downplayed as a "modicum of agreement"; so this is just duplicating that effort. We should go back to the status quo, and then make only changes with clear consensus from appropriate forum. – Ammarpad (talk) 07:58, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, and quick. As it stands, I'm unwilling to fix some unrelated problems in articles because I'm confronted with a sea of read error messages (mainly "Cite web requires |website=", but also "deprecated |deadurl="), that I don't quite understand and that weren't there a short time ago. This is a severe disincentive for well meaning editors. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 12:16, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Only at Wikipedia could a software change that broke so many things still be broken four days later, even after a discussion with a clear consensus. Sort the cite web / cite news issue now, please, because this is actually verging into disruption. Black Kite (talk) 15:04, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. We can continue this discussion without clogging the CS1 error queue with thousands of messages for which there is not clear support. Phatom87 ^{(talk • contribs)} 17:52, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Pointing out something

Since I've read some absolutes in this long overall discussion, I think it should be pointed out that WP:CITESTYLE says, "Wikipedia does not [emphasis added] have a single house style, though citations within any given article should follow a consistent style. A number of citation styles exist [emphasis added] including those described in the Wikipedia articles for Citation, APA style, ASA style, MLA style, The Chicago Manual of Style, Author-date referencing, the Vancouver system and Bluebook." The Chicago Manual of Style, for example, does not italicize website names. So even aside from the MOS' statement that we can make common-sense exemptions, I don't think it's accurate to say MOS is that we must italicize websites.--Tenebrae (talk) 01:06, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

And one of the styles that is allowed on Wikipedia is WP:Citation Style 1. This discussion is only about Citation Style 1, which is not required to be used in Wikipedia articles (as long as the citations within a given article follow a consistent style). —BarrelProof (talk) 05:54, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

It's a good point though that Citation Style 1 is not any of the formal styles (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.) but a hybrid adapted to our own purposes. Help:Citation Style 1#Work and publisher (or use a version prior to changes related to the RfC, Special:Permalink/909741631#Work and publisher) seems to indicate that a work (|work=, |website=, |newspaper=, etc.) should always be provided, that if a website's name and its publisher are the same then to use the stylized domain name as |website=, and when the work is sufficiently well-known or basically the same as the website name, to omit |publisher=, not any of the work parameters. The updated version added guidance not to use publisher to render the website title in upright font, otherwise nothing changed, but this should have been understood as implied with the past version anyway. So there are currently 600,000 (and change) citations on Wikipedia which are being rendered incorrectly according to our own style guide, which at the moment are helpfully categorized in Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical. If we revert the changes to the citation module, the errors will dissipate but the incorrect citations will still be incorrect. I'd rather keep the category. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:29, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

This basically comes down to 90% of the editors that have used cs1 are using it to have access to a template that creates the citation, but using the template in a manner to achieve the desired formatting they want as long as that is consistent within a single article, and (until now) could care less on fields being slotting into metadata/wikidata in a certain manner; I am reasonable certain that that 90% never recognized that documentation elements - instead, copying from others examples and learning that way. So the combination of making |website=, as a "periodical", render in italics from the RFC on the cs1 pages, and making |website= the required parameter over |publisher= is what people are upset about as it forces those that have chosen to learn and standardize on cs1 template but to a format they want to use (as allowed by the MOS) are being told that format is wrong. Those 90% of editors may have been wrong all this time, but regardless, they are upset at the change and that's where the disruption that we're trying to address is coming from. There does have to be discussion to resolve this, including whether the citation template format/approach needs to be so rigorous in its format and error checking, and the like. We should be trying to minimize disruption so some revert to not mark these as errors is essential, then we can discuss the path going forward to re-implementing in a manner that minimizes that disruption, keeps what editors want to use, and gets the metadata approach that is desired. --Masem (t) 13:47, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, I more or less agree. Generally speaking, even if it's been wrong all along, that is the way that things have pretty much always been done. But once it's been pointed out that it's wrong, continuing to do the wrong thing for no other reason than it's how we've always done it is stupid. I agree that on-page display of error messages is disruptive, especially all-of-a-sudden, and that editors are right to be upset about their work being plastered with red notices (other than the apparently tiny minority like myself who want to see where there are errors so they can be corrected, and there's already a css hack for that so that only editors who want to see the errors have to see them). However that issue has been entirely resolved by hiding the error message. That happened days ago. We're already past "re-implementing in a manner that minimizes that disruption". Editors can continue manipulating the template into whatever twisted form they desire, just like they can and always have been able to just drop a bare URL or plain wikimarkup or whatever inside a <ref> block to make a citation, and someone else will be along to adapt it to some site-wide style in due course. Reverting the changes at this point is just moving backwards for no reason. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:59, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh and the WMF has beef about the hidden errors causing extra server load, which is also stupid. (The WMF sticking its nose in again, not the project doing project-things). Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:02, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree that we need to get the wider discussion to figure out if the current cs1 template is "right" and we need users to conform, or if template needs changes to conform to user expectation (this particularly in the italics issue), or if we need a separate template that meets both users and the metadata group's desires. But the fact that we have template error categories that are ~500,000 entries due to this is not a simple "Oh, users should fix that" situation, that's exactly against WP:FAIT, even if the users were wrong. Of course, speaking with 20/20 hindsight, the scope of how many erroneous uses should have been figured out before the template was changed and from that, it would have been clear that we needed a public announcement and discussion before they were made. I don't disagree that the redlink disruption is swept under the rug but the underlying problems remain and I don't feel its right to leave it like that, particularly if, as I mentioned above, the fix is the simple removal of a small set of 4 words from the Lua code; it may break a bot task, but again, disruption minimizing is the larger priority. Leaving it in there implicitly means that the decisions made by the cs1 team without wider input are implicitly correct, and instead we need to get community consensus for such a major change.

And actually, since WMF owns the servers and extra load costs them, I would expect them to say if that's a problem. That's even more a reason to revert to make our "landlords" happy. --Masem (t) 14:07, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

So far, the WMF just wants to know if they need to adjust stuff on their end, and if we have an ETA for the fixing those errors. That said, the problem would just go away if we did the obvious fucking thing and stop having {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} bitch about missing periodical information, since they don't require periodical information to be complete citations. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:38, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Any citation without a specified work is incomplete. {{cite web}} means "cite website". It makes no sense otherwise. Similarly, {{cite news}} means "cite a news source". Not an article in a news source, that is a citation fragment or part. On a similar tack, we are talking about citation style. This is not about wikitext style. Citations are not there to make an article look pretty, they have their own requirements, which may differ stylistically from the MOS applied to prose. If MOS can be accommodated, fine. But this is secondary to applying style as a way to make the citation more functional. Emphasizing the work (source) by slanting text has been cs1/cs2 norm for a long time. It helps the verifier zero in on the most important part of the citation i.e. where the claims in wikitext can be found. At some point, consistency across the citation platform will have to be applied. 98.0.246.242 (talk) 17:02, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Wrong, many citations are not part of larger works. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:06, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

This discussion is not only about Citation Style 1. According to Help:Citation Style 2, All of the templates that belong to CS2 and to Citation Style 1 (CS1) are processed and rendered by the CS1 Lua module suite. StarryGrandma (talk) 14:31, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Pointing out something (part 2)

Is this an "issue(s) affecting administrators generally", or a more project-wide discussion? This page has become huge due to this ongoing thread. I think it should be moved to a page of its own, much like another recent discussion was. Thanks. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 16:44, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

We have a technical issue affecting thousands of pages that we have yet to see those that created it take the steps to resolve. There are steps well beyond ANI, but this immediate issue of how to fix the 100,000s of red-text errors and categorizations is an admin problem to be fixed. --Masem (t) 16:59, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Fair enough. Thanks for replying. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 17:48, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

a bit of clarification please

@Primefac Thank you for closing this.

Can I have a bit of clarification please. In your closing statement, you wrote remove the parameter requirement recently added to the update of the CS1 family of templates and the implementation (making the |website= param mandatory) has been heavily criticized here. Are you saying that the periodical parameter requirement in all of the periodical templates ({{cite journal}}, {{cite magazine}}, {{cite news}}, {{cite website}}) is to be removed or are you limiting the removal to {{cite web}} or to some other subset of those templates.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 19:38, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

The nonsense is with {{cite web}} and {{cite news}}, that's the things that needs fixing. No one is having an issue with {{cite journal}}/{{cite magazine}} requiring |journal=/|magazine=. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:48, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

I wouldn't put it exactly in those words, but {{cite web}} and {{cite news}} were the two templates causing the most consternation in the original discussion; the others seemed to be acceptable changes since they were/are relatively uncontroversial. Primefac (talk) 01:32, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: - please update when you've made the change. Thank you. starship.paint (talk) 02:01, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Update what?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 02:56, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: - remove the parameter requirement recently added for cite web and cite news. Have you done that? I still see the error right now. starship.paint (talk) 03:01, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Where? Did you purge the page?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 03:04, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: - George Hirst - our current featured article has many. Alec Holowka and William J. Larkin Jr. - recent deaths. Carol Lynley (reference 7) and Kiran Nagarkar (reference 10), are two other examples, other than the dead-url ones. Please advise on how to purge, I do not know. starship.paint (talk) 03:08, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Click Edit, click publish changes

—Trappist the monk (talk) 03:11, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

The MediaWiki job queue will eventually work through all of the pages in Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical and refresh them. If you are expecting an instantaneous change simply because I made a change to Module:Citation/CS1, you will be disappointed; it takes time.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 03:14, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: - it worked. So we either purge (edit) or wait. Thank you, it wasn't clear before. starship.paint (talk) 03:19, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

I've started a separate discussion at Help talk:Citation Style 1 to figure out the rest of how to go forward (in terms of getting the updates that were intended but without the massive disruption that this first try caused). --Masem (t) 03:46, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Once the job queue refresh is complete, will Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical be empty, or will it contain articles where {{cite journal}}/{{cite magazine}} require |journal=/|magazine=, or something else? Should the text on the category page be updated? Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 04:40, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical will hold articles where there are {{cite journal}} and / or {{cite magazine}} with out periodical parameters. Error message doc tweaked.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 20:01, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Did you get the response you needed and consider this topic closed? Please update (write a mention here) when you've made the change. It's vital that you keep the community informed, because it's difficult to know current status and many users are engaged in the topic. Thank you for making that extra effort this time even though you may not see the need yourself. JAGulin (talk) 10:56, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

The fix required by the close was made with this edit (about 18 hours ago).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 20:01, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

What's the plan for unhiding error messages for missing periodical? I assume deprecated parameter error messages will be unhidden after the bot is finished with deadurl? Do we know how long that is expected to take? Thanks, – Levivich 21:10, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

No plan at the moment. I have not yet started Monkbot task 16 and probably won't until at least Monday sometime. Without the demonstration of a pressin need to do so, I see no reason to unhide any of these error messages until the next time we update the Module suite. If you want to see the hidden error messages there is the css hack.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:23, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Cullen328

I was wondering if its appropriate for an admin to come to my page and threaten me with a block and follow it up with a threat of an indef block?
That happened within the last 12 hours with Cullen328. Out of the blue (though I suspect he was contacted by an editor with a grudge), I get the following message:

"Please consider this a formal warning from an administrator: If you use this gossip website or any other gossip website again, you will be blocked. Is that clear?"¹

"Read ZergNet before you say anything foolish"²

I followed up by pointing out that I had indeed read the wiki-en entry for zergnet (the source's parent company) as well as checking RSN to see if the source in question had ever been tagged as unreliable. Neither the source nor its parent have ever been mentioned at RSN. In response, I received the following from Cullen328:

"I am here for one purpose only: to enforce Wikipedia's policy, specifically BLP. That policy says: Be very firm about the use of high-quality sources." That is why I am being firm with you. That policy says Avoid repeating gossip. Nickswift.com is without a doubt a gossip site. They call themselves a gossip site. They are widely called a gossip site online. It is absolutely unacceptable to use gossip sites on Wikipedia. If you disagree with my assessment of this website, then you must gain approval at WP:RSN. If you believe that I am being a "dick" then report me to WP:ANI. If you do not take those steps and I see you using a gossip site again, you will be blocked indefinitely"³

So, we have gone from a pretty dickish hello and a threat of a block to a threat of an indef block for asking for proof that the source has been determined by Wikipedia to be a "gossip site" (and no, the website doesn't call itself a 'gossip site').
Look, I know being an admin often sucks and y'all have to deal with some people that deserve to be slapped with a trout forever, but I think Cullen went pretty aggressive on this rather quickly. It was hugely unnecessary to warn me with indef block over a source that not even they can't prove is unreliable.
I decided to get some guidance here because I am concerned that, by further discussing the matter with Cullen328 will ruffle their feathers enough to just up and indef block me. Also, (s)he doesn't feel their behavior was at all inappropriate and suggested I come here to discuss it.
Content discussion aside, should I be worried about this admin's behavior? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 17:25, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Notice of notification: here. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 17:27, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Agree with Cullen. This is aside from your edit war on the page. You're in the wrong, and it's pretty clear.--Jorm (talk) 17:32, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

It appears to me that the source of the trouble is your edit here [46]. Why did you think it was vital to make such a characterization in a biography, and to source it to a site that appears to trade in clickbait and celebrity gossip? I'd say Cullen's warning is on the mark. Acroterion (talk) 17:32, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Please note that I have mentioned here and elsewhere that RSN doesn't note that Nickisiwft or its parent are considered unreliable sources. That's what we are check before adding unfamiliar sources. Hindsight, it isn't the greatest of sources, but threatening me with an idef block for trying to ask about it seems pretty out of hand. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 18:08, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

It's not close enough to OK that you should even have to ask, and you edit-warred to reinstate it after another editor told you it was inappropriate. RSN isn't a shield. Acroterion (talk) 18:20, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

My personal opinion that the reason that nickswift.com has never come up at RSN is because no one has ever seriously thought that they needed the community to weigh in on the fact that it isn't one. The "About" on the website (which was maddeningly difficult to click on, as it kept loading additional content every time I scrolled down to it), reads in part: We dish out the good stuff on all your favorite celebs, add expert analysis, then move on to the next hot topic. Furthermore, two of the main content headers are "The Dirt" and "Crime". Perhaps they aren't using the actual word "gossip", but they are doing so in as many words. CThomas³ (talk) 18:47, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

In the past 2 days, User:Jack Sebastian has had several uncivil incidents in response to BLP-related removals with colourful vernacular and personal attacks in his edit summaries and responses.[47][48][49][50] The last two diffs are in response to an administrator's warning. He has edit warred in response to the removals, demanding discussion and ignoring the WP:BLP mandate that poorly sourced material should be removed without discussion. Ignoring the warning from Cullen[51], he continued to revert to get his way.[52] He has had a history of disruptive conflicts with other editors if you look at his talk page.[53][54] Morbidthoughts (talk) 17:34, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Remember that editor I mentioned with a grudge? Morbid stalked my edits to the Baccarin article. What the user's diffs fail to show that they themselves were edit-warring. Kinda transparent, actually. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 18:05, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• Although the issue involved here (BLP) is much more serious, Jack's approach to an admin warning him is eerily similar to what happened at User talk:Bbb23#About refactoring. I suggest that Jack should be "worried" about his own behavior.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:36, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

@Jack Sebastian:, would you like to withdraw this complaint? MPS1992 (talk) 17:38, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• This is the online marketing tag for nickiswift.com: "The Dirt - Nicki Swift. Breakups, makeups, scandals, and more. Sort through celeb gossip dirt with your source for style and smarts." I rest my case. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 17:39, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Along with using a completely unacceptable source the edit summary includes the statement "please do not stalk my pages" which indicates WP:OWNERSHIP issues by JS. MarnetteD|Talk 17:45, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I think that's a bit of a stretch, to be fair. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 11:09, 6 September 2019 (UTC).

• Jack Sebastian should be blocked for his comments addressed to Cullen. If this thread hadn't been started, I would have, but now it's a community matter. I already see some consensus that Jack Sebastian needs to re-educate themselves on BLP/RS, and a block for these pretty dumb insults should be an option as well. A week is a good start, esp. on the heels of the comments directed at Bbb. Ironic: didn't their insults aimed at Bbb involve a boomerang? Drmies (talk) 17:54, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Please be aware of this related thread Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard#Morena Baccarin. MarnetteD|Talk 17:56, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Okay, let's address that comment, Marnette.

User Morbidthoughts takes issue with my edits at an article (Stoya). After presenting a highly-biased RfC, the user edits in another article where I have posted (the Baccarin BLP) - an article where they have never, ever edited before. I don't find the appearance a coincidence, esp. when Morbid tends to edit porn-related articles almost exclusively.

I do not consider any article - including my own talk space 'mine'. I apologize if my phrasing suggested own-y issues; I was simply asking an editor to stop stalking my edits. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 18:02, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I saw the blatant BLP violation while reviewing your diffs to build the evidence for the RfC post that you double dogged dare me to[55] and a prospective ANI complaint which you preempted with this complaint against Cullen. Funny how that worked out. Morbidthoughts (talk) 18:12, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

By the way, I learned about this matter at WP:BLPN just before bedtime, evaluated the website, made my warning, and went to sleep. No other editor informed me directly. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 17:58, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

A couple quick thoughts: I don't know Mr. Sebastian and want to note that I think a "don't stalk my edits" summary is, perhaps not ideal, but just fine in the overall. I don't know about any other articles or related conflicts, but I have to say: edit warring over this content, using this source, gives me real pause. Dumuzid (talk) 18:15, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

As I noted in my reply to Marnette:

"User Morbidthoughts takes issue with my edits at an article (Stoya). After presenting a highly-biased RfC, the user edits in another article where I have posted (the Baccarin BLP) - an article where they have never, ever edited before. I don't find the appearance a coincidence, esp. when Morbid tends to edit porn-related articles almost exclusively."

When a user scopes through another user's edits to snipe-revert, its usually considered stalking/hounding. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 18:23, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Look, maybe the source wasn't the greatest; I recognize that now, and would have abided by any decision made by the BLPN - had the filing user (the stalk-y one with a grudge) notified me of the discussion. Maybe I am used to admins who know how to approach a situation without threats, and double-down on those threats when asked about their handling of it. Subsequent comments on my talk page by Cullen328 seem to imply they are really, really aggressive, traits usually seen in admins, and certainly not at the first contact.

I had not knowingly interacted with Cullen before, and this behavior seems problematic. Am I wrong for thinking this? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 18:20, 1 September 2019 (UTC)edit-

It appears to me that your judgment with BLPs is the problem: a topic ban from BLPs may be in order. Acroterion (talk) 18:27, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Jack has been here since 2010 and has over 11K edits. I think his misbehavior extends well beyond BLP and that a topic ban wouldn't resolve the problem. Despite users telling him here that Cullen's warnings were well-founded, he doubles down, not about the BLP issue, but about Cullen. It's the same thing he did to me on my Talk page, although he wasn't foolish enough to report me for my rather tame warning.--Bbb23 (talk) 18:34, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

In the meantime, Jack continues to edit war violating WP:BLPPRIMARY this time.[56] Morbidthoughts (talk) 18:49, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, without gaining talk page consensus, and in the midst of this discussion, Jack Sebastian is trying to add the birth name of porn performer Stoya to that article. The problems with this are several, not the least of which is that two different birth names float around porn fandom, and that whether or not to include one name or another has been debated at Talk:Stoya for a decade, and that the performer objects to people trying to use her real name. So, another BLP violation has occurred during this conversation. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 18:59, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Rule number 4 on Jack's talk page is: If I have asked you to not post on my usertalk page, please respect that request and don't do it. If you do anyway, I'll simply delete it and seek your block. I have never interacted with this user before, but the "seek your block" part seems concerning. Clovermoss (talk) 18:56, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I used to get people who would come to my page, capslock scream at me and wouldn't go away when I asked them to. I am allowed to ask people to not post to my page and to seek redress for continued harassment, right? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 19:19, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Jack Sebastian I agree that being harrassed is not acceptable and I understand why you wouldn't want to be attacked on your talk page. However, I don't think making comments like this [57] is the way to interact with others on Wikipedia. I don't see how anything Morbidthoughts has done could warrant that response. Clovermoss (talk) 19:29, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Fair enough. I have refactored (ie. stricken-through) my post to reflect a less snarky tone with a page stalker (1).— Preceding unsigned comment added by Jack Sebastian (talk • contribs) 15:37, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Yet he complains that I didn't notify him for the BLPN post.[58][59] after warning me in his colourful style.[60] His attempts at wikilawyering are clumsy. Morbidthoughts (talk) 19:02, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

After reflecting on this and upon the advice of others, I am withdrawing my complaint against Cullen328. If the behavior is as problematic as I initially reported, I won't be the only person addressing it in the future.

For my own part, I apologize for using a source that wasn't the best. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 19:19, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• Jack has now filed a report at ANEW against Morbidthoughts regarding the Stoya article.--Bbb23 (talk) 19:36, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Post-boomerang

• (edit conflict) @Jack Sebastian: Cullen328 was entirely correct to act as they did. I am blocking you for a week for your ongoing edit-warring at Stoya, itself highly problematic in light of WP:BLP. Sandstein 19:39, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
• I don't believe that Sandstein's block should end this discussion. First, I think we need to return to Acroterion's suggestion of a BLP topic ban. Second, I think we should consider a longer block than a week. As far as I know, I didn't know Jack until he commented on the Talk page of a sock I had blocked...I undid his edit...he complained at my Talk page about essentially what a dreadful administrator I was. His style in that discussion, in the discussion with Cullen, and in this thread, which he had the very poor judgment to initiate, demonstrated cluelessness that you would not expect from an inexperienced user, as well as a passive-aggressive approach to talking to other editors. Worse, I don't think even now he has any insight into his own conduct. For those reasons, apart from the topic ban, I would block him indefinitely (I don't see the point of a limited duration block in these circumstances). That wouldn't mean he would be blocked permanently. Through the unblock process, he may demonstrate that he sincerely understands what's wrong with his behavior and how he intends to resolve it in the future. I don't think that's possible in the near-term based on his "withdrawal" comments here. OTOH, he says he is withdrawing his complaint against Cullen after "reflecting on this and upon the advice of others". Nothing wrong with that statement, but he then effectively says that the future may show that Cullen is a lousy admin: "If the behavior is as problematic as I initially reported, I won't be the only person addressing it in the future." He does something similar with the BLP violation except in only one statement: "For my own part, I apologize for using a source that wasn't the best." The apology is the good part, and "wasn't the best" is an attempt to diminish his reponsibility by making it sound like the source was acceptable but not ideal.--Bbb23 (talk) 20:28, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
• Their immediate unblock request was far short of what I would expect for such a lengthy series of problems in such a short span of time. Their interactions with other editors elsewhere have been dismissive. At the least, a long BLP tpoic ban is warranted. I've filed the necessary paperwork for discretionary sanctions, but that doesn't preclude restrictions imposed here by the community. Acroterion (talk) 20:39, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Yes, I agree with Bbb23 that this discussion should continue, and if Jack Sebastian has comments, he can make them on his talk page and another editor can copy them over here. Saying that the source "wasn't the best" is failing to recognize that the source is absolutely and unequivically unacceptable. I admit that I was very firm with him but I believe that is called for when an editor persists with egregious BLP violations and tells another editor who brought the matter to community attention, "Don't piss on my leg and tell me its raining." Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 20:47, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I hope he was a fan of Garbage. I agree that he has no business editing BLPs with such a shaky knowledge of reliable sources. Morbidthoughts (talk) 20:50, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

@Cullen328: @Bbb23: Just letting you know that a ping and a signature have to be added at the same time to work. I learned that after making a typo in the username of someone I was trying to ping a few months ago. Clovermoss (talk) 20:56, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Note: Jack Sebastian has made a second unblock request. Clovermoss (talk) 21:25, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

You don't need to ping me in the future. His unblock request is entertaining, though. He calls the block excessive, punitive, and his behavior a "hiccup".--Bbb23 (talk) 21:35, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Are not BLP's covered by discretionary sanctions? Just topic ban him from BLP's in general. Its bad enough trying to keep them WP:BLP from drive-by randos without having to deal with long-term editors who know perfectly well what they are not supposed to do. Only in death does duty end (talk) 21:38, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, but the necessary paperwork (formal notification of the editor that there's a problem) came only after they were blocked for the present issue. To be strict on procedure, imposition of an AE ban would come into play if the behavior recurs after the warning. A community ban from this discussion has no such prerequisite. Acroterion (talk) 21:45, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Copy from Jack's talk page:

:Thanks, @Clovermoss:. I find that I do have something further to offer to the discussion:

Regarding BBb23's comments, it appears that he was upset that I asked him not to refactor (ie. remove my post). I didn't suggest that he was a "dreadful administrator". He asked me to remove my post and, after discussion, I did as he asked. I disagreed with him threatening me with a block right off the bat - I tend to get pissed at anyone who starts off a conversation with a threat. That, Bbb23 and Cullen had in common.

I will also reiterate that I did check with RSN to see if the source had been noted as unreliable or unsuitable for use. After the discussion continued in BLPN, I accepted the consensus that emerged. I even posted the findings at RSN, so that any other editor - checking as I had - would now find that the source was unsuitable. I thought it was the responsible thing to do.

With regards to the Stoya article, I would ask if someone could point out where any source I used there was not reliable. At issue in the article is the deliberate effort by a single editor (User: Morbidthoughts) to keep the subject's birth name from the article. This is decidedly unusual, as most of our mononymous-named articles at least note the person's birth name: Cheryl, Shakira, Zendaya, Elvis, Usher, Cher, Madonna and Beyoncé, Rihanna, Drake, Liberace, Morrissey. While those are permutation of her their name - as supposedly Stoya is. Some mononym stage names are invented (e.g. Eminem, P!nk, Lorde), adopted words or nicknames (e.g., Sting, Bono, Fergie). Stoya doesn't get special treatment. The wrinkle here is that entirely reliable sources exist listing two different birth names. After Morbidthoughts reverted (several times) the inclusion of one, I decided to use instead the one that they themselves had sourced and apparently prefered. Morbidthoughts violated 3RR in reverting even that choice out. In short, it wasn't going to matter what I added; it was just going to be wrong. When I reported them for violating 3RR, it was with consideration that this viewpoint doesn't better the article.

