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Pages recently put under extended confirmed protection (25 out of 8475 total) () WATCH Page Protected Expiry Type Summary Admin FIFA Club World Cup 2024-09-28 14:22 2025-03-28 14:22 edit Disruption by autoconfirmed users Black Kite 2025 FIFA Club World Cup 2024-09-28 14:21 2025-03-28 14:21 edit,move Persistent disruptive editing Black Kite FIFA Club World Championship 2024-09-28 14:19 2024-10-05 05:13 edit At least one of the disruptive accounts was autoconfirmed Black Kite 2024 Hezbollah headquarters strike 2024-09-28 13:18 indefinite edit Move warring: Move requests only from this point on El C Thirumagal (TV series) 2024-09-28 12:49 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated UtherSRG Ali Karaki 2024-09-28 11:02 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: WP:PIA, WP:ECR El C Samthar State 2024-09-28 09:40 indefinite edit,move Community sanctions enforcement Johnuniq 27 September 2024 Beirut strikes 2024-09-28 02:34 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Gangwar (surname) 2024-09-28 02:15 indefinite edit,move Community sanctions enforcement: per RFPP and WP:GS/CASTE Daniel Case Template:R from book 2024-09-27 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2509 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II Ibrahim Aqil (Hezbollah) 2024-09-26 22:28 indefinite edit Highly visible page I've posted the article to the main page, so if the decision is to move the page, the admin who moves it should simultaneously adjust the resulting main page redirect. Schwede66 2024 Bangladesh anti-Hindu violence 2024-09-26 17:25 2024-10-07 14:13 edit Persistent vandalism TParis Hunter Schafer 2024-09-26 08:58 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: WP:ARBGS ToBeFree United Nations Security Council Resolution 2749 2024-09-26 02:24 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Turha 2024-09-26 02:20 indefinite edit,move Community sanctions enforcement: per RFPP and WP:GS/CASTE Daniel Case Demographics of Somalia 2024-09-26 00:12 2026-09-26 00:12 edit Persistent disruptive editing: Regular semi-protection ineffective, persistent block evasion and additions of poorly sourced material. Yamaguchi先生 Kalachuri (Rajput clan) 2024-09-25 20:35 indefinite edit,move Persistent disruptive editing: per RFPP and WP:GS/CASTE Daniel Case Tron (cryptocurrency) 2024-09-25 17:07 indefinite edit,move WP:GS/Crypto David Gerard Justin Sun 2024-09-25 17:07 indefinite edit,move WP:GS/Crypto David Gerard Philadelphi Corridor 2024-09-25 04:38 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Thejo Kumari Amudala 2024-09-25 03:19 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Liz South Lebanon Army 2024-09-24 23:29 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Casliber Talk:23 September 2024 Lebanon strikes 2024-09-24 21:45 2024-10-01 21:45 edit,move Arbitration enforcement ScottishFinnishRadish Timeline of the Israel–Hezbollah conflict (17 September 2024 – present) 2024-09-24 18:17 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement CTOP A/I Ad Orientem Template:R from category navigation 2024-09-24 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2500 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II

Massive off-wiki campaign aimed at disrupting Wikipedia

I noticed this Turkish-language Reddit link.[1]. It seems a massive off-wiki campaign has been initiated by Turkish-language speakers to create more disruption in the cesspool known as WP:AA2 and WP:KURDS. As the posts/comments were in Turkish, they were translated using Google tranlate:

• "The first spark was ignited in order to correct and organize the unfounded claims we have seen on Wikipedia recently. r/turkviki was established. Let's get organized from there."[2]
• "Friends, this subreddit was founded on the termination of unfounded claims made on Wikipedia. Our aim is to put an end to the unfounded allegations made on Wikipedia, the propaganda activities targeting our country and nation, to express the truth and correct the mistakes."[3]
• "we need a larger audience, salaried employees of wikipedia, and I don't know how effective we can be against the current Turkish hatred"[4]
• "Turkish Wikipedia Community Discord server. Friends, I left the link below if you would like to join the works that started before us."[5]
• "Friends, let's start with the liberation war first and let there be a spark of salvation for us from the lies in Wikipedia."[6]
• "First of all, we must explain why this claim [Armenian genocide] is not true. For example, instead of the 1.5 million people they said, there were actually 1.1 million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire. There is no article about genocide against Armenians in the Treaty of Mudros Sevres or Lausanne. Until 1948, the United Nations and the League of Nations before it never defined a crime called genocide, and if you eat pizza and eat pizza in the future is a war crime, they cannot hold you guilty for what you did in the past. You can write that the deportation was carried out by the Union and Terraki and that the remaining Unionists completely severed their ties with the party at the Sivas congress, and the Parliament was against what the Committee of Union and Terraki did. In addition, we must reveal the evils committed by Armenians in the public opinion, instead of the crimes they have committed, the terrorist attacks of ASALA in Europe will be the best examples."[7]
• "Ottoman archives of the period are available on this site: Devletarsivleri.gov.tr (<cant post the entire link due to blockquote error>) It is enough for someone to translate it into Turkish for us to understand. then we edit the page on the wiki."[8]
• "The first thing that needs to be changed is the name. Then we will add the villages and towns burned by the Armenians. The number of people killed by Armenians is not specified. We should add them too. Let's diversify the missing parts as comments. Good luck with."[9]
• "A patrol is here! hello, i am zemxer from turkish wikipedia. As I'm on patrol on Turkish Wikipedia, I try to help new users as much as possible. You know, there is an approval system for the contributions made in Turkish Wikipedia, and I am one of the patrol friends who approve these contributions. I can help users and groups who want to contribute to Wikipedia and who want to make these contributions in an impartial framework. good wikis"[10]

So this group of people 1) clearly state their intention to spread Turkish government propaganda at Eng.Wikipedia disproven by the rest of the world 2) They receive support from users at the Turkish Wikipedia. Posting it here at AN as suggested by several administrators. You might be interested in this: @Rosguill: @Buidhe: @Bbb23: @Seraphimblade: @Black Kite: @Deepfriedokra: @Johnuniq: @HistoryofIran: @Dennis Brown: @Drmies: @El C: @Khirurg: @Kansas Bear: @Cplakidas: ‎- LouisAragon (talk) 12:03, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Noting this is still ongoing, see Vahakn Dadrian and its abuse log. DatGuy^Talk_Contribs 15:36, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

The discord server

When looking at the members of their discord, I noticed a person named "Berk". He has a portrait of Ulugh Beg as his discord profile picture, the very same added by one of our own Wikipedians, BerkBerk68, here [11]. In other words, they must be the same person. BerkBerk seems to have a prominent role there, as he has published the rules of the discord. This is not the first time user:BerkBerk has participated in off-wiki canvassing through Discord, see for example these two posts back in July 2021, where user:BerkBerk tried to recruit an admin to his "14 people" discord, which was apparently focused on editing the Syrian Civil War and 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War. [12]-[13]- LouisAragon (talk) 12:03, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Note the date 27-06-2022 at Discord:[14] Seems there's a triad involving editors at the Turkish wiki, off-wiki people, and editors at Eng.Wiki. - LouisAragon (talk) 12:03, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

@LouisAragon, this report may have all kinds of merit, but doesn't the "The discord server" bit inch into WP:OUTING? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:15, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Berk#2835 is me, and that community has permission from authorities of Turkish Wikipedia, and it is not interested in English Wikipedia editing. Many experienced/authorized Turkish-language editors are in that group, furthermore I am not the owner of that server. I undertake all the mistakes done by me at "discord" one year ago. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 13:18, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Why am I not surprised to see you engaging in this kind of stuff again. Not interested in English Wikipedia editing? What is this you have written under Planlama ("Planning") then? Google Translate "Users will be divided into 2 main sectors as English and Turkish Writers. It is obligatory to make a total of 100 edits, 60 from one sector and 40 from another sector, on behalf of users who want to participate in both. When the new week is started, the number of edits between sectors (60-40) may change." I did write a similar report about BerkBerk to ArbCom sometime ago, though I am still awaiting an update. --HistoryofIran (talk) 13:26, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

I invite administrators to the discord server to prove that there is not any single edit provoked by me in english wikipedia, everything asked will be translated by me, and for any kind of distrust, access to server logs (+ProBot for deleted messages) will be given. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 13:35, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

The discord link here just got deleted [15] (including the user who posted it) and the discord is now gone. Something you and co. trying to hide? Fortunately I took pictures of BerkBerk's "Planning" list before hand. Would it violate WP:OUTING to post it here? --HistoryofIran (talk) 13:39, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

that text is not written by me, the person who writed it wanted me to post it (I understand the reason now), the planning list is already posted and I have opposed the things going on reddit on that server aswell. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 13:42, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Kutlug Şad — 13.10.2022 O zaman r/Turkviki başlı başına canlı kuklacılık ("Then r/Turkviki is completely meatpuppet") Berk (me) — 13.10.2022 Öyle zaten ("it is, already") Kutlug Şad also posts a screenshot showing him posting a nationalistic comment, calling reddit users to the discord and asks me about it, I told him "don't". BerkBerk⁶⁸ 13:44, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

again, all logs and messages will be opened for Administrators. I have never motivated anyone to make any edits on English Wikipedia on that server. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 13:45, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

So.. you wrote for the sake of someone else? Honestly, your excuses bore me. Prepare to make more, as this is not even scrapping the barrel. As I said, I also have that huge ArbCom report of you. Not to mention you have been called out for nationalistic editing or similiar by other users than me. Let's not forget my previous ANI report of you either. --HistoryofIran (talk) 13:45, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

I have found messages of the owner sending me the text in order to publish it on server at 27.06.2022. since "discord screenshots" can't be used here, I will post it when its necessary. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 16:39, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

I strongly urge you (both) to only send any personal data like that to ArbCom — posting screenshots/text or anything that someone could argue is personal data will, at the very least, cause drama. The back and forth here is unlikely to resolve the issue, given that it appears to depend on this private evidence. — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 17:49, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

its not just me, but also another experienced editor pings 2 other editors including me, asking if that would be "meatpuppet". and I respond: "it would absolutely be called that because it is". messages at 13.10.2022 proves that I am blaming that subreddit. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 13:50, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

@HistoryofIran Per Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 169#Discord logs Posting discord logs on wiki is oversightable. Email them to arbcom. 192.76.8.81 (talk) 13:46, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

I see. The issue is that it (respectfully) takes too long if I message ArbCom. They still haven't updated me regarding the ArbCom report of Berkberk, which I sent two months ago. --HistoryofIran (talk) 13:49, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

@HistoryofIran: If you believe there's action that ArbCom can take, I'd suggest starting a case request — just ensure you keep the right side of WP:OUTING etc, and (re-)email the committee the private evidence — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 18:02, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

• Based on the evidence already provided in this thread regarding how this Discord group has been advertised and coordinated on Reddit, specifically taking issue with content on en.wiki, I don't buy the claim that this is unrelated to en.wiki editing. Frankly, the rhetoric surrounding this group online is WP:RGW and vitriolic enough that I would have serious concerns about them even operating as a group on tr.wiki; there may be a case for starting a discussion on Metawiki. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 16:39, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

  You are openly invited to the aforementioned group to see the proofs of my opposition on the subreddit. messages there are clearly showing that individuals wanted to support the subreddit and to invite reddit users while experienced editors including me opposed that. it would also prove the fact that I have never encouraged/supported anyone to edit on english wikipedia. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 18:01, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

  Could you more clearly explain what the purpose of this Discord group is? Setting aside your specific participation, what is the purpose of the group, and why has it been promoted on reddit forums in the highly combative manner detailed by LouisAragon in the first part of this discussion? _signed, Rosguill ^talk 22:07, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

  The fact that both the Discord and Reddit sub-forum are now private makes BerkBerk's claim even less believable. I also still have that screenshot of his "Planning" message if an admin is interested. --HistoryofIran (talk) 17:52, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

  Actually, according to this post from 9 days ago, the privating the subreddit was something planned in advance, so. That's on me. ~Styyx^Talk? 23:24, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

  Ah, glad to see. Some users think that I am managing a whole reddit group despite I have opposed that group days ago. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 15:29, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

  promotions were made by different users and multiple experienced users including me thought that it would be meatpuppetry and opposed that (as it could be seen on the server messages including the meatpuppet expression). The general thought of the community is that Turkish community on Wikipedia have been regressed a lot due to the disgusting decision of Turkish government on blocking Wikipedia, and therefore source interpretation has changed a lot, which I totally agree with that. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 15:27, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

  Turkish community on Wikipedia have been regressed a lot due to the disgusting decision of Turkish government on blocking Wikipedia, and therefore source interpretation has changed a lot, which I totally agree with that, this does not allay concerns that the discord is operating as a POV-pushing platform. Additionally, your position in this thread is that there is a subset of people involved with the discord that have been publicizing it improperly, against your advice and against the intent of the server in the first place, would be a lot more convincing if you identified the black-hat editors misusing the discord so that we could investigate and address their malfeasance. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 15:39, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

  ofcourse, the user that I have warned about this situation is Kutlug Şad as I explained above. BerkBerk⁶⁸ 16:23, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

There's some POV editing happening right now at Karapapakhs, who were renamed to "Karapapakhs Turks" by some IPs and a new account. Drmies (talk) 21:05, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Have seen a large increase in dubious editing on Turkic history-related articles recently. I asked for a sockpuppet investigation into one because I thought edits were too similar. However, accounts coordinating off-wiki could very possibly be another solution. ~~ AirshipJ29 (talk) 00:17, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Two brand new users are currently engaging in POV editing at Seljuk Empire, attempting to remove 7k sourced information through edit warring. This is not good. --HistoryofIran (talk) 15:44, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

• Aaand r/Turkviki has been made private by its moderators. ~Styyx^Talk? 17:07, 18 October 2022 (UTC)
• My screenshot of BerkBerk's "Planning" comment also shows a certain user (who has the role of "Yönetici", meaning "Executive"), that is User:Beyoglou. A notorious xenophobic pan-nationalist and sock (Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Beyoglou/Archive), whom BerkBerk has claimed that he has "no relation to" [16] and has tried to defend [17]. Yet they are in the same discord, curious. Not to mention some of Beyoglou's socks have come to the aid of BerkBerk several times. Again, I have all kinds of proof to back this up, but WP:OUTING is not making this easy. I would prefer to send this to an admin who would be willing to make a quick judgement of this, rather than ArbCom. Though if I have no choice, I will send it to the latter. This connects rather too well with my current ArbCom report of BerkBerk. --HistoryofIran (talk) 12:12, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

  Individual administrators aren't allowed to act on non-public evidence. It has to be ArbCom for something like this. – Joe (talk) 12:14, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

  Thanks, I have sent it all to ArbCom and asked them about an update regarding my other report. However, I do think some sort of action or actions needs to be taken here, as this is very concerning. We can't just sit idle. --HistoryofIran (talk) 14:09, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

• I've gone ahead and blocked BerkBerk68. If y'all have a clue as to other editors I should block based on this matter, ping me. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 19:31, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

  Was that an action based on private evidence (as you mention on the user's talk page) provided to ArbCom? If so, we can assume this was a block made in your capacity as an arbitrator (given that you wouldn't have access to that private evidence were you not one), and not a "standard functionary" — correct? — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 20:30, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

  @TheresNoTime Ya know, that is a good question. I'm not 100% sure of that answer? I don't think it can be a block in my capacity as an Arb, because individual Arbs can't place blocks. An ArbCom block is by its nature a block by the committee and we only place them after a vote. So I think it must be a block in my capacity as an individual func. I asked that question of another Arb before I blocked, since I too wondered that, and they were also of the opinion that I could use the info ArbCom had been emailed to make an individual block. We do that from time to time with other matters: we get emailed something that really doesn't need the whole committee to waste its time on it, so one of us will just do it as an individual admin action. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 08:15, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

  An individual admin action based on private evidence that no other admin/functionary (other than those on the committee) can verify/review? Doesn't that sound incredibly close to a recent discussion.. perhaps the community needs to be consulted on if they're happy for these actions to take place. I'm certainly not, and would expect our arbs to use a bit of common sense. — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 08:18, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

  I read that RfC as saying that individual admins couldn't make those blocks, but individual CU/OS could, or of course ArbCom. So unless I've misinterpreted that RfC, I don't see how taking the action as an individual CU is an issue? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 08:27, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

  I thought the whole point with allowing that was private evidence was available for review by those with relevant access (i.e., all functionaries can review the private evidence which led to an action being taken)? Seeing as all functionaries are unable to review this evidence, and this wasn't an action by an arbitrator, all I can see is that you've decided to make a block based off of this thread. Perhaps that's warranted, I don't particularly care, but I definitely do care about ArbCom making somewhat secret decisions but enacting them in their private capacity. Whom do we hold accountable, the committee or the arb? How can we review an unblock request in this case? Do we contact the committee, or you? Why didn't ArbCom forward this evidence to the checkuser list when it decided it as an entity didn't want to do anything with it? These are worrying questions, and the community deserves transparency in how often this happens. — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 08:39, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

While I see your concern, I'm not sure it's a major issue. Let's say that someone emails ArbCom an UpWork profile and says "so and so is a paid editor." Technically it's private evidence. But it would not be worth the time of the committee for all 15 members to deliberate and vote on blocking an obvious paid editor. So an individual Arb can just block said obvious paid editor without needing to make it an ArbCom block. It would be no different if say someone had emailed just me, and not ArbCom. In either case, the block I make is as an individual CU. The appeal is not difficult: the CU looking into unblocking just emails the blocking CU (pretty standard procedure) and asks what the basis for the block was. The blocking CU sends over the UpWork profile, and all is well. This case here is but a variation on that theme. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 08:49, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

I disagree, so have opened a dedicated thread below. Thanks. — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 08:52, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

• Thanks, CaptainEek. I will soon make a (probably unpopular) proposal here on how we can deal with this massive off-Wiki campaign, I would appreciate to hear what you all think of it. We shouldn't take this matter lightly one bit imo. Before the Reddit got private, there were like 400 members. --HistoryofIran (talk) 23:02, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
• :"I believe this all goes back to the current massive off-wiki campaign aimed at disrupting Wikipedia, which Beyoglou plays a leading part in."

