Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
This page is for urgent incidents or chronic, intractable behavioral problems. Before posting: Read these tips for dealing with incivility If the issue concerns a specific user, try discussing it with them on their talk page Try dispute resolution Just want an admin? Contact a recently active admin directly. Be brief and include diffs demonstrating the problem Do not report breaches of personal information on this highly visible page – instead go to Requests for oversight. When starting a discussion about an editor, you must leave a notice on their talk page; pinging is not enough. You may use {{subst:ANI-notice}} ~~~~ to do so. Closed discussions are usually not archived for at least 24 hours. Routine matters might be archived more quickly; complex or controversial matters should remain longer. Sections inactive for 72 hours are archived automatically by Lowercase sigmabot III. Editors unable to edit here are sent to the /Non-autoconfirmed posts subpage. (archives, search)
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Aggressive comments and reverts from shifting IP user

In the last few weeks, some on my posts have been reverted with comments using unwarranted language ("stop vandalism" and implicit accusations of deceit) on the part of a couple of IP editors, all of them based at RIPE Network Coordination Centre, RIPE, P.O. Box 10096, Amsterdam. Two of these IPs are 84.139.199.8 and 84.139.198.95. There may be more; this is difficult for me to track. The coincidence seems to great to me; it is probably one editor hiding behind distinct but related IPs so as to make his edits more difficult to track (while he tracks mine; he seems to have some sort of German agenda, but the articles are unrelated).

When will a line be crossed? Can the user be convinced to adopt a consistent username? May I request that a search be done so that it can be ascertained whether this is somebody with a username who does not want his edits tracked even to his Wikipedia identity? Feketekave (talk) 20:32, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Here is another one: 84.139.235.50. Enjoy. Feketekave (talk) 20:35, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Please provide diffs of the behaviour. If you truly believe that the IP is the sockpuppet of an established user, you can visit WP:RFCU and follow the directions there. Else, provide warnings for uncivil behaviour and report to WP:AIV as necessary. Cheers. // roux   20:37, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

These IPs all have between one and three edits each, all related to the topic; diffs seem unnecessary. Here are two more IPs that are presumably the same: 84.139.243.190, 84.139.241.103. The first IP posted on the topic, the second one answered to me; neither intervention seemed wrong to me at the time (though the edits were arguably slanted), but they may be relevant.

The user seems knowledgeable of some Wikipedia-related language, though possibly not of Wikipedia's actual rules. It seems clear to me that he has spent some time here, but I cannot myself tell which established user he is likely to be. How should I proceed?

Also - if his IP keeps shifting, how can I leave him a warning? Feketekave (talk) 20:49, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Some other IPs that are almost certainly the same: 84.139.245.108, 84.139.205.82, 84.139.199.195. The ones that I mentioned first were the ones I felt had made uncivil remarks (to say the least). These just make this individual's agenda clearer. Feketekave (talk) 21:07, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

The IP will only shift when it is asked to. Try whichever IP you think they last edited from. — neuro^(talk) 21:09, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Will do. Should I make a search request for a sockpuppet, then, or can I do that only when I have a (justifiable) suspicion of which established user he or she is? Feketekave (talk) 21:14, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

PS. I just left a warning at User:84.139.199.8. Is this fine? How can I tell whether it has been received? Feketekave (talk) 21:25, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Please note: These IP addresses are not "based at RIPE". RIPE is the Regional Internet Registry that assigned the 84.136.0.0 - 84.191.255.255 IP address range to Deutsche Telekom. -- The Anome (talk) 00:46, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Throwing stones in the glashouse. Feketekave called it "racialist" to add a category "French people of German descent" [[1]] for someone, who was born in Berlin as a German citizen and reverted even sourced content [[2]] by calling it a "Nazi fake"[[3]]. His last addition to Ilya Ehrenburg was a "translation" from German WP, but instead of naming the head of the soviet Secret Police (Viktor Semyonovich Abakumov), he described him as "frontline soldier", which is an euphemism, to say the least.

P.S. I don't use shifting IP's in bad faith, it works like that, I don't know why. I don't contribute a lot to the English WP, that's why I use IP's. I can't see any "aggressive comments" yet, it wasn't my intention. 84.139.209.53 (talk) 11:30, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

About every single remark made by the anonymous user above is inexact. (On the issue of Ehrenburg, they are outright lies against me.) Mind you, his overall line is quite outside of the mainstream in the German wikipedia. Would he care to state the username he uses in de.wikipedia.org, if he is indeed a regular contributor there? Feketekave (talk) 19:34, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

PS. From wikipedia.de: "Im letzten Kriegsjahr erhielt Ehrenburg kritische Briefe von Frontsoldaten, die ihm vorhielten, er habe sich gewandelt und trete nun plötzlich für Mildtätigkeit gegenüber den Deutschen ein." - This means "In the last year of the war, Ehrenburg received critical letters from front soldiers, stating, that he had changed and now suddently stood for softness towards Germans." Grothendieck, as the son of a Russian father (later killed at Auschwitz) is unlikely to have been granted German citizenship automatically at birth; German citizenship is based on descent, not place of birth (jus sanguinis). And so on, and so on. Feketekave (talk) 19:45, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Also: as you can see from his diff above, both of the citations I removed were unsourced at the time, and had already been labelled as such. As for one of them: "Die Forschung ist sich seit langem einig, dass es sich um ein Gerücht der deutschen Propaganda handelt.[78] Und Lew Kopelew hat als Zeitzeuge mittlerweile vielfach bestätigt, dass ein solches Flugblatt Ehrenburgs nie existiert hat und weder sprachlich noch inhaltlich in Ehrenburgs Produktion passe. „Es scheint nur bei den deutschen Truppen bekannt gewesen zu sein und war wohl ein Versuch der Goebbels-Kader, auf diese Art den Widerstandswillen der Wehrmacht zu stärken.“[79]" - "Researchers have long agreed that this is a rumour [put around] by German propaganda. And Lev Kopoelev, as a contemporary witness, has stated numerous times that such a pamphlet of Ehrenburg's never existed and would not fit either in language or contact in Ehrenburg's work. "It seems to be known only by German troops and was most likely an attempt of the Goebbels cadres to strengthen the will to resistance on the part of the German army."[79]".

In other words: we are dealing with an anonymous user whose Teutonic agenda would be well outside the mainstream in the German wikipedia, and who attempts to change the English-language wikipedia to suit his bias. Feketekave (talk) 20:16, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

You should learn something more about German law of citizenship, your statement is simply wrong. Somebody who calls a long established category "racialist nonsense" [4] shouldn't expect to be treated with kid-gloves. The Ehrenburg problem should be discussed at the proper talk page, you're mixing up the leaflet with truly existing and sourced articles in different newspapers and you reverted the whole part instead if clarifying. 84.139.211.23 (talk) 08:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

You should get a username so that you can read other people's warnings. You are obviously thinking of current German law; jus sanguinis was modified very recently - during the Schroeder government. (We were discussing the life of somebody born well before WWII.) I am mixing nothing up, your use of (ill-defined) categories follows your agenda, and you are making blatantly false statements in the Ehrenburg talk page. There, you now claim that "nobody has claimed that Ehrenburg advocated raping German women"; in fact, the diff you have given above contains exactly such a claim. Feketekave (talk) 23:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Here is the diff this IP user linked to above: [[5]]. There, he complained precisely about my having removed an alleged quotation of Ehrenburg's supposedly about raping German women (and about my calling it a "Nazi fake", which is exactly what it seems to be; see above).

The point is not that he is wrong again, but that either (a) his memory of his own claims lasts only a few hours, or (b) he is making deliberately false statements about my and his edits in order to spread confusion.

The point is also not how I or anybody is not being treated with kid gloves by some abstract entity, but what this user's behaviour is towards others. Feketekave (talk) 23:28, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

More to the point: what should be done? If this user does not react to further warnings, can anonymous edits from the range of IPs he uses be blocked? Feketekave (talk) 00:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Question regarding a username

Resolved

 – There are plenty of reasons why the user could have their name styled as such, but unless they tell you themself we are merely speculating. Already rejected at UAA. — neuro^(talk) 13:27, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

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

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See above from Neuro. There is no need to drag it out and the further incivility has been dealt with by appropriate warnings. End of. Misarxist 10:07, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

---

I'd like to get a couple admins opinion on whether or not they feel the username hoponpop69 "hop on pop 69" is appropriate. Landon1980 (talk) 07:21, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

hoponpop69 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

That's a Dr. Seuss title plus the obvious. So what types of articles is it editing? Never mind, I'm posting the links. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 07:24, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Landon1980 (talk) 07:26, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

(ec)Some civility problems, Landon1980 has brought the user to ANI before. Username isn't, IMHO, an issue as Bugs pointed out. // roux   07:27, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