So, I used a bad source once - the first time in over five years. I completely acknowledge that I fucked up by using it. It doesn't matter that I checked it against RSN records; I should have erred on the side of caution, and I did not. I did follow consensus once it was determined and even took steps to make sure that someone else didn't try to use the same source. I think characterizing me as someone running around destroying BLPs willy-nilly is factually incorrect. I've worked on several BLPs over the years, and my edits and sources were - until now - never problematic.

I don't like being threatened by anyone. An admin threatening me with a block as a conversation-opener is just plain unhelpful, especially when that same admin can just point out a problem and ask for input instead of assuming the worst. I am not a new user; just talking to me works so much better than a threat. I suspect that's true with just about anyone. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 21:55, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Clovermoss (talk) 22:00, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Jack Sebastian's comments about Stoya are just as ludicrous as his comments about Nickiswift.com, as I explained at Talk: Stoya. First, he wanted to ram in purported birth name A without consensus, and then he shifted to trying to ram in purported and contradictory birth name B without consensus. There is an ongoing ten year discussion about this matter on the talk page, and there is no consensus for adding a birth name. That list he posted of all those mononymous-named performers is a waste of time and not relevant because all of those birth names are well-referenced, uncontroversial and acknowledged by the performers. Mentioning Elvis Presley in this regard is really bizarre since he performed under his birth name. I have thick skin and can take the hostility easily but Jack Sebastian's ongoing personal attacks against Morbidthoughts are really unacceptable. He seems to think that this editor lacks credibility because they work on articles about porn performers. Baloney. We need competent editors working to maintain BLP policy in that topic area or it would soon be nothing but a fetid swamp. In these two cases, Morbidthoughts has been correct and Jack Sebastian has been wrong. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 22:51, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm also curious that in his 3RR report on me [61], he noted in the 2nd diff of his attempt to discuss the issue in 2013-2015.[62] Even though it's not obvious if he was one of the IP users in that discussion, this seems like a long standing grudge he has had. Morbidthoughts (talk) 23:29, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Proposals

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I have two independent proposals for sanctions against Jack:

• Proposal A. Jack be topic banned from all BLP articles indefinitely. He may appeal the ban in six months.
• Proposal B. Jack be indefinitely blocked for his behavior toward other editors.

Please include the name of the proposal when you vote.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:26, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support Proposal B because of his behavior towards Morbidthoughts and other editors. I do not care about his behavior towards me. Administrators get attacked all the time and I accepted that when I agreed to an RfA. I also support an indefinite block because of his repeated BLP violations at Stoya and at Morena Baccarin. Indefinite does not mean infinite. I hope this editor has an epiphany and files an unblock request in six months or so acknowledging their BLP violations and aggressive hostility toward their colleagues, and pledging to refrain from that sort of unacceptable behavior forever. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 23:03, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Because the editor has expressed contrition and promised to do better, I now Support Proposal A. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 00:28, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Comment This isn't at all fair — you need a proposal C, no topic ban and no block. I've not reviewed the discussion above and don't have any opinion which I'd support; we just need to have a "none of the above", or people who oppose both will feel like there's no choice for them. Nyttend (talk) 23:14, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• Of course there's a choice. Just as in all proposals, they can oppose both.--Bbb23 (talk) 23:19, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support Proposal A and Proposal B - I'm going to let Jack's own words to other people explain the rationale. He really does know better than he lets on here.[63][64][65][66] Really, "until he can learn to take responsibility for his own behavior, he is useless to the Project"[67] Morbidthoughts (talk) 23:17, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Copy from talk page:

When police arrest someone, they tend to over-charge them with every single offense they can think of, with the idea being that when they propose charging them with a crime that would be a hard-sell to a jury, they offer lots of other charges as well. This is to make it seem like they are doing the suspect a 'solid' by not charging them with the entire raft of charges, encouraging a pleas deal or to make the prosecutor look accommodating.

Bbb23 is proposing that I be banned from BLP articles or, in the alternative, be blocked indefinitely - demonstrating the tactic described above. For using a bad reference once. :In almost 10 years of editing. I've admitted my error. I've refactored some of my snarkier posts. It feels like Bbb23 is out for blood here (their comments seem to suggest such), and that is really disappointing. Blocks are not meant to be punitive. They are meant to be preventative, as per our blocking policy. I am not trying to harm the project or any article, and never have. I have made the mistake of presuming bad faith of two users who threatened me and of a user who edit-warred in two different articles - instead of disengaging immediately and reporting the problem to others. I additionally used a crappy source, even though it was not my intent to do so. I believe that a one week block is excessive, as it was preceded by over 6 years of no blockable issues. Therefore, I offer the following proposals: Proposal C - Jack be unblocked with a warning regarding the use of sources in BLPs, and to avoid the articles in question here.

Proposal D - Jack be blocked for a period of 48 hours, in consideration that blocks are not meant to be punitive and that the user apologizes for the use of a non-reliable source and presuming the worst with other editors. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 23:04, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Note: I need at least an hour before I can come to my own support/rationale of proposals. Real life is demanding my attention at the moment. Clovermoss (talk) 23:35, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

There's more, but I really can't stay around much longer.

(The second post, in response to Cullen's post:)

I deeply disagree with the characterization that I am discriminating against Morbidthoughts because they work primarily in porn articles. I frankly couldn't care less. I pointed it out because - after a disagreement with me, the user came over to an article that they had never been before and their first action was to revert me. No one else, just me. That seems a bit like stalking to me.

I'd also point out that Morbidthoughts has spent almost the entirety of the 10 years reverting out any mention of her name. This despite the presence of good sources that name her explicitly (1, 2). I'd even point out that the aforementioned sources were proposed by Morbidthoughts his/herself. Therefore, there shouldn;t have been any opposition to its inclusion, unless the user simply doesn't want any mention of the birth name. I mean, they have spent 10 years doing exactly that.

Because of this, there is no necessity of privacy, even if the subject wanted it. As well, there is no indication that she is trying to hide her name. So, good sources in an article about a BLP.

As far as the Baccarin article, I have admitted that I used a source found to be unusable. Did I fight it after a consensus emerged on BLPN? No (1, 2). In fact, I immediately went to RSN to notify them of the reliability of the source, as per the BLPN discussion (3). Once a consensus regarding the Baccain source emerged, I did everything I could to implement it immediately across the Project. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 23:36, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Clovermoss (talk) 23:46, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support Proposal B - (edit conflict) Anyone with an ounce of common sense can see "nickiswift" is a gossip site and that it should not be within a 10000 mile radius of any article on this project! The Telegraph one shouldn't be added for obvious reasons, Given the complete blatant disregard for WP:BLP as well as the disregard for WP:3RR I see no other option than to indef them,

We could just topicban then but we all know they'll wikilawyer their way around it and it'll probably be a repeated cycle, Lets cut to the chase and indef. –Dave | Davey2010^Talk 23:37, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support proposal A as BLPs seem to have been what led this editor astray. A chance to show they can be productive elsewhere, without the troubling behavior towards other editors feels worth a chance. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 23:38, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Jpgordon suggested in my unblock request that I need to commit to not edit-war, which I am prepared to do. If I disagree with an edit, I will use the article discussion page to do so (reverting only in cases of blatant vandalism - not wikilawyering, just pointing out that visitors will ovgten vandalize articles; and I know the difference between a normal edit and a vandal).
If agreement cannot be found there, I will widen the circle to follow the normal paths of DR. That's the way it is supposed to be anyway.
I am committed to not edit-warring within articles. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 00:34, 2 September 2019 (UTC) (reply)

• Support both per Cullen, Bbb, and the diffs in Morbidthoughts's !vote above. I am completely uninvolved in these disputes, but after reviewing some of the history, the problem seems to be more serious than edit warring, source selection, or a "mere" content dispute. JS's recent edits to this article (posting "out of wedlock" six times, before finally self-reverting) and this article (note the edit summary "are you actually arguing that it was not her name at birth?", then two edits later, adding a different birth name, with the misleading edit summary "adding reference")–the only edits they've ever made to those two articles–make me want to go through all their mainspace contribs to see what else like this may have gone unnoticed. Trying to edit war "out of wedlock" into an article is outrageous. That's somebody's parents you're talking about! That's somebody's child you're calling a bastard! Do you know how many BLPs we'd have to add that to, if we added such statements? And to violate BRD and 3RR over it? You've got to be kidding me. Add the "birth name" issue, and what this shows is a complete disregard for any kind of basic decency, never mind propriety–or policy, like BLPPRIVACY, NPOV and V. This is "CIR or trolling?" territory; this is running amok with BLPs. Then there's the WP:BATTLEGROUND and WP:IDHT behavior, for example: [68] [69] [70] [71] all of which remind me of [72]. Deferring to my colleagues about whether B is best or just A is enough, but one of them is necessary to protect the encyclopedia, article subjects, and editors. – Levivich 01:57, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Well, I looked, and:
    • At The Boys (2019 TV series), Cloaked gecko changed "gay man" to "homosexual" (contra WP:GAY?)–with the misleading edit summary "Fixed typo"–and YoungForever changed it back. They went back and forth [73] [74], and then JS changed "gay man" to "homosexual" with the edit summary "yeah, just leave it be and leave your personal preferences at the door. Or discuss the change you'd llike to see, as per WP:BRD" (note that Cloaked gecko did the "B" and YoungForever did the "R", so JS is on the wrong side of this BRD here). A few minutes later, JS adds "homosexual" to another part of the article. When an RfC is started and WP:GAY? is pointed out, JS writes:

      As I am the one who replaced 'gay' with 'homosexual,' I wanted to weigh in.

      I was wrong. After looking at the source that YoungForever provided as well as checking both the sources of WP:GAY and limitied online research, gay is a more appropriate term to use than homosexual in practically every instance. Mea culpa.

      That said, I think that Ezekiel's sexuality isn't really explored in the series and since he seems so far in the closet as to practically be in Narnia, I think probably that MSM is probably a more on-target term.

      [emphasis added]

    The bolded part is a bit of WP:OR, like "I recognize 'gay' is more appropriate than 'homosexual', but I think he's in the closet, so let's go with MSM". Then JS changes "gay man" to "MSM", and when it's reverted, restores it with the edit summary "using that reasoning, we don't have a consensus for gay man, either. Finish this in talk, and kindly stop edit-warring". The next day, JS removed another instance of "gay man", and then another. I don't understand what JS has against the term "gay man".

    • At List of The Boys characters, JS removed a statement making a comparison to (competing brand) DC Comics's Justice League, sourced to Wired (magazine), with the edit summary "info behind paywall, unable to verify. Sorry." (Earlier, JS had watered down a similar comparison statement, also sourced to Wired, and other statements of comparison to DC were removed as uncited, see also this 2016 thread.)
    • That same WP:IDHT behavior and misunderstanding of policy at Talk:The Boys (2019 TV series)#Production. – Levivich 03:40, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Proposal A based on Barkeep49's reasoning. Jack has made a lot of mistakes, but I don't think that he would've been an active contributer to Wikipedia the past decade if he didn't care about the project. I brought up the talk page and response to Morbidthoughts, and I agree that Jack definitely needs to work on being more civil in their interactions with other editors. Jack hasn't had any recent blocks (the most recent was 2016) and I think that he should have a second chance. Jack says he'll do better and I want to believe him. If his actions don't reflect that in the future, I would support Proposal B. <strikethrough> Clovermoss (talk) 02:43, 2 September 2019 (UTC) Update: What Levivich has pointed out bothers me. I'm starting to wonder if I made the right call here, especially on top of all the other stuff. I don't think behaviour like this is acceptable. Clovermoss (talk) 03:49, 2 September 2019 (UTC) It isn't acceptable. Edit warring over unreliable sources, edit warring on the The Boys (2019 TV series), violating BLP frequently, the incivil interactions with other editors... I've changed my mind. I'm supporting both Proposal A and Proposal B. Being around this long shouldn't excuse Jack's actions, if anything, it should make him more accountable. Clovermoss (talk) 04:04, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Speaking to Levich's comments regarding my edits to The Boys, I'd point out that I 9/10ths of my edits there were to remove unsourced information or rephrase grammar. As everyone here knows, there is a shit-ton of OR that ends up in our articles, tagged as uncited and left for years.

To me, it doesn't matter whether the article is about Quantum physics, Ferris Bueller's Day Off or Danny Elfman - we can't just toss in information without referencing the statements to a source. And it can't remain unsourced. Fully 75% of my edits in Wikipedia have been about either tagging a need for, removing or seeking out references for statements made within articles. In the Boys series of articles, they were drawing uncited comparisons between, say, the Deep and Aquaman - total OR. I don't care if a character is gay, MSM or whatever; I just want it cited so it is not us as editors making any sort of evaluation, but instead a reliable source. If the term 'homosexual' is cited, then fine. Its the evaluative assumption on the part of an editor who assumes that gay, homosexual and bi are interchangeable that gets us into trouble. In the instance where a comparison was drawn between the characters and DC characters, I didn't oppose the connection because they were a "competing brand"; that's inconsequential. I opposed it because there wasn't a verifiable reference connecting them to one another, and a source behind a paywall is pretty hard to verify. Once any statement is verified, any problem I had to the statement evaporates. Almost every single time.

Bluntly, I don't really focus on what statement is being made (apart from clearly FRINGEy statements); I just care that it is referenced, so it is a source making the comment, and not us the editors. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 04:18, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

@JS: ...but when you changed "gay man" to "homosexual" or to "MSM" or removed it altogether, you didn't add a source. Those changes were to unsourced plot summaries. And how is it possible that you've been editing for 9 years yet believe that paywalled sources fail WP:V? I mean there's even a WP:PAYWALL that redirects to WP:V and says "Do not reject reliable sources just because they are difficult or costly to access" (and there's WP:RX to obtain paywalled sources). – Levivich 05:24, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

• Comment: More evidence in the Sophie Turner article that he forces the inclusion of controversial matters in a BLP forcing discussion before removal.[75] The resulting talk discussion does not do any favours on how he interacts with other editors when he doesn't get his way.[76][77][78][79][80] Morbidthoughts (talk) 19:52, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

• Definitely support A, holding off on B at present as Jack seems to have taken off the Spider-Man suit and come down fomr the Reichstag. Guy (Help!) 20:09, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
• I would support A Acroterion (talk) 20:41, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support A what has been shown here is enough to convince me this editor does not have an adequate grasp of BLP sourcing and the BLP policy in general. I do not oppose Option B but I have not looked at JS's behavior enough to feel comfortable supporting an indef from the project and I have no real motivation to spend my time doing so. Jbh ^Talk 20:57, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
• I want to hear if Jack Sebastian now realizes that shitposting about other users isn't done with impunity. If they do, then maybe such a realization can help forestall an indefinite block. Drmies (talk) 00:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support A but oppose B based on Jack's recognition (see his Talk page) that his behavior toward other editors has been improper and that he criticizes others for behavior that he himself engages in. I think he should be given a chance to demonstrate the changes in behavior that he promises. Schazjmd (talk) 16:09, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

After reading what others have written, I realize that I do indeed take my interactions with others far too seriously (and personally, if their opinions don't align with mine). Its feels like I have advised millions of other users to at more civilly when I have failed to follow that very same advice. I am fully committed to being more polite. I can disagree with someone in RL without making them feel like crap; I need to be able to do the same here, esp. because of the medium.

Additionally, While I think I have done a lot of pretty fine work on BLPs (admittedly, most of it is removing the term "best known for" or removing peacock language), I clearly went off the rails with the Baccarin edits. As far as the Stoya edits, I should have assumed better faith regarding Morbidthoughts' resistance at adding RS-sourced material regarding her birth name. I should have talked to them more, and widened the loop on the discussion if headway wasn't found. As I've said before, if its cited, it belongs in there. If not, it shouldn't be in the article. What I did wrong there was not to poison the well with the other editor working that article, and I should have asked for more eyes on the article, instead of asking the other editor to do so. But those are just symptoms of the problem. I have been really uncivil to others. I admit that I give as good as I receive, and that needs to change. After all, most of us are here for the same reason. I need to remember that and practice what I preach.

What can I do to make this better? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 15:43, 3 September 2019 (UTC) (reply)

• JS has received some good advice and feedback from a few editors on their talk page, and after reading what JS wrote here, as well as the additional stuff at their talk page, I'm thinking that it's always better if an editor can fix their own mistakes rather have sanctions applied, especially a long term productive editor. Maybe some sort of voluntary restriction relating to civility and/or a voluntary 1RR restriction and/or voluntarily agreeing to steer clear of BLPs for a while, until the community's confidence in their editing is restored? The thing about voluntary restrictions is that they don't require other editors to adminster/oversee, and if they're violated, they can still be reported, and I think the community would perceive a violation of a voluntary restriction as being the same as a violation of an involuntary one. In any event, just kind of thinking out loud here; would be curious to know if anyone else has read the talk page discussion and what they think about it. – Levivich 16:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• After a lot of thought, I'm going to Oppose Proposal B and leave a decision on Proposal A up to the rest of you here. As someone who did some stupid things as a young, novice editor a decade ago, I came in wanting to give JS the benefit of the doubt as much as I could. Still, I found his attitude towards other contributors, in particular, extremely concerning, and his continued personal attacks and edit-warring even as he claimed to have owned up to his mistakes, had me ready to support both proposals. Seeing as how JS has finally taken some personal responsibility and committed to playing well with others, however, I'm ready to give him another shot. Again, I'll pass the buck on whether a six-month BLP ban or maybe some voluntary alternative, as Levivich proposed would be more appropriate for the time being. Rockhead126 (talk) 19:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree to a voluntary 1RR on BLPs (as I noted previously, my typical edits in them is to remove OR descriptors such as "best known for"); I hope to revisit that self-imposed limitation after 6 months but even then, I am determined to not have to revert more than once after that self-imposed limitation.

Additionally, I absolutely agree to use article discussions far more effectively than I have of late. You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, and being rude or dismissive makes collaborative editing a lot more difficult. I fully commit to being more a part of the solution than the problem. If I have a problem in discussion I cannot resolve, I will widen the circle to involve other users, as more collaboration is better and keeps things from getting too heated. I absolutely commit to not edit-war on any article content at any time (excepting of course blatant vandalism where I will still request assistance and guidance).

In short, I recognize that I need to stop acting like the Lone Guardian at the Gates. Its a bad way to approach editing, and corrosive to collaborative editing. I don't want to be a part of the Drahmaz.

I am open to suggestions that others may offer here. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 22:11, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support proposal A - I believe that this will be suitable for the time being and will halt the disruption. The editor has expressed contrition and this measure seems proportionate to the misbehavior described above.Krow750 (talk) 23:06, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Proposal A-- that Jack be topic banned from all BLP articles indefinitely. He may appeal the ban in six months. Jack is generally a constructive editor and a usually a net positive. He just needs to be less eager about adding to BLP's that which should not be added.-- Deepfriedokra 04:00, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I've noted above that I am in fact taking a break from BLPs (with the sole exception of addressing the 'best known for' OR) that pops up in BLPs. I have agreed to a selp-imposed 1RR on articles for that very reason. I am not re-engaging in BLP additions at all, and don't plan to for at least 6 months, if not longer. I don't think I need to be banned from all BLPs as I am functionally doing that anyway. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 04:11, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

In my opinion, the BLP topic ban needs to be formalized. The editor expresses an interest in removing "best known for" language, which has been a highly disruptive issue in the past. That intention is a guarantee of future conflict. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 06:25, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Errr, when has a "best known for" ever been a "highly disruptive issue"? I've never encountered any such disruption, and I've been purging the OR phrase for years. The BLP issues I have had concerned bad sourcing and edit-warring; I've been rather clear on that I have no intention of getting that involved in a BLP. For example, if someone reverts back in "best known for", I'd go to the talk page and ask them to supply a source that says that. No edit-warring, no uncivil language - just normal, collaborative editing and building a consensus for inclusion or exclusion - the way its supposed to work, right? - Jack Sebastian (talk) 07:07, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I assume Cullen is referring to WP:BKFIP... Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 09:48, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

That is correct. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 15:24, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Whoah. I was completely unaware that this was a thing. I'd never heard of this in all my time editing. As much as I hate the OR of fannish Best Known For phrasing, I want no comparison being drawn between me and a long-term IP sock. I voluntarily won't edit BLPs, and hope to revisit the subject in six months. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 17:19, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• I can't speak for Cullen (can't do that weird California accent anyway), and he may disagree, but I am pleased enough with Jack Sebastian's answers here. Drmies (talk) 16:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Above Jack said "I realize that I do indeed take my interactions with others far too seriously (and personally, if their opinions don't align with mine)." Yet, he continues to do that in this discussion between him and me on his Talk page: User talk:Jack Sebastian#User:TyMega. He also displays a very surprising degree of cluelessnes about Wikipedia's guidelines that I might expect from a newbie, but not from an experienced, long-term editor. It didn't matter how many times I explained to him what was wrong with what he did, he continued to respond as if (a) he didn't get it and (b) I was saying something else. In a court of law, his answers would be objected to as "non-responsive". Although he didn't attack me, he accused me of opinions I don't have, misperceiving and misunderstanding just about everything I said. And I was sincerely trying to help him.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:26, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  I'd ask that folks read that exchange; I don't think it intimates what Bbb23 thinks it does. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 18:03, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  I'm really surprised to find this, but it seems Jack has, apparently, been creating new editors' user pages with the {{Welcome}} template for 9 years [81] [82] [83] [84] [85] (full list). I would say this goes to Bbb's point about Jack being surprisingly unfamiliar with PAGs, but I looked and – again, surprisingly – neither WP:USERPAGE nor WP:TPG seems to clearly say "don't edit other editor's user pages", or (more importantly) "don't create other editor's user pages". I find this point intuitive, but I'm surprised it's apparently not explicitly stated anywhere. WP:NOBAN has a much more vague instruction: "In general, it is usual to avoid substantially editing another's user and user talk pages other than where it is likely edits are expected and/or will be helpful." This actually seems to suggest (incorrectly, IMO) that one should edit another editor's userpage if it would be "helpful". It does say, in the {{Welcome}} template docs, to post the template on the user talk page, but who ever reads template docs? Some experienced editor should probably update these policies to clarify this. – Levivich 18:58, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Mr. Sebastian, I have no doubt that you edit in good faith and that you are mostly a positive force here on Wikipedia. That being said, the donnybrook on the Morena Baccarin page, and the 'behind a paywall, can't verify' revert are both fairly shocking to me. I won't presume to tell you what you must do, but I think, despite your experience, you should try to move forward with a distinct sense of humility. I believe you have developed some bad habits. That's not the end of the world, and I don't think you merit severe sanctions, but I do think some of your Wikipedia "gut" feelings are simply incorrect. All the best going forward. Dumuzid (talk) 21:01, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

In response to Levich's noting that I'd been adding welcome templates to new users for years, I completely admit that. I honestly thought I was helping new users by supplying them with tools by which they could learn how to edit, ask for help, etc. I would only add a welcome template to a blank user page, never one with content. Additionally, I would always watchlist these new uses in case they asked for help on their own page. Sometimes they did. Often, their contribution never extended beyond the edit that caused me to welcome them. The welcoming I proffered to TyMega was kinda moot, because he was indef'd today.

I learned very recently (via Bbb23) that its better to add it as a section to their usertalk pages, and not the userpages, and once I thought about it, it makes utter sense. While someone with experience can pick and choose what tools they want on their page from the Welcome template layout, its a pain in the ass if you don't. I think that it was my concern that if I put it onto the talk page, it would take up too much space, and break up or obscure conversations already occurring there, as it would look like blocktext.

I can just note my thinking. There was no ill intent, and if my doing so caused more problems, then that's on me. No one had ever brought it to my attention as such before today.

To that end, I resolve to only use welcome templates (if I use them) on usertalk pages, and only with new users (as per WP:DTR).

I have to say, while I started out this process being all sorts of pissed and feeling deeply misinterpreted, I am learning how some of my actions can be perceived negatively. I don't want that, and would very much like to change that around. As I noted before, I am always open to suggestions. I don't think I'm a bad editor, but I sure as hell would like to be a better one. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 21:59, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Guidance on duplicate threads?

Greetings, this is procedural housekeeping question and request for help.