  There is a massive witchhunt going against a lot of person has nothing to do with our so called "massive discord group". I don't even know any of the banned user excluding my sockpuppet "Crasyy". But as I said they try to accuse all vandals and newcomers on Turkish-topics of being meat puppet and related to our "pan-nationalist" group and block them. It's a concerning situation when it comes to newcomer users who try to edit Turkey related topics. when some of the users that making witch hunt against us notice these newcomers, will try to ban them with accusation of relating to us. Is creating Wikipedia-related community and editing Wikipedia illegal according to policies? Absouletly not. But when it comes to some idiotic teenagers in reddit that has nothing related to us, they made our discord group "Pan-Nationalistic", "Xenophobic". 95.70.214.41 (talk) 14:19, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

  For example under this comment a user named "Nyhtar" says "They are even disrupting article not related to WP:KURDS". A random vandal changes "Russian" with Kurdish and accused to be in one of these groups.

  @TheresNoTime:

  @CaptainEek: and other users who involved. 95.70.214.41 (talk) 14:35, 10 November 2022 (UTC) <--- blocked sock of User:Beyoglou

Proposal

• Proposal: WP:ARBECR (which includes a 500edits/30days restriction) over WP:AA2 and WP:KURDS articles.

As LouisAragon rightly put it, the WP:AA2 and WP:KURDS is a cesspool, and it's not going to get better anytime soon, especially with these massive off-wiki campaigns. In my 10 years on this site, the vast majority of IPs and brand new users in this area have been WP:NOTHERE, often ending up getting indeffed for pov editing and/or egregious attacks. It's also too easy for these troublemakers to sock nowadays, it's almost laughable. For example, see this long SPI archive [18] of the notorious sock Aydın memmedov2000, which doesn't even show all of their socks, there are even more of this person here [19]. Sadly that's just one of many cases. It would alleviate so much time and stress on Wikipedia if we implemented at least some sort of restriction in this area. --HistoryofIran (talk) 00:30, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

I concur with HistoryofIran that there are too many LTAs in WP:AA2 (I can't speak for WP:KURDS) and that something needs to be done to address this. Aside from the LTA HistoryofIran mentioned above, there are 2 additional LTAs (1 & 2) whose socks I must report at least once or twice each month. It's extremely rare for a new account or IP in AA2 to make a helpful edit; instead, 99% of the time, they only do so to vandalise or promote a POV. I think the requirement of 500 edits and 30 days (which could possibly be lowered to 200-300 edits and 15 days) is a good idea to address this problem, so I support it. — Golden ^{call me maybe?} 10:44, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

• Support Yes, for both. There's so much disruption in these areas, I'm surprised we don't already have a good enough restriction on them. Nythar (💬-🎃) 22:39, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

Take a look at this edit I reverted just now. They're even disrupting article not related to WP:KURDS. Let's at least ECP articles directly related to that topic area. — Nythar (💬-🎃) 22:53, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

• Support applying WP:ARBECR to AA2 and KURDS. Levivich (talk) 16:27, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support something needs to be done concerning the flood of IPs and sockpuppets. The AA2 area is continuously being disrupted by the socks of Aydın memmedov2000, Beyoglou, Steverci. And a listing of disruption for the last 3 yrs: 2022 disruption 2021 disruption, 2020 disruption. I think this says it all. --Kansas Bear (talk) 18:45, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

If anyone needs further evidence, check out the 8 9 10 reverts by an IP at the Orontid dynasty. --Kansas Bear (talk) 03:31, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

• Support Clearly something needs to be done here. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:53, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support Surely something must need to be done about this disruption. --Magnatyrannus (talk | contribs) 22:22, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support Very sensible proposal to reduce the disruption. Khirurg (talk) 23:59, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support Long, long overdue. - LouisAragon (talk) 15:30, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support the disruption is only ever going to grow, and it's already at unsustainable levels. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 19:44, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support Even though this won't stop them, it will certainly hinder their disruptive activity. Demetrios1993 (talk) 21:08, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support Clearly there is almost no good activity by IPs and plenty of autoconfirmed socks. This is probably the most effective remedy. ‡ The Night Watch ω (talk) 19:01, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
• @HistoryofIran: I have no opinion on the proposal but would suggest replacing "500edits/30days restriction" with "extended-confirmed restriction" – WP:ECR was carefully drafted specifically to address the nuances of applying a topic-wide 500/30 restriction. Best KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:56, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

I see, so it's more or less the same as my proposal, but also takes cares of other details related to it. Thanks, I have slightly reworded my proposal. --HistoryofIran (talk) 23:31, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

• Support, this is a good idea considering what I've seen when patrolling vandalism. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contribs)} 23:35, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support, Disruptive IPs and socks are becoming a big nuisance for the AA2 area, with experienced editors spending significant time protecting the articles from the never-ending flow of IPs, socks, and new accounts, when they could be spending it more efficiently. Yes, it will affect new editors who have good intentions, however, I believe it is better for them if they do not begin their editing in intense editing areas such as AA2. So, I fully support proposed initiative. A b r v a g l ^(PingMe) 06:18, 13 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support, but only for ethnic or political topics in this area. Under the current scope of AA2, an article about an Armenian railroad would be covered by the sanctions, but ECP would be counterproductive unless the railroad has a significant role in an ethnic conflict, or a non-ECP user has repeatedly added ethnic fanaticism to the article. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 10:53, 13 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support per constant disruption/vandalism by IPs on AA2 topic area. – Olympian ^loquere 06:23, 15 November 2022 (UTC)
• Query I'm not against applying WP:ARBECR, but it seems to me this is an ArbCom-level restriction that needs to be applied, not one that we can do via WP:AN based on its phrasing. I support its implementation, but there appear to be some bureaucratic hurdles we should clarify. Buffs (talk) 22:02, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Wikipedia:General sanctions#Community sanctions says the community can impose any general sanctions it wants, and can (and has) made its general sanctions identical in substance to sanctions imposed under ArbCom's procedures. That's if it wishes to, of course; the community is "not bound by Arbitration Committee procedures and guidelines" when imposing these general sanctions. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 22:58, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• This overwhelming support surely is more than enough for the WP:ARBECR to be implemented? --HistoryofIran (talk) 21:10, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

Only if you're brave enough for the WP:ARCA template, which no one is. Otherwise, it'll probably have to be set up (i.e. split) into something like WP:ARBEE → WP:GS/RUSUKR. HTH. El_C 23:03, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

@El C: I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I understand. Are there even more steps required to go through with this? Weren't we only supposed to vote for it? --HistoryofIran (talk) 23:02, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

@El C: I understood this proposal to be for establishing ECR as a community-imposed general sanction. That would not require ArbCom action, if I'm understanding correctly. @HistoryofIran: I recommend posting at Wikipedia:Closure requests. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:04, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure why you'd think that, Kevin, when the proposal plainly says: WP:ARBECR [...] over WP:AA2 and WP:KURDS. Now, asking the Committee at ARCA to consider doing that, as is the intent here, ought to be relatively straight forward when such overwhelming consensus has been gathered. Had I not been so lazy (I mean, the ARCA template isn't that hard) and likewise anyone else bothering, RUSUKR probably would have passed by motion as +ARBEE. The overall trend has been to streamline (subsume), like with WP:GS/COVID19 → WP:ARBCOVID; WP:GS/IPAK → WP:ARBPAK; WP:GS/IRANPOL → WP:ARBIRP; and so on.

To me, personally, it's more or less all the same (even when inelegant), but beyond that, I think it would make sense to have something along the line of clerks assisting users, who, like in this instance, were able to accomplish community consensus for their proposal to add/adjust an existing ArbCom sanctions regimes. To help them file the paperwork, as it were. Because the less of an access ceiling, the better, I'm sure you'd agree. And all of this as we are in flux. El_C 01:54, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

The confusion about this proposal may be my fault. Before my comment here, the proposal was for "500edits/30days restriction over" the articles. I suggested changing it to WP:ECR, which describes more nuances and implementing rules. My thought was that the community would implement the restriction itself, not that it would ask ArbCom to do so. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 14:55, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm not following. What I quoted (the proposal: WP:ARBECR [...] over WP:AA2 and WP:KURDS) was from Nov 1; your comment to whch you link is from Nov 11. The two Arbcom sanctions regimes mentioned in the proposal, WP:AA2 and WP:KURDS, are ones that many of the users supporting the proposal are already accustomed to (to whichever extent). What would be the benefit of adding a third sanctions regime, except this time making it WP:GS instead of WP:ACDS? Would it not make more sense to just amend AA2/KURDS, instead of overcomplicating everything with a new log, new alerts and page notices, new thing to remember? Thwink about it! El_C 16:42, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Sorry guys, but I am even more lost now. Is there a tutorial somewhere for dummies that I can follow? I wanna proceed as soon as possible, especially since the numbers of socks are slowly ramping up. --HistoryofIran (talk) 23:23, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

That's exactly what I've been trying to work towards in my comments above (and elsewhere), HistoryofIran. I wish Kevin would have addressed my point about this access ceiling. Oh well, maybe next time. El_C 23:28, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

El C, the original proposal was for a 500 edits/30 days restriction, as seen in this diff provided by Kevin. This was overwritten later, following Kevin's comment. Can we please get the administrative and bureaucratic eccentricities out of the way, and have some sort of action on the problem? ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 12:56, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm not preventing you from doing anything, least of all read what I had written. El_C 13:36, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

• Support because of constant sockpuppeting. ZaniGiovanni (talk) 11:32, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Ongoing problems with #CfACP

Ever since problems were raised three weeks ago with the #CfACP campaign, I've been keeping an eye on the edits of Special:AbuseFilter/1073. To recap, this is a meta initiative with four Wikimedians in residence, to combat climate disinformation. The quality of the edits has been very poor: copyright violations, weird wikilinks (for instance, [[global positioning system|global]]), nonsensical citations (f.i. a dermatology paper to talk about the environment), and additions of unsourced text. Participants barely engage on talk.

@Jwale2 is coordinating. The participants from the Kenyan part of the project, for which @Cmwaura is the WiR, are responsible for most edits. @Clayoquot has been so kind to offer training, but disruption has continued. Not entirely sure what we do in similar circumstances. @Astinson (WMF) may advice from the WMF side.

I propose we ask the organisers the following:

1. Immediately stop recruiting volunteers
2. Deal with problematic edits themselves. Cmwaura is a new editor herself, so I'm not sure they have the skills to do this.
   1. Monitor edits. Check each for copyright. I have not seen a single comment on participants talk pages from organisers, nor any corrections in main space. Which means volunteers have had to check around 400 edits, most of which require reverting + warning, or fixing.
   2. Inform participants of basic policies on copyright, linking and citations. Ask problematic editors to stop editing unless they have finished training.
3. Clarify to participants that they will not get compensation for data usage if their edits are unconstructive.

In addition, I think it would be good if an uninvolved administrator could keep an eye on the abuse filter, and place partial blocks from main space/CIR blocks where appropriate. Many participates continue to disrupt after multiple warnings. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 09:54, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

Sending brand new users into a topic area with DS is unwise -- Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 12:28, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

An experienced editor is needed to guide brand new editors in this area, which we don't seem to have. For a DS topic, it's a relative friendly topic area. The disruption is around generic WP:Competence is required issues, so I think the DS angle is less relevant here. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 13:39, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

It is deeply unfair that the (apparently paid) organizers of this project are refusing to engage appropriately. This essentially forces unpaid regular editors into the position of having to scrutinize and correct 400+ problematic edits added by barely-competent participants in another stupid WMF outreach project. This goes double in the area of climate change, where editing usefully may take more scientific understanding than many volunteers have (myself very much included). Frankly I think we should mass-revert anything with this hashtag and block participants if they keep adding rubbish to articles. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 08:02, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

• Looking through that edit filter log, here's a summary of the last few edits from that contest, ignoring edits that were just adding images:

Extended content

1: VickyOmondi adding some content copied almost word-for-word from the source it was taken from, plus some unsourced material, to a GA. 2: Wikilinks added by Smilymecy, many of which were nonsensical or incorrect. E.g. linking "global" in "global crop production" to Global Positioning System; linking "impacts" in "Climate change impacts are stressing agriculture, forestry..." to Impacts of tourism; linking the wrong species of moth that was already linked correctly before; or linking common words like Africa and Canada or "century". 3:Mmaua1 adding material copied word-for-word from the source it was taken from. 4:Kemboh adding an unsourced, incorrectly formatted statement that duplicated the material in the sentence directly preceding it. 5:More wikilinks added by Smilymecy, I couldn't be bothered to look through them, so I gave up at this point.

Why does the WMF continue to run these "contests" and "campaigns" which do nothing but degrade the encyclopedia and waste editor time? From what I can see, the campaign participants have not responded to any of the concerns other editors have brought up on their talk pages, and nor have they tried to rectify any of those issues. For example, VickyOmondi's talk page is filled with dozens of warnings about copyright which all seem to have been ignored. I get the feeling that under normal circumstances, some of these users might have already been blocked for disruptive editing/WP:CIR/WP:IDHT issues. Thank you Femke for donating your time to help clean up their contributions, but I heavily question why it was made necessary for you to do that in the first place. (edit conflict) Endwise (talk) 09:04, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

Today's edits were inappropriate changes of WP:ENGVAR, and the insertion of citations at random locations; I reverted all. Still no response from the organisers. @Jwale2 was active yesterday.

Is this type of disruption sufficiently straightforward that I can impose blocks myself, given how involved I am in this topic area? (I prefer somebody else deal with it, not only because I've yet to figure out how blocking works).

