Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard

Welcome — post issues of interest to administrators.

For urgent incidents and chronic, intractable behavioral problems, use Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents. If you are new, try the Wikipedia:Teahouse instead. Do not report breaches of personal information on this highly visible page – instead use Wikipedia:Requests for oversight. For administrative backlogs add {{Admin backlog}} to the backlogged page; post here only if urgent. Do not post requests for page protection, deletion requests, or block requests here. Just want an admin? Contact a recently active admin directly. If opening a close appeal, use {{RfC closure review}} When you start a discussion about an editor, you must leave a notice on their talk page. Pinging is not enough. You may use {{subst:AN-notice}} ~~~~ to do so. Sections inactive for over seven days are archived by Lowercase sigmabot III.(archives, search) Start a new discussion

Visual archive cue: 56

Beligerant User Blanking his talk page

I have tried to help by setting an archive page up for him per a passing comment he made on an article talk page but anything typed on his talk page is removed. I left a message on WP:OWN and that blanking a talk page is generally frowned on unless you are archiving it. I stopped short of the the 3 Revert rule and decided to come here instead to have this sorted out. I didn't care for the message...STOP EDITING MY PAGE YOU SOCIALIST NAZI PIGS!!!! when I was trying to help...or add the section about vandalism. Talk page is located here. User talk:Dwain — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bschott (talk • contribs)

Remove comment from Windows Mobile history

Please remove the comment at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Windows_Mobile&diff=70751273&oldid=70608195 from Bonsai8 - which is me. It simply states a user keeps deleting links. The comment is true, but could be considered a personal attack and therefore should not be there. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bonsai8 (talk • contribs)

Banned User:Wiarthurhu asking for lifting of his community ban

User:Wiarthurhu has contacted me by email to ask whether his community ban could be lifted. He was banned after exhausting the community's patience after several months of incivility, personal attacks and disruptive behavior. The discussion of his ban can be found here. Wiarthurhu's email proposes a set of conditions he feels are reasonable to accompany the lifting of the ban and which he agrees to abide by. I have listed these below verbatim - although this technically allows a potential breach of the fifth condition he lays down, any discussion of undoing a community ban has to take place in the open and I see no other way to fairly discuss this proposal.

I am an involved party having blocked Wiarthurhu before for WP:POINT violations. My personal opinion is these conditions are not acceptable given the user's past behavior, but might with modification by us be the basis for lifting the ban. Obviously this is the broader community's decision.

Thanks, Gwernol 21:40, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Proposal:

• I do have a problem with all of the authors listed on my rfC

• I have very few problems with anybody else anywhere else on WP as long as I don't reference anything these above editors have done.

• I agree to a three month self-imposed block on any article ever touched by any of the editors listed on the rfC, including talk pages

• user wiarthurhu and all associated pages and records are deleted

• I get another username which will not be disclosed to the above editors, some who have shown a pattern of searching everywhere I've ever been and attacking both my material and myself. The terms of this user agreement will not be disclosed to the above parties, who will assume that I do not exist, and I will provide no reason for them to believe that I still exist as a WP user. If detected, you can terminate this agreement.

• I will cease to worry about the sort of things you folks have been tasked with fixing such as bullying behavior, or inaccurate content. Therefore, if challenged, I will defer. If ticked off, I will remain silent. It is no longer my job, it's the job of admins to enforce civility and factual correctness until WP rules are changed otherwise.

Can we give this a 1 week trial?

According to WP rules, a ban can be lifted if the user agrees to change behavior. I believe the above rules of engagement will eliminate all cases of conflict.

Ex-wiarthurhu.

I am willing to assume good faith and believe that he wants to change. I would support a second chance for him, but he must realize he is on a very short leash. If this is refused by the community, however, he could take it to the arbitration committee. Cowman109^Talk 22:01, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

As the dispute in question was beyond simply a user dispute but involved repeated violations of content guidelines and policies including WP:POINT, WP:RS, and WP:V, I am uncomfortable giving the user a fresh start unless these issues are addressed. The user still seems to believe the dispute is limited to "problems" between editors, and not incompatibilities with his edits and Wikipedia guidelines and policies. If the proposal is accepted as offered, the user will simply run amok of other editors and the processes we have observed over the last few weeks will be repeated. --Mmx1 22:08, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Can't say I care much for "user wiarthurhu and all associated pages and records are deleted", beyond the normal right to vanish I can't see why we'd grant this user any special favours. --pgk^(talk) 22:23, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm deferring my comments until I see what others like Tony Sidaway or Cyde have to say on the subject. Beyond that, Wiarthurhu has been warned plenty of times that his behavior would either end up in an ArbCom case or a permaban, so he really can't say that he hasn't been warned. I personally warned him of this fact several times, and that didn't stop him from personal attacks or incivility. Perhaps I'll have more to say later, but for now, I'm at a loss for words. CQJ 05:45, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Just a thought ... How about if all that is initially promiced is that he is allowed to edit under the conditions he has set out except that he edits as an anon - which differs from his current position in that it won't be violating his ban. A month from now he can provide a list of his edits and it can be decided whether or not to grant him a user name or not. Just a thought. WAS 4.250 10:35, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

• I have no problem with him being unbanned; some form of mentorship should be agreed on, a la JarlaxleArtemis (talk · contribs) - remember Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/JarlaxleArtemis and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/JarlaxleArtemis 2? --TheM62Manchester 10:39, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Okay. I've had about twelve hours to sleep, eat, and think about this. I think it's obvious to me that Wiarthurhu has a problem with all of the authors listed on his RfC, particularly because some of them (not all of them) tried to get him to edit within the rules several times. I think part of the problem that Wiarthurhu cites was created by Wiarthurhu himself, especially by the creation of the now deleted Wikipedia strategy article and repeated WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA violations time and time again. I saw the problem in WikiProject Automobiles brewing long before he was banned, about the time our mediation at F-14 Tomcat ended, and I didn't interject or start looking for things until the second and third MedCab cases were filed.

Wiarthurhu's references to these editors who he has a problem with are part of the problem itself. He has referred to the editors joining the RfC in a very negative tone, to the point of crossing the WP:CIVIL line, even to the point where some of his comments are within the scope of WP:NPA. He repeatedly has made comments along these lines in reference to Mmx1, ApolloBoy, and Karrmann at least, even going as far to call them Wiki-bullies and their supposed interference with him "evidence of Gang activity on Wikipedia".

If Wiarthurhu is to come back to Wikipedia, I strongly oppose deletion of his userspace and his associated records on the grounds that he's shown the same type of behavior in two separate disputes in two unrelated content areas against two groups of editors. What happens when the third or fourth group runs afoul of his intent? Further, Wiarthurhu has agreed to follow rules or suggested actions before which he's broken, and allowing him to create another name and dissappear from the radar would not be a prudent course of action, in my honest opinion. I don't think that he would follow a three month block of any article that these editors have touched, including talk pages, because if he was capable of self-restraint, I don't think he would have been permablocked in the first place. I don't mean that as a personal attack, either. Wiarthurhu has brokered "cease-fires" and peace agreements before, but when the other person doesn't play the game as he wants it played, then all hell breaks loose and more conflict comes to light.

Wiarthurhu has not been attacked here. To the contrary, it is usually him doing the attacking on other editors, especially ApolloBoy and Mmx1. Karrmann has also been a recent target of Wiarthurhu's scathing wit in addition, albeit Karrmann has also done a bit of pot-stirring in this case as well (for which he's been warned to cease). And, if Wiarthurhu's material and edits are called into question, it is because of the quality of his edits, not the fact that he makes them in the first place. So again, I strongly disagree with the community allowing him to get another username under the pretenses of non-disclosure.

Now, with that said, I would be in favor of Wiarthurhu coming back and being allowed to edit again, but not under the conditions which he proposes, and on a very, and I mean very short leash. I will pause here to save my contribution, and then I will continue in a moment. CQJ 19:22, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Here's what I propose.

1. Accepting that Wiarthurhu has a problem with the authors listed on his RfC, and the authors accepting that they've had problems with him in the past, Wiarthurhu and the editors listed on his RfC agree that they'll mutually avoid each other except through an interlocutor, a mediator, or a neutral third party for a period of no less than three months. Violation of this condition will result in a 72 hour block for any violating party, Wiarthurhu or otherwise.
2. Wiarthurhu agrees to immediately cease and decist in any action deemed to be in violation of WP:CIVIL or WP:NPA against ApolloBoy, Mmx1, SteveBaker, Karrmann, or any other editor that has joined in dispute resolution mechanisms against him in the past. Violation of this condition will result in a one week block for Wiarthurhu - and any editor baiting Wiarthurhu will be subject to the same.
3. Wiarthurhu will avoid any article within the scope of WikiProject Aircraft or WikiProject Automobiles for three months, as he has suggested himself, or be subject to a one week block.
4. Further, a mentor (or several mentors) from the community will be assigned to Wiarthurhu to help him out wherever necessary or possible.

If Wiarthurhu is honestly sincere about becoming a better editor, and can change his Wiki-ways to conform with our standards, practices, the Trifecta, and Foundation goals, then I have no issue with allowing him to return under these pretenses. If he is not, then he shouldn't be allowed back, as the way it stands right now, there is more than enough evidence that I've seen to support a community permablock without question. CQJ 19:37, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

As someone who signed the RFC, and peripherally involved but not closely enough to be emotional about it, I think his proposal is missing the point. Regardless of whether some of the RFCers were more active and emotional, Wiarthurhu's fundamental problem is not that he's being wikistalked. The username change won't help with that, and will help obscure the user history. If he's really willing to reform, he can do it under that username just fine as far as I care. If other editors or admins do start really wikistalking him then that would be a separate issue to be dealt with later, but I hope and suspect that if he does in fact reform he will have very few problems. Georgewilliamherbert 00:10, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Wiarthurhu has e-mailed me, stating that he agrees to CQJ's terms, but the issue of him retaining his username or not still lies in question. Should he just use his current account, or should he be allowed to use a new one if his account is unblocked? Cowman109^Talk 02:06, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I am unblocking Wiarthurhu shortly given confirmation that he accepts the terms CQJ stated above, and CQJ also said he will help keep an eye on Wiarthurhu to get him back on his feet (I guess being a mentor would be the word). I have also suggested that he follows the one revert rule and that if he feels he is being harassed, to come to me or another administrator about it instead of responding in the interest of not sparking more fights. His account will remain under the same name. Cowman109^Talk 21:32, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Disclaimers

The disclaimers, linked to in the footer of every single document in the project (others too), are in a state of horror. I've (a) made formatting changes and (b) removed what I considered junk; the results are at User:PseudoSudo/Disclaimers/Wikipedia:General disclaimer (diffs: general, risk medical, legal, content). I'd appreciate if a sysop reading this could copy them over to their respective projectspace pages (changing {{../Template:Disclaimer-header}} to {{disclaimer-header}} and [[:Category:Wikipedia disclaimers]] to [[Category:Wikipedia disclaimers]]); I also invite anyone with concerns to comment here and/or reverse the copy if it's been performed.

Although it's an improvement, in my opinion the pages have quite a ways to go. A goal I'd personally like to see is one single disclaimer, free from rhetoric and irrelevent comments (wikilinks gone, too). ~ PseudoSudo 20:01, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Completed by JzG; thanks. ~ PseudoSudo 01:24, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Image deletion backlogs

As it currently stands, the image categories for deletion, such as CAT:NS, CAT:NL, CAT:ORFU, CAT:NR are backlogged from between 5 days and 9 days in the case of NS. In short, for those which are 7 days old, they can be deleted under WP:CSD, if they have not been rectified by the addition of source info, copyright info, used in a a fair use manner or had a fair use rationale supplied. User:Kimchi.sg aka User:Awyong Jeffrey Mordecai Salleh has been the mainstay recently with 16,000 deletes in his 2 months of sysophood, but he is currently busy in real life. Anyone care to lend a hand? Blnguyen | rant-line 04:11, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

CAT:ORFU really needs help, there are thousands of iamges (I?ve been trying to clear it for a week) and they are all speedyable (2 or 3 not really orphaned anymore for each hundred, those are just delisted, all others removed ;) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Drini (talk • contribs) 05:22, August 28, 2006 (UTC)

They're all backlogged heavily. So is PUI and IFD. Kevin_b_er 06:26, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

With the advent of image undeletion, would it be acceptable at this point to blindly delete whatever is in the category without checking for the 2 out of 100 that are mistagged, and then mopping up afterward? That strategy worked rather successfully with the Category:Images with the same name on Wikimedia Commons where thousands were cleared to zero, with relatively little collateral damage.I think we need a way to get rid of these much more quickly. Dmcdevit·t 06:52, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Indeed. It would probably be easier to deal with the handful of false positives by hand than the accumulated days of backlog. -- Rune Welsh | ταλκ 11:39, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree fully with this strategy. One of the things that makes image deletion ponderous (for me) is the manual nature of having to check and count the 7 day period. Given that we can undelete images, I think it's time to update the policies so we can speedy these, making a notification period a valuable, but not required, courtesy. Nandesuka 12:27, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't take time to do it properly. You use Recent Changes and that tells you which ones have been altered since it was tagged and you can see if there was an incomplete detagging by checking about 10 edits. Then you can swamp the rest.Blnguyen | rant-line 06:54, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Use related changes/recentchangeslinked on the individual categories too, will alliviate the need to extensively check history of each image. Kevin_b_er 15:31, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Hey, at least we're better off than Commons. Commons has a backlog for unsourced/unlicensed images dating back to June 19! —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 13:28, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Time for a bot? Yes, I know that admin bots aren't very welcome around here however some of these image categories can be blindly deleted without any human intervention whatsoever. A bot which deletes the day's worth of unlicensed and/or unsourced images (and while we're at it, expired prods) would save a lot of admin time. MER-C 10:04, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Expired prods warrant a human checking to make sure they are not legitimate articles tagged. —Centrx→talk • 06:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Indef blocked userpages - new policy

We block hundreds of accounts with either nil or just one or two edits. Many of these are blocked at creation either for inappropriate usernames, or just trolling 'User:jimbo wales sucks' 'Doc glasgow on wheels' etc. I've been concerned for a while that there is a whole cottage industry of people going around creating userpages for these accounts, and taging and categorising them by whose sock they are thought to be (most are willy impersonators)- or which admin they are impersonating (although they are attacking rather than impersonating). Per WP:DENY I've been tryign to discourage this practice.

I always thought the taggers were simply misguided wiki-criminologists with an obsession with pseudo-law enforcement. However I'm now very suspicious that the same people creating these troll/vandal accounts are involved in tagging them. Many of the taggers are brand new accounts with no edit history e.g. User:ZIN, User:UJonk. Others have been specifically confirmed by checkuser to be creating socks as well e.g User:TheM62Manchester. I'm sure checkuserers could shed more light on this, but as a more general fix I’m proposing the following policy:

Userpages should not be created for indefinitely blocked accounts with an insignificant number of edits. Administrators may delete any userpages so created.