I started a thread at an article talk page about neutrality. Then I posted a pointer diff at the NPOVN intending to steer traffic to the article talk page, so we could have a single discussion at a single place, per WP:MULTI. What is actually happening is chaos. Some eds post at one but not the other, and several duplicate their posts in both. The two venues are

• intended main discussion at Talk:Climate_crisis#Wikivoice and "climate crisis"
• intended comment solicitation and pointer diff at Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view/Noticeboard#Wikivoice_and_"climate_crisis"

If you deem it appropriate, please consider hatting one or the other and steer future traffic to the other. Thanks NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 11:47, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

There haven't been any new comments at NPOVN since you posted your "update" note, but it looks to me like you weren't originally clear that you intended to invite comments from NPOV on the climate crisis page. I've "closed" the NPOVN post and advised to add new comments to the first discussion instead. Always make sure that if you're putting up that sort of notice to invite editors to comment on another page, that you're specific about your intent, that you phrase the notice neutrally, and, you know, link to the discussion. Hopefully all sorted now. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 12:17, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Help - TBAN request

• Bot removed my open request. [86] — Hammad (Talk!) 07:20, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Just clarified the title so an Admin could tell what you were pointing to. The editor is reasonably pointing it out given the unanimous support for removal of it. Nosebagbear (talk) 08:17, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

@BukhariSaeed: moved below to speed things along a little. Incidentally, per WP:SIG#Custom sig, A customised signature should make it easy to identify the username: i.e. not be completely different to your username. ——SerialNumber54129 08:29, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Topic ban appeal/lifting request

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I want my topic ban on saints and religious figures removed. User:Primefac allowed me on 10 August 2018 to appeal this topic ban after the passage of six months. It has been more than 6 months and I have faithfully adhered to this restriction. In the meantime I have a strong history of constructive contributions, which can be seen in my edit history. Please lift this ban now. I think I have proven that I can contribute to the English encyclopedia constructively and I have learnt many editig skills which I would like to extend to the area of saints and religious figures. I have grown older and wiser since my last sanctions and I do not see why they are needed anymore. Thanks.— Hammad (Talk!) 05:11, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

For folks convenience, here is the ANI where that restriction was placed [87]. Captain Eek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 06:34, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• Support – In reading the ANI report, and looking at BukhariSaeed's history, I was admittedly pretty skeptical. A long block history, lot of nasty socking, that sort of thing. But the last ANI did agree to unblock Bukhari. And from what I can see, they have been a pretty faithful contributor since. A look through talk page history shows no major problems, save for one copyvio issue that seems to have been cleared up. They followed their other edit restriction (article creation by AfC only) perfectly, and created more than a dozen succesful AfC's in the last year. They've also racked up several barnstar/wikithanks in the last year. Plus, they're an admin on Urdu wiki with some 80k edits. Given all that and their good behavior, I think its fair that the topic ban be lifted. Hopefully Bukhari may someday become the poster child of editor reform. But I'd remind Bukhari that the Sword of Damocles still hangs over their head, and any wrong move should this ban be lifted will likely lead to permanent exile. Captain Eek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 06:53, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Having now read the original ANI, I understand why you finished off your positive statement with such a dramatic variant of the "but be warned" finish! Nosebagbear (talk)

• Query - hi @BukhariSaeed: - do you have any specific plan on what you would like to edit in the saints/religious figures area or is it "just" to let you edit it when you desire, without risk of hitting the TBAN? Nosebagbear (talk) 09:39, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi Nosebagbear, thanks for your thoughtful query. I would like to contribute to the biographies of medieval South Asian Islamic religious scholars with the use of high level academic sources which I have been collecting and reading. There's quite a lot of new content I can add from thi scholarly material in part of my project to update and improvise biographies of pivotal figures such as Shah Waliullah and Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi. I edit a wide variety of articles for which are non-existent or for typos and Wikification. If TBAN is lifted, I might think of contributing some constructive info in this area as well, although I am not inclined to stick or remain focused to this particular area as I am not a thematic editor. Thanks — Hammad (Talk!) 11:14, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• Support - I supported unconditional unblock in the last discussion and remain supportive now. At the time (a little over a year ago) they had 90k edits across multiple projects, and endorsements from admins on some of those. They're now a sysop themselves on Urdu Wikipedia and Urdu Wiktionary, have nearly 90k edits on urwiki alone and 140k globally, and have advanced permissions on eight wikis (including this one, excluding a few more with IPBE). Seems quite certain this user has reformed from their years-earlier disruption and is obviously here for the right reasons. Just one thing: would you consider editing your signature to better reflect your account name? It's not a requirement at all, just a suggestion. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 11:51, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Ivan for your valuable suggestion. I'll discuss this (Signature) and many other valuable things with you individually and will definitely try to improve on this area as well.— Hammad (Talk!) 12:16, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

FWIW I think it's fine if some puts a real name in place of their username in their sig - if that's what's being done here. I can think of at least a couple editors who do this. My bigger issue is that on my tablet I could not make out the letters clearly so I wouldn't have even known what name it was supposed to have been. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:40, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• Support - no indications I can find of violations, and lots of the good areas to show good faith. 6 months was picked as the appeal time, so unreasonable to necessitate more. Nosebagbear (talk) 12:15, 28 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support. The user duly complied with the ban and has shown to be a productive editor in multiple fronts/projects. – Ammarpad (talk) 10:40, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support Appears to be editing "within bounds" and appropriately. He's served the time and regained trust. Continue contributing in this manner and I see no future problems. Buffs (talk) 19:12, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support - per CaptainEek. I reviewed their talk page history since they returned and there are no serious issues. Also, they have even been granted rollbacker rights, and showed patience by waiting an additional six months. People can change for the better and I trust BukhariSaeed. Well done for improving and keep up the good work! starship.paint (talk) 13:28, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Requesting indefs of old accounts

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Hello,

Boingbop and Eman2129 are old accounts of mine from when I was a kid. I no longer have any intent on editing from them, so I would like for them to be indefinitely blocked if that's fine. Thank you!

– John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 04:35, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done. El_C 04:39, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Template:zoologist returning

The template zoologist (example {{zoologist|Purcell}}) creates a reference to a page on ICZN.org that no longer exists. Could someone look into this please? Wyatt Tyrone Smith (talk) 19:27, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the template and what it pointed to before, but it looks like this link might be the updated one. Or a subpage might be more approapriate. I can make the changes if there is consensus on the corrected link.   Jts1882 | talk  19:37, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

References

Yes, the main page would seem the simplest place, and most likely to be stable. . DGG ( talk ) 16:02, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the change. I notice it is also suffering from the "{{Cite web}} needs website="-problem. It appears in the popup link. Wyatt Tyrone Smith (talk) 18:43, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2019).

Administrator changes

Bradv • Chetsford • Izno

Floquenbeam • Lectonar

DESiegel • Jake Wartenberg • Rjanag • Topbanana

CheckUser changes

Callanecc • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Oversight changes

Callanecc • Fox • HJ Mitchell • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Technical news

• Editors using the mobile website on Wikipedia can opt-in to new advanced features via your settings page. This will give access to more interface links, special pages, and tools.
• The advanced version of the edit review pages (recent changes, watchlist, and related changes) now includes two new filters. These filters are for "All contents" and "All discussions". They will filter the view to just those namespaces.

Arbitration

• A request for comment is open to provide an opportunity to amend the structure, rules, and procedures of the 2019 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee election and to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.

Miscellaneous

• A global request for comment is in progress regarding whether a user group should be created that could modify edit filters across all public Wikimedia wikis.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:37, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Why is Ibn Saud under restrictions??

How is this article related to Israeli-Arab conflict? And why IPs and new editors are not allowed to edit in there? Is Wikipedia paid by the Saudi regime to lock these articles?--SharabSalam (talk) 15:14, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

SharabSalam No one can pay Wikipedia to do anything, as donations are handled by the Foundation which operates the computers Wikipedia is on, and it does not handle day to day matters. Ibn Saud is related to the Israeli-Arab conflict because of his meeting with Franklin Roosevelt on the USS Quincy (CA-71), where the subject of Jewish immigration to Palestine was discussed. If you have changes you want to make on that article, please make a formal edit request on the article talk page. 331dot (talk) 15:19, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

I really think that article shouldn't be sanctioned because of that small paragraph. I think new editors and IPs should be allowed to edit that page freely. I have been watching that article for a long period of time and I haven't seen any dispute. There are articles which are more related to the Arab-Israeli conflict yet they aren't sanctioned. Is there a way to appeal for removing sanctions of an article? BTW, sorry for the accusation I said above. It was a sarcastic comment.--SharabSalam (talk) 15:50, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

If there are articles that "are more related to the Arab-Israeli conflict yet they aren't sanctioned", feel free to point those out as they probably should be. In any event, you can go to ArbCom and make a Request for Clarification; see WP:RFAR. As Ibn Saud first discussed the idea of Jews being given a piece of the Middle East at that meeting(while he counter-proposed giving Jews a piece of Germany), I think it would be difficult to argue it is not related to the conflict, but it's not my decision and you are free to try. 331dot (talk) 15:58, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

It looks like a mistake. It was protected because of the edit notice; the history when the edit notice was added shows no edit warring, no edits to the page for 14 days, and no categories for Israel or Palestine. At the same time a talk page template added it to Wikipedia:WikiProject Israel Palestine Collaboration but the article is not mentioned in any of the WikiProject's pages including its archives. Peter James (talk) 18:18, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree it is a mistake and the protection should be removed. Ibn Saud was not the first to discuss the idea of Jews being given a piece of the Middle East at the 1945 meeting with Roosevelt aboard the Quincy. The first Jewish settlements in Palestine were established in 1878; by 1945 that was already a really old idea; see History of Zionism. To say that the entire biography is under PIA sanctions because of one conversation about Israel... well, you'd have to add sanctions to every bio of every major world leader in the last hundred years or more. PIA sanctions shouldn't be applied to just any article with any tangential relationship with the Arab-Israeli conflict. It should be applied to articles about that conflict; Ibn Saud barely mentions it. – Levivich 00:08, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

• Requested feedback from the Admin that placed the ECP on the article. Buffs (talk) 05:11, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

  Well, I doubt the protecting admin is going to be able to help, unless they're a genius like some kind of quantum physicist or something. – Levivich 05:18, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

  Well, actually the situation is similar to the one which caused the currently pending ArBCom PIA case. I would be willing to remove the extended-confirmed protection and give the article a chance, unless there are strong objections raised in this thread. For the record, I am a quantum physicist.--Ymblanter (talk) 05:24, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

  I'm only looking for an explanation as to the rationale that was used (if anything other than in the edit summary). Are we missing something? Or, in your opinion, is this more of the "broadly construed" vs "reasonably construed" issues we're facing? Buffs (talk) 05:32, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

  Yes, I think this is a broadly vs reasonably construed issue. And things have significally evolved since 2016, I doubt now a request to ecp this article at WP:RFPP would be granted.--Ymblanter (talk) 05:40, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

• WP:AE appeal initiated: Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Arbitration_enforcement_action_appeal_by_Buffs Buffs (talk) 05:32, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
  • You think we need more than one quantum physicist to resolve this issue? – Levivich 05:40, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
    • We can always give it a shot../ Buffs (talk) 15:24, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Per the agreement of Ymblanter to removing protection and the general tone of the discussion here, I have removed the protection. I would have done so days ago but have been unable to edit this week due to phab:T232491. GoldenRing (talk) 08:44, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  @GoldenRing: Thank you. Buffs (talk) 15:21, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

OAbot

I've recently noticed a lot of uses of User:OAbot making semi-automated edits at a fairly high volume. This is reminiscent of recent activity of IABot. This time, it seems to be spread out over multiple users (some of which seem to be trying to make legit-looking user pages and edit only at certain times of the week) possibly in an attempt to make it seem less suspicious. Also, while IABot directly makes the edit, OABot doesn't, so I don't know how to check who's been using it. Anyway, this all seems fairly fishy, and I thought it might be worth it to raise the issue here. Thanks, –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 03:47, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand. As you say, the bot's edits don't state who, if anyone, requested that it operate on a specific page - so what do you mean about "legit-looking user pages"? ST47 (talk) 05:51, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Never mind, I see what you mean. Is there any way to get a better list of those edits though? The Recent Changes only shows the most recent 500. ST47 (talk) 06:00, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@Deacon Vorbis: I went ahead and notified the bot operators (Pintoch and Nemo bis) about this thread. OhKayeSierra (talk) 06:13, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping. It's not clear to me what's the perceived problem. The currently active users look like different people to me, from the interaction I had (different communication styles and so on). They also have distinctly human behaviour. If you doubt they might be sockpuppets, I suggest you open a request at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations. I hope this helps, Nemo 06:21, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

{{Checkuser needed}} I believe that Deacon Vorbis has found himself a ring of sockpuppets which are engaged in paid editing. The purpose of the bot edits is either to make it harder to see the pattern of their paid work in their contribs, or to game one of the confirmed statuses, or maybe just to produce accounts with a Contributions page that looks like an "established" account. The list of accounts using the bot in this way can be found using this Quarry query. In particular, the following users have disclosed paid editing tags on their userpage:

• ContentNerd (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) (498 bot edits, recently extended-confirmed)
• Marnie Hawes (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) (1355 bot edits, recently extended-confirmed)
• PedjaNbg (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) (2687 bot edits, recently extended-confirmed)
• Tashdeed (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) (only 28 bot edits, but links to Marnie Hawes from their user page and has the same paid editing tag, and also has one edit on bnwiki like Marnie Hawes)
• Davykamanzi (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) (only 2 bot edits, but also discloses being paid through upwork in the past - potentially the master?)

Some of the accounts have history on other projects as well, so it's possible that this is either cross-wiki abuse, or recycling of compromised accounts - PedjaNbg has history on srwiki and Marnie Hawes has some on bnwiki. ST47 (talk) 06:23, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

If the objective was gaming the system, I'd say it didn't achieve much: scrutiny of their edits worked. But I agree, let's wait for a CheckUser. Nemo 06:28, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Marnie Hawes and Tashdeed are on the same IP address and are very  Likely. The others are scattered about in various countries. I doubt anyone is compromised. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 13:25, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you. I see they declare to be siblings on the userpage. Nemo 13:47, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

@OhKayeSierra: thanks for the ping. If any change to the OAbot web app is required let me know. − Pintoch (talk) 17:52, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

Request for lifting editing/creation restriction

It would be nice if these very old restrictions could be removed. I feel they are a dead letter. (Indeed the creation was supposed to be temporary.)

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 19:42, 11 August 2019 (UTC).

• For clarity, I believe we're talking about these two discussions: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive218#Rich Farmbrough's persistent disregard for community norms and (semi-)automated editing guidelines and Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive666#Automated creation of incorrect categories. The restrictions are as follows (taken from Taken from WP:EDR):

  Regardless of the editing method (i.e. manual, semi-automatic, or automatic; from any account), Rich Farmbrough is indefinitely prohibited from making cosmetic changes to wikicode that have no effect on the rendered page (excepting those changes that are built-in to stock AWB or those that have demonstrable consensus or BAG approval). This includes but is not limited to: changing templates to template redirects, changing template redirects to templates (see here for AWB stock changes on this item, with the understanding that bypassing template redirects will only be done when there is a substantive edit being done), changing the spacing around headers and ordered lists (except to make an aberration consistent with the rest of the page), and changing the capitalization of templates. Furthermore, prior to orphaning/emptying and deleting categories or templates, the appropriate processes (WP:CFD/WP:TFD) should be engaged.

  Imposed October 2010, and

  Regardless of the editing method (i.e. manual, semi-automatic, or automatic; from any account), Rich Farmbrough is indefinitely prohibited from mass creating pages in any namespace, unless prior community approval for the specific mass creation task is documented. The definition of "mass creation" and the spirit of the restriction follows Wikipedia:BOTPOL#Mass article creation.

  Imposed January 2011. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 19:49, 11 August 2019 (UTC)
• What reason does the community have to lift those restrictions? --Izno (talk) 20:47, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

• It acts as a scarlet letter, and serves no useful purpose. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 21:55, 11 August 2019 (UTC).
  

• You say that they were "supposed to be temporary", but they are both indefinite, which means that no one thought they were temporary at the time they were imposed, except perhaps for yourself, or they would have had a time limit placed on them. You give no reason for lifting them, except, basically, that you don't like them. Considering that you have been the subject of quite a number of sanctions over the years, included a de-sysopping for cause [88], there's no particular reason that the community should lift these sanctions absent a very good reason to do so. Please provide a rationale for their removal which is pertinent. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:23, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

• I did not say they were supposed to be temporary, I said the creation one was:

I would expect the restriction to be temporary by virtue of soon being superseded by an amendment to Wikipedia:BOTPOL#Mass_article_creation. I would be heartily grateful if (a) we didn't waste any more time on this particular case of this problem; (b) Rich accepts the amendment; (c) someone else does the heavy lifting on moving forward the policy change. If/when it happens, the new restriction should be removed as redundant.

— RD232 [the editor who imposed the sanction]

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 07:43, 12 August 2019 (UTC).

• One editor speculating that a sanction would be superceded is not the same as a general expectation that the creation sanction would be "temporary". As I said, if they thought it would be temporary, they would have written it that way. They did not, they made it indefinite. Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:54, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Related:

• Block log.
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive227#Rich Farmbrough violating editing restriction
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive229#Review of Rich Farmbrough's cosmetic changes restriction
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive241#Rich Farmbrough's editing restriction
• desysopping
• failed re-RfA
• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive128#Rich Farmbrough
• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive131#Rich Farmbrough
• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive149#Rich Farmbrough

--Guy Macon (talk) 22:45, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

• Note: "desysopping" and "failed re-RfA" added by me. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:54, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• Desysopping was as a result of a vacated arb case. And the RFA was not failed but went to 'crat chat which closed as no consensus at my request. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 07:50, 12 August 2019 (UTC).
  

• You aren't helping your case by misrepresenting easily-checked facts. The 'crat chat you linked to above starts with "We have an RfA that is numerically shy of the 70% expected for the typical discretionary range". That's the definition of a failed RfA. Also, Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Rich Farmbrough 2 has the result "The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for adminship that did not succeed." You had your chance to withdraw before the RfA closed. You didn't and the RfA failed. At this point our page at Law of holes may be helpful. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:35, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• I was referring to this. And I have amended my statement above to be more accurate. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 08:27, 13 August 2019 (UTC).
  

• Oppose Thanks for the handy links, Guy Macon. I had already gone over the Arbcom ruling and amendments. Rich's block log was, ah, informative. I won't say never but it would take a lot of convincing for me to go along with changing Rich's current restrictions. Old they may be but I'd say earned from the evidence. Cheers, Mark Ironie (talk) 00:02, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose The restrictions were earned through Rich's actions and after much discussion. They serve the useful purpose of preventing the resumption of those actions. If Rich wants to explain why those actions were wrong and to assure the community that they will not resume and to agree that an immediate block would be the proper outcome should any of them occur again then I might reconsider this. MarnetteD|Talk 00:16, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support my interactions with Rich have led me to believe that he is here in good faith and I therefore favor giving him another chance by removing these sanctions from eight years ago. Lepricavark (talk) 00:23, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• My question to Rich would be whether he intends to do either of the following: "making cosmetic changes to wikicode that have no effect on the rendered page" or "mass creating pages in any namespace, [without] prior community approval for the specific mass creation task".
  I'm mindful of a recent discussion where it was suggested that we could lift a TBAN where the editor in question wasn't intending to go do the stuff that was banned would agree that he'd abide by the TBAN even though it was removed from the rolls (WP:AN#Request to remove Topic ban). In other words, the editor was agreeing to have an off-the-books TBAN, which struck me as improper for a few reasons. My way of thinking is that if Rich has no interest in doing those things but does want the bans lifted so, for instance, there's no concern with things that might be edge cases (i.e., whether a handful of articles means "mass creation", or whether the occasional cosmetic wikicode change merits being dragged to AE/AN/ANI), there should be little problem with this request provided there's no recent (say within 6 months-2 years) issues with violating them. I would not make that exactly a binding guarantee since, as I said in that other thread, it's tantamount to an off-the-books editing restriction, which we shouldn't be doing. Rather, I'd consider Rich immediately going back and doing the same stuff that got him these restrictions, we could reasonably infer that he had lied in order to get out of this restriction, and reimposing/blocking would be appropriate. And if he does go back and start disrupting but beyond "immediately", the same restrictions can be reimposed.
  Another idea would be to add a sunset provision to both restrictions. Something like: "Effective on [date of closure], this editing restriction is suspended. On [date of closure + six months], if a community discussion does not reach a consensus to renew this editing restriction on the basis of Rich's conduct over the period since [date of closure], this editing restriction will automatically lapse. This paragraph is not intended to limit the community or an uninvolved administrator's ability to impose appropriate sanctions for disruptive conduct that is incidentally covered by the suspended editing restriction." Thoughts on this? —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 00:24, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• Comment I'm not a fan of the off-the-books restrictions and conditions either. I prefer a clearly defined set of conditions, explicit in the details. This is the current status quo. The sunset arrangement has problems as well, particularly if there is a delay on it (closure + six months or whatever.) This puts a burden on others to check up on Rich at a later time. Overriding some Arbcom decisions makes me a little queasy. There are levels of AFG and giving people another chance that I have trouble with. This is one of those times. Cheers, Mark Ironie (talk) 04:24, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• Mark Ironie This is not an arbcom provision, it was imposed by [[User:RD232], who left the project seven years ago, without a !vote. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 07:43, 12 August 2019 (UTC).
  

• Right, my thought with the sunset provisioning is more if people think there's reason to give Rich a shot (i.e., if he's not violated the sanctions in a long time) but don't want to risk a full lifting right now. I'm with you as there being an added burden to watch for problems, but I'm really not sure how much of a burden that would be. People subject to long-running sanctions—Rich had both community-based and Committee-imposed ones (the latter having been vacated entirely in 2016)—tend to have no shortage of folks checking up on them as a matter of course. Here's an alternative thought though: "After [date of closure + six months], Rich may open a community discussion on WP:AN to request that his status be reviewed and a determination made as to whether the restriction is still needed. If this discussion, having duly considered whether the restriction is still needed, does not reach a consensus to renew this editing restriction on the basis of Rich's conduct over the period since [date of closure], this editing restriction will automatically lapse." That way, the burden is on Rich to ask at the end of the probationary period before the restrictions will be vacated. I'm certain that the AN regulars would provide a robust discussion. Anyway just my thinking on how to approach this procedurally if it's decided to be worth trying. I'm still not decided on whether it's worth trying at all. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 06:02, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• I would have thought 9 years is probably a long enough sunset provision.... All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 07:43, 12 August 2019 (UTC).

• As far as I am aware, there is no such thing in Wikipedia policy as a "sunset provision", so citing it as a reason for lifting these sanctions is an invalid argument. Perhaps there should be sunset provisions. If so, then someone should propose it at WP:VPP and get it approved by the community. Until then, sindefinite sanctions stay in place indefinitely. Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:47, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Mendaliv I do not intend to make non-rendering changes which do not have consensus. Page creation as described is now written into policy, which, of course, I do not intent to break. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 15:11, 12 August 2019 (UTC).

• Oppose - No reasonable rationale provided for removal. As demonstrated by the links above, RF has a history of being sanctioned, and a further history of then violating those sanctions, which means he simply cannot be trusted. Lifting the sanctions still in place leaves him free to take the same kind of actions that got him restricted in the first place. I don't trust him, and do not think that the community can afford to place its trust in him, any more than it did when he applied to be an admin again, and his RfA failed. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:53, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• Approximately 70% of the community supported my RFA. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 08:35, 12 August 2019 (UTC).
  

• Which put it in the discretionary range at the time, and the 'crats -- who are, after all, part of the community -- decided against promoting you. Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:38, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• No they didn't. To avoid placing them in an invidious position, and to avoid an adminship tainted by being a close call I asked them to close as no consensus. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 15:05, 12 August 2019 (UTC).
  

• The 'crat chat you linked to above starts with "We have an RfA that is numerically shy of the 70% expected for the typical discretionary range". In other words, a failed RfA. Also, Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Rich Farmbrough 2 has the result "The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for adminship that did not succeed." BTW, good job getting Beyond My Ken to agree that both of you stop WP:BLUDGEONING this page and then continuing to post comments after he stopped. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:01, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

• In fairness, here's the timeline: Rich agrees to stop, BMK says he has no more good faith for Rich, and then BMK says he'll stop. Not sure it was nice of BMK to take a parting shot like that, although he could have wrote it before seeing Rich's agreement to stop. Lepricavark (talk) 02:50, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

• Actually, it wasn't a "parting shot". I made two (maybe 3??) comments, including one about the lack of good faith, turned my attention to other stuff (no edits, but a five minute gap in activity, according to my contrib log), and then came back to re-read the thread, which is when I saw Golden Ring's remark and immediately agreed to his suggestion. So, the history may look damning, but it doesn't actually indicated a parting shot, which it was not. In fact, I distinctly remember thinking that I wish I had seen Golden Ring's suggestion before I had added the previous comments, just for the sake of appearances. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:15, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

• That's fair. Stuff often gets overlooked in these conversations. Lepricavark (talk) 22:01, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

• Support in the absence of evidence that the banned conduct has been a problem in the last, I don't know, two years? Eight years on, IMO we should be giving someone the chance to show they've changed enough in that time that the restriction is no longer necessary; if eight years is not enough, I don't see any way that these could ever be lifted. I don't object to the sunset clause proposed above, but don't particularly support it, either. GoldenRing (talk) 10:21, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support per WP:Bygones (this page should exist). Seriously, restrictions from 2010??? I trust Rich to be wise enough not to be disruptive today, especially not in the manner he was disruptive nine years ago. — JFG ^talk 10:36, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support Eight years is long enough for these restrictions to be lifted.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 12:11, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• An indefinite sanction is not "infinite", but it does stay in effct until it is lifted. It does not dissipate, or fade away over time, it is just as much in effect at this moment as it was the second after it was imposed. These "support" votes seem to be saying that the evidence the sanctions should be lifted is the fact that the sanctions have done their job well, so we no longer need them. Someone attempting to get a restraining order lifted on the basis that they had stayed away from the person for the 8 years the order was in place would be laughed out of court - the fact that the restrainimg order worked is the evidence for the restraining order continuing to be necessary. Add to that that other people are providing rationales for the sanctions to be lifted, while RF has made no argument of substance at all, and you have more than enough reason to reject this frivilous and unnecessary request. Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:38, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

I have seen this Procrustean argument before. "It worked, so it was necessary. Had it not worked, a stronger sanction would have been necessary." By this logic indefinite is infinite.

Moreover there are side effects, people oppose granting of bits based on things like this.

I don't think that calling my request "frivolous and unnecessary" is WP:AGF - but then little you have said here is.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 15:03, 12 August 2019 (UTC).