If we do not get a credible route for improvement from the organisers in the next few days, and disruption continues, would it be an idea to disallow these edits with an edit filter? —Femke 🐦 (talk) 18:13, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

Given multiple warnings, I'd be inclined to it now. Distinct, I would also (now) contact the WMF grant-giving setup stating the issues being had and that we advise against the provision of any grant to any of the four, until sufficient guarantees of engagement have been carried out. Those receiving grants have a vastly higher obligation to make damn sure those editors they're supposed to be supporting are, and that communications are adequately handled. Nosebagbear (talk) 20:11, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

Quite frankly, indef anyone who isn't responding to warnings (especially copyright), until we can get them to communicate. Communication is not optional and we have had way too many of these ridiculous contests creating major issues. Asking nicely hasn't worked, so we need to take more drastic action. It's immensely unfair to those who work in that area to have to deal with this on top of the normal level of bad edits. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 21:25, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

@Femke lets have a call if that works for you, to further address the situation. Jwale2 (talk) 19:41, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

Jwale2, I don't feel that it's fair of you to expect Femke, as a volunteer editor, to handle this via a phone call. Can you please respond to these concerns onwiki? That's where the damage is being done. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 23:39, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

@Premeditated Chaos, I am not saying we should have a phone call, I ment we should have a meet-up either online using any of the suitable tools like google meet or zoom, also I am not looking at only @Femke joining, everyone here in the forum can join because of the openness of the community. If that has been agreed a follow-up link will be sent so that we can discuss this.In the mean time you can all watch this video : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=196DsSMUfy0. Thanks Jwale2 (talk) 04:19, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Jwale2, If you're wondering what to say, I strongly recommend saying that you will immediately email all the participants of CfACP and ask them to pause editing, and that you also commit to reviewing all of the edits that participants have already made and fixing any damage that they have caused.

What you're seeing here and on the User Talk pages of various participants is serious warnings from the Wikipedia community. If the problems continue, Wikipedia will take steps to stop the disruption, even if that means banning your project altogether. The only way to avoid that is to stop the disruption yourself. Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 04:25, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

Let's see: "Hi, your project for which you are a paid (?) coordinator, is causing tons of problems, can you please help us in cleaning up the mess and reducing the flow of further problematic edits?" "Nah, not really, but you can join me on zoom or watch a 30 minute youtube video instead!". Time for an edit filter to stop the project, and blocks for people persistently adding copyvio's and the like. And in the future, we should be blocking all these initiatives a lot faster once they turn out to be timesinks here.

I mean, this is the kind of shit this effort produces: an editor changing from one English variant to another, and along the way linking "gangs of professional poachers" to Ganges. Before this, the same article was edited by another CfACP editor, who succeeded in linking poachers to Poachers (film) (twice!) and skirmishes to Skirmisher (amidst a see of overlinking, e.g. linking modern). Fram (talk) 08:50, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

Other edits from yesterday are less a lack of competence and look more like sneaky vandalism or whitewashing: this "typo" correction removed the whole "controversy" section. Perhaps it needed removing, but doing it as "edited typo" with a minor edit indication looks very bad. Fram (talk) 08:58, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

I seem to have missed this thread being started, but if there are problematic editors like this they should be blocked, even if only for short periods, until they can demonstrate that editing appropriately is more important than winning a t-shirt in a contest. Primefac (talk) 09:17, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

@Jwale2: Issues concerning Wikipedia are discussed in the open using text comments that everyone can see (we don't meet-up in private calls). Assuming the claims above are correct, the participants must stop immediately or all those involved must be indefinitely blocked. Johnuniq (talk) 09:39, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

@Johnuniq, well noted. Jwale2 (talk) 22:27, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

Spot check, recommendations

Pardon the new subsection. Uninvolved spot check here. I just opened a list of the 300 most recent edits in the edit filter and clicked the diff for the first time each username popped up (excluding unrelated hashtags). Here are all of them:

• [20] changing focussing to focusing. Focusing is generally more common, including in Australia (the subject of the article), but focussing isn't wrong. Meh.
• [21] adding a citation to the official website in the lead. Not in line with best practices for leads or citations, but not particularly damaging, either.
• [22] adds an organization to a list of organizations. looks good.
• [23] changing English spelling variation. I don't see, at a glance, if the article uses one in particular, but it's likely unnecessary.
• [24] adding wikilinks. At least one seems more or less positive; the others are WP:OVERLINK.
• [25] adds an image to an article on the 2020 East Africa floods, but the image is taken in 2019. it's possible the image could help illustrate issues with drainage/water management in that region, but the context should be clearer. Just "rainy day in bujumbura" isn't particularly useful.
• [26] adds a citation (to material I think the same user added). Seems like a decent source, added properly.
• [27] Expands an overview with a statement that's implied in the preceding sentence, though I could see why someone may find it useful to spell it out (i.e. X affects Y, so changes in X affects amount of Y). Not necessary, but not damaging, either.
• [28] adds a wikilink. Looks appropriate as first instance of that term. It's linked below, but that doesn't make this addition incorrect (the next AWB user will grab it).
• [29] links first instance of "weather disasters" to natural disaster, which seems pretty reasonable.
• [30] adding a citation to a section the same user just added. The section is clearly inappropriate in style and tone, and the wikilink is not intuitive. The citation looks reliable enough, but I cannot access it to ensure it's appropriate where cited.
• [31] adds wikilinks. One looks constructive, one is a redlink (with some formatting trouble), and one is circular.

On a scale of 1-10 where 10 is extremely constructive, 1 is extremely damaging, and 5 is neither constructive nor damaging, the average of these edits is roughly a 4 in my subjective estimation. That is, they're mostly not so constructive, but not all that damaging.

That's not good, but I question the urgency to undo all of them en masse, both because the problems are pretty minor, and because this isn't the great big bomb of bad edits that I was expecting from this thread. The combined impact of this campaign and 1lib1ref and WPWP amounts to about 12.5 edits per day over the past few weeks. It looks like about two thirds are this contest, so we're talking about 8-10 less-than-ideal edits per day. That's not nothing, but it doesn't strike me as an emergency.

That said, participants clearly need more training and guidance, and organizers need to understand a cardinal rule of Wikipedia-related campaigns: volunteer Wikipedians really really really resent feeling like they have to clean up after people who are getting paid/supported. I dare say it's the surest way to turn people against whatever you're working on and make your life hard. The best thing you can do is stay in communication on-wiki, work to fix the existing problems (although some will make it seem like you have to go through all of the edits, making a visible effort to fix things is what most people are really looking for), and, most importantly, explain how you're going to help prevent additional problematic edits through training/dissemination/oversight.

Just based on these edits (and what other people have mentioned), here are a few best practices to disseminate:

1. It is of paramount importance that everyone understand the extent to which Wikipedia respects copyright. Failing to summarize material in your own words, leaving it too similar to the source, will get you banned from Wikipedia faster than any of the other issues being raised. This can be a cultural challenge, because copyright rules and best practices vary by country. Wikipedia has to adhere to a strict view as practiced in the US.
2. When adding wikilinks, click on them to make sure it's the correct page. Only link the first instance a subject is mentioned, and don't add links to subjects that don't exist. Never link a general concept to a specific subject (like from the term "climate change" to an organization with "Climate Change" in its name).
3. There are multiple variations of English, with different spellings and stylistic conventions. It may be wise to google a term before "fixing" a spelling to see if what you're changing is actually considered valid, too.
4. If a new user is unsure what they're doing is correct, they can ask first. Ideally, there are people connected to the contest they can ask, but there are also new user resources like the WP:TEAHOUSE (although that, too, is volunteer run, so we must be mindful not to flood it).
5. I'm sure others may have things to add.

Feel free to leave a message on my talk page. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:31, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

So if the average of these edits is a 4, what is the weighted average? That is you looked at a sample of 300 by 12 different editors. If 100 edits were done by someone who is at an 8 that means something very different than if 100 edits were done by someone who is at a 2. If the larger number of edits is coming from editors lower on the 1-10 rating that suggests a different course of clean-up than if the edits are more evenly distributed among editors or more edits are done by the more competent editors. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 04:23, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

Good question, though I don't have time to calculate that. (and on consideration checking the most recent edit from each person and generalizing the impact is better suited to something like WPWP than this project, since here someone may make a larger edit followed by smaller ones). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 12:35, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

If a spotcheck shows that most edits are not really useful (but not actually damaging), and a detailed check shows that inbetween these "meh" edits you have a number of clearly negative ones (copyvio, bad links, ...), then you end up with net negatives. You may "question the urgency to undo all of them en masse", but if your spotcheck has shown anything, it is that nothing much of value is lost by undoing these edits, while the checks of others have shown that actual problems will be removed: and en masse reverts will at the same time save us a lot of work and frustration (as evidenced by Femke's comments). Nothing to lose, lots to win, so why not? Fram (talk) 09:06, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

It's a fair argument from the content perspective. Mass rollback just comes off as a rejection of the project and its contributors, and inevitably catches some constructive edits that shouldn't be reverted. That's a drastic move I'm not ready to support. This is obviously a big project with a big budget that has the potential to do a lot of good. Rejecting it when the negative impact just isn't all that expansive seems like too much. Obviously any bad edits should be reverted, but, you know, let's make sure they're bad. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 12:35, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

For the people who still expect something useful from the paid coordinator Jwale2, see Paid editing disclosure. Refusing to disclose thei paid status, refusing to engage meaningfully with the community here and instead setting up zoom calls, and then failing to show up at the appointed zoom call with an unpaid volunteer without bothering to let them know that they are too busy. The utter disrespect for enwiki while running a campaign which creates lots of issues while providing no benefits for anyone but Jwale should be enough to show them the door. Such parasitic behaviour should be eradicated, not tolerated. Fram (talk) 09:06, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

I have no problem with the Zoom suggestion. Many people consider making the time to connect "in person" (in the sense that Zoom is more personal than enwp communication) is a gesture of good will and friendliness. If I were Jwale2 I'd probably also be looking for someone to meet with to better understand the problems and how to fix them, and just have a conversation removed from the angry clamoring to "eradicate [my] parasitic behavior" (people tend to be less willing to say such things when you're looking at each other, after all). Missing a call when a volunteer agrees to one is pretty bad, though. We all have freakishly busy days sometimes, but there's some catching up to do now. A question, though: what's the breakdown of responsibilities. Each country has a Wikipedian in Residence -- is it them, rather than the coordinator, who is ultimately the one who needs to check edits? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 12:35, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

In a Zoom, you get to explain things to one or a few people, and then what? Then these people must relay the responses here? Why would we add an intermediate level to have this discussion, which is about the edits on enwiki? And not with some newbie, but with someone experience enough to become the paid WiR for this? Someone with more than 300 article creations (with 62 of those deleted, a very high ratio of about 1 in 5 articles deleted!). And of course, you are reversing cause and effect; I talk about "parasitic behaviour" just because they want to have the position and the money, but not the consequences, the work, the responsabilities that come with it. To use that as an excuse not to come here is reversing cause and effect. If they wanted "good faith and friendliness", they could have shown perhaps some inclination to take the issues serious (and no, posting a link to a 30 minute youtube movie is not really helping). Jwale2 was made aware of the issues on 19 October, nearly a month ago. Nothing has improved since. Fram (talk) 13:21, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

I just revisited your spotcheck. Your first one was part of a series of 4 edits, which I just reverted. The editor came across "floral and fauna" and instead of correcting it to "flora and fauna", they linked "floral" to Floral (emblem) and added a source for both the words "flora" and "fauna"[32]. That's not a "meh", that's an "ugh", a negative we can do without.

Your third one[33] may seem useful, until one notices that the same organisation was already included twice in the list... So labeled "looks good" in your list, but I reverted it. Your fourth and fifth ones were already discussed and are both reverted already. The 8th one was already partially reverted, and I reverted it completely as a copyvio[34]. 9th one was already reverted[35]. This one[36] was reverted as well. The few others were mostly meh are at the very best a useful wikilink, but overall this is a clear timesink, a waste of money from the side of the investors and a waste of time of volunteers both those enlisted by the WIRs and those here. Fram (talk) 14:15, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

As recommendations have already been given, both to individual participants by volunteers and to organisers, and all were basically ignored, that route is not feasible any more. While the conversation has moved from the edit filter, I still think that's the best solution for now to ensure these concerns are no longer ignored. Can somebody set up and edit filter to disallow?

I don't know who at the WMF is responsible here (@Jwale2/@Cmwaura)? In an unrelated call, I have spoken to somebody who knows the funders well, who will do some enquiries. I afraid my involvement ends here, as an old injury has resurfaced. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 17:11, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

User:Tgr has provided some Quarry queries that could be of interest here:

• Revert percentage for one or more users
• Revert percentage for a hashtag

The latter gives an overall revert rate of 26% for all #CfACP edits. This includes complete manual reverts in addition to automated ones. Edits that are partially reverted, like this one which I partially reverted in this edit and this edit are not included. The second query gives us a list of users whose contributions should be individually checked, preferably by people who are part of the Code for Africa project. There are definitely edits with the hashtag that still need to be reverted (again, preferably by people responsible for the project) but unfortunately it's too late to do some of them automatically. Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 05:28, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Finance stuff

I'm just going to leave this here: One of the sources of funding for this project is a USD $95,000 grant from the Poynter Institute.[37] I have asked Jwale2 to make a paid editing disclosure; people might be interested in the reply here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jwale2#Paid_editing_disclosure . Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 02:45, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

This is getting ridiculous. If anyone should be getting paid, it should be those such as Clayoquot who are cleaning up this mess and have tried to resolve this without shutting down the campaign. If it were up to me, I'd hand Jwale2 an indef right now for UPE. Looking at Jwale2's history here, I am flabbergasted that anyone though putting them in charge of an editing campaign was a good idea; they have no clue about how policies work here. Their response to a copyright warning from Diannaa was to, and I'm not making this up, invited her to a podcast interview. Creations that end up deleted as at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Filling Station In Ghana give me no confidence either.

Editors far more skilled and polite than I have tried their best to resolve this. As Femke says above, they've been stonewalled. All that leaves us with is an edit filter and/or blocking the participants. One or both should be done in all due haste. This is a tremendous waste of volunteer time and we shouldn't have to deal with it anymore. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 17:52, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

Just FYI, the Wikimedia Foundation didn't fund the project, we did send them documentation on how to create WIR roles, but we were not involved in the WIR selection or plan of work process. Several previously successful organizers are involved in the project, so I would recommend giving benefit of the doubt -- and that they are learning from their mistakes. We do have some contact with the team, and will bring some of the concerns in these threads to them -- I also have more direct contact with some of the WIRs and am providing more mentoring and support as is requested, Astinson (WMF) (talk) 13:38, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

From our perspective as volunteer editors, we don't see any of that. What we see is a continuing pattern of campaigns like this causing disruption, and those responsible for the campaigns not being responsive to community concerns. We are not getting paid to handle any of this, but the WIRs are. That's immensely unfair to the community. These edit campaigns may be well-intentioned, but time and time again this happens. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 18:25, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Pausing editing

I just got an email from Cmwaura that she asked me to share here as she doesn't have a good Internet connection today. SHe has told the Kenyan editors editing climate change articles to stop editing for now. Cmwaura is the WiR for the Kenyan volunteers in the project. I am not sure if her message will get to the other countries, but this should dry up most of the stream of bad edits. She also shared details of how she is arranging for more training for herself and others. Best, Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 18:26, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

The Edit Filter log has been quiet for the past 24 hours. I hope it stays that way for a while. Femke and I, and maybe other volunteers here, need the rest. Hopefully, the CfACP organizers will use this pause in activity to fully examine what went wrong and address the root causes. Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 21:14, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

Need spot-checking for #CfAEP

Jwale2,who brought us #CfACP, also seems to be the organizer of #CfAEP. I looked at edits to two articles and one of the edits turned a correct factual statement into a factually incorrect one.[38] Hooray for misinformation-fighting! Would anyone like to do some further spot-checking? Here's the hashtag search tool. Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 22:28, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

Is there ANYONE besides Jimmy Wales in charge of things at Wikipedia anymore?! This is an absurd situation. $95,000 is a lot of money. I read this entire thread, the Diannaa interaction, saw the invitation to watch the youtube video (I even watched the 1st few minutes of it), and saw the responses of Jwale2 (who is always agreeable and assenting but apparently does not carry through on anything). Please, Clayoquot, don't run yourself ragged over this. I am a woman too. You and the others in this thread should be getting that $95,000. Well, the solution would be if Wikipedia were better managed and these ridiculous initiatives were not even undertaken.--FeralOink (talk) 16:16, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

New essay about noticeboards

Editors and admins here may perhaps be interested in WP:Don't knit beside the guillotine. It addresses some aspects of the wiki-culture at noticeboards, and grew out of a now-archived discussion at Wikipedia talk:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive 16#Making ANI less toxic. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:02, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

This is a fantastic essay, definitely needed more than ever in this day and age. I will thoroughly ponder its lessons, and will do my best to take them to heart. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 16:46, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Thanks! --Tryptofish (talk) 21:10, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Well written, Tryptofish! But ... is this your way of telling us that you have a completely unrelated doppelganger who looks just like you? --GRuban (talk) 19:47, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

It is a far, far better essay than I could ever write... --Tryptofish (talk) 20:27, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

This is a really excellent essay. #Dealing with it is especially good advice. The (thankfully few) times I've been the subject of the ANI mob, I've felt appallingly alone, and wondered why nobody is stepping in to speak reason. But when I see others being subjected to it, I can't even bring myself to read the whole thread, never mind try and de-escalate. We should do better. – Joe (talk) 09:34, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

• In our current culture, I don't see mob rule going away any time soon, but we would do well to avoid such behavior. Hyperbole and assumption of nefarious motives is the way people see the world (especially online). I applaud the effort all the same. Buffs (talk) 17:52, 10 November 2022 (UTC)
• Much as I like the content of the essay, on the essay's talk-page I commented that the choice of title and historical examples is peculiar, and could cause the essay to be criticized for (unintentional) gender bias. NightHeron (talk) 11:48, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

  It's history...it's hardly gender bias... Buffs (talk) 17:59, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

A choice is being made concerning what history to include. Obvious historical examples of the harm caused by a mob mentality would be the witch hunts in Europe and America, the pogroms in the Russian Empire, or the lynchings in the American South. In all those cases virtually all the perpetrators were male. But those examples weren't chosen. NightHeron (talk) 19:52, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

They weren't chosen not because someone hates women or prefers men, but 'cause angry mob of lynchers is already used as example here. Please don't be quick to assume bias or discrimination. a!rado🦈 (C✙T) 21:24, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Perhaps you didn't notice the word "unintentional" in my posting above.

