Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive59

Meatpuppetry?

I must begin this notice by declaring my bias in this. I am one of the disputing sides in this issue. The issue I wish to raise is the following: In recent days, the deletion process has witnessed two strange cases. The first occurred in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gay rights in Iraq. User:Chooserr wished to see this deleted because of pov issues. He then posted this message on User:*drew's talk page: "You listed yourself as Roman Catholic so I thought I might bring this unencyclopedic total POV pushing article to your attention. It is currently up for deletion here." He left the same messages at the talk pages of Burwellian and Pitchka. Pitchka was the only one who voted. When I nominated Category:Pro-choice celebrities and Category:Pro-life celebrities for deletion, Pitchka immediately put notices of this on no less than 57 user talk pages. These users were selected as members of the Catholic or pro-life user categories. The first 30 or so of these users were told: "Hi, I see that you are listed as a Pro-Life Wikipedian, well the Pro-life celebrities category is up for deletion. Category:Pro-life celebrities The abortion zealots don't want anyone to think that any celebrity is actually pro-life." When I pointed out to him that I had nominated Category:Pro-choice celebrities for deletion as well, Pitchka told me: "Am I wrong? I don't think so. Most pro-abortion people don't want this information out. There are plenty of categories and articles that might no appear in an ordinary encyclopedia. This is not an ordinary encyclopedia. So it doesn't matter that you nominated both that is standard operating procedure for people who don't want the info out!" After this, he informed another 25 to 30 users of the ongoing cfd, with the deliberate intention to convince them to vote to keep the category. Of the 57 informed users, thirteen joined the vote (Chooserr, Anti-Anonymex2, Musical Linguist, Dominick, Jakes18, Elliskev, jgofborg, Avalon, Merovingian, Patsw, Eoghanacht, Getcrunk, Shanedidona), all voting to keep the article. In fact, the only keep voter that wasn't contacted was Pitchka, the person who contacted all the others. Technically speaking, these users are not meat puppets. These are all decent and appreciated contributors. However, it's safe to say that their joining the cfd was a result of a deliberate canvassing by Pitchka. Since Chooserr has done the same with an AfD, this behaviour cannot be viewed as isolated acts. This is a clear pattern to influence the outcome of votes. I am contacting the admins about this, because I believe that this case is important to the future of wikipedia. This pattern of behaviour does not just influence wikipedia's content (the decision to keep or delete articles and categories), it also involves wikipedia policy. I fear that wikipedia will be prone to AfD campaigning, that users who have an interest in seeing an article, category, template or stub kept or deleted will canvas a large amount of users, hoping that a sufficient percentage of those contacted will vote and steer the vote in the desired direction. This might open up wikipedia to a "dictatorship of numbers", where a fanatic group of individuals "conspire" ("To join or act together; combine") to influence the content of wikipedia to pander the (in this case religious) pov of the users involved. This would be a violation of several key tenets of wikipedia. Aecis ^praatpaal 00:12, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Update 1: two more keep votes on the cfd, of Hégésippe Cormier and Christopher Parham. Hégésippe Cormier was informed of this cfd by Pitchka, Christopher Parham was not. This means that of the 16 keep votes currently cast, 15 are from what I call "Pitchka's group" (consisting of the aforementioned users Pitchka, Chooserr, Anti-Anonymex2, AnnH, Dominick, Jakes18, Elliskev, jgofborg, Avalon, Merovingian, Patsw, Eoghanacht, Getcrunk and Shanedidona, and Hégésippe Cormier) and 1 is from a non-related user. Aecis ^praatpaal 10:25, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
Update 2: User:Chooserr has today notified 6 users (Pitchka, Speculative catholic, GreatGatsby, Thomas Aquinas, Dominick and Jgofborg) of the AfD on Student LifeNet. Most of them had also been notified of the aforementioned cfd, afd (on gay rights in Iraq) or both. The users have one thing in common: they are categorized as Roman Catholic Wikipedians. So the behaviour to canvas carefully selected users hoping that their voting will influence the outcome of deletion votes continues, albeit not as seriously as Pitchka's 57 notices. Aecis ^praatpaal 19:13, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
Update 3: User:Shanedidona has suggested to Chooserr to "start a Catholic Alliance in wikipedia" in order to "gather votes to defend pro-life articles and similar items." And he/she has proceeded in doing so by creating Wikipedia:Catholic Alliance of wikipedia, "a pro-life group" and "an organization for the purpose of rallying voting on articles about topics such as abortion." This is another proof of a concerted effort to skew deletion votes and fix wikipedia content along religious pov lines. Aecis ^{Mr. Mojo risin'} 00:53, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
Update 4: And when I nominated Wikipedia:Catholic Alliance of wikipedia for deletion, Shanedidona left notices of this on 50+ talk pages, explicitly telling them: "Please vote and/or tell other people to vote to keep this organization on wikipedia." Shanedidona described the Catholic Alliance of Wikipedia to Darthgriz98 (talk · contribs) as "a CAtholic organization for the preservation of conservative values, basically, CAoW is a redily summonable voting block in case a pro-life article is threatened. ... Vote Pro-Life!" [1] This is getting out of hand... Aecis ^{Mr. Mojo risin'} 11:11, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

while I don't approve of this sort of campaiging, this is one of the primary purposes of user categories. It's not really relevant why they found out about the vote, it's relevant if they are members of the Wikipedia community. I recognize most of the names you mention (indeed, 2 [Merovingian and Ann] are admins), and I would count them if they I were closing a vote. It's unfortunate (and as I say, I disapprove of this sort of thing), but it's no reason to discount their votes.--Sean|Black 01:03, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

It's perhaps no reason to discount their votes, but it is imo behaviour that needs to be monitored, to prevent it from getting out of control. Aecis ^praatpaal 01:13, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

• A related and perhaps more troubling incident is the AfD vote for Gay rights in Iraq. The same users nominated the article and canvassed for votes. Several deletion votes resulted that accused the article of problems it never possessed. I doubt these editors read the piece. Other than these individuals, the consensus was to keep. Please read the discussion. I find this disturbing. Gay rights and abortion are contentious issues. I hope this doesn't grow to the point where editors on both sides form activist coalitions. Editors are supposed to base their decisions on enclopedic merit and site policy. In respecting these principles I often edit contrary to my personal politics. When I discovered these efforts to push a discussion - as an honest editor I feel my trust betrayed. Durova 01:59, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

This kind of behavior is absolutely unacceptable. We cannot judge consensus if editors set out deliberately and maliciously to sabotage the process. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 01:46, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

• While I agree that it's unacceptable, similar behavior has been going on for over half a year and there no feasible way has been suggested for preventing it. If the people involved were acting reasonable and rational, an RFC on the subject would work. But vote stacking generally occurs on controversial issues that people feel strongly about emotionally, so talking it out has not been very constructive in the past. Radiant_>|< 21:43, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

• • Radiant_>|< has a good point- if he, or anyone else, could develop a workable solution to the sort of activities which Aecis outlined above, he would be rich. The same problems happen in America, especially during presidential elections. ::shrug:: One would think that in an electronic medium, it would be easier to regulate ill behaviour... but not always.
  • → P.MacUidhir (t) (c) 18:40, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion/Log/2005_December_18#Category:Wikipedians_by_politics. — Jeandré, 2005-12-23t11:36z

Lamenting that there isn't a "workable solution" is missing the point. The "solution" is for Wikipedia editors to stop campaigning using anti-consensual methods like this. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 15:35, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Still NOT amused

Same bug is acting up. I log on, then the site says I have not. I log on as Martial Law, only something like "123.145.090.14" keeps comming up. This mess could lead not only myself to be falsely accused AS a sockpuppeteer, this could happen to someone else as well. Cookies are active, caches are cleaned out. What is it with this bug ?Martial Law 09:59, 17 December 2005 (UTC) :(

I thought I had stepped on it.Martial Law 10:01, 17 December 2005 (UTC) :)

Oh if anyone calls you a sock, just tell him to stop being silly. It doesn't make any difference if you're logged in or not, you're still allowed to edit the wiki. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 13:10, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

• Most likely it's your browser's cache. After you log in, the browser is serving the page from its cache rather than fetching a new one from the server. That's why it doesn't look as if you've logged in. howcheng {chat} 20:46, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Appreciate the info. Cheers. Martial Law 22:56, 27 December 2005 (UTC) :)

Peter McConaughey

Just blocked for 24 hours for repeated personal attacks after warning, after seeing this edit. Can anyone work out any possible way to bring Mr McConaughey back to the land of the living? - David Gerard 22:21, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Now, it's not really necessary to put it like that. We have to bee civil too, ya know. I have been trying to urge Peter to exercise civility. I don't know what else can be done. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 22:23, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

I think David was just making a play on words. But you can block him for incivility if you really want :-) --Ryan Delaney ^talk 22:34, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, I obviously missed the "play" of it. Maybe I missed something. Oh well... --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 22:39, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

I was attempting to euphemise "batshit crazy troll", but anyway. By the way, has Mr McConaughey made any good edits at all, anywhere? - David Gerard 11:05, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

• How about "chiroptera-poop mentally challenged troglodyte"? Radiant_>|< 13:11, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Hmm... I count about 10-20 good edits to articles other than conspiracy theory, 9/11, American terrorism, and related talk pages. I wasn't going in to look at all of those since the idea of POV there is too great to make any sense in a short check like that. Hmmm... an idea. BRB. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 14:32, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Where are they..? I'm sure there must be a few good edits in amongst the user's total edit count of 579, but I don't see any off hand. The proportions have some interest in themselves: only 119 of them are to article space, 123 to user talk alone. What stood out for me were PM's recent exchanges with two notably unflappable and polite editors, JRM and MONGO, on non-existent or nonsense issues, seemingly purely with the goal of somehow, by hook or by crook, needling those users into annoyance. (Unsuccessfully; well done, guys.) A lot of good-faith assumption has already been spent on this user, and has fallen on stony ground. I'm thinking RFAR rather than RFC, sooner rather than later, though perhaps not quite yet. Meanwhile, I advise only the coolest, most laid-back of us to try any interaction (me, I would be the very last). Mind that blood pressure. Bishonen | talk 19:56, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Assuming good faith, here are the ones that I found. Caveat: I wasn't going near any of the talk pages, the POV pages (like American terrorism or conspiracy theory), or the Wikipedia namespace. [2] [3] [4] [5] (Maybe)[6] (Maybe too)[7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] So, all in all, maybe 25-30 possible "good" edits. However, for every one good edit, there are a couple of edits, maybe not so good. I'm just sayin' is all. Phew... good thing I don't do this for a living, but it might come in handy if an RfAr is ever filed. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 20:32, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

In my interpretation Peter has been a very worthwhile contributor to wikipedia. Peter fundamentally grasps the concepts of true consensus and collaborative editing and I have a learned a lot from his WP:0RR guideline. I can give Carbonite the benefit of the doubt if he claims otherwise but I think it was reasonable for Peter to conclude Carbonite was trying to damage the acceptance of WP:0RR, first by moving it to Peter's userspace over a header dispute, then after that mistake was corrected and the guideline was moved back, Carbonite proposed a merge of it to a fundmanetally different and perhaps less effective guideline. However, Carbonite continues to maintain the two guidelines are similar which apparently is easy to do as he fails to even acknowledge the evidence to the contrary. I ask all of Peter's detractors to please assure me they are not attempting to stack the deck against him to ease future discrediting of WP:0RR or any other guideline or proposal he might have? Please give Peter the benefit of the doubt and avoid statements such as the above "batshit crazy troll" that are out of line for an admin and portray him and his contributions way too negatively. The list of "few beneficial edits" above is likewise way too negative. zen master T 21:37, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Are you serious? Way too negative? Take a look at his contribs and find any more productive edits and diffs. I was trying to do PM a favor by pointing out he wasn't just disruptive. Remember also, I was only going through his main namespace edits in areas specified above. And some of my diffs are being generous by calling them productive. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 21:52, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

I have a tendency to disagree with Zen-master ;-) , but here I fully agree. I also appreciate Carbonite's openly stated attempt to group all <3RR on one page, but I can understand disagreement about it and coming from the 0RR page his actions may look a bit self serving and lacking openness. Apart of that, for an as yet unidentified reason some administrators seem not to understand Peter (see also the discussion with Voldemort on my talk page User_talk:Harald88#A & B's discussion and Wikipedia management)... perhaps Texans and Dutch speak the same language? (I'm Dutch). Also, most of his edits and proposals that I saw on Conspiracy Theory were definitely good, helping to move in the direction of similar but already featured articles. BTW what did David Gerhard mean with "batshit crazy troll"? I did not understand that, thanks! Harald88 23:41, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh and see also Mongo's comment on Peter's Talk page User_talk:Peter_McConaughey#Howdy

What you have above is all about "portrayal", you aren't letting the evidence speak for itself. Creating a small list of "productive" edits by an editor already labeled negatively can have the effect of getting people to further unquestioningly accept your negative portrayal -- though I can give you the benefit of the doubt if you assure me that isn't your intention. Regardless, please let the evidence speak for itself and refrain from excessive or multi-layered portrayals. In my interpretation Peter's response to Carbonite's actions was completely reasonable (I give the benefit of the doubt to both parties, miscommunication and misunderstanding can happen). Please simply list any other edits of Peter's you interpret to violate any wikipedia policy, and how? zen master T 22:13, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Someone and someone else asked if he had made any good edits anywhere. I, trying not to condemn PM without looking at the edits, compiled a list of edits that show he has actually made some productive edits. Now I am beginning to think you do not assume good faith on my part. My list has absolutely nothing to do with Carbonite or their history together... notice I stayed away from the 0RR and highly POV pages. If you really want, when an RfC or an RfAr are filed (which is very possible, it seems) you will have a list of "bad" diffs. I was just creating a list of "good" diffs. If you can find any other diffs that might fit into a "good and productive" category, please feel free to list them yourself below. See you around, my friend. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 22:25, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

You did/do seem to support the notion Peter has only made "some" or a "few" good edits? That is a negative portrayal and I believe it is completely inaccurate. Perhaps Bishonen and David Gerard are the ones that may have portrayed PM excessively negatively, perhaps inadvertently. Please give me the benefit of the doubt, I interpret the possibility of a hastily made portrayal being excessively negative, perhaps inadvertently, and perhaps even within the motivation of finding "some good" edits. Focusing on some "good edits" of an already negatively portrayed editor can have the effect of switching around the burden of proof, which would be wrong and seems to have almost happened in this case. The actual burden of proof is on PM's detractors to give evidence of any violations, right? zen master T 22:45, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