You are correct. Your behavior ran out every possible bit of AGF I had regarding you years ago. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:33, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose lifting the cosmetic restriction, as it was being broken as recently as Jan 2019. Primefac (talk) 15:24, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• Comment Could Rich Farmbrough and Beyond My Ken stop trying to bludgeon this request to death and let the community review it please? GoldenRing (talk) 15:36, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

  I'm game. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 16:57, 12 August 2019 (UTC).
  

  Sure, I'll refrain from further comment. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:38, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

  Thank you both. GoldenRing (talk) 12:16, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support I don’t see any need for these to remain in effect. Mr Ernie (talk) 19:13, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

  Mr Ernie, I respect your opinion/!vote, but have a question - regardless of whether it's a "good" restriction (i.e. let's put aside whether it's appropriate for the ban to be in place), do you think someone under a restriction should be violating it before they have it lifted? Primefac (talk) 19:23, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

  What was the negative effect to the project from breaking the violation? Mr Ernie (talk) 20:26, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

  In the case I listed above, and in general, hundreds of pointless edits and flooded watchlists. Primefac (talk) 20:50, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

• support per WP:ROPE and the spirit of WP:UBCHEAP. The violation Primefac brings up is noted, but Rich's explanation was actually quite reasonable even if it violated the letter of the restriction. It's been nearly a decade; I think it's worth seeing how things go without the restrictions. Wug·a·po·des​ 22:59, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose: I wasn't going to take a stand on this, limiting myself to providing some related links, but since then I have taken a deep dive into the edits in question. Too many errors of the type caused by poorly-written automated tools combined with a failure to preview the edits and fix obvious screwups by the automation. Things like nuking a ]] without removing the matching [[. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:42, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Just for clarity, this restriction does not apply to the type of edit you describe, only to edits which make no rendered difference. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 12:47, 14 August 2019 (UTC).

• Oppose as these restrictions really apply to all users. But most do not step over the line. Any mass action should have consensus. Our appealer here has not indicated that compliance will be observed, just that it is not nice to have restrictions. Mass editing requires mass checking and mass errors need mass fixing so much more care is required. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 23:51, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose I see no evidence of a benefit to the community. Automated mass edits are difficult to safeguard on a good day, and user has not demonstrated a need to make them or the ability to make them safely. ROPE is not a good reason-- the user should convince the community the sanction is no longer needed before removing the sanction.-- Deepfriedokra 00:24, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
  • I don't disagree, necessarily, but I guess my question is how Rich would show he can make these edits if he cannot make them? That's really the point of my rationale. If this is as recurring a time sink as Guy below says, perhaps the efficient route is to give Rich one last chance to prove us wrong, and if not we can resolve this quickly at that time. I'm fine maintaining the restrictions, I just think that, at this point, perhaps an ultimatum will save further drama in the future. Wug·a·po·des​ 00:56, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support per Graeme Bartlett. If these restrictions really apply to all users, what's the point of marking Rich with the aforementioned scarlet letter? By this token, you might ban someone from worse things, like "no replacing pages with obscenities" or "no disruptive sockpuppetry". If policy prohibits something, applying special restrictions to a certain person basically just gives enemies "gotcha" opportunities, which it definitely seems to me has been the situation with Rich. Just look for interaction between him and Fram, including five of the six "Related" links given by Guy Macon at 22:45, 11 August 2019. Nyttend (talk) 11:50, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
  • PS, for years I've noticed that Fram was frequently (maybe almost always) the one filing complaints about Rich. It's one thing if you edit in an esoteric area and one other person is basically the only one who has the chance to notice, but when you edit in a very public manner and one person is making most of the AN/ANI/AE/etc. complaints about you, to me it looks very much like you're being targeted, because if you really were the massive problem that's alleged, lots of people would have made such complaints. We shouldn't treat one person's persistent complaining as if it were truly representative of what most editors think. Nyttend (talk) 12:01, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

    Just as a minor note, I might not have been raising anything at ANI or AE, but I've noticed a lot of these issues over the years (as can be seen in Rich's talk page archives) - this is primarily because I'm an AWB/bot user and Rich edits in the same areas that I do. Just because no one has put something on a noticeboard doesn't necessarily mean they don't notice; I just preferred to discuss the issues with them on their talk first. Primefac (talk) 13:02, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

    • I think that whether the complaints lead to sanctions is a key point. If editor A keeps reporting editor B and pretty much every time editor B gets a warning or a block, that's one thing. If there is a long string of the result being no violation, content dispute/not an ANI issue and/or boomerang, that's another thing entirely. Either situation is a problem -- somebody isn't responding to feedback. If I kept being reported and warned, I would figure out what I was doing wrong and stop. If I kept reporting someone and my reports didn't result in any action, I would give up and stop reporting that user. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:22, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. Very much like in the other case on this board, people with this sort of block log would need to give a very good reason for why we should explicitly allow them to do things that all users should not do in any event, and I'm not seeing it. Sandstein 18:42, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
  • I am not asking for that, I am asking for special restrictions to be withdrawn. These have a tendency to be hair-trigger, as you know. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 11:49, 15 August 2019 (UTC).
    
• Oppose I'd like to see a taking of responsibility for the original bad acts before restrictions are withdrawn. Not breast-beating, but a meaningful discussion of what the editor did wrong, and a statement of how the editor proposes to avoid the behavior which caused the block in the future. Not "It acts as a scarlet letter, and serves no useful purpose". I note the number of years that have elapsed since the restriction was imposed. All the more reason for an indication the editor understands the reason for the restriction and isn't just saying "Yeah, yeah, let's get on with it" before getting the keys to the road grader again.--loupgarous (talk) 01:06, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
• Suport There is enough water under the bridge for us to be able to vacate restrictions that are now covered by policy and applicable to everyone. There may well be times when changing a poorly named template redirect to the template name is a valuable improvement for editors of an article. The change from {{Ill}} to {{Interlanguage link}} is an obvious example: my old eyes really can't make out the former, while the latter is very clear. If any other editor had made this edit, would we be complaining about it? I desperately hope not. I'm not encouraging Rich to make those sort of edits, but I'd forgive him for making that cosmetic(?) change, which makes such an improvement for editors like me. There really is no longer any need to treat Rich differently from any other prolific contributor (especially one with 1.5 million edits over 14 years). --RexxS (talk) 20:53, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose There's no need for such permissions at this time/per other opposes. Buffs (talk) 22:08, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

• There's no request for permissions. Peter James (talk) 16:40, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

• A request to edit is asking for permission. Buffs (talk) 04:47, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support: I see many comments above about the OP's block log, so I reviewed it. The last block was in 2017; unblocking was swift and accompanied by a trout for the blocking admin. Before that were two 2013 AE blocks that disturb me for a number of reasons: in both cases, the same two people respectively reported and imposed sanctions; the block time escalated very rapidly (59 days then one year); and the violations in question do not seem especially clear-cut to me. While Rich certainly has more blocks to their name that is desirable, they have a long recent history of not being (justifiably) blocked. I accept the argument that there is no point in special restrictions that align with current policy. I also accept that Rich is justified in fearing that being under such restrictions will lead to "gotcha" sanctions for marginal violations. And I also accept that indefinite restrictions imposed a long time ago can reasonably be asked to justify their continued imposition. Bovlb (talk) 23:53, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose Per pretty much everyone who has opposed above. I would say the restrictions serve a useful purpose in that they prevent the editor doing the things that caused the restrictions to be placed. Only in death does duty end (talk) 21:33, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support If there is disruptive editing the existing policies apply and can lead to sanctions. Peter James (talk) 16:40, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

  ​ There was disruptive editing, and sanctions were enacted. This discussion is about lifting those sanctions, not imposing them. Primefac (talk) 18:22, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

  It's about reviewing whether the sanctions should remain or not; is there recent evidence in favour of keeping them? Peter James (talk) 18:39, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

  I posted evidence, as have others, indicating that these sanctions should stay in place. Primefac (talk) 18:43, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

  The recent evidence in favour of keeping them is that RF is not editing in the manner that brought them about. RF hasn't really acknowledged that the editing was a problem and made no commitment to not resume that kind of editing. Thus leaving them in place is the only way to prevent further disruption. 09:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  Editing in a manner that brought the restrictions would be the only alternative; is that what you recommend? Peter James (talk) 14:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  No - I was clearly answering your question "is there recent evidence in favour of keeping them?" I'm not sure how you came up with anything else. Neither I nor anyone else posting here want the disruptive editing to start up again. MarnetteD|Talk 17:43, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

  The only way for that to no longer be true is for RF to resume editing disruptively. If you don't advise that, is your advice to edit in a manner you are saying is evidence against lifting the restrictions, or is there another alternative I have missed? Peter James (talk) 14:29, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose. I can see no benefit either to Rich Farmbrough or to Wikipedia to lifting these restrictions. If Rich Farmbrough doesn't intend to go back to causing disruption, then keeping the ban in place causes absolutely no inconvenience, but we've unfortunately learned from long experience that this is an editor who consistently interprets "this isn't specifically forbidden" as "the fact there's nothing in writing explicitly banning this means I'm entitled to do it no matter how much disruption it causes". ‑ Iridescent 14:43, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• Note, just as a reminder, both WP:MASSCREATION and WP:COSMETICBOT (as well as WP:AWB's logic with respect to WP:GENFIXES) have had significant overhauls since 2010/2011, and are now much more restrictive / clear as to what they encompass. It's certainly possible that the restrictions are no longer needed in light of those updates. As for myself, I'm mostly indifferent either way. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:54, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support per Headbomb and Nyttend since both are more or less applicable to all users anyway, the only difference I can see is that it doesn't apply to pages not designed to be viewed by readers and so that small change doesn't seem like a bid difference so I'm sure WP:ROPE would apply anyway. As a side note I have been looking at having articles created by a bot which I think is a good idea but we indeed need to be careful with the possibility of errors. Crouch, Swale (talk) 08:28, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Proposed additional restriction (withdrawn)

Proposal withdrawn: not getting any traction. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:22, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Proposed: If the above appeal fails, Rich Farmbrough is not allowed to appeal or otherwise ask again that his restrictions be lifted until January 1st of 2020. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:35, 12 August 2019 (UTC) Edited 23:52, 12 August 2019 (UTC) Support as proposer. The previous requests have been a major time sink. Note: If this passes, he makes another request after Jan 1. and it too gets shot down in flames, I intend to request a one year extension of this restriction. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:35, 12 August 2019 (UTC) @Guy Macon: Is this requested often? It's the first one I remember seeing (a poor metric), but if this is a recurring time sink, I'd be inclined to agree with you. Wug·a·po·des​ 00:25, 13 August 2019 (UTC) Oppose seems less than ideal to make this suggestion before the above thread has been closed, especially in light of the fact that it is not exactly SNOWing up there. Lepricavark (talk) 23:44, 12 August 2019 (UTC) Added the phrase "If the above appeal fails". I probably should have specified that from the start. Does that address your objection? --Guy Macon (talk) 23:52, 12 August 2019 (UTC) It kinda addresses it, but at the same time I don't believe such a restriction is necessary unless there's a recent history of Rich filing these appeals too frequently. Otherwise, it almost seems like piling on. To be sure, you could reasonably contend that this proposed restriction is preventative rather than punitive, but is it something we normally formally do? Lepricavark (talk) 02:44, 13 August 2019 (UTC) Not formally and not normally. There is an explicit six months before an appeal will be considered that is added on to many arbcom and ANI decisions, but there are plenty of times (I would guess more often than not) when this is not done. And of course any such time limit can be undone if, for example, new information completely exonerates the blocked user. That would be a legitimate situation to invoke WP:IAR. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:24, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Blacklist move

There is a WP:RM/TR move (permalink) that only admins may perform due to a title blacklist. ToThAc (talk) 18:01, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

@ToThAc: That isn't true. Page movers and template editors are also permitted to override the title blacklist. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 18:27, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

Pppery is right, page movers like myself can override the title blacklist. With that said,  Done. SkyWarrior 19:55, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm guessing that this request results from seeing MediaWiki:Titleblacklist-custom-pagemove, which currently says This page move has been blocked by the title blacklist because the new title contains characters, words, or phrases commonly used in page-move vandalism. If you think this has been done in error please leave a message on Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard. If this is not the right place for such requests, then we should change the message accordingly. Bovlb (talk) 17:29, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

The messages suggests that you should come to AN if you disagree that the page was put on the title blacklist in the first place, which if that's the case AN would be the right place for such requests. However, that is not the case here, and I think this specific request is here simply because ToThAc thought only admins can override the title blacklist, which is incorrect. SkyWarrior 20:26, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

False accusations against my good name in English version

Dear administrator, I was shocked realizing that someone published in Wikipedia my "portrait" with evident lies and false accusations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gust%C3%A1v_Mur%C3%ADn I am asking You to DELETE this fake news + hoax before I will be forced to the legal action. I contrary to that the Czech version is correct: https://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gust%C3%A1v_Mur%C3%ADn It means that somebody misused Your project to humiliate my person by pure lies. Please, act as requested above. Many thanks for You kind understanding. Gustáv Murín

P.S. Here is my CV that is showing my real public activities as writer and scientist: https://gustavmurin.webgarden.cz/rubriky/biography/comments-to-writing — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.216.151.21 (talk) 10:55, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I blanked out some content that was clearly violating BLP. 137.71.23.54 (talk) 11:17, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I added revdel and semi-protection. -- RoySmith (talk) 12:07, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

And we just let the legal threat go unpunished?--WaltCip (talk) 13:01, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I can't see the original content, but I'm willing to assume good faith and call this WP:DOLT case. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 13:13, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, it was pretty DOLTy, and clearly english isn't their primary language so that likely contributed. 137.71.23.54 (talk) 13:22, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Fair enough.--WaltCip (talk) 13:28, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Requesting deletion of a redirect page for a move

Hello. I'm trying to remember where do I request to have a redirect page deleted to make way for a move to that page. This is an uncontroversial move.

I intend to move "Ensisheim (meteorite)" to "Ensisheim meteorite." The second mentioned page is the current redirect. There is no need for parentheses in the title, such as what the article page has. "Ensisheim meteorite" is the name of this object and, therefore the subject. Anyway, where do I go on Wikipedia to request that a redirect page be deleted in anticipation of a move? I can easily do the move myself after the redirect is deleted. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 22:13, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

@Steve Quinn: You can tag such redirects with {{db-g6}} in the future, but I've deleted Ensisheim meteorite so you can complete the move. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:19, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks very much. I will keep in mind {{db-g6}} - that makes it easy. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 22:22, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Resignation of Courcelles

Effective immediately, Courcelles (talk · contribs) has resigned from the Arbitration Committee. He has also relinquished the CheckUser and Oversight permissions. The Committee sincerely thanks Courcelles for his service and wishes him well.

For the Arbitration Committee,

Worm^TT(talk) 22:58, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Resignation of Courcelles

A Village Pump RfC was archived without closure

The following Village Pump RfC was automatically archived without closure: RFC: Formalize Standing of Portal Guidelines as a Guideline (18 July 2019). I would like to request that an uninvolved admin either closes it officially or reopens it by moving it back to Wikipedia:Village pump (policy), with a Bump template added to prevent further accidental archival of the topic. --Hecato (talk) 09:05, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't know, it looks like that discussion died a natural death. If someone really wants to I wouldn't object, but I'm not sure it's necessary either. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 15:03, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh, I probably should have mentioned somewhere that I requested a closure at WP:ANRFC not too long ago. While I agree that it died a natural death, having a definitive close from an uninvolved editor is worthwhile as I think it will prevent edit warring over what tag to apply. Wug·a·po·des​ 01:14, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

I also think that a formal closure of the discussions there is in order. Otherwise, the matters being discussed there remain in an uncertain limbo, which defeats the purpose of the RfCs occurring in the first place. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 04:22, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

User:Enlightened 762

Have removed this users ability to edit. They have struggled to 1) use references 2) format properly 3) not copy and paste from sources / add material which is not a copyright problem. As I have been involved with cleaning up much of the concerns happy for others to review my block. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:37, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Doc James, Just curious, does a CCI need to be opened? 💵Money💵emoji💵^💸 13:40, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

User:Money emoji I think clean up is basically done. They have not edited that much. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:43, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

If you look through Enlighteneds edit history you will see other editors, including me, have had to clean up quite a few edits as well.---- Work permit (talk) 05:05, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Possible undisclosed paid editing by User:جواد

Hello. In case you don't know me, I am a sysop, bureaucrat and checkuser on Persian Wikipedia (fawiki). I want to bring to your attention that we recently found out that User:جواد has been engaging in paid editing without proper disclosure, thereby violating Wikipedia:Paid-contribution disclosure. This seems to have happened both on English Wikipedia (enwiki) and on fawiki.

We learned about this amidst a larger ongoing investigation of other undisclosed paid editing (UPE) activities on fawiki (many of which done through socks). While I have no reason to believe جواد has been part of the same UPE ring, I think I should still give you a warning. Some enwiki CUs are aware of (and have helped me with) the CU investigations we ran on those socks, and should have the ability to check that data against edits by جواد if deemed necessary.

I also want to point out that جواد is a formersysop on wikidata (from 2013 to 2014), and was a sysop on fawiki from June 2012 to September 2012 (when he took a hiatus) and from January 2013 until around May 2013 when a complaint against him was submitted to fawiki's ArbCom-equivalent body (the "Supervising Committee", hereafter referred to as SC); the SC decided that he should be desysoped, but before it was enacted جواد requested to be retired from adminship on fawiki. Since then, he has been blocked several times. The point is to emphasize that (a) جواد is an advanced user with high level of familiarity with Wikipedia processes, and (b) he does not have a completely clean history.

The evidence we have about his UPE activities comes from the website ponisha.ir which, in my words, is an Iranian alternative to TaskRabbit. We know that there are several "freelancers" on Ponisha who have been paid for successful completion of fawiki-related activities (such as article creations, or assistance with AfDs). The specific piece of evidence I want to bring to your attention is here (archived here). Since it is in Persian (Farsi), I think providing some translation would be useful: the requester states that an article is created on fawiki here and asks for the enwiki version of this article to be created. Going to the fawiki artcile and following its interwiki link to enwiki gets you to Bahman Kazemi. The Ponisha task is completed by a Ponisha user named javadyousefi. This implies a first name of Javad and a last name of Yousefi. Of note, Javad is the English transliteration of جواد and User:جواد also publicly states that his real name is Javad Yousefi (see wikidata:User:جواد). (Historically, he used the account User:Javadyou until it was renamed to User:جواد). Finally, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bahman_Kazemi&action=history shows this page was created by User:جواد (originally in User:جواد/sandbox2 and later moved to the main namespace).

This page (archive) shows a list of tasks completed by Javad. This includes references to two pages on fawiki which we confirmed were created by جواد without proper disclosure of paid work; as a result, I just blocked him indefinitely on fawiki. To my knowledge, the only article on enwiki for which we have evidence for UPE is Bahman Kazemi. That said, I still felt obligated to report this to enwiki admins.

If you have any follow-up questions, kindly {{ping}} me in your response. Respectfully, huji—TALK 00:18, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Additional info: I just found out that here he was paid to create Shahram Jahansooz. So now we have evidence of at least two articles being created by him in form of UPE. huji—TALK 11:30, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Statistics from his contributions, in case anyone finds them useful:

• His last edit was on 4 August 2019
• His last edit to mainspace was on 2 August 2019
• His last 50 edits go back to August 2018
• His last 50 edits to mainspace go back to December 2017
• His last 50 page creations go back to April 2013
• He's created 47 pages in mainspace, including some that were the result of moving a page.

If you exclude pagemoves and the creation of redirects, it looks like he's created 5 pages in mainspace, beginning in 2012. Nyttend (talk) 03:18, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

RfC on user rights of (site) banned users is now underway

An RfC relating to user rights of (site) banned users is now underway at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User rights of (site) banned users. Please feel free to participate. --TheSandDoctor ^Talk 20:22, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Requesting a copy of a deleted page

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Last night, as I was working on expanding and improving the article on Nancy Navarro. The discussion was closed and the page deleted while I was editing it. It had been at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nancy Navarro. Ad Orientem has graciously place a redirect where the page was. Would someone please take the last version of the article and place the code here: User talk:Evrik/draft2. I can find the text here: "Nancy Navarro". wikimili.com., but want to avoid the work of wikifying the text. Thank you. --evrik ^(talk) 18:36, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Please see this discussion on my talk page. I have already received and declined this request, a point which evrik failed to note. -Ad Orientem (talk) 18:40, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Actually, I linked the discussion, User talk:Ad Orientem#Nancy Navarro, in my post. I am cleaning up the first post and making it clear that we have talked about it. Thank you. --evrik ^(talk) 18:46, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Kafka Liz's personal threat against MJL

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Kafka Liz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) wrote at User talk:MJL (edit | subject | history | links | watch | logs) (who has disclosed on their talk page they are from Connecticut):

What good fortune that I have family and friends in Connecticut. I’ll make sure they know your name and what you stand for.

This was shortly after a comment at Eric Corbett's talk page that self-important pseudo-moralizing (in the words of another editor) was "#NotAllNewEngland; more like [redacted geographical opinion that wouldn’t be helpful]. Cunts any road." (diff) The "redacted geographical opinion" is Connecticut, a state that is part of New England. Prior to that, Kafka Liz wrote that the block of Eric Corbett was a "shit move" and "Without transparent proof, I simply don’t believe that. I know there’s some sort of nasty cull going on, but I hadn’t believed you all would stoop so low. May you get the editors you deserve from this." (diff) While it's understandable for the friends of Eric Corbett to blow off some steam, there's a line, and the "I have friends in Connecticut" threat at MJL's talk page was way over that line. The community tolerated previous instances of this from others, and so of course it has not only continued, but now escalated. We need to put an immediate stop to the harassment of MJL. I'm requesting appropriate administrator intervention, please. – Levivich 16:35, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Would you please stop tweaking so I can post a response without edit conflicting? Jehochman ^Talk 16:50, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Since your edit was successful that's a non-sequitur. WP is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit - and at any time. Levivich, Connecticut has a population in excess of 3.6m. Leaky caldron (talk) 16:53, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

I asked you to stop pestering me. Please do try to ignore me. Jehochman ^Talk 17:01, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Me pestering you! Until you turned up on my TP the other day impertinently demanding me to revert an edit, I'd never even heard of you! I have engaged with Levivich and MJL a few times. On ya bike! Leaky caldron (talk) 17:05, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Your comment was egregious gravedancing. I still recommend that you strike it and not make comments like that again. Jehochman ^Talk 17:18, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

I have redacted the original comment because it is prone to being misconstrued. Obviously it's not that offensive since you chose to re-post it here, rather than provide a diff or contact WP:OVERSIGHT. MJL is a candidate for political office, which is announced on their talk page. Your statement that they are "from Connecticut" leaves out that important fact. Kafka Liz appears to declare that she will exercise her constitutional right to campaign against them, which she is free to do, but preferably not on Wikipedia. If Kafka Liz does not dispute my action, we are done here. Jehochman ^Talk 17:06, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Constitutional rights, yeah, sure – right to bring on-wiki disputes into the real world? No, never. See, e.g., the Jytdog case. Threatening to interfere with an editor's employment (which is what running for office is) because of on-wiki actions is not appropriate. Threatening to get people to vote against an editor's real-life candidacy, because of on-wiki actions, is also not appropriate. As for oversight, hiding this is not the answer. Sunshine is the best disinfectant. I have reverted your premature attempt to close this. – Levivich 17:12, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't think soapboxing about a real-world election on WP is a great move either. Two-way street. - Sitush (talk) 17:14, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

If I mention on my user talk page in a conversation with another editor that I'm going to be away for a while because I'm running for office, that makes it OK for some editor who's mad at me for something I did on-wiki to post a threat to derail my candidacy? This is the Wikipedia you want to work in? – Levivich 17:25, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

You're making false assertions of fact and strawman arguments. Nobody has said that the comment was okay. Moreover, serving on the Cromwell Board of Assessments Appeals committee is (if like my nearby town) an unpaid, part time position that helps citizens raise their profile, which can have secondary business benefits. Only voters in Cromwell have a say. If Kafka Liz has relatives in Stonington or Salisbury, or any of the other 166 Connecticut towns that are not Cromwell, they won't get to vote against MJL. This is a tempest in a tea cup. Please drop it. Jehochman ^Talk 17:49, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Wouldn't bother me but I'm not the sort of sanctimonious, virtue-signalling person who gets wound up about that sort of stuff: I'm reasonably thick-skinned and, while capable of empathy, will only empathise if it seems justified (see here). As Jehochmann says, people are allowed to exercise their constitutional rights and if MJL opened the door by raising their candidacy on-wiki then it is unrealistic to anticipate that they could do so in a vacuum. If they hadn't opened that door, there would have been no excuse for KL's comment. Whether KL can act on it is another matter entirely, and definitely outside the scope of Wikipedia. - Sitush (talk) 17:52, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

• Don't see how that can be perceived as harassment; Jytdog was different ball-game altogether. And, Jehochman's and Sitush's views quite-aligns with my own. ∯WBG^converse 17:58, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
• I counsel calm.
  • I suspect KLiz realizes she’s had a narrow brush with a block, and won’t be repeating such behavior.
  • I seriously doubt she knows anyone in Connecticut who (a) cares what she thinks and (b) is in a position to affect MJL’s electoral prospects.
  • I think MJL has shown great poise in the face of extensive provocation in this matter, and if I were a constituent of his I’d be more, not less, likely to vote for him as a result.

