Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

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

User Democrat4 paid to create articles in wikipedia for customers: A new MyWikiBiz?

There is an ebay user with multiple listings not unlike MyWikiBiz, offering to make articles for a fee [1] . The user, Diremine (ebay account) also Had a wikipedia account that was indefinitely blocked, now has another sockpuppet, user:Democrat4.

The evidence, showing little need for checkuser other than to make sure he or she has no other sockpuppets: Old edit on Diremine's page about a blog

And Edit with same edit summary, same owner of same blog

The user is creating articles that on the outside appear to be perfectly legitimate, but seems to be gaming the systems by carefully stylizing the articles and being careful not to break any rules, but in the end the user is just a paid editor.

An example was Gloria Irwin, which was recently deleted.

A current example is Kevin_Eggan, which is currently listed under AFD.

Just thought I'd bring this here to see what should be done. Note that in the previous case, MyWikiBiz was blocked indefinitely (twice by Jimbo, in the end by the community). Cowman109^Talk 02:15, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Wow. Is there any wmf policy prohibiting this that we can block him under? —Crazytales (o rly?) 02:51, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I went hunting with checkuser, and Diremine is the only sockpuppet I found. Raul654 02:53, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I've indeffed per WP:SOCK. Someone please take care of the templates. Durova^Charge! 03:28, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I used a screen shot of that eBay auction at a recent presentation on the "SEO Reputation Problem". Somebody should complain to eBay because the seller has a very strong reputation score: 6580. - Jehochman ^Talk 04:42, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not convinced that this is a sock of MyWikiBiz, just another entrepreneur with some similarities in the MO. Durova^Charge! 13:55, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

MWB socks are often anagrams of the phrase "Jimbo Wales Sucks" (JossBuckle Swami, MuscleJaw SobSki, etc.). -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 13:21, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with blocking him in spirit, but as usual I question the wisdom of blocking external paid editors while permitting paid editing at WP:REWARD. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 16:26, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I cannot remember where it was, but there was discussion about the principle of allowing (third party) editing. I believe it was generally agreed that if the editing didn't violate any policy or guideline it would be no different than volunteer authored work and therefore valid. The only possible problem would be WP:COI but if it was undetectable in the work then it isn't really a concern. LessHeard vanU 20:26, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

This editor is committing a fraud upon eBay by promising things that violate site policies and that this person cannot guarantee. Durova^Charge! 05:40, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

If the editors edits conform to WP policies and guidelines (I'm not saying they do, just if) then what duty of care did we owe to eBay and/or third parties which results in us blocking an editor for off-wiki promises for actions that are not in themselves against the creed that "anyone can edit"? Are we creating precedent in blocking an editor for making promises outside of WP which does not (potentially) result in violating WP editing principles? LessHeard vanU 21:17, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Well a precedent was already created with Jimbo's blocking of User:MyWikiBiz. Cowman109^Talk 21:43, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and I never suggested that this was a sock of MyWikiBiz, but that this was just a similar situation. And I find it hard to believe that MWB would have socks like that, as he seemed to be quite a professional person who just happened to be caught up in the not so acceptable area of advertising for companies on Wikipedia. Cowman109^Talk 21:50, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, that was informative and answered my query. LessHeard vanU 21:55, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

unindent) In response to ">Cowman109, was MyWikiBiz not banned for sockpuppetry and/or making legal threats? Neither would apply in this case. Risker 21:58, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I've added url Democrat4president.org to the Blacklist^[2], and it appears Democrat4president.org article has already been deleted.--Hu12 22:10, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, MyWikiBiz was banned for those it appears, but the outlying issue that started it all was the fact that he was paid to advertise for businesses on Wikipedia, I guess. That's the only similarity here I meant to bring up - the fact that we have another paid editor issue. Cowman109^Talk 22:13, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

So when did everyone turn psychic so that they can determine the motivations of an editor for contributing. As long as contributions adhere to the content policy and guidance then what justification is there for blocking or otherwise harassing them? If a contributor engages in persistent confrontations over the content that falls into the existing methods for censure and enforcement.

I really think people need to get a sense of perspective here.

ALR 08:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

ALR, this editor is perpetrating a fraud. I realize what a strong word this is so let me repeat it: this editor is perpetrating a fraud. This person is purporting to sell a service on eBay that would guarantee any purchaser a "homepage" at Wikipedia (read: an article, regardless of underlying notability) and guarantees twelve outgoing links to the purchaser's website. This person has no ability to make such guarantees, which are in blatant violation of WP:NOT, WP:OWN, WP:COI, and WP:SPAM. It is a play upon the client's ignorance and our goodwill. Durova^Charge! 15:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

the nature of any advertising on eBay is eBays problem, not Wikipedias. Frankly as far as the eBay advert is concerned, and the Craigslist ones below, caveat emptor. If someone purchases the service and then discovers that it can't be fulfilled then that is between them and the vendor. Wikipedia has no place in the transaction, other than as a third party.

I'd go as far as to say that any effort to do something, beyond what's already covered in the content policy and guidance, about it probably increases any liability.

I'd consider a comparison with someone who is employed by an organisation and edits articles related to them, either during their work time, or in their own time. Take a look at the PA Consulting Group page for an example of someone in the marketing department of the company dealing with the article.

I appreciate that in any system there is a tendency for rules and administranium to self perpetuate, but frankly I'd like to see the jackboots kicking in more appropriate doors. wikipedia has enough of its own problems without sorting out eBay and Craigslist.

ALR 15:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Selling something which it is patently obvious is unable to be delivered is fraud. While Wikipedia probably would be seen in the courts as a victim of this, not a perpetrator, we've moved, independently, to avoid such problems. You see that as a problem? That's an unusual perspective, and you seem to be almost supportive of it. Further, if you don't like what User:Summilux is doing to the PA COnsulting group article, talk to him/her, and edit that article to be better. If talking doesn't work, go to the COIN folks, and ask for help. We have recourse available, nad saying 'well, they're doing it too' isn't a valid defense. ThuranX 21:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

My point with regard to PA consulting was that the blatant advertising was dealt with by discussion. That waas an example of a more general point, what is the situation with employees, or indeed contractors within an organisation, editing the articles related to their employers? I appreciate that the point was probably more subtle than is usual in this area.

I have no problem with someone making money out of this system, they've seen opportunities and they're exploiting them. If the advertised service is fraudulent then that is between the parties involved; Wikipedia is neither responsible for it, nor a victim of it. However I do object to some creeping effort to police the whole web. Policies and guidelines allow this to be handled without the rather excessive step of preemptive blocking of accounts, in fact you clearly identify two of the approaches yourself, and another is being used immediately below this.

So much for anyone can edit, frankly ones motivations for editing shouldn't be policed. Play the ball, not the player....

ALR 21:20, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_an_anarchy Just because anyone can edit doesn't mean they're welcome to roam wild. This site has policies and standards.
• WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_a_blog.2C_webspace_provider.2C_social_networking.2C_or_memorial_site We don't have homepages: we have encyclopedia articles.
• WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_your_web_host A more explicit policy statement of the above.
• WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_a_directory Wikipedia is not a resource for conducting business.
• WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_an_indiscriminate_collection_of_information Subjects have to satisfy a certain threshold of verifiable information to merit an article.
• WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_a_soapbox Advertising and self-promotion are explicitly against policy.

I don't set out to police every entry at eBay or Craigslist, but as an administrator of Wikipedia I most certainly do pay attention when someone attempts to manipulate Wikipedia for ideological or profit motives. I deal with this kind of thing all the time. And if you'd rather participate in a different wiki where that kind of editing is welcome and I don't volunteer, you are most welcome to create one or join one. Unless you persuade consensus here to alter several fundamental policies and guidelines, I'll keep right on doing my thing. Durova^Charge! 02:32, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Clearly there is something I'm not communicating here. I've pointed out several times that Policy and Guidelines exist which allow us to address content issues. I have a concern that there is a pre-emptive effort to ban people on the basis that they might break those policies and guidelines, predicated on their service offering; writing or editing articles for monetary reward.

If that's not what you're suggesting then it's not clear from your wording.

The effort to justify pre-emptive action based on your assumption that the actual contractual arrangement might be fraudulent strikes me as rather disingenuous, and comes close to being intellectually fraudulent in it's own right. Of course I might apply a very different standard of justification around punitive action than you do. It strikes me that you're seeking to justify making up your own rules on the hoof, which is a risky direction to take.

Of course your suggestion that I should f*ck off elsewhere does seem to be consistent with the approach you seek to justify. Clearly my expectation of self discipline and professional behaviour from administrators is misplaced.

ALR 07:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't bother so much about the "fraud" aspect, the fact that he might be unable to fulfill his "contract". I bother about that he is obviously willing to try to fulfil it. Which entails that he is willing to write articles regardless of the encyclopedic merits of the subject, and make an effort sneaking them into Wikipedia, bending our rules if necessary. Note that he isn't just selling his services to customers he judges suitable (as MyWikiBiz did, if I remember correctly); he is selling them to anybody, to the highest bidder. So, according to the e-bay rules, presumably he hasn't even got any control over which customers he accepts or not. If I hire him to write an article about my pet cat, he will be obliged to try and write one and fight to have it included. This is what he is publicly declaring he's willing to do. And this means he is automatically not a good-faith contributor. Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:24, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

This is interesting. What eBay seller is going to risk getting negged over something he can't deliver, and, as noted above, about any subject the buyer wants? The seller has 6500+ positives with 6 negs, none of them in the last 12 months. $100 just doesn't seem worth the risk, but it's a creepy little section of eBay anyway. Of the five or so buyers I found from the last month (seller uses exact wording except for names to sell Yahoo Answer, Google, Facebook, etc pages), two have left feedback...buyer Robbo0 bought on Aug. 16 and left positive on Aug. 27 and Diremine left positive on Aug. 31, while RayJasm left a cryptic positive on Aug. 19 (bought Aug. 9). Other purchases were buyer from Bulgaria, online store "My Native Creations" and GiaPromotions, which markets poker stuff. The two articles could be connected with the feedback, but I couldn't see the dates from the already deleted article to see if it matched up. Be interesting to see what feedback comes from these buyers down the road. Flowanda | Talk 19:04, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Craigslist

eBay is behind the curve compared to Craigslist. From a Google search of site:craigslist.org for "wikipedia":

• This guy has "two projects that should be of some interest to an accomplished author with a potential book deal sometime in the future" and non-disclosure/secrecy agreements. It helps if, despite Wikipedia's "encyclopedic" style, you could "employ some passion." Salary is negotiable, of course

• A local filmmaker in Philadelphia wants someone to "create a Wiki profile" about him/her

• Canadians will be glad to know that Wikipedia needs photographers in Toronto to snap photos for use in articles. The photographer even gets a link to his site from "whatever article(s) Wikipedia uses the photos in", in exchange for taking "pro bono" shots

• Here's a guy in Houston who "guarantees (to write for you) a Wikipedia entry free from spelling and grammar errors", plus a "chance to become part of history". (I never thought of myself as historical.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by KrakatoaKatie (talk • contribs) 08:14, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

There are more like this that have expired and are unavailable for viewing. The things people will do to promote themselves never ceases to amaze me. - KrakatoaKatie 08:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Actually the third of those four listings is completely legitimate. The other three look very bad. Durova^Charge! 15:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, he can't get a link in the article. In the photograph, maybe. But never in the article. Cary Bass ^demandez 15:54, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I wrote to the photographer, explaining he can't offer a link *in* the article. Cary Bass ^demandez 15:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Good to know the third one is okay – the phrase "Wikipedia uses the photo in" sounded very odd. - KrakatoaKatie 20:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Lordy. The fourth guy has had a long, illustrated, reasonably well written, but completely non-notable article for almost a year: J. Kevin Tumlinson. See you all when this AFD red link turns blue. :-). --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 17:53, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Arrgh! I looked for him in userspace, not the mainspace. Look at the article's history - I'm trying to WP:AGF, but how many believe User:Oldhatgolfer and User:Hat72 are different people? - KrakatoaKatie 20:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

They _are_ the same guy. See Oldhatgolfer's deleted edits, and Hat72's deleted edits. (Non-admins can't see these, sorry.) - KrakatoaKatie 20:10, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I almost forgot – I don't want to hijack ANI, but there's one more, and it may be the best one of all:

• A "Nude resort and spa" in Los Angeles wants a "WIKI expert to help resort on trade post for us". They "are seeking more help with really working wikipedia and some other sites like this as we cant seem to be able to post", and "and there seems to be many places for us to placemnt on Wikipedia". They're willing to exchange expertise for a free midweek stay at sea mountain inn for two people (URL removed) or two free dayspa passes for two" to their nudie spa.