He's been on for about 2 1/2 years. He claims the name comes from an IMDB entry somewhere. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 07:28, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Yeah I have somewhat of a history with the user. I just never really thought about the username until now. I've certainly seen names that are less offensive blocked. I'm not suggesting a block, just wondering if anyone else thinks it's potentially offensive. I personally am not offended, but I can see how someone could be. Landon1980 (talk) 07:32, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Hoponpop would take it as an attack if I were to ask him to consider changing his username, so I brought it here to see what others think about it. I added the name to the usernames for administrative attention earlier and the result was no violation, so I just wanted to get a couple more opinions before I drop the matter. Landon1980 (talk) 07:37, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe ask him directly where the username comes from, rather than asking him to change it. Although if you've had a run-in previously, it's hard to tell how he might react. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 07:52, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Does it actually matter where the name comes from? If my cat is named "hairy pussy" and I love the cat and have the best intentions with the name that doesn't mean it can be my username does it? I thought you were supposed to avoid usernames that were potentially offensive. I don't know much about policy regarding usernames though and that is why I brought it here. Isn't it safe to say that most are going to think the obvious upon seeing the username. I can't think of too many things "hop on pop 69" could mean other than that. Anyways, thanks for taking the time to comment. Landon1980 (talk) 07:59, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Like Mrs. Slocombe in Are You Being Served?. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 11:53, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

At worst, it's a username the user will regret having registered down the line; kind of like getting a dumb tattoo just because you're in your majority. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 08:38, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

I have to say I think it's far-fetched and rather contrieved to interpret that user name in any offensive way - so not at all "safe to say that most are going to think the obvious". Hop on Pop is the name of a book, and there are several possible reasons for having the number 69 at the end of a user name. --Bonadea (talk) 10:03, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Just not the year of publication, which was '63. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 11:53, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) Personally, seeing as I happen to have a copy of Hop on Pop the Seuss book right here, to "Hop on Pop" can be construed as sexual to begin with, unless we're talking about the book. "69" is of course, not just a summer than Bryan Adams sings about (although an entire summer of 69??). 1 potential sexual reference + 1 potential sexual reference = sexual reference. The new combination sounds like the treat that "dad" gets from "mom" for being a good Santa Claus to his children. ♪BMWΔ 12:38, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe also drug references. "Hop" is slang for "high", as in "getting hopped up" on something - in this case, soda pop, which is heavily laced with caffeine and sugar and other dangerous substances. For further information, see "Puff, the Magic Dragon". Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 13:16, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

With all due respect, this conversation is fruitless. Speculating over the name further is a ridiculous pursuit, and one which I hope people won't go through. — neuro^(talk) 13:19, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Don't go bringing fruits into this. That's a whole 'nother subject. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 13:21, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

If you genuinely want me to elaborate, let me put it this way. There are an infinite number of reasons why he could have his username as such, but unless he tells you himself it could either be intended to be offensive or not. I would have imagined that if it were the latter the person would have made more of a serious infraction - most editors of Wikipedia (who are the people, I would imagine, are more likely to, say, look at the history pages and see his username) are not going to be offended by such a username, as on first glance it does not appear offensive, and even now with extensive discussion it appears that it is not a blatant infraction of our username policy. This speculation is just elongating AN/I, and there's not much point to it, as I've said, it doesn't gain anything. — neuro^(talk) 13:25, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Hence my earlier advice, to simply ask him. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 13:43, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

I apologize for wasting everyone's time with this. I just saw where policy said usernames that could be offensive should not be used. I have seen several usernames blocked with reference to bodily fluids, so I thought if "buttsauce" was inappropriate that surely to God a username that was a series of words telling you to hop on and let's have oral sex would be. Hop on pop in correlation with the number 69 is a very big coincidence, why the hell does it matter what the name could possibly mean? Anyone with one iota of intelligence would draw the conclusion the name was a reference to the sex position, at the very least it would cross their mind. I swear I wonder how some of you people function in real life. The policy on usernames clearly says potentially offensive names should be avoided, but a good portion of administrators are just too fucking stupid to understand that. This site needs real, paid, competent admins. As long as any idiot, given their bored enough, can become an admin this enyclopedia will never reach its potential. Landon1980 (talk) 16:22, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

I find your insulting diatribe much worse than the user name. Since you are clearly so easily offended by words, I expected you would apply more caution to your own comments.--Atlan (talk) 18:22, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

People might want to note that soon after he left that comment I warned him for defamation (wrong one, I know, hence the next bit), and then shortly after removed that and left a comment mentioning that his comments were not acceptable. Can we please leave this as the last comment, this thread doesn't need any more drama. Thanks. — neuro^(talk) 18:31, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't find Land1980's questioning to be insulting at all. If someone had never heard of the Dr. Seuss book and was sensitive to questionable names (and I would say I'm also in that category), then it's a reasonable question to raise. But I do agree that the subject has been sufficiently beaten up now. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 19:07, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Quick reply - I believe Atlan was talking about Landon's particularly rude summary of his fellow editors. — neuro^(talk) 23:04, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

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

"Emotional Freedom Technique"

Administrative eyes would be welcome at "Emotional Freedom Technique". (See its history page first.) My own eyes are bleary as it's my bedtime. -- Hoary (talk) 15:06, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

• Removed the OR section again, and left the editor a note. Black Kite 15:12, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

See this related thread at EAR: Wikipedia:Editor assistance/Requests#Edits rejected as "opinion". – ukexpat (talk) 16:11, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Paging SA. He'll solve this one. the new editor is clearly a biased proponent, and not any particular scientist, all her edits are to remove qualifiers which erode the positivity of the idea, and to spew caveats against negative results. SPA, topic ban her and be done.ThuranX (talk) 16:23, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Sarcasm always helps, eh? In any case, this editor is proposing text which is, while written as personal opinion, a solidly mainstream personal opinion: the EFT is blatantly unscientific and credibly identified as pseudoscience. Guy (Help!) 16:58, 27 December 2008 (UTC) My bad, read it upside-down, as noted below. Guy (Help!) 17:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I might've read this wrongly, but isn't the editor trying to add a section claiming not that EFT is unscientific, but the opposite - that a piece of research critical of EFT is unscientific? Black Kite 17:29, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe you're right, maybe I am cross-eyed due to spending most of the day hanging upside down under my railway layout pinning up wiring. Guy (Help!) 19:29, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

You've read it correctly, Black Kite, which makes Guy a bit off in his little outburst at me. Like I said, the editor adds text discrediting scientific reports discrediting the EFT ideas. Apologies can be sent to me care of my talk page. ThuranX (talk) 22:25, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Meh, that wasn't an outburst. But your comment was sarcastic, and I don't think that helps when that editor is actively being discussed on WP:RFAR. But you're free to ignore me, I am a bit sensitive about users who are pushed to the edge and beyond by relentless civil POV-pushing. Guy (Help!) 17:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Bottom line: more eyes would be great. Please watchlist, all of you. I've been on the case at this article for awhile, and this is hardly the first proponent of Emotional Freedom Techniques to make an appearance. While you're at it, take a look at the associated article on Thought Field Therapy. MastCell ^Talk 06:09, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

A challenge to this whole series of articles on 'alternative' psychological treatments and similer follderoll, is that most of the editors are spa's on one side of the topic or another (except for a few fringe studies folks such as MastCell) and they really don't understand how wikipedia works very well. Some will become full fringe nutters that are impossible to work with, most will not if we educate them about how wikipedia works. The talk page of EFT is instructive, a couple of long time users have patiently tried to work with a number of spa's over the last year with moderate success in getting them to either edit to our guidelines and policies or move on and waste time somewhere else (the long soapboxing at the top of the page, goes away by the end). It does not need to be confrontational (though that is sometimes where it ends up). --Rocksanddirt (talk) 08:11, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User:Skomorokh

Skomorokh (talk · contribs) These are false accusations here and here. I consider this editors activities to be disruptive, lacking in good faith, and borderline racially based. This editor's support of whitewashing the Stormfront (website) article is not acceptable. I ask that this editor be blocked or permanently banned from the project. We don't need his type around here. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 16:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Whatever the other merits, he certainly appears to be well beyond 3rr [[6]] and certainly doesn't seem interested in the fact that his POV is being soundly rejected by the other participants on talk.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:08, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Here are difs from today when he undoes others work on the article. [[7]] [[8]] [[9]] [[10]]Bali ultimate (talk) 17:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

A pattern he apparently carried on from previus days as per [[11]] and [[12]] I don't think he can argue that he was unaware that there was, at best no-consensus on his edits and in fact an overwhelming majority opposed to them.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:20, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Among the diffs only [39] is a clear revert. In [40] Skomorokh moved a statement to a different place. In [41] (s)he removed a citation from the lead, because it is not necessary there. And in [42] (s)he simply merged 3 successive refs. I do not see evidence of a violation. Ruslik (talk) 17:30, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Just noting my agreement with Ruslik. 3RR appears to be intact. — neuro^(talk) 18:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Skomorokh added a "maintainer" template for himself at the top of the talk page of Stormfront (website) [13]. He seems to be behaving aggressively to other editors (warnings to Orangemarlin [14] and Verbal [15] on their talk pages about using the category "Neo-Nazi website", wikilawyering on the talk page pf the article) and adding racially sensitive material, out of context, to the mainspace article, based on newspaper reports of postings on the forums of Stormfront. He has written that on google "my method is simply to search for the word "Stormfront" and take information from the sentences in which the word appears". In view of the problem of WP:OWN shown by the maintenance template and his failure to understand the controversial nature of this article (as well as a likely COI), he should probably receive a topic ban of some sort: he does appear to be disrupting the editing of the article and causing needless offense on talk pages. Mathsci (talk) 13:24, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Austell, Georgia

Resolved

 – User has apologised for his behaviour. Let's move on, shall we?

