User:Fvw/TalkArchive/7

Welcome to my talk page. If you want to leave criticism or question my judgement, that's fine, communication is important. If you want to have a chat, point out good or funny articles or leave suggestions or compliments, that's even better. If you want to list this page on VfD, it was funny the first five times, let's give it a rest now, ok? Please add new comment threads at the bottom of the page in a new section (click here). I'll reply on your talk page, copying what was said to keep things clear. Please sign your comments.

Archived talk pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6

Block

Thank you, Fwv. SlimVirgin 07:04, Jan 24, 2005 (UTC)

Hi Fvw, do you need the blocking information to stay on my Talk page, as I was going to archive it? Let me know if you have a preference. Best, SlimVirgin 08:02, Jan 24, 2005 (UTC)

Open proxies

Frank, I fully agree that open proxies should be blocked—permanently, too. But I am not quite sure that a bot is the right way to go. It seems to me that checking for open proxies can be done completely offline. (In fact, why check at all? Why not just assume that the list at e.g. [1] indeed does list open proxies, and just block all the listed IPs without double-checking?) Then just generate a list of the appropriate SQL statements, and have a developer run them. (I assume that blocks are stored in the DB somewhere.) Seems much simpler to me, especially because running the SQL on-site will produce less load on the servers, consumes no network bandwidth, and avoids the precedent of having a bot with admin privileges (which seems to bother at least one person). Did you talk to the developers, e.g. Tim Starling? Finally: make sure your bot unblocks IPs before blocking them as open proxies to ensure that prior short-term blocks get indeed overridden. Lupo 07:20, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Importance of Anonymity

To Frank and others: I understand the frustration with vandalism performed via anonymous proxies. While the initial reaction to block all open proxies seems like a good idea I think the ramifications of this decision should be explored.

There is strong historical precedent for supporting anonymous communications, be it whistleblowing or controversial topics to a desire to make a claim or position without influencing perception given personal reputation.

The suggestion to require a user account for anonymous editing was not deemed suitable due to the ease of creating new accounts as the abused ones are terminated. Perhaps there is a middle ground?

Some suggestions that come to mind:

- A user who creates an anonymous account will have all edits directed to a moderation queue. If the edits are deemed productive and useful they can be accepted.

- An anonymous user with a good history of useful edits might be granted direct access to avoid the delays associated with a moderation queue.

Again, I want to impress upon those involved that while anonymity can (and will be) abused there are times when it becomes critical to the discussions at hand. The state of affairs in China and other repressed nations as well as increasingly intrusive legislation here in the United States (PATRIOT act monitoring of web activities without a warrant for example) is a strong reminder of the importance of anonymity for controversial and important topics.

Please try to consider any workable solution that will serve both the interests of Wikipedia and anonymous users.

Thank you,

   Martin Peck

There are a lot of technical solutions possible for the anonymous editing problem, and if you want to code them, it'd be much appreciated. However, until we have those solutions, blocking anonymous proxies is a necessity. Keep in mind however that a single group of users being blocked from wikipedia is losing out on the labour of that group of people, but those edits can always (theoretically) be done by others. First-hand experiences and other information "that's need to be brought out in the open" shouldn't be put on wikipedia and will be removed anyway, wikipedia is not intended for original research and other unverifiable information. --fvw* 13:15, 2005 Jan 24 (UTC)

Sounds like a plan. Regarding the original research / unverifiable information this is probably of little use as you indicate. The corporate employee or expert desiring anonymity is probably more applicable (Unlimited Freedom blog my favorite example). I'll start looking at the Wikipedia sources to see if I might be able to accomplish this. Are there others already involved in this project working on similar / related features? I'll move remaining discussion to a devel list or appropriate forum. Thanks again.

advice on error

Thanks for that, I'm feeling at bit slack at the moment, I've been up all night Richard Harvey 14:46, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for reversion...

...on my home page. Paul Beardsell 20:05, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Sandbox

Are you blind!? Its there-check my last post.