If you're interested, please don't tell me about the experience. I have enough problems. ;-) - KrakatoaKatie 20:50, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Free midweek stay at a nudie spa??? WP:Conflict of WHAT? I'm there! Any female parties interested in that second ticket, you know who's Talk page to hit up. Awww yeahhhh. :-P Bullzeye ^{(Ring for Service)} 11:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I guess since it's not an offer of money, it doesn't violate WP:COI. However, some of us (like yours truly) aren't at our best unclothed, so it's not all that appealing of an offer. -- llywrch 23:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Deliberate, repeated violation of WP:BLP by User:Sesmith + incivility

I recently noted that User talk:Sesmith had, contrary to WP:BLP#Categories, made large numbers of additions to categories such as Category:Latter Day Saint entertainers, Category:Latter Day Saint artists, Category:American Latter Day Saints etc., despite providing no citations from reliable, published sources to justify the subjects' inclusion in the categories, and despite the fact that the subjects' supposed religious affiliation often played little or no part in the reasons for their notariety.

I pointed out to User:Sesmith with a friendly reminder that WP:BLP#Categories requires that: "the case for the category must be made clear by the article text"; [t]he article must state the facts that result in the use of the category tag and these facts must be sourced"; "[c]ategory tags regarding religious beliefs... should not be used unless two criteria are met:

• The subject publicly self-identifies with the belief... in question;
• The subject's beliefs... are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources."

None (or very few) of his additions to these categories, as far as I could ascertain, satisfied any of these criteria, let alone all of them: there was usually no mention of the subject's religious affiliation in the article text, which is a requirement. The absence of such information in the body of the article also tends to suggest that "the subject's beliefs" were not "relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life." As well, of course, the requirement "these facts must be sourced" from "reliable published sources" was completely unmet.

User:Sesmith responded with a dismissive note inviting me to be more specific. He deleted my notice from his talk page with an edit summary that suggested he was already familiar with the policy. I took his request for greater specificity at face value, and responded with a selection of the offending inclusions and citations of the relevant portions of WP:BLP to make it clear what was at issue.

User:Sesmith responded[3][4][5] with a hostile note asserting, essentially, that he was already aware of the policy, and claiming that the violations were negligible and anyway (for some reason) not his responsibility because they were part of a "batch update" and were ancillary to category additions by previous editors -- implicitly conceding that in spite of being aware that they violated WP:BLP#Categories, he had made such changes to, in his words, "hundreds" of articles.

I responded by saying that he is responsible for his own edits, reiterated that the edits violated WP:BLP#Categories, and pointed out that he had created a large mess he should now clean up, and that he could consider removing any similar violations he might find in the articles which now required cleaning up. User:Sesmith deleted my message with an abusive and uncivil edit summary.

Not only did User:Sesmith not revert his improper additions to these categories, he actually restored[6][7][8] specific ones I had mentioned as being violations and had removed -- again, evidently in full knowledge that doing so violated WP:BLP#Categories.

He then proceeded to the article List of Latter Day Saints, an article likewise afflicted with large numbers of unsourced claims about religious affiliation, and is the subject of a notice on the BLP noticeboard. I have been in the process of moving through the list removing entries involving living people where no citation from a reliable, published source justifies keeping them on the list and had explained the rationale here. User:Sesmith, who now appears to be following me around, intervened in the exchange with this uncivil and abusive response and then promptly restored all the violations to the list -- now without any doubt deliberately and in the full knowledge that restoring these entries violates WP:BLP. (Admin User:Jossi has since deleted the offending entries, and placed a warning against restoring them on the article talk page).

In my opinion, User:Sesmith:

• Should face a block for disruption (specifically, "persistently posting material contrary to the biographies of living persons policy") for:
  • deliberately and repeatedly violating WP:BLP, and in particular WP:BLP#Categories, in spite of having a clear understanding of the policy.
  • his repeated abusiveness and incivility ("ignoramus," "anal," "on a personal power trip" and so forth).

• Should be instructed to cease his incivility in the future or face the possibility of further blocks.

• Should be prevented from editing articles in this subject area unless he can commit to observing WP:BLP henceforth, and should face a longer-term block in the event he resumes violating the policy.

--Rrburke^(talk) 17:01, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Can you give us the Cliff's Notes version of the above discussion? Raymond Arritt 17:37, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I'll try:

He did this, this, and this after I told him here that doing so violated this. Doing it after being informed of the policy, which he said he already knew anyway, means that he did it deliberately, knowing that the edits were violations.

He claims to have made similar edits to "hundreds" of articles,[9][10][11] and in that last set of diffs implicitly acknowledges he was already aware of the policy, which confirms he was not acting ignorantly, simply ignoring the policy.

If more confirmation were actually needed that he engages in deliberate violations, he restored a whole host of WP:BLP violations with this edit, long after he'd been informed of the policy (the edits were later removed as WP:BLP violations by an admin in this edit) and after reading and participating in this discussion -- so he is not just violating the policy in question, he's repeatedly violating it actively and deliberately, and presumably plans to go on doing so.

He's also abusive and uncivil, as this edit summary and this edit, for example, make clear.

But the long version is better :) --Rrburke^(talk) 18:56, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

If people making mechanical category changes (category renames/merges, etc) are to be held responsible for the categorizations of every article they touch, nothing will ever get done (except, possibly, deletion) at CFD. Why not go further and say that ANY violation of ANY policy in ANY part of an article is the responsibility of the last editor who touched it, even if they didn't insert it. This is essentially the same as holding someone who edits a template responsible for a pre-existing BLP-violating transclusion of that template. --Random832 19:53, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

A further question - why is it that BLP#Categories applies to ALL categories whereas BLP itself applies only to "contentious" material? This even seems to apply to stub sorting: Picking an article at random, Joe_Allen_Evyagotailak provides no sources for the claim that its subject is canadian, or that he is a politician. Or for that matter that he was born in 1953, that he's Inuit, that he's from Kitikmeot Region, or anything else the categories say. I'm not going to violate WP:POINT by actually removing the categories, but CLEARLY there is something wrong with WP:BLP#Categories as it stands. --Random832 19:57, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is a live issue in this case: this case is these about improper additions of categories to individual articles -- lots of them -- not about changes to the categories themselves. --Rrburke^(talk) 20:24, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

The letter of BLP#Categories (and this complaint is definitely sticking to the letter in some of those cases) forbid ANY unsourced categories, which severely impacts stub sorting (no, this is not a case of stub sorting, the point is it's a clear example why the rule is messed up). And, the words that he's twisted into "admitting that he's deliberately violating BLP" (those words, incidentally, constitute no such admission) are clearly a case of (regardless of if it's true), him claiming that he's applying something akin to a category naming convention change rather than actively categorizing articles. --Random832 22:56, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by "sticking to the letter": this is about as cut-and-dried an example of violating the policy in question as I can imagine: the policy requires that if you're going to add a living person to the category Religion X, the article text must also say the person belongs to Religion X. These (and a great many more I didn't include -- "hundreds" according to the editor himself) didn't. The policy requires that a reliable published source be provided to corroborate that the person actually belongs to Religion X. These didn't.

The policy is especially precise about category tags claiming religious affiliation: they "should not be used" unless "the subject publicly self-identifies with the belief" and "[t]he subject's beliefs... are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life," with the requirement of verifiability: "according to reliable published sources." A great many of these category tags were added to articles on sports figures and entertainers, and so didn't satisfy any of the criteria -- and all of them need to be satisfied. Also, no sources were cited. Adding a category tag for Religion X to an article about a baseball player, when the article itself doesn't even mention the player's religion, let alone contain a quote establishing "self-identification" together with an inline cite, fails every one of the criteria -- and there were lots of examples just like this one: Roy Halladay.

I have to say I take some exception to the claim that I've "twisted" anything into anything else, if that's supposed to imply some intention to mislead. First, I never used the words "admitting that he's deliberately violating BLP" -- those are your words, not mine. If you're going to claim that I'm "twisting" something, please at least quote me accurately. I sent a short note to the editor on the assumption he was violating the policy innocently, asking him to remember to observe WP:BLP#Categories. He replied, "I always do, thx." So I gather from that he's already familiar with the policy, and was familiar with it when he made these "hundreds" of similar edits -- which is a different thing altogether from violating it innocently. If he then continues violating it, it can't be because he's never heard of it. Even if he had never heard of it, I then, in response to his request for greater specificity, quoted the relevant portion of the policy and gave specific examples of edits of his -- a few among "hundreds" of similar edits -- that violated the policy.

After you've had the policy cited to you and been given specific examples detailing edits that violated it, if you go ahead and do the same thing again, you're violating the policy deliberately, in full knowledge of what you're doing -- even if you hadn't already acknowledged you were familiar with the policy to begin with, which this editor did. And it's not a question of misinterpretation or different people having different understandings of the policy, because WP:BLP#Categories is a very straightforward and uncomplicated couple of sentences with a handful of easy-to-understand criteria.

You seem not to like WP:BLP. Naturally, that's fine and I respect it. I'm sure plenty of people agree with you. But your responses appear to confuse your dislike of the policy with the question of whether it was violated in this instance, matters which don't really have anything to do with each other. --Rrburke^(talk) 11:47, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

If there were so many examples where it wasn't mentioned in the article text, why didn't you use those diffs in this ANI posting instead of the ones where it was? The reason I took exception to this was that you were listing articles where it _was_ present in the text - not sourced, but not contentious either, and seemed to be using a loophole in BLP that inexplicably makes it stricter with categories than with article text. The other thing that it seemed clear that in many cases he was simply adding subcategories to articles already in the latter-day saints category, and it's really not reasonable to hold him responsible for that - CFD would never get anything done if people can't make mechanical category changes based on already-present categories without opening themselves up to BLP accusations. Can you point to any examples where both of the following apply?

1. The article text did not already state the subject's religion
2. The article was not already in an LDS category not added by User:Sesmith

If not, I have to wonder if you have some other motive. --Random832 23:41, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

A couple of things: first, this is not the first time you've tried to insinuate that I'm acting from some ulterior motive. As you have no basis and no evidence for such an insinuation -- it also happens to be wrong -- I'll thank you to stop making it. Absent evidence to the contrary, you can assume I submitted this report for precisely the reasons set out herein, and not for any other.

Second, I chose the examples I did precisely because they were ones I had already specifically raised with the editor -- violations he decided to restore even after being made aware of the policy in detail. My purpose was to make it as clear as possible that these were not innocent violations, but ones made deliberately -- after being aware both that they were violations and how they were violations. They illustrated the point best, because they were ones about which there couldn't be any confusion. These were not mechanical mass additions of subcategories, but one-at-a-time manual restorations of categories in cases where the editor had already been made aware that the addition of them in the first place had violated WP:BLP. [split response, this paragraph is Rrburke^(talk)]

The majority of the diffs you cited in this ANI post either had a statement already in the article text that the subject was LDS, or had a _category_ that was already on the article, saying the subject was LDS. "when the article itself doesn't even mention" the religion is simply false for most of the diffs you cited. --Random832 14:33, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

The addition of these particular category tags has to satisfy all the criteria: some failed certain ones; others failed other ones; still others failed all. These are the ones he chose to restore even after being made aware of the policy. So? --Rrburke^(talk) 20:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I chose these edits and not others because they and not others are the strongest examples of the disruptive editing I'm attempting -- with little success, evidently -- to draw attention to. The "hundreds" (the editor's own words) of others are the background to these, but the editor acknowledged early on that he was already aware of the policy and didn't need me to remind him of it, which appears to me to mean that even at the time of adding these categories to hundreds of articles, the editor was familiar with WP:BLP#Categories and so couldn't claim ignorance as an excuse. There's a difference between being ignorant of a policy and ignoring it. [split response, this paragraph is Rrburke^(talk)]

A single edit where he was actually newly inserting the claim that the subject is LDS would be a MUCH stronger example of a BLP violation than any number of diffs where he is not doing so. --Random832 14:33, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

That would only be the case if, to use the example again, the fact that someone previously added President Bush to the category "War criminals" would somehow negate my responsibility for adding him later to the category "American war criminals". Since it wouldn't, and the prior presence of offending categories has no bearing on a later editor's addition of more, neither does it have any bearing on the strength of the examples -- which, moreover, were offered to illustrate disruption, not simple, even knowing, violation. --Rrburke^(talk) 20:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If any confirmation of the deliberate nature of the violations were still required, consider that he later restored a whole host of WP:BLP violations with this edit, both long after he'd been informed of the policy and after reading and participating in this thread where the fact the material he later restored violated WP:BLP was being discussed. That edit more than any other demonstrates that the editor not only violates the policy but does it for a disruptive purpose, from a "wilful refusal to 'get the point' despite the clear statement of policy," as it's described in WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT.