It will be some time before Eric Corbett’s sycophants get over the loss of their one-eyed king, so let’s just try to roll with it. Further threats of off-wiki action — and this certainly was such — should however be met with blocks. EEng 18:07, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Do "I counsel calm" and "Eric Corbett’s sycophants" really go together? Regardless, the way I see it, if someone willingly discloses personal information on-wiki, they should be also be willing to live with the consequences. So, for MJL, rule number one, don't disclose personal stuff here. For the rest of us, I suggest taking any claims of off-wiki ambitions with a large grain of salt. Other than that, this thread is a waste of time.--regentspark (comment) 18:54, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

• Do "I counsel calm" and "Eric Corbett’s sycophants" really go together? – Yes they do. The sycophants will be letting off steam for a while, and the rest of us need to remain calm while that runs its course. (If you prefer I’ll say “cult members” instead.)
• if someone willingly discloses personal information on-wiki, they should be also be willing to live with the consequences – That’s stupid. If someone edits under their real name (let’s say) that’s not carte blanche to harass them IRL.

EEng 19:58, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Unless your name is Eric Corbett, presumably? I think you're getting into more of a muddle here, EEng. - Sitush (talk) 20:01, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Whatever you may want to pretend about what happened to poor victim Eric Corbett on wiki, AFAIK no one's claimed he's been harassed off wiki. The muddle's all yours. EEng 00:01, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

Comment. @Jehochman, Levivich, and EEng: please amend your statements to reflect my preferred choice of pronouns.
Honestly, I didn't think me taking a wikibreak would be the cause for so much drama. Levicich has it right that I was just telling people the exact reason why I would be busy. I can't edit nor check Wikipedia as much until after November 5th.
It is fine if people know where I am from, what I do IRL, and know any COI I may have with a given subject (I WP:AGF they won't abuse this knowledge). The only thing I have an issue with is just referring to me by my IRL name on-wiki. I don't want that disclosed to any extent possible. I consider revealing my name, phone number, street address, and email all varying degrees of WP:OUTING. I messed up by not going by MJL until this March, but I can't change what I did in the past.
The town I live in, what office I am running for, and the political party I am in... those are all fair game. I think that helps with establishing whether I have a WP:COI for any given subject.
I really would appreciate it though if people don't use my openness and trust to carry their onwiki disputes with me into real life. Just because I am a relatively transparent person doesn't give people the complete right to start screwing with me personally just because they feel like it.
This is not a job I am running for; it's a local position that (1) doesn't pay, (2) meets only two months out of the year, and (3) doesn't do anything besides mediate tax assessment disputes. If I didn't edit so much all this summer, I wouldn't have needed to take a wikibreak. I did, so here I am.
On another note, I am rather surprised that Kafka Liz would say those mean things about me. I've only had pleasant experiences with her, and until I read this report I assumed she was trying to wish me good luck.
Either way, people are going to hate me for the exact reasons Swarm said here. That's fine. I don't mind being hated for good reasons, but let's not pretend that this is anything less than sad to watch. I'm a 21 year-old-kid; I use big words and try to act mature. I'm not exactly running for President nor should I have to expect to be held to higher standards than anyone else.
Let face facts; I just make a convenient punching bag for some people in this community. If me being one even when I am not actively editing somehow improves the encyclopedia, then I don't really care because that is more important. It's irrational though, so no one should feel the need to accept it just because I have personally. (edit conflict) –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 20:53, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

• Friends, this isn’t a chat room. Take it to somebody’s talk page please. Jehochman ^Talk 00:04, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Going forward (discussions proposal)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Moved from #Going forward (discussions proposal) (moved) above Primefac (talk) 19:22, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

As was mentioned above, it would be nice to get a full consensus on just the matter regarding any future changes to the citation module. The proposal was as follows:

• "Require that all future changes to the citation module be advertised at WP:CENT, wherever they are discussed."

I think this is pretty straightforward and do not want it to be lost in the conversation here as a lot of other proposals are lumped together.

• Support - As re-introducer. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:13, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - That's self-explanatory.Tvx1 16:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• No. A) This is the wrong place. AN is not for content-making decisions. You want VPPRO/VPPOL (pick your poison). B) Every change advertised when proposed is insane. You would require or desire the same level of oversight for a bug fix, or a minor feature, as something in this case which affected many many articles. There might be some reasonable discussion on how much oversight is enough, and when, but it's not here, and it's not this. --Izno (talk) 16:28, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  This module isn't changed that often as it effects millions of pages, we need a fix to the problem and not editors making major decisions through casual chats. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:33, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  It doesn't change that often because we don't want to break the wiki job queue with thousands of small but livable changes for each release. It's not changed rarely because the changes that are made don't exist. --Izno (talk) 16:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  The point is that this could happen again if discussions are not done ahead of time with the releases. What do you propose be put into place so something similar doesn't happen again? The facts are changes were made without broad consensus which has angered a lot of editors here on Wikipedia. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:41, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  If you want to have that discussion, let's take it out of the high-stakes scenario you're putting us in by having an RFC on AN where it is also misplaced. I was planning to start a normal talk page discussion about it at Help talk:CS1 (with perhaps some invitation at WT:CITE and WP:VPPOL), where it is both in-scope and highly-relevant, since I agree that we seem to have caught people by surprise, and I doubt anyone wants to relive the past 24 hours. As I said, here and now is not the right time or place to have that discussion. --Izno (talk) 16:45, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  I have removed the RfC, I cant speak for other editors but I share the frustration going on. One person should not be making these changes without consensus per our normal practices. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:47, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• No I expect that the smart people dealing with the CS code should be able to make bug fixes without having to seek out consensus. But at the same time, they should be aware when a change will affect a large segment of existing citations and should seek CENT-type consensus building then, or recognize that when there is a situation like this (a change after the fact turns out to be disruptive), to back off the non-bug fixes and then reseek consensus. Nothing that can presently enforced through admins through. --Masem (t) 16:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Meh, advertising would not have solved anything that happened with this rollout. Not really against, but that seems like pointless WP:BUREAUCRACY to me. If you really care, then watch Help talk:CS1. if you're interested in CS1 templates. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:40, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• No. Yes, major changes to the way citations behave should be discussed centrally, but that is already true for major changes of anything. There doesn't need to be an additional requirement specifically for the templates and I am sure going forward large changes will have wider discussion. The major problem that turned up here wasn't mentioned in the update description at Help talk:CS1#update to the cs1/2 module suite after 2 September 2019, so advertising that wouldn't have helped. Otherwise that description was very clear and linked to the discussions where the changes were considered. StarryGrandma (talk) 17:05, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - I proposed this originally (somewhere up the page). Changes to citation modules potentially affect every article on the project, there should certainly be some means of notification even if it's just a message like "on <upcoming date> we're rolling out changes to the citation modules, here's what you need to be aware of". If not CENT then a watchlist notice maybe? I mean, otherwise, editors have pretty good reason to be angry when their hard work on constructing a professional-quality article is suddenly and unexpectedly covered by new error messages all over their references, through no fault of their own. I don't expect devs to seek community preapproval for every little bug fix or feature standardization or whatever, but clearly it was intended that this change would produce error messages, and it would have been better to know in advance. At least someone could have stepped in beforehand and said, "you know what, you're going to piss people off doing this, why not hide the error messages or have some kind of transition period?" Otherwise we get AN discussions like this one with mobs demanding blood, and everything goes backwards. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:03, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  @Ivanvector: re 'someone stepping in'. This would not have happened, because the test suites didn't show these behaviours. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:08, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  Well, fair enough, but that suggests testing was not sufficiently rigorous. I mean, was it not expected that changing the periodical name parameters to requirements and adding visible error messages would, you know, produce visible error messages if a cite was missing the parameter? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:30, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  What was expected was that {{cite journal}} / {{cite magazine}} and other periodical citations throw errors when they didn't have |journal=/|magazine=/|work= set, because either that is clearly a critical omission (or the wrong template used). What wasn't expected was that {{cite web}} would be throwing missing periodical errors, because websites aren't periodicals. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:44, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

  So, today, we do publish a notification of intent to push the sandboxes to the live modules approximately a week in advance. That notification usually occurs on a few pages: Help talk:CS1, WT:CITE, WT:AWB, offhand. It looks like Ttm didn't do so for this release outside of HT:CS1. So that's one gone-wrong. I think maybe that list of pages might be too short and perhaps we should include VPM or VPT or VPPRO? Possibly also UT:Citation bot/UT:InternetArchiveBot? So that might be a second gone-wrong. --Izno (talk) 19:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

• This is the wrong place to make such a proposal. Raise it at WP:VPT or the module's talk page. There's been a lot of latitude in these off-topic threads, but I think it's time to start closing them and/or moving them to the appropriate place. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 19:50, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, and for style issues, Wikipedia talk:Citing sources should also be notified. SarahSV ^(talk) 20:54, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, would save precious time of editors wasted in trying to get disruption to millions of article reverted in the face of unprecedented stonewalling. It would also ensure changes to be made with consensus not with imposition and invoking of fait accompli. I also disagree with those who think this is not the right venue, same can be said for the original discussion. Since this where it started it better end here, nothing is going to be broken because of holding discussion anywhere. The arguments put forth is what matter. – Ammarpad (talk) 06:44, 7 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose as written but support in principle. "All future changes" is too broad. I'd support "all changes to require or unrequire parameters" being listed at CENT, and there are probably other types of "major" changes that should be listed at CENT. I think this issue needs further discussion before being proposed in an RfC (and I agree such an RfC shouldn't be at AN). – Levivich 21:14, 7 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose Initially supported, but on further consideration, 'all future changes' is broad. Should narrow down to major or breaking changes. robertsky (talk) 04:15, 8 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose per robertsky. There are plenty of minor and technical changes that happen in that template module. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 08:36, 8 September 2019 (UTC)
• Something needs to change, but I'm not convinced it's this. My day job is making changes to production systems. Tolerance for risk varies from organisation to organisation, but in every case there is a requirement to be able to roll back any potentially impactful change. I was disturbed by the resistance to rollback here, and by the implication that there were multiple dependent changes which made simple rollback unachievable. When an impact occurs during a change it's normal to have a discussion over rollback v. fix-forward, but with something that has this scale of impact the bar to rollback is normally low. I think we should look at improving the change management and incident management processes around high impact changes in line with normal practice for customer-facing services everywhere. Guy (help!) 09:45, 8 September 2019 (UTC)
  • ^^^^ this. Ultimately, this whole giant thread was arguing about removing four words from the module code. Yet, it took four days and something like 100 editors' time. In those four days, the new update could have been rolled back, adjusted, and re-implemented, without needing 100 editors to !vote on anything. I think the most important thing is to make sure this doesn't happen again. – Levivich 14:59, 8 September 2019 (UTC)
• Closure This page is for "information and issues of interest to administrators" and the suggestion does not require admin permission nor assistance. On the other hand, the wp:CENT is not meant for Announcements nor Topic-specific discussions so the suggestion should not be enforced as it stands. Further voting is thus non-productive and the discussion should be closed.

The module is edit-protected and most changes are made by a few users, with prior discussions and announcements. In the bigger discussion, the suggestion and support seems to be asking for a respect for consensus as well as a wider engagement in the module discussions. There is no dispute on that part, and whenever appropriate, wp:CENT and Wikipedia talk:Citing sources may be used to attract needed attention. A more open-ended discussion on how to assure compliance for this module is welcome at CS1 talk page. JAGulin (talk) 10:55, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Trend toward more inappropriate AIV reports

I've noticed lately that there seems to be more and more reports at WP:AIV that are not consistent with the guidelines in the green box at the top of the page. While there has always been a certain level of inappropriate reports there, this currently occurs to an extent that I haven't seen in my >12 years a regular patrolling admin at AIV. Examples include: IPs reported for routine vandalism without having being warned; reports for a single vandal edit for which they were given a first warning and then immediately reported before making another edit; editors adding their social media accounts to their user page being reported as promotion-only accounts; content dispute/edit warring between an IP and a registered user where the IP only gets reported for vandalism; etc. These types of edits are of course problematic, but are not really immediately blockable offenses. I feel we are becoming more and more bitey toward new editors in this regard. Some of the fault here lies with the editors making the reports, but I also see lots of these reports resulting in admins blocking which further encourages this type of reporting. If we are going to be more strict in the way we deal with new users' problematic editing, I think we need to get consensus and change the guidelines first. Otherwise, I would suggest that admins be more proactive in declining reports that are not consistent with our current guidelines. What do other admins think? -- Ed (Edgar181) 13:05, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

I've also noticed some admins will block even after a report is declined. Reaper Eternal (talk) 13:12, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Reaper Eternal, Hm - do you think SQLBot's timing should be tweaked to remove un-actioned reports sooner? SQL^{Query me!} 22:19, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

I've been thinking it wouldn't hurt to shorten it a bit. Leaving reports for a bit is nice feedback for reporting users, but they don't need to linger too long. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 20:56, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Amorymeltzer, Any specific suggestions on how the algorithm should be tweaked? SQL^{Query me!} 01:30, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh I don't know. I think 4-8 could be 3-6, but looking over the discussion for its implementation, it seems 8 was a pretty agreed-upon value, but that's for un-replied-to reports right? Is it the same for replied-to reports? Maybe those with a single declined reply could be removed quicker. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 10:18, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

• Additions along those lines clearly shouldn't be there - are they generally being raised by those who should know better, or by early counter-vandals who aren't sure about the process? @Reaper Eternal: - could you give any examples of that occurring, that would be a more serious concern than some unwarranted posts Nosebagbear (talk) 14:49, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Although there is always a low level of inappropriate reports from new users (which is understandable and manageable), the trend that I'm observing in general involves experienced users. -- Ed (Edgar181) 15:17, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

I've called those users out on it in the past (commenting that the report is inappropriate). They tend to get very mad at me because "I'm not an admin and it's not my business". Frankly though, I think the comments are valuable to give the admins a head's up. -- Rockstonetalk to me! 22:42, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

I've had a long-standing beef with CSD U5 being used frivolously for any new editor who posts ANY personal information about themselves on their user page. We have long-standing editors with elaborate bios on their user pages stating their interests but I've seen new editor user pages just stating something simple like "I am a student at X university where I'm studying science. I love Facebook and editing Wikipedia!" being deleted as "not a web host" and sometimes "self-promotion". I spoke with others at WikiMania about this and am ready to post about this on the Village Pump. I think some admins are not evaluating rationales for deleting user pages and considering whether the criteria are even appropriate. I think there is a rush to delete and, in your case, Edgar, to block over infractions that, in the past, would have involved a conversation with an editor first. First, we need to get across to our reporting editors that they need to be more judicious before they tag pages and report "vandals" and talk to our our admins who spend most of their time deleting to question tagged user pages and not just automatically delete them. I can't think of a quicker way to drive away new editors than deleting their user pages that might contain simple biographical information about them. I'm not talking about wanna-be djs, models, actors and marketers but just new editors introducing themselves by telling us who they are. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 04:14, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Liz, since you and I have had differences of opinion in the past about this, how would you suggest editors improve their tagging of sandbox pages as U5? My understanding is that you don't speedily delete sandbox pages as U5 if they're plausible article drafts, whereas I think that even if it's a plausible article draft, a vanity autobiography is U5 material. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 13:07, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Creffett I wouldn't call the type of page Liz is describing a "vanity autobiography". One's userpage exists to introduce oneself to other editors. "I am a student at X university where I'm studying science. I love Facebook and editing Wikipedia!" sounds to me like a perfectly appropriate example of the intended use of one's userpage. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 13:13, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

ONUnicorn, well, yes, and I wouldn't U5 that (probably should have made that clearer). I was talking more about a place where Liz and I have disagreed in the past, where I have marked a sandbox page for speedy deletion under U5 and she declined it as a plausible draft. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 13:16, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Okay, my point is nothing without examples so here are two user pages that admins can check out that were just deleted in the past few minutes that I think should be perfectly fine: User:Mohamed Abdullahi ibrahim isack and User:Rezoanul basher. Both editors created a user page within 30 minutes of creating an account with a little bit of biographical information about themselves. Nothing egregious, they weren't talking about their DJ business or a company they worked for. Maybe it is not ideal to include a social media account but I am sure are respected editors who include this as well.

Think of some of our most veteran editors and the amount of information they include about themselves on their user page and ask yourself why we have one standard for experienced editors and a different one for newbies. I was talking with Doc James about this and he asserted that it was important for editors to share information about themselves so we know if they have a COI regarding the subjects they write about.

And I can't see how an article draft written on a user page can be activity unrelated to Wikipedia...it's an article draft for goodness' sakes! It might be promotional and it might not meet our notability standards. But how can it be "not a webhost" content when an editor is drafting an article? That's exactly what we keep telling editors that they should be spending time on.

Sorry to rant, I'll try to come up with a solid proposal regarding this to bring to the Village Pump but it bugs me every time I wander into CSD territory and see some of the pages are speedily deleted without question. How many of us started of our Wikipedia editing careers with sterling editing? I think we have to provide editors with room to try, learn and improve. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 22:54, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

• I'd just like to comment here as my spambot requests often result in confusion. Some new users are just telling about themselves however a good portion of spambots appear to be innocuous new users but are, well, spambots in the ntsamr category. They often look like this:
• My name is Emilia from Court-At-Street studying Law. I did my schooling, secured 76% and hope to find someone with same interests in Sewing. source
• I am Beatriz from Zonhoven doing my final year engineering in Theatre. I did my schooling, secured 77% and hope to find someone with same interests in Home automation. source
• Hello, dear friend! My name is Carolyn. I am pleased that I can unify to the entire world. I live in Germany, in the south region. I dream to go to the various countries, to obtain familiarized with fascinating individuals.
  
  Visit my page - link redacted source
• My name is Brice Youngblood. Researching fashion could be the thing I really like most. For years I've lived in Virgin Islands hence there is no love every day living in the following. I am currently a filing assistant. Go to her website identify out more: link redactedsource
• I am Jamel and was born on 10 October 1977. My hobbies are Seashell Collecting and Footbag.
  
  Also visit my blog url redactedsource
• 28 yr oⅼd Equipment Employ Manager Benton fгom Dolbeau-Mistassini, ｒeally loves garage saleing, redacted link escorts ɑnd fashion. Ϝinds tһе charm in traveling tօ spots ɑround thе entire world, reϲently ϳust returning fгom Wieliczka Salt Ⅿine.source

I could list hundreds, if not thousands more from here and from every other project but I'm hoping that the pattern is a little more clear.

Here is a series of different spambots:[89][90][91][92][93][94][95][96]and this one is a scam/spambot

And this will certainly explain some of the reports Liz pointed out above and the increased numbers of reports you're seeing, as there is an influx of bots but I cannot stress enough that these are not naive editors or even spam-editors, they are spambots, they will never become productive editors and they cannot be reasoned with...because they are not sentient, but I see all too often that we're told to warn spambots like this which is quite frankly a waste of everyone's time and if it's problematic that they're being reported at AIV or if you think it should be reported elsewhere, maybe an RFC needs to be started to remove "spambot or compromised account" from the default selection at AIV. Of course this doesn't address the inappropriate vandalism reports but I just wanted to point out the spammer/u5 stuff is often overlooked. Praxidicae (talk) 16:20, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

they cannot be reasoned with...because they are not sentient that's what they want you to think... ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 17:14, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Sometimes they do remove speedy tags though...they also like to have an identity crisis every now and then and change the fake name they use. Praxidicae (talk) 17:23, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

In order to reduce any potential confusion regarding this specific type of report at AIV, I would recommend adding a link in your report to m:NTSAMR to make it clear to any patrolling admins that it is part of a larger pattern of abuse. -- Ed (Edgar181) 18:30, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

• (Non-administrator comment) The problem certainly exists—see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Indian politics‎‎ #Edit war in Communist Party of India for example of a deceptive “vandalism” report—but my observations suggest that it is not as bad here in en.Wikipedia as elsewhere. I have an impression that an average sysop here understands what is vandalism and what is not – certainly not the case for Commons. As a tangential comment, IMHO vandal fighters should be able to distinguish several scenarios. For a casual vandal e.g. on a generic dynamic IP – yes, warn, wait for next edits, and then block. But there are also vandal IP ranges; in that case it isn’t necessary to warn the last active IP especially if user_talks of individual IP already have a plenty of warnings. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 21:21, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Possible socking

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Not certain, but we may have a WP:SOCK issue at List of oldest living state leaders article. SCUTI85 is suddenly being helped by 'brand new' comer Maria Binion. GoodDay (talk) 19:28, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Chris.Sherlock/Letsbefiends unblock request

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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• Chris.Sherlock (talk · contribs · blocks · count · rollback · admin · logs)
• Chris.sherlock (talk · contribs · blocks · count · rollback · admin · logs)
• Letsbefiends (talk · contribs · blocks · count · rollback · admin · logs)
• User talk:Chris.sherlock

I'm bringing this here after unilaterally declining it because I think it's may be worth having community review. The text of the initial appeal is

You don't know the back story. I was editing under User:Letsbefiends, but in case you haven't noticed this account was pretty much automatically created across wikis. It is remarkable that the admin blocked this account, yet User:Letsbefiends is no longer used, and never will be again. My other accounts were User:Ta bu shi da yu and User:Tbsdy lives, in which I did important work on Wikipedia. For instance, I created , wrote articles that got to the main page, etc. I canned those accounts and won't be using them any more, and I am unlikely to do very much except perhaps the odd spelling error. It doesn't exactly make sense that you have blocked this account. There are no other accounts. And I point out that the original blocker has stated they don't do much on Wikipedia any more, so not sure how you want me to reach out to them if it's unlikely they will respond in a timely manner (I have done this already via email). Incredible how dismissive you were though. Gotta love a user who writes on their user page that they are open to being emailed, yet I find they have turned off that feature. Thanks Yamla! - 218.215.23.155 (talk) 13:24, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

There is more on the user talk. Note, I am giving my permission as a CheckUser for an administrator to unblock the Chris.Sherlock account if there is consensus here to do so.

I personally oppose an unblock for two reasons:

1. There is CU confirmed block evasion logged out a few months ago
2. Special:Contributions/Chris.Sherlock is unquestionably a sock created after the block of Letsbefiends, and the abuse he leveled towards DeltaQuad during the unblock request would likely be worth an indef in it's own right. The other commentary on the initial edits from that account also very much don't look like someone I'd advocate unblocking.