// roux   01:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

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• Marshall Williams2 (talk · contribs · checkuser · block user · block log · edit count)

Someone please explain to this novice editor how exceedingly unlikely it is for Rambot to have created an article as false as this person claims it to be. Compare the article as it stands now with the initial Rambot version to see how drastically this article has been stripped of verifiable information. I'm a little busy with some article rescues to spend a lot of time patiently explaining things. (And according to the boilerplate vandalism warning that I was given for contesting the proposed deletion of a city covered by the U.S. census, I'm supposed to be reading the welcome message right now, anyway. ☺) Uncle G (talk) 21:06, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

I notified him of this thread. Very silly conduct. Rambot generates article from census data and the like, which we may well assume to be as correct as can be.  Sandstein  22:46, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

I reverted back to the earlier version, and notified the user that the data was correct based on the census data provided. The only change from his insistence that I moved forward on was to note that the city is entirely within Cobb County as opposed to being partially in Douglas County (which someone erroneously posted). He is being a bit on the belligerent side, but I've been trying to assume good faith and move accordingly. --Mhking (talk) 22:55, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, everyone. --Marshall T. Williams (talk) 01:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User: Nilzy, BLP issues

User: Nilzy continues to add unsourced and controversial rumors about a living person to Talk:Ctrl+Alt+Del. He is accusing someone related to the article of pedophilia and criminal acts. There are no sources to support this accusation, and yet he insists that a discussion about it be started. Myself and several other editors have asked him to stop, removed his edits, and attempted to advise him on the WP:BLP policy [16] [17]. We have also sought help from the BLP Noticeboard [18]. Not only are his accusations unsourced, and highly controversial/libelous, but the article in question is about a webcomic and not a biography on the author, about whom he continues to make the accusations. This evening I have reverted his re-addition of the unsourced rumor several times (as per WP:BLP policy to remove unsourced controversial material immediately), and he continues to re-add it. A total of four editors have removed his edits, but he continues to re-add them, despite multiple warnings.--Thrindel ^Talk 00:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

This matter has been resolved.--Thrindel ^Talk 01:11, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Just a quick reminder not to edit war like you've been doing - I've spent the last 20 minutes trying to figure out the basis for this complaint, wading through all the various reverts you and Nilzy have undertaken. If you need help in future, could you provide a diff showing the actual content we should be looking for. Thanks anyway. Nick (talk) 01:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I thought 3RR & Edit war rules did not apply to BLP violations - anyone is allowed to revert them with extreme prejudice as often as required. Exxolon (talk) 03:02, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Common sense dictates after one or two reverts, administrator assistance is requested (preferably here). The reason reverting BLPs is exempted from 3RR is not to give users immunity to revert each other continually, it's to stop users being blocked, on a technicality, for preventing problematic material being inserted into any article whilst they await administrator assistance, be it in the form of an administrator discussing the issue with the parties involved, page protection being instated, or a user being blocked. The policy is not intended to give users carte blanche to revert each other over a period of several hours or days; edit warring over problematic material is a course of action that does nothing to ensure problematic material is removed and remains removed from any article. The correct course of action when you see problematic material is "revert, discuss/warn" - if the material is added again without proper discussion and agreement, then it's "revert, summon administrator assistance". The other point to remember, if you were to continually revert additions to a BLP without requesting help, what happens when you go offline - if nobody else knows a problem exists, then you'll likely find the edits restored by the time you return and that's doing nothing to help the project. There's really no reason to be reverting more than a couple of times before requesting assistance from an administrator or experienced editor, if we don't know about a problematic editor or article, there's nothing we can do about it. Nick (talk) 13:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I realized too late that it had gone too far, too fast. In the future I will take care to clarify diffs. Thank you.--Thrindel ^Talk 01:33, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

As a coda to the evening's events, I'm assuming a copycat of Thrindel has popped up at the page trying to get the user's attention. [19] Dayewalker (talk) 01:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Potential WP:CHILDREN problem.

Resolved

 – False alarm

Can someone delete this edit [20] and report to WP:OVERSIGHT please, thanks. Exxolon (talk) 02:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Why? "I attended this school" doesn't mean "I am a child" – she might have been there in 1952 – and in any case there's no personal information given other than her name. – iridescent 02:57, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Apologies - I misread the sentence as "I attend this school." Exxolon (talk) 02:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Bot-assisted incivility

Last month, STBotI (a bot belonging to ST47) posted a warning on my talk page regarding a non-free image that I'd uploaded without supplying a fair use rationale. The image in question was a Wikimedia project logo (which obviously didn't require a fair use rationale), so I rolled back the bot's edit and thought nothing more of it.

Earlier today (my time), an anonymous editor posted a message on my user page (and that of several other Wikipedians) informing me that my name had been listed on the page User:STBotI/BADUSER and that this was visible via search engines. Curious as to why I'd apparently been publicly labeled a "bad user," I read through STBotI's documentation to no avail.

So I headed over to ST47's talk page, where I found a couple of existing threads on the subject (including someone else's inquiry as to the page's nature). I joined the discussion, and then I noticed that DragonflySixtyseven had moved the page to User:STBotI/LEFT-NOTE-FOR-USER with the summary "as per OTRS". But because the bot's code still directed it to the old page title, the next data dump automatically restored all of the content to that location. DragonflySixtyseven rolled back the edit, and I perceived this as the beginning of a tug of war between human and script (until the latter could be updated with the new title). For this reason (and because the redirect's existence ensured that the page would remain indexed by search engines), I deleted the redirect and protected the page against re-creation. (I noted this on ST47's talk page, indicating that "if anyone feels that these actions were inappropriate for any reason, please feel free to undo them or request that they be undone.") At the time, I didn't realize that DragonflySixtyseven already had blocked the bot (so my steps made no difference).

A short time later, ST47 restored the single deleted data dump (labeling my deletion "vandalism") and merged it into the main history at the original name. He/she then updated the bot and moved the page to User:STBotI/WARNEDUSERS (edit summary: "Happy?"), leaving behind the redirect at User:STBotI/BADUSER (which he/she later explained must be temporarily retained for technical reasons).

In the discussion that followed, Gwen Gale complained about an addendum, referred to by ST47 as "a nice notice on top of the new page in case someone decides to take offense." This "nice notice" was worded as follows:

---

This page is updated regularly by the bot. It's purpose is really none of your business, but some people are exceedingly nosy and seem to have this innate desire to waste my time. One of them in particular even blocked the bot over this page. Divas.

This page contains a list of every user the bot has warned as part of it's live IMGBot2.pl task, along with the number of times they have been warned, since the last time the page was cleared. Probably a long time ago. When I first wrote the bot I used the terse name BADUSERS for this page, as it was the dump page for the BADUSERS sub, which reported users who had uploaded over 10 bad images to an IRC channel. Unfortunately, due to meddling by the aforementioned exceedingly nosy users, it was moved to this name, which sort of screws up anyone who is trying to actually review the bot's code, since it's got a nice logfile for NFCC10C issues called NFCC10C, a logfile for notag issues called notag, etc, and now the wikipage WARNEDUSERS for the BADUSERS sub. This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption, is in no way guaranteed to be accurate, and is really best ignored - it needs to be on wiki so it is shared between STBotI's various host servers.

---

ST47 partially reworded the message, but not in a manner that eliminated the incivility. When Gwen noted this and I expressed agreement, ST47 ignored our posts (while replying to someone else's unrelated post) and reverted to the earlier (more uncivil) text.

I don't know how to address this situation. Editing the message would be futile (because it would be reverted during the next data dump), and ST47 has withdrawn from the discussion and evidently restored the worse version out of spite. I honestly don't know why he/she has responded in this manner, and I find it quite disheartening. —David Levy 04:06, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Note that I've directed ST47, DragonflySixtyseven and Gwen Gale to this thread via their talk pages. —David Levy 04:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

There's also this on the bot's user page:

Admins: Getting to block a bot is not a trophy you get. If you block this bot, you had better have a good reason.

Ed Fitzgerald _{t / c} 04:27, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I know the editor hasn't been particularly responsive to queries about the page, but it seems like getting him to add {{noindex}} to the page would help? Then his bot could still keep its list and you and the other editors who've angered the bot won't have to worry about a page called 'Bad Users' (or whatever it ends up being called) turning up in web searches for their user names. -- Vary Talk 04:31, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that would help. It was suggested to ST47, whose reply was rather unhelpful. —David Levy 04:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

There's also a threat of violence on the bot's talk page (User_talk:STBotI) - "Oh, and if you say rational instead of rationale, I am going to hit you over the head with a large fish." Exxolon (talk) 04:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm inclined to interpret that as facetiousness. —David Levy 04:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Enigma ^message 05:34, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Quite possibly, but there seems to a problem with WP:CIVIL here too. "small-minded fool", "some people are exceedingly nosy and seem to have this innate desire to waste my time.", "Divas.", "aforementioned exceedingly nosy users," are hardly the sort of phrases an admin should be throwing around. I'm also somewhat unhappy with this statement - "Do not revert the bot's edits to your userpages or templates, because the bot will just do it again." - does this mean the bot will revert removal of a warning template from a user's talk? Exxolon (talk) 04:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

So, out of curiosity, are ST47 and Betacommand the same people? It sure seems like it... - ✰ALLST☆R✰ ^echo 05:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

No. Enigma ^message 05:34, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

By that, ST47 means that the bot will drop the warning on the user talkpage again if the user just reverts the warning and doesn't fix the image. Which is of course correct. Black Kite 10:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