Finally, the issue of whether the articles were already in LDS categories not added by User:Sesmith is irrelevant: if some vandal adds George W. Bush to the category "War criminals," would that somehow excuse me from responsibility if I then come along and add him to the category "American war criminals"? What's my defense? That's it's not my fault because I'm merely compounding somebody else's vandalism, not coming up with it all on my own? That's not just specious but silly, and I should expect to be held accountable for my own edit, whatever the earlier vandal might have done. --Rrburke^(talk) 09:36, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It wouldn't excuse you, but it would make it at least suspicious for someone to choose you alone to go after when the person who added the other category is equally guilty. Why are you going after him and NOT the person who added the other category, or the statement in the article text, in each of those cases. Is there any particular reason you have singled him out? --Random832 14:33, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) The reason is exceedingly simple (and not "suspicious"): when I glanced at the edit histories of the articles in these categories, I saw that this user's name appeared time and again in a large number of them, each time adding one of more of these categories. That is not why I "singled him out" -- because in fact I didn't single him out: I sent him a very innocuous note asking him to remember to observe WP:BLP#Categories when adding religious-affiliation categories to articles. He responded dismissively with an (erroneous) assertion that he always did so. Since that obviously wasn't the case, I cited the policy in question to clarify the matter, which occasioned an increasingly shrill and finally abusive string of responses, together with a restoration of the offending edits with no attempt to provide the required citations -- followed, finally, by a disruptive spite-edit which there can be no question he knew to be a violation. So I didn't "single him out": he escalated a simple matter with an easy remedy to the point where in order to prevent further violations, which he showed no likelihood of stopping on his own, few options were left but to bring it here. --Rrburke^(talk) 20:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

---

One reason that BLP applies to all categories is that those seeing the category pages cannot see the citation or back-up, so looking at Category:Criminals if you see Joe Blow there you know that Joe Blow is a criminal and (if all is well in WP) that something in his bio is sourced saying that he was convicted of a crime. For me, I think that religious/ethnic/race labels are inherently contentious anyway: think not? Do you think that Bill Graham would object if you changed his religious category to something else - say Atheist, or Nelson Mandela would care if his race were changed to something else - say Afrikaaner? WP shouldn't be in the business of categorizing by these characteristics for a number of reasons (WP:V, WP:OR, WP:SYNTH, WP:OCAT, arbitrariness, and yes, WP:BLP). Carlossuarez46 02:23, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Regardless, it seems pretty obvious to me that "the facts supporting a category's inclusion MUST be sourced" (even if they're not contentious) is one of those rules that only applies if someone has it in for you. --Random832 22:58, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

That doesn't seem at all obvious to me, and the issue seems pretty straightforward: "these facts must be sourced" in this instance merely means that in order to add a living person somebody to the category Religion X, the person in question has to have said "I belong to Religion X," and a reliable source has to be cited to prove he or she actually said it. This is a simple question of verifiability, a core policy -- with the added burden to get it right that WP:BLP places. --Rrburke^(talk) 11:47, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

But even BLP doesn't put that much burden on anything other than a category. I brought up stub sorting because stubs are the articles most likely not to have sources cited for anything. What BLP is saying is that even the most uncontroversial statement, that would NEVER be removed if it appeared in article text without a source, is cause for accusing the person who added a category of repeated and deliberate policy violations. The written policy is not the same as what is actually done every day by thousands of users. --Random832 23:22, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

The issue here is not any uncontroversial statement, but the claim that someone is affiliated with a particular religion -- a claim that would face the same scrutiny if placed in the text of an article, so there is no extra burden being placed on categories. Surely you're not saying that if I pick a biographical article at random and insert the unsourced claim "X is a member of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church" that that insertion would go unchallenged? It would be reverted immediately. Moreover, WP:BLP#Categories specifically sets out strict criteria for adding category tags claiming religious affiliation -- and the editor was aware of these criteria, because I had made him aware of them, and he chose to restore the categories anyway.

So it is completely erroneous to claim that on the basis of an "uncontroversial statement that would NEVER be removed if it appeared in article text without a source" I am "accusing the person who added a category of repeated and deliberate policy violations." Talk about "twisting"! First, the kind of statement in question is not uncontroversial. Second, it would be removed -- immediately -- if it were inserted unsourced into the text of a biographical article. And finally, that's not even the "cause" for the accusation anyway: the cause for the accusation is that the editor restored specific categories to particular articles when I had already made him aware that the addition of them in the first place had violated WP:BLP -- and that then, presumably for spite, he restored other unrelated violations after participating in a discussion which detailed how and why they violated the same policy.

I won't question your motives, although you've questioned mine, but I could be forgiven for ending up with the impression that you're trying not to understand. --Rrburke^(talk) 09:36, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

---

Daniel Rona - not only does the article text say he's LDS, it asserts notability solely on that basis. If the claim were removed from the article, the entire article would be {{db-bio}}. No, it's not sourced, but neither are a lot of stubs. I could probably take an afternoon and clear out most of any given stub sorting category if I felt so inclined. (this is the other part of why I was suspicious - if you have to rely on a policy as fundamentally broken as the current WP:BLP#Categories to do what you're trying to do, is it really what's best for the encyclopedia?) That you cited an edit to that article as one of your three top pieces of evidence does NOT help your claim. --Random832 14:39, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

The article Daniel Rona is completely unsourced, so none of the claims in the article are verifiable anyway, which means that any addition of a religious-affiliation category tag would WP:BLP#Categories. The article also seems fairly spammy and cites no reliable, third-party sources to establish notability. If it did, which it should or else be deleted, adding the categories in question would've been defensible. So if the editor wished to restore the categories he could have chosen, having been made aware of the policy, to seek out reliable, third-party sources to establish the claim in order to make the category restoration comply -- and he would at the same time have been improving the overall quality of this until-then entirely unsourced article. Instead, he chose a reflex-revert to show that he wasn't going to be told what to do, no matter what the policy says.

Let me try to clarify again why I chose these edits using a list of three ways to violate a policy. The list is not meant to be exhaustive:

• I've never heard of that.
• That doesn't seem important so I'll just ignore it.
• Screw you, I'm going to ignore what you told me and do it again anyway.

I chose the examples I did not because they were the strongest examples of violating the policy, but because they were all Screw yous and Screw yous constitute disruption. It's the fact that they were Screw yous, otherwise know as a "refusal to 'get the point'", that made the edits disruptive -- and it's the disruption that the primary basis of this complaint. The "That doesn't seem important so I'll just ignore it"s, which are the majority, are ancillary. They're violations, certainly to be distinguished from "I've never heard of that"s; they merit reversion and a caution, but they're not the main thrust of this complaint: "That doesn't seem important so I'll just ignore it" is knowing violation; "Screw you, I'm going to ignore what you told me and do it again anyway" is both a knowing violation and disruptive. It's the disruptive edits I'm trying to highlight, because disruption is the basis of the complaint.

I notice, by the way, that you've studiously avoided addressing this edit in which the user deliberately restored a whole list of WP:BLP violations even after participating in a discussion whose headline was "Large number of unsourced entries violating Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons." That's not just a Screw you, that's a "F--k you: I'm going to go on doing this and worse as long as I like". There no mistaking what's going on in this one. It's called disruption, and it merits a strong caution or temporary block. Is there a reason you've chosen not to address this example?

And who, exactly, says the policy is "broken"? It sets out a handful of simple, commonsense and defensible rules: don't put a person in a category unless the basis for doing so can be readily discovered from the article, otherwise it's not an important-enough part of the reason for their notoriety to include. The part of the article that is the basis for the inclusion requires a source -- like any claim that might be challenged. In particular, don't add a person to a category that claims they belong to a religion unless they've said they do, and don't add such a category unless their affiliation with this religion is an important part of what they're known for. What's unreasonable about any of that? --Rrburke^(talk) 20:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

""He replied, "I always do, thx." So I gather from that he's already familiar with the policy, and was familiar with it when he made these "hundreds" of similar edits -- which is a different thing altogether from violating it innocently."" You're SEVERELY violating WP:AGF here by assuming that his claim that he's following the policy means that he is in fact aware of it and deliberately violating it, rather than simply not sharing your interpretation of the policy. Many experienced editors misinterpret policy, or don't keep up with changes to it. It was absolutely unwarranted to take his statement that he was following policy as anything other than that he honestly believed that his edits were in line with policy. --Random832 14:52, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

What's special about religious affiliation tags is they're specifically mentioned in the policy:

Category tags regarding religious beliefs and sexual preference should not be used unless two criteria are met:

• The subject publicly self-identifies with the belief or preference in question;
• The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources.

The criteria are very simple, exceedingly clear and unequivocal. There is really no "interpretation of the policy" to founder on here. A person would have to be wilfully obtuse to pretend to be confused by it once it's been shown to him.

And taking the editor at his word is not a "severe" violation of WP:AGF -- or any kind of violation at all. Res ipsa loquitur. Moreover, you still seem to be misunderstanding me: the only instances in which I'm saying the editor is violating the policy in a way that constitutes disruption is in those instances I've cited. In the others, he appears to be aware of it and is choosing to ignore it -- which, as I've said, merits reversion and a caution but is not by itself disruptive. The disruption begins after you've had the policy, which is not complicated, explained to you in detail and you restore the material anyway -- and then follow the editor who's informed you of your violation of the policy to a wholly different article just so you can violate the policy again just for spite, and toss in uncivil abuse and infantile name-calling just for good measure. That's disruption, plain and simple, and signals an intention to keep at it.

Finally, you keep using words like "suspicious" and intimating that I have "some other motive" despite the fact that I've asked you to stop doing that unless you can produce some evidence. So here it is in plain English: if you've got an accusation to make, then come out with it already and I'll refute it point-blank. The insinuation and innuendo are getting tiresome. It's time to decide whether to put the matter out there or else drop it altogether. --Rrburke^(talk) 20:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Linkspamming by new editor??

Not sure if this is the right place to report this, but I'm a bit disturbed by the treatment of a newly registered editor, User:aaa intern, by several other editors, including at least one admin. This editor has been blocked from editing (just 7 minutes after a first warning!) for adding links that other editors have acknowledged improve the articles. See discussions here, here, and here. The editor may or may not be involved in linkspamming, but it seems that Wikipedia policies of Wikipedia:Assume Good Faith and Wikipedia:Please don't bite the newcomers are scarcely in evidence. It seems to me that such aggressive enforcement of anti-spamming policies will ultimately do more harm than good. Moreover, User:Hu12's block of aaa intern has apparently had the unintended side effect of blocking at least one other registered user. MrDarwin 00:56, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Some discussion is located Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam#http:.2F.2Fwww.aaa.si.edu

Aaa intern (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Contributions to wikipedia from that account consist soley of adding external links to an organization the account is associated with. The account seems to be a WP:SPA Role account which is a violation of Help:Username#Sharing_accounts. "Role accounts for the purposes of conducting public relations or marketing via the encyclopedia are strongly discouraged and will be blocked for violations of the Wikipedia:Conflict of interest guidelines." The block does not affect User:Aaa intern's ability to edit or discuss on his/her own account talk page. No discussion, nor unblock request has come from this account, however the only discussion seems to be from MrDarwin. Account was blocked for 24 hours, I have now indefinatly blocked it as a spam only account and per ubove policy, which now should no longer affect any one sharing IP 160.111.254.11, any subsequent addresses they attempt to edit from or preventing new account creation. It appears there was an Autoblock, ID: 613575 attached to the account, this should no longer be an issue as it has been corrected.--Hu12 01:44, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

If the intern wishes to register a new account, and agrees to follow all policies, I expect they could do something productive. Instead of adding COI links to articles, the intern could leave notes on the relevant talk pages suggesting these references/links and explaining why they'd be appropriate. The Smithsonian's online collection may be worth linking to, but this should be decided by editors independent of the Smithsonian. - Jehochman ^Talk 01:57, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

From an actual examination of the links that were added by aaa intern, I'm hard-pressed to see that these edits were made for the purpose of "conducting public relations or marketing via the encyclopedia". Moreover, I fail to see how aaa intern violated Help:Username#Sharing_accounts; as far as I or anybody else knows, these edits were made by a single person, editing under a single user name.