That being said, it's controversial on the talk page, and other administrators were advocating IAR before the CU findings. I'm open to letting the community decide this one, so I'm bringing it here. TonyBallioni (talk) 01:08, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

• This is Ta bu shi da yu, first edit June 2004, who is part of the infrastructure of this place. He's the creator of {{citation needed}} [97] and WP:AN, [98] and lots of good articles, most memorably Exploding whale. He is funny and kind, and he was very helpful in his day to lots of editors. His real name is Chris Sherlock (he outed himself years ago), and at some point he ran into emotional problems and had to leave. There have been a couple of attempts at returning, none successful. As I understand it from Tim Starling's recent post on User talk:Chris.sherlock, [99] Chris has undergone psychotherapy and would like to come back. I strongly support that, and I hope the community will too, on the understanding, of course, that he uses only one account. SarahSV ^(talk) 01:28, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose for now: The unblock request is still missing the essential parts: understanding what they did wrong and convincing us (well, the reviewing admin) that they'll do better. I see a history of their contributions followed by some combative behavior. I respect their significant past contributions to the project, but I'm definitely a "nobody is above the law" type. Oppose, potentially revisited if they at least meet the minimum requirements for an unblock request. creffett (talk) 02:09, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Weak oppose, per this rant, as mentioned above. It would be stronger if I didn't suspect I was missing a large part of the back story here. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 03:03, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support When Tim Starling and SarahSV support an unblock, the only reasonable procedure is to agree with them. Apparently there were problems and of course, like all unblocks, there may be problems in the future. However, the intentions are good and the rant mentioned above is not a rant. Further, the editor is known to have created good content. Johnuniq (talk) 04:02, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support for the same reasons. DGG ( talk ) 04:39, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support somewhat conditionally, per SarahSV's and Tim Starling's comments. TBSDY needs to take things slowly, because many things have changed since he needed to step away for health reasons; it would be helpful if a few of his longtime colleagues undertook to help him transition back in (I'm sure several of them are reading right now and will gladly step up). Chris needs to be aware that there's nowhere near the tolerance within the community of "characters" or eccentricity that was commonplace when he was more active, and it would be wise of him to temper his behaviour accordingly; he should willingly take and follow advice from colleagues willing to mentor him. He will be on a pretty short leash, and of course should be restricted to one account. Risker (talk) 04:45, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support per all, and at the very worst WP:ROPE. I hope Mr. Sherlock feels better! :) – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 05:02, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support per above, emphasising that it would be best if Tbsdy could stick to a single account. —Kusma (t·c) 10:04, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. No matter this user's past merits, their conduct is incompatible with participation in Wikipedia, and any unblock request would need to recognize this and address it, as per Creffett. Sandstein 10:51, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, we should always be willing to give people a second chance. Fish+Karate 11:35, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support We should give a user who has contributed much to the project in the past and has had some health issues another chance.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 12:24, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support giving them another chance per all the reasons above. – Ammarpad (talk) 16:23, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support The unblock request is reasonable unlike the original block which was excessive. I understand that there hasn't been a sufficient amount of public groveling from the blocked user to satisfy some of the admins here but that's entirely their problem. Iaritmioawp (talk) 16:31, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Chris is good people. I know a lot of the back story outside of Wikipedia, I am not concerned. And I miss him here. Yes, he needs to take it steady, for reasons some of us understand, but I don't see any reason he'd be a risk here right now. Guy (help!) 16:58, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. His response to the unblock request does not give me any faith he's actually going to be a productive contributor again. If he cannot state in his own words the specific issues that led to him being blocked, and has been socking recently, that's further reason not to consider his request. If he had emotional issues I'm hopeful they're taken care of, but that's outside the realm of consideration. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 17:08, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Perhaps if the admin who blocked him had done so, we might all know why he was blocked in the first place. Orderinchaos 03:06, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose His response or diatribe at the unblock request should be enough of an indicator that this will result in issues. To me it shows an astounding lack of WP:AGF. --Cameron₁₁₅₉₈ ^(Talk) 17:30, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Mainly per Guy. A valued contributor in the early years ran into emotional difficulties. Of course we consider that. This is a real person, not an abstract avatar, and we need to be kinder to our fellow editors. Anyone who has contributed so much in the past deserves to be given help and opportunity to contribute again, especially given Tim's assessment that they are now past their problems. --RexxS (talk) 00:22, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose primarily due to the discussion that has already occurred at the user's talk page and the user's block evasion sockpuppetry. Would support extending the WP:SO. ST47 (talk) 01:38, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Net benefit to the encyclopaedia. The issues over which he was blocked were ridiculous - he was accused of breaches of policy, but these were never substantiated, and seemed to fly in the face of the facts relating to the subject of the article being disputed. And we do not generally give indefinite blocks for WP:NOR. One health issue three years ago - recovered from - does not define a person, and I also think that editing under his real name, by his own choice, imposes a degree of personal accountability. Orderinchaos 03:06, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

  We definitely do indef block editors for persistent or egregious BLP vios, especially if the editors start editing logged out to get their way. As we should. I haven't and won't look into the content details of the block since frankly I don't feel it has great bearing on what we should do now at least at this time. And it's likely to be difficult anyway given changing sources. But BLP should be taken seriously and if there are significant concerns it is often better to leave the content out until it is clear there are no reasonable concerns. Any editor who goes against that may reasonably be blocked maybe even indef with the recognition indef is often not meant to be permanent but to require an editor understand the problem with their editing before they edit again. Edit: It seems the content was on a sandbox which looks to have been deleted so not possible for us peons to review. But definitely someone using primary sources like ASIC, court cases etc would be a strong concern per WP:BLPPRIMARY. I will make one final comment which is that UNDUE relating to a LP is by definition a BLP concern even if as with all BLP matters how we handle it will depend on the details. Nil Einne (talk) 01:35, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support - as has previously been a dedicated user. Hence fair chance of being net benefit. I know parts of the back story and can forgive some venting. If there are future problems I am sure they can be dealt with accordingly. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 03:22, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support giving another chance to improve. This is WP:ROPE anyway. starship.paint (talk) 04:57, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Chris is clearly someone who cares about the project and has contributed very positively in the past, but he's suffered from some personal problems. Thankfully he seems to be well along the road to recovery, and wouldn't it be nice if his friends here could help with that process? I know about the "not therapy" thing, but it's for our benefit too, because it looks like we'll get a great contributor back. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:29, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, per WP:ROPE mostly. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:56, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. I have have fond memories of Ta bu shi da yu, I know he has the potential to be a real plus to the community. I know he had problems, but if Tim Starling, SarahSV, and most importantly Guy are willing to give him another chance, then I am. Guettarda (talk) 20:28, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
• Reluctant oppose despite the strong support from some respected contributors above, I can't support based on what they've said. They have my strong sympathies for the problems they've faced in life and for whatever mistakes we made in dealing with them. But ultimately we have to protect Wikipedia. I don't expect grovelling. I do expect an understanding of stuff like our sockpuppetry policy. There's also a wide chasm between grovelling and the rants they've left. Nil Einne (talk) 00:25, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  Should mention that I'm fine with the editor using whatever single account they want if unblocked. Even if they hadn't scrambled the other account it's never seemed necessary to me to be too fussy about which account provided all accounts are properly declared. With reason of course. Nil Einne (talk) 00:56, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

• Tentative support I am not worried about "harm" to Wikipedia, I am however worried about Wikipedia resulting in harm to Chris. Wikipedia is often a fairly rough place and can cause editors a great deal of stress. Chris are you sure you want this? And do you agree to reach out for help if needed / take a step back again if it becomes to stressful? And most importantly continue to take care of yourself? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:37, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose To be blunt, this person was blocked 2 days ago for block evasion. That alone should give everyone pause. And the rant in his request seals the deal for me. He should be commended for his previous work and I wish him all the best in the future, but I do not believe a block should be overturned at this time. Buffs (talk) 16:35, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
• Conditional oppose unless there are specific, written, agreements that any editor can order him to stay off their talkpage and failure to do so will result in an immediate and indefinite block, and that any admin can impose a full interaction ban between him and any other editor if they consider it justified and failure to comply with it will result in an immediate and indefinite block. Yes, I'm familiar with the background here, but regardless of the circumstances this editor rightfully earned a well-deserved reputation as a vicious and aggressive bully (much of the history has been hidden owing to the out-of-process deletion of his talk page, but see the most recent entries at Special:Contributions/Tbsdy lives, for instance), and regardless of how much he's changed it's not reasonable to expect anyone who had dealings with his previous incarnations to be forced to interact with him against their will. ‑ Iridescent 19:49, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose in part per Buffs: Block evasion should not be rewarded with an unblock a few days later. But more than that, my observation is that the main supporters here are supporting on the grounds of recalling someone with a good track record or understanding this person's struggles and a personal knowledge of improvement. That's all well and good and could absolutely support someone on those grounds were I in the same place. But treating editors equally, on objective grounds, and on the public record, should be the basis for deciding whether to unblock. And looking at this case objectively, without knowledge of who this user is other than what's presented about the post-block conduct, does not provide adequate support for an unblock. The discussion quoted by TonyBallioni above does not inspire confidence that Chris understands and accepts why he was blocked. If there is a recent record of positive contributions outside of enwiki then those may be relevant for consideration. I think Chris should seek reentry to the community via the standard offer in six months' time. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 20:01, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose Based off the odd showing of pure nepotism above. It's obvious some of the supports above want to disregard the socking policy because they knew this editor a long time ago. As someone who doesn't, I don't see the user showing any understanding to why they were blocked in the first place and the TP shows they don't even know how what they did can be perceived as socking. Its simple: they were blocked for not following the BLP policy. Wasn't unblocked when they made a new account to start editing again, and was blocked when caught. So oppose till the user can tell us how they understand why they're blocked and what they can do in the future to not run into the same problems that got them to be blocked in the first place. Valeince (talk) 20:40, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
• Comment Involved user User:TonyBallioni is attempting to silence Chris's attempt to hold the blocking admin to account on his own talk page, the only place where he has edit access at this point. Orderinchaos 02:59, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
  • I am not involved: I reviewed a CU block and when I determined their was block evasion, blocked one of the socks, and then brought it here for review. When you and the user appealing decided to continue harping on DeltaQuad rather than raise issues here, I hatted the discussion as disruptive. See also my response on my talk. I see another administrator has restored the hatting now. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:08, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

She was asked to justify her actions, and as the thing wore on, it became increasingly obvious she had incorrectly used the powers the community had vested in her and imposed novel rules. Powers on here are not a gift of absolute power, and if they're wrongly applied, they deserve to be questioned. The conversation there is also on a rather different topic to here - it's more about the original block than about this unblock request of this account. Makes sense to keep them separate. Orderinchaos 03:38, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Just noting that there's been considerable progress on Chris's wall, underscoring the positives of keeping that discussion open. Closing it prematurely would have prevented the apology that resulted. Orderinchaos 03:57, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose - The editor in question is edit warring, and displaying OWNership issues on their talkpage, [100], [101]. I think Orderinchaos should probably back off a bit here from sinking to accusations of bad faith repeatedly. SQL^{Query me!} 03:26, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Firstly, while I accept talk pages aren't "owned", accusing someone of edit warring on their *own* talk page is kind of stretching the intended purpose of the edit warring policy. Secondly, It wouldn't have been so had you not edit warred yourself [102] [103]. Thirdly, there is a theme of people not reading policies here, but WP:AGF explicitly says that the policy "does not require that editors continue to assume good faith in the presence of obvious evidence to the contrary". I expressed my opinion earlier in the piece in favour of Chris's rehabilitation on the project, and was initially prepared to leave it at that, but the actions of some here have utterly disgusted me and reminded me exactly why I only occasionally edit these days despite having been one of the site's most prolific article writers on Australian topics for several years in the past. Orderinchaos 03:32, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

That obvious evidence to the contrary being....? Also, I take offense to being accused of edit warring. I would like to see that evidence as well, please? SQL^{Query me!} 03:45, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Second part first - easy. The two diffs I linked above show you reasserting someone else's earlier edit, then doing it again, on the encouragement of the original (asserter? for want of a better word). [104] First part - I'm loath to prosecute that now that there's been positive developments on the other talk page (another thing that demonstrates why it was good to keep it open), but I've been here long enough to know how pile-ons work. Hell, back in the IRC days I was probably part of a few, although that doesn't make it right. Orderinchaos 03:52, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

I edited the user_talk page ONCE, then gave an opinion without even approaching reinstating my last edit nowhere even remotely close to reasserting someone else's earlier edit, then doing it again. That doesn't even come close to edit warring. Please retract your claim immediately. SQL^{Query me!} 04:00, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Partial retraction as noted with relation to the second edit, and apologies for getting that one wrong. But your first edit (third overall) has a cosine similarity of 0.501 against the original edit, with even a quote directly from it. Orderinchaos 04:11, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

He's allowed to edit his own talkpage in the manner done. Other editors are not entitled to simply do whatever they want there (for the record, I still oppose, but not on these grounds). Buffs (talk) 19:08, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

*Support unblock. It seems Chris was a productive editor in the past and I believe, from his responses, that he intends to continue being a productive editor. From my perspective WP:AGF applies. I don't see the rant as a rant - it seems he was understandably frustrated. He has indicated that he will use only one account going forward, so that issue seems to be resolved. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 08:45, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support It would have been better & simpler for all had Chris.sherlock applied to return under WP:Standard offer -- & likely would have been unremarkably successful had he did. Had he done this, he would have avoided the mistake which appears to be the reason for this accusation of sock puppeting. But to insist that he use this method now that he has returned is little more than process for process sake. Chris.sherlock has proven to be a valuable contributor in the past: he is probably the only editor to merit a Signpost article upon his departure the first time, many years ago. However, as Risker pointed out above, things have changed & he needs to return the community slowly & with mentoring in order to successfully re-acclimatize. -- llywrch (talk) 17:00, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
  • little more than process for process sake I find it astounding that this is grounds for dissent in a post-WP:FRAM world. Adherence to process, whether for the sake of process or (as is the case here) in order to demonstrate equal treatment and encourage appropriate behavior, is the single most important thing we need to be doing on Wikipedia right now. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 17:31, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
    • So you doubt that if Chris.sherlock were to drop this, wait 6 months, then approach any of at least a dozen admins, he wouldn't be allowed back into Wikipedia? After which, there will not be some outcry of favoritism & corruption, & perhaps no requirement that he receive some help & spend some time familiarizing himself with all of the changes? It saves us time not going thru those hoops, instead deciding here & now if we want him back, than to repeat this discussion 6 months from now, & reach the same conclusions. (And WP:FRAM was about an outside group telling us how to handle our people, not the community deciding how to handle this case.) -- llywrch (talk) 07:13, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
      • I think that if he came back in six months and sought an unban (since this will become a CBAN upon its failure) under the standard offer, not having engaged in block/ban evasion in the meantime, I think that the request will get a reasonable evaluation based on the evidence presented at that time. And, no, WP:FRAM is not simply about how WMF handled Fram, as the outcry over the Arbitration Committee's bungling of the situation has proved. It's about equal treatment under policy and fairness of process. As another commenter has stated, the arguments that Chris should be allowed back in because he's part of the old guard and did some good things in the past is the most disgusting display of nepotism I've seen outside of WMF board members. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 20:30, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
    • No, the single most important thing we need to be doing on Wikipedia right now, and for all time, is to treat people with empathy, decency, and compassion, and when process gets in the way of that, we ignore the process and just do the right thing. --Jayron32 12:54, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
      • And here, the right thing is to follow the process. Irregular, "out-of-process" actions, especially administrative actions, are what got us into and perpetuate the WP:FRAM mess. Crying IAR or NOTLAW every single time a rule gets in your way is a slap in the face to everyone who routinely gets an unblock request denied because they don't have friends, or who has an article deleted on notability grounds, or any number of other routine things. Chris is neither unique nor does he present special circumstances over any other blocked editor. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 20:30, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
        • The implication that I supported unblocking him because of some kind of favoritism is in no way true, and the fact that you would invent that kind of insinuation against me is rude beyond belief. I've never met the blocked user, I would have made the same argument to unblock any blocked person blocked under similar circumstances, and the fact that you would try to invent such a motive for me just shows what kind of person you are. --Jayron32 01:07, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose mainly per the user's belligerent comments on his Talk page and, in particular, the personal attacks against Amanda, the substance of which is often ludicrous.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:18, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support The main crux of the block seems to me to be over the socking issue, and yet I don't see the intent to deceive or avoid scrutiny. These accounts are in the open, were never meant to avoid scrutiny or discipline, etc. Some of the lashing out seems problematic, but does not arise to the level of blocking IMHO. --Jayron32 18:19, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose I changed my Ivote from Support to Oppose. As @Bbb23: has noted, the comments on the talk page have become quite belligerent from two users who are not Amanda. This is exactly the kind of disruptive behavior that results in being blocked or banned. They appear to be seeking some sort of justice for past wrongs that happened three years ago. It is time to drop the stick and stop trying to confront a number of Admins about this. (Chris Sherlock pinged four Admins on issues that have already been discussed [105], [106], [107], [108]). Also, it is not appropriate to accuse @TonyBallioni: or Amanda of a bad faith block or other nefarious motives.---Steve Quinn (talk) 18:40, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

There was an apology from Amanda on the page yesterday, following which the tone has significantly changed in a positive way. IAR is a good thing to have always as a backup, but it does not entitle admins to make up policies on the run and block people indefinitely for them, then (initially) refuse to engage constructively when their behaviour is questioned. I don't see how raising this is belligerent. Wikipedia literally would stop functioning if more admins behaved in that way. Some would argue it already has - there's been huge changes since my main active period, pretty much none of them positive. I apologise if you were offended by the outcome of my incredulousness at what I was seeing and my feeling that someone needed to say something. Orderinchaos 03:41, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

I appreciate the apology. And I think there was no IAR involved. It is policy to block sockpuppet accounts. Fortunately one Admin decided to allow the community to decide. What I saw on the talk page were two editors repeatedly confronting Amanda until she apologized - for something that occured three years ago. I think that was taking advantage of WP:ADMINACCT. Maybe I'm not perceiving this correctly, but this is what see right now. Also, editing from the perspective of trying to right great wrongs does not seem to be effective (imho). ---Steve Quinn (talk) 05:57, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

• Comment I think the CU block is a good call and being blocked for sockpuppetry is a good call. It amounts to the same thing. Recommend return in six months per WP:Standard offer due to the aforementioned behavior and sockpuppetry, which resulted in going around a block to continue editing. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 01:03, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Ta bu shi da yu, the creator of this very noticeboard, is something of an icon to those of us who were around then. Now he wishes to edit under his real name (Chris Sherlock). I'm in favour of drawing a line under the chequered history in between, not least because it's too complicated to disentangle; because I don't see any real attempt to avoid scrutiny; and because, though I daresay Ta bu was at fault, it looks like others may have been too. I'd like to welcome him back and see how it goes. With a plea to Ta bu / Chris to take it slow getting into his stride and to look forward, rather than back to old grudges. Do you think you can do that, Chris? Bishonen | talk 01:53, 13 September 2019 (UTC).
  • Wow, that is ironic; here is WP:AN's earliest history. Johnuniq (talk) 05:34, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
    • Ironic, indeed. I second that WoW. ---Steve Quinn (talk) 06:03, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Dicklyon pushing for the mass-renaming of pages through a small-scale consensus

Dicklyon (talk · contribs) is pushing to have "The" removed from the disambiguator of all band articles on Wikipedia per this discussion (closed by User:The Gnome). However, there was no clear consensus. For something very controversial like this, less than 10 participants shouldn't be able to form a consensus. It was more or less 55%-45%. I think a community consensus is needed to go ahead with the mass renaming of pages on Wikipedia.

I would like to ask for a review of the closure of the discussion and if there is consensus to carry out the Wikipedia-wide renaming of pages. Warm regards. 69.9.33.228 (talk) 02:26, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

• I've been moving along, a band at a time, manually, and so far have heard no pushback. I posted after the linked closed discussion (where 16 people had responded) that I'm working on it, and got no response in 9 days. Moving forward does not appear to be controversial. Dicklyon (talk) 02:34, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• I also agree these moves are not controversial and they are also in line with WP:CRITERIA (namely WP:CONCISE). I'd also suggest the IP use his account to register his complaint, instead of doing so anonymously. Calidum 04:48, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Agree with that last bit. Amazing how a new editor knows the background to this case, and is able to log an issue on this board. Maybe they'd like to login with their everyday account? Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 07:20, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
    • I would take issue with the false idea that being logged out means being new … were it not that the geolocation tool and some checkers tag 69.9.33.228 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) as a proxy, a spam source, and a compromised server on the day that these edits were made. Uncle G (talk) 09:49, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• This IP is part of Atlantic Metro's server farm. Please note that both alternative accounts and logging out to edit are not allowed in project space. Please log into your main account if you really think this is an issue.  IP blocked with a rangeblock on the server farm. Reaper Eternal (talk) 13:29, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

• I wouldn't mind an independent review of the close before moving forward on this. I don't want to go ahead if it's viewed as controversial. I'm in discussions about getting some bot help to get it done. Dicklyon (talk) 14:53, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
• Perhaps this report should be closed per WP:DENY/WP:RBI. And, going further, perhaps deleted, so that it's not archived, so it doesn't end up being misconstrued as a "black mark" on Dicklyon's record. – Levivich 16:30, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

  Well, if someone's searching the archives for black marks about me, I'd rather they find this one than some of the others ;^}. Dicklyon (talk) 22:47, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

• I think an independent review of the close should be carried out. I don't agree that there was clear consensus whatsoever, and just because there has been no pushback so far doesn't mean there won't be or that users don't (still) disagree. I do, and I had no idea this discussion to remove "the" inconsistently from article names (even when most sources use a 'the') even took place until several days ago when I was notified about Closer (Chainsmokers song). Again, there are probably plenty more examples even Dicklyon can't think of to rename, so it's not going to be consistently implemented anyway. The sooner this is revisited and reviewed, the better. Ss112 20:48, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

  If it's agreed that it's not controversial, I can pretty much guarantee that we'll do it consistently; I've got a quarry query that identifies all articles with disambiguators "(The X song)" etc., and a short list of exceptions, and we'll get those reviewed before executing via bot assistance. The point of doing some by hand first is to elicit any opposition, if there is any, so we can resolve it. Dicklyon (talk) 02:03, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  Also note that Ss112 is really just here because he got annoyed about an unrelated topic that we discussed on his talk page. Dicklyon (talk) 02:12, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  Also note that Dicklyon is adding that addendum because he couldn't get the last word in at my talk page and kept harassing me, disregarding my request to stop posting at my talk page. You know, I already explained, but let me try again for you: I was notified days ago when an IP editor connected "Closer (Chainsmokers song)" to the Wikimedia data page and I wondered how it had gotten there, and saw you moved it because of a discussion without a clear consensus and saw you were going around doing the same to what looked like every artist you could think of that have "The" in their name. It really looks like you couldn't wait to move a bunch of pages to incorrect titles. What for? To rack up an edit count? Wouldn't surprise me. It wouldn't be the first time someone had done that here; Koavf was accused of doing so quite recently. Even if I was here for the reason you said, it doesn't invalidate my opinion, regardless of what you may think. Ss112 02:18, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

• That needs a far better and in-depth discussion than that one (and also one with a better consensus). There are so many examples where removing "The" is wrong (The Fall, The The, The xx, The 1975, The Alarm, The Who, The Used, The Firm, The Darkness, The Streets, etc. etc. Black Kite (talk) 00:56, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  Yes, I would welcome a discussion of whether some of those should be added the exceptions list, which currently is only The The and The 1975. And of course, exceptions can easily be introduced after the fact, too, with minor hassle. Personally, I think that moving Change (The Alarm album) to Change (Alarm album) would be a good thing. Dicklyon (talk) 02:03, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  Until/unless someone organizes such a review or expanded discussion, I will assume the recently closed RFC represents consensus. Dicklyon (talk) 16:35, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

• You'll also need to be careful where there are bands called "Whatever" and "The Whatever" - for example The Streets and Streets. (There aren't actually any disambiguated titles by The Streets, just giving an example.}Black Kite (talk) 19:58, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

• FWIW I think the closer got the RfC close right (and it was a detailed closing explanation), and this report misstates the issue. It's not "The" removed from the disambiguator of all band articles on Wikipedia, it's "The" being removed from the disambiguator of song and album articles, which is a big difference. "The" gets dropped when the band name is being used as an adjective. For example, we say, "Revolver is a Beatles album", we don't say, "Revolver is a The Beatles album." "Tommy is a Who album," not "Tommy is a The Who album." "Coexist is an xx album." So it's correct to have Revolver (The Beatles album) → Revolver (Beatles album), Tommy (The Who album) → Tommy (Who album); Coexist (The xx album) → Coexist (xx album). There are some exceptions where this would be confusing, such as for the bands The The and The 1975, and there's an exceptions list for this. It seems like some safeguards are in place for soliciting exceptions and having review of the list prior to using a bot. I'm not seeing a problem here that needs to be at AN. – Levivich 17:40, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  You might just about get away with The Who example, but The xx are never called just xx. Try the Google search xx band -the. Also, your example above doesn't actually work. Of course we wouldn't say "Coexist is a The xx album" because language doesn't work like that - we'd say "Coexist is an album by The xx". Black Kite (talk) 19:58, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

  Here we see "This stark xx song" and "number one xx song" and "this invigorating xx song". There are others where "The" is dropped from xx. Dicklyon (talk) 00:23, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

  Together with 31 mentions of "The xx" in the same article! This is the problem really, no sources are going to be completely consistent. On the other hand though, our Pixies article refers to them in the text as "The Pixies" despite the fact that not a single item of their output contains the word "The" on the cover. So it goes both ways... Black Kite (talk) 00:31, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

  But zero "The xx song", which is what we're talking about. Similarly, here you find "an xx album" but no "the xx album". Dicklyon (talk) 00:38, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

  BK, you're not accounting for the noun-vs-adjective distinction. "The" is (almost always) dropped when the noun is used as an adjective. As for The xx are never called just xx:

  "the new xx album" NYTimes

  "the new xx album" LATimes

  "the new XX album" Boston.com

  "the new xx album" Spin

  "the second xx album" Irish Times

  "it is, after all, an xx album" Sydney Morning Herald

  "still distinctly and deeply an xx album" Spin

  "since the last xx album" Paste magazine

  "Jamie XX Talks New XX Album" The Fader – Levivich 00:52, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

  Certainly agree this is not something that needs admin attention. I assume that if someone cares enough they'll open a new RFC some place and let me know; otherwise I'll go with the apparent consensus. Dicklyon (talk) 01:34, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

• Not controversial? This is incredibly controversial. The mass renaming of music articles needs a far lengthier and more in-depth discussion that just a handful of editors. Clearly, the RfC was not publicized widely enough, since I would imagine a few dozen editors would have weighed in. I've got other irons in the fire, but if an RfC is begun, I hope I'd be notified. --Tenebrae (talk) 14:43, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

  It doesn't seem particularly problematic to me. In order to be a problem, it would have actually led to an article being incorrectly renamed. Can you point to any of the renames done under this purview, by Dicklyon or anyone else, that should NOT have been done? --Jayron32 16:31, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

Help

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

My edit I made on princess of Belgium had her age wrong but I tried to fix it and now there’s an error how do I fix the error. BrandoLikesMoney (talk) 18:30, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

I've reverted to the version before you edited it, so it should be alright now. Note that you've got the age wrong; the birth date (which is sourced) is in October 2001, so her age, which is automatically calculated by a template) is 17, not 18. For another month or so. --Floquenbeam (talk) 18:36, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Temporary block of User:Citation bot

See also: User talk:Citation bot § Better batch/queuing handling revisited, and User talk:Citation bot/Archive_18 § Category/batch whitelist

Citation bot has been unleashed on Category:CS1 errors: missing periodical, containing over 330K articles in it as of writing. This is downright nuts and prevents the bot from being used by anyone else. Please block the bot, this should kill that process and hopefully restore access to the bot for other editors. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:42, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Appears to have been activated by User:Ost316. Ost316, any comment on this? — xaosflux ^Talk 17:55, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm fine with canceling it and I apologize for causing a problem. In previous runs, it seemed like it was stopping after a certain amount of time on other categories (I assumed it was when my OAuth token expired), but thanks for letting me that it blocks others; I can certainly be more prudent and cautious in the future. —Ost (talk) 18:06, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

• @Headbomb: a one-hour block has been placed on this bot. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:13, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. Shorter might also work, and it's possible that this doesn't restore access just yet, but we'll see how things go. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:15, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

The gadget works again now. Not sure if the background process was killed, but we'll see soon enough I suppose. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:27, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Headbomb, please read the mandatory warnings given above: When you start a discussion about an editor, you must notify them on their user talk page. A passing comment to someone else is not a proper notification!!!  :-) Nyttend (talk) 22:01, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I started a discussion about block of User:Citation bot and left a notice at User talk:Citation bot. I'm not sure what more you want. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:11, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Pretty confident he was kidding. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:21, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Correct. If I were serious, I wouldn't use small text or a smiley. Nyttend (talk) 03:24, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

#subtlesarcasmwastoosubtle Buffs (talk) 16:22, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

And, again, a massive run on Category:Dynamic lists by @Ost316:. A temporary 5 minute block would be sufficient I believe. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:17, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