I'd interpret significant as 10+, but that's details. I intend to enforce this policy immediately, unless there are factors I have failed to consider. Thanks. --Doc 13:21, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I suggest that be 10 good faith edits; a user who manages to blank ten pages doesn't need a userpage any more than a user who blanks one. Otherwise, I wholeheartedly support the idea per DenyRecognition; the criteria for speedy deletion can be tweaked, so an entirely new policy wouldn't be needed. // [admin] Pathoschild (^talk/_map) 13:26, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

WP:DENY never had a consensus of the community and is still just an essay and not a policy so I'm curious as to why you are calling it one. I'd prefer this to become a policy through our normal process before people start enforcing it. pschemp | talk 13:27, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

DENY is a principle not a policy - but usual process is to codify good ideas that work. So I'm putting this forward now as a response to the immediate situation. What other process do we have for policy. If there are reasoned objection, I'll wait and discuss. --Doc 13:31, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Most of the policies on Wikipedia were principles or common practices before they were written down. In fact that's why they were written down: so that we could let new users know what principles and common practices the existing users were enforcing. WP:DENY merely describes what many of us are already doing since it is a matter of common sense and best practice. As with previous policies many of us are enforcing it long prior to its codification. And I am curious as to why you believe that WP:DENY doesn't have a consensus. Surely we can't know whether it has one or not until we ask the community. -- Derek Ross | Talk 08:01, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Good idea. I think {{indefblockeduser}} should only be used by admins or for the blocks of real editors. All usernameblocked vandals' pages should be deleted, there is no reason to have pages with vandalistic titles. Kusma (討論) 13:28, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I think one of the main issues related to this, is that if someone creates an account along the lines of "Bobby Boulders on Wheels loves General Tojo who killed FireFox", somebody will have the great urge to tag the userpage with masses of tags covering all angles of the username. This has certainly been an issue in the recent past, at least. — FireFox ^(talk) _{13:30, 29 August 2006}

Creating the above bolded language as a policy has my full support. Leaving these pages up just gives incentive to these vandals for "upping their count". Yes, they'll come up with more creative ways of gaining notariety. But each time they do something like this they provide us with more and more information and bring us closer and closer to identifying them. Bastique▼^parler _voir 13:40, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I support the principle of WP:DENY, let's not give each and every internet malcontent their 15 minutes of fame on Wikipedia by creating their own generic Sockpuppet Template. That much is good, but this is not a policy Doc, it's only your idea for a policy. At the moment, it's only a personal policy. Fine, run around deleting these pages at will if you must, I'm not going to complain, but let's have some semblance of discussion on this. I think it would be useful to keep only the generic {{indefblockeduser}} for userpages, whether applied by admins or not. We don't all have checkuser access or immediate responses from any informal requests (wherever or however those are done). Keeping the generic template would help in the fight for the "non priveliged". This debate should probably go to WP:DENY. --Cactus.man ✍ 13:41, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't mind getting rid of userpages, but I think the separate categories are useful when dealing with onslaughts of socks and should stay at least while socks are active so efforts tostop thme can be organized and apparent and so other admins don't come behind you unblocking socks. After a particular vandal has gone away, it is fine to get rid of them. pschemp | talk 13:45, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting the deletion of any template or categories at this stage - and yes it is a personal policy. Actually, I've been doing it and there's been no objections. But I'd like to encourage others to do the same, and I'd like a little consensus so I can point it out to the taggers when I discourage them from their activity. This is more a case of me saying 'any objections?' in an open way. Call it policy, guideline or whatever you like. --Doc 13:48, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

WP:DENY suggests the deletion of categories, so if that is what you are using, you are suggesting that. Besides, its the tags that help organize socks with their respective categories. (I'm talking about the generic sockpuppet tag, not user specific ones. Those should go)pschemp | talk 13:50, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Please don't tell me what I'm suggesting, rather let me tell you. Yes, I like WP:DENY and I'm certainly happy to ask people to consider it. But what I am suggesting as a policy here is simply the words that I bolded in my initial post. Nothing more. --Doc 10:16, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

No objection from me. I think it's a good idea. --Kbdank71 18:32, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

All these stupid pages show up in Google. Why should we have 250 Google hits for "Jew Aardvark"? Especially for usernames that attack other usernames or real people, I prefer to have nothing offending showing up. I support the tagging of real vandals that have actual edits, but username stuff just encourages the impersonators. Kusma (討論) 13:49, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Cactus.man that users blocked without a significant edit history should only have either of three templates applied to their userpage:

• {{subst:indef-user}} for username blocks
• {{subst:indef-vandal}} for vandalism only blocks
• {{subst:impostor}} or {{subst:impostor-m}}, whichever is appropriate

Someone needs to write a bot to replace substed sockpuppet templates with the appropriate username block template. I might have a go if this is the community consensus.

(edit conflict) I apologise - I was responsible for about half of those Blu Aardvark sockpuppet templates. MER-C 13:54, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I once put "kitten vandal" in the block summary and regret giving them recognition ever since, I don't make any userpage for them and am peeved when others do unless noting 'proxy' or 'sock by checkuser'. Block summary - "vandal only account", subst: the usual vpblock on the talk page, next please. I support Doc's view here. --Alf ^melmac 13:55, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry I think the sockpuppet tag is useful when dealing with a current onslught of socks and suspected socks so that checkuser can easily find them in one place to run. The category it creates is useful at the time. after that sure fine, delete it, but removing a tool useful in the heat of battle is silly. pschemp | talk 13:57, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

The checkuserers I've spoken to say otherwise. --Doc 14:01, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

The checkuser I worked with on EnthusiastFRANCE (Mackenson) used the category a lot to identify open proxies and go through and tag. That would indicate it is useful. Did you ask Mackenson specifically about that case? pschemp | talk 14:04, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Good point. The pages could still be deleted after the vandals have been checkusered and their proxies blocked. Kusma (討論) 14:07, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

When the onslaught is done, deleting is fine, then there is no permanent memorial. Certainly these categories are easy enough to find later to delete. pschemp | talk 14:10, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Another option is to simply blank the page. The sockpuppet information would still be in the article history. --Deathphoenix ʕ 14:17, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I support not tagging vandals with specific user names or templates, and deleting such that exist. Blanking is a viable second option. Vandals should not be rewarded with notariety, should not be googleable. FWIW, Mackensen has weighed in at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Long term abuse/Willy on Wheels 2 on a similar topic. Thatcher131 (talk) 15:34, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

The divider for me is: does this glorify the vandal (and at most only incidentally help the admins deal)? Lose it. Or does it help admins deal (and at most only incidentally glorify the vandal). For now, it seems to me that tagging accounts with names that attack or disparage may not be productive (although I tag them with the base {{username}} when I spot them, is that something that is perhaps not productive as well?) but that tagging accounts as socks often is ( perhaps not for WoW or WiC, perhaps but for some of our other sockfesters like PoolGuy for example). It seems that placing them in the category requires that either the userpage or the usertalk page not be deleted (so that the category has a place to be put). But that doesn't mean the page needs more than that category tag. On balance I think DENY ought to be considered to become policy, perhaps with some tinkering but agree it's not yet. Nevertheless it's a good practice. Qualified support of this idea. ++Lar: t/c 17:24, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree, some are useful in the short term (and it should be short term), we just need to apply some common sense. Many of these tags are basically irrelevant. On the point of policy regarding WP:DENY, I think it should also be noted that there is no policy saying we plaster tags over the userpage of every user who is blocked... --pgk^(talk) 19:23, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I think Doc Glasgow's proposal is reasonable. WP:DENY is a good idea in principle, subject to implementation. As pgk suggests, it doesn't require a policy change to not add a template, or to blank a userpage, maybe leaving the category. I'm going to start doing this whenever it makes sense. Tom Harrison ^Talk 20:26, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

arbitrary section break for editing purposes

Note Werdnabot will orphan this subsection when it auto-archives unless the latest time stamp is the same as the last time stamp in the section above. Suggest refactoring when the discussion cools off or switching to a different archival bot. Thatcher131 (talk) 15:55, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

ah ok, didnt know that limitation... I'll come back and remove this if the discussion lapses Syrthiss 16:07, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Can someone recover the deleted WoW long term abuse page so I can export it to my MediaWiki installation?? --Whitmarewood 08:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, normally I'd consider such a request, as I do userify deleted pages on request, but um... in this case, click on the user and you'll know why I'm declining. ++Lar: t/c 15:41, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

An example right here of where a LTA page was helpful. Admins with no prior knowledge are reluctant to block what was an obvious sock: example. Getting rid of all this stuff is going to cause more confusion. pschemp | talk 14:02, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree that LTA pages may need to be kept for more subtle vandals who require investigation as in your example. So far though we're mostly talking about Willy, Squidward, and other types of flagrant abuse. Thatcher131 (talk) 14:11, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

And Doc has expressed his opinion that all of the pages and categories are useless and this proposal is the first step. The next one will be to get rid of all of them. I don't have a problem with getting rid of WOW crap. What I fear is that this will be expanded to everything. In fact I'll be extremely surprised if it isn't. That's the direction off-wiki discussions about this are going. pschemp | talk 14:18, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

If this proposal goes so far as to get rid of a useful page like the MasgotGuy page (which, if you review it, will clearly demonstrate enormous utility to admins trying to deal with the problem, and no glory to the vandal) then it's going too far. I'm having trouble figuring out where to address this concern though as it seems there are many places where parts of this are being discussed. ++Lar: t/c 15:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

If there are off-wiki discussions going on, imo they should be brought back here (or some centralized location). I hate to think that people are being denied input because they don't use IRC. (reply to pschemp, not reply to lar ;) ) Syrthiss 15:24, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Note that there are related discussions to this at WP:ANI#WP:DENY-driven deletion spree and Wikipedia:Categories for discussion#Category:Wikipedia blocked imposters and all subcategories. Syrthiss 15:29, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

It's a bit too early to be deleting vandal pages as there isn't any consensus to delete them. Furthermore, some of them contain useful information, like which IP range do you block when Blu Aardvark shows up? If the relevant vandal page gets deleted (which it hasn't because it's in my userspace), admins are going to have to sift through the checkuser evidence while he vandalises away. I reckon such pages should be moved to Essjay's wiki where they are of use but don't give vandals recognition and have been trying to do that, but Essjay seems to be on a wikibreak. MER-C 09:37, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Images that aren't there

Shavian alphabet has a large number of images depicting the various letters of that alphabet. For example, Image:Shavian-ado.png. If you click on that, you will see that the "image" tag in the upper lefthand corner is red. There is no "history" tag, and there is no "delete" tag, even if you're an admin. Neither is the image taken over from Commons (because I just deleted a copy from Commons for not having a source or license, but the local version is still present). Now, these letters were designed by Ronald Kingsley Read, who died in 1975, so they aren't in the public domain yet. They have no source and no license, but with no "delete" tag, how do we get rid of them? —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 19:15, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

The letters were created then, but are these images themselves the creation of Read? Can you really copyright an alphabet that was intended to replace the Latin alphabet in English? If you're worried about the images themselves, it doesn't seem like it would be too difficult to create new ones and just update the images with the new versions. _└ ^OzLawyer / _talk ^┐ 22:18, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

But under what license? I don't think they're {{PD-ineligible}} the way normal letters are, because they are the creation of a specific, identifiable author. And there's no knowing what the source of these particular .png files is. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 06:39, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm contacting the author of a Shavian font right now (and it's possible that he's the author of the font that the images were taken from, if they were taken from a font), asking for permission to create image files from them for Wikipedia. Is there anything particular I'm supposed to ask/say regarding the copyright situation of the images outside of Wikipedia? Does his granting us permission mean that all subsequent providers of content taken from Wikipedia have the right to use the images as they see fit? _└ ^OzLawyer / _talk ^┐ 13:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, granting Wikipedia permission to use the images isn't good enough. He will have to agree to license them under a free license like the GFDL or CC-BY-SA. However, since the Shavian alphabet is a recent invention and has an identifiable author (unlike most writing systems), I'm still not convinced that the letters aren't covered by R. K. Read's copyright. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 14:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Where do we go to find out otherwise? I can't even conceive that an alphabet created for public use and which was hoped to replace the Latin alphabet was copyrighted. If anyone owned the copyright, I would think it was Shaw's estate, since Shaw commissioned the alphabet in his will, and so paid the creator for rights to the work. I would assume, with good faith, that Shaw didn't want copyright (and probably stated so in the will). But then, assumptions don't mean a whole lot here, eh? _└ ^OzLawyer / _talk ^┐ 14:08, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I doubt that Shaw's estate would own the copyright to this alphabet. He only commissioned the development of some phonetic alphabet; he had nothing to do with the development of this alphabet. There was a contest, which Read won. But it was Read, not Shaw's estate, who went on to develop QuikScript out of the Shavian alphabet, so I think any moral rights to the alphabet belong to Read. I suppose the question really comes down to whether or not these squiggles meet the threshold of originality necessary to being copyrighted. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 18:50, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm the creator of the Shavian font mentioned above. I've decided to provide images of my font under the GFDL to replace the images in the Shavian article. I can identify the current images by their shape, and they are taken from an existing font which has been copied much but I don't believe the author has given permission for any of these copies. We really do need to have a properly licensed set of images, and that's why I've decided to provide them.

As for the issue of possible copyright by Kingsley Read, I don't see how it can possibly be copyrighted by him. There was a contest and several people's designs were accepted, and money was paid to the creators. Read's was chosen as the best of them, then additional modifications were made. The alphabet is mostly Read's creation but not totally. I've researched Shavian for several years and have never heard of any copyright. I don't know if an alphabet such as this can even be copyrighted. Unless someone can provide evidence of copyright, we must assume it's public domain, since all the information we have at least implies that. EthanL (talk) 08:19, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Copyright question related to lists

Modern Library List of Best 20th-Century Novels

Is this list, prepared by a Random House and published here with a notice "Copyright 2003", exempt from copyvio? To the best of my knowledge, a list, with its precise ordering of information, is a creative effort, and hence fall under copyright. Or am I wrong in this? --Ragib 07:26, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

If the list is objective like best selling books or tallest buidings or oldest people, then the list can not be copyrighted in america regardless of the effort used to create the list. This is the law we go by even tho other nations may have different copyright laws. If the list is subjective such as based on a poll of a few select people (as opposed to a poll representative of public opinion thus representing objective fact - you can't own a fact) then the list as a whole can be copyrighted but specific facts about it like what was number one on the list can not be copyrighted (like you can not copyright the individual words in a sentence but the sentence as a whole might be copyrightable). WAS 4.250 13:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

So, can anyone look into the article I've mentioned above and see if it's a copyvio or not? thanks. --Ragib 17:51, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I am most certainly not a lawyer, but there appear to be two lists on the source page: one for "the board's list" (which sounds more like the poll of a select few) and another for "the readers' list" (which sounds more like the poll of a larger number of people). The article here only contains "the board's list". In my view, this is not something at all like a list of the hundred tallest buildings, and should probably be removed. —ptk✰fgs 18:13, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Copyvio, plain and simple. It's an "expert compiled" list and unless it's been released into the public domain/GFDL it's under copyright. Factual lists may be free of copyright in the US, lists like this are not and have been deleted on numerous occasions. --kingboyk 18:19, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Even poll results that purport to represent the opinion of everyone is copyrighted--taking a poll involved formulating questions, performing statistical correction and such other activities so that a poll can not be fairly considered a fact in the way that the number of people living in Ann Arbor is a fact. Thatcher131 (talk) 00:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Good spotting. Source is marked as copyright; I suggest listing the article on Wikipedia:Copyright problems. -- Infrogmation 01:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. I've listed the article in Copyright problems. --Ragib 04:51, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

By the way, can anyone direct me to the Wikipedia policy page on such external lists, and the associated copyright issues? I tried looking it up but can't find it. Thanks. --Ragib 02:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

If this is copyvio, then we should either notify all these libraries http://www.google.com/search?q=modern+library+best+novels+%22reader%27s+list%22&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official or figure out what exception they're using in order ot be allowed to publish the lists on their sites. Mateo LeFou 00:00, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Telefacts deleted content?