I'm also bothered by the implication that editors will be prevented from editing articles in which he or she has any particular knowledge or expertise. For the sake of improving Wikipedia and making it the best that it can be, I hope that these policies will be re-examined and leavened with a modicum of common sense. MrDarwin 02:20, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I've verified that the user was adding links to Smithsonian Institution archives materials on specific artists to articles on those artists. It seems to me, to say the least, highly questionable that the only possible purpose of adding links to Smithsonian Institution materials to articles on (often very obscure) artists is solely the marketing and public relations of the Smithsonian Institution. Therefore, it seems to me that it is by no means certain that WP:COI WP:SPAM, which requires such a purpose to justify an indefinite block, has occurred. I believe WP:COI in fact specifically permits interested parties to make an edit that would be clearly appropriate if done by a non-interested party, and this would seem to be such a case. Moreover, WP:COI is a guideline, not a policy, and relevant materials in Smithsonian Institution archives would seem to be sufficiently relevant to the articles involved that discretion in applying the guideline seems appropriate. I have advised the user that a block can be appealed. I would recommend that the user be unblocked, or at least not indef-blocked. Best, --Shirahadasha 02:05, 5 September 2007 (UTC). Clarified --Shirahadasha 03:02, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but the username violates WP:U and needs to be changed. There's not so much value in adding links to articles. Google works pretty well if somebody wants to find something. I think this sets a bad example for others if we allow it. I'd rather have the intern use the article talk pages. - Jehochman ^Talk 02:23, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I have unblocked the user. If I am further overridden I will not act again on this matter, but believe that WP:SPAM simply hasn't been met since the material is not promotional in nature, is specific, relevant, and useful to the articles it was added to. I also believe that this material would be accepted by a non-interested editor if added by an ordinary user, hence WP:COI does not require interfering. I will ask the user to voluntarily refrain from adding links to the Smithsonian Institution for the time being and discuss the issue. One can question whether articles should have links at all, but the link policy permits it. Best, --Shirahadasha 02:46, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Fundementally, spamming is about promoting your own site or a site you love. Even commercial sites are often appropriate. Links to sites(any) for the purpose of using Wikipedia to promote it, are not. my 2 1/2 cents. For now, let see how this pans out. Contributions relating to COI need to made on the article talk pages. We all want the best for the project. Lets hope this doesn't set a bad example ;)--Hu12 03:17, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

For those who are interested, there have been several lengthy debates about spamming behavior by representatives of libraries, archives, what-have-you, but no consensus so far. We really need to develop a policy on this. See the discussion here and the previous discussion linked from it. There's a thread on how it's possible to be non-profit but still have a vested interest in driving traffic to your site. Katr67 03:59, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• I think the deleted Archives of American Art links should be restored. User:Hu12 might suggest this to User:Aaa intern. Thanks - hopefully alls well that ends well Modernist 04:06, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I suspect User:Aaa intern is unfamiliar with policies here and needs some help learning the guidelines. Modernist 12:07, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I think it is clear that everyone involved in this situation has acted in good faith according to his or her understanding of the situation and what is best for the project. Nonetheless, the net effect was a very serious WP:BITE violation against a good-faith new editor with valuable information to offer, and I hope this sort of thing can be handled very differently in the future. Newyorkbrad 12:22, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure mass reversion by Modernist of the links added by Aaa intern and deleted by Hu12 is the answer. The Spam policy is clear, even if Hu12's actions were a bit bitey. Katr67 20:44, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• I've restored the links. The Archives of American Art should be communicated with by you guys. Ty - Modernist 20:49, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I also am not sure if the mass reversion by User:Modernist is a good answer. I hope that we all do understand, that we are trying to write an encyclopedia here, not a linkfarm. You say that the mass linkadditions of good, on topic links is OK (even with a conflict of interest, then what witholds a museum to add en-masse external links to a number of pages. Apparently that is all OK, even without discussion. So all car-musea can add their link to the external links sections of all pages about cars .. and all these pages can be turned into linkfarms (etc. etc.). WP:SPAMHOLE is that way. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 23:23, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Modernists revisions seem to be independent of consensus and is one that contradicts Wikipedia policy. Perhaps we should demote policies and guidelines in place preventing such behavior to essays? Perhaps We should rethink the entire purpose of wikipedia and allow sites like Overstock.com/WordBomb/Judd Bagley pursue their own adgenda by allowing mass additions to their various products to each article that is related to shoes, shirts and electronics. Surely this would ad value to the reader. "I went to wikipedia and saved 10% on an Ipod"...LOL... seriously. Overstock.com and aaa.si may be fundamentally different, however the behavior we are condoning is the same. Aaa intern has made no attempts to communicate in any of the multitude of discussions that have taken place. Bite or not, the Duck test needs also considered.--Hu12 05:40, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Modernist is an established editor with significant contributions to art-related articles and there is no indication he has a COI here, so he is entitled to make an editorial decision that these links have added value and should be kept. This is open to challenge as with any editorial decision. A good solution has already been found in an identical situation with User:VAwebteam (from V&A Museum), namely to set up a mini-project so that they could work with other editors to assess each proposed EL. This was very successful and they were fully co-operative. See their user and talk pages for more details. Obviously when a major institution participates in wikipedia, we don't want to chew them out. That said, we can't allow mass unsupervised insertion of links either. Careful dialogue is the way forward in such cases. See also Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Visual arts/Infoart articles, where an editor, Infoart, associated with the Saatchi Gallery had created over 150 articles on artists associated with that gallery. Rather than mass speedy deletes, a team of editors worked with him and attended to each article, with the final result of the addition of much useful content to the project. Tyrenius 13:34, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The Archives of American art is an important source of valuable and valid information for visual arts articles. I actually thought there was a mixed opinion about the links with four or five editors including an administrator or two in favor of restoring the links. I acted with the spirit of WP:AGF and WP:UCS, if I restored the links too hastily - (it was a lot of work) I apologize if I offended anyone, that was not my intention. I think the links add value and valuable information to the encyclopedia. Modernist 13:50, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

If the Archives of American art is so important of a source for visual arts articles, then why not endorse it as such at Wikipedia:WikiProject Visual arts. Perhaps the proper approach should be incorporating a template approved by the project in to articles. Modernist said himself, "there have been several lengthy debates about spamming behavior by representatives of libraries, archives, what-have-you, but no consensus so far. We really need to develop a policy on this", there is a policy, its located @ WP:NOT#LINK. The External links policy on Advertising and conflicts of interest states You should avoid linking to a website that you own, maintain or represent, even if the guidelines otherwise imply that it should be linked, which is in line with the conflict of interest guidelines. I fail to understand how actions of an obvious WP:SPA spam account who has not participated in any of these discussions, has no edits outside of spamming links(77 in less than two hours, 116 in total) to his own organization, have support for his behavior by established editors. I can undrstand if there was participation/clarification by Aaa intern, however the silence is deffening, telling and quite indicitive in pattern and action of the thousands of spam accounts seeking traffic from wikipedia we see @ Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam. As it stands should we allow Icewarp ltd (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (a new user) to freely conduct public relations and marketing via the encyclopedia also?. I appreciate Tyrenius' examples they are very helpful and I know how much work goes into cleanup, Modernist, its work, alot of work.--Hu12 16:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Actually, it was me who mentioned the other discussions. I realize we have a policy, but this comes up so often, that the policy needs to contain a very clear librarian clause. Katr67 16:46, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with User:Modernist. The links enrich the articles by connecting them to an unimpeachable, public, institutional, non-commercial, and thoroughly accredited source. Regardless of the fact that the links may have been added by some automatic means, they should remain, as welcome and legitimate sources of information. MdArtLover 18:54, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd endorse Tyrenius's comments above. The V&A approach has worked, as the European Library one earlier really did not, because the COI user there was not prepared to do things the WP way. I'd add that modern, still in copyright, artists present special problems as it is often impossible to get the images needed onto WP because of copyright. So good external links are especially useful. Johnbod 19:04, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Personal complaints on Newsvine article

I am having trouble with an anonymous user who continues to make edits like this one to the Newsvine article. I've reverted the edits because the user is clearly just using Wikipedia as a soapbox. After numerous reversions, I even opened up a discussion on the talk page, to no avail. Is there something that can be done to take care of this situation? – Mipadi 15:51, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Have you tried talking to the user? ˉˉ^anetode╦╩ 16:00, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Judging by at least one of Mipadi's edit comments, I think there is no shortage of language here. Sheffield Steel^talkers_stalkers 23:06, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

User is an anonymous IP. In my experience, such users don't reply to comments on talk pages. – Mipadi 16:04, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

People using anonymous IPs are editors, much like me and you. Getting angry and edit warring with other editors only serves to create a hostile environment which could result in both parties being blocked. While no one will advocate for a submissive attitude to tendentious editing, a little courtesy and communication is not much to ask for. ˉˉ^anetode╦╩ 08:45, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Query - positioning markup

Why do we allow "floating divs" in the first place? Is there any plausible use for them other than to obscure parts of the MediaWiki interface? >Radiant< 10:55, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Floating divs are everywhere - infoboxes, etc. The problem is absolute positioning. People use that functionality to do cute things on their user pages but, otherwise, I'm not aware of places where it helps the encyclopedia. —Wknight94 (talk) 11:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Just to be clear about terminology, a floating div is typically a box that floats left or right of the main text. It moves things out of the way to make space for itself. This is a very useful feature. A floating div will not obscure other things. Absolute positioning, also known as layers, puts a div a set number of pixels away from an edge of the screen. This can cause the div to obscure other things. Here are the beans if you want to test this:

<div style="position:absolute; top: 200px; left: 200px"> <h1>Beans! Beans! Beans!</h1> </div>

Try this in your sandbox, not on a live page, please. - Jehochman ^Talk 11:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• Okay, so I used the wrong term :) the question stands - why do we allow this in the first place? I believe the MediaWiki software can filter out unwanted kinds of html tag. >Radiant< 11:28, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• Well it's used by a whole host of templates that put various icons and such up next to the article title (FA stars, padlocks, geographical coordinates etc). None of that is rely critical to the ensyclopedia, but are they causing a lot of problems though? I've seen them used to block out the toolbox on one or two userpages, but I generaly don't think of it as a problem. If someone is using it to be disruptive just revert and take apropriate measures if they are beeing dickish about it. --Sherool (talk) 12:30, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Ok, good answer. Thanks. >Radiant< 13:09, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Can their use be restricted in software, to template space then? They are being used for spam and links which (being hidden) are on the pages, disrupt editors, and assist SEO, but are not always visible casually. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 13:50, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

In response to Wknight94, there are (IMO) valid uses for absolute positioning when captioning various features on an image or diagram - see Broadwater Farm Estate or Hampstead Heath, for example — iridescent (talk to me!) 22:33, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