The reason doesn't really matter, but I missed the leading digit on the article count when I accessed this category from a parent, and I when I clicked through it shortly later, I feared that I may have caused an issue. I mentioned this on my talk page as I knew I was going to be away, but I did not escalate it here because I did not notice the blocking behavior (there were intermediate edits by the account). I support the prospect of a short block; a longer block would make the bot just as unavailable as it is now, and it only needs stop long enough to kill my thread. —Ost (talk) 03:20, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done. It might be worth looking into a non-blocking method of shutting the bot down. Primefac (talk) 12:35, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Bird Sanctuary

Does Anyone Have Any Idea What The Heck Is Going on here? Is this an LTA I don't know about or just a bunch of spammers? HickoryOughtShirt?4 (talk) 07:25, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

It doesn't look like spamming, maybe a prelude to spamming. It looks a bit sockpuppet- or class-project like. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 07:37, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) I think something odd is definitely occurring. Might an SPI be in order? Invalid^OS (talk) 15:30, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) To me it looks like these accounts were created as part of a Wikipedia editing course of some kind. Looks like they are trying out Wiki markup with generic placeholder text. Probably harmless. --Hecato (talk) 15:43, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) There's a list of all the sockpuppets I found at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Prabhak582. This seems to have been going on for a while and have been disrupting Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary. TheAwesomeHwyh 21:54, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

Holy fifty visitor comment book entries, Batman!!! This has been going on since 2017. And some of the scribbling hasn't been caught. Uncle G (talk) 00:20, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Then there's the edit history of Talk:Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary. Uncle G (talk) 01:27, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

For what it is worth: if the pattern of past years is anything to go by, 1 month of protection is not going to be long enough. Let's see what happens. Uncle G (talk) 10:46, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

While investigating, I came across this very interesting edit [109]. Anyway, in case people haven't noticed, this isn't just one article. See e.g. Mandagadde Bird Sanctuary which hasn't been affected as bad but shows similar stuff [110] e.g. [111]. Likewise the talk page [112] [113]. As both of these are bird sanctuaries in Karnataka, I looked at Category:Bird sanctuaries of Karnataka. From there I found Gudavi Bird Sanctuary which while even less affected (none this year so far) shows similar signs [114] e.g. [115]. Again also the talk page [116] e.g. [117]. BTW, although Mookambika Wildlife Sanctuary was mentioned on some of the above user talk pages, it doesn't look like it's been affected yet. Anyway, personally I'm leaning towards this being some extremely misguided class project or edithon rather than classic paid editing, but it's hard to say. I did come across [118] Special:Contributions/117.192.115.16 and [119] Special:Contributions/117.247.19.26 which look to be logged out edits in the same vein, both belong now to the telco Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited and geolocate to Mangalore, Karnataka. Nil Einne (talk) 14:40, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree that this looks like a (second edition of a?) misguided editathon from some school out of Kenjar near Mangalore as one user name suggests. Shyamal (talk) 16:26, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

RFC underway regarding proposed inclusion of existing practice in TPE policy

An RfC regarding the inclusion of the existing practice (at administrator discretion) of granting template editor user rights on a trial/temporary basis in the procedural policy itself is currently underway. --TheSandDoctor ^Talk 20:12, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Requesting page protection for Eucalyptus regnans

An IP editor User:178.255.168.193 has been making an edit without explanation, source or discussion. I have reverted them twice and made comment on their talk page here requesting they provide a source or at least discuss the change but they have made the same change a third time here. Could an admin please provide partial page p[rotection please at it seem they are unwilling to discuss this and I don't want to get into a 3RR situation. - Nick Thorne ^talk 13:30, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

Nick Thorne, requests like these are generally made at WP:RFPP. Either way, it's clearly edit warring behavior so I've blocked them for 31 hours. Primefac (talk) 18:22, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

But at the same time, Primefac and Nick Thorne, there's nothing wrong with making a report here; it's just easier to make it over there. Nyttend (talk) 23:01, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Primefac and Nyttend. Also, I didn't know about WP:RFPP, I do now. All good. - Nick Thorne ^talk 00:51, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Left a note on your talk-page. Imho not a case for applying protection. Lectonar (talk) 09:24, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

WP:CBAN for PenguinsElite

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This has been going on for almost two years with the amount of suspected/confirmed socks found on the two categories (suspect and confirmed) and the fact that mostly one administrator confidently blocks the socks, I will describe the details along with a proposed ban for the user for making hundreds of edits during the time of the block by the original account. I see three administrators who've blocked the accounts who will be notified of my views on this.

PenguinsElite (talk · contribs) is a prolific sockpuppeteer who is deliberately evading the indefinite block placed by Ferret (talk · contribs) on 13 October 2017, later revoking talk page access on 22 October 2017 by Favonian (talk · contribs) due to a legal threat. The sockpuppet investigations archive page is at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/PenguinsElite/Archive though it is not as large as some other sockpuppeteer's cases. I see dozens of user names with similar patterns and a few IP addresses have been involved to avoid detection by well known users who spots the editing patterns, e.g. by User:Mattythewhite. Although the edits are usually not vandalism, the edits have been made to evade the indefinate block by Ferret and Favonian; sometimes the edits follow a certain pattern, by changing some section headings (latest one I see is on Brendan Rodgers) which usually deduces that the newer accounts are sockpuppets of PenguinsElite.

The socks has been blocked by Mattythewhite in most cases since the point when the user has been very confident of the pattern used by the usernames when seen on the watchlist - e.g. "Themansionmaniac69", "MightyBoroWe'reGoingUp!" and "TheAllBlacksFan69" to name but loads. I would have thought the user would be aware of the sockpuppet rule but on the unexpected day, a few edits come by and a block followed that.

The usually affected articles involved by these socks either refer to Middlesbrough F.C. related footballers/staff like Ben Gibson or Garry Monk etc. and a couple of TV shows like The Voice (UK) or Emmerdale. The latest sock that Mattythewhite has seen as recently as today has the usual letter...number sequence or CamelCase usernames as I've mentioned previously.

I therefore move for a formal community ban against PenguinsElite (talk · contribs), applied to the entire en.wikipedia, of indefinite duration and in any case no shorter than six months from the last edit they make with any account or via any IP address. Then the user may edit using the PenguinsElite account if the appeal is successful by an administrator.

• Support as proposer. Iggy (Swan) 22:01, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Comment Minor point of clarification, I appear to have set a 1 month block, which Favonian up'd to indef. I have no real opinion to offer here, from what I can tell I did this block via an AIV report or similar venue, and not due to any familiarity with the user or article area. This is largely symbolic to formally ban them, but sure. -- ferret (talk) 21:47, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Per WP:3X, they are already indefinitely community-banned. --qedk (t 桜 c) 21:50, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

  @Ferret and Iggy the Swan: --qedk (t 桜 c) 21:51, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

I have not been aware of a community ban already being placed if there has been one. Iggy (Swan) 22:01, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

But I do think WP:3X is to be read out carefully (by me) before doing something like this again. Iggy (Swan) 22:06, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

No pressure, 3X is a relatively new policy and it was done with the sole reasoning to not need to individually CBAN prolific sockmasters, such as PenguinsElite. --qedk (t 桜 c) 22:09, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Website selling Wikipedia articles

I did a quick search on Google for "en.wikipedia.org", and the first advertisement I saw was from "Wikispecialistllc", and the description said that "Improve Your Wikipedia Presence: We'll Create, Optimize & Protect Your Pages! Deals for First 100 Users. Additional 30% Discounts.". This may be a violation of the Wikimedia terms and conditions, as they might as well not reveal that they are paid editors. They also said that they would make sure that their client's Wikipedia page isn't "misedited", which may mean either removal of fake information (which is ok) or removal of negative sourced information. According to their website, Abel Cullum is one of the articles they made. The article was made by Kind Herb, an undisclosed paid editor they employ. Another example of an article they claim to have made is Maliina Abelsen, by Algkalv, who is an autoreviewer. The website claims that they comply with Wikipedia's rules, but they didn't disclose their paid editing. The H Collective and Ballard Spahr were also apparently made by them. Nigos (talk • Contribs) 08:55, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Dishonest spamming firms like this are known for lying about what articles they wrote. See Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_143#Wiki_Specialist_LLC. MER-C 09:06, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

The H Collective was created by User:Erik, who is also its major editor. [120]. Erik has been around since 2005, and I know him from when he was Coordinator for WikiProject Film, and I was working on a lot of film articles. I respect Erik, despite our occasional disagreements, and highly doubt that he is paid editor.

Ballard Spahr, which already has a paid editor tag on it, was created by User:Eastlaw, another long-term editor (2006), whom I do not know. Eastlaw is the major editor, with two IPs, 72.37.171.60 and 174.141.199.182 the next two in line.

You said that these two articles were "apparently" made for Wikispecialistllc. Where did your information come from? Beyond My Ken (talk) 09:10, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Beyond My Ken, they claimed that they made these. Nigos (talk • Contribs) 09:15, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I see now. The company is probably lying about some of these or just edited the articles and claimed they made it. I'll see if I can report their ad. Nigos (talk • Contribs) 09:18, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Yeah. I'm inclined to believe two things. First, they are indeed doing undisclosed paid editing here (or at least trying to) and (B) that some of their claims are bull. Still, worth investigating. Beyond My Ken (talk) 09:20, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

I reported their ad on Google just now. Nigos (talk • Contribs) 09:25, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

About their FAQ:

Q: Is Wiki Specialist LLC affected by Wikipedia’s policy on paid editing and other related bans? A: No company or individual can make any changes to its wiki page which leaves an open opportunity for the competitors to make wrong edits and add misinformation to defame the brand’s reputation. Wikipedia has banned many individuals and brands for disregarding this strict policy of the platform. Wikipedia clearly states that “If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it.” Wiki Specialists LLC updates and edits the page content as the outsourcing company in order to avoid any rule violation.

What they are doing isn't really helping the encyclopaedia, so ignore all rules doesn't apply here.

They even said that the Wikipedia article about their clients belong to their clients, which violates the fact that no one owns any articles here. Nigos (talk • Contribs) 09:32, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Not to mention indicating that by outsourcing it that somehow avoids our rules on it. And they would seem to be directly editing the articles. Not to mention that it's embedded into the TOS as well as local policy. Wonder if we can get the nice people at WMF Legal to send another C&D letter Nosebagbear (talk) 10:36, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

​​Perhaps a simple ammendement to WP:COI is in order? Obviously their "loophole" isn't actually a loophole at all, but if we were to amend the policy to explicitly address this, it could drive off some of their clients who bother to read the COI guidelines. Perhaps text along the lines of "Ignore all rules can not be invoked in order to avoid disclosing your COI, as per the Wikimedia Foundation terms of use, you must always disclose any possible COI." and "simply outsourcing your edits to another company or person does not exempt them from the COI guidelines, as they must disclose that they are being de-facto paid by the article's subject, even if they are being hired through another company." Perhaps a bit wordy, but it would do. TheAwesomeHwyh 03:07, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

We've already established these spammers have zero integrity. What's stopping them from continuing to lie about our policies if we make this change? Being their clients and caring about the purpose of Wikipedia are already mutually exclusive. MER-C 19:27, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

​I don't think their clients do know about the purpose of Wikipedia, though. Maybe changing our policies is a bad approach- I mean really, do you know many people in real life who actually know how Wikipedia works? I don't, because there's no one to teach them otherwise. What we need is education, to teach people why editing pages where they have a COI is a bad thing. Though I'm not quite sure how we would accomplish that- What if started a "COI Academy", where we could have lots of resources on disclosing your COI, making edit requests, and the like? Not sure- but I honestly don't blame most people who hire this company, because they probably don't know what they're doing is wrong. TheAwesomeHwyh 20:47, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

We could also have alternative COI warning templates which encourage people to learn to edit responsibly in edits where they have a COI. Plus, we could have a dedicated area for COI editors with questions and concerns. TheAwesomeHwyh 20:52, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Er, the templates would also link to the academy. TheAwesomeHwyh 20:54, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Paid editors lie about their past articles, and Wikipedia policy, continually. For a recent example from just last month, see Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard/Archive 148#"The Digital SEO". And this notice is on the wrong noticeboard. As MER-C pointed out, this paid editor has already appeared on the correct noticeboard. Uncle G (talk) 10:40, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

It would be nice if Google inserted a link to WMF's "you don't have to pay..." above every ad for article writing services. Guy (help!) 14:32, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Hello, regarding The H Collective, I created it of my own volition. I did not do it for anyone and certainly not for pay. My takeaway is that coverage of the company has been pretty basic, and the article is detailed and structured enough to warrant an outside party making a claim to writing it. If the company gets bad press, I would gladly include that in the article. Other editors are welcome to review the content and provide feedback to ensure that the article is encyclopedic. Erik (talk | contrib) ^{(ping me)} 15:56, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

I don;t think there's a scintilla of evidence there's anything untoward about the article or Erik's editing. Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:31, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

• Apart from paid editors lying through their socks, just from force of habit, at least one of them has claimed authorship of a few articles (quite visibly, which seems an odd strategy for a rather secretive business) and then complained about them on here, all just to discredit one (unpaid) author who had created them. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:37, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Long delay

Hi, the block appeal at User talk:ShappeAli has been unattended since 14 July except for closing on stale grounds as unanswered. He has apologised for his actions and if he is unblocked ive committed to monitor his edits and steer him clear of any trouble, regards Atlantic306 (talk) 15:22, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

This is a checkuser block, which means that a checkuser has to unblock. Ordinary admins are not allowed to do so. — Ninja Diannaa (Talk) 17:27, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

An admin can accept a checkuser block appeal and unblock an account as long as it's done in consultation with a checkuser.-- Jezebel's Ponyo^{bons mots} 18:53, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

• I've commented. They can appeal in 6 months like normal or appeal to ArbCom if they think there's a good reason they should be unblocked outside the normal timeframe for appeals. TonyBallioni (talk) 23:05, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Violation of BLP

Handling this is not an administrator-only thing. Properly placed on Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard. Uncle G (talk) 09:50, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Convoluted user history

Could someone with a modicum of patience (i.e. not me) sort whatever is happening at User:Aadarsh Ashutosh? User:Aadarshashutosh and User:Ashuraaz23 both redirect to User:Aadarsh Ashutosh, but it is not a registered account. There have been various renames and moves involved and it's messy. Note I also deleted Draft:Aadarshashutosh, which was also a botched redirect of sorts.-- Jezebel's Ponyo^{bons mots} 20:23, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

You might want to ping User:Martin Urbanec he did both of the page moves! Necromonger...We keep what we kill —Preceding undated comment added 20:57, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Well, it's a little bit hard for me to comment if I don't see the history - the pages are already deleted. I believe the pagemoves were automated through, done on my behalf by the renaming interface. When I approved the request of the user to be renamed, it automatically moved their userpage to the new title. This should be clearly stated in the move reason - it's "Automatically moved page while renaming the user "xxxx" to "yyy"". There's no way how can this pagemove be to an userpage of non-existent user - the only way would be two consequent renames, which should be clear in the logs. Let me know if I can help you, --Martin Urbanec (talk) 05:22, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

The user moved their own page before the rename, so when the user was renamed, the page that was moved was already a redirect to the non-existent name. Peter James (talk) 13:34, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Special:MergeHistory isn't much help. It looks like someone will have to perform a manual history merge. Or just delete everything – User:Aadarsh Ashutosh qualifies for CSD U2. That's not a very friendly option, but it's less work and within policy. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 22:17, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, this doesn't seem like it's worth time to untangle. I slashed and burned it and let them know how to properly change their username. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:00, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, Beeblebrox. They seem to have a history with page moves in general that will likely need to be dealt with if it continues, no matter their username.-- Jezebel's Ponyo^{bons mots} 23:38, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Fram unbanned immediately (temporary injunction in Fram case)

The committee has resolved by motion that:

Remedy 1a of this decision and its supporting principles and findings are passing, and so Fram shall be unbanned immediately, without awaiting the close of the case. The remainder of the decision remains pending. As the status of Fram's sysop rights has not been decided, Fram is not to be resysopped during this interim period.

For the Arbitration Committee Worm^TT(talk) 16:52, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Fram unbanned immediately (temporary injunction in Fram case)

Rangeblock assist

Hi, can anyone help me by 1 month range blocking whatever range includes

• 101.78.169.241 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)
• 101.78.245.57 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

Since about April 2019, an editor of questionable competence who jumps around Hong Kong IPs keeps making problematic edits, usually in areas related to Indian personalities Himesh Reshimmiya and Ram Kapoor. It's typically ridiculous overlinking like here. Or weird choices like here, where he adds almost 20 "notable works" titles under Ram Kapoor's name, when most of the other people have 2 or 3 listed. The user has no concept of what is acceptable editing behavior or not and their choices are sometimes way out there like with that Ram Kapoor example. Here, he doesn't know what to capitalise. More overlinking here. More miscapitalisation in April 2019 here and here. Here he wants to list every celebrity that attended another celebrity's funeral. It's relatively minor crap, but done over and over. There's no apparent way to communicate with them and poor Ravensfire typically has to deal with the cleanup. That's gotta suck. They've also used IPs:

• 101.78.237.88 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)
• 101.78.170.192 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)
• 218.255.71.34 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

I know that last one is not helpful for a range block, but since I'm here, I'll leave it for archival purposes. I typically have just blocked the individual IPs for varying amounts of time. Most recently, one month each for the ones at the top of the report. Thanks, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 16:11, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

@Cyphoidbomb: Have you tried {{IP range calculator}}? --Izno (talk) 16:19, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

All IPs are in the ranges:

• 101.78.128.0/17 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)
• 218.255.0.0/16 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)

but it looks like within each of these they are using smaller ranges, which for CIDR notation would have to be split into:

• 101.78.168.0/22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)
• 101.78.232.0/21 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)
• 101.78.240.0/20 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)
• 218.255.68.0/22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)
• 218.255.72.0/22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)
• 218.255.170.0/23 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)
• 218.255.172.0/23 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · block user · block log)

which is just over a tenth of the /17 and /16. Peter James (talk) 17:21, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Move to ban Zombiedude101z

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I move to ban Zombiedude101z. This user should be eligible for unblock consideration by the community no sooner than one year after their latest account creation or latest edit. Zombiedude101z has been a problem for more than six years. They were blocked on 2013-02-15 as a vandalism-only account. Since that point, they've engaged in significant sockpuppetry and block evasion. The unblock requests such as those at User talk:RevenantEditor187 and User talk:SkitterWeaverKhepri2012 and User talk:86.134.164.104 and User talk:EverettTheUrban show this person just doesn't get it, constantly blaming admins for blocking them and being very clear they will not stop evading their block. Someone operating from their IP address has made a death threat against a sitting U.S. senator at Special:Diff/901680343. I indicated at User talk:Zombiedude101z that I would push for a ban if any further block evasion happened. They subsequently set up SpeedyGonzales1488 (note the use of Nazi hate in that username, though that's an escalation for this person) to further evade their block; jpgordon confirmed the sockpuppetry (but didn't specifically call out the original account). Therefore, I move for a WP:CBAN on this user. I believe this is mostly a formality; we are long past the point when any admin would consider unblocking them, but I can't just declare WP:3X here. --Yamla (talk) 11:10, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

• Agree, for all the documented reasons above.--Tenebrae (talk) 11:44, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support on the same criteria and for the blatant reasons above. If that was an actual threat that I can't see, shouldn't it handed off to the WMF to do the needful? Nosebagbear (talk) 12:44, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support and note that AngryJewbacca69 is also another sock in this group with a matching device to SpeedyGonzales1488. Nazi hate assertion appears to be correct.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 13:53, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - there's a much longer history of angry and duplicitous behavior. Not clear if the death threat and the random nazi stuff is just the latest attempts to titillate and get attention, but I don't really care. Kuru (talk) 19:42, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support: I won't even touch the Nazi issue or the death threat; simply put, the user is doing a heck of a lot of block evasion and sockpupptery. That's good enough for me. — Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 20:04, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
• I support the site ban, but why exactly can't WP:3X be declared in this case? Seems like it would apply here. SkyWarrior 20:19, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

WP:3X requires documented CheckUser findings. This is normally (though not always) documented in a sockpuppet investigation. For example and as noted above, SpeedyGonzales1488 was not specifically documented by a CheckUser as Zombiedude101z, though they are documented by a CheckUser as violating WP:SOCK and clearly are Zombiedude101z. It's possible there are actually two CheckUser-documented cases of block evasion, but it wasn't clear to me and I wanted this ban to be unambiguous, given how problematic this user's behaviour has been. --Yamla (talk) 10:49, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

I confirmed one, and Drmies confirmed another. It's been over 24 hours, anyway, so not much point in keeping this open. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 22:48, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support - A no-brainer. Heave-ho. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:31, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

user:Lectonar

• 2019 Abqaiq–Khurais attack (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

This admin has protected this page saying that there is addition of unsourced or poorly sourced material. Yet, I have been watching this page and I don't see that. Please either unprotect or give a valid reason why that page was protected.--SharabSalam (talk) 13:54, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

This is a recent event, and not all IP edits were helpful. I've kept the protection deliberately short, things will probably calm down and reliable sources will appear. No need to bring this up here without contacting me before. Lectonar (talk) 14:01, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

An IP has been adding soucred information then a user who actually had made problematic, poorly sourced edits(see the history page) went to ask for page protection. This is unfair and it's against what Wikipedia stands for, which is to be a free encyclopaedia for all.--SharabSalam (talk) 14:04, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

I brought it here because an immediate action should be taken by notifying you not to do such wrong protection again and to immediately unprotect that page. IP edits were very sourced. You just killed what wikipedia stands for.--SharabSalam (talk) 14:06, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Let's cut down on the hyperbole, shall we? El_C 14:09, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Wow and you just went there and reverted me saying the coined edit summary "can't used same sources for new addition" even though that addition was there before and was removed because "not needed" like a totally subjective opinion.-SharabSalam (talk) 14:22, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

What do you mean by "coined"? Yes, that was a mistake. I corrected and further qualified. El_C 14:27, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

El_C You use the same edit summary when reverting edits made by newcomers or ips when they like, change an information(that you don't know much about) without changing the source. Notice that I am by far the most editor who has made edits there [121] and you had made one or two edits there. Sadly, it's so obvious that you assumed bad faith.--SharabSalam (talk) 14:38, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

I didn't assume bad faith — I just misread the source. It happens. I had no idea who edited the article how often. That is not something I look into ordinarily when editing. El_C 14:40, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

• Endorse protection - most IP edits have been constructive, and the few disruptive IP edits don't rise to my own personal threshold for protection (I would have declined the RFPP request) but protection was within admin discretion here and the protection time is suitably conservative. @SharabSalam: you need to dial back the rhetoric and understand that we're all trying to do what's best here. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:32, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
• Endorse protection (basically per Ivanvector), and why was this not raised on Lectonar's talkpage before being brought here? Yunshui ^雲_水 14:36, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

This ip 184.170.174.6 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) has been making a lot of sourceed improvements to the article. The user wanted to revert them but was unable so they requested a protection. What is shocking is that they succeed. I feel bad for the IP.--SharabSalam (talk) 14:45, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

User:SharabSalam edit summaries like this are very unhelpful, to say the least. You may want to knock off that kind of statement, it can be seen as a personal attack. Necromonger...We keep what we kill 14:50, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Wekeepwhatwekill, it's true. You can't just say that's "not needed" while relevant sources mention it, frequently, unless we are going to write wikipedia with Anglo-American focus.--SharabSalam (talk) 15:13, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

User:SharabSalam You just doubled down on what you said on the talk page edit summary. Wikipedia is not written with an Anglo-American focus, it's written with a Neutral point of view. To say other wise is to accuse that person of POV editing. Unless you can back it up with diffs, it could be considered a personal attack. Necromonger...We keep what we kill 15:54, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

@SharabSalam: That does not explain why, when you disagreed with an administrator's decision, you did not ask them about the decision before coming here. So I ask again, why was this not raised on Lectonar's talkpage first? Yunshui ^雲_水 14:54, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Yunshui I was thinking the protection was a mistake and I except that admins will remove the protection immediately when they see it. There was no disruptive or unsourced edits. I doubt that if I went to the admin talk that the admin would unprotect it. A while a ago there was the article of Ibn Saud and it was protected. the protection was obviously wrong. However, admins kept trying to excuse the protection until it was brought to the Arbitration Committee and then it was removed. I wanted to go to the last phase straight because I didn't want the protection to last for so long.--SharabSalam (talk) 15:13, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

The Ibn Saud situation was much different from this. That was an article indefinitely protected under auspices of an Arbcom decision which turned out to be out of scope on review and was properly reversed. This is an administrator reviewing a reported pattern of disruptive editing and deciding to place a restriction which expires in less than 24 hours, which is squarely within their discretion. IP editors can suggest changes on the article's talk page, and you can review the material that was being added and add it back yourself if you like, as long as you're checking its accuracy and making sure no policies are being violated. You should do that, and drop your accusations of abusive behaviour. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:23, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

So far, I didn't accuse any admin of being abusive. All I am saying is that the protection is wrong similar to the protection of Ibn Saud. The admin should be notified to review the requests of protection before making the protection. And why would helpful IPs have to go through all of that process(request edit in the talk page etc etc) to make a helpful edit.--SharabSalam (talk) 15:34, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

I just want to add that I object to the (repeated) insinuation that I did not review the article and its history before protecting. Lectonar (talk) 10:47, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

May I please note that in the Ibn Saud case, SharabSalam went straight to AN without even caring to notify me, not taking about asking to remove protection. Another editor notified me, and I immediately agreed to remove protection. Accusing me in that "admins kept trying to excuse the protection until it was brought to the Arbitration Committee and then it was removed" is a gross misrepresentation of the situation. This is not what happened. I suggest to trout SharabSalam for repeatedly bringing issues to dramaboards without discussing them with an admin first.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:31, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