BTW the picture at WP:Angry Mob Noticeboard is not of a lynch mob. NightHeron (talk) 22:40, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Alright, as someone from the US, you know more about lynch mobs than me. If you say that toy villagers on the picture don't look like they're going to do pogrom in Lego City's ghetto, I trust you. This all was intended as lighthearted nod to humorous "noticeboard", but I again messed up like dummy. Sorry and have a nice day! a!rado🦈 (C✙T) 14:28, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Great essay, Tryptofish. The mob mentality at ArbCom proceedings and other dramaboards can be horrific. They often function as kangaroo courts with no rights or protections for the accused. All forms of gross violations of our rules of conduct are allowed, including real-life slander and libel, with no repercussions at Wikipedia, but very real damage in real life elsewhere. I was once dragged through an ArbCom trial, and I was very close to committing suicide. Never in my life had I felt so helpless and alone. Fortunately, some other editors defended me and exposed the dubious nature of the accusations, my accusers community banned, and I was later vindicated.

I asked an admin whether BLP applies to editors and was told it does not. All living persons, including people not associated with a BLP article, are protected, but not editors. That's awful. That explained what happened. Ever since then I have been reluctant to participate at dramaboards. They are not places where justice is served. I have never fully recovered from that experience. Before that, I never had issues with depression. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:08, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

Thank you very much for that post, Valjean. As someone who has long had depression myself, but not in any way as a result of Wikipedia, I am very moved by what you describe. The thought that anyone could even briefly consider suicide as a result of an experience at this website chills me to my core, and I hope everyone keeps it in mind whenever they interact with any of our noticeboards. I won't be so presumptuous as to hope that the essay I wrote will lessen the risk of something like that ever happening here again, but I do hope so. I also hope that you are getting all the medical help that you need; that's had a tremendous benefit for me. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:50, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

Nominations now open for the 2022 Arbitration Committee elections

Eligible editors may now nominate themselves as candidates in the 2022 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee elections. Nominations must be transcluded by 23:59, 22 November 2022 (UTC). Please note that there is a change to the process this year: per WP:ACERFC2022, questions may only be asked on the official questions pages after the nomination period is over. Thanks, Mz7 (talk) 03:41, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Contacting IPv6 users

IPv6 addresses are generally allocated with one /64 per customer. See these pages for more information:

IPv6 subnetting reference

User:TonyBallioni/Just block the /64

Contributions per /64 IPv6 block can be viewed by adding /64 to the Special:Contributions URL. That, however, is just about the limit of MediaWiki's helpfulness in dealing with them. Viewers for other types of logs (edit filter, etc) only work with individual users or IP addresses. This is fine for IPv4, but not for IPv6 where a "user's IP address" is effectively an entire /64 subnet. Some system configurations switch addresses within a subnet much more frequently (daily or more) than an ISP assigns a new subnet.

Single IPv6 addresses are much less stable than single IPv4 addresses and IPv6 /64s.

Which brings me to the point: It is very difficult to contact an IPv6 user because you can only leave messages on talk pages of individual addresses. If their operating system switches addresses, they won't see the messages ever again.

This is a technical limitation of MediaWiki. Are there any solutions or workarounds? --Frogging101 (talk) 16:42, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Frogging101, it may (eventually) be moot. IP masking has been coming for 3 years now. Cabayi (talk) 17:33, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

In addition to this forthcoming feature, phabricator is probably full of requests for a /64 talk page notification feature. Nothing will be done about that, especially with IP masking on the agenda. One extreme option that I've used to great effect before is to use a block message. But that's extreme, and not always effective. For normal cases, there's detailed coverage of solutions and workarounds over at Wikipedia:IP hopper. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 17:46, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

The /64 thing isn't very reliable anyway, it depends a lot on where in the world you are and who your ISP is. Lots of people jump around much wider ranges than that. Girth Summit _(blether) 17:50, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

IP masking? Where can we tell them that this is a bad idea? Frogging101 (talk) 18:13, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure that you can. However, start here: m:IP Editing: Privacy Enhancement and Abuse Mitigation. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 18:26, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

IPV6 addresses can be automatically configured by the attached router to include your connected devices UNIQUE MAC address, making unmasked ipv6 edits traceable in some cases to specific people and not just networks. This MAC address can follow you from network to network of they are also configured to provide guaranteed unique addresses, allowing a user to be tracked easily as they travel. Masking is good, unless you really need to find dissident voices as part of your government job. The night king kills Arya in the winds of winter (talk) 23:45, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Two suggestions for consideration:

1. Add a link to MediaWiki:Anontalkpagetext with a list of IPv6's with a talk page in the same /64...

   e.g. on User talk:2600:100F:B1BE:D70D:7DFA:D992:F760:3915 → Special:PrefixIndex/User_talk:2600:100F:B1BE:D70D:

2. Start leaving messages on the /64's :0:0:0:0 address & redirect the actual talk page there. It would coalesce the /64 for talk purposes. If :0:0:0:0 causes problems, maybe use :77:69:6B:69 (wiki)?

I've not fully thought it through. Just spitballing. Cabayi (talk) 13:21, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

I don't think that will work. You want to trigger that "You have new messages" WP:OBOD, and centralizing the discussions onto a page that isn't the IP address you're currently using won't have that effect. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 02:18, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

The elephant in the room that unfortunately often doesn't get discussed in these situations is that IP editing, and policies and procedures and norms surrounding it, including talk page communication was enacted basically 2 decades ago, before IPv6 existed, where all addresses were IPv4, and where most editing happened from hardwired, desktop computers with stable, static IP addresses. This is not the world we live in, and yet most of our standard practices around IP addresses still operates like we are. It's been an openly known and not often discussed problem that has existed for a long time. I'm not sure there is a solution, or at least, not one worth working on, as the entire IP editing system is being massively overhauled with the IP masking processes coming down the pike from WMF. And no, it's not worth arguing against at this point; the natural conflict between privacy and security will always exist, and the pendulum has swung towards privacy. If you can square that circle and somehow create a system that perfectly protects privacy and allows perfect security, good on ya. A lot of minds smarter than you have been working on it for centuries, and have not yet figured it out. No, we have no reliable way of communicating with IPv6 users. The reality is, we never have, but we've also never really tried to fix it. --Jayron32 18:51, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

User:LDS20 - block review

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

---

I've just indeffed this editor purely on the basis of their user page (linked above) which I've only blanked, not deleted. I am unconvnced that a user whose userpage claims them to be a member of the "Ground Forces" of a neo-fascist and racist organisation, as part of "1st Woodland Combat Brigade" and whose "battle campaigns" include 2020–2022 United States racial unrest is worth keeping in a collaborative environment, regardless of their actual edits.

Your mileage may, of course, vary. Black Kite (talk) 18:58, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• Without actual evidence of disruption or violation of policies via diffs, I don't think an admin should not be justifying actions with essays when deciding to indefinitely and unilaterally block editors. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 19:26, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  "Without ... I don't think ... should not be justifying"... Well, there's a triple negative for the ages. — Trey Maturin has spoken 19:34, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  I completely concur with DWF. It's a slippery slope without any rails. Buffs (talk) 22:57, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• Sorry, I'm too busy laughing at someone claiming to be a Proud Boy saying "I believe if we can move beyond all the hate and divisiveness..." to come up with a good review of this block. Maybe just a kid role-playing? Trolling? --Floquenbeam (talk) 19:31, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• Their edits are actually OK (I think - I'm not sure about this stuff). The block is purely on the basis of the userpage, which probably violates at least two of the five pillars. Black Kite (talk) 19:39, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  That is, apparently, Runic. Makes "kid role-playing" slightly more likely. --Floquenbeam (talk) 19:45, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Indeed. And it looks like a phonetic translation of the info already on their page, as well as a personal name. Dumuzid (talk) 19:47, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

They are specifically Anglo-Saxon runes rather than the similar long branch Younger Futhark (the Ear (rune) gives it away) and are indeed phonetic-based spellings of personal names. I'm trying to say this as neutrally as possible, but runes are often used by groups other than kids roleplaying, so their usage shouldn't be discounted, but also shouldn't be taken at face value as something negative either. Edit: thinking about it, there's no sense beating around the bush. Runes are sometimes used by white supremacists. They're not the only ones that use it so seeing runes isn't a clear-cut indication that someone is associated with white supremacy by any means, but a self-professed member of the Proud Boys saying that the 2020–2022 United States racial unrest is a "battle/war" that they took part in does raise an eyebrow and the runes should not be used as evidence that it's a kid roleplaying (the other details not fleshing out, however, does suggest that). That said, they've put their name, DOB, and location in that infobox, if they're trolling they might be trolling in someone else's name. - Aoidh (talk) 05:05, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• If you're going to block someone and discuss them here, please state specifically why, in policy, they should be blocked. Citing essays (which aren't policy) and "probably violates at least two of the five pillars" is inappropriately vague. I'm not here to say "let's invite all the Nazis in!", but if he isn't disrupting anything, why not simply remove the portions of his page that are generally not permitted and move on? You've already blanked his page. There's literally nothing for him to do at this point to be unblocked other than acknowledge he can't promote his affiliations.

  I would expect that the same rules apply to these users of {{User antifa}}? Buffs (talk) 22:26, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• If any other admin thinks this sort of thing is OK, they are of course welcome to accept the unblock request that is currently at User_talk:LDS20 (which appears to contain little self-awareness, but whatever). Black Kite (talk) 19:55, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support block. The Proud Boys are designated as a terrorist group in my country, Canada. In addition, they are basically what WP:NONAZIS is all about. I think proudly proclaiming your membership in (indeed, directorship of a chapter of) a "neo-fascist, white nationalist" group is incompatible with collaborative editing good. Oh, sure, the edits may be fine, but this reminds me of the bartender story. Also comment I placed the unblock request on hold. Can the closing admin please resolve their unblock request as per whatever consensus emerges here? Thanks. --Yamla (talk) 19:57, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
• Do not unblock. Infobox officeholder? OK.. apparently the office held is that of Director of Proud Boys of St. Clair County. 1st Woodland Combat Brigade? And under the heading "Battles/wars" in the infobox, we find 2020–2022 United States racial unrest. (This is a long, detailed Wikipedia article which does not even mention the Proud Boys. I guess that does not prevent the user from being proud of the group's achievements during the unrest.) Also 2020-21 United States election protests. This user who is attempting to bring "battles" and "wars" to Wikipedia needs to be blocked either per WP:NONAZIS or as a flaring troll. Do not unblock; do not waste more time on them. Bishonen | tålk 20:21, 16 November 2022 (UTC).
• Dont think we should be blocking people without evidence of actual disruption. Started with Bedford, and looking back at how this has continued I kind of regret talking myself into that block on the basis of a couple of shitty edits to the mainspace, but at least there were shitty edits to the mainspace that could justify it. Not going to spend energy arguing for an unblock, but I do wish the block had not happened. Theres enough crap going on that we dont have to actively look for problems. nableezy - 22:07, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Agreed. We are going down a path of blocking people for political differences. In no way do condone any of these groups, but the block itself is based on claimed affiliation, not actual edit history. Buffs (talk) 22:26, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• Theres close to 0 chance this is going to get overturned, nobody is going to go to bat for a user with 327 edits saying he's a proud Proud Boy, but down below theres a statement about "divisive and polemical views" being by themselves disruptive. And Im sure somebody will come along with a Hate is Disruptive wikilink, but we are continuing down this path of a Wikipedia orthodoxy that if one strays from it they are shunned from the community. A place of knowledge is not supposed to be a place free of divisive views. It is not supposed to be a place where you are always comfortable. The body that makes up the editor base of the English Wikipedia is largely white, male, liberal (by US standards at least), progressive on most social issues. I dont even have to base this on my own userbox, as was discussed earlier and others are hinting at below, as I dont even consider it to be a "pro-Hezbollah" userbox anyway. What it is being against results like this. Results in which a body of editors decides that it is unacceptable to hold a view. Not make an edit, but hold a view. Whatever view. And I can understand that this is to make this a more welcoming place for the minorities that are underrepresented in our editor base. I can imagine that it would not be comfortable to be Black and editing Murder of George Floyd alongside a self-declared Proud Boy. Not everything is supposed to be comfortable. We should be blocking people based on their actions as it relates to other editors directly and our articles. Not on some idiotic infobox on their userpage. nableezy - 23:18, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  To clarify, the user page I'm envisioning for that example is something that says explicitly something along the vein of This user supports Hezbollah, not a weird green and yellow box that explicitly supports violent resistance but doesn't name a specific group as the desired target. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 23:46, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Even then, shouldnt matter. You are basing the idea that this should be prohibited on the basis that some other states have condemned them. So what? (And as far as the 911 report, it also calls the 83 Beirut bombings "Hezbollah's massacre of marines", which would be a surprise considering it was founded in 1985). But really, so what? The African National Congress was designated a terrorist group by the United States and other South African allies. So what? What does that have to do with anybody's editing? nableezy - 23:54, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Regarding What does that have to do with anybody's editing, perhaps nothing. My intent with the questions below were to try to elicit policy-based reasons from editors that support the justification for the initial block, but I'm left without seeing a strong policy basis for it. I think there's ample justification for blocking per WP:NOTHERE as a troll, but I'm unsatisfied with the original rationale for the block if nobody can point to policy that justifies it. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 01:20, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Support block: I don't think that editing privileges should be extended to a self-identified member of a violent, neo-fascist organization, the Proud Boys. --K.e.coffman (talk) 22:24, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Should we block members on site if they are part of violent, anti-fascist organizations too? Buffs (talk) 22:35, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

there's no need to bludgeon the discussion. --K.e.coffman (talk) 05:30, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Gotcha. "don't like the group = deserving of blocking...but only for groups I don't like. Others are fine if I like their organization". Buffs (talk) 06:15, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Questions. How do people feel about blocking supporters/members of violent terrorist organizations, such as Hezbollah? Is there a policy basis for such a block if they indicate their support/membership on their user page? If so, what is that policy basis? If not, what policy basis applies to this block and not to the case where a supporter/member of Hezbollah is editing Wikipedia and disclosed so on their userpage? — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 22:44, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  ^^^ What WTH said... Buffs (talk) 22:55, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  (edit conflict) I am less familiar with Hezbollah. My understanding is Hezbollah has a political wing as well as a militant group. My personal position is someone identifying themselves on Wikipedia as a part of a terrorist organisation should be blocked. I believe, but could be mistaken, that the militant group part of Hezbollah may qualify, but the political wing would not. The Proud Boys, by comparison, only have the militant part. The specific policy is harder to find, and may not exist. WP:POINT by posting the infobox? Wikipedia:User_pages#Advocacy_or_support_of_grossly_improper_behaviors_with_no_project_benefit? WP:CIVIL? I accept the possibility that my position may not backed by policy and we may be obligated to allow people to post their support or participation in terrorism, white supremacy, and other distasteful topics, though I hope that isn't the case. --Yamla (talk) 22:59, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  The proscribed remedy for advocacy as you cited is "These may be removed, redacted or collapsed by any user to avoid the appearance of acceptability for Wikipedia, and existing speedy deletion criteria may apply." It says nothing about blocking him. Buffs (talk) 23:25, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  I wasn't going to reply to this, but what do you think would be the reaction of a non-white US editor who came to this editor's page to discuss an issue, to find they claimed to be a part of a group that included violent racists? Black Kite (talk) 23:31, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  To be blunt, that's not the issue at hand (the issue is what have been his actions that justify a block), but I'll address it anyway. The answer is: I haven't the least idea what some hypothetical person's reaction would be. It could be anything from indifference to curiosity to anger to rage to "well this guy is clearly an idiot" to "man, I want to be part of Proud Boys" to "I hate that they just let anyone on WP" to "well, I don't like that opinion, but everyone is entitled to their own opinion" to...who knows? There isn't a simple monolith opinion or reaction that's possible to describe for a "non-white US editor". The idea that you believe there is a single opinion is highly concerning. Likewise, and more importantly, you have no idea of my minority status, so you seem to indicate that you feel that my opinion should be discounted minority (