On Rambutan etc

1. Rambutan has been disruptive in the past – Not completely untrue, as a user who has been in dispute with Rambutan, I can say that he has been unhelpful and unwilling to listen at times. However, he responded well to reason in the past, learned from his mistakes and has been willing to collaborate.
2. Rambutan agreed to move on with the GFDL banner, which hovered over the GFDL links before he was blocked.
3. It would be interesting to note that Rambutan had only recently nominated an article for deletion over which Phil Sandifer seems to have an active interest. See Judd Bagley and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Judd Bagley (2nd nomination), soon after which Phil commented on the AfD page, and then commented upon how Rambutan was "deliberately" – [12] trying to make his talk page unusable. This petty dispute escalated and resulted in the non-admin getting blocked for a duration of one month(?).
4. Phil Sandifer has repeatedly introduced material – [13], [14], which can be considered to be libellous on a permanent medium of information like an encyclopedia. On that very page itself, Phil Sandifer misused his admin tools to semi-protect the page to prevent the anonymous IP address from editing again. This was soon followed by the petty issue been addressed on Rambutan's talk page.
5. Rambutan has been blocked many times during the months of June and July, majority of the blocks been executed by Phil Sandifer himself – [15]. The very first block made by Phil Sandifer (citing Removing talk page comments is disruptive.) was overturned by another administrator. This did not discourage Phil Sandifer from continuing blocking this user.
6. I would strongly recommend other administrators looking into the dispute, to delve into the issue rather than making observations solely on what it appears on the surface. — Nearly Headless Nick {C} 17:46, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

At the very least, I implore Phil to stay away from Rambutan, and let other admins deal with him. This is not to say that Rambutan is in the right, just that Phil should focus elewhere. Will ^(talk) 23:32, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Funkynusayri

User Funkynusayri is insistently using the n word on the talk page at Talk:Negroid#Disambiguations_page . I think his excessive use of the term is inappropriate. Furthermore he deliberately misspelling my username, I don't know why. Muntuwandi 21:06, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I've asked him to not call you "Mutu" anymore. As to use of the "n word", there's nothing inappropriate about this as long as he is not using it as an insult - it seems he's referring to the article nigger itself, and there's nothing wrong with calling an article by its name. Remember, Wikipedia isn't censored. Picaroon (t) 21:16, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• As I've already explained, I've referred to the article by the name "Nigger" itself every time I've used it. So I don't see the problem at all, unless the article itself gets changed to "N Word". I think this whole thing is extremely silly.

I quote, from here, in italics: [16]

Fourdee was blocked by Jimbo Wales himself? Are you sure about that? Anyway, there is an actual Nigger article, I don't see you complaining about that. If that isn't deleted, there's no reason to delete this one, if the justification is that it is almost as bad as having the "Nigger" article. Why use this article as a "proxy for the N word", when that word already has its own page? Your logic is quite flawed, reeks of desperacy. Funkynusayri 18:12, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Please Funkynusayri, try not to turn this page into a shock site, if you do I will have to report you. This is the intent that I was talking about. Yes Fourdee was blocked by Jimbo [17]. So for others interested in continuing being a wikipedians, should take note that wikipedia is not stormfront, a place for xenophobic bashing. It is a resource for education and an encyclopedia. Muntuwandi 18:21, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

What the heck are you talking about? "Shock site"? There is an article by the name Nigger here on Wikipedia. I'm referring to that. Funkynusayri 18:23, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Odd.

As for "Mutu", I called him that when we were still on good terms, and he didn't seem to mind at all back then. So I should stop saying it now just because he has ceased to like me? Also, I should maybe mention that he has manipulated my messages a couple of times, I don't know whether it is an offense or not, but it is highly annoying and inappropriate, far worse than my "offenses", if I may utter my own opinion.

Watch: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3ANegroid&diff=155883725&oldid=155882803

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3ANegroid&diff=155767819&oldid=155753230

Funkynusayri 18:36, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The replacement of your loving nickname for him with his user name is appropriate, the censorship of "nigger" is not. I'll ask him to stop. Picaroon (t) 18:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• He himself has referred to me as simply "Funky" on numerous occasions (take a look at that same talk page, for example), I had no problem with that, so I smell hypocrisy. If I get threatened here for referring to him by a nickname, I have an equal right to complain about him doing the same. Funkynusayri 18:45, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

  Exactly, you have no problem with that nickname. If you desire him to stop calling you that, tell him so. Picaroon (t) 18:53, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Let's say that then, if he wants to keep calling me Funky, I'll keep calling him Mutu. Or well, let's see if he agrees with me just calling him "Muntu" from now on, he proposed that himself. Funkynusayri 19:05, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Talk:Occupations of Latvia

The article Occupations of Latvia was placed on article probation by Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Occupation of Latvia and it could use some outside comments. The major outstanding issues from the arbitration case still have not been resolved. There are actually 3 occupation periods—by the Soviets 1939-1941, Nazi Germany 1941-1944, and the period of Sovietization 1944-1991. The outstanding issues are, (1) should the article be split into three to cover the three periods or kept as one, and (2) is "occupation" an appropriate title to describe the period of 1944-1991 (Latvian SSR).

Right now there is a particularly silly argument being made by two editors that since a number of books they have found deal with all three periods together, it would be original research to divide the 1939-1991 time period into 3 articles. As an admin answering a request at WP:AE I have tried to point out that splitting the article is a matter of editorial judgement and would violate no policies; I have pointed out that the books are probably divided into chapters (they are too obscure for google scholar), and that there is no similar problem in splitting articles related to other historical topics. Since this article is under probation. allowing disruptive users to be banned, I think a little more admin attention and comment would be helpful. Thatcher131 21:51, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to point out that the 4 books were cited to refute the main argument for splitting the article: that the 3 periods are unrelated and are tendatiously presented together in order to synthesize something that is not present in the original sources. These books (two available at Amazon Books [18],[19]) advance the position that the three occupations are inter-related and the period can only be properly understood when discussed together. The story of the Baltics is about how they fell prey to two cooperating totalitarian regimes in partnership (later dissolved), and the exploitation by the Nazis of Soviet atrocities for their propaganda and the exploitation by the Soviets of Nazi atrocities for their propaganda; the historical consequences and the continued misrepresentation of those consequences. Martintg 05:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Its very simple really. There are event articles and historic articles. Each of the events above are article-worthy. No one questions that really. What is not legitimate is to arbitrary paste separate events under a tendentious title to push one's political agenda.

There is a way to have articles devoted to a series of events that cover a country's history over a significant period of time. Such articles are called "History articles" and should be neutrally called [[History of Country (Year1-Year2)]]. If one, however, does not want a history but wants its POV presentation, one starts from a title with a skewed lead section being a second next important step. This is exactly what we've got here. --Irpen 09:33, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I think I understand, you mean a country's sequence of history sub-articles should be named like [[History of Country (Year1-Year2)]], just like it's done in History of Russia? :) Seriously, how can someone continue to claim a series of events are unrelated and are tendatiously presented together, when there are published sources that do consider these events are related and presents them together. Seems your issue is with these sources, if so you should consider writing a paper and having it published in a journal. Then your view that this is illegitimate would carry more weight. Martintg 10:33, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It has already been mentioned that the history of latvia 1940 - 1991 is not correct term. The article analyzes Latvia under occupation and events related to that. As it is very important part of Latvian history. For the same reasons why are there articles like WWII anyway? The world war II consisted of many different events. But they all came together in the concept of WWII. This article brings together the event of Latvia being under occupation and links to subevents through {{main}}.

It might be hard to understand for people who don't know much about Latvian history but in short it is:

1. Latvia declared independece and became republic.
2. Latvia was occupied by Soviet Union.
3. Latvia was taken from Soviet Union (not from Latvia) by Nazi Germany.
4. Latvia was retaken from Nazi Germany (not from Latvia) by Soviet Union.
5. Latvia became free from Soviet Union and redeclared independence.

Latvia was taken in 1940 and didn't have nothing to say about the matters until 1991 when together with collapse of USSR it regained it's independence. So there is clear continuity here. Suva 10:52, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It might help for people to see History of Latvia. This gives a good overview. Blueboar 15:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Following the Russian Revolution, every village of the former Russian Empire declared independence and some even succeeded in gaining a measure of international recognition (e.g., Don Cossack Republic). Of a hundred plus post-imperial polities, Latvia did the most to impose Bolshevism on Russia (see Latvian Riflemen). The official position of the Russian Federation was voiced by Pres. Putin: "Now, on the subject of occupation. As I see it, in 1918, Russia and Germany concluded a deal that was sealed in the Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty, under which Russia handed over part of its territories to German control. This marked the beginning of Estonian/Latvian statehood. In 1939, Russia and Germany concluded another deal and Germany handed these territories back to Russia. In 1939, they were absorbed into the Soviet Union. Let us not talk now about whether this was good or bad. This is part of history".[20] Amen. --Ghirla^-трёп- 06:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Not sure what your point is... Except maybe you and mr. Putin should familiarize yourself with the terms of "Annexation of region" and "Occupation of Internationally recognized republic". Suva 12:09, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Article: Jasenovac Concetration camp

Kindly asking for the mediation in the case of the above mentioned article, due to the fact that all of my contributed and 'documented info-s and photos' have been deleted by the user Rjecina, who in my opinion tries to block the influx of valuable informations to the article and subject involved(see discussions to relevant article too,pls).

Sincerely, --Votec 22:44, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I accept mediation but still demand block of user:Votec because of his personal attacks on me and his 200 or more edits during last 3 days in this article. --Rjecina 22:57, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

...well, 200 or more edits were done because I am just on my third day on Wiki-line, did not know how to apply changes efficiently and as well have done a lot of grammatic corrections of the article...in addressing of member Rjecina 'demand for blocking': first of all be so kind and do not demand anything, but do try to kindly request:)...second of all, it won't help the mediation and third of all, calling you possible 'Holocaust denier' ( due to your activities concerning article 'Jasenovac concentration camp' and involving relevant discussion of the article) is not the insult, but in contrary my argumented claim.

....with hope of having constructive mediation.

sincerely, --Votec 00:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

You seem to have started a single purpose account. You have accused two WP editors of being holocaust deniers. Please read WP:CIVIL, WP:AGF, WP:NPA and WP:POV. All edits must be supported by verifiable sources. Mathsci 01:14, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

---

...well, as per calling yourself 'pure profession mathematician', Mathsci, you should not be starting direct and explicit qualifications before doing some basic readings!...what about, just my comment above your one: there it clearly states that I am registered and on line user just for, now it would be four days so, as per following that simple fact you certainly CAN NOT label me with 'single purpose account' label...and for that 4 days I have addressed only 2 articles...so, your claim is per such just intentional fantasy!!!

...and BTW, in the major contrary to your deliberate above claim yours 'two WP editors - namely Rjecina and Ante Perkovic' are the one and the members with 'single purpose account'...that is clearly obvious after just a short look to their activities!!!...with your 'pure profession math brain' you should certainly agree ? :)...right?

...secondly, the article (Jasenovac), I did partially contributed, does have EXTRA verifiable sources, clearly two of them, as per bellow: <<http://www.arhivrs.org/jasenovac.asp>> 'Archives of Republic of Srpska' = for your kind attention Web page being listed on the UNESCO's Archives Portals !!!...and...

<<https://cp13.heritagewebdesign.com/~lituchy/index.php>> 'Jasenovac Research Instite' = which does state in it's first sentence: " The Jasenovac Research Institute is a non-profit human rights organization and research institute committed to establishing the truth about the Holocaust in Yugoslavia and dedicated to the search for justice for its victims. The JRI promotes research and activities designed to enlighten the world to the crimes of genocide committed at Jasenovac and wartime Yugoslavia against Serbs, Jews and Romas and provides assistance to all groups and individuals who likewise seek justice for these victims." >>>goal which sounds very noble to me...humbly hope you certanly agree too !!!

...thirdly, concerning the two WP editors ( members Rjecina and Ante Perkovic, I believe ) being accused by me( as you wrongly claim ) of being Holocaust deniers: It is not an accusation, but argumented claim, due to the deliberate activity of this two members!!!...kindly visit discussion page of the member Ante Perkovic and there you will find member's Rjecina claim that they are practising here on WP 'reversing wars' !!!!...HOPE THIS IS CLEAR ENOUGH..AND ANY TRY TO MINIMISE THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE CARNAGED IN THE HOLOCAUST OF WWII...I DO NOT TOLERATE AND CALL HOLOCAUST DENIAL!!!