[outdent] I don't pretend to understand a thing about what the bot does or for that matter why, but it seems to me that the behavior displayed by the bot owner has been somewhere between stubbornly unhelpful and outrightly uncivil. WP:OWN applies to all pages on Wikipedia- even if (s)he owns the bot (s)he doesn't own the pages and this sort of snide remarkery shouldn't remain hosted on our servers. I say remove anything borderline from the bot pages, block the bot if necessary to prevent it overwriting until we can get this sorted out, and surely ST47 has something to say for him/herself? l'aquatique |✡| talk 07:19, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I concur with L'Aquatique.  Sandstein  09:29, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

FYI, STBotI is an important bot that tags uploaded media with no copyright information for deletion, and also non-free images that have no valid fair-use rationale. It also informs the uploaders what is happening. Black Kite 10:18, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Do important bots follow different policies than unimportant bots? rspεεr (talk) 10:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

By "important", I was pointing out that blocking the bot would be a bad idea when the problem isn't directly related to the bot's main tasks, which it appears to be performing mostly correctly. Black Kite 10:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Blocking bots is no big deal. They can catch up later and they don't have feelings to hurt, and the temporary absence of one bot will not harm Wikipedia. Blocking a bot is just something you do when it's making undesirable edits. The problem is that ST47 seems to be taking these blocks of his bot personally, and getting angry instead of addressing the problems people bring up. rspεεr (talk) 10:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, my point being that the bot's actual main task is not being affected at the moment. I think this is a bit of a storm in a teacup to be honest, but yes it would be useful for ST47 to address the issues raised. Black Kite 11:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

On top of the incivility, ST47 should disabuse himself of the notion that he can intentionally edit-war using his bot by acting as if it's out of his hands. It is within ST47's power, and his responsibility, to change the bot's code if it is making undesirable edits. rspεεr (talk) 09:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• The notice needs to include {{NOINDEX}} - OTRS tickets 2008122610019734 / 2008122710016502 / 2008122710016682 for reasons why. I suspect in the end that some people will never be happy with anything other than uncritical acceptance of any unfree image however tenuous the justification, but the tone of the message on the WARNEDUSERS page hardly helps. I would put money on the anon being the self-same user who created the three OTRS tickets listed above, all of which must be very important and serious complaints because they HAVE LOTS OF CAPITALS and inform us that the BADUSERS page is ILLEGAL. Guy (Help!) 11:21, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

You see, there were at least two or three points in there that I was actually interested in replying to. Unfortunately, it's just a jumble of text now. Good job.

1. The page was moved. The new page has a brief explanation as to what its purpose is. Far more explanation than a simple logfile should need, but heh. It was called baduser because it was the dump file for a subroutine meant to locate potential bad users. Aptly named "sub checkbaduser". Here is the current text:

   $badusertext="This page is updated regularly by the bot. There used to be an explanation here of why it was moved, but some overly sensitive users have requested that it be taken down.\n\nThis page contains a list of every user the bot has warned as part of it's live IMGBot2.pl task, along with the number of times they have been warned, since the last time the page was cleared. Probably a long time ago. When I first wrote the bot I used the terse name BADUSERS for this page, as it was the dump page for the BADUSERS sub, which reported users who had uploaded over 10 bad images to an IRC channel. Unfortunately, due to meddling by several users, it was moved to this name, which sort of screws up anyone who is trying to actually review the bot's code, since it's got a nice logfile for NFCC10C issues called NFCC10C, a logfile for notag issues called notag, etc, and now the wikipage WARNEDUSERS for the BADUSERS sub. This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption, is in no way guaranteed to be accurate, and is really best ignored - it needs to be on wiki so it is shared between STBotI's various host servers.\n\n";

2. I didn't 'revert' my change when I went from the older message to the newer one, I just hadn't let that change propagate. Now it has, and the bot has been restarted, and the notice will stay.
3. Guy: You must be behind on sleep if you think you can justify deleting this page on legal grounds, especially in its new state. I see no reason to add templates or notices or documentation or pretty colored boxes or flying ponies to what should be a simple log file.
4. If you try to move one of these pages and the bot ignores you, DO NOT block the bot. Let me know, and if you're clever enough to justify moving it, then I will shut down the bot, edit its config, force propagate the changes, and restart the bot.
5. The redirect needs to stay for now. Do not delete the redirect. The IRC portion of the bot running on some faraway server will not function without the redirect. Once everything has been updated, I will delete the redirect. If I have not done so in a week, you may remind me then. It shouldn't take any longer than that.
6. Vary: The page called Bad Users is no longer in use. It is now called Warned Users. This has the benefit of being factually correct, and therefore noindex is really unnecessary.
7. Ed Fitzgerald: What, is asking admins to think before they block such a horrible crime? What is so wrong with sanity?
8. Exxolon: Right. It's a threat because I'm actually going to find every user who misspells rationale and go to their house, break in, bring a tuna, and attack them. It's far more plausible that I didn't actually mean that.
9. Exxolon again: "Do not revert the bot's edits to your userpages or templates, because the bot will just do it again" means that if you revert the bot's removal of fair use images from your userpage, from a template, from a portal, from anywhere else, then the bot will just remove the image again on it's second pass.
10. Rspeer: At the time that I made the note saying that the bot would ignore any change to it's log file, noone had actually made a coherent case as to why. As a matter of fact, the same is true if we substitute 'now' and 'why there's still a problem now that it's at /WARNEDUSERS'. ST47 (talk) 12:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Cut that message short because I was looking for an iridium flare, unfortunately it's a bit too cloudy. I first became aware that someone was complaining when that user vandalized my talk page, the bot's userpage, and the bot's logfile, all in CAPS, while logged out. Obviously a user with an account who had to log out to vandalize. He was blocked for 24 hours, the damage was reverted. When I got there, I believe I reverted one more edit to the logfile from a while ago and then I semied it. I also left a message on the IP's talk page, which I really think was rather nice of myself after he came and acted like such an ass. Anyway, I think I then received an email, let me check. No, maybe not. I heard from someone that there was a rather incoherent OTRS request up from a user who was, their words, not mine, 'mentally unstable'. Around this time the first message on my talk page was left. The user didn't justify their request, didn't ask me to add the template, didn't give any reasons, just pretty much asked what would happen if he added it to the page. The answer to that is "The bot would ignore it, and on the next update it would be removed". Then lots of stuff happened. He msged me at 5PM yesterday, my time, and told me the page would be a problem. I was at a calculus study group, away from my computer, and could not respond. Despite the fact that the page had been up for over a year, Dragonfly6-7 couldn't wait 15 minutes and moved the page at 5:10. Sometime in this period the bot probably reuploaded the log, because it's nowhere near clever enough to see what DF67 did. Less than a half hour later, he blocked the bot. He could have protected the page: the bot is not an admin, and could not have edited through protection, and would have been able to continue to run. People have this innate desire to rack up trophies or something like that by blocking the bot rather than taking the more effective, more sane, less exciting approach. When I got back, I probably shouted at people a bit, had the bot unblocked, then I histmerged the page and moved it to /WARNEDUSERS. This is a perfectly fine title. It is truthful. It is a list of users who the bot warned. The message at the top is more truthful than incivil, for sure. 'Meddling' is entirely accurate: rather than wait for me to reconfigure the bot, people had to try to do it themselves, wound up failing, then blocked the bot. ST47 (talk) 12:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Finally, Guy. The second half of your comment appears to be sarcasm, but you also seem to be using it to support the use of that template. Are you being sarcastic about that as well, or are you actually suggesting that since the user has used enough capital letters, we should add some random template? Also, if you do have some request to make of me, then you really need to support it with the actual tickets that explain your supposed "reasons why", rather than some arbitrary timestamps. Being that I don't have OTRS access, I can't evaluate an argument that is hidden behind a timestamp. ST47 (talk) 12:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

"...This has the benefit of being factually correct, and therefore noindex is really unnecessary" - would it hurt to add noindex, though? There's no need for the log of a bot to be publically searchable - as you yourself state, "This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption..." _TalkIslander 12:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

No need for it not to be. ST47 (talk) 12:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, but in a way you're contradicting yourself there. You can't state one minute that the page isn't for the general populus, but then the next refuse a request to hide it from search engines. Apart from all else, it's a tad stubborn. Adding it would not be at all detrimental to you or your bot, yet you refuse. Why? _TalkIslander 12:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

@ST47: I'm afraid your comments to me above don't actually address what I said. I did not say the page should be deleted, I said we should add {{NOINDEX}}, I think we should do that with any page where bots make records of usernames - in this case the username is the user's real name, so the fact that one of the first page of Google hits is a page about BADUSERS is a bit of an issue for him, for all of his (IMO) rather hysterical over-reaction to it. I am sure he'd have got the result he was after much more quickly and with less drama if he had left the caps lock off and just asked nicely, since I don't believe that anyone is setting out to e actively evil. But the tone of the message on the WARNEDUSERS page is pretty inflammatory, and I don't think it would hurt to tone it down a bit - do you? Guy (Help!) 13:33, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

It's no longer called BADUSER, it's called WARNEDUSERS, therefore the title is factual (list of users who have been warned) therefore it's no reason to exempt it from the whole searchable openness of knowledge thing. The message has been changed once again. Still waiting on a good reason for noindexing. ST47 (talk) 13:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Just to set things straight here, I appreciate the change to use the editable header text (I assume it uses it direct, but whether it does or whther you copy-paste it periodically probably isn't relevant at this point). You've been given what several users think is a good reason to use NOINDEX, which I see you currently do. Do we still need to have any further debate about that or not? Guy (Help!) 17:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Page protected