  You should deleted the offensive material (as directed at Wikipedia:User_pages#Advocacy_or_support_of_grossly_improper_behaviors_with_no_project_benefit). Nothing you've cited justifies your block. In fact, you openly stated that none of his edits were inappropriate in articles.

  Since you've bothered to reply to a comment that wasn't directed at you, perhaps you can explain why there's no effort on your part to block avowed members of a organization dedicated to using violence to achieve their political goals? You've already made remarks that people of specific religious faiths shouldn't be allowed to close discussions involving political matters (and defended that action).

  If you want to block someone, it should be for policy reasons, not an essay that does not have widespread acceptance. Buffs (talk) 05:19, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Hezbollah's delegation depends somewhat on the country; some countries (like France) recognize a difference between the political wing and the militant wing, while the United States and United Kingdom don't distinguish in status. Page 68 of the 9/11 Commission Report even notes military ties between the group and Al-Qaeda in the mid 1990s.

  There's a content guideline that Userboxes must not be inflammatory or substantially divisive, but in general the solution is to simply delete the pages that are in violation of that (and, while technically that wasn't a userbox on the right side of his page, I think that this same logic applies here). This user should remain blocked under WP:NOTHERE for being a clear troll whose account was made to intentionally be as inflammatory as possible. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 23:32, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Great, so you think the block was fine, and your Questions above were literally just an attempt to hijack this discussion into an unrelated third rehash of a specific user's page that I've seen people post this week. Parabolist (talk) 01:02, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Not quite. If you read my rationale for the block, it's that the user's a troll who made an inflammatory userpage in order to drum this up, which leads me to believe that they're WP:NOTHERE. That's quite different than the original rationale for the block, which I'm not able to find a strong policy basis for. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 01:17, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Here, here. Buffs (talk) 05:19, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• The infobox on their user page is an extremely bad look that goes well beyond the "advocating violence" litmus test that is more or less consensus right now, as it suggests having proudly committed said violence (as well as holding a view of the George Floyd protests that could be described as "fringe", but is so out there that "tendentious" may be more accurate). Their unblock request is also weak, as the focus on their lack of racist intent seems like sealioning. That having been said, I don't think jumping to an indef block is appropriate. I also strongly disagree with the litmus test to userspace propriety being based around the question of terrorism, a label which says more about a group's relation to institutional authority in its area of operations than it does about their moral character or the extent that advocating for them would be disruptive to other editors. I also think that the "advocating violence" test is overly simplistic, but don't have a 30-second solution other than the Solomonic "no political content in user space at all" that I don't think anyone wants. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 22:49, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  I see no evidence that they "proudly committed said violence". There were lots of people who simply protected businesses against rioting and that may be to what he's referring...no idea if that's true. Buffs (talk) 22:54, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  I think that framing it as participation in a military campaign, on behalf of a paramilitary grouping, pretty clearly suggests violence. "Protecting businesses against rioting" can also be a violent act. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 23:01, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Even the US military has decorations for humanitarian missions. While it's vague, I think you're concluding WAY too much. Buffs (talk) 23:29, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  I also agree with Floq below that the odds that LDS20 actually are a member of the Proud Boys is very, very low. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 23:10, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse block. Creating user pages of this sort, promoting divisive and polemical views, is in and of itself disruption, as such content violates WP:NOT and WP:POLEMIC. The user should be unblocked if they convincingly promise not to repeat such conduct. Sandstein 23:03, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
• The thing is, if I were to guess, I'd say that "Second Director of the Proud Boys of St. Clair County, 1st Woodland Combat Brigade" has about a 0.1% chance of actually existing. It's something a 7th-grade idiot would think sounds realistic. LDS20 has shown, once again, how easy it is to troll WP. Someone should just decline the unblock, archive this section, and ignore the kid and/or troll behind this. --Floquenbeam (talk) 23:07, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  So...why should he be blocked then? Buffs (talk) 23:30, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Because they're trolling. Floquenbeam (talk) 23:31, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  And, as I've said above, imagine if I was a non-white editor who came to discuss an issue with this editor, only to find they were part of a violent racist group? But you do you, Buffs. Black Kite (talk) 23:34, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse block per Floq and Bish. WP:PACT. Miniapolis 23:18, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
• Question Block, my thoughts here is that this would on the surface further the idea that Wikipedia is a liberal website. I have a very strong distaste for their sentiment and views but can't this be handled by Discretionary sanctions IF the editing rises to that level? That seems like a relatively simply fix without a block that can be twisted in purpose by those who wish to? Unbroken Chain (talk) 23:43, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

  Anything can be twisted any way people want it to. Decisions should be made on the basis of the rules, and what's best for the encyclopedia. Second guessing every decision with "how could a bad faith actor spin this?" will ruin your ability to do anything, and it's not worth spending the brainpower on. Parabolist (talk) 01:05, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

User:Parabolist, their actual edits seem constructive though, I'm not seeing problematic editing other then the obvious userpage. Unbroken Chain (talk) 02:24, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• I haven't reviewed the full edit history, but this case is a fairly obvious troll and blockable as such. I would still caution that blocking solely for userspace stuff when they're not disruptive in mainspace is a dangerous road. If the user in question here wasn't a probable troll, a better solution would have been to just blank the problematic material and then give the user a pointer to the userspace policy (again, not really suited for troll situations). There's a line between being a host for problematic material on all ends of the spectrum and/or feeding trolls, and excessively policing userspace and personal speech. Does the fact that I have {{User MSG descendant}} and {{User CSA descendant}} alongside other similar US military history userboxes violate Wikipedia:No Confederates, which I've seen cited on par with the NONAZIS essay? No, but based on the tenor of some discussions I've seen here and at MFD, I'd bet there'd be some established editors who would say yes. Hog Farm _Talk 00:32, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  What evidence is there that he is a "fairly obvious troll"? Buffs (talk) 06:12, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• The user says that they are from St. Clair County, Alabama. An early edit was to remove content about a vicious local campaign of racist violence and harassment against Black Muslims in that county, as reported by Time magazine. The Pell City Public Library in the county seat maintains an archive of newspaper articles about that racist campaign. LDS20 removed that content three times, calling it "vandalism" in their third edit summary. The editor who added that accurate but unreferenced content was brand new, but left Wikipedia after their contribution was reverted three times. Nobody explained the need for references to them. LDS20 hss also tried to keep any mention of notable drag queen Trinity the Tuck out of the "Notable people" section of Springville, Alabama, despite the fact that person spent much of their childhood in that town and attended high school there. I think that LDS20 started out as a civil far right POV pusher and morphed into a troll playing the role of a civil POV pusher. So, I endorse the block, although I do not think that NONAZIS should be given as the reason. That essay may be popular with many but I do not think that it enjoys widespread enough support in its present form to be used in this fashion. Whitewashing racist violence, erasing gender minorities and grandiose userpage trolling are enough to block for disruptive editing. As for the troll's skills, they got a bunch of us to discuss a controversial Lebanese organization and the definition of terrorism, did't they? Cullen328 (talk) 02:48, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  If you are going to cite someone's history, you really should provide diff's to illustrate. You should also provide them in context.

  First, you stated, he had An early edit was to remove content about a vicious local campaign of racist violence. While that was indeed the content removed, you failed to mention that the reason it was removed was that it didn't have a source mentioned...and it didn't. While {{cn}} could have been used, unreferenced material can be removed on WP. Furthermore, it appears the information was grossly disproportionate in the subject's history section (clearly violating WP:UNDUE). I'm not saying it should/shouldn't be mentioned, but when one issue accounts for 1700 of the 2100 characters for a county over 200 years old, I think that pretty clearly violates WP:UNDUE.

  You also stated LDS20 hss [sic] also tried to keep any mention of notable drag queen Trinity the Tuck out of the "Notable people" section of Springville, Alabama. Look at the whole history. While I see the removal here and here, I think there's a reasonable debate as to where someone is "from" and seems to be a reasonable content dispute. He wasn't arguing for exclusion, just placement elsewhere. Later, he trimmed unnecessary details, but left it in-place...this was 2 months ago. It seems very much that discussion yielded keeping it and he was willing to abide by consensus. I also see some highly defamatory remarks added to the article about LDS without any justification in violation of WP:BLP, WP:CIVIL, WP:Casting aspersions, etc. I think that this pretty reasonably could be considered "Vandalism" and was correctly removed...arguably it should be revdel'd. To argue that the person left WP is without evidence. To the contrary, it is very likely that this person didn't leave, but became a registered user: Special:Contributions/AbbyN1982.

  In both of these instances, you've made a lot of assumptions in bad faith and inappropriately left out details. Buffs (talk) 06:11, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Buffs, diffs are needed when the edits in question are hard to find or confusing. I provided links to the two articles where the edit histories are not at all difficult to parse. The edits are readily visible and obvious. As for the racist violence and harassment that took place in Springfield in 1969, I was able to find evidence of it with a ten second Google search and the local public library maintains an archive about it. It was not minor. It was violent, egregious and institionalized, and the then governor of Alabama was a cheerleader and an enabler. Perhaps this kind of thing could be forgiven from a genuinely naive new editor, but their ugly indistrial strength trolling in late 2022 renders that theory spurious. Nice try, though. Cullen328 (talk) 06:55, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Buffs, did you not notice that I wrote accurate but unreferenced? Please read what I wrote more carefully. Thank you. Cullen328 (talk) 07:00, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Also, Buffs, you are entirely mistaken about the editor I mentioned who might have been discouraged fron editing Wikipedia by LDS20. I was talking, as should be clear to anyone looking at these edits, about User: Onnani and their factual but unreferenced newbie edits to St. Clair County, Alabama. Read the edit summaries by LDS20. They never claim that the content was false but rather that it was Nor a significant staple in the county's history. What does "significant staple" mean in this context? Staples are wire fasteners for papers or basic foodstuffs in a region. Do we need to pad out the article about a that county to include its minor role in the Creek War or its impressive Cotton mills in order to also include content about the vicious violent racism that took place there? If so. please feel free to add more content about that other stuff. Cullen328 (talk) 07:52, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Read WP:SIGNIFICANT...WP:UNDUE applies as well. I'm not for its removal entirely, but it was clearly and unnecessarily heavily weighted. Buffs (talk) 16:40, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse block - per WP:NOTHERE, WP:TROLL, and WP:NONAZIS. We are in control of what we want this community to be, and I, for one, don't want this person in it. I'm sure there are those who consider that an entirely unsophisticated reason, not based on firm philosophical grounds, but I could care less. Kick the guy to the curb and let's get on with improving the encyclopedia. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:34, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
• Endorse block and perhaps reblock on review for gross incivility or the like. RAN1 (talk) 06:10, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  @Black Kite: Just an aside, this block reason falls under WP:NPA#WHATIS: Comparing editors to Nazis, communists, terrorists, dictators, or other infamous persons. RAN1 (talk) 22:04, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  Then he should have been blocked for that reason. Buffs (talk) 03:52, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

• I don't believe this first edit is of a 22-year-old Alabamian named Wesley S. Heath? Someone is playing games here but the purpose behind it is unclear. - GizzyCatBella🍁 06:15, 17 November 2022 (UTC) - (no opinion anymore if the account should remain blocked because most of their edits seem to be fine, besides for those spotlighted by Cullen328.) - GizzyCatBella🍁 06:56, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

I didn't want to comment on it above because even though it's not hard to figure out I didn't want to just come out and name the person, but since they gave the name in the Latin alphabet themselves, that name is exactly what the Anglo-Saxon runes at the top of that infobox says, for whatever that's worth. - Aoidh (talk) 17:34, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Ok, I'll be the guy who first goes beyond questioning the block and I'll go straight to: Oppose block on procedural grounds. None of the required methods of communication with this user were followed. No attempts at correction were made. No warnings were given. The blocking admin went straight for an indef block with no justification based on policy (only an essay) and without any attempt to WP:AGF. The portions of their user page that were not allowed should simple have been removed per Wikipedia:User_pages#Advocacy_or_support_of_grossly_improper_behaviors_with_no_project_benefit (this is policy, not merely an essay). Buffs (talk) 06:31, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• All right, Buffs, that is your sixteenth post in this thread in a timespan of seven hours. You seriously need to be done now. You have made your position absolutely clear and then some. Bludgeoning the discussion is disruptive. Bishonen | tålk 08:17, 17 November 2022 (UTC).