...can I kindly question your good intention and ask you...are you possibly the friend of above ones and trying to advocate in their behalf ? !!!...team work, maybe ? :)

very sincerely,

--Votec 12:31, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

---

Please comment on the content not on the editors. The editors are not important, the content is. --Rocksanddirt 19:09, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

This page is not a blog and comments here are usually designed to be helpful. Please read the links I provided to avoid any future misunderstandings and kindly refrain from any form of personal attack. --Mathsci 22:26, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

---

...you certainly haven't done much of reading of above...as I can see I am the only one who is using the argmented talk and not the only direct attacks!

--Votec 20:02, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

---

---

For the note of administrator: by --Votec 20:42, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

On Wednesday, September 5th I have requested the 'mediation' of the 'English speaking page administrator' due to the repeated vandalism and deliberate deletion of the chapters in this article( not only contributed by me, but in his vandalism, by everything what did not suite his fancy...deleation have happened twice and with his second deletion on September 5th at 23:35 user Rjecina deleted (-3034) contributions by me and other users by not giving the explanation!).

If you kindly look and follow mail exchange of user Rjecina with his fellow user Ante Perkovic( and on the profile of Ante Perkovic), you can simply find that they do claim that they are doing 'reversing wars'!!! In addition following their 'line of interest' ( which can easily be concluded following their discussions) they are 'single purpose members', and if I may use the therm 'sel-made quasi WP historians'!!! Following their malicious work they do not deserve to be the part of this vibrant community.

In addition, following the history of discussions with the article 'Jasenovac Concetration Camp' I am free to conclude that this article has been constantly vandalised ( most horrible example being...(kindly read relevant comment in dicussion)...statement added on the page by irrelevant user: 'Dear Catholic God, make all fucking Serbs die!!!"

This article is not about Serbs, Croats or Jews...it is about HOLCOAST and humans being exterminated in the horror of thier coexistence and as such should be adequately protected.

---

Once when I started added to the article 4 days ago, I found article to be genuine ruine: written in pour English, with obvious numbers of delations in the chapters by various members with their various 'interests'...which have made article hardly cosequent and readable. As well, due to the primitive involvements of the numbers of users from all sides, the 'most elaborated' chapter was about recounting the victims, but not about, for example, the conditions in the camp, human suffering, history, background. Shameful!!!

My editing on article was focused on conecting 'the bits and peaces' in one readable story. I did have added historical facts about Zagreb's WWII archbishop Stepinac( using the info's from the relevant WP article about him). Also I have added 29 photos and related informations from the two Web pages:

<<http://www.arhivrs.org/e_index.asp>> "Archive of Republic Srpska" which is listed on UNESCO Archives portals!!!...and...

<<https://cp13.heritagewebdesign.com/~lituchy/index.php>> "Jasenovac Researh Instite" which on its first page states: "The Jasenovac Research Institute is a non-profit human rights organization and research institute committed to establishing the truth about the Holocaust in Yugoslavia and dedicated to the search for justice for its victims. The JRI promotes research and activities designed to enlighten the world to the crimes of genocide committed at Jasenovacorganisation and wartime Yugoslavia against Serbs, Jews and Romas and provides assistance to all groups and individuals who likewise seek justice for these victims."... cause I do certanly find noble and justify.

Both Web pages being mentioned, have been attacked by user Rjecina in his malitious manner and informations concerned and relevant( including the pictures of children bing victims in camp DELETED by this vandal!!!).

As well I have deleted with explenation short sentence towards the end of the text, addressing the awards given, finding it inappropriate( reasons and notice for deletaion given at the end of my above comment, in section discussions ).

---

Following all above mentioned and the history of the article I do consider and kindly ask for this article to be fully protected. Certanly I do not expect, that version which is actuall now ( being last edited by myself and in my opinion still very poorly elaborating the subject) should be the protected one, but I do ask for your mediation in finding indepentent and prominent source ( for example, United States Holcoast Memorial Museums, which is having the info-s, certanly willinness to do so, and computer knowledge to contribute). After their contribution article should be fully protected.

I do respect Wikipedia philospohy of being the open information source, meant to built up the knowledge and share, but in the certain ocassion ( as I have noticed you have implemented it few times with 'difficult subject'...example 'Roma people' ) and this is certanly, in my opinion, the case ( due to the expolosion of primitive emotions accumulated and due to the wars in ex-Yugoslavia), I beleive that this would be the adequate solution.

If no, I am certain and positive that after this, or any other future conflict situation and mediations, this article will be repeaditly and repeditly vandalised and missused.

Holocaust thematic and Jasenovac as World Heritage Site do certainly ask for full protection.

Thanks for you readings and kindly advise with your point,

--Votec 20:42, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

---

---

Scientology deleted

Resolved

Scientology was deleted, but the deletion logs show it should still exist. See all logs for Scientology and all logs for HAGGER???????????????????. Anyhow, can someone resurrect this? Thanks. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:14, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

All is ok. A vandal moved Scientology to the HAGGER??????.... page. It's been fixed. Flyguy649 ^talk _contribs 03:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

What does "HAGGER" mean, anyhow? Burntsauce 16:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Haggar is how Hagrid (in the Harry Potter Novels) is refered to by is 1/2 brother Grawp. --Rocksanddirt 19:15, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Bmedley Sutler

Resolved

 – User indefinitely blocked as self-admitted sock of FAAFA. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 23:00, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Bmedley Sutler (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has recently been blocked for disrupting the project. He, once again, states that one of his goals on Wikipedia is to "out" people he considers right wing.[21][22] In the second link, he invites another editor to try homosexual sex. I really don't have a problem with gays, but that sort of language is in extremely poor taste. A recent ANI discussion showed that the community is running out of options for improving Bmedley's behavior (see here). I believe that Bmedley should be blocked for a lenghty period of time (perhaps indefinitely). Pablo Talk | Contributions 05:10, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Discussions about long-term resolutions should be had on Wikipedia:Community sanction noticeboard. -- Avi 05:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I came to the noticeboard to post regarding this edit of Bmedley [[23]] - Clearly taunting and he's been blocked for it before. I cant say I'm suprised to see he's been alerted on for other behavior already. Dman727 05:13, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

"Try it. You'll like it." That is really grossly inappropriate. Any language of that sort wherever it be heterosexual, homosexual, pansexual, or Furry is unacceptable. In a workplace that would be considered sexual harassment, and considering this user's habit of pushing it to the limit always there should be consequences. Seriously. --MichaelLinnear 05:30, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I found this sentence especially disgusting, he's bringing children into it and promoting pedophilia - "Its okay, (IMO) to have a wife and kids and enjoy some Gay sex now and then!"[[[[24]]] Dman727 05:36, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

No he's talking about closet cases who have a family to keep up the facade for whatever reason. I'm sure that's what he meant. --MichaelLinnear —Preceding unsigned comment added by MichaelLinnear (talk • contribs) 05:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC) where did the time stamp go? temporal shock for the fucking win

Michael, your right. I parsed that sentence wrong. At least I think that you are right. Even with the clarification, I really find these kind of posts appalling. Dman727 05:50, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• User:DHeyward is Wikistalking me He is following me around and (IMO) trying to provoke me. He showed up on an article I am active on for months Western_Hemisphere_Institute_for_Security_Cooperation that he had never edited, right after my block ednded, made a 'troll edit' and then erased my message to him aasking him not to troll the article. [25] The fact that he wont communicate about this issue which I posted to him in good faith and his troll edit to the article shows that he lacked good faith intentions on this article and is just trying to provoke me (IMO). There are millions of articles on Wiki. Could you ask him to leave me alone and find another article? IMO his only object is to haunt me and get me to bite. I have now decided to avoid certain articles like Larry Craig so I wont be provoked. I am staying away from Crockspots favorite articles as much as I can. And I have since my block! And now I go to an article that I have been editing for months and Dheyward Wikistalks me there and haunts me and provkes me. Please get him to stop and leave me be on that article. Thanks. Update That was a few days ago. Then I ask someone in the LBGT community to mentor me, and [[User:DHeyward] Wikistalks my edits again and teams up with one of his RW friends (who are all showing up now because they're a team (I won't say Cabal!) to talk about his Wikistalking. After my block I completely avoided any article any of them work on, and Dheyward followed me to bait me, as many say is their plan. Now they will all pile on. This organized RW harrassment from the same group of approx 6 editors must stop! Please, if they leave me alone, Like I tried to do them there will be no problems! •smedleyΔbutler• 05:39, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

You are all interested in the same topics, American foreign policy, politics, and everything involving the nebulous Allegations of state terrorism by the United States article. Why is it all a surprise when you meet each other? --MichaelLinnear 05:43, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Judging by your asking them to have gay sex, your attempt to leave them alone is unsuccessful. I would like to hear you defend your actions, instead of trying to change the subject to other editors (as you always do). Also, please quit reducing this to a "left vs. right" thing; it is not about political affiliation. Pablo Talk | Contributions 05:44, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I've seen this user's name mentioned far to much here on AN/I in recent months. Unfortunately Bmeldey's actions have shown a habitual use of incivility, harassment, personal attacks, edit warring and disruption. I have decided that, considering past discussions on this issue (where the possibility of indef blocking was specifically brought up), it is reasonable to say that the community's patience has been "exhausted". The user has been talked to, by several users on several occasions about this conduct and still actively refuses to stop it. Hence I have decided to indefinitely block the user. I want to remind all of you that indefinitely blocked does not mean infinitely blocked. I specifically left a note on the block log saying that the user should be unblocked if he agrees to cease all such conduct and to abide by established wikipedia policy. Anyone can feel free to discuss my block below.--Jersey Devil 05:56, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with your consclusions on Bmedley's behavior, and I support the block. Pablo Talk | Contributions 05:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I would have liked to have seen mentorship, which he agreed to yesterday, tried first. ←Ben^B4 05:59, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree, but I think the operating word for Bmedley was incorrigible. --MichaelLinnear 06:04, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Strong support of this block. I'd intended to comment (pre edit conflict), "I believe we're being trolled."Proabivouac 06:02, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It appears that Bmedley Sutler has retired.[26] Pablo Talk | Contributions 06:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

He is angry at this point which explains his most recent edits. I'm going to wait until he cools down a bit to listen to his response. I ask that people be respectful and not try to egg him on below this point.--Jersey Devil 06:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

He responded, and once again has used his two favorite defenses (neither of which are legitimate): accusing his opposition of being "right wing" and changing the subject to other editors. Pablo Talk | Contributions 06:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I have to endorse Jersey's actions here. I've spoken up for him once or twice in the past, but the edits posted in this thread are unacceptable in pretty much any context. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 20:39, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

As Bmedley Sutler has (almost certainly falsely) stated that English is not his first language,[27] I asked him what it was.[28] I reproduce his response in full:

"That is private. Don't try and 'out' me by asking these personal questions especially now that I have caught the USMIL and BUSHGOV in 100% proofed lies. Outing of this type is not allowable on Wiki, and I will follow up on it. I consider this a harrassment."[29]Proabivouac 07:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

That response is, of course, ridiculous considering that Bmedley Sutler has tried to out the supposed sexual orientation of several individuals, while maintaining that his first language is private. Pablo Talk | Contributions 07:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

When it gets to the point where good will and AGF cease being effective it is often time for something else. ((1 == 2) ? (('Stop') : ('Go')) 14:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

My God, that block log is genormous. After looking at the guy's talk page, I honestly think this should an infinite community ban. It's obvious others have had saintlike patience with him--enough is enough. Ban. Blueboy96 19:42, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

If he's retired, then we've done with him. Sexual harassment is totally unacceptable, and this user has shown no ability to improve his behavior, or even understand what is inappropriate about it. --19:47, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd be inclined to agree, but guys with his profile usually have a hamperful of smelly socks ... I was suggesting a ban as a preemptive measure. Judging by the fact that he's apparently a meatpuppet (at the very least) of a banned user, my hunch was right. Blueboy96 20:29, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

In this edit summary, Bmedley admits that he is a sock of User:Fairness And Accuracy For All, who was banned for a year and recently had his ban reset. Perhaps an extension of FAAFA's block to indefinite would be appropriate. Pablo Talk | Contributions 20:21, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It's been obvious for some time that he's FAAFA; e.g.:

• Republicans, gay sex and meth:[30][31]
• "Busheep"[32][33]