The article link on Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Log/2006_August_4#Telefact links to this page. Don't know if its recreated or missed content that should have be deleted. Telefact seems to redirect to Telefacts. Cheers,  :) Dlohcierekim 01:04, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I haven't seen the original article, but reading the AfD indicates that it had something to do with the university of Pittsburg. The current article Telefacts is about a completely unrelated matter, an existing and popular TV program in Flanders (Belgium). A legitimate article, and a reasonable redirect, so no problems there. On an unrelated note, when I tried to edit this section, I came at a completely different one (humor something or other). So I'm editing this by going through the whole way too long page... Fram 13:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Prime Minister Move

I submitted a move request regarding moving Prime Minister to Prime minister, per reasons given on Talk:Prime Minister#Requested Move. After the standard five days, there were three other users in agreement with the move and no objections. Thus, I performed the move. Jtdirl moved the page back saying the move is fundamentally incorrect and against policy because prime minister either has both of its words capitalized or both of its words not capitalized. He added that "it was decided long ago, on this and similar cases, that there was no option but to use the title in uppercase" and that "indeed if the RM proposal had been spotted in time, admins would have aborted it as the vote is invalid under WP rules," but I saw no discussion of this on Talk:Prime Minister. Is Jtdirl indeed correct about this discussion or can the page (as I and, presumably, the other supporters believe) be moved to Prime minister and a {{lowercase}} template (if necessary) be added to the article? -- tariqabjotu 01:47, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This issue has come up a few times all over the place. There are certain titles involving a number of words which can be lowercased or uppercased, but which must be done in unison. A mixed upper-case/lower-case title for certain offices is fundamentally wrong in English. (It is the equivalent of writing United states or George w bush, or indeed President of the united states.) Because of this the requirement for full uppercasing or full lowercasing was explicitly spelt out when it comes to prime minister/Prime Minister in the Naming Conventions and elsewhere. In the past, when the page was moved to a mixed upper & lower case, the move was instantly undone by admins under the IAR rule, on the basis that to put an office under such a illiterate form of name would be to bring ridicule on Wikipedia, because it is such a fundamental error. (It is the sort of error that students, if they replicate it in exams, are instantly failed on. It is what is known in the academic trade as a "nuclear error" because if you do it, nothing else counts.) While the RM procedure normally functions smoothly, the wisdom of Wikipedia's rule about decisions not being based on votes is shown here.

Where there is a valid argument for either uppercasing or lowercasing, for technical reasons we cannot an entirely lowercased version. Rather than make ourselves a laughing stock, it has long been precedent in these and other cases to use the only other alternative then available, using the uppercase version of the title. As with precedent in this and similar cases, to avoid embarrassment to WP and going by the rules laid down in the MoS and NC, I used IAR to overrule the RM vote and reinstate the page to a correct format. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:02, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Even if you are correct here, Fear, you are exaggerating significantly. I certainly don't appreciate the suggestion from an admin that I am making Wikipedia a laughing stock and attracting the ire of the international media by a simple article move. I hope the hyperbole was intentional.

Nevertheless, the advertisement for the WP:RM backlog is impossible to resist here. -- tariqabjotu 02:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Something to consider is that the input of three people might not be sufficient for a move of such gravity. For example, in cases where only a few people have weighed in on an AfD it is relisted in the hope of attracting more attention. In this instance, a note on the village pump, or at WP:PEER, or anywhere else where interested parties lurk would not have been amiss. Mackensen (talk) 02:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

That might have been a good idea in 20/20 hindsight, but there was no reason to believe that was necessary as no one objected to the move or mentioned this precedent. Many move requests don't get much input and, as Wikipedia:Moving guidelines for administrators says, In general there is a consensus that there is no minimum participation, unlike with AfD. -- tariqabjotu 02:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Correct, as far as process is concerned everything was by the book. This doesn't change that fact the more people should have been consulted, and that the article ended up in the wrong place. Mackensen (talk) 02:29, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Alright; I'll keep that in mind for the future. -- tariqabjotu 02:34, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I support Jtdirl's interpretation of the situation. Had I been aware of the proposed move, I would have objected in the strongest terms. Mackensen (talk) 02:07, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

On a further note, the title "Prime Minister" became an official one in the United Kingdom in 1905 or thereabouts, when Campbell-Bannerman took office. It could be argued that prior to 1905 the office was a notional one in the UK, and that the First Lord of the Treasury (or Foreign Secretary in the case of Salisbury) was the monarch's "prime minister." Of course, this ignores the Continental usage, where the office was established in law far earlier than that. Mackensen (talk) 02:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think, Tariq, you realise how big a mistake it is. Saying it would make WP a laughing stock is if anything understating how ridiculous it would look. It is the equivalent of writing United states, of calling Berlin the capital of France, or of writing about a "Prime Minister of the United States". It is the sort of mistake that would lead readers to ask "how could an encyclopaedia make such an elementary mistake?" If the article had remained at Prime minister I can pretty much guarantee that the mistake would make the Sunday newspapers in Britain next Sunday with "and they call this an encyclopaedia?" articles. It is a cringemaking mistake that a first year politics student would get pulled up for. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:26, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This is about the capitalization of a letter right? And there is still a redirect to the article, which wasn't demolished, right? It is the equivalent of only the first thing you described, "United states", the other two are plainly different and it is ridiculous to equate them. "United states" doesn't look that bad, by the way, and "united States" was the capitalization used in the united states declaration of independence. —Centrx→talk • 03:05, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

No. It is about accuracy. The office can either have both words uppercased or both lowercased. It can never ever ever have one uppercased and one lowercased. That is idiotic, akin to writing President bush. As WP cannot for technical reasons have both words lowercased the only option is to go with the uppercased version. A RM vote (of 3!) decided to ignore the rules of grammar and all the rules of Wikipedia as laid out (and the case of prime minister/Prime Minister is explicitly spelt out as an example where half-upper and half-lower is not an option) and move to a made-up name that is quite simply illiterate bullshit. As admins have done in the past (on this article in particular) I used to IAR rule laid down by Jimbo to overrule the application of a move which would make WP a laughing stock. And yes, Centrx, Prime minister. as Mackensen and anyone else who deals with current affairs, political science, history etc will tell you, is illiterate nonsense. It is one of those elementary faux pas taught to students as a "you must never ever . . ." It also features in style guides worldwide as an example of what never ever to do. BTW united states, lowercased, means an informal, unstructured group of states. United States, uppercased, means a formal country by that name. United states, mixed, means either that the person who wrote it had been drinking, or had an English teacher so bad they should sue them for incompetence. Prime minister means the same. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 04:13, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I certainly hope you are joking. —Centrx→talk • 04:20, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This is beyond ludicrous. First off, to quickly deal with User:Jtdirl's utterly ridiculous example: "United States" is a proper noun, a name; "prime minister", isn't. If you have a reality-based example, bring it out, but this isn't one. If you can't tell the difference, don't spout off nonsense about "illiterate bullshit".

Second, since "prime minister" is the proper form for the job, Wikipedia page titling -- and standard English orthography -- demands the page be called "Prime minister", just like every other two-word title would be in every other similiar situation. Since this is absolutely standard, the only people likely to be confused by this are morons -- and while I realized that Wikipedia is not edited for the protection of minors, I didn't realize it was edited for the protection of morons. Make "WP a laughing stock"? Only among complete idiots.

It also features in style guides worldwide as an example of what never ever to do. Fine, give an example, one that explicitly says that using "prime minister" at the beginning of sentences demands that both words be capitalized. --Calton | Talk 09:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

In order to stop this ridiculous wikilawyering, should we propose the move from Prime Minister to prime minister instead? In that case, morons will be protected as well and everyone happy. (Yeah, I do know what will be the page's title in that case, in case mor someone didn't get the sarcasm.) Duja 11:25, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I've moved the page back to Prime minister, in accordance with both Wikipedia's naming conventions and the consensus on the talk page. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 12:33, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Style wars are silly. Find something more useful to do. --Tony Sidaway 12:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I will be reserving a spot at Wikipedia:Lamest edit wars. If this continues this way, we will be having some administrators blocked, a couple of RFCs, and a lot of stress for a single letter. -- ReyBrujo 12:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Glad I brought my hip waders today, as I'm going to get knee deep in it here... I don't have my Canadian Press stylebook handy today, but I know that in referring to Stephen Harper, when I'm not using words that aren't repeatable in polite society, I capitalize Prime Minister, and I have one style reference that says that it should be capitalized depending on the importance of the person being referred to - suggesting that as federal government policy. [1] Here's another guide that suggests it's capitalized in conjunction with a name, but not otherwise. [2] This guide says only capitalize if it's after a name when referring to a head of government. http://www.yorku.ca/gcareers/grammar/capital_letters.htm#RULE%206:] A discussion we had at the office here last week on titles brought forward that if we're putting it before a proper name, it should be capitalized all the time, but if it's after, we can use lower case. Personally, I'd still capitalize Prime Minister if I'm referring to Harper or Blair, but that's the joy of being an editor - you can bend things occasionally. However, we might also want to look at our own manual of style, which, under the second section on Titles discusses capitalization of prime minister depending on various uses. All in all, I think we should follow the initial suggestion: move to "Prime minister" and add the un-capitalized note at the top. Tony Fox (arf!) 15:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I made a long-winded comment on the talk page. Basically, it comes down to a pragmatic decision about what does or doesn't "look funny" that has to be made in some pragmatic way. If it's a question of what is technically correct, then we should write "prime minister" throughout the article except when it begins a sentence. The title of the article should then be "Prime minister" because it is our publisher's house style always to capitalise the first letter of an article's title. Surely, though, we make some pragmatic exceptions to this, don't we? Metamagician3000 10:00, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

To be clear, that doesn't mean that I think the circumstances justify a pragmatic exception being made here. I have no opinion about that. I just think that it would be good if both sides realised that the other side has a point. In one case it's grounded in consistent application of house style; in the other it's grounded in the risk of public misunderstanding. At the moment, consistent application of house style seems to be the majority approach, and I can certainly live with that. Metamagician3000 23:21, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Forgiveness on Wikipedia

I've just read some of User:Giano's comments at User talk:Lar#Carnildo, who (Giano) continues to have hard feelings about a block comment that User:Carnildo wrote when blocking Giano a while ago. This may be a problem that has affected more than one user.

My first instinct was to say we'd need block and edit summaries to be editable by the blocking/editing party, but that means either accepting that when the block comment is removed, the offense is forgiven, or adding another layer of revision control, presumably without summaries. Such an additional layer of r.c. would add too much complexity for my liking (and may not meet with much enthusiasm from the developers).

There is potential that if implemented without r.c., such a facility would undermine the value we currently derive from block comments as a log of past objectionable actions, because there is potential that admins give in to blocked parties too easily upon unblocking, and remove this important information in cases where the user continues to be disruptive. On the other hand, it would be a way of building forgiveness right into the system. It does, however, assume that users understand that if they quote edit summaries, the quoted content becomes, in all but very rare instances justifying oversight, embedded in the edit history, thus remaining visible to those willing to put in the effort to dig it up.

An alternative would be a spam filter for edit, upload, block etc. summaries that gives a warning about the use of typically derogatory words - a warning that could be overridden by a second click (as may be important for articles about anatomical parts or derogatory terms, for instance). This could (?) be easier to implement, but will not catch every offensive instance.

Thoughts? Samsara (talk • contribs) 09:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I love the idea, after all:

• "Repent therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out" (Acts 3:19)
• "when he forgave us all our trespasses, he erased the record that stood against us" (Col 2:14)

Unfortunately, Wikipedia isn't God, so I think you'll need to 'forgive but not forget'. Not even the blood of the Jimbo would expunge your block record. But rather "I know my iniquities, and my sin is ever before me" (Psa 51). --Doc 11:11, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

A good idea to have a technical facility to do so but probably best used only by decision of ArbCom: e.g. they could have decided in the pedophile wheelwar case that the 'bad' blocks could be struck from the log. Just a thought. The Land 11:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Well spoken, Samsara. The technical facility has been proposed, or one close to it. See Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#Expunging_block_log_entries ++Lar: t/c 11:55, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Except where defamatory statements or private information are included, it wouldn't really be appropriate (and we can't easily filter those out automatically). It's important on Wikipedia to have a sense of proportion; those who don't may pose a problem, but this can be dealt with using normal, human methods. Writing yet more complex software won't help. --Tony Sidaway 12:13, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

If we need the ability to wipe a long, the more more urgent one would be the deletion log. I've at least once deleted an article with a libelous or privacy violating title and then though 'woops'. I suspect that happens more often than unfortunate blocking summaries. --Doc 12:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Right. The auto-deletion summaries are often very bad, including birthdates of real people or even attacks. It would make sense to change some of them, much more than the block log. Kusma (討論) 12:53, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Agreed here also. I've had this problem also. JoshuaZ 21:46, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Whatever happened to the idea of, "Once a criminal, always a criminal"? If someone screws up once, they're likely to screw up again. Even if they don't screw up again, the people who violate policy once still deserve extra scrutiny. (Except, perhaps, for people who have expertise in highways.) It's like that old "permanent record" they threatened kids with in school: "This is going to go on your permanent record!" Removing notifications of blocks, or removing vandalism warnings, is an all-too-convenient way of erasing one's permanent record. --Elkman - (Elkspeak) 20:02, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Nice cite of unreasonableness to encourage reasonableness, Elkman! However, it was all summed up better above: "forgive but don't forget". That's a good policy that guards against people falling back into old ways. However, it rarely applies in real life. Those who made a genuine mistake go away and reappear under a new username and never mention their old identity. Those who set out to destroy Wikipedia and changed their minds demand forgiveness but only allow about 8 minutes for it to be granted before they start destroying again, "justified" by not being believed (cf User:Lir). Those who are seriously deranged - and I mean "water tower-rifle interface error" - scream for positions of power in return for returning as "an ordinary user", then start to vandalise in a complete "help me! help me! I need pills and a rubber room!" way (qv User:Blu Aardvark).

Wikipedia as a whole has bags and bags of forgiveness, beyond anything that would be found reasonable in Real Life. And still we tend to be caught out by it. Huh. ➨ ЯEDVERS 20:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

The problem with this analogy is that, at least in Giano's case, there was no initial wrong. He wasn't hate speaking. His block needs expunging. Elkman would it be OK with you if I blocked you with the notation " indef block, major wanker, eats children in his spare time, runs down old ladies in crosswalks " ?? That's an exaggeration but it's just as unjust and unwarranted a block entry as "hate speech". I think it would be a lot easier for Giano to forgive Carnildo if that smirch were removed. Of course I could be wrong and he would never forgive him but that's my theory. ++Lar: t/c 20:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Regardless of the block log, one cannot force forgiveness or amend lost trust by decree. Especially when there is seemingly so little incentive to do so. But since Giano is bothered by his block log, I'm blocking him for 10 seconds with an appropriate block log note attached. I, at least, was immediately resysop'd so as to be able to make such a note, plus Essjay added his own. El_C 21:39, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I want to expand on my own block log note (which is indeed harsh) because I consider it closely tied to my approach toward Carnildo, who in his responses, draw the comparison that preemptively blocking pedophiles is similar in nature to preemptively blocking homosexuals. My antipathy toward his stance is largely based on the fact that, in the realm of ideas, he has yet to address these notions. So, intellectually, as far as I can understand, that remains his position, which is a pitvotal problem for me. El_C 21:56, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Category:Wikipedia protected edit requests

Just a quick heads up; this has 17 items as of this timestamp (I've seen a backlog tag with just 8!). --ais523 10:51, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Help wanted

We are now up to 689 links to chabad.org ([3]), which is far beyond what can be justified by this small though significant organisation. I'm sure many of these are valid and appropriate, but I'm equally sure that we are being spammed. Can a couple of helpful individuals pop along to my Tal;k page and see if we can work out how to approach this? I am really not convinced that we need to have the Chabad-Lubavich perspective on every single subject which touches on Judaism, but it's not a simple case of nuke-on-sight, and it's rightly been rejected at the spam blacklist as having at least some legitimate uses. Just zis Guy you know? 17:01, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I went through a number of the links but could only delete a few. Many of them are relevant to the articles in question but some are merely links to other collections of links. The ones I deleted were the links to more link of links :-). I do wonder, though, if there is a faster way to deal with this (like a bot)?--Alabamaboy 18:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive55#Spam-a-rama copy/pasted below for relevant discussion the last time JzG brought this up. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 19:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for pasting the info below. As I said, the links that are to useful articles are no-brainer keeps but I personally don't believe the links to further links should be kept. However, while I removed a few of the most blatent of these I'm not going to spend any more time doing so. Best, --Alabamaboy 20:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

You deleted two types of links, one was a link from the weekly Parsha of Matot [4] which has links to every viewpoint in Judaism's commentaries on it and there should be not reason why chabad's should not be included. Another example is this edit [5] which was a relevant link to the customs of the Priestly Blessing. In regards to your point about linking to further links. The links on chabad.org which have links to more articles are a collection of articles on one topic and is far better than linking to each individual article from wikipedia, as it covers many aspects of one subject. In the future please be more carefull before you mass remove links. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 20:37, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Copied from Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive55#Spam-a-rama