I didn't know who protected that article. When I asked here why that article is protected an admin called "dot" or something like that kept making excuses although it was so clear that it shouldn't be protected, that's what I referred to. I left that discussion and didn't bother, but then after 5 or 4 days and admin unprotect the article, I went to the discussion and saw that there was a conversation and someone brought that to ArbCom. So yeah. You can't easily make an admin admit that they made a mistake simply by approaching their talk page. Also as I said I wanted to remove the protection not to report the admin even though I asked that the admin gets a warning not to accept any request for protection without reviewing it. We would use a bot if reviewing wasn't necessary.--SharabSalam (talk) 10:19, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

(ec) So you basically did not care to conform to the policies, you left an accusation at a drama board and did not care even to follow it further, you still do not understand what happened and continue spreading disinformation, and of course you are right and everybody else is at fault. How nice of you. If someone is here to get a warning this is you.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:34, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Although I admit that I should have gone to his talk page first but I was in hurry and wanted the page to be unprotected immediately without long conversations. Yet, it didn't.--SharabSalam (talk) 10:30, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

• Protection should be removed: not all administrator actions were helpful either, but that doesn't mean the result should be desysopping. Peter James (talk) 15:26, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Article deletion request

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Hello. This is about a mistake I made when I first started editing. Here's some background. Islamic Society of Baltimore is an Islamic community center which has a mosque in it. The mosque is called Masjid Al-Rahmah. I created Masjid Al-Rahmah back in 2017, which was unnecessary considering there was already an article for Islamic Society of Baltimore. If you look at the two articles, they are almost identical. Can someone delete Masjid Al-Rahmah and have it redirect to Islamic Society of Baltimore? Melofors (talk) 00:31, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Melofors, you actually could have done that yourself - just clear the page and put in a redirect, no deletion necessary (be bold!). I went ahead and took care of the redirect. creffett (talk) 00:48, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you! Melofors (talk) 00:50, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Please fill in descriptions

any missing source/author/licence info from deleted local page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Diopsis.jpg to c:File:Diopsis.jpg. Thanks!--Roy17 (talk) 15:28, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

The only information on the en.wiki version of the page before deletion was the {{GFDL}} template. No source link/etc. to copy over. --Masem (t) 15:53, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

HistoryofIran reverting

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

• HistoryofIran (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Ruwaym (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

User:HistoryofIran is reverting any Category about "Arab" and "Arabic language" in Iran. please stop him. See his last reverting on category:Iranian Arabic poets. --Ruwaym (talk) 14:08, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

So are you. As I suggested on your talk page, please get consensus at WP:CFD if you think there's a problem with one of the categories, or through a WP:3O or WP:RFC on one of the relevant talk pages, instead of continuing to edit war. ST47 (talk) 14:10, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ruwaym: You are spamming (broken English) categories into Wikipedia, I couldn't care less if you were adding something about the Arabs, Amish, Chinese or whatever. More or less all your edits have been you spamming rather questionable Arab-related categories. And you also clearly lack the ability to have a simply discussion, and instead resort to revert and call me a "troll". See Wikipedia:COMPETENCE and stop wasting everybodys time, thanks. --HistoryofIran (talk) 14:14, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

• Y'all, we have a whole area of Wikipedia that is devoted to dispute and conflict resolution and none of it involves this kind of edit warring and personal attacks, which will lead to sad consequences. You've both had your say now, let us take a look and don't continue this argument here, thank you so much. KillerChihuahua 14:18, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

  I'd like to suggest you both stop the revert warring before I block you both for edit warring. KillerChihuahua 14:23, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Killer ok, and thank you for help. --Ruwaym (talk) 14:27, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

• Ok, here is my suggestion. Start a discussion on ONE talk page - link to it from the others, if you think there are editors who would like to be involved who only edit one or two of the articles in question - and discuss this. Politely. With respect and civility. While you are discussing, don't edit the articles to add the contested new categories - leave them as they were before this whole mess started. Ruwaym, if you can make a good argument for Persian poet vs Iranian poet, etc, whatever the change is - then your fellow editors will support you. If they think your argument isn't strong enough, and they agree with the counter arguments, then the categories will stay as is. It may be that some articles will be better one way, some the other. That's ok. The key thing here is to be patient. The world will not end if you cannot reach consensus right away. It can take time. If you think a formal Rfc will help, do that. Both of you read up on dispute resolution. Stop edit warring and calling each other names. Puppy is done; if there is future edit warring go to WP:AN3 and follow the directions. If there are further insults, bring them here but don't be surprised if everyone's behavior is examined. KillerChihuahua 14:34, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Killer https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Ruwaym&diff=917587150&oldid=917585658, racist attacks to me by him. --Ruwaym (talk) 14:36, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

@KillerChihuahua: Appreciate your help, but I haven't called him anything though. Yes I may been have a bit rude/aggressive, but it's a bit hard not to be when you get more or less accused of being racist. --HistoryofIran (talk) 14:44, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

• Are you two still here? I told you what to do, and complaining about each other here ad naseum wasn't part of that. KillerChihuahua 15:06, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

SPI request

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Hello! Could someone please look at this relatively straightforward SPI. I ticked the CU box when creating it but I believe it could be resolved by skipping that even, as evidence continues to mount (the user already deserves a "promotion only account" block even if it survives the SPI). Thanks! Usedtobecool ^TALK ✨ 13:15, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

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Requested move discussion needing closure

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Talk:Peć#Requested_move_12_August_2019 This requested move discussion has been open for more than a month. An admin or an experienced editor looking at it and making the closure if/when appropriate would be helpful. Cheers, Ktrimi991 (talk) 12:39, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

WP:ANRFC is the place to make these kind of requests. I've also fixed the link so it doesn't force desktop users on to the mobile site. Iffy★Chat -- 16:29, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh, I forgot to modify the mobile link before posting it here. Thank you very much @Iffy:. Much appreciated. Cheers, Ktrimi991 (talk) 17:57, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

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Persistent vandalism at Anuna De Wever

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For the last month a series of different IPs (Special:Contributions/185.194.187.0, Special:Contributions/185.194.187.2, Special:Contributions/185.194.187.138, Special:Contributions/185.194.187.142) and others have persistently been reverting to a version of the page that has poor syntax, no sources, and contentious personal claims about the subject.

1. [122]
2. [123]
3. [124]
4. [125]

This is not something that WP:BLP would suggest is tolerable. I would ask that the page be protected in a sourced form (this seems to be the latest version before the vandalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Anuna_De_Wever&oldid=911230099 ) and that the IPs used to vandalise the page be blocked. The series of IP edits seems to have begun after User:TruthSpeeker was blocked. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 23:08, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

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User talk:Govvy

I am confused, is the IP posting to my talk page trying to troll me? Govvy (talk) 18:42, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Redirects needs deletion in order to move draft to mainspace

I wanted to move Draft:Hurricane Lorena (2019) to main space because I think it passes WP:GNG. However, there's already a main space article (Hurricane Lorena (2019)) which is currently a redirect. This prevents me from moving the draft to main space. I did tagged it for speedy deletion for G6, but that was hours ago and it's still tagged for speedy deletion. Can somebody delete this so I can move the draft article to main space? I don't want to copy-and-paste the whole draft article to the redirect because there's multiple edits that helped with the draft article and doing the copy-and-paste would be saying that I did all the work. Thanks! INeedSupport ^:V 20:18, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done. INeedSupport, just as a general note, admins are all volunteers (and it is the weekend) so it's very likely that some lower-importance CSD categories like G6 might take a while to be fulfilled. Patience is a virtue! Primefac (talk) 20:29, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@Primefac: Understood. Thanks for you help! INeedSupport ^:V 20:50, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@Primefac: - the lack of boring business meetings to work in really does seem to put a crimp into the editing corps' efficiency! Nosebagbear (talk) 20:59, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

"Moscow Mitch"

Heads up for admins: an advocacy group has released a Chrome browser extension which replaces "Mitch McConnell" with "Moscow Mitch" ([126]). Last time something like this happened we went through a few weeks of repeatedly removing "Drumpf" vandalism which mostly turned out to be accidental. Might it be worthwhile to add editnotices warning about the extension interfering with article editing, say at Mitch McConnell and other possibly related pages? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:09, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm of two minds on an edit notice. On the one hand, I've had similar extensions cause problems for me in the past so an edit notice probably would help avoid some unintentional vandalism. On the other hand I'm uneasy about a preemptive edit notice for possible streissand effects. Wug·a·po·des​ 22:17, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Perhaps an edit filter set to warn? I'm not sure if that would work though. -A lad insane (Channel 2) 00:35, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

This feels like a job for an edit filter b/c there's no practical way to edit notice all the pages where he might be mentioned now and impossible to do so in the future.--Jorm (talk) 01:00, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Such scripts needs to be blocked by an edit filter. Edit notices are too easy to not notice and editors may not realize that the script is messing up the article text. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 09:26, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes. Special:AbuseFilter/901 warns about the Drumpf plugin (and Special:AbuseFilter/614 stops the addition of Drumpf); similar things can be easily done for Moscow Mitch if/when it starts being a problem. Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:15, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Community-ban appeal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Further information: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive310 § Standard offer request - Elisa Rolle

This is an appeal for reconsideration of the July 2019 community ban of Elisa.rolle (talk · contribs · logs · block log). Elisa began editing in March 2017 and has made 17,662 edits; her 10,746 edits to mainspace (edit counter) include 717 articles created. She was blocked indefinitely in August 2018 after posting a copyright violation on her talk page. Before that, she had been blocked four times, including twice indefinitely for copyvio. In July this year, she appealed the most recent block. In response, Ritchie333 opened the AN discussion linked above, which Yunshui closed as unsuccessful, converting the block to a community ban. Several editors felt the close was premature, and Elisa didn't realize that an AN discussion might lead to a community ban (see further discussion on AN and with Yunshui).

Elisa would like another chance, this time with more formal support. The situation was caused by a combination of her not understanding copyright, having difficulty summarizing because English is not her first language, working too quickly, and feeling overwhelmed once the complaints began. To try to help her, several of us—Valereee, Rosiestep, Megalibrarygirl, SusunW, and myself—have formed a mentoring collaboration. In addition, Victoriaearle worked through a tutorial with Elisa in July; Victoria's assessment is here. Valereee has created a mentoring plan at User:Valereee/ER. In brief, Elisa will focus at first on adding sources and fixing close paraphrasing in articles she has already created. She will always summarize source material in her own words; there will be no copying, no matter the copyright status of the source. If she wants to make any substantial addition, she will first bring it to User:Valereee/ER for feedback. And she will abide by 1RR for 12 months. The mentoring team will keep a close eye on her editing, and if an uninvolved admin is needed (for example, should another copyvio occur), GoldenRing has agreed to be available. Thank you for considering this.

• Support as proposer. I'm confident that with this support Elisa will be an asset to the community. SarahSV ^(talk) 02:23, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support. I reviewed but did not participate in the last discussion, partly because I was unable to decide. But this level of support, indeed, seems promising. El_C 02:35, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support, if for no other reason than it sounds like Elisa.rolle will be quite thoroughly monitored. creffett (talk) 02:37, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. It sounds like the user will have lots of help. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 03:05, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support With such a strong mentoring team, this editor deserves another chance. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 04:09, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Per Cullen.--Jorm (talk) 04:11, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support That's a pretty strong group of mentors - I'm willing to give it a shot. — Ched (talk) 04:51, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Per endorsement of the mentors. – Ammarpad (talk) 05:03, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support I saw this proposal being prepared, and looked into the details then. I think it has as good a chance of being a net positive as any ban appeal I have seen. Vanamonde (Talk) 05:08, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support as this is the best-prepared appeal I recall. Johnuniq (talk) 05:21, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support because I trust Valeree and Victoria. And, I do think the provisions to be well enough. ∯WBG^converse 05:42, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Let's give it a go. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:16, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Yep, that's a pretty impressive mentoring lineup. I'll just add, while I'm here, that I think the "Any failed indef block appeal at ANI automatically converts to a community ban" thing has turned out to be counter-productive. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:23, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support- Seems like a sufficiently restrictive set of conditions, and vigilant enough mentors. Why not? Reyk _YO! 08:52, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. I only wish we could offer this level of support to more users who run into problems. GoldenRing (talk) 09:09, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Elisa.rolle ought to embrace 1RR permanently, firstly because it's good behaviour (WP:BRD), and secondly "because English is not her first language". Anybody playing the language card should be aware they might be misunderstanding events and tread carefully. Cabayi (talk) 09:24, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. The proposal seems workable and promises a net positive for the project. Regards SoWhy 09:41, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support as member of the mentoring team. I believe Elisa will become a valued member of the community. --valereee (talk) 10:45, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support It'd make her CCI far easier to clear out with her actually being here, and I trust the mentoring editors greatly.💵Money💵emoji💵^💸 11:15, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support She's unlikely to run into issues with so much assistance, and will become a valued contributor. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 11:55, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - excellent plan for mentorship. 78.26 _{(spin me / revolutions)} 13:27, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - looks like a mentorship with a high possibility of succeeding. KillerChihuahua 13:46, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support per all of the above. – Levivich 13:53, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support Wikipedia loves second (and more) chances. My policy is to support so long as there is at least one willing and competent mentor. Jehochman ^Talk 14:13, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support I !voted oppose for unblock the last time this came up because of the probability for recidivism in regard to copyvios. With these restrictions, I am all for giving Elisa another chance. It is wonderful that there are kind editors willing to help her. Jip Orlando (talk) 14:22, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support provided that she accepts the conditions stated by Xaosflux below.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 15:29, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - I realise this is SNOWing, but I wanted to state my own support - that level of collaboration and support from multiple mentors, a tad embarassingly, actually made me tear up - we're supposed to be so hostile to each other it was great to see this level of help to get an editor back into the Community. Nosebagbear (talk) 16:02, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support - of course. GoodDay (talk) 16:08, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support per GoldenRing. New/newish users are constantly berated for not following rules that are NOT easy to find and aren't always as common-sense as we think. Simple education for an honest editor can go a long way. Close ASAP per WP:SNOW. Buffs (talk) 16:24, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support. I enjoyed working with Elisa, found her to be receptive and willing to learn, which goes a long way. It's work I enjoy and, though I'm not here everyday, will be available to look over her shoulder and continue to work with her as I did before we had to cut it short. It benefits the encyclopedia to have her work on her existing articles to weed out issues, with the help of others, and through that process she'll become a productive editor. Victoria (tk) 17:20, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support: So long as this collaboration holds, and Xaosflux's conditions are accepted and implemented, I have no objections. — Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 17:26, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support as a member of the mentoring team. SusunW (talk) 17:57, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Support At first I thought this would be leading to a walled garden, protecting this editor from outside influence, but upon reading the actual proposal at User:Valereee/ER I find those fears unfounded. Good luck all in this endeavor. Valeince (talk) 20:18, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss (Elisa.rolle)

@SlimVirgin: as this is starting to SNOW support, just want to make sure the following "mechanics" represent the objectives: Elisa.rolle's community ban will be vacated, and a new set of editing restrictions for Elisa.rolle will be enacted: 1RR on all pages for 12 months and a set of article-space editing restrictions as outlined in User:Valereee/ER for 12 months, which may be relaxed or removed by the "mentoring team" early. If so, is there any diff's of Elisa.rolle's acceptance of the condition yet? — xaosflux ^Talk 13:50, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Speaking of SNOW, this should be allowed to run for a minimum of 24 hours.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 15:29, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

• That all seems reasonable - I'd specifically like to note I'm happy with the team removing the constraints early if they think it suitable Nosebagbear (talk) 16:27, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
  • My advice is not to rush anything nor to put any undue pressure on Elisa. Let's wait for her to post her unblock request, and if/when it's granted move at a leisurely pace. No deadlines and all that is my mantra these days. Victoria (tk) 17:20, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
• Question: is my reading that only Goldenring can be considered as an outside admin to enforce possible violations correct, or can any uninvolved admin take action if needed? Valeince (talk) 19:41, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

@Valeince: - the mentoring plan clarifies " GoldenRing has agreed to be available as an independent admin; of course any administrator is also welcome to act in any appropriate manner" Nosebagbear (talk) 20:04, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• Guy, this may seem a formality as I supported in the above discussion but CBAN discussions are required to remain open for a minimum of 24 hours with no early closes per WP:CBAN and this RfC. Appealing a CBAN falls into the same category since this is a consideration whether to uphold or remove the CBAN placed on her. A discussion was held after Elise's CBAN at Wikipedia talk:Banning policy with 24 hours remaining the minimum. Would you be so kind as to revert your early close and let it proceed for the 24 hours?.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 08:26, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
  • Actually, it won't matter. Although it was closed early, we are now beyond 24 hours since it began so I withdraw the above.
     — Berean Hunter (talk) 08:32, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fram

An arbitration case regarding Fram has now closed and the final decision is viewable at the link above. The following remedies have been enacted:

1. The Committee decides that Fram's ban was not required, and therefore vacates it.
2. The behaviour shown in the case materials falls below the standards expected for an administrator. Accordingly, the committee takes over the decision to remove Fram's administrator tools. They may regain the administrative tools at any time via a successful request for adminship.
3. A Request for Comment will be opened under the Arbitration space, and managed by the Arbitration Clerks. This RfC will focus on how harassment and private complaints should be handled in the future.

For the Arbitration Committee, SQL^{Query me!} 19:16, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fram

Fram

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Everyone aware of the Fram RFA? Guy (help!) 23:38, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

Perhaps not "everyone" is aware of it, but it's on the watchlist notice (as is the other pending RfA), and has already had more than 180 !votes in less than a day. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:49, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

And since at this moment the !vote is 100 to 100, it illustrates well the very deep split in the community. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:09, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

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Unconstructive edits by new users

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Hello I want to report myself, because I do not make constructive edits, which is contrary to the purpose of Wikipedia. I add content like a clan clan war game and I will surely be happy with the clan wars and war game again I am very happy that. Can someone please do something about me? Thanks,Schoolvand2 class iei (talk) 07:06, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Could someone possibly move The Viking Raiders (professional wrestling) back to War Machine (professional wrestling)?

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Hi all,
Undiscussed page move. Could someone possibly move this back to the original article title? I would do it myself, but (shhh, don't tell anyone I said this, OK?) I'm not good with that sort of page-move technical stuff, and if I tried it would probably result in a WP:AN thread along the lines of "Could someone possibly fix up my attempted but completely messed up move The Viking Raiders (professional wrestling) back to War Machine (professional wrestling)?" TIA.
Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 11:05, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done. I think you just lost your nerve, Pete. It can be alarming when you get the question "Do you want to delete the page to make room for the move", but the answer is that you do want to; just tick the box "Yes, delete page", then carry on, then have a stiff drink on me. I know what it's like, I just completely lost my nerve trying to handle the SPI template. Bishonen | talk 11:32, 25 September 2019 (UTC).

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A Village Pump RfC was archived without closure

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The following Village Pump RfC was automatically archived without closure: RFC: Formalize Standing of Portal Guidelines as a Guideline (18 July 2019). I would like to request that an uninvolved admin either closes it officially or reopens it by moving it back to Wikipedia:Village pump (policy), with a Bump template added to prevent further accidental archival of the topic. --Hecato (talk) 09:05, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't know, it looks like that discussion died a natural death. If someone really wants to I wouldn't object, but I'm not sure it's necessary either. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 15:03, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh, I probably should have mentioned somewhere that I requested a closure at WP:ANRFC not too long ago. While I agree that it died a natural death, having a definitive close from an uninvolved editor is worthwhile as I think it will prevent edit warring over what tag to apply. Wug·a·po·des​ 01:14, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

I also think that a formal closure of the discussions there is in order. Otherwise, the matters being discussed there remain in an uncertain limbo, which defeats the purpose of the RfCs occurring in the first place. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 04:22, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Bumping thread. Hecato (talk) 16:46, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

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Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Antisemitism in Poland closed

This arbitration case has been closed and the final decision is available at the link above. The following remedies have been enacted:

1. Icewhiz and Volunteer Marek are indefinitely prohibited from interacting with, or commenting on, each other anywhere on Wikipedia (subject to the ordinary exceptions).
2. Icewhiz is topic-banned from the history of Poland during World War II, including the Holocaust in Poland. This topic ban may be appealed after one year has elapsed.
3. Volunteer Marek is topic-banned from the history of Poland during World War II, including the Holocaust in Poland. This topic ban may be appealed after one year has elapsed.
4. The sourcing expectations applied to the article Collaboration in German-occupied Poland are expanded and adapted to cover all articles on the topic of Polish history during World War II (1933-45), including the Holocaust in Poland. Only high quality sources may be used, specifically peer-reviewed scholarly journals, academically focused books by reputable publishers, and/or articles published by reputable institutions. English-language sources are preferred over non-English ones when available and of equal quality and relevance. Editors repeatedly failing to meet this standard may be topic-banned as an arbitration enforcement action.
5. The committee acknowledges the lengthy delay in preparing the proposed decision for this case. We apologize to the case participants and to other editors interested in the topic area, and thank them for their patience.

For the Arbitration Committee, CThomas³ (talk) 19:29, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Antisemitism in Poland closed

Sock pupet

• 212.241.98.39 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) is the sock pupet of Tirgil34 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Long-term_abuse/Tirgil34

Evidence : https://ko.wikipedia.org/wiki/%EC%82%AC%EC%9A%A9%EC%9E%90%ED%86%A0%EB%A1%A0:212.241.98.39 --Igirami (talk) 03:23, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Dueling sock puppeteers, eh? You should report each other to m:SRG and let the stewards sort it out. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 04:30, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Resignation of SilkTork

Effective immediately, SilkTork (talk · contribs) has resigned from the Arbitration Committee. He has also relinquished the CheckUser and Oversight permissions. The Committee sincerely thanks SilkTork for his service and wishes him well.

For the Arbitration Committee,

Worm^TT(talk) 07:45, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Resignation of SilkTork

Challenging ANI close

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(I have notified the closer. Please advise as to whether I should notify everyone who commented.)

At Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#(Needs Admin Attention) Sir Joseph and accusations of Holocaust denial and revisionism The raw count was

Topic ban: 23 support, 11 oppose.

Site ban: 19 support, 25 oppose.

In addition there was evidence of canvassing and calls for certain SPA !votes to be stricken.

Yet the closing summary was "Closing..." with no action taken.

I call for the close to be vacated and for another uninvolved administrator to evaluate the consensus and write a proper summary. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:36, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

See also Primefac's edit summary. He's apparently in the process of writing up the closure. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:44, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

CheckUser and Oversight appointments 2019

The Arbitration Committee is accepting applications for appointments as CheckUser and Oversight team members. GorillaWarfare and KrakatoaKatie are the arbitrators overseeing this process. The names of all applicants will be shared with the Functionaries team, who will be asked for assistance with vetting candidates.

• Applications: 23 September to 29 September
• Review period: 30 September to 2 October – the committee will review applications and ask the functionary team for their feedback
• Notification of candidates: 2 October to 3 October – notification of candidates
• Community consultation: 4 October to 23:59 UTC, 10 October – candidates' statements published, community is invited to comment
• Appointments: by 14 October

For the Arbitration Committee,

Katie^talk 17:11, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#CheckUser and Oversight appointments 2019

Topic ban for Muhammad Samiuddin Qazi (sami)

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I propose banning Muhammad Samiuddin Qazi (sami) from editing any article relating to India, Pakistan and Iran. They have already been blocked for sockpuppetry. However, the user keeps on editing articles relating to India, Pakistan and Iran, and won't seem to stop. They mainly target the articles relating to Hindi, insisting that it is a dialect of Urdu. They also seem to be going into broader topics relating to India, Pakistan and Iran, such as by creating a template and a few categories about TV shows relating to the countries I mentioned. Nigos (talk • Contribs) 05:34, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

SPI case: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Muhammad Samiuddin Qazi (sami)/Archive Nigos (talk • Contribs) 05:35, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

• I am afraid, they are blocked over a year ago (May 2018) for sockpuppetry. And up till now they did not successfully appeal the block, that means any more of their sockpuppet will also be blocked once detected. So what's the point of "topic ban"? Topic ban is for people who are eligible to edit. It makes no sense to people who are not allowed to edit in the first place. – Ammarpad (talk) 06:54, 24 September 2019 (UTC)
• Agreed. Report socks when they arrive, they'll be blocked. A topicban is rather pointless at this time. KillerChihuahua 13:57, 24 September 2019 (UTC)
• Concur No edits in 1+ years = TBAN isn't a necessary solution. Buffs (talk) 18:24, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Help needed with the automatic archiving process

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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• See User talk:Airbornemihir/Archive 2#Automatic archiving for the discussion. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 04:42, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

  Anthony Appleyard, this should hopefully fix it. – bradv🍁 04:58, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

  @Bradv and Anthony Appleyard: Thank you both. I believe the bot Lowercase Sigmabot III comes online at midnight UTC and clears its archiving backlog over the next few hours... so we'll know then if it worked. Airbornemihir (talk) 09:45, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

  @Bradv and Anthony Appleyard: It looks like it's been done in this edit, so thanks again. It would be nice if the index could be fixed also - I'm not sure how to "request" LegoBot to regenerate the report. But that's a small thing and I'm OK with this discussion being closed. Airbornemihir (talk) 04:50, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

  @Airbornemihir: I'm neither Bradv nor Anthony Appleyard, but  Archive index fixed. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 23:47, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

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Can someone help me get content of deleted page?

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My Module:Commons category was deleted. Can someone help me get content of deleted page and copy it to c:User:Jarekt/a? --Jarekt (talk) 03:06, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

 Doing... looking this over. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:13, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done @Jarekt: this is done, you will need to set the content type on the commonswiki page. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:17, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. --Jarekt (talk) 03:22, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.