He'll be back either way, and, if history is any guide, we'll have to go through the entire process again. Perhaps he'll be able to sink a few more RfA's, maybe start an arbitration case, who knows?Proabivouac 20:33, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh yeah, indef indeed. Laughing in the community's face like that? He's banned himself, I think. Blueboy96 20:39, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Should any action be taken regarding his "sinking" of the RfA (User:Crockspot's, I assume)? It's kind of unfair that the RfA process was sabotaged by a meatpuppet who was finally "sunk" himself for, among other things, the very type of "outing" behavior that sunk the RfA. BmS's ad nauseum quoting of one flip comment from Conservative Underground as "proof" of Crockspot's homophobia really did a lot of damage; BmS even used that remark to accuse me of being gay, which I neither confirm nor deny, then turned around and say, "Well, Crockspot said it!" It doesn't seem right that such sabotage should go uncorrected, but I don't know that there's any way to correct it except to try the RfA again. Calbaer 22:20, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Well he has now pretty much admitted that he let the banned user FAFFA use his account for edits. By the way, about 50% of my edits were FAFFAs who would log into my user, he thought I might only last 1 week, and we went 2 months! Sinking that racist homophobes RFA is our proudest moment! Toodles [34] which leads me to say that though I was open to unblocking initially (had he made a commitment to change his ways) now the block will stay.--Jersey Devil 22:48, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm opening a discussion of FAFFA's fate at WP:CN ... just so it won't get lost here. Blueboy96 22:57, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't see the need. Bmedley is indef blocked. I believe FAAFA is banned already. If he comes back it will simply be an abusive sockpuppet, and we can just block him indefinitely. There's no real need for CN on Bmedley.⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 23:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

He's only banned for one year, but given what's been revealed today, I really think it ought to be ndef. Discussion is here.Blueboy96 23:05, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I've removed the anti-homosexual comment on his user talk, as well as redacted something that appeared to be an outing of an editor's real name (I didn't delete the edit because I wasn't sure).⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 22:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

point of order, the above redaction of the editors real name was actually not. See [35]. As it is, his user talk is blanked and redirected to his user page, so that's a moot point. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 01:33, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Admin Radiant!

A conflict between admin Radiant! (talk · contribs) and users Tony1 (talk · contribs) and Pmanderson (talk · contribs) began over a proposal for a gender neutral guideline. When the conflict first surfaced, at Radiant!'s specific request I provided an example of the past issues to Radiant!, with diffs. Radiant! has taken this conflict to the Community sanction board (subsequently withdrawn), asking for sanction against a long-standing editor with a clean record, here to AN/I (request feedback above on gender neutrality, where it was mischaracterized) and in two different threads to Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts (where Tony1's comments were also mischaracterized). Tony1 was warned (templated no less) and Radiant! was advised to cool off and review his own part in the conflict. Radiant! has mischaracterized other poster's content, for example posting to my talk page that I had labeled Pmanderson "as an evil disruptive nasty person". I removed that from my talk page (I believe that's a first for me) because of the mischaracterization. Because I answered a direct request to explain the conflict, and did so with diffs, Radiant! has now threatened me with a block, although I've committed nothing remotely close to a blockable offense. I suggest that Radiant! needs to remove him/herself from this conflict in which he finds himself personally involved, and not be threatening to use admin tools to further the conflict. Because I removed the mischaracterization from my talk page, and Radiant! removed my posts from his/her talk page, I have summarized the conversation, with all diffs, at User:SandyGeorgia/RaToPm issue. I am concerned that Radiant! has several times mischaracterized other editors' content, has threatened me with a block because I responded to a request and provided diffs, and appears to be personally invested in this conflict. I'm asking uninvolved admins to step in and oversee the ongoing conflict in the editing of Wiki's manual of style, including numbers and links, as well as the issues at the gender neutrality proposal, and to assure there is no misuse of admin tools to further one version. As an admin, Radiant! has not worked to de-escalate the conflict, which is now spreading, partly because of the unnecessary esclation due to Radiant!'s personal involvement. Thanks, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:43, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• This is a needlessly exaggerated issue. Simply put, PManderson made some WP:BOLD changes to a guideline page. These changes appear to be minor, and the primary reason that people object is because "it has not been discussed properly" ([36], [37]). What these people need to understand is that it is quite acceptable to edit pages, even guidelines, without requiring lengthy discussions beforehand, and that it is inappropriate to throw around accusations of disruption, and terms like Nazi. >Radiant< 13:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Yes, the original issues were minor in relation to what this has become; the bigger issue now is you threatening to use admin tools inappropriately, in this case, because I responded to your request with only one example of diffs. You are personally vested in this conflict and threatening to use admin tools to further your version; outside admin oversight is needed. You are also now harassing continuing to post to my talk page, although I've politely asked you to refrain from posting there. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:13, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Enough. Sandy, while threatening you with a block was certainly inappropriate, I don't think Radiant's comments at your Talk page constitute harassment. Everyone needs to cool off here. You are both, of course, welcome to remove anything you're not interested in reading or responding to; but this sort of edit summary is really, really pushing it, Radiant. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 14:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Changed word "harassing" above to "continuing to post to", thanks for pointing that out, Fvasconcellos. Just because I may *feel* harassed doesn't mean I am :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
    • I'd like to note that I am in no way an uninvolved party here, as I've interacted extensively with Sandy and Tony in the past and wandered into this the day before yesterday while responding t an RFPP request. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 14:19, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Excuse me? First, standard civility warnings are not "threatening people with blocks". Sandy is construing this as if I said "I will block you if you don't do what I say", which is an outrageous falsehood. Second, Sandy made a long post on my talk page where she accused PMA of disruption. I investigated, and concluded it was biased and misguided, and explained on her talk page that editing a guideline is not a big deal. She responded with personal attacks and accusations of harassment, and demanded that I stop using her talk page. If, as you claim, you are "in no way an uninvolved party here", you shouldn't take sides as obviously as you're doing here. >Radiant< 14:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
        • Mischaracterizations. Personal attacks? Radiant! you are vested in a personal conflict; please cool off on this entire matter and stop escalating it with mischaracterization. Step back and look at your part in this, as advised at Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts. Let other admins handle the pages you are involved with. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:36, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
• (outdent and edit conflict with Sandy) Everyone, please: I'm willing to cool it, and I hope others here are as well. I'm sorry to Radiant for my unmeasured comments yesterday (which I've struck out), and in return I ask that he approach interactions in a calmer manner. This is making WP very unpleasant for everyone, and I want an end to it. We still have to fight through the GNL issue, and frankly, it's all too venomous. Can we all agree to disagree in a less confrontational manner? From a sysop, I'm expecting assistance in calming others, whereas I'm finding the opposite. Please use your skills at conflict resolution rather than inflaming what is already a heated situation at GNL and other places, Radiant. Tony 14:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
  • It is interesting that you apologize for unmeasured comments (most of which you have not, in fact, struck out) and in the same breath make more unmeasured comments. For several days I have been trying to get through to both of you that no, editing a guideline is not the big deal you make it out to be, and as a result I get shouted at and called names. Consider that, then ask yourself who is escalating what. >Radiant< 14:47, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Tell me where they are, and I'll strike them now. Manderson's edits are often poorly written and controversial; as such, they require discussion (indeed consensus where they're significant changes in policy) on the talk page. That is what the template says at the top of every MOS. It causes tension among the folks at these policy pages (not just me) and makes the page look unstable when reverts are necessary. It's destabilising to a consensus-driven culture. But I really don't want a full-on war right here about this. Can we take the emotion out? Tony 14:53, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Please do tell how referring to users as "Mandy" and "Radio" can be anything other than remarkably childish. Anyway, the point is that, for guidelines or indeed any page, you should talk about content rather than process. "This has not been properly discussed" is never an argument, unless you specify what you want to discuss - otherwise, what is there to discuss? Don't say "people might object to this" without specifying what the objections actually are. >Radiant< 15:05, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh heck, man: loosen up. It was light-hearted. And light-hearted is in alarmingly short supply on this page. Tony 01:19, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm still waiting for an example where Radiant threatened to personally block anyone for anything. Or any other threat to abuse sysop tools in any way. —Wknight94 (talk) 14:56, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• [38] "I must point out that if you persist in attacking PMAnderson, or assisting Tony in his childish antics that amount to the same, you may be blocked from editing." Not only does he threaten a block and mention "attacks" that never happened (I responded to his request with diffs), he warns me not to assist Tony, whatever that means. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:01, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
  • People who make personal attacks may be blocked from editing. That's not new, that's policy. >Radiant< 15:05, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
    • That's right. And answering your request for an example, with diffs and my interpretation of them, discussing the edits and how they destabilize MOS, is not a personal attack. You should certainly warn a user and threaten to block them once they've actually committed an offense. And what does the warning not to assist Tony mean? Am I supposed to no longer edit any page Tony edits or agree with any of his edits? Since we have similar interests, that's going to be interesting. Please clarify. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:24, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Radiant did not say that he would personally block you. If you engage in personal attacks, you will be blocked - but probably not by any admins you are in a dispute with. Very important distinction. —Wknight94 (talk) 15:26, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

        Wknight, when an editor has about 45,000 edits as I do, and has never been warned or blocked (and Radiant! was the one who approached me and asked for feedback), there's really only one way to take his posting. Radiant! knows that I don't need to have Wiki policy cited to me, that I've been around long enough to know policy, or I doubt he would have approached me to begin with. I don't think I misinterpreted the veiled warning, and I notice that he still hasn't answered my query about assisting Tony. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I think you are forgetting the "childish antics"-part Radiant! used in his assisting Tony remark a bit too easily here. While on the other hand you’re making sure to use the word "mischaracterization" in combination with Radiant! no less than nine times in three of your posts. Do you think that helps? --Van helsing 16:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, right. Tony 15:43, 6 September 2007 (UTC) PS Hoary says he feels quite left out, not being a target. Tony 15:46, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• I see that your apology above was hollow and meaningless [39]. That sums it all up, doesn't it? >Radiant< 15:50, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

No, it's just that this is going around in circles, and we've all got better things to do with our time. No, my apology you can take at face value. But this is getting silly here. Off to bed. Tony 15:56, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

By the way, to clear up another mischaracterization, Radiant! said earlier that I was asking for an outside opinion on a conflict.[40] I should clarify that Radiant! initiated the conversation on my talk page,[41] and specifically requested my feedback,[42] after I successfully intervened to stop an edit war he was engaged in (he was at 3 reverts), by suggesting a compromise solution.[43] Adding edit warring to the rest of what's happening here, there are troublesome issues in evidence for an admin in conflict. I've got a plane to catch so I won't be weighing in further, but this situation needs de-escalation. I see Tony's apology has been rejected; not encouraging. Good luck to all! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:01, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• Please see Non-apology apology. You're really clutching at straws here. >Radiant< 16:09, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Calling someone a Nazi is a blockable offence and Tony needs to refrain from such comments. I wouldn't support a block in this situation as Tony is contributing to discussions, and I'm glad to see it struck out. violet/riga (t) 16:05, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Just to be sure we're all on the same page; Tony1 said he was acting like a Nazi. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

While technically true the difference is not so great. violet/riga (t) 16:30, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It's also worth mentioning that Tony did later change that comment, striking out parts of it. (I'm an uninvolved third party who attempted to help defuse this situation over on Wikiquette Alerts.) — KieferSkunk (talk) — 21:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• "Hoary says he feels quite left out, not being a target"? Wow, how strong a fix does Hoary need? Marskell just told him to fuck off for recommending the singular they, won't that do? I actually have an explanation to propose for what we may term MOS rage. Radiant: you say, rightly, that WP:MOS is only a guideline. But: people who don't frequent WP:FAC probably aren't aware that MOS is treated as policy there. "It complies with the manual of style" is one of the sacred Featured article criteria, and "complies" is interpreted with extreme strictness. "MOS breach" is a common objection offered to a Featured article candidate. (Example "breach": there are spaces round the emdashes.) I think that's the reason changes to WP:MOS make tempers flare among the FAC aficionados. Bishonen | talk 16:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC).
  • Would there be support for changing the relation of MOS to FAC? It would probably improve tempers in both places; permitting MOS to deal in good advice, applicable to most articles, and requiring FAC reviewers to justify their complaints by appeals to what English does. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

How sad that this was even brought to ANI. I'm speechless. Burntsauce 16:26, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