We seem to have consensus here that User:STBotI/WARNEDUSERS should not include the objectionable commentary directed at other users, and should include {{NOINDEX}}. I have made these changes and, according to ST47's suggestion above, protected the page to stop the bot from overwriting it. I ask all administrators to only lift that protection once the bot has been reconfigured so as not to undo these changes. Thank you.  Sandstein  13:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I also suggested that you first come up with a good reason why. I've made the changes to the bot to use noindex, and if you have a good reason to, I'll keep it that way. ST47 (talk) 13:31, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I would suggest that the commentary should be neutral, and perhaps transcluded from a protected page that can be tweaked without having to get specific users to make code changes. By neutral I mean something like: "this is a list of all users warned by the bot, being listed here does not imply that there is an issue with the user, this is purely for maintenance purposes." Or something. Some of those usernames are real names. Guy (Help!) 13:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

The reason why, apart from the fact that you do not own that page and appear to be the only user here not to want it noindexed, are our policies regarding civility, personal attacks and, as Guy points out, the biography of living persons. I strongly recommend that you follow Guy's advice with respect to transcluding the commentary.  Sandstein  13:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Guy: It's just a header for a logfile. It seems neutral to me. Once I finish this post, I'll even get rid of everything except the explanation. And since there will be a nice, neutral, explanation, I don't think we'll need noindex, do you agree? ST47 (talk) 13:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I certainly don't agree. You still haven't explicitly stated why you refuse to add 'noindex' - it seems to me that you're the only one here against including it, so unfortunatly consensus is against you. I'll just add that I think the transclusion idea is a good one - as you're well aware, you don't own the page, so you shouldn't be the only one able to edit its contents (which, by having the bot overwrite it, you effectively are). _TalkIslander 13:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

All I really want is a reason why we have to take the step of noindexing the page. Now that there's an explanation as to why the page exists and why it should not be used by anyone or anything like that, and that the title isn't inflammatory, anyone who finds it would see "oh look, a bot's log page, nothing interesting here" and move along. No reason to hide it from google. ST47 (talk) 14:02, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, put it this way. If I were warned by your bot, I would be added to that list (quite legitimately). Now, it could be that I was warned for uploading a fair-use image for which I forgot to write a rational - as soon as I got your bot's warning, I'd write one (not the best example, as I never upload fair-use images without rationales, but humour me :P). I wouldn't then want a result for a google of 'Islander' to bring up a page entitled 'WarnedUsers'. Yes, it's not really inflammatory, and yes, it's miles better than 'Badusers', but still, it's a blot in my copybook. You won't find anyone that wants to be labeled a 'bad user', but equally I think you'll find very few that are quite happy being labeled a 'warned user'. Being a 'warned user' implies that you've been a bad user, and warrented a warning. In short, though the new title is much better than 'badusers', it's still not great, however factually accurate it is. _TalkIslander 14:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User:ST47/WUHead. Feel free to add a comment to the header explaining that. You can also use User:ST47/WUTitle. If you do, then please also move the existing page to the new address so as to preserve history. ST47 (talk) 14:25, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you - much appreciated :). _TalkIslander 14:26, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Sand: If we ignore the commentary, and assume that I make it nice and neutral. A list of users who have been warned is in no way uncivil, it's not a personal attack to say "STBotI warned you", and I don't even see where BLP comes into play. If we treat this as a mainspace article and apply that policy, then we really just need it be unbiased and sourced. If it would make you happy, I can add a link to each users' talk page history as a source? ST47 (talk) 13:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Updated with a neutral explanation. ST47 (talk) 13:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks so much for taking care of the worries editors had about how things were worded. I don't think anyone was being nosy or untowards, although from your outlook, in the thick of things trying to run the bot, I understand how the page name seemed utterly straightforward and harmless to you, a scripting artifact and nothing more. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I really would like to keep it not noindexed, and I've put the header and title into a template at User:ST47/WUHead and User:ST47/WUTitle. If you have any suggestions, feel free to update them. ST47 (talk) 14:27, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

How about calling the dump something like TEMPLATEDUSERS or NOTIFIEDUSERS instead? I see nothing wrong with keeping the page open to SE bots if the pagename along with any header text are wholly neutral. On the Internet, it's so easy for folks to take things wrong at a quick glance. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:34, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Either one of those is fine with me. Perhaps we can not make it ALLCAPS? User:STBotI/Notified users? ST47 (talk) 14:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Oh, for some reason I thought ALLCAPS was how you wanted it, to denote botness or whatever. I always like smallcase better. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Why is it important that a bot's logfile be indexed by search engines? DoubleBlue (talk) 14:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm fine with the page as it now is, but I think the NOINDEX should stay, as the page is of no use to the general public and would needlessly clutter up search engine results.  Sandstein  14:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

If it's not indexed I see no meaningful worries with the name and header as they are. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

The reason for including NOINDEX is simple: some of those are real names, and some others look like blameless users who made trivial errors in NFC rationales. There is no reason why it would ever need to be indexed, so adding NOINDEX makes good sense - it removes an identified problem without apparently creating any further problems of its own. Anyway, all sorted now, thanks. Guy (Help!) 15:01, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Precisely. No matter what the page's title is, an incorrect inference can be drawn by someone who sees such a list (containing names added due to issues ranging from blatant image vandalism to "a bug in the bot's code," the latter of which resulted in my name's inclusion). The new explanatory message certainly helps to counter such misinterpretations, but I see no reason why a page of this nature should be publicly indexed.

Thanks for calming down and addressing the problem, ST47. —David Levy 16:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Ashwin K

On article Ashwin K, author is IP hopping to remove CSD tag on autobiographical vanity article. User name is User:Inkwash and involved IP's so far include: 117.196.160.97, 117.196.164.71, 117.196.163.234, and 117.196.164.22.--RandomHumanoid^(⇒) 06:26, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I have not looked into the editors' conduct, but in my opinion the page doesn't meed the CSD A7 requirements since it does assert notability of subject. So I will be rmoving the CSD tag; please take it to WP:AFD if you disagree. Abecedare (talk) 06:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, given that User:Inkwash has recreated the article twice and his user name is a anagram of Ashwin K, COI is perhaps likely. Anyway, any article related issues themselves can be discussed at leisure at AFD. Abecedare (talk) 06:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I did just WP:AFD it. Nonetheless, is there to be no temporary ban on this fellow for his behavior?--RandomHumanoid^(⇒) 06:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I should hope not. Seems he was doing the right thing, if in a slightly unorthodox fashion... l'aquatique |✡| talk 07:21, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Offensive language and personal attacks by User:AP1929

User:AP1929 is a pro-Ustaše user that has been roaming on Ustaše-related articles ("AP 1929" is an abbreviation of "Ante Pavelić 1929", "1929" being the year the fascist "Ustaše" Croatian ultra-nationalist movement was founded). His IP is 99.250.48.35, which can easily be confirmed. While his constant fascist comments can be tolerated, his description of an established User like Thewanderer as a "communist piece of shit" [21] should not go unrewarded in my opinion. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 08:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User was topicbanned for six months from these articles by FutPerf. Perhaps it's time to do it again? // roux   08:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Seems like it... --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 19:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

His contribs show him to be essentially a SPA- blocking him would have the same effect as topic banning him, but with the added bonus that it's actually enforceable without a whole bunch of dramaz. l'aquatique |✡| talk 19:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

On second thought, topicbanning would hardly be an appropriate response to calling a User a "piece of shit" on his own talkpage. Such action is not really related to any particular topic. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 22:35, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Possible range block (3)?

Resolved

 – Rangeblocked again Black Kite 13:24, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• First ANI report - 2 week block.
• Second ANI report - 1 month block.

The "truth" is once again being preached from the 168.187.176.xxx range. --Onorem♠Dil 13:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

In addition to spouting nonsense the guy from this IP range is typing in all caps, which makes the nonsense even larger. However, he apparently lives in Kuwait. Isn't that punishment enough? Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 13:22, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Nice xenophobia there. Act upon content not location, unless a desire to throw out such comments fills an empty void in your life. Minkythecat (talk) 18:42, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I was beginning to think I had to evade my indefblock at ANI once more just to ask why nobody is calling Baseball Bugs on this utterly stupid and xenophobic comment. Thank you for doing so. Everybody else who read this please be appropriately ashamed that you did not challenge BB's BS for over five hours. 78.34.133.168 (talk) 20:04, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

3 months this time. Doesn't seem to be much (if anything) productive from that range, so rangeblock is better than semi-ing a number of articles, I think. Black Kite 13:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Assume good faith

Resolved

 – by Algebraist (talk · contribs) Agathoclea (talk) 15:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

An anon editor has just nuked the page of WP:Assume good faith can someone revert it as I cant seem to find the revert button on my screen as it is covered over with hacked by china or something along those lines. Corruptcopper (talk) 15:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Done. Allowing position:fixed is a bad idea. Algebraist 15:44, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Hm. Hacked by "China" seems to be in Canada. Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 20:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Pediapress