Arbitration Committee case opening

You have been named as a disputant in the recently opened Charles Darwin/Lincoln dispute case brought before the Arbitration Committee. You may wish to add evidence to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Charles Darwin/Lincoln dispute/Evidence to support your case. -- Grunt 🇪🇺 03:33, 2005 Jan 25 (UTC)

Your blocking without explanation

Sir, you have blocked me without explanation for 24 hours yesterday. You simply said "vandalism" yet you gave no example as to what vandalism. I was not engaging in any vandalism so it leaves me wondering what you were refering to. Care to shed some light on the matter? 168.209.97.34 08:06, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Re large and bright-red banners people don't read

I don't know what the policy on this is, but my gut instinct says it would be OK to protect talk archives for preventing this sort of mishap (and any possibility of crypto-revisionism). Of course, some people may cry "abuse of admin powers" because admins can do that and mundanes can't... *sigh* How about a read-only archive: namespace? :-) JRM 12:05, 2005 Jan 25 (UTC)

Yeah, perhaps some sort of archiving provision would be nice. But I think there are more important things to be done with (and more importantly, to) MediaWiki right now. I suppose I could protect them, but I'll just stick to petty whining until it becomes a real problem. --fvw* 21:01, 2005 Jan 25 (UTC)

Oh, I was only kidding. I'm not going to ask for new features and hold my breath; if I really wanted them I'd look into becoming a developer. As is my understanding, the whole thing is a PHP/Perl/MySQL hack; I could manage that. However, using the software has a higher priority than fixing it right now. JRM 08:07, 2005 Jan 26 (UTC)

Perl? I wish. All PHP. --fvw* 08:19, 2005 Jan 26 (UTC)

OK, thanks for the tip. I'll bump it down a few notches on my to-do list, then. >:-) JRM 09:30, 2005 Jan 26 (UTC)

Request

Can you please not revert the gay template discussion? My edits of the gay holocaust article were in good faith but has now been totally reverted, I have been attacked on the talk page, and I will not edit it again. I don't want to be smeared like that user was trying to do, because this is my real name and I don't want to get in trouble. Thank you Noah Peters 21:49, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)Noah Peters

They're not direct personal attacks, so there's no grounds for removing them. You'll have to live with it. --fvw* 21:52, 2005 Jan 25 (UTC)

These comments directly question my motives, implying I am homophobic, which constitutes a personal attack. I have removed no votes except my own, all the rest is stray commentary about me. PLEASE do not revert, or I will seek to block your IP. Noah Peters 21:58, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)Noah Peters

Noah's vandalism

O.K., will do. Jayjg | (Talk) 22:51, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Thanks!

Thanks for cleaning up after my mess. :) -- RyanFreisling @ 03:08, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Ehm, I didn't. I'm leaving that pleasure all to you :~) --fvw* 03:10, 2005 Jan 26 (UTC)

your alarming notice

Hello, it took some sleuthing to find who left this alarming warning for me, since you did not include any contact information. I believe you left the alarming warning after I added a link to the page regarding Bhajans, because apparently you deemed it to be spam. The referenced page is a noncommercial page of chanting and devotional singing that includes many bhajans and links to other pages of bhajans, and which is soon to include even more. If you deem it to be not appropriate to this topic for some reason, that is obviously part of your job, and I am new to this process, however it seems that you are quite quick to send alarming notices that must certainly chase away those who have come to contribute valuable links, such as the link I added to your bhajan page, which had no links at all until I added the link to our free, streaming audio page of bhajans, which also includes links to other pages of streaming audio bhajans. I think that it is a shame that I'll have to see your alarming notice whenever I check my user talk page at wikipedia.

FVW replied: Wikipedia is not a web directory. Only add links that are informative and strictly relevant to the subject. --fvw* 15:56, 2005 Jan 26 (UTC)

Of course, giving a link to a free page of streaming bhajans is clearly informative and strictly relevant to the subject of bhajans. It was surprising to see that you left this message on my page and then chose to also leave the nasty warning alarm on my page just because you thought that my page of streaming bhajans somehow did not relate to the subject of bhajans. I think this makes it clear that you like to bully people who have come to participate in this effort, since I clearly explained why this alarming notice was not wanted or warrented. Is there an administrator that I can bring this problem to?

Great Googly Moogly

Hi. After you posted the VfD for Great Googly Moogly, I really got into it and did a fair amount of research and editing work. I agree that in its original state it wasn't worth keeping, but it's a completely different article now. Would you take another look at it and see if you think it's worth keeping in its current state? --RoySmith 18:55, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)