See this list [6] of links to chabad.org, a polemical website. Many of these links are inappropriate (in Christian topics, for example, where the Hasidic view is not really relevant). I am not sure what to do about this. Hundreds of links always lights up the spam radar. Just zis Guy you know? 12:33, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Zap the lot of them, and enjoy it! --kingboyk 12:43, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

First of all it is not a polemical website. It is one of the largest Jewish websites out there. Each link is an important resource which belongs there under WP:EL. An example of a link which he removed is this link from the Psalms article, which is the Judaica Press (Non-Hasidic) translation with the commentary of Rashi. I have restored those links. Which christian topics does it have links by? I could not find any. The Problem of evil which you removed a link [7] is applicable in Judaism as well. etc.--PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 12:47, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Do you deny that it carries heavily politicised pro-Israeli editorial content, then? Just zis Guy you know? 13:06, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

It has a few article which are very pro-Israel, but that is to be expected from a Jewish site. In fact every Jewish site out there has pro-Israel articles, are we going to start removing links to all of them? The links that are in the articles are to specific sections of the site that deal with the content of that article. For example in the Psalms article it links to the transalation and commentary of Psalms, not to any Israel related content. The Israel content is a tiny fraction of a percent of the site. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 13:14, 22 August 2006 (UTC) In addition its Pro-Israel articles focus less on politics and more on prayer, charity, and good deeds. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 13:16, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Do you deny that it carries heavily politicised pro-Israeli editorial content, then? And the translation with commentary is indeed problematic, as is the fact that the copyright status of the commentary is somewhat unclear, and the fact that it is surrounded by adverts selling off the page (see the shopping cart icon?). Oh, and the text "at chabad.org" is weblinked not internally linked. Just zis Guy you know? 13:06, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

About the Pro-Israel content see above. Why is a third party commentary Rashi problamatic? There is no problem with copyright. You can write to Judaica Press to ask them. and a small advert on the side offering someone to buy a hard copy is quite reasonable when you are making the entire copy available online for free. I don't know, but perhaps Judaica Press asked them to place a link there as part of the agreement. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 13:27, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Chabad-Lubavitch is a popular and well-known Jewish movement, and chabad.org is a popular Jewish website - for example, it gets an Alexa ranking of 10,786, significantly higher than other popular sites about Judaism like askmoses.com (15,200), aish.com (15,930), ou.org (66,439), and jewfaq.org (68,141). I daresay it is the most popular site about Judaism on the internet. The fact that it carries a small amount of material about Israel is almost inevitable (just about every Jewish site does), though it's not clear what makes this content "heavily politicised". In any event, most of the links appear to be not to content that has anything to do with Israel at all, but rather to relevant pages on Jewish thought on various topics. In particular it's hard to imagine what is objectionable about the links to Jewish translations of various books of the Bible, along with Rashi's commentary. The Judaica Press translation is generally recognized as one of the most scholarly Jewish translations (it's not a translation done by Chabad, btw), and Rashi is the pre-eminent Jewish commentator - observant Jews almost never read the Bible without using his commentary. All in all, these links are a rather valuable service provided to the Wikipedia reader. Oh, and regarding "copyright" issues, Rashi wrote the commentary in Hebrew in the 11th century, so I suspect his copyright has expired at this point. Jayjg ^(talk) 17:44, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm with Jay on this one. That said, the chabad.org site does not in every single instance represent the mainstream Orthodox Jewish viewpoint. In those cases, alternatives may need to be sought. But I don't support blanket removal of all links simply because an editor (an admin in good standing) once added them many months ago. JFW | T@lk 22:39, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

The issue here is that we are in many cases representing the Chabad-Lubavitch POV as the Jewish POV, which is not exactly correct. If we don't do that, but don't have the mainstream Jewish POV, then it's undue weight. I think in many cases the Chabad link could be replaced with a link to the article in the Jewish Encyclopaedia. Just zis Guy you know? 13:53, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

There are 5,013 links to the Jewish Encyclopedia [8] if you know of any articles that still need a link, feel free to add it. However probably due to the outdated language that they use they are one of the less visited sites according to alexa [9]. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 21:19, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Copyrighted information from a municipality's page being added by an employee who wrote it

Hi, sorry if this is the wrong place for a question like this--please redirect me to the right place if it is not.

A user recently added a dump from this site to the Brampton, Ontario page, which I twice reverted as copyrighted information. He then emailed me stating that he worked for the City of Brampton and was the author of said information. I'm no expert on copyright, so I told him I'd contact someone here, but I assume he'd need to prove that the city itself (that is, someone who has legal authority to speak on its behalf) has given permission to use this copyrighted information on Wikipedia (and in essence release the copyright through acceptance of the GFDL). If he can provide this information, where should it be directed to? _└ ^OzLawyer / _talk ^┐ 18:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Email to permissions@wikimedia.org, explicitly stating a) what the page in question is and b) that they're willing to have the material licensed under the GDFL. Email should come from an address clearly recognisable as the operator of the site. Shimgray | talk | 18:46, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

You should also let them know that licensing under GDFL also means they are giving up copyright and control over their text. Sometimes these places don't realize the implications of allowing this. You can direct them to Wikipedia:Confirmation of permission for more info and instructions on how to do all this.--Alabamaboy 18:50, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Additionally, in most Berne countries, the copyright of a creation made during the course of employment by and as part of the duties of a body vests the copyright in the employing body, not the employee. That's how Wikipedia gets to use NASA images and US National Parks photos as Public Domain - the copyright goes to the person paying the wages, not the person earning those wages (and, in the case of this example, US Fed Gov stuff is generally PD). ➨ ЯEDVERS 19:00, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, I let him know all of the above. _└ ^OzLawyer / _talk ^┐ 20:00, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

They aren't giving up the copyright; users retain the copyright to any text they contribute, presuming that a copyright would apply. Christopher Parham (talk) 06:26, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

An addition to watchlists

Greetings, just an invitation to all here to please add the new Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons noticeboard to eveyone's watchlist:

Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard.

Thanks. (→Netscott) 19:43, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Odd AFD close

At Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/A Poet's Life, the article creator, User:Worthlessboy1420 has closed the debate as a speedy keep, after also advocating for the article to be kept. Notwithstanding a number of keep votes, I think that's a bit odd. Could someone take a peek? Tony Fox (arf!) 20:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• It did not meet the speedy keep criteria, and the article's author should not speedily close the discussion. I am not certain that the concerns of everybody commenting "delete" were adressed. Kusma (討論) 20:23, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
  • WP:IAR is one of the five pillars... --Kbdank71 20:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
    • No it isn't. "We have no firm rules" is, but that's not an endorsement of IAR as much as an endorsement of how our policies evolve. Regardless, it looks like the close was thankfully reversed. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:59, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
      • Your assertion doesn't become true just because you constantly repeat it, you know. --Calton | Talk 07:23, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
        • The truth, however, will set people free. --badlydrawnjeff talk 18:47, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
          • No doubt. Completely irrelevent to anything you've actually said, of course, but a wise and a pithy saying. Did you bring it up for a reason? --Calton | Talk 19:01, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

• Yeah, let's all do whatever the fuck heck we want, IAR! Who needs common sense, anyways? --Conti|✉ 21:23, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• I have dropped the user in question a note asking him not to do it again. Article deletion procedures should be followed unless there is a very good reason. The Land 21:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

It was an overwhelming keep. This was an appropriate action. --Tony Sidaway 14:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

It's appropriate for the creator of an article to close the AfD on that article as a keep in less than a day of it being up? I haven't a problem with the article myself, but that seems to set a fairly dangerous precedent. Tony Fox (arf!) 15:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

It's not a precedent. Since there's been no jiggery-pokery the close was obvious and appropriate. --Tony Sidaway 18:46, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

People involved in the discussion should not do the closing. Period. User:Zoe|(talk) 02:32, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Image:00050113hg1.jpg

*sigh* I find this is incredibly bad timing considering the issue with User:Publicgirluk and all.. — The Future 21:04, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I will try and see if I can determine the copyright status later, but IMHO, it should stay deleted. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 21:20, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I was actually suggesting for it to be deleted, but I never got to post a update before Drini deleted it. :) — The Future 21:30, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

The uploader has uploaded a fairuse (orphaned ready for deletion) and a fairuse trying to pass a gfdl-self. So I assumed trolling and copyvio -- Drini 21:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Legal Threats by User:Stirling Newberry

This might be a complex underlying issue, however, I am concerned by Stirling's overt legal threats made against me with no evidence whatsoever to support them here: [10] and here [11]. Request administrative intervention to remind Mr. Newberry that he should keep his head cool and not resort to accusing me of "illegaility" and "slander/libel." T Turner 21:21, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

T Turner is obviously not a new editor. The account T_Turner (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has been used solely to attack and edit war with Stirling Newberry. (It's first edit was to criticize Stirling on another editor's talk page.) I warned Turner earlier today that if he couldn't find a positive and non-Newberry-related way to contribute to Wikipedia he would be blocked. I have just issued a final warning to Turner to find something useful and non-Newberry to do. If he fails to take heed, I intend to block him indefinitely as another sock of the editors who have been harrassing Newberry. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Even though I have not said I was a "new editor" you automatically side with Stirling Newberry even though he falsely accused me of spamming his cell phone? What you are saying is that Stirling is allowed to violate WP:NPA, whereas when I bring up a valid point, I get threatened with a block. That is obviously unfair, and I feel that your "friendship" with Stirling is clouding your impartial judgement on this issue. If I am blocked by you related to my non violation of Wikipedia policies, I will pursue RFC. T Turner 22:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I welcome the comments, advice, and scrutiny of any other admin. I would ask that T Turner not re-delete my comments to him from his talk page until this complaint is resolved. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

A checkuser request might prove fruitful. On the other hand, banning a troublemaker is faster. Mackensen (talk) 23:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm all for speed.

All of his edits are attacks on Stirling. I blocked it indefinitely as a harrassment account, and welcome review of this action. Antandrus (talk) 02:56, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

based on a quick review: support. ++Lar: t/c 15:11, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Talk page move question

Normally I'd not concern myself with posting a relatively trivial question here but both my own page move and that of an admin have been reverted concerning an image's talk page. This image had to be reuploaded due to the fact that its original name was completely out of accord with NPOV. Since the image is identical save for its new name shouldn't the original talk page be moved to correspond to the image's new name? Thanks in advance. (→Netscott) 23:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This is one of a number of attempts by Netscott to cause trouble over this issue. First, it's a content dispute and therefore not appropriate for AN/I. Secondly, it's BLP-related, and therefore I won't go into detail on-wiki. Anyone wanting to know the background is welcome to e-mail me. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Nothing like a bit of transparency to allow for a proper review of the matter I always say. (→Netscott) 23:31, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This in fact is a WP:BLP issue as User:SlimVirgin rightly says. It involves Wikipedia implying (through lack of a reliable citation in the text of the concerned article) that an individual is an anti-Semite. But that is besides the point. Save for "ignore all rules" what is standard policy regarding the moving of image talk pages? (→Netscott) 23:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

If an uninvolved party could review this that'd be appreciated. My valid concerns are now being deleted by SlimVirgin (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log). Thanks. (→Netscott) 23:45, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

As SlimVirgin rightly said this is not the place to discuss content issues. This thread was started relative to the question of moving a talk page of an image under the image's new name. Also please note that there is an AOL user trying to move the comments and SlimVirgin's has used here rollback tool to undo this anon's edits. (→Netscott) 00:07, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

This is not for WP:ANI. It is a content dispute. Please take it to talk page ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 00:09, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for responding Jossi but my question still remains about moving an image's talk page. I think we both can agree that's not a content issue no? (→Netscott) 00:14, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

The BLP question is now being discussed in the proper place over here on WP:BLP/N. (→Netscott) 01:14, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Could I ask editors wishing to refer to the blocking policy to use the words "blocking policy"? Using arcane abbreviations as some kind of shorthand does not help the readability of these often complex discussions. If you expect people to spend time reading your words, please spend the extra quarter of a second or so it takes to type the words. --Tony Sidaway 14:51, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I believe they are referring to "Biographies of living persons", but your apparent confusion is another example of why we should not use shorthand in normal conversation. --Deathphoenix ʕ 14:56, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Troll has created deleted attack page and I'm not taking the bait

(There is a User:kross they are defaming.)

user:SuperMayan Has recreated the deleted attack article Kross and is taunting me with it. User:IncredibleJake had originally created this and I gave him a test 3 for it. User:Incredible Jake had earlier taunted me with a note on my talk page about similar posting on unencyclopedia which I reverted because it contained an external link and I don;t care about unencyclopedia. Rather than taking the bait, I'm posting here as it does not have a db-attack on it yet and I don't want to feed the trolls. Oh dear, oh me, another taunt from User:Incredible Jake as I'm typing this note. I'm not so worried about the stalking as the defamatory attack article on Wikipedia. Cheers. :) Dlohcierekim 06:29, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Cheers,  :) Dlohcierekim 06:29, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Speedied and protected against re-creation. -- Vary | Talk 07:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Csd again

There is another major backlog on the Category:Candidates for Speedy Deletion, which I have been working on for the last hour. However, I really need to go to bed now and there are still about 200 items left, mostly images. Academic Challenger 08:32, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Still a problem, I've spent half an hour and deleted around 100 images and articles. About 240 items in there now. --Robdurbar 10:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

The category was getting full of images because a bot, PoccilScript (talk · contribs), was using {{db}} rather than {{NowCommons}}. The bot was blocked by Geni. --bainer (talk) 11:38, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma, again

I am inviting a review of my move of the article Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma to Queen Anne of Romania, as I am still getting complaints about it. It is a rather complicated situation. Queen Anne of Romania is the most common usage, but there are also good reasons why Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma should be used (see Talk:Queen Anne of Romania, User talk:Kjkolb and this section of the Administrator's Noticeboard for discussions). The survey results were two to one in favor of a move. At first, I did not move the article because of an apparent conflict in the naming conventions, the most common usage vs. a rule for the naming of consorts. Then another naming convention seemed to apply, so I moved the article based on that and the survey result. However, the other convention may not be relevant, either. Still, I did not move the article back because of the survey result and Queen Anne of Romania being the most common usage. Also, moving the article back and forth does not seem like a good idea. Finally, while I would not call two to one (or three to one) a consensus, requested moves usually get little participation, often it is just the nominator, so going by the majority is more practical (barring any reasons why the majority position should not be followed, such as a relevant naming convention or having weaker arguments than the minority). -- Kjkolb 09:04, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

User talk:David Sneek

David is asking to have his talkpage delete and cites his right to vanish. I can understand having his userpage deleted, but believe talk pages should be retained for historical purposes and to ensure discussions aren't broken on one side. Has this been discussed already? I appear to have a distant memory of a similar discussion in the past with a more famous Wikipedian. - Mgm|^(talk) 11:40, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Generally I think the talk page can be blanked (and protected if necessary) but is not actually deleted. Thatcher131 (talk) 12:28, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like a reasonable idea. It leaves the edit history in tact, but still allows him to disappear. - Mgm (not logged in) 12:55, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, in this case since there are no warnings he would be allowed to delete it per meta:Right to vanish. However he has already had his user talk page deleted twice before (check the page log). I would suggest looking at the deleted versions to see if he has ever previously claimed "right to vanish" or if he was previously hiding administrative warnings. Thatcher131 (talk) 14:50, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

A blanked page is still a page - no vanishing there. Meta:Right_to_vanish mentions neither previous deletions nor administrative warnings (not that there were any), so those objections are beside the point. David Sneek 15:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