  Gotcha...people who respond and have questions need not appear on here. A solid chunk was simple agreement. Buffs (talk) 16:38, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Do not unblock per https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:LDS20&diff=prev&oldid=1111294273 where user claims leadership of a chapter of a terrorist organisation. Daveosaurus (talk) 10:44, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse Block I just want to briefly note a slightly different take here--were I an admin, would I have made this block? I would not have. But I think it is entirely reasonable and within the sphere of discretion afforded to admins. We need not agree with an exercise of power to decide that said power was validly exercised. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 14:27, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse Block per WP:HID. Yes, it is an essay. Let me clarify for all of the people who repeatedly refuse to understand why people link essays in discussions like this: because it saves the time of having to type an entire WP:TLDR rationale every time. Hate speech, and support of hate groups, is disruption and is thus legitimate grounds for blocking. But you'd have known that had you read WP:HID. --Jayron32 17:25, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  ...which is another essay...not really helping your point. If you block for "repeated violations of WP:V as outlined in WP:AN ESSAY" that's viable. You're saying there is a reason for the block as outlined in WP:policy and it is explained by an essay. I'm fine with that. I'm actually not against blocking him based on his user page. But once that inappropriate information is removed, what is the rationale for the block? The rationale for a block should not be WP:IDONTLIKETHAT, but based on policy. If you cannot outline the actual policy violation, the block should not stand. Buffs (talk) 03:57, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse Block per WP:NONAZIS: Right in the user's info box was what could be seen as an SS logo. No thanks. Kjscotte34 (talk) 18:57, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse block If someone comes right out and tells you they are a violent fascist, take their word for it and take appropriate action. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:01, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

  Where did he say "I am a violent fascist"? Buffs (talk) 03:53, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

  Here, specifically the part |office = Director of Proud Boys of St. Clair County ... |allegiance = Proud Boys (2020 - Present), linking to the article that identifies Proud Boys in the first sentence as a neo-fascist organization that engages in political violence. Levivich (talk) 04:07, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

  That's ridiculous. The Proud Boys are no "violent fascist" organization. All they do is meet for tea and crumpets on Sunday mornings and read from The Bible while listening to Easy Listening music. Beyond My Ken (talk) 16:25, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

  @Beyond My Ken - 😂 I’m sure that’s exactly what those folks do - GizzyCatBella🍁 17:12, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse block I think a lot of people above are missing the part where this user advocates for race war as an armed conflict in which they are a director of a contingent of a "woodland combat brigade" of the "ground forces" of the Proud Boys. This is a group that has attempted to violently overthrow the US government. This user is trolling us. They also say they support "actual science, real history, deep philosophy, and politics." WP:DUCK and this sure is quackin'. WP:DFTT. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 16:33, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

  That reminds me of some questions I had about the 1st Woodland Combat Brigade of the Proud Boys of St. Clair County:

  • First, how many Woodland Combat Brigades do the Proud Boys of St. Clair County have, such that they need to disambiguate "1st" vs. "2nd", etc.?
  • Secondly, what combat brigades do they have other than Woodland Combat Brigades? St. Clair County, Alabama has a total population of 91,000 -- which in some parts of the world would be called a "town" and not a "county", but this county is apparently so large by Alabama standards that it has two county seats: Ashville, Alabama (population: 2,000), and Pell City, Alabama, which is a "city" of course because it has a population of 12,000. So, I think we can safely estimate there are zero Urban Combat Brigades among the Proud Boys of St. Clair County. What does that leave us? Mountain Combat Brigades? Well, St. Clair County exaggerates its "mountains" about as much as its "cities": St. Clair County's highest peak, Bald Rock Mountain, is 1,575 ft (480 m)... it's a medium-sized hill. So, is there a 1st Hills Combat Brigade?
  • Third, who the hell are they preparing to engage in combat against? Who is threatening to invade St. Clair County, Alabama, such that it needs a brigade to engage in woodland (and, possibly, hills) combat? Or, even more perplexing, who would St. Clair County, Alabama want to invade such that they need a combat force? Neighboring Etowah County, Alabama? This is the thing I never understand about these conservative militias in the US: liberals are notoriously anti-gun, anti-war, anti-violence... so who is it that conservative militias expect will take up arms against them? Other conservative militias, right?
  • Which leads me to my final question: is there a 1st Woodland Combat Brigade of the Proud Girls of St. Clair County?

  Inquiring minds want to know. Levivich (talk) 17:24, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

References

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

Requesting deleted articles to post their contents off-wiki

Is deletion review needed to request the retrieval of deleted articles (e.g. by e-mail) not for the purpose of restoring the article on Wikipedia, but to post it on another wiki? — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 01:46, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Nope, deletion review is only needed to restore deleted pages to mainspace. If you'd just like article text back to post elsewhere, you're welcome to post at Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion or email an administrator individually. Many of us (myself included) would be happy to send you deleted article text, so long as it's not grossly inappropriate material (e.g. something deleted under CSD G10). Ajpolino (talk) 02:02, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

See Category:Wikipedia administrators willing to provide copies of deleted articles. Animal lover |666| 05:58, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

So no inflammatory BLP material and copyvios right? — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 20:07, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

The relevant policy is WP:Reusing Wikipedia content. Since the articles and page histories have been deleted, the considerations in WP:Copying within Wikipedia#Reusing deleted material (guideline, shortcut WP:RUD) also apply: attribution must be provided explicitly, a link is not sufficient. Flatscan (talk) 05:24, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Request to create a bunch of redirects involving ɕ

The character ɕ seems to be part of an edit filter. I've been adding a load of International Phonetic Alphabet redirects from the symbols to the relevant pages (e.g. ʈʂ), but I can't add any involving this character, as apparently it's restricted to administrators.

Unfortunately, each sound tends to have quite a few different variants. Could the following all please be redirected to Voiceless alveolo-palatal affricate? My intention is to make things as easy as possible for anyone who copy and pastes one of these into the search bar, so I want to add every possible variation. The redirects tɕ and t͡ɕ already exist, so no need to create those.

• cɕ
• t̠ʲɕ
• c̟ɕ
• ȶɕ
• c͡ɕ
• t̠ʲ͡ɕ
• c̟͡ɕ
• ȶ͡ɕ
• t͜ɕ
• c͜ɕ
• t̠ʲ͜ɕ
• c̟͜ɕ
• ȶ͜ɕ

Many thanks. Theknightwho (talk) 05:59, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

The character is found on the MediaWiki:Titleblacklist, line 13. .*[ℂ℃℄ɕƌʥℇ℈℉ℊℋℌℍℎℏℐ‼ℑℒℕ℗℘ℙℚℛℜℝ℞℟℣ℤℨ℩ℬℭ℮ℯℰℱℲℳℴℹ℺⅁⅂⅃⅄ⅅⅆⅇⅈⅉⅎ].* <casesensitive> # Select Unicode Letterlike Symbols (excluding Kelvin, Angstrom and Ohm signs, see talk) – dudhhr ^talk _contribs (he/they) 16:23, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I know. That is why I’m requesting that an administrator make these pages here. Theknightwho (talk) 16:27, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

BTW, I believe that bypassing the title blacklist does not need admin privileges; page movers also bypass it. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 20:11, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Template editors bypass it as well. – dudhhr ^talk _contribs (he/they) 20:48, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

I'll get on it. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 16:34, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Thanks so much! I'm happy to sort out the redirect categories etc. once they've been created, so bare redirects would be great. Theknightwho (talk) 16:38, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

The bare redirects have been created. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 16:41, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Great - thank you. Theknightwho (talk) 16:41, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Perhaps page protection is warranted for the Aaron Mate BLP talk page

I wanted to bring this to your attention, Administratiors. I fully realize that talk pages are not typically page protected, however, I have never read a talk page like this before. There ARE standards of decorum that should be upheld for talk pages, especially for BLPs. Yet the tone is like 4chan, but crueler. It is a cesspool of hate and malice directed at this poor soul because bad editors are allowing their own political and other biases/opinions to run wild. For example, I found 35 word counts of "journalist" and at least three sub-sections where editors challenged whether Mate should be described as a journalist, followed by vigorous WP:RS and WP:NPOV supported discussions, and resolution achieved. Yet yesterday another he's not a journalist sub section appeared and had to be addressed.

Unsourced hate is directed toward Mate because (these are all examples on that talk page; I'm not being sardonic): "he writes for a publication that isn't sympathetic to Uighyurs", "he's just like Max Blumenthal", "Tablet says he's okay, so he must be a propagandist shill", "he's pro-Russia", "he's pro-Assad", "he's a propagandist because it pays better", "CounterPunch has included his work on occasion", "The Guardian UK says he's one of 28 bad guys that spread disinformation", "he's a Houthi apologist"! And of course, that he is a conspiracist. That he's left-wing is generally agreed upon. He's pro-Palestinian. I'm not left-wing. I'm not pro-Palestinian. Regardless, I can write with a neutral Wikipedia voice. Just because Zelenskyya kicked up a fuss and got Aaron and Max disinvited from some event doesn't mean that all impartiality must fly out the window. If Aaron is pro-Assad, that doesn't mean Wikipedia should use pejorative adjectives in describing his work. Please, will someone do something about this? I don't have the permissions to. FeralOink (talk) 16:52, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

When I look at this, I don't see anything that merits page protection. There are some heated discussions on the talk page, but I see nothing to indicate in the page history that it is the target of disruption or vandalism, or bad faith; nothing from the talk page has been removed or reverted, aside from archiving, in the last several weeks as far as I can see. If there's nothing worth reverting, then why do we need to protect it? If there are some diffs or examples of vandalism, disruption, or other problems that I have missed in combing through the page history, please post them here, but I see nothing in the page history that indicates that protection is warranted. --Jayron32 17:19, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Here are a few examples.

ONE This thread is verging on a WP:BLP violation, where it is argued that "journalist" should be changed to "propagandist" despite having had the same discussion already, four times in a few months on the talk page, and now 48 mentions (up from 35, three days ago) of whether or not he is entitled to that title as his occupation.

TWO derogatory claim is discussed ad infinitum, specifically, "a clearly derogatory claim about a living person requires far more rigorous and widespread sourcing than a single mention, which does not make the specific claim, in a document written by a charity, published by a campaign group, and mentioned only by a single news organisation".

THREE Section head "This article is turning into a sewer": "There are countless examples of violations of the WP:BLP, WP:NPV and WP:RS policies here. It looks like a few activists have taken over this page and have inserted all sorts of defamatory language...." Yet it is continuing. I wouldn't call this merely "heated discussion".

FOUR "the state that this talk page is in is horrendous", which then goes on to an argument between two editors accusing each other of possibly being Aaron Mate. One of these editors seems to be an extremely active advocate in favor of Mate (the "talk page clogger"), so that's a good point, and disturbing as well.

FIVE In an attempt to get everyone to settle down, a nice administrator did this but it hasn't been effective: "1RR for all Syrian Civil War articles, in effect here, has been supplanted for the next month with a 72-hour 1RR, imposed as a discretionary sanction under the same Syrian Civil War sanction regime. Please stop reverting each other so much."

SIX Certain editors repeatedly advocate for describing the BLP subject, a young leftist Jewish man, as a fascist in the lead of the article, see here for the most recent example and note similar a few days earlier here. Another editor refers to the BLP subject as "a tankie" twice. This is a problem. It is not merely heated discussion. The editor who used the term tankie started out calm, collected, and impartial but maybe he's getting exasperated with that talk page mess.

I shouldn't have suggested page protection for a talk page, Jayron32. You're right about that. I do know that Wikipedia policies are being violated, and that the subject of the BLP is getting cranky about being defamed, or so he seems to be saying loudly on Twitter. I'll just avoid anything to do with the article from here on out and let y'all handle it.--FeralOink (talk) 08:10, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Try WP:BLPN, which is more designed to deal with actual BLP violations. People who frequent that noticeboard may have something more to say on the matter. I will note that not every claim of a BLP violation is always a BLP violation. Maybe some of these are, maybe some of these aren't. --Jayron32 17:05, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

That's a good idea! I didn't even know it existed. Thank you.--FeralOink (talk) 13:02, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Stephen - case request

Consistent with the Arbitration Committee's procedure on return of permissions following expedited removal, Stephen (talk · contribs) has requested that the Committee open normal arbitration proceedings to examine the removal of permissions and surrounding circumstances. Stephen has additionally requested that the case be heard privately, and the Committee agrees that there are significant privacy issues constituting extraordinary circumstances. Accordingly, the Committee directs its clerks to open an in camera arbitration case titled "Stephen", with no public evidence or workshop phase. Instead, relevant evidence may be submitted to the Arbitration Committee by email (arbcom-enwikimedia.org).

For the Arbitration Committee, Primefac (talk) 18:24, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard § Stephen - case request

Review request re my unblock of Rathfelder

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

---

This morning, El C drew my attention to a piece on Wikipediocracy, criticising my recent decision to unblock Rathfelder, who I had blocked shortly beforehand for sockpuppetry and votestacking. There is some stuff in the piece that I was unaware of until now, and which might have made me respond differently had I known about them at the time. However, since I'm in the position of catching off-wiki flak for the decision, I feel that my judgment could be called into question on the best way to go forward - hence, I am passing the buck asking for a review.

The background: I received an e-mail from an editor outlining their concerns that Rathfelder and Bigwig7 might be one and the same person, and pointing out multiple CfD discussions where they had overlapped. The concerns seemed credible, so I ran a check, and confirmed that they were being operated by the same person. Since they were obviously votestacking, I blocked, and notified the community at this noticeboard. A couple of days later, Rathfelder requested unblock, we had a discussion, and he agreed to accept TBans from categories and deletion discussions, and the withdrawal of his Autopatrolled flag (I felt that was needed since any articles he created would, by necessity, be uncategorised and hence would benefit from NPP review), and also a one-account restriction. Since the only inappropriate editing I was aware of was the use of multiple accounts in deletion discussions, I felt that this would be sufficient to unblock (preventative not punitive, etc).

What I didn't know at the time: mainly using the Bigwig7 account, Rathfelder created the article Alex Scott-Samuel (he has also edited it with his main account). Now, Rathfelder is open about his real-life identity (public disclosure). Scott Samuel was the chair of a body, the Socialist Health Association, which Rathfelder had been director of. There was a clear conflict of interest there, which was not disclosed on either account; further, he used sources in the article in which he himself was quoted. I believe he alluded to this in his unblock request: I also used it a few times to edit controversial pages about living people who would recognise my name. That should have been a red flag for me, and I should have probed it before unblocking. To be honest, I think my eyes glided over it - it was a long unblock request, and I already thought I knew what the problem was - I missed it, mea culpa. I don't know whether there were other instances of COI editing.

At this point, I would like the community to consider what the best course of action is - whether that be reinstating the block, warning, or nothing at all. I would also be grateful if an experienced uninvolved editor were to look over that article closely. Girth Summit _(blether) 18:51, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Ouch. That's a tough call man. First of all, let me say that I hold no fault with you. You've done everything right here, you acted in good faith and had appropriate empathy towards a user who themselves said things that any reasonable admin would have taken as reasonable conditions for an unblock. If someone is going to err one one side or the other, to err on the side of empathy will always be the proper call for me. Secondly, you've asked for outside eyes on a situation where you've clearly botched it up yourself. That's the proper course of action, and if more admins did that, Wikipedia would be a utopia of good governance. I'm not 100% sure I have the answers for how to proceed until I hear some input myself from other people. I've not fully made up my mind yet, but if we do decide to leave Rathfelder unblocked, I would impose an additional community restriction of a TBAN on ALL WP:BLP editing, broadly construed. They have proven themselves untrustworthy in that area, and any continued presence at Wikipedia (if they are not blocked or sitebanned outright) should be under some restrictions. --Jayron32 19:02, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• I think I understand what I did and why it was wrong. I would like to have a chance to show that I have seen the error of my ways. Rathfelder (talk) 18:59, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  So are you saying that you previously didn't realize that using a sockpuppet to promote your side in a real-life dispute might be objectionable? Dr. Duh 🩺 (talk) 20:02, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  I didnt see it like that. I didnt think I was promoting my side. I know this sounds stupid. I can only say I was in a stressful situation and clearly not thinking straight. And I did actually try to present the positive sides of Alex Scott-Samuel's work. It wasnt meant to be an attack page, and I dont think it reads like one. I made only a few minor edits to the Socialist Health Association article, only one of which I think really had a conflict of interest, after controversy broke out and I was sacked. I have kept away from both pages since and I will continue to do so. Rathfelder (talk) 21:26, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  • Rathfelder created Socialist Health Association in 2005 and has made 120+ edits to it as Rathfelder {and 7 as Bigwig7) which is hardly a few. And this is not a minor edit (and was after the sacking). Oculi (talk) 22:20, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  True, but I was attempting to be fair - Its mostly about Scott-Samuel's speech to the Labour Party Conference. Most of my edits to the SHA article were about its history, nothing to do with any conflict. Rathfelder (talk) 22:44, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  The second half of that edit removes the reason for your dismissal and implies that it resulted in the loss of key financial support, which may be fair to you. NebY (talk) 00:34, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