• Evidence of violations is plentiful on these pages. They're looking for evidence of good edits by Peter. Radiant_>|< 23:12, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

• I've been following this page quite closely and seen no evidence of any "violations" by PM. Suggesting people look for a few "good edits" by Peter is a negative portrayal which I currently assume was an inadvertent mistake on your part? Please discontinue that either way. zen master T 23:20, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
  • You apparently haven't been following it all that closely, considering you are unaware that the suggestion that people look for good edits by Peter is actually a serious request by David Gerard, rather than an inadvertent mistake by me. Radiant_>|< 23:43, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
    • As I said above, requesting editors to look for "good" edits by an editor is needlessly prejudicial as it portrays them negatively, though, because I give you and/or David Gerard the benefit of the doubt that it was inadvertent I will simply ask you to refrain from doing that in the future. zen master T 00:06, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

And I am not even sure why you are arguing with what I did. I was trying to help Peter here. There was a question of whether or not PM had made any good edits anywhere. I, looking for ways to not have him blocked outright, came up with a list of productive edits. That way, no one can say that he has never made a useful edit. I am trying to help Peter, and you are fighting me on it. Why? There are people looking to ban him indefinitely, and I am trying to persuade them to be nice and give him a shot. Did you even read my first comment in this section? I was trying to act in PM's defense. Yet you have already prejudged me as being anti-Peter. Please, continue to assume good faith on my part as I try to save Peter from being banned for good. See you around, my friend. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 14:11, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I understand you claim you want to "help" Peter and I can give you the benefit of the doubt. However, what I am telling you is your "help" or someone else's question that you responded to actually has had the effect of an excessive and very unfairly negative portrayal of Peter. The notion that Peter has only made a few good edits is completely inaccurate and taints a fair consideration. What further concerns me is now you seem to be hinting that Peter should be banned for good, that is also completely incorrect. Where did you get the notion Peter should be "blocked indefinitely" from, it seems you are definitely against him now? This page only contains a negative fluff portrayal of Peter, the only evidence presented here involves Peter's supposed "name calling". However, in my interpretation Peter's comparison of Carbonite to a troll made sense given the abusive and stifling actions Carbonite committed, though I give both parties the benefit of the doubt that tensions flare and mistakes happen. But it is starting to seem reasonable a small group of editors are systematically trying to portray Peter negatively because they really don't like his WP:0RR or other posts for some fundamental reason. zen master T 18:11, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Please listen to me... First, I never said those were Peter's only good edits. I just wasn't going near the aforementioned areas. I was just showing that he was able to make productive edits. You fault me for trying to show Peter in a good light? Second, I never once said Peter deserved to be banned for good. Please stop putting words in my mouth. I said there are "people looking to ban him indefinitely, and I am trying to persuade them to be nice and give him a shot." What is so wrong with me trying to be on PM's side here? You want to be the only one? Third, let me say it again, this has nothing to do with Carbonite. Do you get it? Did you read what the first thing I wrote here was? Did you read any of this? See ya, Zen. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 19:22, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Responding to Lord Voldemort, you seem to have accepted as a given that Peter should be "blocked indefinitely" and I think that is a completely inaccurate portrayal given the evidence presented. You say "there are people looking to ban him indefinitely" but where did anyone directly state that (innuendo doesn't count)? I am not "faulting" you for anything as I can give you the benefit of the doubt, I am merely only pointing out what you claim to be "help" has actually had the effect of an excessively negative and unfair portrayal. It is true that it was David Gerard not you that was the one who asked the leading question above: "By the way, has Mr McConaughey made any good edits at all, anywhere?" which should be obvious to see was meant prejudicially, perhaps inadvertently, as David's preceeding sentence contains the phrase "batshit crazy troll"... zen master T 19:43, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

So apparently the answer is no, you haven't been reading what I've been writing? Let me say this one last time, as clear as possible... I was trying to help User:Peter McConaughey from being indefinitely banned, by showing that he has made useful edits, and is not just a "batshit crazy troll". There are people looking to ban him indefinitely (You asked for evidence, here's your diff), and I was trying to stop them by showing PM has been useful. And in fact, I wasn't even responding to David Gerard's question, I was responding to Bishonen's question and comment, "Where are they..? I'm sure there must be a few good edits in amongst the user's total edit count of 579, but I don't see any off hand." If you continue to assert that I am against Peter, which I never have been (show me the diffs for evidence of me being anything other than civil or helpful towards Peter), I will not discuss this matter with you further. Your continued lack of good faith on my part leads me to believe that you just want to argue, and don't care what has actually been written. Please, before you respond, make sure you read this entire comment. Thank you, my friend. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 19:57, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I've always given you the benefit of the doubt that you are not directly against Peter, but I separately can't ignore the overall excessively negative and unfair portrayal on this page. Your citation of David Gerard's suggestion of blocking Peter indefinitely is precisely my other point, where has David or anyone actually presented actual evidence and made a case against Peter (again innuendo doesn't count)? It seems you've been following all the various Peter sections on this page quite closely? The Carbonite "troll" comment is small potatoes and was reasonable given Carbonite's actions that were interpreted as being stifling and I've seen no evidence of Peter "wikistaling" him, if anything an opposite case could be made. The entire concept of "search for any good edits" by a negatively portrayed user further stacks the deck against them, perhaps you have inadvertantly fallen victim to that, though I can also give David Gerard the benefit of the doubt as cases and arguments made hastily can have, perhaps inadvertent, prejudicial results. zen master T 20:49, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Listen... buddy... if you have a problem with David Gerard, take it up with him. Quit debating with me. I would appreciate it if you would stop putting words in my mouth (here, and now seemingly on Peter's page). Why do you keep bringing Carbonite up? I will not argue with someone if you won't even listen. I won't argue with someone who seemingly cannot see that I am trying to save PM, not ban him. This is silliness. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 21:07, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps what you claim is my "not listening" to you is instead us simply disagreeing over whether looking for "good" edits is actually "helpful" or not in this case? I maintain that seeking "good" edits has the perhaps inadvertent effect of unfairly reinforcing a negative portrayal and characterization. I bring Carbonite up because the supposed "personal attack" by Peter against him is the only actual "evidence" on this page, but as I explained above I think that was completely understandable given the situation. What else, if anything, makes you think the case against Peter is so strong that redeeming edits must be found to "save" him? I do take issue with David Gerard's apparently hastily made portrayal that also lacks evidence, but I can give him the benefit of the doubt and need not follow it up with him if he refrains from repeating the same, perhaps inadvertent, mistake. zen master T 21:58, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Listen carefully, I don't really give a crap about how Peter is being portrayed here. I don't give a crap the history between Carbonite and Peter. I don't give a crap if you can't or won't understand me. I DO give a crap about possible good users getting banned.

You ask, "What else, if anything, makes you think the case against Peter is so strong that redeeming edits must be found to "save" him?" My answer: Someone said they were close to banning him! Honestly, at this point, I don't give a crap what the case against him is. Someone was close to banning him, so I thought I'd help him not get banned. If someone says, "Hey, I'm going to ban this editor unless someone can show he or she is useful", I am going to see if I can show them as useful. I provided quality diffs that show PM as something other than a troll (Again, I don't give a crap if this label was justified, that is not what I am arguing here. If you want to have that conversation, we can do that later, for now, please focus on this.)

I don't know if you are arguing just to argue, but this time I really am done with you. You fail to assume good faith, you put words in my mouth, you don't seem to want people to try and help, this case is seemingly hopeless. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 22:23, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

So you unquestioningly accepted David Gerard at his word that the case against Peter was so strong that redeeming edits must be found to save him, and, you dutifully took it upon yourself to spend a significant amount of time searching for only that without considering the possibility there is no case, and, you have repeatedly made a point of insisting: 1) you have nothing to do with Carbonite, 2) or David Gerard, 3) and you are not duplicitously against Peter? Ok, I can still give you the benefit of the doubt. Going forward, if you really want to "save" Peter, as you claim, then be aware that focusing on "redeeming" edits to "save" him can, perhaps inadvertently, reinforce an unfairly negative portrayal, which is exactly what almost happened in this case in my interpretation. The case against Peter is actually slim to none, no where near having to search for redeeming edits to "save" him. zen master T 22:55, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

So the apparent, perhaps inadvertent, effort to portray Peter as needing to be "saved" and the effort by other editors to "save" him has fizzled out as quickly as it started? zen master T 16:29, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

No, I am just done with you. He's still being watched closely. Don't worry. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 15:11, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Sock check

Can we get a sock check on User:RachelBrown as compared to User:Poetlister, who was blocked indefinitely by User:Mindspillage as a "suspected sock puppet of RachelBrown" with apparently no evidence of this, and indeed RachelBrown has not been banned so I query whether that is an automated ban anyway. This has happened in the middle of a request for mediation in relation to edit warring with another user which involved these 2 users and a 3rd user. The mediation was refused by the person who was requested to deal with it, thus meaning that a request for comment is in order. Due process has been disrupted by this block. I ask for a sock check to prove that these two are indeed the same person, as there seems to be circumstantial evidence that they could not be the same person and WP:POINT may apply in relation to this block. Zordrac (talk) Wishy Washy Darwikinian Eventualist 22:41, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

We already got a sockcheck, which showed that they were likely to be the same user, which is the reason for the block. No mediation is taking place, nor is a request for comment taking place. Note that the main RachelBrown account is not blocked: only the likely sockpuppets being used to stack debates. Mindspillage (spill yours?) 22:57, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

There is an evidence field in the {{sockpuppet}} template for a reason, please fill it in. If it has been proven by a sockcheck (aren't these supposed to be logged somewhere? If so you should link to it as evidence) then use the {{SockpuppetProven}} template instead, again with evidence. Thryduulf 01:52, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

How has this been "proven"? You say "likely", but it was established elsewhere that the two are real-life friends... Are ALL edits from the same IP or just a few? It could just be that maybe some edits were made while round the same house, college, university or workplace.... --Mistress Selina Kyle 02:03, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Thryduulf, I'm not familiar with the technical evidence, but there has already been a suspicion of sock puppetry in relation to the RachelBrown account. She violated 3RR together with 81.153.41.72 (talk · contribs) at List of Jewish Fellows of the Royal Society, but one of them said the IP address was not RachelBrown but her flatmate "Lisa." But if you look at the edit summaries, at one point RachelBrown says: "Why do these childish people keep deleting my edits?" [29] and less than an hour later "Lisa" reverts to RachelBrown's version with: "As i said, why do these childish people keep deleting my edits?" [30] RachelBrown, "Lisa", Poetlister, and one other than I know of, Londoneye (talk · contribs), all have the same "voice," make the same types of edits to the same articles, and now apparently there is technical evidence to link them to each other, and to Newport (talk · contribs) and Taxwoman (talk · contribs). The accounts add names to various List of Jewish xxx articles, but refuse to supply sources, and it has happened so much, it has become a problem. For example, Londoneye added Laurence Baxter to a list, saying he was Jewish. I couldn't find anything online about this, so I removed it and asked for a source. She wouldn't supply one and reinstated the name, saying in the edit summary that it was "obvious" from his Wikipedia article that he was a Jew. And it is obvious. The only problem (apart from the fact that we're not allowed to use WP articles as sole sources) is that Londoneye wrote the Wikipedia article on Baxter, also using no sources there. This is the the same behavior other editors have experienced with RachelBrown and Poetlister. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:30, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Isn't this kind of thing supposed to work through solid evidence (like any other "conviction") rather than amateur personality-profiling and a bit of sheer guesswork, though? --Mistress Selina Kyle 02:51, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes it is, and Mindspillage wrote above that she blocked them based on the technical evidence. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:55, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Regarding SlimVirgin's evidence above, RachelBrown did not violate 3RR, her flatmate did who was not aware of Wikipedia rules at that time. She did make one edit under Rachel's account when Rachel had not logged out, see [31]. Regarding the four blocked users, these people are friends from the UK who have supported each other on some disputes or voted the same way on some vfds but otherwise have different interests. I think that is quite normal for close friends to want to support each other and should not merit a block. If it is considered not advisable for friends to support each other in disputes or vfds a warning should be placed on the relevant user pages before blocking. Arniep 04:12, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Where is this Arbitration Committee ruling? I was not aware of an Arbitration Committee action against Poetlister or anyone else. This seems most unusual. I wasn't aware that you could be permanently banned because of using sock puppets to try to influence an AFD, especially because AFDs are not "votes". I thought that such a case, if it was true, would warrant a warning only. Why a permanent ban in this case? There also seems to be quite a lot of evidence that they are not sock puppets. It seems extraordinarily odd to suggest that on 22 December 2005 Poetlister acted as a sock puppet for RachelBrown, when RachelBrown's last edit was 10 December 2005, and last regular one was 3 December 2005. Surely that is the antecedent of sock puppetry - as in, not theoretically possible to be true. Zordrac (talk) Wishy Washy Darwikinian Eventualist 04:29, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

• You don't get permabanned for that, but your sockpuppets usually are. Note that there's generally no way to distinguish sockpuppets (duplicate accounts by the same person) from meatpuppets (getting your friends into Wikipedia for voting purposes only), and hence both can be blocked for that reason. It is not acceptable to get additional new accounts for voting, and whether they are self-made or made by your friends is irrelevant. Radiant_>|< 12:35, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
  • I concur. Accounts that act like a sockpuppet can be treated like one. --Deathphoenix 14:15, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

but the accounts were clearly not created for support or voting purposes only, they all have different interests and edit articles on different subjects. User:RachelBrown joined on April 14th, 2005, most of her edits are on Jewish related articles. User:Londoneye joined on Sept.28th, 2005, most of her edits are on London related articles. User:Taxwoman joined on Aug.9th, 2005, most of her edits are on fetish related articles. User:Poetlister joined on July 11th, 2005, most of her edits are literary subjects, although she has joined in editing Jewish pages since they began to be disrupted and nominated for deletion by User:Antidote in November, whose in now subject of an rfc at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Antidote. I feel I am in some way responsible for this as I have asked 3 of these users to vote or comment on vfds, but I did not know that was against the rules. Arniep 20:29, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I have blocked the socks indefinitely and User:Rachel Brown for a week. Wikipedia is ridiculously tolerant, but we're not actually stupid. See below. - David Gerard 17:30, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Another sockcheck

I request a sockcheck on Nuview. This user has admitted on their talk page of using "other personas" and there are two other mysterious usernames that have allegedly edited the David Miscavige article.--Fahrenheit451 22:57, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Using multiple persona is not prohibited on Wikipedia. Unless you can show that the alleged use of sockpuppets violates policy, there will be no sock check. Kelly Martin (talk) 23:03, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Deletions and disruptions of Holodomor article sections by User:Kuban kazak

User:Kuban kazak has repeatedly deleted sections of the article. E.g. see [32], [33], [34]. He also removed quotes, references, and old photos. He then repeatedly posted his own text that lacks references and is factually wrong. E.g., see [35], where he wrote, "Although in 1918-1920 it /the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church/, along with the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) was subject to many repressions". The former church wasn't created until 1921. Unfortunately, this disruptive behavior prevents normal work. Instead of improving the reference scope, there is a war to keep the article from disintegrating into a pile of personal comments and historical science fiction. Please help.--Andrew Alexander 04:20, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Kuban kazak continues re-inserting bogus history of the events, personal comments in his recent edits: [36], [37]. For instance, he re-inserted the bogus historical fact mentioned above, adding some new ones as well.--Andrew Alexander 02:22, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Sockpuppet needs attention

Missionary is a sockpuppet of Retcon. This was recently proven, as outlined on the following page I created: User:Tommstein/Retcon-Missionary Sockpuppet Evidence. Shortly after I created that page, Retcon admitted to this fact Missionary's user page, although it has since been moved to the talk page. I have already slapped the Sockpuppet tag on Missionary's pages, but the SockpuppetProven tag seems more appropriate, seeing as only one of the criteria listed in Wikipedia:Sock puppet#Tagging identified sock puppets is necessary and this case already meets two of the three (and we can make a request for arbitration if we want to go for the perfect trifecta). The problem is, the SockpuppetProven tag expands into text that reads, in part, "and has been blocked indefinitely." I asked on Wikipedia talk:Sock puppet about who to report this to in order for the sockpuppet to be blocked, and I was told that this was the place to bring it. Can someone please apply said block, both to rid ourselves of this pest and to legitimize the appropriate SockpuppetProven tag?