It is my understanding that the notices on such a page may be archived, but not deleted. Particularly if the user name is still functional. Kukini 16:02, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that it's odd that a user should repeatedly have a page deleted under 'right to vanish'. RTV really only applies if the user intends to leave the project, I believe. If David is really through with Wikipedia, it would be appropriate to delete his userpages under right to vanish, but perhaps with the understanding that all revisions should be restored if he resumes editing? The last time those pages were deleted was on August 19, and David has edited more or less continuously since then, so RTV wouln't have applied. -- Vary | Talk 16:05, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I didn't appeal to "right to vanish" before, I just asked for the page to be deleted and this was done. I am planning to vanish this time. David Sneek 16:10, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

This is my understanding as well. David will need to stop editing under this user name alltogether. Administrators do the task of "vanishing" you David. Kukini 16:14, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

The deleting admin should check the prior deletions to see what reasoning was claimed then; as long as David is not a "serial vanisher" then we should assume good faith and let him vanish this time (but maybe watchlist it too). Thatcher131 (talk) 16:16, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

As an administrator, I am able to delete the user upon his request, I believe. I will do so now. Please contact me if you have any concerns about the process. Kukini 16:19, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Deindenting. No concerns about the deletion, but should David resume or continue editing wikipedia, I do think that all revisions of the talk page should be restored, per Thatcher's comment about 'serial vanishing'. If David wants to start over, he should do it with a new account. Other than posting of personal information and similar extenuating circumstances, I think the history of an active editor's talk page should be available to all editors, not just admins. -- Vary | Talk 16:29, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I am in complete agreement with Vary on this. Kukini 17:27, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

User talk pages are supposed to be kept. They can be blanked, but the history must be intact. The only times that they are deleted is when the user has only a couple of edits and is leaving forever or has already been blocked indefinitely and requests deletion to make a clean break, when the user is being harassed or when Jimbo deletes it, which is rare. I think that the page should be restored and blanked. -- Kjkolb 19:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

The user requested to "vanish" and was afforded this opportunity. Right to vanish does not apply selectively to user talk pages and not the actual user account, but to the entire user account. In the service of helping this user vanish, the IP and account creation options were both left available. If this account is to be restarted,the user talk page needs to be brought back in its entirety. Of course, the user has the right to archive it, but not to delete notices such as "test 1." Kukini 22:02, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

FWIW, I concur in Kjkolb's analysis, which seems quite consistent not only with that which I've long understood to be our practice but also with that which is plainly sensible. Joe 03:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Second or third editor to quit

I'm the second or third long-standing, good editor to quit Wikipedia as a result of the situation with the anarchism-related articles, even though my editing expanded far beyond them. Anarchism is listed as one of the subjects on which every Wikipedia should have an article on; yet, it is probably one of the worst and most unstable articles on the English-language Wikipedia. It draws to it a myriad of ideological warriors, from both sides of the spectrum, who have no problem gaming the system to get what they want. Some of them (like RJII or Thewolfstar) have been banned, but have also admitted or been proven to have numerous sock puppets.

While most of the editors of these articles, regardless of partisanship, are reasonable and intelligent people who are willing to compromise, there have always been two or three (an interesting number, considering that two or three have been banned indefinitely) editors who have thrived on throwing matches into the powder keg. These editors know well how to game the system, and some administrators, probably unwittingly, play right into their hands. They wait for the slightest violation of Wikipedia policy by editors they disagree with and then report it immediately and vindictively, and a few administrators are always more than willing to come barreling in to block so-and-so without actually attempting to understand the context of the situation. I have been blocked three times in the three years that I have spent on Wikipedia, all within the span of the last month or so, as these users have learned how to better game the system. I am not typically a hot-headed or edit-warring type of editor. The second time, it was a mistake (later admitted by all involved). The last time, it was a mistake, but then again, Woohookitty does seem to be incapable of error (and quite rude -- but then again, as a long-standing and active administrator, he deserves the respect of a soldier on the front lines, God bless him, I could never comprehend his travails).

Since I no longer see any reason to put any time into Wikipedia, and now see my thousands of edits and time spent trying to improve particular articles as rather pointless, I've decided to quit along with the two or three editors who have also recently quit as a result of this very same problem. I am posting this, as my last message to WP:AN, only because I hope that people will actually put some time into this problem and attempt to fix it. That is all. I don't want any sympathy, and I don't care whether or not anybody agrees or disagrees with my last block. It just needs to be recognized that there is a huge problem, and that that problem is not me, or Two-Bit Sprite, or Blahblahblahblah, or infinity0, or The Ungovernable Force, or any of the myriad of other editors involved in these articles, but rather two or three editors with too much time on their hands. --AaronS 13:45, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I haven't looked into the specifics of this case. However, I have already seen practices of "gaming the system": using the formal rules of Wikipedia (3RR etc.) to get rid of people of different opinions who have less time to spare or who are less organized. There's something flawed there; essentially, a group of decided POV-pushers with time to spare can effectively lock out good contributors.

I'm personally in favor of applying 3RR sensibly. David.Monniaux 17:27, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I do appreciate your comments, Aaron. What dispute resolution steps have been tried with that article? Might be time for an RfAr to try to get things under control. That article has been "trouble" for a long long time. And I might've been hasty with the blocks and comments. We admins can make mistakes too. Not making excuses for myself but it reminds me of Neuro-linguistic programming when it was at its worst. It's so complex that it's hard to adjudicate anything. --Woohookitty^(meow) 12:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Just to answer your question, that article has been through a great deal of dispute resolution (RfAr, MedCab, etc.), and it hasn't helped one iota. The most troublesome editors are not interested in compromise. To compromise, for them, is to lose the great struggle. RJII, for instance, really believes that he is on the front lines of a revolution. Also, thank you for your comments. I appreciate that. --AaronS 21:38, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

KarlV unblocked

I have removed the indefinite block on User:KarlV, which had run for a month, based on the prior discussion showing no community consensus/support for an indefinite block. I'd urge all involved to refrain from further inflammatory accusations or actions and see if Karl's repeated promises of good behaviour are born out. --CBD 17:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

User:Dbiv

We don't want to lose Dbiv. I blocked him for a few days after he resumed defiance of his arbitration ban from Peter Tatchell after warnings. In the interests of continuing dialog I have unblocked him for the purpose of engaging in editing from which he is not banned. --Tony Sidaway 22:39, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

His talk page makes it sound like he was sockpuppeting yesterday to get around the block. Is this true? I'm all for de-escalation, but I'm not sure I like the idea of unblocking someone who was just evading their block yesterday. Friday (talk) 23:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

He was sockpuppeting on a related note - leaving messages on talk pages etc but not particularly attempting to engaged in tendentious editing. I unblocked his sockpuppet for similar reasons as Tony has jsut unblocked his main account. I would describe Dbiv as behaving oddly; there is a chance he is being manipulative; however given the quality of his contributions I think we should extend every opportunity for him to regain our trust. IF he continues to either breach the ArbCom decision, or otherwise wind people up, it is little hassle to reblock him. The Land 23:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Seems reasonable- I have no idea of the background here, so I'll certainly defer to those who've been previously involved. Unblocking a recent block-evader just struck me as usual, and I suppose it is, but that doesn't mean it's always a bad idea. Thanks for the clarification. Friday (talk) 23:58, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Irishpunktom. --Tony Sidaway 18:44, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

User:Kirbytime 's "gotcha"

User:Kirbytime makes a personal attack but it was only one and that is not why I am posting the situation here. He states, Are you done being a tool of Scientology already? [12] So, I attempted to get into communication with him. But leaving a signed message on his user page causes a "you've got a new message" to appear and when clicked that then redirects the unsuspecting user to this page: [13] This "gotcha" template which appears when a person gives him a communication and signs it with four tildes is why I post here. I believe administrators should be notified because it is a mis-use of a user's discussion page. Terryeo 00:53, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, I think it is intended as a joke, sort of like R2-45 was, so I suggest you lighten up and stop your pouting.--Fahrenheit451 01:24, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Some editors disfavor the practical joke new messages, but their use is widespread and not something over which to quibble. In any event, there is no nefarious process by which Kirbytime leaves the new messages message for users who have written on his talk page; in fact, the template appears on his user page, as it does on the user pages of many editors. The question of the propriety of Kirby's initial remark aside, this ought to be quite far down on the list of on-Wiki items about which one should be concerned. Joe 03:02, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I've given him a warning about the attack on Terryeo (which in my opinion was particularly blatant). The so-called "practical joke" seems to amount to wikilinks at the top left of Kirbytime's user and talk pages, which are presumably intended to resemble the "new messages" notice in some skins. Childish but not particularly problematic. --Tony Sidaway 15:17, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Kitty Pryde article

I've been trying to protect this page only against moves, since a minor page-move war is going on, but think I've stuffed it up. Sorry to admit my technical incompetence. Could someone check and fix this? Some clearer instructions on how to do it in the guide for admins would be welcome, too, if anyone has a moment. To me at least, it's not intuitive. Metamagician3000 07:36, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I fixed it. If you want to have different settings for editing and moves, click on "unlock move permissions". Then set each to the appropriate level of protection. I think they tie them together as the default because pages are usually blocked due to editing and not moving, and if no one can edit the page, it does not make much sense to allow the article to be moved. -- Kjkolb 12:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. Metamagician3000 07:01, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Re-Deletion of Halo Vehicles List

The article List of vehicles in the Halo universe has recently been recreated. It was successfully deleted on 13 July 2006 primarily as a violation of WP:NOT, section 1.9.4 (WP is not a game guide). Two notable precedents were cited [14] [15]. The page was recreated 1 September without malicious intent. I do not believe it falls under criteria for SC or PROD (as it does contain factual information). Being unsure about the best way to redelete the article, I moved to standard AfD, where I could not figure out just how to correctly list an article for deletion that had already been deleted. By bringing it to administrative attention, my hope is that the article can be deal with properly, as opposed to me taking a stab at random and hoping it works. --Ourai ^{(т • с)} 08:56, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

To nominate where an article with the same name has already been nominated, you need to substitute {{afd}} onto the page, then edit the AfD message and replace the link "[[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pagename]]" with something like "[[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pagename (2nd nomination)]]". Then follow the new redlink to create the page as you would normally. --bainer (talk) 10:40, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

This would be a clear-cut speedy deletion, per WP:CSD#General criteria #4: "Recreation of deleted material. A substantially identical copy, by any title, of a page that was deleted as a result of a discussion in Articles for deletion or another XfD process, unless it was undeleted per the undeletion policy or was recreated in the user space." -- ChrisO 11:14, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Negative or harmful material about living persons

I would like to have a clarification about the wikipolicy that material that could be construed as critical, negative or harmful about living persons should be removed immediately. [16] @ Talk:Controversy over racial characteristics of Ancient Egyptians, one editor wrote that Hawass is a "liar": "Hell, if liars like Zahi Hawass can pronounce to the world [...]" [17] I removed the word "liar" [18] but it was reinserted immediately with the comment: "restored. do not alter my posts. And if you're going to refer to Wiki policy, provide a relevant link. Hawass is a public figure; he's fair game" [19] Comments? CoYep 12:11, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

The ascription of liar to a biographical subject is probably less-than-helpful, such that one might reasonably strike it out, I suppose, but this situation seems quite insignificant relative to those that BLP seeks to address; not only is liar almost surely not potentially libellous, but such appellative is mentioned on the talk page of a and quite plainly a subjective assessment not advanced as unsourced fact (toward which, see mistake of fact and opinion; of course, neither unsourced facts nor personal opinion be introduced into articles [or appended to talk pages], but it is worth noting that there are, at the very least, no legal issues here). The fair game formulation does seem to reflect a misunderstanding of BLP (although perhaps the editor means to refer to the distinction in United States law as regards libel between those who are public figures and those who are not [New York Times Co. v. Sullivan], but I imagine that a note on his talk page as to BLP would suffice, even as such note might not be necessary. Joe 15:56, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't quite understand the above explanation, but I've refactored to remove the epithet and left a note on User talk:Deeceevoice. Regardless of law, we don't allow unsourced negative material about living people, out of sensitivity to them for one thing. Talk pages are on search engines. Tyrenius 01:05, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I would doubt that talk page comments are a big deal legally (I sure hope they're not). But, this seems like an issue we might want clarification on from the Foundation (they might wanna consult their PR people or lawyers). Until such clarification is made, I'd think we want to be conservative on issues like this. Since such invective is irrelevant to working on the articles, removing unflattering opinions of living people seems harmless and might help save somebody's ass. Even if it's legally alright, it could turn into bad publicity for the project. Friday (talk) 02:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Talk page comments are the same deal legally as comments posted anywhere, unless you mean these particular comments, which are cause for prudence, not panic. Tyrenius 02:52, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The Strange History of Doctor Octagon

I've posted a "History of Doctor Octagon" on User_talk:David.Mestel. I'd appreciate it if admins would read it, and be aware of the pattern for when a new Gilliland sockpuppet appears. Thanks! Nandesuka 17:50, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Request for Help

Perhaps you can help me. I have been working on some embryology and congential heart defects. There is a page dedicated to truncus arteriosus(embryology) and truncus arteriosus congenital outflow tract anomaly. I was able to change Truncus arteriosus to a more exact term Persistent truncus arteriosus, but when I cross reference in embryology it still sends me to the congenital defect. It needs to be Truncus arteriosus for embryology and PTA for congenital heart disease.GetAgrippa 14:39, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

You might have been better off using the Wikipedia:Help desk or Wikipedia:New contributors' help page, as this doesn't sound like it requires admin intervention. In any case, are you looking for [[this style of|link]]? If you do that link ( link ), it sends you to "this style of", but has the text "link". It might also be useful to change that redirect that you created into a disambiguation page. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 14:59, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Grigori Perelman

I have protected this high-profile article due to an edit war. The issue is that despite good references that he is Jewish, people keep removing this information on grounds that clearly violate WP:V, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV. There is evidence of sockpuppetry. Can an admin not previously involved review this please.--Runcorn 17:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

1. First there is no proof if there is show it the only "proof" is a russian article where they themselves only go by his name
2. Why is the alleged religion mentioned at the very top of the article why isnt Arnold Schwarzeneggers religion mentioned at the very top or Bill Clintons or Bill Gates or Richard Nixons or Jimmy Wales of their articles.
3. Has he had a bar mitzvah is he even a member of the religion?
4. Even the article about Einstein dosent mention the religion at the very top at the very beginning of the article.
5. So why is the alleged religion mentioned at the very start at the very beginning of the article. When it is extremly hard if not impossible to do so with the vast majority of wikipedia articles about persons.
6. And what is the most interesting is that the Admin has himself violated the 3rr rule which if anything proves that the alleged religion shouldt be mentioned at the very top at the very start of the article and why even mention it at all

Ramand 17:32, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I've been looking into this situation. There appears to be some heavy-duty sockpuppetry/meatpuppetry going on here. Kelly Martin (talk) 18:33, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Also, for what it's worth, Jewish is a lot more than merely a religion, it is also a heritage and culture. Although I am atheist by "religion", when someone asks me what I am, I am likely to respond Jewish, because that is my culture and my heritage. Grigori Perelman is clearly Jewish in this regard even if he doesn't have a personal belief in a deity. --Cyde Weys 00:48, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

There was repetitive removal of a properly referenced statement (from The Daily Telegraph a reputable UK paper) of his Jewish origin ("Jewish family", meaning immediate family), because of a POV assertion that this didn't count, according to the removers' criteria of Jewishness. Several of the removing editors were blocked as socks. In the meantime Runcorn got blocked for 3RR restoring the material. Tyrenius 00:43, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Israeli apartheid

This case has closed and the final decision has been published at the link above.