  If you didn't think you were doing anything wrong in creating Alex Scott-Samuel, why did you use a sockpuppet to do it? – Joe (talk) 06:53, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• I don't think an unblock is unreasonable, but given the COI editing, and the apparent creation of an attack page on somebody else, a topic ban from all things Socialist Health Association and additionally a BLP ban would be appropriate. nableezy - 19:09, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  With the added socking and restoring very poor edits to a BLP he has a COI with, reinstate block. nableezy - 15:28, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• There are few "high crimes" on Wikipedia, but sockpupppetry to game consensus, and COI BLP editing to gain advantage in a real-life dispute, are two of them. Girth did nothing wrong given the information available at the time and hindsight is 20/20. My !vote is to reinstate a full indef block and let the editor pursue unblock avenues in the ordinary course like everyone else. Unblock conditions like TBANs etc can be handled in the ordinary course as well. Levivich (talk) 19:14, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
• This discovery is all the more disappointing following my prompt on 7 November for Rathfelder to come clean if there was anything else to disclose. Given his history of vote-stacking on articles about health service–related organisations, I suggest that if there is to be an additional topic ban, then we should be considering a ban on health service–related articles rather than all BLPs. – Fayenatic London 21:44, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  But I did disclose this. That is why I disclosed my personal history. And in my defence I have created or editted a lot of healthcare related articles but I have never done anything improper with any but these two where I was personally involved. Rathfelder (talk) 22:44, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  I mean this in genuine good faith, but I think you have made your point. I don't think arguing here does you any favors. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 22:55, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

  I think they may be referring to another apparent sock account used to vote at a RfC [39] in which both your Rathfelder account and BigWig7 sockpuppet also voted. But that's just a guess. EnPassant♟♙ (talk) 22:59, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Quoting Fayenatic london, "we should be considering a ban on health service–related articles". Drmies (talk) 01:25, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Comment - user:Harry Boardman's last 20 edits include the organizations rfc mentioned above by EnPassant, Alex Scott-Samuel and Socialist Health Association (edit summary:‎ Spelling/grammar/punctuation correction); Bigwig7 has this (edit summary:‎ Spelling/grammar/punctuation correction). Healthcare in Belgium has been edited by both Rathfelder and Boardman. 11 of the first 13 edits to Alex Scott-Samuel are by Bigwig7, Harry Boardman and Rathfelder. What are the chances? Oculi (talk) 01:53, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Comment. This addition to Alex Scott-Samuel of a thoroughly nasty phrase without quotation marks but with attribution to The Times (actually it was the Sunday Times)—so I am unable to check whether the phrase is even in the article cited—on 25 March 2019 by Bigwig7 is unacceptable. (It followed the addition of his being on a list in The Economist, with neither source being flagged as opinion articles in the edits.) And that was in our article, unchanged, when I edited it a little more than 24 hours ago. If those edits were made in the heat of emotion after dismissal, quite apart from that being a very good demonstration of why COI editing is wrong, I would have expected that human decency would suggest going back at some time during the next 3½ years, re-examining that biography of a living person, and changing at least that passage in wiki-voice. Yngvadottir (talk) 03:33, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

  Can find the source here, and it did indeed include that phrase, but it isnt any better. It is an editorial by Sarah Baxter, and it should have been attributed to her if it should have been included (and imo it should not have been). nableezy - 05:04, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

  Restored by Harry Boardman. (Harry Boardman was a folk singer from Manchester.) Oculi (talk) 05:39, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• At the time, I did think you were a bit quick to accept Rathfelder's explanation at face value and unblock, Girth Summit. But that's nothing to criticise and you didn't have the full story at the time. But now we know, the indef needs to be restored. Levivich has summed it up well already, but years of deliberately manipulative socking and creating attack pages on your real-life political opponents is not something you come back from with a slap-on-the-wrist topic ban. And yes, Rathfelder's version of that article was an attack page, that described its (Jewish) subject as a ringleader in "antisemitic bullying" and "a swivel-eyed middle-aged conspiracy theorist". I can't imagine we'd even be having this conversation about someone with a lower edit account. Like the Wikipediocracy writer, I'm also very suspicious of Harry Boardman and potentially more sockpuppets. – Joe (talk) 06:36, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• I agree with Joe and others that an indef should be restored, as I feel Rathfelder was unblocked under false pretenses. I further detail my reasoning in my follow up to the original notice I posted to GS' talk page last night: User_talk:Girth_Summit#WPO blog post: Rathfelder – "a good editor". Sorry, am writing in haste. Thanks. El_C 07:13, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Since GS made it clear below that he is leaving the matter entirely to the community, meaning that the CU block is unlikely to be reinstated, and because I find a standard indef that any admin can undo insufficient — like many users below, I also support a community site ban (WP:CBAN). I should add that Rathfelder's comments since I've written the above did the very opposite of convincing me against this being the only viable outcome at this time. El_C 01:43, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

• Yes Harry Boardman was me. I'd rather forgotten about that. That was a very difficult period in my life which I had rather shut out. And I entirely agree that these conflicted edits are more serious than vote stacking. All I can say in my defence is that neither had much effect. I dont think any decision about categories was altered by my vote stacking. I did my best in the article by Scott-Samuel to be objective, but he was effectively my employer. I put in material about his career and achievements, and it was all referenced to respectable sources. I have put a lot of time and effort into wikipedia. These discreditable episodes are a very small part of what I have done, and my circumstances have changed. There is no reason to suppose that they would recur. I would see a complete block as an excessive punishment. I would hope to be given a chance to redeem myself. Rathfelder (talk) 09:02, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

  I was on the fence until this half admission, which I doubt Rathfelder would have disclosed if not for direct questioning. Time for a site ban. Note, I have no issue with Girth's unblocking under the information available at the time. This was an established user and no reason to question the disclosure. Star Mississippi 19:52, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Site ban. I'm not really active here these days. But I think long-term "good" editors who abuse Wikipedia for their own ends are one of the project's most insidious problems, and I just have to offer my thoughts. Rathfelder now says "I did my best in the article by Scott-Samuel to be objective." No, he painted him in a bad light, while whitewashing content about himself, that much is clear. And used *three accounts* to keep it negative. Someone trying to be objective would have discussed it rather than edit war, and wouldn't have hidden their obvious COI. Then he says "These discreditable episodes are a very small part of what I have done..." I'm not seeing "episodes" here. I'm seeing Rathfelder socking to abuse consensus for years, right up until he was caught and blocked. And that has involved using at least three accounts, in some cases, to votestack discussions. And now we get gems like "I think I understand what I did and why it was wrong"! I'm generally pretty forgiving. But Rathfelder has acted as though he's superior to the community for so long, I think he should be removed from it until he can make a convincing case to be readmitted (after spending some time away). Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 10:42, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Keep blocked we have much more useful editors banned off Wikipedia for similar activities with socks. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:58, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site ban. Like Tenebrae, this is an abuse of the community processes. I echo Boing!. Jip Orlando (talk) 14:49, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site ban. Given all that has been revealed above, I don't think the community has much choice in the matter. Vote-stacking with socks is grounds for an indefinite block. Socking to create and maintain a conflict-of-interest BLP attack page alone would be grounds for a community ban. Combine the two, and add in the lack of disclosure of the Boardman account when asking for the block to be lifted, and the continued attempts here to minimise the significance of what has been done, and anything less would be untenable. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:16, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site ban per Boing and AndyTheGrump. starship.paint (exalt) 15:24, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Full Community Siteban - I'm unhappy this is happening, but it goes much deeper than what may be resolved with a topic ban from medial subjects. We've all been here long enough to know using sockpuppets to votestack is not ok and there is a serious breach of trust here. That combined with the COI editing puts it over the top for me. If Rathfelder would like to return at a later date, he may go through the usual avenues available. EnPassant♟♙ (talk) 18:47, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support a site ban or, failing that, an indefinite topic ban from BLPs, in addition to the restrictions he already has. I get a feeling, looking at his latest contributions, that he may have done some good work on categorizations. At the same time, the revenge editing, the lack of disclosure of another sock account (Harry Boardman), and the apparently false statements suggest that a site ban is the only appropriate solution. If he wants to appeal, he can follow the instructions at WP:UNBAN.

Several of his statements are suspicious:

• I was deceitful I dont think my bad behaviour had much effect. It was confined to the backstage area of categorisation discussions. [40] – The evidence in the above comments suggests that the misbehaviour was not restricted to category space;
• I was in those cases very careful to use reputable sources and avoid bias. [41] – You created an attack page with content describing the subject as a "swivel-eyed middle-aged conspiracy theorist" [42];
• I made only a few minor edits to the Socialist Health Association article, only one of which I think really had a conflict of interest [43] – No, you made 130 edits to this article, when including edits made by your socks. Many of them weren't minor;
• I entirely agree that these conflicted edits are more serious than vote stacking. All I can say in my defence is that neither had much effect. [44] – Untrue. The subject of the article was reportedly very distressed;
• But I dont know what TBans are. [45] – I find it incredible that an editor with almost 550,000 edits wouldn't know what "TBan" means.

Finally, even if the WPO post contains inaccuracies, the evidence presented on-wiki clearly demonstrates that he needs, at the very least, these three topic bans. Dsuke1998AEOS (talk) 19:12, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Site Ban I'm not sure why this is even up for discussion. No one is bigger than the project, and I don't care how much "good" was done, socking to vote stack, on top of having a COI negates all of that and then some. Also if someone is going to need multiple topic bans to even be allowed to edit, they shouldn't be editing period. RickinBaltimore (talk) 19:51, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

  The reason it's up for discussion is set out at the top of the thread. I hope you can understand why I brought it here for discussion - I made a mistake, which has been publicly criticised on an off-wiki site, so any action I take now would be open to accusations of trying to cover my own arse. I want to step back from the situation entirely from an administrative angle and hand it over to the community. Cheers Girth Summit _(blether) 21:28, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

  In any case, since 3X clearly does not apply, if an editor wants a site ban this needs to be up for discussion. Nil Einne (talk) 06:09, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

• Site Ban from my reading of the above thread. The extension of discussion here, provides the editor considerations which are not afforded to every other blocked editor. The editor is free to seek an unblock on their own after some time has elapsed. Bruxton (talk) 21:41, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site ban per above discussion. NW1223<Howl at me•My hunts> 22:06, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site ban - I hesitated between !voting for a site ban and simply restoring the indef block, but I think that the editor has abused the trust of the community too many times now in too short a period, and has stretched our AGF well past the breaking point. If he wants to return to editing, let him convince the entire community to give him another chance, rather than a single admin who may or may not be aware of the background of the case - that requires a CBAN. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:37, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site ban per BMK and Boing (good to see you again). Miniapolis 23:19, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site Ban per Levivich and others. This editor cannot be trusted. If they are reinstated with multiple topic bans, I don't trust them not to find another area in which to edit corruptly. The apology is of the "Mistakes were made" type. We would be making another mistake to reinstate this user. Robert McClenon (talk) 05:45, 19 November 2022 (UTC)
• Support Restoration of Indefinite Block to be treated as a CU block. -Ad Orientem (talk) 19:01, 19 November 2022 (UTC)
• Site Ban per all of the above. OrgoneBox (talk) 19:05, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

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

Severe UAA backlog

Title speaks for itself. Need some eyes over there. Thanks. Taking Out The Trash (talk) 22:48, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Cleared for the most part (some bot leftovers). 78.26 _{(spin me / revolutions)} 01:26, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

Arbitration motion regarding contacting admins for Level 2

The Arbitration Committee has resolved by motion that:

The first step of the Level II procedures is amended to read:

1. The initiating arbitrator will contact the account via e-mail asking the account to contact arbcom-en and leave a message on the account's talk page alerting the account to the email. If email contact is not possible, the initiating arbitrator will leave a message on the account's talk page asking the account to contact arbcom-en.

For the Arbitration Committee, Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 00:26, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard § Arbitration motion regarding contacting admins for Level 2

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2023 Memphis 901 FC season

Seems the article, got removed and deleted while at AfD. I am not sure what the process is here, if the AfD should be closed, or if restored. The article looks like it could have been speedy deleted anyway. Regards, Govvy (talk) 06:36, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

The article was moved by its originator into draft space while still tagged for deletion, and is at Draft:2023 Memphis 901 FC season, where it is displaying an error message. My preference as nominator of the AFD would be for it to be moved back to article space to allow the AFD to run its course. Moving an article to draft space while it is tagged for AFD is an effort to game the system that I see from time to time, and the policies are less than clear on what to do in that situation. My own opinion is that moving an article that is tagged for deletion should be disallowed, but other editors have reasons that they understand. Someone else can figure out how we should handle this, since I seem to be in the minority in thinking that the move should be disallowed. Robert McClenon (talk) 08:04, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

OK, I screwed up and need admin assistance. I moved the draft back to mainspace so the AfD could finish, only to find that the AfD had been closed because the original move from fraftspace to mainspace was accidentally. So, I moved it back to draftspace, but now I can't find the version of of the article which has content. My apologies -- could someone please clean up after me? Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:34, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

I think I have the right version inthe right space now. If someone could please delete Draft:2023 Memphis 901 FC season - bad I would appreciate it. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:40, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

My thanks to @Explicit:. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:01, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

And @Iridescent: Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:51, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

Case of WP:BULLY and WP:CPP I have trouble handling alone

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

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Hello, I recently expanded the article Samuel Aba. You can compare the current version of the article with the one including my edits. The article uses arguments backed by two ancient sources to present one view, failing to mention a third ancient source that would discredit the view that's being pushed. more specifically, there are two ancient sources claiming that Samuel Aba was of Attilid descent through his father's line (a 13th-century work by Simon of Keza and a 14th-century manuscript), and one source that does not deny this but fails to report it (a 13th-century work by an anonymous writer, the so-called Anonymous).

The article, as it is now, fails to mention one of the ancient source (Keza) while putting an emphasis on the source that does not mention the subject's Attilid descent, and (incidentally) highlights the fact that the source claiming Attilid descent was written a century after the source that does not mention this (Anonymous vs. the 14th-century manuscript).

When I saw this I was surprised, so I edited the article, adding the missing part. But my edits were reverted by User:Borsoka. They justified their action with a WP:NOR. Other parts of this article are backed by primary sources, as most articles on this topic are, but ok, it made sense. So I spent quite a while to gather sources to back my addition and republished the deleted content. Borsoka, however, removed again my additions, as they kept on claiming I am "relying on a primary source".

I again edited the page, adding a few templates to ask for more sources to back the part they don't want to delete (I don't disagree with it being in the article, but I felt it should have more citations, with quotes, since I couldn't check all the sources used therein and there are some mildly stretched/dubious sentences).

My edits were reverted again however, this time by another user, Surtsicna, who justified their action with: That really does not look like improvement. Please use the talk page to explain your edit. Surprised and unable to see what they exactly want me to explain, and at this point honestly thinking that the whole thing doesn't make sense unless someone is willingly trying to hide a part of the story, I did as they asked, went to talk page and explained what I already explained.

Surtsicna apparently gave up discussing after asking me to discuss (cf. 1 and 2), meanwhile the content stays removed of course, so I guess it's fine for them.

Borsoka meanwhile keeps on talking about primary sources, now implying that the sources I used are "not reliable" either. I replied to them again, now starting to lose my cool a little bit.

I don't know what's going on here, but I can't possibly explain it all unless there is some form of WP:CPP and/or WP:BULLY.

As I finished to write this, I gave a look at the talk page and noticed that User:Borsoka had already tried to downplay/hide (whatever) the aforementioned part of the story. Giray Altay (talk) 18:07, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

@Giray Altay: You are required to notify Borsoka of this report per the instructions at the top of the page. I'd also suggest paring down your complaint as it's way too long.--Bbb23 (talk) 18:35, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

Sorry Bbb23, I thought that pinging them here was enough... Ok, I will shorten it ASAP.--Giray Altay (talk) 18:38, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

• Having now looked through the edits on the article and the Talk page, it looks like a content dispute that should remain on the article Talk page. I see nothing wrong with the conduct of Borsoka or Surtsicna, both of whom disagree with Giray Altay's edits. Giray Altay should go back to the talk page and be more patient with the process of reaching a resolution.--Bbb23 (talk) 18:45, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

Bbb23 normally I would agree with you. That's the process. But I saw too many times disputes ending the wrong way because nobody cared. This is a kinda Balkanic related topic and I just can't stand some type of stuff.

Why do you have to hide something from the article? Should I wait? Nobody'll care, and if they do they'll WP:Bully them out of the discussion again. Just give another look at the edits. How can you remove fundamental content backed by five reliable sources and claim "you are using a primary source", or "I don't see how this is an improvement"??