As a related question, I wish to ask, can anything be done about Retcon to convey to him that this isn't an OK thing that will just get the sockpuppets blocked and have no consequences for him as he creates another army of sockpuppets? We already have very strong suspicions about new sockpuppets, which I am trying to have verified by someone with CheckUser powers.Tommstein 11:05, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I've done a sockcheck and discovered that Retcon has a small army of socks; see my talk page for more details. I would like an uninvolved admin to look specifically at Tommstein vs. Tomnstein and IP Law Girl vs. IP law girl, as it appears to me that there's some impersonation involved here. The junior account in both cases should probably be blocked. Kelly Martin (talk) 12:57, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Anyone wanna volunteer? Whoever does, please don't find me to be impersonating Tomnstein, pretty please.Tommstein 20:03, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

The Tommstein/Tomnstein case is pretty clear to me; it's the IP Law Girl/IP law girl case that is unclear. The senior account is the sock and has far fewer edits than the junior account, which is exactly backwards of the usual pattern for an impersonation. This suggests that this is not a normal impersonation; I tend to suspect that the first account is a meatpuppet, perhaps a relative or acquaintance of Retcon's, who forgot her password upon returning home and instead created a new account. (Of course, this is entirely supposition.) Kelly Martin (talk) 20:32, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Nobody? Is this considered an inglorious aspect of being an administrator or something? Do I have to go and start asking specific administrators?Tommstein 21:04, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

I blocked User:Tomnstein since that one seems a clear-cut case of impersonation as well as sockpuppetry. —Matthew Brown (T:C) 11:44, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Brazil4Linux is violating his ban

User:Brazil4Linux is avoiding his one week ban through the use of sockpuppets. He was banned for using his sockpuppet User:Quackshot to avoid the 3RR. Now he is avoiding his ban with User:GroundZero. GroundZero is most likely a sockpuppet of User:Brazil4Linux because:

• Same distinct linguistical traits
• Contributes at the same time as Brazil4Linux did
• First edits were pages Brazil4Linux contributed on
• Same views as Brazil4Linuz in Talk:Ken Kutaragi
• Appeared as soon as Brazil4Linux and sockpuppet User:Quackshot were banned
• IP address coming from Brazil just like Brazil4Linux
• Same Internet Provider as Quackshot
• Vast knowledge of Wikipedia for a new user
  • Example: Joining in edit discussion, requesting users for comment and the use of edit summaries

Jedi6 02:02, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

(Not to be confused with the admin User:Ground Zero, who has a space in his username.) FreplySpang (talk) 02:50, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Another reason this user should be banned. It is too close to an existing one. Jedi6 02:51, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Could someone help with GroundZero. He has really gotten bad on Talk:Ken Kutaragi and has made personal attacks on people. Jedi6 06:28, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Following up on this, it appears the user got blocked for being too close to the admin's username. Ral315 (talk) 21:15, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

User:Everyking and User:MarkGallagher

Everyking (talk · contribs) has agreed to a stricter period of parole over the next two(ish) days, in return for being unblocked. He has agreed to suffer a 48-hour block if he does not maintain absolute silence on the subject of Phil Sandifer. The agreement expires Christmas Day. Please see User:MarkGallagher/everyking for details. Cheers, fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 07:56, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

While I greatly appreciate the received two days of silence, I will admit to finding Everyking's continued treatment of his parole as an opportunity to play a great big game of Let's Make a Deal disheartening. Phil Sandifer 15:15, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

You refer to the idea of making deals with scorn, I note. Everyking 17:38, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Deletion Wheel War

Can some uninvolved admin try some mediation here with regard to OGTV2 - From Tha Hood to Hollywood (whether this is red or blue right now) see [38] and Wikipedia:Deletion review#OGTV2_-_From_Tha_Hood_to_Hollywood. I'm afraid it looks like 'Tony Sidaway vs WP:DRV' again. --Doc ^ask? 10:00, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

They insist on keeping a Snoop Dogg album deleted because of "process"? What the fucking fucker fuckery? I have undeleted again. This is too stupid to put up with - David Gerard 11:00, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Fine - and that's (hopefully) the end of that. There is plenty crap for those who like to delete stuff without worrying about this. I suppose the only reason to defend process is that it should (?) come to the right conclusion in the end (if it don't than it's broke) and without some form of process we end up with arbitrary decisions and wheel wars. But then, I suppose that argument doesn't hold up when process causes the wheel war in the first place. (I do sometimes think, we could save a lot of time if we deleted WP:DRV and redirected the page to User talk:Tony Sidaway - but now I am being a troll). Merry Christmas. --Doc ^ask? 11:22, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, it did fail an AFD as a fraud of an album (maybe it's a bootleg?) but undeleting is probably best if we have an album cover... Redwolf24 (talk) 11:47, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

The album is listed by HMV Japan and waa produced by Snoop Dogg. We do not delete articles about the works of Snoop Dogg, even bootlegs, without a very, very good reason. It doesn't matter what AfD says, it doesn't matter what DRV says, we're running a serious encyclopedia, not a chatroom, and we never let broken processes kill good content. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 17:22, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Would it be so bad to leave good content inaccesible for a few days, while things got sorted out, rather than fighting a wheel war? If there was new information, than WP:DRV would've sorted this out without intervention. -- SCZenz 17:36, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

In this case, I would say it would be better to block admins who engage in deletion wars. I agree with Tony Sidaway: Snoop Dogg albums don't get deleted. If AFD (temporarily/permanently) lost its mind and decided they should be deleted, I can't say I care. This is an encyclopedia. --Ryan Delaney ^talk 21:57, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Turns out that that particular bootleg was produced by Daddy V, who seems like some dude that sells mixtapes from the back of his van. Tony, I'm as tired as everyone else is of your campaign against WP:V. Pilatus 20:31, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

It's not good to repeatedly misstate the known facts in this manner. Please stop, or at least keep the falsehoods off this talk page. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 17:26, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh, c'mon! In a nutshell, events were like this: The article was deleted last month as an inconsequential bootleg (note that the nomination was made by User:FuriousFreddy, whose judgement on rap one can trust). It went to DRV a few days ago, was summarily restored by Tony who trusts neither AfD nor DRV (and has no notion about rap to boot), deleted, restored by Tony and deleted (each time by a different admin) a few times more, and finally restored by David, who thought is was a legit Snoop Dogg album. It is now on AfD again, where it will likely end up deleted. All heat and no light. Pilatus 03:04, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Expertise, claimed or otherwise, on rap or anything else is not a deletion criterion. --Ryan Delaney ^talk 03:05, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, except if it's expertise on webcomics. Nandesuka 03:07, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Good one, Nandesuka. Tony Sidaway has a long history of defying consensus and undeleting willy nilly whatever he in his infinite wisdom feels needs to be here, despite AfD and VfU. This was just one more example. User:Zoe|^(talk) 03:22, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

As long as people are willing to take the position that process always trumps content and the actual rules, actions like Tony's will be necessary. Phil Sandifer 03:36, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

"I am an expert on rap, and I say this article should be deleted, so it should be deleted" doesn't fly here. Sorry. If you want to claim that something meets a deletion criterion or two, you need actual evidence, not your own determination, or an appeal to the authority of another editor you claim to be an expert. And that applies to everyone. Again, if AfD lost its mind and decided to defer to claimed expertise rather than find out for themselves, then Tony Sidaway was and always will be absolutely right to override the vote and undelete the article. --Ryan Delaney ^talk 04:08, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Tony was dead right to undelete this one, and it's emblematic of the increasingly shitty research that goes into AfDs. That an album does not appear on AllMusic shows nothing except that it is not a U.S. release. Not being a U.S. release is not, in fact, a deletion criterion, nor will it ever be. In the face of an album cover and a link to HMV Japan, one needs to actually do one's homework before arguing for deletion. People who make delete votes without doing basic research should expect to be ignored by the first admin with a lick of common sense to come along. If you want to show that an article should be deleted, be prepared to actually spend more than two minutes searching on a single website. Phil Sandifer 03:29, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't, as it turns out, expect community consensus to be ignored by any admin, whether or not that admin has a lick of common sense. I do expect an admin who regularly arrogates and overturns community consensus to eventually lose his status. It's happened before, and it will happen again. If you can't implement (or at least accept) consensus, even when it goes against your own desires, you're on the wrong wiki. Nandesuka 03:36, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

The reason we allow ourselves to be governed by community consensus is that we assume that the community is going to be reasoned, do their homework, and act in accordance with pre-defined principles of what Wikipedia is. When the community fails to do these things, then Wikipedia's basic premise has been violated. Put another way, the community is empowered to make decisions, but the community is not empowered to completely and totally fuck up the project. Phil Sandifer 03:43, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Garbage, Phil. If DRV had been allowed to run its proper course it would have determined that the album in question was a random mixtape. Now it's back on AfD, and the only thing that has been achieved is that a fair number of people are pissed at the waste of time and the disregard for process that actually works. Time for a finger-wagging and an encouragement to stay away from deletion-related things for a while. Pilatus 03:38, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

It is difficult to take DRV remotely seriously when there are people who regularly vote with no regard to content whatsoever, and when it routinely feels the need to send every article it undeletes, no matter how wrong the original deletion, to AfD to double check. The original AfD was done on bad research, and anyone who trusts DRV to actually do fact-checking and additional research has never actually read DRV. If you want the deletion process to be taken seriously by people, you need to behave seriously, and stop the playing-to-win bullshit that permiates all of these discussions. It seems as though more people here care about whether this is finally their chance to "get" Tony than actually have any investment in the article. Phil Sandifer 03:43, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Maybe DRV was wrong, but at that point you have the option of creating a new article, not based on the old one, that demonstrates notability, verifiability, etc... Simply restoring the old article and letting sit there gives the impression that you're more interested in bucking consensus than improving the encyclopedia (note, however, that it's perfectly okay to override speedies if you think that they were invalid- I did it today).--Sean|Black 03:48, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

If the issue is "The article is fine, people just didn't entertain the concept that it might be a Japan-only album," though, there's not really anything to change - this seems to be a case where AfD just didn't do its homework, leading to serious doubt. That the doubt turned out to be unfounded, and the album turned out to be non-notable is beside the point - it should never have been deleted until the research had been done. Phil Sandifer 03:57, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Okay, that the voters were "wrong" doesn't invalidate the vote- it does, however, help your case at Deletion Review immensly. It's unwise to overturn a vote like that.--Sean|Black 04:25, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

"It seems as though more people here care about whether this is finally their chance to "get" Tony than actually have any investment in the article." Oh please. Calling Tony out on yet another disruption of the consensus-forming process isn't "playing to win," it's called "discussing administrative moves that some of us think are stupid", with a dash of "forming consensus." If we were "playing to win," a phrase you seem to love to use, we would engage in different tactics. Just to pick an example of one such tactic, perhaps we'd start an RFArb against him without trying to reach consensus first, either through conversation, mediation, or an RfC. That, it seems to me, is a textbook example of this "playing to win" you seem to be such an expert on. Nandesuka 04:40, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

You're the one who used the phrase "playing to win" here. I think this has less to do with winning and more to do with the fact that you assume bad faith in Tony, leading you to find him at fault even when it's AfD, not him, that fucked it up. Phil Sandifer 05:45, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Either you're drawing some subtle distinction between "playing to win" and "playing-to-win" that is unworthy of you, or you've simply forgotten this edit, less than an hour before my comment, where you talked about "the playing-to-win bullshit that permiates all of these discussions." And I tell you what. Find me another admin who regularly arrogates and overturns consensus on AfD and Deletion Review, and I'll publically say that when she or he does it, she or he is being stupid, too. I don't have to "assume bad faith" to think that when Tony regularly overturns consensus, he's doing a stupid thing. Good or bad faith ain't got nothing to do with it. We have consensus mechanisms to make these decisions, and by cutting them off before they have reached their end he is, in my opinion, committing an offense against the consensus-building process, and insulting everyone who participated in it. His motives could be as pure as the driven snow, and it would still be wrong. We should expect more of our admins than we get from him, when he acts like this. Nandesuka 13:38, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Gee Snowspinner, that sounds like you're dismissing AfD. Is anyone allowed to do that, or just you? - brenneman^(t)(c) 01:17, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

SpongeBob Hoaxer

68.74.10.146 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) This user has a quite impressive history of adding completely bogus information to articles. He has been blocked repeatedly, but he's up to it again. Please block this user immediately to preserve the integrity of Wikipedia. --Apostrophe 20:14, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

67.38.10.35 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) ...Again. --Apostrophe 05:04, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

68.248.82.134 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) ...Again. --Apostrophe 21:15, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Kwanzaa