To summarize: Discussion of global issues which concern use of "apartheid" and all polls shall be at Wikipedia:Central discussions/Apartheid with subsidiary dialog on the talk page of affected articles. Based on the difficult and controversial nature of this matter, with the exception of Zeq (talk · contribs), who remains banned from editing the article, the principal participants in this dispute shall be granted an amnesty for past actions, but are strongly encouraged to engage in negotiations. All involved administrators are admonished not use their administrative tools without prior discussion and consensus. - Mgm|^(talk) 20:48, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Revert, block, ignore

I welcome everyone to take a gander at a new essay entitled RBI. These games we've been playing with the vandals have long since gotten tiresome and it's time to simply revert, block, and ignore. Remember, we're here to write an encyclopedia, not play cops and robbers. --Cyde Weys 00:50, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah I think we tried that on the PWOT mob. Strangly talking to them worked better.Geni 01:32, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Comments posted on talk page of the essay. Newyorkbrad 03:03, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Looks similar to Wikipedia:Vandalism is not a game.--Andeh 07:31, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

A thought about Vandalism

One tenet that reassures all of us that Wikipedia never will be overrun by vandals is that people inherently want to be "good" more than "evil," so the number of people reverting and fighting vandalism will always be higher than the number of people vandalising -- no matter how much Wikipedia grows. It has occurred to me, however, that the more notorious Wikipedia becomes, through either media hype of its supposed inacurracies from minor misinformation to libel (Siegenthaler), or god forbid, if any mishaps should happen to children preyed upon by pedophiles here. I'm sure you can imagine the massive media coverage that would get.

Therefore, if Wikipedia becomes notorious in the media for its real or supposed "evils," the number of people using Wikipedia to vandalise and wreak havoc would increase faster than the people fighting vandalism. New vandals would see harming Wikipedia as a crusade in taking down something seen as malicious, something with a bad reputation, and a bloated factory of internet evil. And thus Wikipedia would finally be overrun. Its just a thought I had. Wiki Mirabeau 03:45, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Ericsaindon2

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

• Ericsaindon2 is required to choose one username and edit only with that name.
• Ericsaindon2 is banned from Wikipedia for one year due to a variety of disruptive activities.
• Ericsaindon2 is placed on Probation. He may be banned for an appropriate time from any article or set of articles which he disrupts.

For the Arbitration Committee. --FloNight 06:05, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Ericsaindon2 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) has been blocked for one year as per ruling number 2. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 06:53, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Deleting the talk pages of editors with a significant edit history

Since administrators are the ones who fulfill or deny requests to delete user talk pages, I wanted to make sure that they are aware of the discussion about modifying the policy here. -- Kjkolb 10:27, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

New Lanark

Just a minor issue, Hi,

 this is srujan.Iwant to get little information about the following,like,

how can i know about the university and how to apply for the university.even i wanted to know how islife when i come over ther and wht would be my expenses for my staying and my tution fees,can u pelse help me whith this information .

                                        Thanking you ,
                                                        yours faithfuly,
                                                         Srujan Pudhota has been reverting good faith edits of mine on New Lanark without comment and I beleive he holds a certain sense of ownership for the article. I'm just off for a couple of weeks holiday, so would appreciate it if somebody could keep an eye on thigs. Thanks/wangi 11:49, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Heqong

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

• Heqong is placed on Probation. He may be banned for a reasonable period of time by any administrator from an article or set of articles which he disrupts by tendentious editing. Should Heqong violate a ban he may be blocked for a reasonable period of time. All blocks to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Heqong#Log of blocks and bans.
• Heqong is banned for one month for personal attacks.
• Heqong is placed on personal attack parole.

For the Arbitration Committee. FloNight 14:25, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Blocked for one month per above. JoshuaZ 14:31, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/CoolKatt number 99999

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

• CoolKatt is banned for one year from articles which relate to US television stations. He may continue to comment on talk pages.
• CoolKatt is placed on Probation. He may be banned from any article or talk page which he disrupts. After the expiration of any ban imposed by this decision that ban may be re-imposed should he resume tendentious or disruptive editing. All bans are to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/CoolKatt number 99999#Log of blocks and bans.
• All of CoolKatt's subpages that do not comply with Wikipedia:User page#What about user subpages? shall be deleted.
• Should CoolKatt violate any ban imposed on him by this decision he may be blocked for an appropriate period. All blocks are to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/CoolKatt number 99999#Log of blocks and bans

For the Arbitration Committee. FloNight 18:05, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Pages by prefix link. I'm not sure how we determine which subpage violate that guideline though, since they could all be "a work in progress". Or is the idea just to delete everything that looks like an article? --kingboyk 18:09, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Does he finish serving out his 3 month block for violating the preliminary arbcom injunction? Also how does this ruling address his incivility and behaviour that exists outside of TV Station articles, like where he went on a spurious campaign of labelling everyone and their dog a sockpuppet for speaking out against a particular pokemon article (and went so far as to put obviously false sockpuppet tags on user pages to further that campaign), would that be considered a disruptive behaviour?--Crossmr 18:23, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

three files mysteriously deleted from my user space

Several files have been mysteriously deleted from my user space recently.

• User:Geo Swan/working/Guantanamo articles that have been nominated for deletion
• User:Geo Swan/shadow/Guantanamo articles that have been nominated for deletion.

I am not aware of anything in these pages that was a violation of policy. But, if, for the sake of argument, someone else felt that they were in violation of a policy I think that whichever administrator felt they had the responsibility to delete them should have at least left an explanation on my talk page.

Cheers! -- Geo Swan 18:55, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Looks like they were only redirects. You still have a complete page at User:Geo Swan/working/Guantanamo related articles which have been nominated for deletion.

Deletion logs: [20] [21]

--kingboyk 19:00, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Shutting down Universe Daily for good.

Hi everyone, we've come to a fork in the road where WP:DENY is being fully implemented and most of the Wikipedia:Long term abuse subpages are being deleted.

So, before Wikipedia:Long term abuse/Universe Daily gets deleted we need to figure out whether to shut down the linkspammer once and for all at the risk of forcing him to change tactics and risk making it harder for us to track him.

"Universe Daily" is an abusive SEO who is known to have posted redirect-spam links Wikipedia to 40 known domains of his in the past. For example, stephenhawkingsuniverse.com (whois) is one such domain which has been linked to at the Stephen Hawking article. His links aren't noticed for some time because they are actually an invisible frame redirecting vistors to an official site. In this example, stephenhawkingsuniverse.com was a redirect to Hawking's official documentary site at PBS. After having establishing an external link in any article for some time, "Universe Daily" would then either turn on his own ads in his domain's frame or redirect his domain to an ad/link farm as he did with universetoday.net at Universe Today (their official site is .com).

This spammer has continued doing this since May of this year and has been banned many times for using sockpuppet accounts and random IPs as well as the odd open proxy. There's also a debate as to whether we should blacklist all of his known domains. If we blacklist all his domains, we run the risk of him purchasing a whole new set of domains to start all over again and it may become even harder to pick up his trail again.

"Universe Daily" has also switched to a new tactic where he is directly redirecting his sites back to the revisions of the Wikipedia articles that he inserted his own domains into. Could it be possible to oversight every reversion of every article he's ever edited to sabotage whatever SEO technique he is trying to use?

I just don't know what the best course of action dealing with this spammer is anymore. Through my investigations, I have noticed that the Registrant's contact details are publicly available. Is there anyone from the Wikimedia Foundation has the official capacity to ask him to cease and desist from spamming Wikipedia? --  Netsnipe  ►  19:19, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

As an aside, and a significant one, this person left 469 hate mail messages in my e-mail box on Friday, two days ago. Four different messages, advertising an anti-semitic hate site he built himself, and bragging that his vandalized version of the Israel article could be found there. He must have spent a lot of time at his computer copying and pasting the hate-mail text into the little box and hitting "send". Unbelievable. (I deleted them all with about six mouse-clicks.)

He's not just a spammer: he's a fierce anti-Semite, and is the most hateful single person I've met in two and a half years of vandal-patrolling.

I know his real name, and he edits from a library terminal in Queensland, AU.

I think he needs to be shut down for good. No question about it. Antandrus (talk) 19:26, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

WP:DENY really only applies to people vandalizing Wikipedia. If someone is abusing Wikipedia for other reasons, in this case to make money, WP:DENY doesn't apply, because denying attention is irrelevant; he's not editing to get attention. However, it's probably a good idea to move it into private all the same; if we try to put together our defense against him in public where he can read it, he can easily stay one step ahead of it. --Cyde Weys 19:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Block his links, then he can't spam them. Agathoclea 19:37, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Has he been spamming lately? I knew all of his linkspam sites, and I kept that list private until he started putting his pages as framing to real websites. He sent me close to 2000 mailbombs from wikipedia email until I sat down and noticed it and put an autodelete filter on his emails. I know his real name too, including several details about his spamming activities that is not on the LTA page. That being said, the issue with the LTA page is WP:BEANS, where we don't want to help him improve his activities. However, the links almost look 'useful', because several of them are just framing to actual (and useufl) websites, but at any time they could go back to his phpbb fourms he's spammed so much. Kevin_b_er 19:41, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I'd be happy to place all the sites on the blacklist. You can either email me or leave a message on my meta user talk page. Naconkantari 21:08, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Naconkantari's option is the way to go. It's simply denying him what he wants. There is an issue here, however: the URLs we have for the foul-mouthed little mailbomber are all liable to change, so this isn't a permanent solution as we will have meta admins AGFing and not adding his filthly little sites to the list without many and several hoops being jumped through. And rightly so. But this is the way to go if we want to stop Wayne and his spamming activities on our side. On his side, we're going to need Oz Wikipedians to get in touch with his ISP if it can be found; Canadians to talk to Doteasy Technology, his registration agents, and the Foundation to talk to Google (his ultimate aim) about a hard blacklist.

The one thing Mr Smith should not expect is for Wikipedia admins to be put off by mailbombs and persistance. We've all had bigger things than him free with our breakfast cerials of a morning, and his death-threatening mailbombs are usefully futile, amusing... and slowing the idiot down. :o) ➨ ЯEDVERS 21:32, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I have added all of the links provided to me to the blacklist. Naconkantari 21:34, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

domians cost money. Shut them down fast enough and what he doing becomes finacialy unviable.Geni 23:26, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Naconkantari. Could you also add fuckisrael.org to the blacklist as well? I forgot to add that link to the LTA report, but seeing as it also belongs to him, we definitely don't need it on Wikipedia. --  Netsnipe  ►  00:47, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

User:Mauberley (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Disrupting Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Following Follows. Tracker/TTV (myTalk|myWork|myInbox) 21:37, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/His excellency

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

• His excellency is placed on personal attack parole, should he engage in personal attacks directed at individuals he may be briefly blocked, up to a week in the event of repeat offenses. Should he engage in attacks directed at ethnic groups such as "The Jews" or "The Kikes" he may be blocked for extended periods of time, up to a year.

• His excellency, having made one personal attack directed at "The Jews" and another directed at "those kikes" is banned for one month for the first offense and 3 months for the second offense, to run consecutively.

• His excellency has continued to make anti-Semitic attacks on other users [22] during this proceeding. An additional ban of 6 2 months is imposed to run consecutively with other bans.

• His excellency is placed on Probation for one year. He may be banned by any administrator from any page which he disrupts by edit warring, incivility, or other disruptive behavior. All bans are to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/His excellency#Log of blocks and bans.

• Timothy Usher is placed on Probation for one year. He may be banned by any administrator from any page which he disrupts by edit warring, incivility, or other disruptive behavior. All bans are to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/His excellency#Log of blocks and bans.

• Traditional Muslim usages such as "Salam, brother" or (PBUH) may be used on talk pages at the discretion of the user; however, care should be taken to not create a hostile atmosphere for non-Muslims.

• Violation of bans imposed under the terms of this decision may be enforced by blocks appropriate to the offense involved. All blocks and the basis therefore to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/His_excellency#Log_of_blocks_and_bans.

For the Arbitration Committee. FloNight 21:43, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Question: does that also apply to his second account, Amibidhrohi (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) ? If it does (I hope so) it should be blocked too... -- Grafikm ^(AutoGRAF) 22:09, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

All arbitration remedies apply to the person, in any guise, unless the remedy says otherwise. The remedy is intended to address the problematic behavior. --Tony Sidaway 22:15, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, thanks for the quick answer :) -- Grafikm ^(AutoGRAF) 22:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Everyking desysopped

Recently it was brought to the attention of the Arbitration Committee that administrator Everyking (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) has posted to an external site in the process of trying to determine the contents of inappropriate material, sensitive personal information, deleted from an article. Everyking looked up the deleted material using his administrator privileges, and offered to post the deleted content publicly. He stated:

I looked for you, but when you look at deleted revisions it doesn't show you the changes (or if so I don't know how to access them). I guess I could just post the full text and you could work out the differences yourself. [23]

It is already known that the user who posts at that forum under the name "everyking" is in fact Everyking because he has confirmed it in email to the Arbitration Committee previously. We view this as a serious misjudgment and a betrayal of the trust the community has given him in adminship. As such, Everyking has been immediately desysopped. Dmcdevit·t 23:43, 3 September 2006 (UTC) Fred Bauder 00:45, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

This is shocking and I call for it to be overturned. I didn't actually post anything (being worried that SlimVirgin might get pissed) and even if I did I don't see how it could be a betrayal of anything. Everyking 23:46, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Your cooperation with Wikipediareview is questionable enough. User:Zoe|(talk) 23:50, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

You may not like it that I post there, but since my speech is severely restricted on WP itself I choose to post my views there instead. It violates no policy to do so, and I don't believe it would have been in violation of any policy even if I had posted the text there. In any case I had not posted and about two or three days had passed in which I did not deliberately didn't follow up on it because I thought better of it. Everyking 23:54, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I was just thinking that, Zoe. Plus, there he had once advocated unblocking Amorrow. CanadianCaesar Et tu, Brute? 23:52, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't remember ever arguing for him to be unblocked on WP, and I certainly wouldn't want that now. Everyking 23:54, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I should think that advocating the unblocking of a user is not grounds for any sort of sanction, else we would have had to toss Danny out for advancing the notion that User:Mike Garcia could be reformed. Phil Sandifer 23:55, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Garcia was bad. Morrow is scary bad. --Golbez 00:02, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The point is moot because I do not think he should be allowed to edit. I'm well aware of his harassment of our female editors. I did argue he should be allowed to post his crap on WR, because I support the notion of it as a free speech forum, but that is not pertinent. Everyking 23:57, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

In this case he was cooperating with banned troll Wordbomb to uncover sensitive deleted information. Thatcher131 (talk) 23:57, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Tell me how. Everyking 23:57, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

The legal implications of allowing someone who is willing to post personal information removed from an article by an administrator access to sensitive deleted content should be clear. You made it clear that your continued adminship was a liability to the project. Dmcdevit·t 23:59, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

What the? Personal information? I didn't even know what the content was. I still don't know. I sure as hell would never post anybody's personal information. Everyking 00:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Is it clear that EK recognized what the nature of the deleted content was? Or are we now adopting a policy against posting delete pages, period? Phil Sandifer 00:02, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

There is a reason personal information is removed and viewing of it is blocked. Legal reasons. Everyking clearly attempted to get around those reasons. User:Zoe|(talk) 00:04, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I explicitly did not know and made that clear in my comment (I stated that I couldn't determine the differences in the revisions). Now I gather that it was personal information, and I take offense at the notion that I would be willing to post that. Nothing in the thread was there to tell me it was personal information. Everyking 00:05, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I would be inclined to agree with Everyking. This seems to me to be a startling failure of WP:AGF. RyanGerbil10(Kick 'em in the dishpan!) 00:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I will say, given the clearly stated suspicion on the page that the subject was a Wikipedia editor, some more care might have been in order. But honestly, I'm skeptical that this is in and of itself grounds for an emergency desysopping. It seems more like a case of the arbcom seeing an opportunity to justify a penalty they've wanted to put out for quite a while. (After all, Everyking's willingness to support real life harassment of users should hardly be news to anyone who has followed my own case.) Phil Sandifer 00:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

That Everyking was willing to "post the full text" of a deleted page without knowing why it was deleted or what it contained is somewhat worrisome. Prodego ^talk 00:11, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

But did not actually post anything. This is a critical point. What I read there gave me the impression the admin action was done wrongfully, and I was at first willing to help out, assuming that to do so would be OK with policy, but then decided not to because I was worried there could nevertheless be ramifications (as there were anyway, obviously). Everyking 00:14, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Have you said anywhere you wouldn't post the content of deleted pages ever? Or apologized for saying you were willing to do so? That would certainly be a start, but without any assurance from you that you won't ever do this, your desysopping should stand as you are a liability. pschemp | talk 00:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