Edit for whoever's reading, for whoever cares: I edited the article again, adding four more sources to state the obvious; what is willingly kept out. Now there 8 sources supporting a well-known fact.--Giray Altay (talk) 19:17, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

(after edit conflict) Giray Altay, just base your edits on modern secondary sources and then certainly someone will care, but they might not agree with you. Nobody is bullying you, but simply asking you to justify your edits. You know that your edit is contested, so you should not be reinstating any of it until the talk page discussion has come to a conclusion. Phil Bridger (talk) 19:21, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

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

Unicode encoded pages and user pages

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

---

Hanover Amenity has created unicode encoded user/user talk pages of themselves, which may end up rendering stuff like using Twinkle or notifying this report of them useless if one is not too careful. This behaviour is exhibited at Talk:Franchise_Tax_Board_of_California_v._Hyatt_(2019)#Requested_move_10_November_2022 which they closed without waiting for further inputs. They had also created similarly unicode encoded pages and done copy and paste moves to affect the changes. Whilst I would like to engage this user like how I would have engaged any other closers over such closures on their talk pages, this editor's peculiar usage of unicode encoded user page and mainspace pages might need to be addressed first.

Their user page:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Hanover_Amenity&redirect=no

The unicode encoded (non-existent) user pages:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:%D0%9D%D0%B0n%D0%BEv%D0%B5r_%D0%90m%D0%B5n%D1%96t%D1%83
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:%D0%9D%D0%B0n%D0%BEv%D0%B5r_%D0%90m%D0%B5n%D1%96t%D1%83

On the RM discussion:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franchise_%D0%A2%D0%B0%D1%85_Board_of_California_v._Hyatt (copy and paste from Franchise Tax Board of California v. Hyatt (2019))

– robertsky (talk) 13:34, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Notified at the user's own talk page Special:Permalink/1123048133. – robertsky (talk) 13:38, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

In case anyone else was wondering what they were up to, they were alternating Latin and Cyrillic script characters. I've deleted the rogue userpages. The user talk page is not where it was. Some other cleanup is still needed. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 14:14, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I've moved it back. —Cryptic 14:52, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

The copy-paste move at Franchise_Tax_Board_of_California_v._Hyatt_(2019) has been reverted and the partial-Cyrillic title has been deleted as G6 by Happy-melon. – dudhhr ^talk _contribs (he/they) 15:42, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

@Cryptic: the talk page is still at the old title, could you fix that as well? Thanks, ansh.666 16:29, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I meant that I'd moved the user talk page that zzuuzz mentioned back, but I've fixed Talk:Franchise Tax Board of California v. Hyatt (2019)→Talk:Franchise Tax Board of California v. Hyatt now too. —Cryptic 17:11, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Is User:Hanover Amenity/bio impersonating User:Randy Kryn? Or is that supposed to be an article draft? Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:39, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Yes. Blocked. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 17:23, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

No, that was a good faith article draft. Not impersonating. And by that point the issue had been resolved. I really don't see a reason for blocking just because an editor is working on an article draft, please reconsider (I don't need an article, that's not the point, and it's too soon anyway, but blocking someone for this seems excessive and not accepting a fellow Wikipedian in good faith). Randy Kryn (talk) 19:00, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

To be clear about it, Randy Kryn, they were blocked as a sockpuppet of Awolf58, who is banned, and has been impersonating you and others for I think most of this year. Frankly their obsession with you should be concerning. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 19:02, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I get the block, but what I'm saying is there was no reason to even check the account as a sockpuppet. There should be stricter criteria for checking for a sock other than a hunch. We've talked, and hopefully share a mutual respect for each others work (check the edits of this newly blocked account, good and productive edits, and nothing there to suspect a sock unless it is that anyone who talks to me or edits pages I do is an automatic suspect, which seems very unfair). Even knowing that this account is a sock I'd ask that admins consider reverting the ban and restore the good edits until and unless something outrageous happens which actually warrants such a cover-all approach. Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 19:11, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I can tell you that dedicating 190 edits to creating an obsessively detailed biography about you was a bit of a clue, although, we have dealt with so many sockpuppets that yes any new accounts interacting with you are now automatically suspicious. With the amount of nonsense this person has been up to, including the impersonation and harassment, and especially including the vandalism starting this thread, I don't see their ban being lifted any time soon. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 19:21, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

My request was to reconsider the ban of this one particular account. It doesn't seem fair because the official criteria for opening a sockpuppet investigation doesn't include "interacting with user Randy Kryn". I don't know about coding or the specifics of what opened this thread, but the thread seemed to be completing itself and resolving until my name popped up. Not fair to the user or to me, and fairness should be in every Wikipedian's DNA. Randy Kryn (talk) 19:33, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Bans are applied to people, not accounts. You could argue that this is not the same person as Awolf58, but that would be incorrect. Does this person look like someone who should be unbanned? Not while they're keeping that up, they don't. Do they look worryingly obsessed with you? I'll leave that in your court, but hint: yes. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:09, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Missing the point. The identification of this named user only came under question because my name came up and (see above), someone asked if he was impersonating me, and that was answered in the affirmative when it was not true. It seems unfair that a ban was placed on this named user because of that, everything else is probable guesswork. Where's due process on something like this? Thanks for the concern, lots of dynamics between him and I that you and others are missing. He incorrectly believed until recently that I played a major role in his being banned in the first place, during his United States edits, giving him reason to be exceptionally an asshole because, mistaken about me being a negative influence in him getting banned and equally mistaken that I was a regular on the United States page when I seldom had edited it (he was banned, as I remember, for pretty much being way too enthusiastic while editing in his own style with almost all of his edits being pretty good, but then wall of texty like this when trying to defend himself) what happened next, and this is the good part, he found out about James Bevel. And he, like myself, and to be honest not that many others, if you love American history and how the nation evolved, when you find out about Bevel (especially if you've never even heard of him, but you're interested in an era-defining subject: the 1960s civil rights movement) it's like a huge WTf? This guy did what? You must be kidding me. And he saw that the editor who he imagined did him shit was a subject matter expert on Bevel but had pretty much not done any substantial edits on Bevel's article in what, seven, eights years, I don't even know, and did his Wikipedian ignore-all-rules Beastrage thing and came at me with an army of sockpuppets and Wikipedia-only threats trying to get me to edit and improve Bevel's page. Because Bevel's page deserves to be really something, packed with substantial information and the length of the pages of other great Americans in history, Washington, Madison, Lincoln, Dr. King, Franklin, those type of people. Thing is, I agree with him. I should be working more on the page. Although I have no intent to personally expand it to huge lengths, he's right about that. But as I've told him, sure, I think so too, but in my own time and thanks for putting my attention on it. We only disagree about the speed, and he kept on playing strange Wikipedia games, ruining my revert percentage in the process as one way of trying to force me. But that has kind of stopped after he found out that I actually was doing the opposite of what he thought during his initial ban. And I think he was writing an article about me not because of my personally, but because he realized that I am the historian who happened to tie-together Bevel's work, publish a few small things about it, and placed Rev. Bevel's accomplishments into their proper context within the literature of the field. By writing that article on a user page, a pretty incorrect article by the way which is what you often get from sources, he was honoring James Bevel, not Randy Kryn. For a long time I thought that doing that in a principled and accurate way was pretty important too. But kind of lost interest in the last eight or nine years until this fellow decided to remind me. Randy Kryn (talk) 23:18, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

That's a lot of words to say that you want to unban someone because you liked their edits. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 15:22, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

↑This↑ is spot on. HandThatFeeds was able to express in one short succinct sentence exactly what is wrongheaded about Randy Kryn's response to the block.-- Ponyo^{bons mots} 17:32, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Hello HandThatFeeds. Wrong, but thanks for chiming in. Randy Kryn (talk) 18:21, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

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

Ghost of Kiev on a spree at WP:RPP in order to get ECP.

I count 52 requests. Doug Weller talk 16:35, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Forgot - they were only told a short while ago about ECP. Doug Weller talk 16:37, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Sir,

I am not "on a spree" in order to get ECP. I went through the (Category:Russo-Ukrainian War) and picked articles that looked like they should be restricted from editing by editors like me. I chose those articles intentionally: I excluded articles that do not have to do with the war closely, such as Good Evening (Where Are You From?) and Hydraulic warfare, because I don't think those are restricted from what was posted on my talk page. I then started to go through (Category:2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine) before made copy edit on Skylar Kergil and removed section where someone had attacked the transgender musician because of Twitter.

If you do not want me to request that so many articles be protected at one time, I can slow down or stop, but I did not do this with malice. I want to help Wikipedia be better, and I am sorry if I have made it worse by making too many requests for protection. Ghost of Kiev (talk) 16:46, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Yea, I have half a mind to remove the entire set of nominations as inappropriate. Little to no care was given to the nominations; for example, you nominated several under the rationale "Persistent vandalism", but where there is absolutely no evidence of vandalism. Also, policy says that ECP is not required for enforcing the Arbcom GS sanctions in the topic area. There's just WAY too many bad noms for me to weed through to find the ones that are appropriate. Please don't do anything like this again. When you dump this many requests at once, and where most of them don't have an appropriate rationale, it just makes extra work for admins to investigate all of the bad noms. --Jayron32 16:52, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I am sorry that this has created so much work and that I have harmed Wikipedia. I will be more careful in the future and will never again nominate a large number of pages for protection at once. Ghost of Kiev (talk) 16:55, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

It's okay; you're acting in good faith, but remember that real people, who are just volunteers like yourself have to do all of this work. If you have specific articles where there is a specific need for protection, nominate those, but rarely is preemptive protection used. Applying page protection as a preemptive measure is contrary to the open nature of Wikipedia and is generally not allowed if applied solely for these reasons.. --Jayron32 17:00, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I went and removed the whole batch. After looking at more of them, there's just too many false positives to deal with. ECP is only necessary where disruption is active and ongoing, even the ArbCom remedy states "this restriction is preferably enforced through extended confirmed protection, though this is not required." (bold mine) It appears that Ghost of Kiev is trying to get the entire set of articles ECP all at once; this strains the resources of the admin corps and is not necessary, as the policy does not require it, especially not all at once. Let's focus on articles where there is conflict or disruption is actually actively happening. --Jayron32 17:00, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. Doug Weller talk 17:36, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Request for removal of permissions

Hi there! Please remove page mover, file mover, new page reviewer, pending changes reviewer, and rollbacker from this account. Thanks so much! 🥒 EpicPickle ^{(they/them | talk)} 17:45, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

•  Done Hut 8.5 18:01, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

RFC being overwhelmed by meatpuppets?

Not sure we are getting a real consensus at Talk:Iroquois#Meatpuppets. Not sure the best way forward here....

editor interaction tool. Moxy- 19:21, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Well, for now, feel free to tag those users with the {{spa}} or {{canvassed}} tags. El_C 22:25, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

What a surprise... Canvassing on Reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/Haudenosaunee/comments/z09kmz/update_wiki_title_to_haudenosaunee/. The starter of the RFC has the same username as the reddit username of the starter of the thread. Jackattack1597 (talk) 02:05, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

There was on-wiki canvassing too, although they were subsequently informed of the canvass guidelines. That said, the RM isn't that overwhelmed yet, and it's pretty obvious who is familiar with en.wiki policies and guidelines and who has been blindly canvassed. Should be easy enough for a closer to sort out. CMD (talk) 02:23, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Indeed, I just posted at the RM-in-question. Looking it over, there certainly is puppetry occurring. GoodDay (talk) 22:43, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I've tagged two SPA accounts (the only SPAs in that discussion). Nythar (💬-🎃) 02:25, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

2022 Arbitration Committee elections: last day for nominations

There are a little under 24 hours left for eligible editors to nominate themselves as candidates in the upcoming 2022 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee elections. Your nomination must be transcluded no later than 23:59 UTC on 22 November 2022; per WP:ACERFC2020, this is a hard deadline, and we may not be able to grant exceptions in the event of any technical issues. In this election there are 8 vacant seats to be filled for either a two-year or one-year term depending on the candidate's level of support. At the time I am writing this, 9 candidates have nominated themselves. Mz7 (talk) 00:25, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Disruptive editing by User:Uinko

This user had made countless unsourced, disruptive, and ungrammatical edits over the past several months, and has been warned countless times. The user has also apparently made personal attacks in the past, and the response when I last reached out was passive aggressive at best. I think that a block is clearly warranted, and that these harmful edits be reverted. Cpotisch (talk) 11:03, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm seeing a mix of positive and negative edits, but very infrequent and over a considerable time. Not comfortable issuing blocks at present. Stifle (talk) 12:08, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Disruptive political editing by User:RobertBanclair

This user just started editing under this account within the last 24 hours, and so far all of their edits are to add political misinformation or unsourced claims to articles about the recent U.S. elections and current U.S. political candidates. They altered the title of a source in 2022 Arizona gubernatorial election to make it appear to report the opposite of what it really says. And although it's not definitive, their recent edits to that page are suspiciously similar to an IP user's previously-reverted edits to the same page a few days ago. SS451 (talk) 15:55, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Indef'd for NOTHERE, though vandalism as well would have worked. RickinBaltimore (talk) 15:57, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Probably a naughty mouse, but

... this (inconsequential, mostly) edit happened at a time when my laptop was closed and I wasn't editing. I was moving the mouse out of the way sometime around then ... and I really think it's just a case of a very unlikely couple of clicks (and rollback doesn't require any confirmation, so yes it's possible). This is the first time in 15 years and 120k+ edits that this has happened. No one has access to my account, and there's no way someone could have guessed my password. I'm just reporting this here to be super-careful ... if I've been hacked and this account starts going wild, someone please block me, but I really don't expect that. I'll keep an eye out for any unexplained edits. - Dank (push to talk) 20:23, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

If you're truly worried about a compromise, ask a checkuser to run a check on your account. It sounds unnecessary to me, but I'd be willing to do it if it calmed your anxieties. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 21:12, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm not worried enough about a compromise to ask for anything, it seems very unlikely ... I'm just being super-cautious, which I don't think is a bad trait in an admin :) I'm just saying, if something really weird and unexpected happens, don't hesitate to block me (anyone), but it's probably nothing. - Dank (push to talk) 21:23, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

I ran the CU - we have to take compromises (especially admin compromises) seriously. Dank has only edited from one IP address today. So no compromise - feels like some kind of misclick (do you have a touchscreen Dank?). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 23:50, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for that, good to know. I do have a touchscreen but my laptop was probably closed at the time. I think my mouse is just being weird, I'll check into it. - Dank (push to talk) 23:59, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

You shouldn't let your pet mouse near your computer. Indeed, mice generally can damage all sorts of things, e.g., spark plugs and telephone cables. Perhaps your mouse is upset with you because you haven't been feeding it enough or paying sufficient attention to them. Mice have feelings, you know.--Bbb23 (talk) 16:29, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

When I saw a thread about a naughty mouse, I thought someone else must have noticed this new account.Sometimes mice mean to cause trouble... Girth Summit _(blether) 19:52, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

Editor refusing to communicate

Angryskies is engaging in a slow edit war and refusing to communicate. Case in being Deloitte where editor has reinstated his post fives times in a month:

• 21 October
• 27 October
• 4 November
• 11 November
• 21 November

Multiple attempts to communicate with the editor both through the edit summary and their own talk page with the editor just deleting without responding and then reinstating their post.

I did bring this issue here 10 days ago. Was advised that I should make a further attempt to communicate. This was done and reverted without response.

Editor has decided to describe his edits as Reverat vanadalism. After being being blocked in 2021, editor was warned against falsely accusing other editors of vandalism, something that has fallen on deaf ears. Zoumestein (talk) 02:51, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

A block of the individual, just might get some attention. GoodDay (talk) 03:08, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

How much "attention" do you feel like the 2021 block and warning, mentioned in the post you replied to, got? Begoon 14:06, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

Panel close for the fundraiser banner RFC

I've started a discussion at WT:VPR about the formation of a panel regarding the closure of the RfC on the banners for the December 2022 fundraising campaign. Interested parties should respond there rather than here. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 19:23, 23 November 2022 (UTC)