It being That Time of Year again, multiple users, some registered, some IPs (and some in both modes) are pursuing their assault upon Kwanzaa, some just enjoying gross and/or racist vandalism, others insistant on rampant POVification. I've used up my three reverts for this lovely task; someone else please help out. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 23:40, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

It's now on my watchlist. -- SCZenz 23:57, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Kwanzaa really is under blatant attack from anonymous POV warriors. I don't think it's possibly to hold them back within the rules, but there are extremely blatant problems with their edits. I request a previously uninvolved admin to take a look and asses the situation. -- SCZenz 01:38, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I had to revert blatant vandalism when I first got to the article then after reviewing the page history I sprotected the article temporarily. Jtkiefer^{T | C | @} ---- 01:44, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not an admin (I came across this page--and dispute--on RC patrol), and I've said as much on SCZenz's talk page, but: While many of the anons' edits are clearly blatant vandalism, simply adding a link to a site critical of Kwanzaa does not constitute "POV-pushing". In fact, given the article's total neglect of the small but non-negligible anti-Kwanzaa "movement" (not sure of a better word for it), it helps move the article closer to NPOV. Kurt Weber 01:57, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

The situation is difficult, because the way the links were added was inappropriate. One was liked as "the TRUTH about Kwanzaa" while another's title referred to it as a "Holiday from Hell". Either could have been liked as "an article critical of Kwanzaa," but was not. I admit I was getting frustrated towards the end of my efforts to deal with the page, which is why I stopped and called for an uninvolved admin to take a look. -- SCZenz 02:53, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Where possible, we should try to synthesize and summarize significant and verifiable arguments held by a non-trivial minority of people, in preference to just providing external links. It is not our responsibility to provide a link to every kook with a website, and doing so degrades the quality of our articles. Nandesuka 03:22, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

• Thanks for the backup, folks. I guess you can see how I was rather frustrated, though of course I shouldn't have acted alone. Regarding the anon POV warriors, part of the problem is that one of the anon POV warriors is also a registered user (User:TurtleTurtle); that's why sprotect didn't help at all. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 03:46, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Christmas trouble

Today there have been a couple of disturbing (to me at least) happenings on the Christmas article. Firstly, there is a developing edit war on whether dates that consist of only the day/month should be linked (see Talk:Christmas)--some editors are de-linking repeat occurrences on the basis that this clutters that article with links, others have restored the links because removing them breaks date format preferences. Secondly, the article has been semi-protected. I think that semi-protection is a bad idea because this article will get a lot of visits in the next 24 hours and, as for the main page featured article, I think that protection of any sort shoudl be avoided. JeremyA 02:23, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Not to mention, the FARC process for this article is also continuing, so we might have to replace this as the FA for the day. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 02:29, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that that has been done already. JeremyA 02:33, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I checked and the FARC is still going on, and Christmas was removed from the front page, replaced by Ido. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 05:13, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I believe that the Christmas Article should be reinstated on the main page. It got there by merrit and its removal was just censorship. If it doesn't belong there oughtn't be any mention of Kwanzaa, or Haunuka hereonout. Chooserr 05:15, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I do not believe it was done by censorship, but based at [39]. The person who made the call was Raul654, the main co-ordinator of the FA process and articles. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 05:18, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I do not know Raul654, or his edit history, but will say inspite of this that ANYONE can abuse power. Chooserr 05:21, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

You can see the actual edit at [40] I do not think this is an abuse of admin powers, since he is the one that can select which articles to appear on the front page and he can change it if there are significant concerns. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 05:26, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Have you even read the Christmas article? There's no way it's in good enough shape to be on the Main Page, let alone featured anymore. It has *NOTHING* to do with censorship. --bbatsell | « give me a ring » 05:28, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Administrator abuse????

Administrator mikkalai (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) had blocked me illegal for so-called vandalism. Actually he's doing vandalism with his buddy Node ue. Someone can unblock me to defend myself and to ask de-adminiship of mikkalai (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) ? -- Bonaparte talk 08:38, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Next block

Blocked for 1 week for persistent and fully aware distortion and deletion of official info, e.g., in Republic of Moldova, Tighina and in other places. This is considered persistent and malicious vandalism. Persistent removal of Cyrillic spelling of moldovan toponyms is an intolerable censorship of information. mikka (t) 21:38, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Read here very careful mikka: I was just reverting Node's edits which are considered persistent and malicious vandalism. So you have to block Node, not me! And your persistent adding of Cyrillic spelling of Moldovans toponyms is also persistent and malicious vandalism. Moldovan (Romanian)'s official spelling is in LATIN ALPHABET. So, block yourself! Bonaparte talk 08:26, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Excuse me - this is a content dispute not vandalism. Please do not use blocks when dealing with content disputes. Mikka is clearly has a conflict of interest, by blocking Bonaparte for edits to a page in which he is actively involved in editing, and he is also involved in a content dispute with Bonaparte at this same page. At Tighina, there seems to be a dispute between including the Moldovan Cyrillic version of the text. Again, this is a content dispute. Please take this to the talk page. Mikka has a very valid rationale for including this Cyrillic text, but Bonaparte can also make his argument. It is the same at Republic of Moldova. They are not cases of simple vandalism. If the 3RR is broken, the Bonaparte can be blocked, but not for one week. I hope he is unblocked now. Thanks, Ronline ✉ 07:20, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Erm, for future references, please place a notice, either AN or ANI; duplication in both is excessive. El_C 11:23, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

The China wars

Administrators may note the edit-warring occuring between me and instantnood in various pages such as

• Thomson Road
• List of railways in China
• Hong Kong Central Library
• Districts of Hong Kong
• Template:Asia

National dish is also becoming a tripatite war between the above and User:Yuje.

For your information and neccesary action in relation to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Instantnood 2.--Huaiwei 10:34, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I think peace is needed here. I'm the cause of it, like the Singapore Changi Airport, I restarted the table and it became controversial. This table would be hiding, if not for me putting the Asia template in many articles of Asian countries (it was not used in many country articles before I putting in the template). I'm sorry. :( --Terence Ong ^Talk 10:38, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

These can better be handled by RfC/Huaiwei for the time being. — Instantnood 11:36, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Instantnood and I have been agreeing to disagree here: [41] Should I start another poll? >.< enochlau (talk) 06:05, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Resolved for now. Please see Enoch's and my user talk page. :-) — Instantnood 09:16, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

While the admins generally ignores the above, and probably deems it unnecesary to enforce the outcome of the above Arbcom, the disputes threatens to spreads to other pages. Temple Street is the latest victim.--Huaiwei 19:14, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

And probably in Char siew rice and Char siu soon too?--Huaiwei 19:27, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Catholic Alliance of wikipedia

I have deleted the project page Wikipedia:Catholic Alliance of wikipedia as "Not remotely compatible with Wikipedia's policy of neutrality." The project was specifically "intended to nurture and keep wikipedia's pro-life/pro-catholic articles and categories." Needless to say, if any such articles exist they must also be made neutral or deleted if this is not possible. Any project with similar partisan aims, as far as I am concerned, must be deleted on sight. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 15:15, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

That was the edited version. This text was edited only after the mfd started. The original text, the one I nominated for deletion, simply mentioned "an organization for the purpose of rallying voting on articles about topics such as abortion." Or, as Shanedidona described the alliance to Darthgriz98, "a CAtholic organization for the preservation of conservative values, basically, CAoW is a redily summonable voting block in case a pro-life article is threatened. ... Vote Pro-Life!" Anything they say about intending to nurture is just a disguise for pov pushing to me. Aecis ^{Mr. Mojo risin'} 18:52, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

You'll have to show me that policy, Tony. Probably the closest in regards to deletion is CSD A6. Basically all that you've done is become what you chided me for being here[42]. The only difference is that I bully those who bully or abuse the trust of others, you bully those who disagree with you. karmafist 21:57, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not aware of bullying anyone. I deleted that page because there is absolutely no possibility of this project ever being acceptable on Wikipedia. Such pages must be deleted on sight. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 15:33, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't think it was right to delete it (twice) while the vote was taking place. It looks very much as if the consensus is going to be for delete, but it would be more respectful of the community not to anticipate the result. I have no wish to keep it, but I can't see that it's going to do any harm to Wikipedia while the vote is coming to a close. However, deleting it a third time could be harmful in the sense of causing bad feeling and frustration. AnnH ^(talk) 15:39, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Semi-protection on Kwanzaa

Kwanzaa is listed as semi-protected, but was just vandalized by an anonymous editor (63.19.128.24). What's wrong? Firebug 15:33, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure when, but the protection log shows an unprotection earlier today and then a reprotection a few hours later. Perhaps the vandalism was at that time. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 19:19, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Obesity is semi-protected

Why is the article semi-protected?? The idea is just ludicrous on the obesity article! --Sunseeking Jay 18:28, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

• Looking at the page history, it would appear that there's been a bit of a vandalism spree the past few days. I would assume that whoever protected it will be unprotecting it relatively shortly. JYolkowski // talk 18:40, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Considering the high amount of vandalism it's been getting recently, including some from User:Sunseeking Jay himself, it's a very good idea. --Angr (t·c) 18:47, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

User:Bulgarian Ben

This user put a {{WoW}} template on his own user page: [43]. He isn't actually blocked, though; nor has he done anything blockable yet (though he does seem interested in moving pages in the future). --Angr (t·c) 18:47, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I've blocked him as a troll. He is either Willy or someone pretending to be Willy. Either way he is trying to disrupt. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 19:16, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, taste the corn indeed...............yep that was a totally pointless insertion. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 19:17, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Are you trying to imply that I can't spell? I'm offended! It's Korn! not corn. The fer ack t the hat eye can knot speel is an otter mat her. Eye wrung ever three think threw a spill cheque two make shore fist. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 19:22, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Nah I just wanted to insert a random statement here :) Merri ykrismas Tireesa — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 19:36, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

So your signature is advocating tasting Sam Korn...? :-) Dmcdevit·t 10:01, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes! He stated on my talk page that he wouldn't let anyone taste him, I informed him that we'll just have to hold him down. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 14:21, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Insane, the wikipedia editors are — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 23:41, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Date format warrior

I've come across a date format warrior, Hmains (talk · contribs). I tried explaining to him that dates are linked to allow formatting by user preference, but he continues to remove links around dates. He's also changing BC/BCE. I know there was some discussion and perhaps an arbitration case on something similar in the past. Can anybody point me to the appropriate policy/Arbcom rullings? --GraemeL ^(talk) 19:35, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Jguk and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/jguk 2. --cesarb 19:59, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Jayjg was adamant that we address this in our climate dispute 2 case -- Wikipedia does not mandate styles in many different areas; these include (but are not limited to) American vs. British spelling, date formats, and citation style. Where Wikipedia does not mandate a specific style, editors should not attempt to convert Wikipedia to their own preferred style, nor should they edit articles for no other purpose than to convert them to their preferred style. - Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Climate change dispute 2 Raul654 20:01, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I've recently been involved in some minor edit warring concerning BC/BCE/AD/CE. The "fighting parties" are now working towards consensus, compromise and resolution at Wikipedia talk:Eras. It is possible that Hmains has been inspired by that issue. Aecis ^{Mr. Mojo risin'} 20:07, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

FWIW, the prefered style is not to link dates anyway. Martin 20:22, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

You're flatly wrong there. Adding square brackets "DATE" to full dates allows date preferences to work. Editors are not required to link full dates, but most full dates in Wikipedia are linked so that each user's date-formatting preference appears in the text. - Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers) Raul654 20:25, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Of course, that applies only to full dates, whre date preferences will work. I think it would be better if some form of wiki-markup other than a link were used to activate date prefernces but that is anotehr issue. DES ^(talk) 20:33, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

It was the removal of links from full dates that originally attracted my attention. I only noticed the BC/BCE changes after I had left him a message about why full dates were linked. --GraemeL ^(talk) 20:45, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, I didnt mean that specifically, its difficult to refer to that page as it seems to be changing frequently, but I was referring to So unless there is a special relevance of the date link, there is no need to link it., which it doesnt say anymore. Martin 20:37, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

OK, it says it again now ;) Martin 20:38, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

User:Regforafd

I've indef blocked Regforafd (talk · contribs) for sockpuppetry. He voted on a slew of afd votes(thus the name, short for "Registered for AFD") right after starting the account. Yawn. Now I suppose I gotta go clean up all those votes. Sigh. karmafist 21:01, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Ah, the plot thickens. Mailer diablo (talk · contribs) welcomed Regforafd [44], and then closed a bunch of the afds he voted on [45],[46],[47],[48],[49], just for starters. I'm blocking Mailer indef now, and asking for a checkuser to see if it should be permanent. karmafist 21:17, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I just informed Mailer[50], and indef blocked until I can get a checkuser just to be safe, he seems fairly active on afd. karmafist 21:32, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

That seems a tad premature. I'll unblock him so he can reply to these accusations. If there are indications of sock puppetry, use RFAR. If he was indeed doing what you accuse him of, he clearly won't be able to continue it now, so the block serves no purpose . Zocky 21:34, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Hang on a minute. If I were going to try and use socks to change the outcome of a afd vote, i would not use a sock with that name, i would not welcome that sock, I would not close an afd so quickly. I am fiendishly clever mwhaah! ( good job I'm not evil) perhaps Mailer diablo (talk · contribs) is not so sneaky as me, or perhaps he is innocent and you are reading too much into things? Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 21:39, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I am innocent - I created no sockpuppetry, and I have not even nominated a VfD for weeks! Please check your email. I invite a checkuser on me to prove my innocence. I have nothing to hide. - Mailer Diablo 21:47, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

December 6th, Regforafd nominated 9 related articles for AFD. Mailer Diablo closed 63 total articles that day.

December 8th, Regforafd nominated 1 article for AFD. Mailer Diablo closed 35 total articles that day.

December 14th, Regforafd nominated 6 articles for AFD. Mailer Diablo has, so far, closed 13 total articles for that day. None of the articles he's closed have been an article nominated by Regforafd. All 6 Regforafd nominations were closed by someone else.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the accusation that Regforafd is Mailer Diablo, to say nothing of blocking Mailer Diablo, is wildly premature. Mailer Diablo is one of our most active AFD closers, and is therefore likely to intersect with AFD sockpuppets by sheer happenstance. The evidence does not support the accusation.