I stumbled upon User:Pediapress when a template I was working with was linked to a subpage User:Pediapress/TemplateBlacklist and thought it a rather strange situation. The user is advertising pediapress.com so I thought is was a promotional user and reported it to UAA, and was instructed to report it here. After looking at it closer, the WMF does appear to have a collaboration with this website, but the userpage and its monobok instructions, and the afformentioned subpage, still seem unusual. Maybe some additional eyes can take a look and see if this user, userpage and subpage are all on the up and up, or if any action should be taken. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 16:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User:Pediapress/collection.js was deleted as G11, maybe we should notify the foundation though, as they should probably be the ones to inform the company that they are not exempt from policy just because they have an affiliation. — neuro^(talk) 19:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Ottava Rima, et. al. at WT:DYK

Could some uninvolved admins please step in at WT:DYK? The constant sniping and hostile atmosphere between Ottava and other editors at DYK has driven contributors away and is a detriment to Wikipedia. Is Ottava still under mentorship? If so, could the mentors please advise him/her on disengaging? BuddingJournalist 16:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• Diffs, please? Protonk (talk) 17:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Until any are given, here is a stack to look through. No opinion on subject matter. [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] — neuro^(talk) 18:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I haven't been able to keep up with the DYK issue, but my understanding is that Ottava Rima ended the mentorship a few weeks ago: [37] [38] [39] [40] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:44, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thats about right, except for the mentorship actually ending here, 5 days before. Ottava Rima (talk) 19:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• Two hours and not one notification that I am put at ANI? And this is some how supposed to quell my claims that people at DYK are not following community standards anymore? >.<!!! Ottava Rima (talk) 18:57, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

  I apologize for not informing you. I was merely trying to flag down administrators to calm the waters at WT:DYK, not start a discussion here. BuddingJournalist 20:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

  Here is a good diff to look at. I tell Politizer to get involved with other aspects of the community: Village Pump, GA/FA, MoS, etc, in order to get a greater sense of people's opinions and issues, because DYK has been making some proposals that seem to run counter to how people outside of the rarely viewed WP:DYK talk page feel about various issues. What is the response? "You can go fuck yourself, Ottava Rima". I have a lot of DYKs. I have half of the DYK 5+ hook awards. I know about making complicated DYK, and I defended DYK for a long time at ANI. Now I am being dragged through the mud because I defended Blockquotes as counting as prose, as even MoS and WP:SIZE states it is. Then I am criticized because I stated that translations and simply taking what another wiki says and copying and pasted it into wikipedia is not new. What is this world coming to? I stated before that Village Pump or RfC should be used to get wider consensus on an issue and certain members called for me to be banned from DYK because of it. Is this really fair? Is this right? Ottava Rima (talk) 19:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User:Hungupbg - Hasn't improved since last block

Resolved

 – Blocked indef Black Kite 18:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

The above user is continuing to cause disruption by adding unreliably sourced information to articles. Despite multiple warnings he/she will not listen or communicate. The editor was blocked previously, but this had no effect. Please help. — Realist² 17:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• No improvement and no communication = blocked indef. If they want to communicate via unblock and explain how they are going to improve their editing, then they can. Black Kite 18:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
  • Thanks. — Realist² 18:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
    • And now Netherlands2304 (talk · contribs) has picked up Hungupbg's mantle. Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 20:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Revert over protection.

Why are admins editing over protection. What I see here is a protection, then a reversion. Should pages be protected in the condition they are found? page history. The protection policy does not call for full protection at user request, but only semi after vandalism. NonvocalScream (talk) 19:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

No. You can't protect and revert in the same edit. Please note it is the same editor who protected that reverted. --Smashville^talk 19:16, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

And it was at user request. NonvocalScream, may I respectfully suggest that you drop this matter? It's over, done with. // roux   19:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

It was still very much against what we do. We don't protect a user's preferred version of disputed content. As for your suggestion -

A single title was removed from your watchlist:

   * User:Bstone (Talk)

I'm not watching that page anymore. Respectfully, NonvocalScream (talk) 20:01, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Well umm... the ANI you started had a consensus to leave it alone. The MFD you started and withdrew had a clear consensus to leave it alone. So it's not about protecting the user's preferred version, it's protecting the consensus version. Cheers. // roux   20:28, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Your right. I guess I am having a hard time with a message on a userpage that brings a user and the project into disrepute. As if the userpage belongs personally to the user. I guess I had better get over it before I start exhausting the communities patience. I, personally don't have alot of patience for troll like behaviour, but as above, the page no longer appears on my watchlist, and is also protected against my editing. I've already asked for opinions here, and subjected it to MFD. There is not anything else I can do. It saddens me a bit that the page can continue to exist in its form. It is a bad faith page, and one that would sully the project and an editor. NonvocalScream (talk) 21:03, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Conflict with Jehochman

Jehochman (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has been actively advocating for a community ban/block/etc. of me for more than a month. I'm fine with this, but when he takes unilateral actions to stop my attempt to deal with problematic situations:

[41]

what am I supposed to do? This was an inappropriate close of the COI report. Similar to User:Pcarbonn whose report was closed by the same user leading indirectly to us having to escalate the condition all the way to arbitration, Jehochman is cutting off process and not letting people comment. His claim that people's "vocations" don't make for conflict-of-interests is false on the face of it. I am accusing this particular user of editing articles which have a direct financial connection to a business that he runs.

Imagine if we had a person who was selling snake oil editing the article. By Jehochman's arugment, we could say that he wouldn't have a conflict-of-interest editing that article because it was his "vocation". We could make the similar argument for nearly anybody.

As such, I submit that this early admin-close was inappropriate for two reasons:

1. It was done by an admin with a stated vendetta against my involvement at Wikipedia.
2. It was done inappropriately. The claim that you get out-of-conflict-of-interest-free simply because it is your "vocation" is false on the face of it pursuant to various rulings including Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience which dealt with Eric Lerner's vocational conflict of interest and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Cold fusion which dealt with Pcarbonn's vocational conflict of interest.

I would ask that an administrator remove the "close" remarks and simply allow discussion to occur. I think the premature closing of this discussion was rude and opposed to our desire to get consensus. Jehochman is not the be-all and end-all of conflict-of-interest discussions.

ScienceApologist (talk) 19:42, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Probably be best to leave out the vendetta bit and other accusations so the question of how best to handle the COI report can be focused on without all the other drama. ChildofMidnight (talk) 20:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• SA, the complaint was closed because the editor in question is quite open about his bias and therefore it does not need to be brought to the COI noticeboard. Whether there should be a user RfC or a motion to ArbCom under the terms of the homeopathy arbitration is another matter. Guy (Help!) 20:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I think the problem is that Jim Butler never ever stops his advocacy, and while the direct benefits may be low, they might not be; we can't guess how often he sends people unsure about Acupuncture to the Wikipedia article as a 'good introduction to the subject', knowing that his highly biased edits populate the article. I've seen discussions of his NPOV-violating edits to scientific articles before, but note that once again, this has become about SA, not the people who constantly sell bullshit as 'essences of roses' on Wikipedia. If WP:COI isn't appropriate, then we need a WP:ADVOCACY reporting system to deal with this sort of behavior. Until then, COI makes more sense than any other location. ThuranX (talk) 20:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Hm, we actually have had people selling snake oil editing the article on snake oil - it's a fringey mess ATM. As for COI, not sure here. I occasionally contribute to general articles involving chemistry (my academic background). I would think twice before editing articles involving my specific area of research - not sure if I could be unbiased when I've reviewed papers by the "other guy" I think are horseshit. That's a grey area. I would never edit any article involving my employer, as that would be a clear COI. So I think this is closer to the grey area than a direct violation of COI, and is probably best described as advocacy.

The closest comparison to Mr. Butler's behavior is probably, I hate to say, Dana Ullman[[42]]. I would suggest that Mr. Butler step back from active editing of acupuncture articles and restrict himself to talk pages in light of this. Arbcom has not looked kindly on dedicated advocacy.

As for Jehochman, I urge him not to bring any administrative action against SA at least until the conclusion of the impending arbitration. There's some pretty harsh rhetoric from both sides in the RfAr that makes me question if Jehochman can be impartial here. In any case, it's like dumping gasoline on the fire. Skinwalker (talk) 21:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Do you guys complaining about my edits actually read them? I write for all sides of the argument (e.g. adding a whole "criticisms" section, or updating evidence showing less effect for osteoarthritis, or adding a source re cultural bias in studies). If I put in a "pro" position I source and weight it carefully, engage on talk pages, compromise, etc. IOW, I wear my WP editor hat first. I've been accused of this stuff before, and the evidence never backs it up; e.g. this ANI thread on another disruptive editor, Mccready (whom ScienceApologist closely resembles in his disruption). Thuranx and Skinwalker, this is the first time I've heard of you; if you have issues with my editing, why haven't you discussed it with my via usual channels (talk pages)?

You've got to show better evidence of COI or POV-pushing than merely asserting it exists because I happen to be an acupuncturist. Absent such evidence, all you're doing is violating WP:NPA: "Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views—regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream." BTW, I also have a very mainstream M.A. in chemistry from Harvard; be assured that I experience no inner conflict at all from also being an acupuncturist. I just try to be as objective as I can, and skeptical type editors who actually collaborate with me, as a rule, tend to say favorable things about my editing (see my talk page, e.g. here and here). I welcome scrutiny of my edits, but let's see some diffs: otherwise, this all sounds like meritless piling-on to me. -Jim Butler (t) 00:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

And of course, if I edited pseudonymously, this would never come up; but since I edit in good faith with my real identity, and am open about my background, I get slimed. No good deed goes unpunished. What a dysfunctional system. --Jim Butler (t) 01:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Was the COI report closed for a correct reason?