No, I didn't know there was anything wrong with doing so. But given the trouble it has apparently caused, I will make that assurance now. Everyking 00:22, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Could you please directly address pschemp's questions? She did not ask if you knew there was anything wrong, and your assurance is in response to a sentence. I'm not picking hairs here, please answer the questions. Teke ^(talk) 00:31, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

This is outrageous. Retrieving/posting deleted material is a basic right under the GFDL (but one that should not be exercised if the material was deleted for legal reasons or contains sensitive detail, of course.) When are people going to understand that Wikipedia does not own content? It's not OK to copy something I (for example) write into other Wikipedia articles just because I posted it here, without giving me attribution. It's not OK to accept my (for example) contributions under the GFDL then delete them and deny the Commons access to them. What if another site wants to publish it? What right have we got to deny the use of GFDL material to anybody? Absolutely none. I am genuinely shocked and outraged at the suggestion that Wikipedia has any right whatsover to material posted here above and beyond the rights assigned to it under the GFDL. --kingboyk 13:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Indeed - Wikipedia would be hard pressed to persue legal action against someone who posted deleted page content. Hence the lack of takedown effort on Wikitruth. However, the GFDL does not constitute an obligation to make content available, and the GFDL offers no protection outside of legal protection - whether someone is an admin on a website is wholly outside its purview. Phil Sandifer 13:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The answer to both of the questions is no. However, I assure everyone that I will never again offer to post the content of a deleted page anywhere (much less actually do so), no matter what the content. Everyking 00:34, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I guess the basic lesson to come away with from this is don't get too cozy with banned trolls anywhere. --Cyde Weys 00:21, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

This was a gross and obvious violation of Administrator trust. Let us all remember that we have the power to do great harm, and we must resist the temptation to do so at all times. Private information is not ours to disclose; we only have administrator powers for one purpose: to improve Wikipedia. We cannot usually do that by publicly compromising private information. --Tony Sidaway 00:40, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Many administrators including, if I'm not mistaken, you at some point, Tony, have offered to post the content of deleted pages to those interested under certain conditions. Everyking made an offer to post the content of a certain deleted page and then thought better of it. Haukur 09:25, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I did not disclose anything. How is it a violation of trust? Everyking 00:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

You offered to do so. That you didn't follow through is beside the point: you made the offer. --Calton | Talk 01:04, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

What does the offer matter compared to the act? Isn't the question whether the material is made available? And it was not made available, because I decided not to make it available. And furthermore, the offer is merely a helpful gesture. I thought going through with it might anger SlimVirgin but never imagined that it could get me desysopped, because I never imagined it was a violation of anything. As it turns out, I didn't do it and still got desysopped. Everyking 01:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The disturbing thing is this, as said by you "I didn't know there was anything wrong with doing so." If you weren't capable of understanding that revealing deleted personal information was wrong at the time you made the offer, then you shouldn't be trusted with such information. It shouldn't take a desysopping to make you understand what was morally wrong with that offer. pschemp | talk 01:27, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

You're missing a key detail: I didn't know it was personal information. I would never have made the offer if I had known that. I take a very strong stand against compromising personal information. Everyking 01:28, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

If that's the case, you're also a liar. We know from long experience what your attitude is to "compromising personal information". Rebecca 01:57, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

With such long experience, you should be able to recall a few examples to support this claim against my integrity. Everyking 01:58, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I could post that charming email you sent me after the WR folks started stalking me, or the congratulatory post you made to WR about Kelly Martin after the same, or...shall I go on? Rebecca 02:06, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to see that e-mail, actually... Phil Sandifer 13:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

You offered to post deleted content without even knowing what it was? That's even worse.pschemp | talk 01:38, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, if you read what I wrote originally on the board this would be obvious. I clearly stated that I did not know what the content of the deleted edit was, and I was offering to post the full text so others could figure out what it was. And when we are talking about what is better and what is worse, we should be mindful that I decided not to do anything at all. Everyking 01:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I did read it. Nowhere there did you say you weren't going to do it. pschemp | talk 01:44, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

You're missing a key detail No, you're obscuring the key detail, given that the subject is your powers of judgment -- or lack thereof: you offered, without investigation, understanding, or thought of the consequences and/or liability -- to reveal something which had been deleted. Your lack of judgment being in question on the issue of whether you should be allowed to have powers that can be abused, it's perfectly relevant to discuss the things you say you're going to do, not just those which you succeed in carrying out. --Calton | Talk 01:45, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Nice rhetorical twist there: "succeed in carrying out". What do you suppose kept me from succeeding in this diabolical mission, so that several days passed in which I posted no deleted content, until this desysopping hit me like a bolt from the blue? Everyking 01:50, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Rhetorical twist? No, a reality check. And given your history of nitpicking wikilawyering, to accuse someone else of twisting words is a bit rich. Project much? --Calton | Talk 02:16, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Come on, man, tell me why I didn't "succeed in carrying it out". Everyking 02:18, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I suggest everyone abstain from replying for now, since this discussion is rapidly deteriorating. Prodego ^talk 02:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Prodego. Nothing is to be settled here, at least until the emails and other communications stop flying. This was a notice; while commentation is encouraged I think Everyking and all the other users need to walk away for a day. Teke ^(talk) 02:48, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

No, I didn't say that, I just abstained from replying to the thread any further. Everyking 01:50, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Regardless of the situation at hand, I do want to remind everyone that deleted content - especially deleted revisions of an article - are deleted for a reason, and that special concern needs to be taken when viewing and discussing the material. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 00:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Special concern, yes, but withholding GFDL text from the commons if it doesn't contain sensitive info, absolutely not. If Everyking didn't post such info I don't see what the problem is. Furthermore, am I to remove {{user recovery}} from my user page?! --kingboyk 13:05, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Special concern, definitely. But I do want to point out - again, disregarding the situation at hand - that Wikipedia policy is sometimes more restrictive than outside law. In other words, even though something may be legal, it may be prohibited under Wikipedia policy. However, I do reiterate that I'm not commenting on the situation at hand. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 16:21, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

bainer's reply to thread

I ought to mention that I also responded to that thread, having checked the contents of the deleted revision. I made this reply, saying that the revision was deleted because it contained "what appears to be personally identifiable information". I did not say what that information was. My intent was to establish that the revision was properly deleted, and to defend the admin in question.

On one or two other occasions in the past I have responded to posts on Wikipedia Review, having checked deleted revisions, with the intention of defending other admins' actions. I have not actually publicly disclosed the contents of any deleted revisions. I ask the community to advise whether these actions were acceptable. --bainer (talk) 00:37, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I think you should definitely discontinue that practice, though I don't think any action should be taken against you in the circumstances, since you were apparently motivated by loyalty to WP and your colleagues. I can't say the same for Everyking. We have every reason to lose confidence in an admin who would even contemplate posting deleted information on another site. It's not a matter of whether there's a specific policy against it; it should go without saying - a matter of basic common sense and team loyalty. Everyking is entitled to have certain ideals of free speech, or whatever they are, but if he is at all inclined to pursue them to assist Wikipedia Review then the honourable course for him is to avoid any conflict of interest between his ideals and his corporate loyalties. The way to do that would have been by voluntary relinquishment of his admin powers. This desysopping should not even have been needed. Metamagician3000 01:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I would have made the offer just the same on WP itself if the question had come up and nobody else addressed it. There is no "conflict of interest". Everyking 01:24, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Just a note: The signpost will be covering this this week so some names maybe mentioned in the article. ForestH2 t/c 01:39, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

In this case, I would like to read the article before it is published to ensure that nothing inaccurate is said about me. Everyking 01:44, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Sure. I'll show you the article when it is done. ForestH2 t/c 01:45, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Discontinue the practice? Defending admins on Wikipedia Review, while probably futile, is hardly harmful; if Bainer finds this a useful pursuit, why shouldn't he keep it up? — Dan | talk 02:38, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree while I would urge Bainer to excercise caution letting them know why something was deleted might help matters. JoshuaZ 16:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

... Checking in both the user rights and a log search shows that Everyking still retains his sysop powers. Anomo 02:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't. My rollback, delete and protect buttons are gone. Everyking 02:02, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Did you check the meta rights log? Desysoppings show up there, not on the local wiki. --Cyde Weys 02:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I checked the user list and it doesn't show sysop anymore. Anomo 02:03, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I would suggest that nobody get involved with Wikipedia Review in any capacity. It's not even worth it to show up there to try to defend yourself or other Wikipedians. Just ignore them. --Cyde Weys 02:08, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

As a personal matter I agree because frankly most of the people there are trolls or worse, but if a user or an admin wishes to slum, we shouldn't stop them (I am strongly not endorsing Everyking here. To even think about posting deleted material without talking to the admin who removed it is appalling. To do so for known trolls and banned users is unacceptable). JoshuaZ 16:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

It is a good place to talk about Wikipedia freely if you aren't allowed to do so on-wiki, as in my case. The downside, obviously, is that certain people monitor your every word and look for something to use against you. Everyking 02:10, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately your action — that is your words — have lost the trust that is necessary for working together, not to mention showing a lack of awareness of possible consequences. If there is a fault with wikipedia, and you can't talk about things that are necessary to talk about, then that should be addressed here, to improve the project. I think you're going to have to build up trust again. Tyrenius 02:18, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Almost every administrator who is outspoken or active in any way has lost the trust of a substantial portion of the community. My biggest offense was to offer to do something in ignorance, never mind my decision to not actually do it. Everyking 02:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

See, if you are that ignorant, you shouldn't be a sysop anyway, however I'm not really buying the ignorance defense. pschemp | talk 02:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Two and a half years and I seem to have done OK with sysop tools. When the worst thing a person can come up with is that you offered to do something that you in fact refrained from doing, it's almost a compliment. Everyking 02:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Dude we rely on admins being ignorant to get through the day. Aside form that admins are ignorant of all sorts of things. Copyright law. How to do range blocks how to use the whitelist. The fact there is a whitelist. How to close an AFD. What the exact CSD criteria are (they keep changeing for some reason). No admin knows everthing thing.Geni 02:36, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

If this was a reply to pschemp, pschemp's not a dude :) Anyways, admins are supposed to be rational in every decision they make. I don't really have a stance towards either side, but considering EveryKing has a prior history of blocks, I didn't surprise me that he was desysopped for something like this. How to close an AFD is one of the most basic admin activites. If an admin candidate doesn't know how to do that, I would be surprised if the RFA passed. Admins don't know how to do everything perfectly, but they should have a general idea of what to do in a situation. — The Future 03:05, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I reserve the right to call anyone dude. In case you forget AFD in it's current form didn't exists when many of us were promoted.Geni 10:28, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Bottom line: don't try to hunt with the hounds and run with the hare. Metamagician3000 03:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. The defense that an action was performed in ignorance is hard to take seriously. Everyking was certainly not in ignorance of the fact that he was taking that action apparently on behalf of a community riddled with disruptive, destructive elements. It's impossible to believe that an individual of good judgment would blithely assume all was well with the request, considering the venue. Christopher Parham (talk) 04:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The people at thge other end could have had no idea what the deleted material was.If it was harmless then there was no need to allow uncertianly that could be used in attacks to continue

I think wikipedia review isn't a good place to criticize wikipedia. There's criticizing to improve and just being anti-wikipedia and wikipedia review is sort of the later. They are really picky on registration and it seems they only allow in vandals and those that they want to corrupt (like wikipedia admins). I don't think it's wrong to complain about wikipedia, it's like complaining about your tap water quality or TV programming... you sort of need it, but you can always want it to be better. Maybe someone can host a wikipedia criticism forum that is more inline with wanting to help wikipedia. I don't want to, though. For those who do, there's lots of free forums like network54 and stuff. Anomo 06:06, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Right, well, when you have the arbs putting ten draconian restrictions on what you can say, you tend to relish the opportunity to talk about WP freely, even if you do have to do so among a bunch of people who are broadly anti-Wikipedia. Everyking 06:26, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps if you didn't have such a long history of bullying and personal abuse you wouldn't need the only wiki-restraining-order in the project's history to keep you from doing it. Rebecca 07:12, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Rebecca, I'm glad Everyking is desysopped. He seemed to be the worst POV-pusher around at Ashlee Simpson. I think he should be blocked for 1 year, in addition to his desysopping, as is the norm with such ArbCom block decisions. He's not the first - remember Karmafist (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) - now blocked indefinitely, but still sockpuppetteering. No doubt Everyking will do that here, and we'll have to use ((some template)) to list his sockpuppets. --Langwath 09:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I've never even seen your user name before. Everyking 09:42, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I have a suspicion the Langwath is a troll user. Anyone object to blocking Langwath? Sjakkalle (Check!) 10:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Please go right ahead. A genuine newcomer doesn't jump straight into things like this. AnnH ♫ 10:15, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Um, well, I would kinda prefer it if he got a warning first. His talk page is still a red link. Everyking 10:24, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Blocked. Appreciate your openness Everyking, but I don't think that this is a good faith contributor. Starting off by making a taunt against you at such a sensitive time is highly inappropriate and removes any vestige of assumption of good faith I might have against Pelican Shit. Sjakkalle (Check!) 10:27, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Langweth is unblocked after posting an apology here, but please keep an eye out for him. Sjakkalle (Check!) 10:36, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

This is ludicrous. I can see no point to engaging with Wikipedia Review. But there is no reason whatsoever to desysop people on this basis. There is no claim that any confidential, harmful or even just plain deleted information was disclosed. Whatever people might think of Everyking overall is irrelevant to this case. I strongly urge ArbCom to open a case on this and give the matter full consideration instead of what looks like a knee-jerk reaction. The Land 11:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Bearing in mind that two ArbCom members are the ones who pushed forth the desysopping, an ArbCom case would be fairly pointless at this point except to satisfy process. Most probably Fred Bauder and Dmcdevit consulted with other ArbCom members secretly and obtained their approval. Captainktainer * Talk 12:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Doubtful not if they were acting at that speed. 2 arbcom members is less than 20% of the Committee.Geni 12:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Even ArbCom members might benefit from a few days' reflection on the matter. The Land 12:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with The Land on this issue. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:54, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I support this action, and gave my support in private before the action was taken. Sam Korn ^(smoddy) 17:16, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

We're into denying admins the right to freedom of speech now too are we? This is getting beyond a joke. --kingboyk 13:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

What makes you think we ever had freedom of speech here? We routinely block users for harrassing and personally attacking other users. Free speech is a government censorship issue. Here on Wikipedia we do what is necessary to foster a productive editing environment, and someone trying to push the limits of "free speech" is liable to get blocked. And frankly, offering to abuse admin tools to aid a banned user is a lot worse than just a "fuck you" anyway. --Cyde Weys 16:45, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. This is the first time I have ever said this about the community here- I am disgusted. RyanGerbil10(Kick 'em in the dishpan!) 13:53, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I think the desysopping was an overreaction. What Everyking said was "I guess I could etc." and then, upon further consideration, he didn't. Haukur 13:57, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The reason why Everyking didn't do it wasn't because he had reflected and decided not to, it was because he couldn't get to the material that he wanted to provide to WR. User:Zoe|(talk) 17:43, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't even understand your accusation. Why couldn't I "get to the material"? Everyking 17:47, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Implications

Hummm, after reading this, I wonder what the long ranging implications of this will be, aside from the stern warning to the community in general. One important issue is that it is all a matter of timing. The information was available for some time, and in that time, it could have been cached by a webcrawler (google, answers, whatever), and be available permanetly outside Wikipedia. Or it could have been stored by a visitor and made publicly available (all allowed under GFDL). The conflict here is between the openness at one hand (everybody can at a specific time get all available information and store it off-wiki, regardless of libel, Copyvio, personal information etc), while at the otherhand desysopping for just offering to do the exact same thing. For me at the moment, that does not compute, and I would like to have some input on this from others on the timing aspect before making up my mind on whether the desysopping was good or not. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 15:12, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Maybe I have to set the question somewhat more pointed: If I had stored the information in question on my harddisk between being posted and being deleted and would now make it available externally, it would be ok under GFDL and I would not lose my sysop powers, while if I would use my sysop powers to retrieve the deleted version and make it available, I immediatly would lose my sysop powers? -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 15:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Kim van der Linde, it is a matter of User:Everyking offering to use his admin tools to assist a banned user to gain access to information. Copyright status of the material is not the issue. FloNight 15:47, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