Ξxtreme Unction|_{yakkity yak} 21:58, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Well put. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 02:39, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

• If it can be proven he's using sockpuppets to manipulate AFD, he should be blocked, obviously. But I find blocking him before an sockcheck has been done far too premature. His closures can be reviewed if need be. Blocks should be done with proof or community support. If he's not unblocked yet, I will. Extreme Unction's assertion above is quite right. - Mgm|^(talk) 22:04, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks guys. I've been now unblocked by Zocky. - Mailer Diablo 22:07, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
• If someone is using sockpuppets to manipulate AfD, it should go to ArbCom or get community consensus. The notion of one admin perma-blocking another based on his own analysis of the evidence, even if far more ironclad than this evidence was, is just plain bizzare. Here, I don't think there's even a reason to do a sock check. -- SCZenz 22:17, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

• (after editr conflict) A block on an admin for closing AfD's some of which turn out to include votes by a user who may be a sockpuippet of someone, with no indication that the admin was in any way aware of said sockpuppetry (assuming that there was sockpupetry, which seems not unlikely but is unproved AFAIK) seems to be a violation of WP:AGF. I think User:Karmafist was rather too fast on the triger on this one. As for Regforafd (talk · contribs) having a separate ID for AfD votes is not against policy, but if this is legit, that user should IMO disclsoe his other wikipedia identity, if any. But unless he actually used this ID to cast multiple votes from different IDs on some AfD, this user has not actually violated policy. Is there any evidence that this has in fact happened? DES ^(talk) 22:23, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
• Karmafist blocked, I unblocked, nobody reblocked. End of story. Kiss and make up and go do useful stuff. Zocky 22:36, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I just looked up Regforafd. It ain't Mailer diablo, it appears to be someone playing silly buggers over at least the last month. See block log for more in a short while. And Karmafist, this block was on crack; run ones of this standard past ANI first for a sanity check, 'cos this one fails it - David Gerard 22:39, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Names are Fixbeforeigo, Regforafd, Creativenamehere, Waterguy and (most of the edits) IP 24.17.48.241. I'm sure if they want to stop messing about they'll be in touch by email and can pick a name - David Gerard 22:46, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

• I will not pursue this matter further. I sincerely hope that karmafist will learn something from this incident. - Mailer Diablo 22:42, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Yeah, thanks for clearing this up. Mailer's a good editor, so it was a preventative matter until it was settled and it looks like it's settled. Sorry for any consternation. karmafist 23:23, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
    • GF or not, I don't think it's a "preventative matter" you should have been doing. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 02:39, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

User W00811 has been blocked by a bot (page moves)

User:W00811 has been blocked by a bot intended to block pagemove vandalism.

Please check the move log for this user and unblock if this was an error.

Please delete this message after the situation has been resolved.

This message was generated by the bot. -- Curps 22:47, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh dear, it's Willy again... Aecis ^{Mr. Mojo risin'} 22:48, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Cleaned up. Flcelloguy (A note?) 22:52, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

P.S. Interesting side effects when two admins simultaneously revert a page move... All cleaned-up now, in either case. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 22:57, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Hehehe, I guess that's what happens for a sysop who's cleaning WoW the first time. :P - Mailer Diablo 22:58, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

• Confirmed WoW. - Mailer Diablo 22:56, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

202.152.162.216

The anonymous IP 202.152.162.216(talk) has been warned several times and is almost always reverted. It has been given a severe "final" warning by an admin and yet it went ahead a day later in two different periods and did it again. It continually changes categories and adds unneeded and unwanted new categories for fictional animals that are too specific. I think it needs a longer block than usual, say perhaps a week. Hu 15:35, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

It is also using IP 202.152.162.215(talk) Hu 16:01, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I've blocked both for 3 hours. This seems to be a misguided user who simply doesn't understand how categories work. However, as he is noncommunicative, there's no point in trying to reason or educate him, regrettably. Hopefully, this short block will get his attention. As this is a first block of a user with some valid edits, I'm reluctant to apply a longer block. Let me know if he continues in the same pattern when the block expires. Owen× ☎ 16:52, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

This is a dynamic IP address from an Indonesian ISP. So, longer blocks may not be suitable. Rather a note to the ISP's abuse contact (spam and abuse report : abuse@indosat.com, abuse@palapanet.com) may be a better option, if the vandalism persists. --Ragib 23:03, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

GMB (talk · contribs)

The user GMB is making several politically-motivated remarks toward users on his talk page. Regardless of his arguments, he has ignored two warnings to stop, and is now on a third and final warning. On December 24 he was blocked for 24 hours through 3RR, with 12 hours added to that for his personal attacks then. Most of these attacks are aimed at User:Natalinasmpf. The continued personal attacks mean that, if he makes any further attacks, he will be blocked for another 36 hour period. Hedley 23:07, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I have blocked User:GMB indefinitely, because of his continued disruption, particularly his refusal to stop making particularly pointed personal attacks. Could someone with more experience than I please review. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 04:19, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

From the contribution at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:GMB&diff=prev&oldid=32837411, GMB has called someone a Holocaust denier, which is a crime in some nations. I have looked at this block and I deem it to be fair. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 04:33, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

That's enough to get someone blocked? In some countries, it's probably illegal for women to show their faces in public or to access Wikipedia, but damn, having to follow every law of every country, contradictory ones even, is pretty hardcore.Tommstein 09:13, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

While we mainly have to follow US law here, IIRC, but I wanted to point that fact out to those who are not from the USA that something like this could get someone in trouble. And, with all of the recent problems we have been having for the past few weeks, something as serious as this remark should be taken seriously by the administrators of Wikipedia. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 09:32, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

He wasn't blocked for calling someone a holocaust denier. He was blocked for persistent disruption, which including POV-pushing and hurling abuse at other users. When informed of such policies as WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA, WP:DICK and WP:AGF, he declared that he could never follow them, because that would just be giving the Communists what they want. WP:NPOV is a leftist conspiracy to prevent accuracy. When informed of his block for WP:3RR on $SOMEARTICLEOROTHER, he declared that User:Natalinasmpf was a "Communist child". He decided that, when User:Hedley warned him for incivility, Hedley was also part of the hard leftist conspiracy on Wikipedia (it's like the Jewish Cabal, only we have to worship Marx instead of God!). When FrancisTyers waded in, he accused him (?), for no reason that I or anyone else could see, of being equivalent to a "holocaust denier" because he hadn't instantly declared "adequate disgust" with the "Communists". And all that's before I mention his disruption to other pages on Wikipedia. So, no, it wasn't because he used the words "holocaust denier" — that was just the last straw. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 13:46, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

The holocaust denier thing isn't quite like it sounds, but a rhetorical flourish of commie-hatred: it's Stalin's "holocaust" GMB is accusing somone of neglecting or denying. If that makes a difference. Anyway, there's nothing unfair about the block, as the article editing is terrible and the talkpage worse, and people certainly have tried with him. But in keeping with Wikipedia's proud tradition of ridiculous tolerance for very new users (GMB only started editing on Christmas Eve) I still think a week-long block might be tried first, with a clear warning that indefinite blocking will follow on its heels if he goes on in the same way when it expires. It doesn't look, from the talkpage, as if he really took the block warnings seriously: he seems quite but-I'm-the-GOOD-guy incredulous about them. Also, nobody mentioned "indefinite", and the reasonable reading of the warnings he was given was probably that he might face another 36-hour block at worst. The difference, psychologically, between a week and indefinite would—optimistically—be that the week might make him see that we mean it, without imposing the hurdle of a potentially humiliating promise to "behave". And it would be very simple to re-block indefinitely if he comes back shouting, there would be no need for any further warnings or blandishings. Bishonen | talk 07:19, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

He just started a few days ago and started all of this? Wow. While I think that he still should be punished for what he has said, if you wish to reduce the block, you will have no objections from me either. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 07:39, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

FYI -- nobody on Wikipedia has the authority to "punish" anyone for anything. You will not find the word "punish" in any of its forms in the blocking policy, nor is punishment given as one of the duties of Wikipedia administrators. The purpose of blocking is to prevent specific kinds of harm to the project; it is not to reform the person, or to work retribution upon him.

This is an encyclopedia project and not a prison, army, or for that matter a BDSM club. People who are interested in punishing others should consider signing up for those instead. --FOo 08:56, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

What other word should I have used: sanction? forced vacation? Regardless, I still think that GMB should get the message that he is not allowed to attack anyone personally or use remarks as he has used before. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 09:05, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, it's not a matter of what words to use. If you're thinking "punish" I hope you will write "punish" ... rather than hide your intention behind some kind of political correctness. But if your goal is to punish people for saying the wrong thing, you aren't doing Wikipedia any favors. We've seen enough of folks setting themselves up as tin-pot authorities and sitting in personal judgment of other people's virtue. That kind of thing does a lot of damage to the project.

If someone is disrupting the project, then administrators can block them to prevent that disruption. But the purpose of blocking isn't punishment; it's to directly prevent the continuation of the disruption. In this case, there's an account that isn't being used for anything but disruption, so blocking makes sense -- there isn't a real contributor here. (Because of that, "punishment" would be ironic in the extreme -- this isn't a contributor with an interest in being here other than to be a jerk; so what exactly would he be deprived of -- jerkspace?) --FOo 11:21, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I just received the following from him, by email:

Hurry up and unblock me Gallagher. I'm not going to let small children, communists, tax eaters and the more generally ignorant get away with this.

I'd like to respectfully suggest that, if unblocked, he would probably continue to cause disruption. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 13:46, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I was maybe thinking an indefinite block is too harsh, as he's not a 'vandal', but that sort of makes me more certain it's right. Hedley 16:18, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

User:OceanSplash

I've been asked [51] to block OceanSplash (talk · contribs) for posting that "Muslims are masters of tricks ... Once you ... become a Muslim and see how they lie with clear conscience you won't be surprised of anything." [52] He's been warned many times about making these kinds of anti-Muslim comments and has been blocked three times already for them. I'm minded to block him for 72 hours for this one, but because the comment partly involved me, I'd appreciate some feedback first. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:55, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Definitely not the first personal attack OceanSplash has made, nor his first racist comment directed in an anti-Islam fashion, including my personal 'favourite' earlier this month Muslims lie. This is what Islam teaches them to do, and another imaginary deity of the self proclaimed prophet of Islam replacing Mohammad Sherurcij ^{(talk) (bounties)} 21:12, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I blocked OceanSplash for 24 hours a while ago. It started on Talk:Ali Sina leading me to post Talk:Ali_Sina#Stop. I also notified him on his userpage User_talk:OceanSplash#Block. He complained to Jimbo about me which didn't seem to go anywhere User_talk:Jimbo_Wales#Gross_and_flagrant_abuses_of_power. I almost blocked him again for the comment, however, I decided since it was on a userpage and not on article talk pages it wasn't as big of a deal. I think he could be blocked but when it's on article talk pages it's much worse in my opinion. gren グレン 21:31, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Compared with her/his former self-deleted user talk page, I see OceanSplash reducing her/his anti-religious personal attacks. I suggest to keep an eye on the next edits. If nothing changes, a longer block would be appropriate. Cheers -- Szvest 22:51, 27 December 2005 (UTC)  ^{Wiki me up&#153;}

Blocked for one week, these kinds of comments are unacceptable and after reviewing this user's contribs and talk page I think it's safe to say that he has a history of this type of behavior and that a one week block is warranted. Jtkiefer^{T | C | @} ---- 23:08, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for dealing with it, Jtk, and to everyone else for the input. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:29, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I on the other hand disagree altogether with this witch-hunting. OceanSplash has stated his candid opinion, which he should be able to freely present in the free market of ideas which are discussed in the in the talk page without at once being accused of racism or personal attacks.

Furthermore, that particular view is shared by many others throughout the world. Now if we cannot take a bit of adverse opinion to our way of seing the world I wonder then what we are doing participating in an user based online encyclopedia whose mission is to spread knowledge throughout the world.

Like Noam Chomsky tells us quote:

Goebbels was in favor of free speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If you're really in favor of free speech, then you're in favor of freedom of speech for precisely for views you despise. Otherwise, you're not in favor of free speech. --CltFn 05:30, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

You think Muslim editors should have to put up with comments from OS like "Muslims have evolved to have no conscience"? And if we try to stop him, it means we're like Goebbels? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 05:39, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Being in favour of free speech for those I dislike does not give me any moral obligation to hand them a megaphone when I see them on the street. Wikipedia is not their private vehicle for these things. Shimgray | talk | 11:56, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

In the free market of ideas editors can take the opinions and ideas of other editors and discuss them and challenge them if they wish. That some editors cannot deal with the opinions of other editors is no reason that these other editor's opinion should be suppressed by wikipedia admins. Stifling free speech is not going to result in a good encyclopedia.