I opened a discussion at WT:COIN: COI report when not promoting oneself? --Enric Naval (talk) 23:19, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Move, renames, lost history

I don't know where to post this, but the moves and redirects for the Nazi philosophers article are getting out of control. I don't think there's any ill intent, but this contribution history [43] contains many of the titles and moves. The history is in one place List of Nazi philosophers and the article, with new history, is now in another Nazi Philosophers (at least last I checked) which should probably be Nazi philosophers. Thanks to anyone who wants to help sort this mess out or point me in the right direction. There's also an issue of what the article should be titled and what it should include if anyone wants to weigh in. ChildofMidnight (talk) 20:20, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

An old conflict of personalities has been renewed

For several years a small number of editors have been editing a set of rather obscure articles revolving around the history of sects in the Baha'i Faith. Because first hand knowledge of the subject is rather limited it seems there are only a few of us who even bother to edit the content of these small groups articles. I happen to be a member of one of the small groups in question, and User:MARussellPESE belongs to the larger group of the Baha'i Faith. Over the year many edit wars have transpired between me and User:MARussellPESE, and unfortunately we've both been guilty of crossing the line of civility at one time or another. A discussion which has only just begun here which was started by User:MARussellPESE yesterday and my objection to part of his edit has elicited a hostile verbal response which seems entirely un-called for; specifically: "Oh, and thanks for being such a jerk. You have my undivided attention now. I see that you've added these filings all over the place. Time to go excise them. MARussellPESE (talk) 15:18, 28 December 2008 (UTC)" Not only has his response been insulting and entirely uncalled for, but he has launched an array of edits which are borderline vandalism: [44], [45]. I don't believe this is the way to start a discussion, and the reaction to my objections seems way over-blown; something common to our discussions. We have a history of posting to each others talk pages, challenging each other in discussions, and reverting each others contributions. The days of constructive criticism between us appears behind us, and I believe he's simply become intolerant of my contributions. If this is attitude at the outset of a discussion, I don't believe we can be productive on the page. I would appreciate any input from this board. _Disarray^General 21:09, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• There's enough bad behavior to go around, it seems. I think the situation requires someone impartial. JuJube (talk) 21:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
• I also noticed you didn't go through the trouble of notifying User:MARussellPESE so I did it for you. JuJube (talk) 21:18, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your quick response. Yes, I agree there's been " enough bad behavior to go around", and I believe I acknowledged that in my opening comments. My apologies, but I wasn't aware I was required to notify him; that kind of courtesy wasn't extended to me when he reported an incident against me here last May. That incident, btw, is still unresolved for the issue arose out of him deciding a biography written by one of Mason Remey's believers "was out" based on his own interpretations of WP:SELFPUB. Removing that well sourced biography has effectively sterilized Remey's bio to a large extent, and now MARussell has again gotten out the hatchet and culled reliably sourced information. I'm not looking to agitate anything further, but rather for resolution and progress. I don't believe name calling and threats fall into that category. We have both demonstrated our resolve to hold fast to our positions, but it's a new development for him to act maliciously at the expense of the pages we edit. He has threatened to and carried out egregious deletions of content without discussion based on me "being a jerk"; something which I believe crosses a new line. I really don't know how to even respond to these deletions which effectively blot out the existence of whole sects of believers in our mutual faith. _Disarray^General 22:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I believe your only recourse here is WP:RFC. JuJube (talk) 23:16, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

• Um, the courtesy notice is noted in the first paragraph of this page. This isn't the place for content discussions anyway, Jeff.

Please read the whole thread. I opened with a discussion of the failings of a particular source. His response was to question my good faith and add a cheap shot at my religious community. This is a typical pattern of his. Calling that out as being a jerk isn't a personal attack as it's directed at his conduct.

Disarray used to be known as User:Jeffmichaud. Please, take at a look at our respective talk page archives (If you can find his old ones. His username usurpation has certainly cleaned that up.) and block logs to see who's more adept at the personal attacks and edit warring.

I'm not intolerant of Disarray's contributions. I'm intolerant of his contributions that don't meet WP:V, WP:RS, etc. Unfortunately, given the subject that's legion. That's a huge difference, but Disarray's been personalizing these discussions for years. MARussellPESE (talk) 23:25, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Bambifan101 related protection requests

There is a bunch of requests for protection regarding targets of banned user Bambifan101 (talk · contribs) at WP:RFPP. I personally would decline all of them for not much activity but I am unfamiliar with the user so I'd like some more input. Regards SoWhy 21:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Bambifan101, aka "The Disney Vandal", uses dynamic ip's to attack favourite articles - the ip accounts are quickly stomped upon, but usually not before they are abandoned. If the major targets can be sprotected without too much (preferably no) collateral damage then it would remove a lot of potential damage. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I would grant the requests. The Disney Vandal is persistent, and does a lot of damage with edits that aren't obviously vandalism, making it difficult to get his accounts dealt with quickly through AIV and other more normally useful techniques.—Kww(talk) 22:26, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I've softblocked his /17 range (it's fairly high traffic) for 72 hours. Nishkid64 _{(Make articles, not wikidrama)} 22:30, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Bambifan101 nearly exclusively uses named accounts. Soft-blocking is of no help.—Kww(talk) 00:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

It is if the accounts are new. Black Kite 00:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Gottlieb Agnethler

Resolved. AFD closed – iridescent 22:04, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I feel uncomfortable closing Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Gottlieb Agnethler due to my involvement, but it keeps garnering discussion even after the nominator withdrawing it. Could someone please remove the dead horse from its flogging. Agathoclea (talk) 22:00, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

✓ Done – iridescent 22:03, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Interim naming of December_2008_Gaza_Strip_airstrikes

We're having a problem where a fresh set of eyes might help. There is some discussion of what to call the article about the recent events in the Gaza strip. The article began as "Operation Cast Lead" named for the Israeli code name for the operation and some editors felt that this was a violation of WP:NPOV. That discussion (with the requisite renaming wars) began here and then continued here.

At issue is what to name the article in the interim, while we attempt to build consensus about a long term name. Specifically, that User:Cerejota might have overstepped by changing the name of the article to the current name while discussion was still ongoing. It seems to me that there is growing consensus that the article should be changed back for now if not forever, but that could be my own bias on the subject,

The general sense that I'm getting is that people are frustrated and unsure as to how to proceed both on the short and long term. So I'm asking for an admin to take a look and give us some feedback.

Lot 49a^talk 23:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

What's wrong with Operation Cast Lead? Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 23:20, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

We've had a few arguments raised: that an incident that involves killing civlians shouldn't be named after a poem, that by using the IDF name for it, we're endorsing their view, that no one in the media is using Operation Cast Lead to describe the events etc. There are screens and screens of arguments [[on the talk page in two main places if you want to read more. Lot 49a^talk 23:57, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Lot49a, we do not discuss content here at ANI, we discuss behavior needing admin intervention. It is sufficient to mention that you are misrepresenting the views you do not share. Interested editors can see the arguments, for and against, in the talk page. I am responding to your behavioral claims separately, as it seems you do not have the full information available. It is also obvious from your post you do have a side to pick, which is unfortunate, as I haven't seen you argue in the talk page as one should. Thanks!--Cerejota (talk) 00:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm new to all of this and wondering if instead of AN/I I should have gone to RFC? It honestly doesn't REALLY matter what we call the article in the interim while we wait to decide about the long term name. Both names redirect to the same page.Lot 49a^talk 00:32, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Article started as Operation Cast Lead, but when I arrived the title was 2008 Gaza Strip bombings here is diff. That is when the discussion that Lot references started. A discussion started to develop, and in the middle of it, User:Wikifan12345 User:RyanGerbil10 reverted to Operation Cast Lead believing, incorrectly, with it being consensus. Then I reverted, and then did minor refactorings for language. Someone suggested that rather than "bombing", "airstrikes" was more correct, and I agreed it was so and changed it. If I overstepped, so did User:Wikifan12345 and User:RyanGerbil10. I believe none of us did, but I believe RyanGerbill is mistaken in thinking he operated with consensus. He didn't.

Yes, I was WP:BOLD and WP:IAR to ensure that an incorrect title didn't remain: Operation Cast Lead makes a great redirect, and should be mentioned in the lead, but both the immense majority of the reliable sources and a need for editorial neutrality make it invalid as an article name choice. Consensus cannot operate against policy on a per article basis: systemic changes on policy are to be by systemic consensus. I stand by the judgment call made, as it makes us a better encyclopedia.

As to a generalized sense of frustration, I disagree. I think we are all discussing this, and we disagree and agree but this is normal. There has been two users I have had issues in particular, User:Wikifan12345 (I can provide diffs upon request) that I have asked to calm down as he was on the verge of personal attacks (this is the same user who moved against consensus himself and who I reverted, and who has in fact launched threats to "get higher authority" over disagreements, personalizing the debate) - and User: Cowmadness who made inflammatory, soapboxy claims in a discussion I WP:SNOWBALL closed as irrelevant, and then posted some stuff about "talking to Jimbo" in my talk page. Otherwise, I have seen no other expression of frustration, just disagreement.