And since when has that been an offence, and an offence punishable by summary desysopping? --kingboyk 15:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Since when has it been an offense to assist a banned user with the use of administrative tools? Since when has murder been illegal? --Cyde Weys 16:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

depending on the legal system that is quite a complicated question. While you are deciding which legal system you mean you might want to consider why comparing everykings actions to murder is not an entirely logical course.Geni 17:48, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Ok, so the criteria is the usage of the admin tools. So, if this information is available, it is ok to post that somewhere else under the condition that it is not retrieved using admin tools. Good to know. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 15:58, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Appears to me that Everyking was acting as a surrogate for banned user User:WordBomb. My dealings with WordBomb make me think that EK's actions need a full arbitration case. EK willingness to assist a banned user in general, and WordBomb in particular, needs to be addressed. Knowing what I know about WordBomb, this is broader in scope than EK's use of his admin tools. FloNight 16:13, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I am not familiar with the case in sufficient detail have an opinion about that. I am more interested in the implications, and especially when information added to wikipedia is under GFDL, and when the same information is not. Because what happens here is that information can be at the same time under GFDL and not, depending on how it was retrieved. That is a legal impossibility. Either it is under GFDL, or it is not. If it is under GFDL, I would think that people can actually request or sue the foundation for it if they want to have it, while we at the same time desysop people for doing the same thing. That just confuses me. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 16:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Nobody can require the foundation to provide any piece of information simply because it was edited into Wikipedia. The foundation can hardly be required to publish or distribute information to which it does not even hold the copyright simply because another individual has released it under the GFDL. (This ignores the fact that much personal information is not subject to copyright, and that therefore the GFDL has no bearing on its publication.) The Foundation would certainly exercise judgment in releasing deleted revisions. Everyking lost his sysop bit precisely because he appeared uninterested in demonstrating such judgment. Christopher Parham (talk) 17:22, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like few, if any, are sad to see Everyking lose the sysop tools. But, the excuse used for removing them was fairly sad. Maybe a generic "exhausting of ArbCom's patience" type reason should be used in cases like these. Friday (talk) 16:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Where is all this discussion heading? Everyking was emergency desysopped apparently because of a sworn desire to make deleted content available to non-admins. Whilst this is occasionally appropriate, it is most definitely not appropriate to post it to Wikipedia Review. However, Everyking has made clear above that he has no intention to make such content available to non-admins, and unless we doubt his word, why does he not have his sysop bit back? Emergency desysoppings are not permanent unless they get ratified by the ArbCom or under WP:OFFICE, as far as I understand it. - Mark 17:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I just want to point out that I had no "sworn desire", otherwise I would have posted it instead of choosing not to. Everyking 17:08, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Were you planning on posting the entire GFDL wording, as is required by GFDL, when you posted the deleted information on Wikipedia Review? Or did you not care about the copyright status of the information? User:Zoe|(talk) 17:46, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I wasn't planning on doing anything, as you can see by the fact that I posted nothing. Everyking 17:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Presumably because the circumstances of the incident have brought his judgement into question to such an extent that the ArbCom feels his retaining the bit would be a liability to the project? I doubt this can be boiled down to a simple question of promising not to do someting in particular (e.g. not make deleted content available to non-admins); the broader issue is whether someone who considers—even fleetingly—using his sysop tools to help the nice folks at WR can be trusted with access to them. Kirill Lokshin 17:47, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I frequently use my admin tools to help people.Geni 17:50, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Why were assisting an user banned from Wikipedia? WordBomb is not welcome on this site for a very good reason. You should assume good faith towards the admins that blocked WordBomb. WordBomb has openly expressed contempt for Wikipedia. There is no valid reason for your actions. Period. FloNight 17:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I didn't assist him; how could what I wrote have assisted him? And I don't determine whether I assume good faith just based on whether someone is an admin or is banned; I assume good faith at the outset as a general principle and withdraw the assumption if I see good reason to. Everyking 17:57, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Acting as a surrogate for WordBomb by looking at deleted information shows no respect for Wikipedia users and admins that are being harassed by WordBomb and sock/meatpuppets on an ongoing basis . FloNight 18:17, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

This would be more meaningful if WordBomb had gained something from it. All he got was me saying I looked at it and couldn't determine anything about it. Everyking 18:24, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

And it didn't occur to you to talk to the blocking admins at all? Do you realize what a lapse in judgement that is? You seem to be saying that you knew that the user had been indefinitely blocked by community consensus and you still assumed good faith without asking the other admins for any input? What about that doesn't strike you as wrong? JoshuaZ 18:15, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I know that user is blocked, but not how that came to be. I guess I would have said something to SV about it if I was going to actually post it, considering my concern about her reaction was significant enough that I decided not to continue with the matter at all. At the time, however, my assumption was that the content had just been deleted as part of some crackdown against an individual, so I was less concerned; had I known the information was sensitive I would never have even suggested the possibility that I might post it. Everyking 18:22, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

sensitive information? Haven't been able to find any in there yet.Geni 18:24, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

People here tell me there's sensitive personal info in there, but I still have no idea what it is; I'm just assuming they are correct about that. Everyking 18:28, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree with Everyking on this matter. He should not have been punished just because he intended to give out confidential information, which he never actually did. --Ixfd64 18:44, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Even "intended" is too strong; I put the offer on the table, thought about it, decided not to. Everyking 18:46, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

While I'm sure we're all glad that in the end Everyking decided to not start posting said information on WR, that fact that it was ever an option is disturbing. Admins are supposed to be trustworthy. If I started muttering on WR about providing the IP addresses of fellow sysops, I suspect I'd find myself desysoped, uncheckusered, and at the wrong end of an IP block for the forseeable future–and rightly so. From his recent post above, Everyking is displaying at best questionable judgement. You'd been a sysop for a long time–longer than I have. Why did you even have to think about it? Mackensen (talk) 18:50, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

certianly. Because checkuser was provided on the understanding that you would never give out IPs. Admins frequently provide information about deleted articles.Geni 20:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

They do? to blocked users? Show me where. pschemp | talk 20:36, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

A couple of hours ago someone on IRC asked me to post the text of a page deleted by Dmcdevit. I did. For all I know the person I was talking to is a banned user on enwiki (though I think that's quite unlikely). This happens all the time. As long as the content is harmless it's fine. Everyking was in a dodgy forum and he implied he might post the contents of a page without reviewing it carefully first. That was a mistake. Then he decided not to do it and let the matter drop. That was the right call. Haukur 22:13, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Without knowing that the content was sensitive, it seemed just like any case of making the contents of a deleted page available to an interested party, and I'm not aware that's considered a problem. I thought people did that all the time. Everyking 21:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

This reminds of a suggestion I brouhgt up a while ago- to have an open log of what admins accessed what deleted pages when. It might help deal with this sort of situation somewhat. JoshuaZ 20:50, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

How could this have prevented anything? We'd find out that Everyking looked at the deleted content, a fact we already know. --Conti|✉ 20:56, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be useful to not hide non-sensitive deleted articles from non-administrators. Deleting articles because they don't fit editorially should be factored from deleting articles or revisions that have personal information etc. Almost all articles deleted via prod or AFD could be viewable by anyone. Then it would make sense to log viewing articles that truely need to be hidden. —Quarl ^(talk) 2006-09-04 21:17Z

Also stewards can truly delete sensitive edits now, of course. The problem I imagine is that many of those still remain unnoticed in the deleted articles tables. I wonder how many deleted articles we actually have?! --kingboyk 21:20, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

If we make deleted articles generally visible unless specifically set otherwise, we're going to have to use that setting a lot. Huge chunks of our material is deleted because it's a copyright violation, and allowing that to be publicly visible defeats the entire point of deleting it, which is no longer to publish the material... Shimgray | talk | 21:20, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I believe it is fine for admins to give out a deleted article if it's been AFD'd as non-notable. Right? Even though in the instance where SlimVirgin deleted specific revisions those should have been kept secret. Right? Anomo 23:00, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Yup, it was clear that Slim Virgin had her reasons for deleting a quite specific revision. It was also clear that digging around to try to discover the content of that revision for the purpose of making it available to a banned user with an evident grudge against Wikipedia was something that a good colleague on the admin team would never even have thought of doing. When Everyking says he never actually did it, that's a relief. But he's still questioning (as of yesterday) whether there would have been anything wrong with it if he'd gone ahead. I can't trust him with the admin tools in those circumstances, no matter how good an editor he is otherwise. This is definitely not like userfying an article that was deleted because it was on a non-notable topic or userfying a userbox that did not belong in template space but had no particular tendency to disrupt the project or bring it into disrepute. We are expected to have good enough judgment to make such distinctions. Metamagician3000 00:46, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Specific reason? The only thing I could find was stuff about a case settled out of court.Geni 00:51, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Legal threats, I really need help

Please, I can't deal with this; I'm not a lawyer and I can't really understand much of what this user is writing. The user has left me a variety of messages which I have moved to User talk:Mets501/Hans Henning Atrott for convience, and has threatened to bring in a lawyer. I do not want to anything wrong, so I don't really want to act. The only thing I have said to this user is remind him that by submitting any information to the English Language Wikipedia, he is publishing it under the GNU Free Documentation license (GFDL), and that cannot be "withdrawn", as the user wanted to call it. Thanks in advance for anyone's help. —Mets501 (talk) 02:26, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Legal threats = not appriciated. First admin to see this, I would block the person making legal threats for a little while. — The Future 02:29, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

kick it upstairs. Legal threats are mostly for the foundation to deal with.Geni 02:31, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

User is currently blocked due to sperate issues.Geni 02:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Which user? I noticed a User:Merryhobby mentioned something about a lawyer on Mets' talk page, and he is not blocked. CanadianCaesar Et tu, Brute? 02:34, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

yea, I think the one who was talking about this whole legal thing was User:Merryhobby. I would suggest a temporary block on Merryhobby, FWIW. — The Future 02:35, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Ah I was talking about user:172.176.81.14.Geni 02:38, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

By the diffs provided in the history of Mets501's talk page, Merryhobby was the one who posted the things found on User talk:Mets501/Hans Henning Atrott. — The Future 02:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Merryhobby made the legal threats, but User:Joerg Atrott (his son) also wrote on the talk page, but not with legal threats, as did 172.180.82.139. —Mets501 (talk) 02:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Per previous incidents, I've deleted most of it which was unreferenced (apart from a couple of points referenced only in German) and reduced it to an acceptable stub, so that solves the immediate problem. Anyone making legal threats gets to be blocked indefinitely, till they withdraw them, as we can't function with another editor in those circumstances. You might like to warn the complainant of that. The article will need to be built up carefully and closely referenced. Tyrenius 02:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Does a representative of WP:OFFICE monitor this page? If not, someone should bring this thread to their attention quickly. Newyorkbrad 02:56, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

No need. There's nothing (as far as I know) contentious left in the article. Besides, the preferred option is that problems are tackled by editors/admins. Tyrenius 03:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Copied from my talk page: Since Mets501 said that Merryhobby was the one who made the legal threats, and you said that anyone who makes legal threats should be blocked, could/should you block Merryhobby? — The Future 02:57, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

If the user is making legal threats they should be blocked from editing immediately. However, I suggest that as they are in the sensitive position of complaining about BLP, it might be politic in the first instance to explain the article has been amended, and ask them if they withdraw any legal threat, or else we will be forced to block them. Perhaps Mets501 could have a go there. Tyrenius 03:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

That would certainly be the appropriate reaction to an off-hand probably-not-meant-seriously legal threat, but this does not fall into that category. It's a serious situation that needs to be dealt with by very senior admins or by the office. Tyrenius, you have mail. Newyorkbrad 03:14, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I've just dealt with something similar in another very serious situation. The preferred route is to deal with it ourselves. However, feel free to contact anyone you think should be contacted. No mail has arrived. Tyrenius 03:27, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Mail just sent. I'm not an admin, so give my thoughts whatever value you think they deserve. Newyorkbrad 03:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Got it. I'll reply. Meanwhile I've left the message for the user and given them the options, so no problem. Tyrenius 03:35, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Article and talk page histories deleted to remove any and all possible defamation. Tyrenius 04:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Proxy problems

Okay, I'm not technical, so bear with me: Keybounce, a legitimate user, has been autoblocked through a proxy-IP problem, or summin' like that. Anywho, he can't contact either administrator who wrote the program that blocked him, so I'm trying to help out. I've left a message on one of the admin's pages, but he and the other have not been editing lately. Help? --172.193.194.250 02:52, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Advice to Tor users in China —Mets501 (talk) 03:37, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Single purpose account

DrGladwin (talk · contribs) is a single-purpose account whose main function on Wikipedia is to whitewash the unaccredited University of Health Sciences Antigua (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). DrGladwin refuses mediation: Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/UHSA. Per the emerging consensus in ArbCom, as expressed in the substantially similar case of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/St Christopher/Proposed decision (SPAs editing an unaccredited medical school in order to obscure problematic status)), single purpose accounts may be restricted from editing articles where they have a material interest. I therefore propose a community ban on DrGladwin from directly editing this article, the List of unaccredited institutions of higher learning and related pages, ban to be enforceable by blocking if necessary. Just zis Guy you know? 09:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Unnecessary. My main purpose was to prevent Robo doc and Azskeptic from spamming the article with foreign links with disregard to the overall structure of the article. Since they both are gone, I have no problem now. --DrGladwin 12:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

So you say. However, by all appearances and judging from your contributions history your actual purpose appears to be to prevent them highlighting the problematic status of the school with which you are associated (e.g. [24]). Guy 12:34, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not preventing anyone from doing anything. See the medical school entry now. I totally agree with what everyone has posted especially you and Leuko and a few others. There is a proper way of posting things and you should have seen what Robo doc did to the article - he started the good ol foreign medical school defaming here (using words like "fake medical school" "nigerian fraud" without citations) then completely changed the formatting! If you really think what Robo doc did is ok, then go ahead, block me. By the way, beginning next week, I'm no longer associated with the school so I will no longer post in that area; (I got accepted elsewhere). --DrGladwin 15:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The Dr. has been adding criticism at the Quackwatch article. When it was specificed who these people are, and what their businesses are an anon. removed it.[25] Arbusto 21:24, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

N.B., the user in question has made at least one legal threat: [26]. A.J.A. 22:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Role accounts are not permitted

Please see this new policy proposal, feel free to edit it further... I've just started it. --Langwath 09:37, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

already covered by WP:SOCK.Geni 10:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Isn't User:Langwath himself also "already covered by WP:SOCK"? Obvious trolling-only account. Fut.Perf. ☼ 11:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I am inclined to believe so. I blocked the account indefinitely, but since he apologized, I have unblocked the account. But please keep an eye on. Sjakkalle (Check!) 11:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I nuked the article as WP:POINT, an attack on named users and redundant anyway. Guy 12:30, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Since the user's indefinite block has been undone, I've restored his userpage, which I'd deleted. We'll see how this goes. Metamagician3000 12:36, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

And as always, the user campaigning to get himself unblocked to do "good contributions" has yet to do any. Such is normal it seems. Oh yes. --Lord Deskana (talk) 21:21, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Libellous remark

Sorry if this is the wrong forum - I am very new to Wikipedia. The comment within the second paragraph of the Carreer section of the article on Kate Garraway is surely libelous - could somebody remove it?

AMPY 16:15, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes. Removed. Welcome. Haukur 16:28, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

And in the future, if you see something like that, you can remove it yourself. You won't get in trouble. ;) --Mr. Lefty _{Talk to me!} 00:09, 5 September 2006 (UTC)