As far as Goebbel goes make up your own mind, Noam Chomsky is the source of that quote.--CltFn 07:34, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

I agreed with NAMBLA's right to keep up their website despite the fact that pragmatically it was likely harmful. Should they be given a free vehicle to support their endeavors? If any Muslim editor tried to convert me I'd warm him and if he persisted he'd end up on WP:AN/I. This project has a goal and when you alienate editors it isn't conducive towards that goal. Send some of OceanSplash's edits to an EB editor. See what he or she thinks. Show some of OceanSplash's edits to a manager of a company. Would he or she accept that behavior among employees? Yes we have more leeway for discussion but OceanSplash used more "dawa" than any Muslim I've seen here. gren グレン 13:19, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Sounds like the line of thinking of pre-21st century censorship which used some weird morality to prevent free speech. Isn't it time to let go of the hypocrisy of the insane past milleniums in regards to preventing the free expression of opinions because some dinosaur group somewhere would find that offensive. FREEDOM of SPEECH means 100 % free speech, no restrictions , no controls , no parameters of acceptability , 100% undiluted free speech. --CltFn 17:34, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Marsden

User:Marsden has been blocked, because Wikipedia does not need trolls with nothing better to do than accuse Jimbo of stacking the arbcom with Zionist Randroids. Phil Sandifer 23:13, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

I can read nowhere in Wikipedia:Blocking_policy where you are allowed to block someone indefinitely on your own (even if you have a few administrators backing you up). I must ask you to either properly start a request for arbitration or undo the indefinite block. Otherwise I'm going to have to take up this issue. -- Dissident (Talk) 22:48, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm repeating my assertion that the indefinite blocking of Marsden (which goes way beyond a simple enforced cooling down period) was a violation of Wikipedia's blocking policy and should be undone. If anyone is convinced the punishment was appropriate, I'm sure there will be no problem of going through the official channels, in this case by starting an arbitration request, if not a lesser remedy. -- Dissident (Talk) 14:31, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

You may want to read Wikipedia's banning policy, which states that the decision to ban a user may come from the Wikipedia community. Since none of the 700+ admins have unblocked Marsden, there is de facto community support for this ban. Carbonite | Talk 14:37, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Actually, Everyking wanted to unblock Marsden, but felt that he might be de-adminned if he did. 222.99.239.170 05:50, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

You're argumentation makes no sense for several reasons (and I personally find it highly disturbing from a due process point of view). First of all, administrators are not equal to the Wikipedia community and are not to be considered to be more authorative when it comes to consensus forming. Apart from that, consensus is almost by definition not "de facto" and depends on a large participation at a reasonably visible place, which I don't think ever took place in this case. I doubt much more than, say, 5 procent of the administrators were even aware of this issue before just now and there is obviously a massive natural bias in favor of banning from those who were aware. All I see here is a bunch of administrators acting in collusion, and I'm exactly putting up this notice at the bottom in order to raise awareness among much more administrators. If the unblocking simply depends on a single administrator disagreeing, wouldn't you agree that that would be too much of an intimidating prospective for such an administrator? And aren't the policies not exactly meant to prevent such things from happening? -- Dissident (Talk) 15:21, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Arbitration will come out no different. Harassing users by threatening their employment is not acceptable. Perhaps that should be put into the banning policy. Fred Bauder 14:52, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

As Fred surely knows very well, Marsden never threatened anyone's employment, and in fact assured SlimVirgin that he had no intention of ratting out Jayjg for editing Wikipedia from work; Marsden just wanted a simple statement from Jayjg either confirming or denying that his participation in Wikipedia fulfilled part or all of his employment obligations. 222.99.239.170 05:50, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Why are you making assertions (which can be disputed) and then automatically become judge, jury and executioner of them? You can't simultaneously be confident of your side and then fear a subsequent official inquiry? I'm reasoning in circles here. All I'm asking is that you follow official procedures and give Marsden his day in court. -- Dissident (Talk) 15:21, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Dissident - this sort of thing needs to be done properly. I'm not aware of blocking policy that permits banning people indefinitely for being "trolls". If Marsden has made (legal?) threats, that's a reason for blocking or banning - but that wasn't the reason given by Snowspinner, and a diff to show the relevant edit would be nice. The only thing I can find is this, which does not seem sufficient justification. Snowspinner also apparently failed to notify Marsden of the ban, never mind explain it. Rd232 ^talk 15:44, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

If Marsden was banned an harrasment grounds, and thats considered clearly unacceptable by the wiki community, why don't you just unban-reban with the proper reason this time? That shuould handle most of the objections.--Tznkai 15:53, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm just asking for evidence of behaviour justifying a ban, and noting that normally such justification should be placed on the user's talk page. There's mention here of "Threatening people's place of work", but I'd just like to see the evidence for it. Rd232 ^talk 18:56, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Threatening people's place of work gets an immediate ban unless and until we can be sure the person operating the account can damn well behave like a decent person and not a thug. (This, by the way, is one of the reasons CheckUser data is guarded with such paranoia — there are enough dicks on Wikipedia that there is real danger of such harassment.) This is unlikely to be negotiable, and in the case of an unblock a reblock is almost certain.

BTW, for anyone who cares: Dissident does not appear to be Marsden, so their concerns are independent - David Gerard 17:05, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

BTW, David Gerard, I am Marsden. And this is the second time you have slandered me. Have you no shame, David Gerard, no shame whatsoever? You are a disgrace to Wikipedia, David Gerard, and you are in a position for which your character, or lack thereof, makes you unsuitable. I still remember your unjustified block of Dervish Tsaddik, and your disgraceful refusal to consider that you had made a mistake. 222.99.239.170 05:50, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Dave, he didn't threaten anyone's place of work. He asked whether Jay was being paid to edit Wikipedia. You must know that that rumour -- which Jay has denied and I take to be entirely false -- has been circulated. Marsden didn't to my knowledge threaten to tell Jay's bosses that he spends time working here. Nor was that what Snowspinner banned him for. It looks to me as though a group of admins has arranged to have a dissident editor banned and now they're making up whatever bullshit reason they can come up with to justify it. -- Grace Note.

I consider your identity checking unwarranted and thus a personal attack against me. -- Dissident (Talk) 17:14, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Not sure how its personal, or an attack, and you were just cleared of any suspicion seperate from yorur conduct.--Tznkai 17:24, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I wasn't a personal attack but it was, in my opinion, unwarranted. No one accused Dissident of being Marsden. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 18:01, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

It was my first thought - David Gerard 18:26, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

So much for the checks we were assured you'd have on your use of it. -- Grace Note.

If this is true and instead of a crude human analysis by glancing at edits, an outright IP test has been done here without due case, then shame on you, David Gerard, for violating my privacy in this blatant disregard of assume good faith! -- Dissident (Talk) 00:21, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm confused. Why do you expect information that you put out for public consumption — a connection on the internet — to be private? Nandesuka 00:29, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Then explain to me why IP checks are usually reserved for persistent vandals. Must I be a persistent vandal for bringing this up? Am I disruptive for pursuing this matter here? Do you people want me to shut up about it lest I be penalized? These things say a lot about the kind of atmosphere in which the editing take place. If I know I can arbitrarily become a victim of sysop abuse in case I (accidentally) end up at the bad side of a bunch (which is what I believe might well have happened to Marsden here), then at the long term it's going to affect the quality of Wikipedia. With a reasonably well-defined dispute resolution process, I would at least see these things coming in advance and have a slightly better chance at a fairer and a more transparent treatment. -- Dissident (Talk) 00:52, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Then you have a poor grasp of what does or doesn't constitute a personal attack. WP:NPA - David Gerard 18:26, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I consider it, if not a personal attack, at least an indirect attempt at a poisoning the well attack on the basis that instead of addressing my arguments you think me as a person is somehow relevant here. If you think my behavior is out-of-line, then you should speak out about that instead of immediately searching for evidence that no one but the subject himself could possibly say what I've said here. Back on-topic, if Marsden has made unambiguous threats which are not based on contrived interpretations of his statements, I would like to see them, and, again, that might as well then be on an arbitration page. -- Dissident (Talk) 19:19, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

BTW, assume good faith is also highly regarded here. -- Dissident (Talk) 19:24, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

It doesn't apply to those who have had the finger pointed at them. -- Grace Note.

Alright, fine, I would have liked to know, in the spirit of due proccess having everything open, to be assured that you were not A known troublemaker's sock, and/or meatpuppet. ITs not personal, its not an attack, its doing your homework--Tznkai 20:49, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

And I am of the (probably naive) opinion that since I don't believe I have done anything that should have triggered such an off-topic meta-issue, it shouldn't have been brought up. -- Dissident (Talk) 21:02, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Its the first question that old jaded wikians ask when someone has been banned and someone is trying to do something about it, right or wrong.--Tznkai 21:05, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Dissident, you wrote that you want Marsden to have his day in court. But that's exactly what he wants, and it's why he wrote to you (I assume he did write to you, along with all the others he has tried to stir up). He wants an arbcom case that he can turn into a circus and use as a platform to repeat all his personal attacks. He was here to cause trouble, not write an encyclopedia, and he wants to come back to cause trouble. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:24, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

What Slim writes is true, if you understand "cause trouble" to mean, "prevent SlimVirgin and some of her prefered co-editors from presenting their POVs as the NPOV." Anyway, as Thomas More is reputed to have said, "Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!" originally posted by 222.99.239.170 (talk · contribs) on WP:AN/I at 05:50, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Slim, out of curiosity, why does it matter what he wants?--Tznkai 20:53, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

If what he wants is to make trouble, it matters a great deal. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:56, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

So don't let him. I don't see how putting it through Arbitration will allow him to make it a circus. Just sayin.--Tznkai 20:59, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

You're the second to make a wrong assumption here (since I'm not an administrator here I would be an odd choice for him anyway). I'm doing this because I worry about due process and that one day I might find myself in a similar Kafkaesque situation. Lots of other people, including highly destructive editors were handled adequately by the ArbCom, so I fail to see how in this case it would "obviously" be inadequate. The way I see it, the administrators are supposed to be the police and the ArbCom the court. What you are calling a circus, might perhaps been judged differently as a valid argument and frankly, whether it could be or not is not for you to decide. -- Dissident (Talk) 20:41, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

He hasn't only contacted admins. He's been in touch with anyone he thinks might start up a bit of trouble on his behalf. As for the situation being "Kafkaesque," Joseph K didn't know what he had done wrong. Marsden does. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 21:08, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I guess I learned that trick when Jayjg recruited you to revert me on Occupied territories when he'd hit 3RR. And I know I've done nothing wrong, Slim, save piss off some people in positions of authority for which they are unfit. 222.99.239.170 05:50, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

If you and/or other administrators just stopped at giving him a few cooling-off periods on your own that would have been ok. But the moment it was decided to ban him indefinitely (especially since what the ArbCom hands out is usually in the order of a few months at most) the line was crossed and instead an arbitration case should have been started. The fact that you also protected his talk page twice after he was banned doesn't make any sense and makes it seem that discussion of his case by third parties is being stifled. Seriously, can you blame outsiders for finding the whole sneakiness about this entire affair troubling? -- Dissident (Talk) 21:25, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Apparently, wishing to have a process is "stirring up trouble" but just blocking whoever you don't like indefinitely is helping out. Well, it certainly gets the message across to those who disagree with Jay that they must treat him with more care than he has to treat them. I have no doubt Marsden has transgressed and could have done with a month off to think about whether he really wants to contribute to WP, but you're very right, Dissident, this has been handled very shoddily by the party of admins who opposed Marsden and their friends. I'm not Marsden, by the way. Save yourself the work with CheckUser, Dave, if you're checking anyone who thinks that Marsden has been poorly treated. -- Grace Note.

Honestly (and again, I AM Marsden), I am not interested in being unblocked. Wikipedia is a lost cause. Take a look at what three of the other idiots on ArbCom consider to be acceptable behavior (at least, when it's from one of their favorites) if you want another example (warning: it's painful even to read such utterly dishonest nonsense). What's needed is a bulldozer, not just a sledgehammer. And, obviously, if I ever really want to edit something here, I can. 222.99.239.170 05:50, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I'm sure you'll make a marvellous open proxy canary. Do please continue - David Gerard 15:06, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm likely to be in London sometime next spring, David. Perhaps we should discuss the venomous lies you've been spreading about me in person, with no proxies whatever. Marsden

I have changed the block to one month, backdated to when Snowspinner made the block (16 December). I do not think an indefinite block was appropriate, and I'm not sure some of the previous blocks were entirely necessary either (perhaps I'm missing key contributions of Marsden's). If Marsden chooses to come back to the Wikipedia community, I hope he tries harder to play by its written and unwritten rules. Rd232 ^talk 10:57, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Marsden has been at this for many months; one month will hardly be a hiccup. I see no evidence whatsoever he's here to write an encyclopedia. He does, however, spend a lot of time emailing admins and now non-admins, looking for the ones he can play like a xylophone - David Gerard 15:05, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Well I'm sorry, I think an indefinite block requires somewhat more process. At the least the blocking admin should marshal some convincing evidence in a relevant and accessible place. This has not been done AFAIK, and I've asked several times and looked through Marsden's recent contributions myself. In any case, two admins have now restored the indefinite block without further discussion. block log I find this somewhat disturbing, especially as I was under the impression that indefinite bans were frowned upon, and that blocks should be imposed in a rising pattern except where there is extreme justification (evidence of which has not been forthcoming). Marsden's longest block prior to this indefinite one was 1 week - I would have thought 1 month or 3 months would be appropriate as the next step, if further action is indeed justified. Rd232 ^talk 22:52, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Marsden made over 500 contributions in 2 months before being blocked for the first time (24 hours) on 10 November (and after several more blocks, indef blocked on 16 December); that doesn't sound like "has been at this for many months" to me (maybe everybody was being very patient with him before November, but anyway...). Rd232 ^talk 22:58, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, that's exactly right. People were extremely patient with him. He is one of the most vicious editors I've encountered. He has made only 300 or so edits to the main namespace and most of those were probably reverts. His main contribution has been to insult people on talk pages, and stir up trouble behind the scenes by e-mailing trolls and asking them to intervene on this behalf or revert for him. If he has emailed you to ask you to help him, it is not a compliment. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:50, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

If Marsden did email me it must have got buried under a mountain of spam... :-O Rd232 ^talk 19:52, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

This is quite ridiculous. If you think Marsden should be permanently banned and his previous actions on Wikipedia more than justify this, then I'm sure it won't be any difficulty at all for you to put together some evidence for the Arbitration Committee to consider. I'm willing to accept on faith that he's made personal attacks, but I'm not willing to accept on faith that he has done anything worthy of a lifelong ban from Wikipedia. That's something I want to see proof for. Talrias (t | e | c) 23:07, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Then with respect, look through his contribs, Talrias, and educate yourself, rather than expecting other admins to do it for you. The user has a long history of making serious personal attacks against several editors, admins, and members of the arbcom, including Fred Bauder and Jimbo, to the point where several good editors have stayed away from certain articles because of him; at least two have considered leaving if he continues to hang around; and I believe one did leave, or at least drastically cut back on editing. It can't be tolerated any longer, particularly as he makes almost no contribution to the encyclopedia. This is a project to write an encyclopedia, not a children's toxic playground. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:39, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

With due respect, currently M is banned for one month. Surely that is enough time to draw up the evidence of M's errant behaviour to convince any outsiders on the correctness of the indef block. Surely it is not hard to collate this evidence? (not Marsden ->) 210.177.242.221 02:58, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

With due respect, it's not worth anyone's time to do so; we've got an encyclopedia to write here. Wikipedia is not therapy, and it's not an experiment in democracy either. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 03:23, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

In light of the fact that (a) Marsden has said he's not interested in being unblocked (b) thinks WP is a lost cause (c) has made personal attacks against probably at least half of ArbCom (giving him cause to demand that arbitrators recuse themselves, and for other known trolls to jump on his bandwagon with the same demand...) (d) is clearly a troll (as an open-minded review of his edits to ArbCom candidates' Q&A pages demonstrates...e.g., this) and (e) has used this page as a platform to further his pattern of personally attacking other members of the community, specifically admins (who have the ability to try to put a stop to his disruptions), I see no reason to think that (a) his block should be removed or even reduced to 1 month from the original indefinite block or that (b) if it is, anything will change in his perspective, and consequently, in his editing or harassment style. In most cases, I would say that taking a case to ArbCom would be preferable to handing out an indefinite block, but I'm compelled to agree that the silence of most of the community on this issue isn't ignorance on their part, but rather quiet agreement with it (and since they're interested in editing an encyclopedia more than they are in seeing disruptive and destructive editors stick around), are happy to see that he's at least blocked for a month, and will unlikely be around long once that block expires, since there's little evidence that he's interested in changing his ways, or ever will be. The only thing taking Marsden to ArbCom will accomplish is to unnecessarily drag this out, something even Marsden has indicated he has no interest in. ArbCom, frankly, has more pressing issues to deal with—trying to resolve disputes, not providing counseling services for editors who clearly hold them, the rest of the community and indeed the entire dispute resolution process, in utter disdain. Tomer^talk 05:27, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

One might similarly ask, "Why hold a trial for a murderer? It won't bring the victim back to life." In spite of SlimVirgin's and David Gerard's paranoid assumptions that I must be emailing people to support me, in fact I only entered an email address on my WP account in order to question one SlimVirgin on her block of me (as to whether that counts as "e-mailing trolls and asking them to intervene on his behalf," I will not comment). I subsequently used that email address (which for some reason my regular computer does not like to open, and I do not use any other email account to communicate with anyone I've encountered on Wikipedia) to email a couple people who I thought would be interested in my RFAr against SlimVirgin; Poetlister is the only one I am sure I emailed. I have also gotten perhaps six emails from other Wikipedians through that account, although I only look at it once a week at most. A less paranoid (as long as we're throwing around references to providing therapy, I hope no one will object to me using that term) explanation for people's interest in my extra-judicial banning might be gained by assuming good faith, and considering that maybe some Wikipedians (just as they say) are concerned about due process of law, and about whether Wikipedia has a fair and effective dispute resolution process. I have already decided for myself the answer to that question ("NO!"), but I don't think that any honest person of goodwill should want to discourage anyone from considering such a matter in an enterprise in which he participates: a conscientious person should not aspire to be employee of the month in the Zyklon B factory, for example.