As a reminder this article falls into the Discretionary Sacntions ruling of the ArbCom for all Israeli-Palestinian articles. Thanks!--Cerejota (talk) 00:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

"we do not discuss content here at ANI", you say just three minutes before posting a comment that... hm... discusses content on ANI. -- tariqabjotu 00:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I had to explainmy behavior, from my perspective. My intent was not to raise a content debate, but address my behavior. I am sure you are capable of understanding the difference. (no thanks! because you find them sarcastic) --Cerejota (talk) 01:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Hidden Vandalism of User Sgeureka

Resolved

 – Merging episodes to a List Of is hardly the stuff of ANI, closed Black Kite 23:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

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

---

User:Sgeureka for a last 2 months spends his time to vandalize articles of The Outer Limits TV-series episodes. First he has removed (without any discussion), all these articles, merged snippets of text in the useless List of Episodes.

When I called for his explanation, the matter was discussed here. The outcome of the discussion (8:2) was "keep" — i.e. preservation of all individual articles [46].

However, Sgeureka did not started to restore deleted articles immediately, but only after a special reminders [47], and instead to agree with the community's opinion, he immediately thereafter starts a new debate on the same topic at the (discussion page) [48]. After restoring only a small part of deleted articles, he became to wait for additional arguments to restore the remaining articles [49].

This debate once again led to the same result: community again does not agree with his insane proposal to merge all articles into single list — because it meant the removal of original articles that contain many useful information [50].

After that Sgeureka was forced to restore the remaining articles, but all the restored articles contain some additional Templates (see example) that discredits and disfigures the pages and once again questioned the relevance and notability of these articles.

Thus, Sgeureka once again destroys the consensus on the status of these articles — and is going to start a new (3rd) debate on that same theme (and he does not hide this [51] [52]). Even after my regular reminders, he every time returns these puzzling tags, accompanying his own actions by fool comments [53] [54].

This is all the more strange, given that Sgeureka himself acknowledged that he did not watched the series, and so, he is not going to work at these articles [55]. Also, the User is permanently trying to blame others for what he is doing himself — imposing his "endless" discussions [56], as well as placing misleading comments to edits (see example).

In addition, one of the unfortunate results of his actions was that the period between the removal and recovery of articles on episodes there had been deleted all images, illustrated the movies, and he had done nothing for their rehabilitation, although he was warned about it [57], and besides recently he became an administrator [58], and has the appropriate opportunities to restore the images.

Thus, this User:Sgeureka every time violates the agreements reached and undermines the Global policies and goodwill principles of Wikipedia, substituting them by some minor arguments. It seems that becoming an administrator, this User is confident that now his words (and fool comments) have more weight.

And now, I would like to know the following:

• 1. In the Russian Wikipedia (where I came from), there is a rule that after consensus it is forbidden to raise the same question for months (see the template ru:Шаблон:Оставлено). Is there any rules with the same meanings in the English wiki? All I have found here is only WP:GAME and WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT:

Refusal to 'get the point'

Shortcuts:
WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT
WP:IDHT
In some cases, editors have perpetuated disputes by sticking to an allegation or viewpoint long after it has been discredited, repeating it almost without end, and refusing to acknowledge others' input or their own error. Often such editors are continuing to base future attacks and disruptive editing upon the erroneous statement to make a point.

Wikipedia is based upon collaborative good faith editing and consensus. When a stance passes the point of reasonableness, and it becomes obvious that there is a willful refusal to 'get the point' despite the clear statement of policy, and despite reasoned opinions and comments provided by experienced, independent editors, administrators or mediators, then refusal to get the point is no longer a reasonable stance or policy-compliant — it has become a disruptive pattern, being used to make or illustrate a point.

Note that it is the disruptive editing itself, not the mere holding of the opinion, that is the problem.

• 2. Where can I contact to place the issue on the Prohibition of this User to edit "The Outer Limits" tv-series episodes' articles, as well as to force him to remove all his misleading templates?

• 3. Where can I ask a question about undoing of User:Sgeureka's adminship status?

Best regards & Happy Holydays, Krasss (talk) 23:29, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I can't see anything in the decision to force Sgeureka himself to restore any articles, nor anything preventing you from doing so.—Kww(talk) 23:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

The first point is, No, there is no period after a consensus is formed during which a proposal may be revisited. However, unless there are changes in circumstances such new proposals are often speedy closed with reference to the previous discussion. If an individual continues to raise the same questions/requests/proposals then they may be considered as being disruptive, and the various methods of dispute resolution put in place - and if it is particularly disruptive then even warnings and reporting the matter to admin noticeboards (I think this covers you point 2). Re point 3, unless the editor has been using sysop tools to further their editorial preferences there is likely no reason to attempt to remove them. Admin tools are not a reward for good editing, and are therefore not withdrawn for being in a dispute. If there is admin abuse then it can be brought to the attention again of the admin noticeboards, and if severe a request for Arbitration can be filed. Lastly, I would ask if the editor concerned has been notified of this discussion? LessHeard vanU (talk) 23:43, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User has now been notified. // roux   23:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

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

Unusual Behavior by User:Matthewedwards

Resolved

 – No action needed

I want to tread lightly here, and certainly do not want to add to anymore drama that is found at AN/I. The last thing I want to do is bring an administrator to this venue. However, this edit coupled with the edit summary does not sit well with me. The discussion can be found here as well as a refactoring another user's talk page.

I understand OWN, and realize that anyone can edit my talk, but since I use my talk page openly, and freely, I do not think it is in good taste to modify another user's signature, nor claim SOAP, nor force archival on another user. On my talk, I have no problems with ideas, signatures, nor inflammatory commentary. It does not bother me. What bothers me is that as discussion or talk pages are here for a reason: to work out issues and freely communicate. This behavior is, IMHO, highly inappropriate and does not better the project. I simply ask, as a resolve, that issues like a signature, or forced archival, are taken to the appropriate forum, instead of unilateral behavior. I appreciate the anticipated time spent looking into my complaint. ^Law _shoot! 23:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Several users had let LOTR know that the sig was unacceptable, and he had shown no interest in changing it. I think this was a good move. // roux   23:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't see why this is uncontroversial. LOTR is basically soapboxing every time he posts a message, so such a move is a good thing. — sephiroth bcr ^(converse) 00:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Agree. Also, Matthewedwards notified LOTR in multiple messages on LOTR's talk page of his concern and his replacement of the sigs. LOTR responded positively. Marking this resolved; nothing to be done here. Tan | 39 00:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

User:Rjd0060

User:Rjd0060 just semi-protected User:X!'s user page overruling User:X!'s decision to fully protect it. User:X! obviously wants his user page to be fully protected. Today there was a request for unprotection. I declined that request. Without any previous discussion (Rjd0060 talked neither to me nor to X!) Rjd0060 overruled my decision at RFPP (and thereby of course X!'s decision to protect). Completely regardless whether the full protection was appropriate Rjd0060's behaviour was highly inappropriate here. Overruling two admins' decisions without talking to them at all is highly inappropriate. — Aitias // discussion 00:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't think this is inappropriate at all. Please review Wikipedia:PPOL#User pages and then review the page history and you'll notice that there is no reason for protection. And then coming to AN/I? Wow. - Rjd0060 (talk) 00:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Not touching on your other points but "Completely regardless whether the full protection was appropriate" seems just wrong. Nobody has shown any need to full protect the page. BJ^Talk 00:59, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Note: I emphasised it already above. However, once again: Completely regardless whether the full protection was appropriate Rjd0060's course of action (overruling two admins' decisions without talking to them at all) was inappropriate here. — Aitias // discussion 01:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Your original decline reason ("Declined, Wikipedia:Point. Thanks.") is what was inappropriate. - Rjd0060 (talk) 01:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Could you please stay on-topic? If you wish to complain about my decline reason: Here you go. — Aitias // discussion 01:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

There is no admin action required in either case, so why is this even here? If you are considering this wheel warring an RFAR is in order. BJ^Talk 01:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

This is not the complaints department Aitias. Majorly talk 01:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Is there any reason for this other than drama? All he did was reduce it to a semi-protect. X! doesn't own his talk page, so no, it is not his decision whether or not it is fully protected. This has already been explained to you here and here. Just because you don't like the answer doesn't mean you have to shop around til you get one you like. Did you even bother to ask Rjd why he did it instead of chastisizing him for it and accusing him of bad faith and making pointy edits? The real questionable part of this is the bad faith response to the RFUP request here. --Smashville^talk 01:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

This page is not the complaints department, and Aitias should know better than to come forum shopping. There's no reason for X!'s userpage to be fully protected, so rudely responding to a request with unfounded WP:POINT accusations is pretty poor. Majorly talk 01:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

• Is there any reason to keep this open? Marking as resolved. // roux   01:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Smashville, that's not my point. What would have been wrong with asking X! first? User:MZMcBride's course of action seems to be far more appropriate: He tried to talk with X! first. That is my point. Why could Rjd0060 not have waited until X! would have replied? — Aitias // discussion 01:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Semi-protect December 2008 Gaza Strip airstrikes

Resolved

 – WP:RFPP is just down the hall, on the right

// roux   01:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

A number of controversial edits are being made by anonymous editors, which appears to have to do with the recent and controversial nature of the events. In order to keep vandalism away, it would be wise to semi-protect at least until this is no longer a top news item. This is separate from the move protection. Thanks!--Cerejota (talk) 01:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)