I assert that Wikipedia has become a very dysfunctional project in many respects. I could argue this as well, except that certain people are intent on making sure that my version of the history of my participation in Wikipedia never sees the light of day -- SlimVirgin has made a pastime of controlling my talk and user pages, for example, including deleting a list I had prepared of editors whom she seems to have driven away from Wikipedia. (In recruiting supporters via email and in driving people away from Wikipedia, both of which I am accused of, I am pretty certain that my attackers -- I think I use that term fairly at this point -- are more at fault by far than I am.)

It has become a common refrain among my attackers -- again, I think I use that term fairly -- that "we are here to write an encyclopedia!" And the implication in this is that their actions -- including obstructing me -- are consistent with this end. I don't think this is the case, particularly with their reliance on extra-judicial means: as Dissident noted above, "can you blame outsiders for finding the whole sneakiness about this entire affair troubling?" Even I, having decided that Wikipedia is a lost cause, sometimes wonder if Wikipedia's dysfunction is worse even than I imagine: it strains credulity for me to imagine anything that would lead to the level of secrecy and opacicity that is insisted upon with regard to me.

(BTW, how many of you feel comfortable knowing that David Gerard is "safeguarding" the "sensitive" information collected through CheckUser?)

Marsden

Marsden, there are two problems I see here. First off, the comparison you start out with is a false analogy, meant to appeal to emotion. Second, your reaction here, as well as elsewhere (which is what led to the block to begin with), has been confrontational and incivil, often taking the form of disruption if not outright personal attacks. That Dissident is arguing against the length of the block is very different from arguing that any block was unwarranted. Tomer^talk 19:38, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Tomer, as a first comment to you, let me say that it is really annoying to have people like you (and FeloniousMonk, and Snowspinner) show up out of nowhere to make blocks or snide comments about me, actions that indicate they have pretty well-developed opinions of me in spite of the fact that I don't know them from Adam. As a matter for your life, Tomer, and not just for your participation in Wikipedia, let me suggest that it is very rarely the case that one side of a dispute is all you need to hear in order to make a fair decision about it. I have no idea, Tomer, why you ever took an interest in anything I have done on Wikipedia. The first I ever heard of you was at FM's talk page, where you made the absurd comment to Huldra that "I have to assume you're unfamiliar with Marsden's activities." Actually, Tomer, Huldra has been aware (usually disapprovingly, by the way) of my disputes with Jayjg and SlimVirgin almost from the time they began; it is really you, Tomer, who is far more likely to be unfamiliar with my activities. My reaction to your "me too-ism" in attacking me from out of nowhere is that you are probably a coward: had you any courage in your convictions, you would have wanted to hear at least part of my side of the story before insulting me -- not out of respect for me, by the way, but out of respect for yourself. Now, you can roll yourself into a defensive ball, hurt that the mean man on the internet disputed your grandmother's assessment about what a wonderful young man you are, but seriously: you come across as a flake when you snipe from afar. Your comment to me just now was the first thing I've ever seen from you that garners any respect from me.

As to your immediate comment, I think you miss the point: what any Wikipedian should be concerned about is not, "Are the contributions of one particular editor out of thousands going to be missed?" but rather, "Is the manner by which one particular editor was driven out of Wikipedia something that should be repeated?" As Wittgenstein wrote, "And when I put the ruler up against the table, am I always measuring the table; am I not sometimes checking the ruler?" (And, if the ruler resists your checking of it, should you trust whatever measurements it produces?)

Marsden

You don't pay attention very well if the first place you saw me was on FM's talk page...[53] Tomer^talk 02:45, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I think it's quite understandable that I wouldn't have recalled such a comment. The rest of my remarks stand. Marsden

The rest of your remarks, unfortunately, were primarily thinly veiled, if not overt, personal attacks. Can you not find a more constructive mode of interaction, and indeed a better way to spend your editing time, on WP? Tomer^talk 19:11, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I now already have two administrators agreeing with me that the indefinite block was excessive without an ArbCom decision and who tried to undo it, only to have others reinstate it. If this isn't controversial enough to trigger an Arbitration case, then nothing is. -- Dissident (Talk) 16:13, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

I would find this much less frustrating if it had been done when the block was made instead of over a week later. It is not as though the block wasn't on AN originally. An arbcom case would be a circus with a foregone conclusion - at least one arbitrator has privately thanked me for saving them the circus with the block. Wikipedia does not really care about process so much as product. If anyone sincerely believes that Marsden is not going to get himself banned from the site through one means or another, they should consider lifting the block. If their only concern is that process must be followed properly, they should not. Phil Sandifer 16:21, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

I can't find any discussion on WP:AN/I of an indefinite block of Marsden (prior to the issue being opened a week afterwards); there's this a week before which didn't mention such drastic measures. Blocks (especially long ones, never mind permanent ones) are to be avoided without due process, of which I see no sign. The admin who originally made the indefinite block didn't even notify Marsden, something we do routinely in the case of temporary blocks for vandalism. There is an irreducible minimum of due process required to ensure that power is not exercised arbitrarily; this is as true of Wikipedia as of any other community. If Marsden is leaving anyway then perhaps we can leave it at that in this case, but we should at least draw some lessons from how this case was handled. Rd232 ^talk 19:48, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Rd, look at the start of this thread: December 15 (started on WP:AN). No one responded until December 22. Maybe it took Marsden a few days to e-mail you all and find a couple of people willing to act for him. Otherwise, it's hard to explain why you're complaining now but didn't complain at the time. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:59, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Whoops - there's the notice I've been looking for. The notice doesn't, however, say that the block was indefinite - a rather unfortunate omission, don't you agree? Anyway, Marsden has never emailed me; my interest in the matter was triggered by Dissent's comment at the top of the thread. Rd232 ^talk 12:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I've changed the block back to "indefinite". Some people seem to have trouble understanding here that "indefinite" is not the same as "infinite". Quit messing with the block period until something definite is agreed upon here. Wheelwars are pointless. Tomer^talk 05:49, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Something definite? How about a year (the maximum the ArbCom has imposed AFAIK) or 1 or 3 months or 6 months (the next steps up from the previous longest block of Marsden of 1 week). Rd232 ^talk 12:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Great. Contrary to implications (and unwarranted personal attacks) by some parties, I don't care. My primary interest in this affair is to prevent a wheelwar. If you want to propose one of those as an alternative, go for it. My point is, don't say "I disagree with you, therefore I'm going to change your block." Discuss. Resolve. Implement. Don't jump the gun. Doing so only causes more unnecessary friction. I'm quite confident that this whole situation can be resolved without taking it to arbcom (which would be, as I said earlier, futile, since Marsden has set himself up as a vitriolic opponent to at least half of the ArbCom membership), or probably without requiring intervention by Jimbo (who is most likely to support the ArbCom membership rather than Marsden...especially if he digs deeply enough into Marsden's activities). So. Back to what I was saying. Instead of arguing about whether or not the block should be Snowspinner's version or your version, open discussion here in support of a proposal. Like I said, "indefinite" is not "infinite", it's "to be determined". So, let's start determining already. Tomer^talk 13:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I implemented a 1-month block, which another admin also did after this was reverted to indefinite. I've said why I thought something of that order was more appropriate. (I'm not actually convinced based on my own impressions that he deserves even that, but it is abundantly clear that those who've dealt more with him disagree, and I defer to their judgement.) In the (messy) circumstances I still think 1 month is sufficient - if he misbehaves on his return (if he returns) further action can be taken; the longest prior block was a week. More than 3 months without formal process or attempt to marshal evidence justifying such a length of ban, or one or several egregious contributions people can point to (eg threats) seems inappropriate. Rd232 ^talk 15:59, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

No, Rd, what you did was undo Snowspinner's indefinite block, unjustified or otherwise, and then implemented a 1-month block, a week after Snowspinner's original block, without anything remotely approaching adequate discussion of your action, nor even a cogent challenge of his original block, unjustified or otherwise, and certainly w/o obtaining input from others in support of or challenging your oppostion to Snowspinner's block. I don't want to get into a pissing match about the whole thing, but what you did was to change another admin's implementation w/o discussion. This kind of activity is what spawns wheelwars. Tomer^talk 16:41, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

To be precise, I implemented a month block, which technically superceded the existing indefinite block. I did so after enough discussion to confirm my initial reaction that an indefinite block without process is prima facie injustified except in clearcut cases (eg threats). Some of this discussion was on AN, some by user talk pages. Rd232 ^talk 00:21, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

You're mistaken about at least one thing, Tomer: I wouldn't want anyone on ArbCom to recuse himself in an arbitration over my banning. Having no expectation of anything even vaguely resembling a fair hearing, why would I object to anyone participating in it? Again, what any Wikipedian ought to be interested in is, does the dispute resolution process work? With the thorough lack of transparency and accountability of Wikipedia's "dispute resolution" process at so many levels, on what basis can anyone be confident that a Stalinist clique doesn't in fact run the whole damn thing, injecting its biases into articles with impunity? If you can control information, you can control the world. And, also again, I doubt very much that you have dug very deeply into my activities; probably just enough that you can make an argument for what you want to believe anyway, as long as you ignore half of what you find. Marsden

This discussion reminds me of something...what is it again?

smart admins will by now have noted that it is much less bother to block trolls for one month only right away; you'll avoid the sort of discussion just experienced (time wasted: hours), and if they resume trolling after a month, you'll just block them for another month (time wasted: one minute). Can we conserve this wisdom at WP:1MONTH or somewhere? dab (ᛏ) 16:14, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

A hearty yes please! to that. Rd232 ^talk 00:21, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

To clarify, I'm not opposed to a 1 month block for Marsden's crap, at present. Further disruption should bring a 2 month block, IMHO. If he can't desist, then a 3 month, then 6 month, then 1 year, and then, an infinite block (as opposed to simply "indefinite" which is, according to my understanding a "to be determined" block). Tomer^talk 16:41, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

That course of action sounds eminently sensible. (But AFAIK indefinite blocks are effectively permanent in practice, and was intended as such in this case.) Rd232 ^talk 00:21, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Damn Sockpuppeteer

User:DickyRobert has finally gotten me to the point of wanting to drive to Toronto and physically hurt him. I've been dealing with this jackass for the better part of 3 months now. Is there nothing we can do other than rollback + block his army of socks? David or someone else with CheckUser... can you narrow this down more specifically? I know that most of the anon ips with similar edits all come from U of Toronto. One is a Toronto dial up account. Can we definatively link this user to U of T? If so I know a certain school network admin who's going to be getting a phone call.  ALKIVAR™ 13:11, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

LOOOOL, internet access providers hold no responsibility for what the user does on the internet, don't forget that. You can keep contact admins all you want, but they don't have to do shit for you. LickyVada 17:23, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Actually we've had some success with some internet service providers. Not all of them take a totally laid-back attitude toward their customers/clients/employees using their services to violate other services' AUPs.

Besides, we can block ISPs or networks who do not cooperate. Redwolf24 (talk) 18:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Eve Plumb

Because of the constant adding of this person's phone number and home address, I had to delete and restore this page countless time to purge the history. The guy who kept on posting the information has been blocked, but switched IP address and kept on adding the information. He signed up for an account once, Eveslover, but that was blocked. I would like to ask what other options are available, since I am frankly getting tired of this mess. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 20:53, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

You could try protecting it for a while and see if he gets bored. --cesarb 21:57, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Done that 5 times, all failed. See http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=protect&user=&page=Eve+Plumb Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 22:00, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

I think it will take longer than much longer than 24 hours for this particular stalker to get bored. Try it for a month. The article went two months without an edit before this particular stalker showed up, so I don't think we're keeping important edits from being made by a longer round of page protection. If someone has vitally important information that absolutely must be added now now now to Eve Plumb, they can contact an admin. Ξxtreme Unction|_{yakkity yak} 22:15, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Can we semi this page instead? novacatz 15:09, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, I recommend that for now. User:Zoe|^(talk) 16:55, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

"Go back daily and redo what they undid": revert war invite to Bigfoot

User:Beckjord, the subject of Erik Beckjord, is one of the main contributors to Bigfoot and other cryptozoological articles. He is a strong defender of the reality of these creatures—well, when I say "reality", I don't mean in the mundane sense, as he argues that they are "interdimensional". He has trouble with WP:NPOV and WP:CIVIL (though he has been polite in my own exchanges with him) and he acknowledges finding Wikipedia principles and rules in general difficult to come to grips with. Beckjord has now issued a call at his own forum for his supporters to come in and revert war on Bigfoot, with instructions for how to edit the article: "Read article, see all the false sh*t... Click on EDIT THIS ARTICLE... make edits... go to bottom and type in box >> reversing really bad former edits <...Watch the bad guys get upset... Then go back daily, and redo what they undid... If we have ten people doing this, it will drive the skeptics NUTS." Now, I'm not proposing that an influx of cryptozoologists would be a major threat. Still. It mightn't hurt if a few people added Bigfoot to their watchlist. Bishonen | talk 01:57, 29 December 2005 (UTC).

• This might also call for a pre-emptive semi-protection of Bigfoot. Suspected meatpuppets of Beckjord will be reverted on sight (by me, anyway). android79 02:00, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • (with a smile on my face) what part of 'this is not pre-emptive' on the semi policy-page didn't you understand? :) :) :) novacatz 02:08, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
    • D'oh! android79 02:18, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Beckjord's edits so far seem solely to promote himself as an expert on these topics and to harass anyone who gets in his way. Considering what I've already seen, as well as reports of his behavior in general found on Google searching for his name (frequent cases of false legal threats to try to quiet critics, etc.), I suspect he's going to give us no end of trouble. DreamGuy 02:57, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

This is a clearly unacceptale and underhanded tactic. El_C 03:55, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Are you saying I'm unacceptable, or the guy out spamming the encyclopedia is unacceptable? DreamGuy 05:43, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

El_C's comments at Talk:Bigfoot indicate that he meant the latter (I think). android79 06:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I don;t care is this putz Beckjord was on Letterman... inciting a revert war is wrong and deserving of suspension from Wikipedia. Dyslexic agnostic 05:34, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree completely with Bish and DreamGuy. The kind of person that would make an off-wiki site for the clearly anti-Wikipedia purpose of defying NPOV and consensus has no encyclopedic goal of ours in mind. Anyone who does not only that, but does it while posting the username of another Wikipedian there, and calling him and others "assholes," deserves to go the way of Amalekite and Daniel Brandt. Dmcdevit·t 07:01, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Also note the continued addition of POV and unsourced material to Erik Beckjord. android79 07:02, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

User:Beckjord

I have warned the user not to engage in personal attacks; the user has vandalized my user page with a personal attack. Blocked for 48 hrs. El_C 07:51, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Based on this user's recent forum posting above, his admitted use and encouragement of edit warring, his continued incivility, and declarations to continue it, not to mention his blatant disregard for NPOV and consensus, I question whether this user has any place at Wikipedia at all. Dmcdevit·t 08:07, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Agreed. "rading the rules pages will take 6 monthsm and i feel nobody here follows them anyway" pretty much sums up his attitude about Wikipedia. I've asked him several times to simply give WP:NOR, WP:V and WP:NPOV a read and he flatly refuses. The rules are for the rest of us and we all should kowtow to him simply because he's a self-proclaimed expert. There's an indefinite block in this editor's future, and I don't think we need to involve the ArbCom. android79 16:49, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

War called off

User:Beckjord has called off this war. Go to his talk page. Martial Law 05:51, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Really? His link to the revert war invitation is still here! Dyslexic agnostic 05:59, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

The page says "No such message." Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 09:43, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Aw, the call to arms is gone? Of course that's a good thing, but I was rather hoping the size of the, ahem, influx of Beckford supporters on Bigfoot would answer the interesting question whether he has any supporters out there. So far the magic eight-ball says "Where are they?" Bishonen | talk 13:48, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

For the record, we did get one meatpuppet. android79 17:10, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

User SPUI has been blocked by a bot (page moves)

User:SPUI has been blocked by a bot intended to block pagemove vandalism.

Please check the move log for this user and unblock if this was an error.

Please delete this message after the situation has been resolved.

This message was generated by the bot. -- Curps 10:02, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Assume bad faith, eh? --SPUI (talk | don't use sorted stub templates!) 10:06, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

That was an extraordinary number of page moves, for what it's worth. I wonder if the bot has a whitelist? Ral315 (talk) 11:54, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I dont think it does... but it sure as hell should whitelist all admins so that maintenance like this doesnt get them blocked.  ALKIVAR™ 12:07, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

SPUI isn't an admin. Kelly Martin (talk) 12:23, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

He isnt? Hrm ... my bad.  ALKIVAR™ 12:36, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

IIRC he declined a nomination. --cesarb 14:27, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Come on guys, the bot provides a very useful function and has an autogenerated notice to avoid unnoticed blocks; Curps himself undid the block within a minute and even if he hadn't, another admin would have. What needs to be said here is: "Thanks to SPUI for doing such tireless and often thankless work, thanks to Curps for watching out for Wikipedia and protecting it from potential page move vandalism. Now, lets all take a deep breath, beat each other senseless with a Nerf bat, and get back to work. -- Essjay · Talk 01:29, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Boki 02 blocked indefinately

Boki 02 has continually uploaded copyrighted text and images despite repeated requests to cease. Following Jimbo's recent example, I've blocked him indefinately and I'll be reviewing the rest of his contributions to identify any other violations. If I'm misinterpreting, please feel free to change the block. .:.Jareth.:. ^babelfish 17:24, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

3RR blocks overturned

At 08:18 yesterday, Miskin (talk · contribs) was blocked for 3RR at Macedonians (ethnic group) [54]. A few hours later, Merovingian (talk · contribs) unblocked him, making no comments about it anywhere (I can find), with the reason "User's edits have been justified, as he was removing unsourced claims". Four hours later, I blocked Miskin again for a second 3RR at Manakis brothers [55] (along with CDThieme) as well as excessive edit edit warring at a third article, Macedonian Orthodox Church [56]. Not to mention edit summaries like "one more time and I'll report you for 'official policy vandalism'," so I made the block 36 hours. Despite all this misbeavior, an hour later, Merovingian unblocked him, without an explanation anywhere, with the reason "Miskin has been reverting the insertion of unsourced claims, and his edits are therefore justified." Funny thing is, I had been talking it out with Miskin, explaining how edit warring is wrong in every circumstance, that even if you're in the right, that's why we have mechanisms like RFC and such to deal with it, and that only vandalism is excepted by the 3RR, not POV-pushing (which would be self-defeating) [57]. And then an admin disagrees and unblocks him for just those reasons, twice. I'm not going to engage in a mini-wheel war, but anyone else uninvolved want to take a look at this and consider reblocking? Dmcdevit·t 20:23, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I advocate full protection on all three articles. I initially protected Macedonians (ethnic group), but when I realised that the revert war spanned three articles, I thought it wasn't worth it. Still though, despite 3RR blocks, pointers to WP:DR (I have even begged Miskin to consider mediation), the revert war persists. He is convinced that he is reverting vandalism and is 3RR exempt. I have told him that WP:V violations do not make him 3RR exempt, it made no difference. Izehar 20:31, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps it's because administrators unblock him for just that reason that he thinks 3RR doesn't apply to him. Considering it spans 3 articles, that's why I thought a block was more appropriate than protection. Dmcdevit·t 20:41, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Merovingian (talk · contribs) is clearly violating policy and needs to stop, and if he does it again he should be blocked himself. An admin can't abuse policy like that to push his own agenda. Unless he apologizes and promises not to do it again, that's clear reason to have his admin rights taken away. DreamGuy 21:51, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Did anyone talk to Mero about it? --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 21:59, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I haven't - I don't think he knows. Izehar 22:01, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Also, DreamGuy, what are you talking about? Merovingian is not violating policy. Izehar 22:04, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, he was --- he was blatantly violating the 3RR policy by letting someone make multiple reverts without cause and undoing legitimate and quite necessary blocks. Apparently now from his posts below he knows not to do that again, so there shouldn;t be a problem in the future, but it's inexcusible when admins try to enforce or even overrule a policy that they haven't bothered to read. He shoudl not have unblocked someone without going to the policy page to read it, or to ask about it for the people who did block the person, or the project page used for enforcing the issue. That was clearly out of line. DreamGuy 00:46, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Per the question above, both the involved admins should probably work on their communication. Merovingian should have (at the very least) notified Dmcdevit when he undid the blocks. Dmcdevit should have asked Merovingian about the unblocks, and notified Merovingian that he started this thread. (My apologies if there was communication that I missed.) Come on, guys—talk to each other! TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:07, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Erm, I did the second block, yes, but not in disagreement with Merovingian, it was a separate block. When he unblocked, I decided to take it here rather than reblock or make any further action, putting it up for review. That was communication. I admit I didn't think to notify Mero about this thread, but the point wasn't to criticize him anyway, but to figure out what to do now. Dmcdevit·t 06:03, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry I'm late! Miskin approached me on IRC and asked to be unblocked. Now, I wouldn't just go ahead and unblock him, so we had a good conversation about what was going on at the articles in question. Miskin had been reverting some unsourced claims, and the other user (User:Macedonia, IIRC) wasn't discussing his changes at all. I thought Miskin was in the right, and that the blocking admin had made a mistake. Did I miss something? --King of All the Franks 22:30, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Well he still did violate the 3RR and even if he was removing unsourced claims, the relevant policy (WP:V) does not exempt anyone reverting unsourced claims from the 3RR. It is not like vandalism, which is an exeption. Also, he has been violating the 3RR in more than one article - that's never good. Talk pages are there for a reason. Izehar 22:50, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh! I thought reverting to remove unsourced material was alright. Miskin was trying to invite the other user to the talk page, but it seemed like he wasn't going to have any of it. --King of All the Franks 23:04, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Please take the time to go read the 3RR policy, as it is spelled out quite clearly there. You should actually read the relevant policies before making decisions that overrule other admins. No harm no foul if you learn from this, but come on... DreamGuy 00:49, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

That still doesn't exempt him from the 3RR. The page should have been protected to stop the edit-war and no one should have been blocked (which is what I told the blocking admin and he agreed). Blocks don't stop edit wars - once the blocks are over, the edit-war continues (it has happened). Resolving disputes stops edit-wars. I offered to lift Macedonia's block if he would use the talk page. I made the same offer to Miskin, and they both e-mailed me agreeing to talk. However, further 3RRvios came to light and more blocks have been handed out and everything is left hanging in the air. Izehar 23:24, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Protection over blocks: I can dig it. --King of All the Franks 23:48, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

At least now User:Macedonia is using the talk pages - the problem is that they still are not listening to each other. The revert war continues. Izehar 23:36, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

• The point is that whatever the end, revert warring is not the means to reach it. Even if you're right, revert warring is still wrong (in fact, most revert warrers consider themselves right, and by definition at least half of them must be wrong). Radiant_>|< 23:00, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • That was exactly my point. It seems to me (based on the above) that Merovingian also missed that the second block was for a second 3RR in that time, when he unblocked again. Which was the reason that I preferred blocks over protection in this matter; it spanned multiple articles. I also note that Miskin is unblocked right now (and CDThieme never was), should anything be done about that now? Dmcdevit·t 06:03, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Biased User Account

Could someone who has a moment please take a look at Biased_User_Account (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). After I blocked him (or her!) I left a message on the talk page, and he's now claiming that his account was "taken" by Willy on Wheels, and that the arrow started moving on the page even though the mouse was stationary. It doesn't seem very likely to me, but I don't have a huge amount of technical knowledge, so I'd be glad if someone else would take a look at it. Thanks. AnnH ^(talk) 22:48, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

The chances of that are remote, in the best-case scenario. He's bluffing. Besides, he also should have gotten hit with a {{usernameblock}}. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 22:53, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that qualifies for a username block anyway. Rather confusing, no? --King of All the Franks 22:55, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

All of his contributions are blatant vandalism. There's no reason for him to want to keep the account. --Quarl 23:08, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

• Don't feed the biased troll. Radiant_>|< 23:16, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Well I thought he was probably bluffing, but I just wanted to be quite sure. Thanks. AnnH ^(talk) 23:18, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Talk:University of Ottawa

Ok, here's the situation. I welcomed Ardenn (talk · contribs) a few days ago, s/he still has under 100 edits., getting involved in University of Ottawa, where Anakinskywalker (talk · contribs) has caused some problems in the past [58]. Normally, i'd block Anakin as he's violated WP:NPA, WP:CIVIL, WP:BITE, WP:3RR, WP:V, WP:NOT/bureaucracy, WP:OWN, and so on(Ardenn has also violated 3RR, but he's new and didn't know). However, I assume that somebody would think i'm biased here because I welcomed Ardenn and therefore was the first person he came to for help. So, as a reverse Harry Truman, i'm passing the buck so I don't get anymore b.s and can help end this issue. karmafist 00:53, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

I've blocked both for 24 hours for 3RR violations and for incivility. Despite being a new user Ardann was quite incivil including cursing off anakinskywalker in an edit summary and anakinskywalker wasn't much better and was just as guilty in terms of revert warring. Jtkiefer^{T | C | @} ---- 01:19, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks JT. I feel bad for Ardenn here, but you're right, he went too far, even if it seems he was suckered into it. Hopefully he can cool off in 24 hours.karmafist 04:34, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

I support the early unblock by Karmafist btw, true he went too far and he didn't do anything to stop the edit warring but anakinskywalker wasn't much better and I can see where WP:BITE comes into play here. Jtkiefer^{T | C | @} ---- 05:44, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Given that WP:3RR policy requires all parties in a revert war to be treated equally shouldn't Anakinskywalker be unblocked as well? Granted, as Jtkiefer said, he "wasn't much better", but he shouldn't receive a harsher penalty just because he isn't quite as much of a newbie as the other guy. As to the rest of this... Karmafist, these threats [59] [60] are unconscionable. Anakinskywalker was mildly territorial and got into a revert war. That's no cause for going beyond an "indefinite block" to "cruel and unusual punishment". Actually... there aren't any grounds for that. Ever. Don't go there... or I will act to stop you. --CBD _☎ ^✉ 12:11, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Help with copyright violations

I just blocked Glenncando (talk · contribs) for copyright violations. After I noticed Centro Escolar University had been recreated (after I previously tagged it for copyvio and it was deleted), I found it to be a copyvio and left a message for this user. He removed the notice today and has continued contributing. Glancing through his contributions today I found several more copyright violations. Normally I'd try to harder to discuss this first, but there is are too many contributions to go through (the images probably will have to be deleted as well) and given his previous refusal to discuss this I don't want him to continue to copy-and-paste text. I tried going through his contributions but there is too much for me to check everything; if anyone has any extra free time I'd appreciate if they could help search for copyvios. Also I have no problem with someone unblocking him if they are willing to closely supervise his contributions. Thanks! — Knowledge Seeker দ 07:29, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

As a start, I added {{PUIdisputed}} to all the images he uploaded (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&type=upload&user=Glenncando&page=&limit=500&offset=0) -- Chris 73 | Talk 08:56, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

If they orphaned, I went ahead and deleted them. Zach ^{(Smack Back)} 09:15, 30 December 2005 (UTC)