This edit, "analyzing" Radiant's "ploys", is probably responsible for any vehemence Radiant may have shown. If I were Radiant, I would be tempted to bring it further. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

When I see a pattern of decptive language, I feel that the public benefit is served by exposing it. I'll repeat the exercise if Radiant continues that strategy. Oh, and just one minor point: I've seen no rebuttal of the substance of what I said. That's probably because my analysis was hard to buck—quite plain, in fact. Tony 01:16, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps they understand that meeting paranoia with reason is unlikely to be productive? Christopher Parham (talk) 11:25, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• For the record, I do not regard any of Tony's three ploys as an accurate or useful description of Radiant's post; and the final crack about working for a politician is uncalled-for. It did not seem useful to add this to the discussion of gender-neutral language; but that's why I mentioned it here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:20, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Given how much they interact, I'd guess that Tony's comment re Hoary was meant as friendly ribbing and nothing more. Hoary and I are amicable, as well. Wanted to clear that up. Marskell 16:51, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Confirmed. I'd been dozing off at the keyboard, and being told to fuck off gave a much-needed little fillip. Another editor did seem somewhat upset by its possible upstaging of his earlier present to me of vomit, but I think I've assuaged him. I sent Marskell a tankard of Young's Special London Ale, and am thrilled to wake up and find that he's sent me just what I'd wanted as both an admin and a high-spirited boulevardier: an axe. I'm looking forward to meeting up with Marskell soon, preparing ourselves with London Ale, and then going out for some good hacking. Now, what was the question? -- Hoary 01:24, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment from a completely uninvolved editor It is frankly quite depressing to see two of the editors I most respect involved in such... fractiousness. I wish the two of them were able to step back and apply the commonsense, decency, and good faith they invariably show when mediating or otherwise dealing with other editors and disputes. LessHeard vanU 20:27, 6 September 2007 (UTC) Which two? Tony

Block evasion and revolving IP vandalism

DCBMSNB (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) appears to be a sock of the permanently banned Float954 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Skarth (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (same SPA topics). He appears to have made a brief revisit as an anon 'bad hand' 85.74.181.34 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) to repeat nuisance edit pattern of removing tags from a range of Salamis articles (and vandalize the page of the editor who had placed the tags [44]) then come back immediately as DCBMSNB to edit those same articles. See identical edit pattern at Ampelakia, Agios Georgios, Salamis etc. Does anyone have any ideas on how to handle this long-term? While registered edits can be tackled as and when they appear, the main problem is that this editor is using revolving IP addresses to keep obstructing cleanup on this block of articles. Gordonofcartoon 22:20, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

That was the previous notice, now he's back as User:Dsjgfwutvgeyxg U, who continues to vandalize Salamis pages, and now my User page: User:El Greco Something MUST be done. ^{El Greco (talk · contribs)} 16:46, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. See edit history - Dsjgfwutvgeyxg U (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). Apart from ranting in edit summaries, this user completely refuses to communicate with other editors, which makes the problem impossible to address by discussion. I appreciate it's difficult to get long-term semiprotection on articles, but this cretin should not be allowed to carry on disrupting work across so many articles. Is VoABot II a possibility? Gordonofcartoon 17:05, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Dsjgfwutvgeyxg U, now been block see his talk page, but lets see how long that lasts. ^{El Greco (talk · contribs)} 17:21, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

And now in action again as Dikd (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). Gordonofcartoon 11:07, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Indefinite block of User:Gaby de wilde

After telling this user to desist soapboxing on the talk page for the 9/11 article, I retired to bed. Apparently, in the interim, he was blocked for harassment and sockpuppetry by another admin. Though I had nothing to do with this block, he has taken it upon himself to send me a number of harassing emails, despite my polite responses. Given that he has made no substantive contributions to the project, and he already has multiple blocks for harassment and personal attacks, I have therefore indefinitely blocked his account, and his email privileges, until such time as he decides to comport himself in a reasonable fashion. Since his talk page is protected for the duration of his previous block, I'm inviting external review by other admins. Unblock, or shorten duration, if you feel this was excessive. --Haemo 16:52, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I have also received a harrassing e-mail. Though I blocked him for one week, I support the indef block. Rklawton 17:26, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I am somewhat involved - made previous blocks (for harassment, attacks) and the sockpuppetry block for using an IP to repost soapboxery. I would have blocked indef at another incidence of harassment, trolling, POV pushing, etc. The emails are just that. Mr.Z-man 17:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I am completely uninvolved, and I support the block for the reasons given. ((1 == 2) ? (('Stop') : ('Go')) 17:44, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Yup... if anything, probably overdue. Good block. MastCell ^Talk 17:59, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not an admin but I did have experience of trying to prevent Gaby from de-railing the 9/11 Talk page. I'm grateful for any reduction in disruption there. Sheffield Steel^talkers_stalkers 18:53, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

unjustified page reversion User:goethean

I posted a merge proposal for Quadrupel on 25 July. There was a discussion Talk:Brouwerij_de_Koningshoeven with the majority (3-1) in favour of the merge (as the one proposing the merge, I am including myself in the vote). Yesterday, user:goethean, voted against this merge, but instead of giving reasons against the merge, he made a personal attack against me and another user. Even assuming his vote was valid, the vote was still 3-2, so this morning, I completed the merge. This afternoon he reverted it. He has made personal attacks against me a number of times. Mikebe 17:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

In case anyone looks into this incident, I would like to make a few points. User:Mikebe has attempted to delete the article by fiat previously, and I told him to take it to articles for deletion. Apparently, he doesn't want to do so. So he proposed a merge, closed it, and then merged one well-referenced article (Quadrupel) into a footnote of another article, deleting most of the well-referenced material. I again suggest that if Mikebe wants to delete the article, he take it to articles for deletion. I would also add that his proposal to merge a beer type article into a brewery article is prima facie absurd. — goethean ॐ 19:54, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

AlptaBot

In its effort to update fn/fnb templates, the bot is wreaking havoc on at least a few articles where the standard ^[45] template is used for source citations and fn/fnb is used for textual amplifications--often, for clarity and utility, within the body of the article, rather than as endnotes. The conversion performed by the bot confuses the numbering and layout. Here are the four examples I am tracking where the bot has repeatedly caused this problem (in order of severity): English plural, major film studio, Hollywood blacklist, and film noir.—DCGeist 18:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Bot blocked. You are correct in that the bot was causing harm on at least a few pages. Please start a dialog with the bot's owner on getting this straightened out. Any admin is welcome to unblock once the owner has dealt with the problems. - TexasAndroid 18:54, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I too have had problems with this bot, some seemingly different from DCGeist's, and some obviously the same. I've documented them more fully here on Alpta's talk page. In brief, the additional problem is that in articles where a single footnote is referenced several times, the numbering goes all awry. (This version is a case in point. It includes a link to a note, [8], despite there being only 7 notes in total: four amplifications and three citations.) I've reverted the affected edits that have crossed my watchlist. — ras52 22:02, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I too had problems with it in the Kargil War page and had to revert it because it couldn't distinguish between 2 types of notes and the internal link to the note was removed (reverse linking did work though). Idleguy 03:05, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Xenubox

Resolved

Account indef blocked.LessHeard vanU 20:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Xenubox (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) This is a vandalism-only account that's posting "humorous" additions to pages such as Scientology. It's obviously a user who knows what they're doing (they created an extensive infobox) so I'm not sure that warnings are necessary (although several have been given). I think it's mop and hammer time. Sheffield Steel^talkers_stalkers 19:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Chaosdevil101 removed no fair rationale tag using sockpuppet again

Resolved

Following the action taken by User:Picaroon on User:Chaosdevil101, see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Removing tags placed on non free images with no fair use rationale, the user has again used an ip address to remove a no fair use rationale tag on Image:Pro Evo 2008.JPG. I was told to report straight to WP:AIV if it happened again but the user used an ip address. Thanks. Tbo ¹⁵⁷talk 20:29, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

ip addresses can be reported to AIV. Use the {{IPvandal|''ip range here''}} template and a quick explanation, such as mentioning sockpuppetry and name of previous account. LessHeard vanU 20:52, 6 September 2007 (UTC) resigning my post - typo and all - as it was changed accidently ps. I'm pants at image stuff, can someone else check the violations and take the necessary actions?

Chaosdevil101 is blocked and it appears that the IP needs a range block which I don't know how to do. -- John Reaves 20:42, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I will report the user to AIV since he has removed another tag. Thanks -- Tbo ¹⁵⁷talk 20:55, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

According to the block log, the user hasn't been blocked yet, despite there being a block notice on the user's talk page. Thanks. Tbo ¹⁵⁷talk 17:08, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Morton Christopher and possible sockpuppetry

The userpage of User:Morton Christopher is an exact duplicate of that of User:Rutherfordjigsaw, and I noticed that both have voted keep on the AFD of List of traps in the Saw film series. I haven't checked other edits too far, but I suspect we're dealing with a sockpuppet (Rutherford being the original). Am I reporting this in the right place? --Lenin and McCarthy | (Complain here) 20:31, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Looks it. GDonato (talk) 21:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It looks like Morton Christopher copied Rutherfordjigsaw's userpage to me. Rutherfordjigsaw has been here almost a year, and surely after a year you'd know the ins and outs of wikipedia well enough to come up with a much less obvious sockpuppet than that. If you think there is problematic behavior, I'd file an request for checkuser. AniMate 04:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User:RJ CG editwarring again

Resolved

Blocked for 119h by Stephanie. Suva 21:46, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

He seems to have started the old reverting on Bronze Soldier of Tallinn and Rein Lang again. Together with editmessage chatting. He also accuses everyone of personal attacks while throwing personal attacks himself.

I am not sure wether or not he has broken WP:3RR yet, he apparently tries to avoid it by claiming that some of his several edits are one revert or something similar.

Every time his block expires he seems to start the same stuff what he has been doing for a month again. Don't know what to do about that, maybe someone else does? Suva 21:13, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Sikandros Removing Material from Hassan ibn Ali

Sikandros has been removing cited, scholarly material from the Hassan ibn Ali page because he doesn't like it. He's now begun to refer to the material itself as vandalism. I've made note of it on his userpage but he's only responded angrily. Elijahmeeks 21:24, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

one question

dear sycops and users i wish you ask i simple question .is it alowed to put such photo in english wikipeida or not?link this photo?--mardetanha 22:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

actully i mean to ask is it normal to put it in melody max article or with obsenity criteia it is not allowed?--mardetanha 22:39, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

There aren't any obscenity criteria - Wikipedia is not censored. However, were a new article on Melody Max to be created (the old one was deleted per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Melody Max two days ago), the image would be disallowed for a different reason: it does not meet the non-free content criteria. Hope this helps. Picaroon (t) 22:46, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

as i am using wiki for a long time i haven't seen such nude photo in english wiki (photo not a drawing or ...).so will u alow put such photo in english wiki or not?--mardetanha 22:53, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

There are no obscenity laws on Wikipedia. Images uploaded to the Wikimedia servers do not conform to real world or local laws on obscenity. This image is allowed under that bare minimum. However, if you're going to write a new article on Melody Max, that image cannot be used on that article because we do not accept copyrighted images of people to illustrate what they look like in articles if they are still alive.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 23:00, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

thank for your quick replys. actully the problems back on artice in fawiki which it goes aroud melody max.so i decide to refer to english wiki. though i could't find any photo like that in english wiki!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mardetanha (talk • contribs) 23:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia isn't censored. Use your editorial judgment when evaluating image usage like this. The Manual of Style states:

Words and images that would be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by typical Wikipedia readers should be used if and only if their omission would cause the article to be less informative, relevant, or accurate, and no equally suitable alternatives are available. Including information about offensive material is part of Wikipedia's encyclopedic mission; being offensive is not.

In this case, the image is copyrighted and I don't see a valid fair-use argument. So don't use it.

As an aside, many wikipedians think pictures of men sucking their own wieners is just fine. --Duk 23:15, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

thanks--mardetanha 00:32, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User talk:Witmeall

Could somebody please speedy delete the pyramid scheme at User talk:Witmeall and block the User? Corvus cornix 23:00, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

User:DarkFalls deleted the page, and I gave the user a stern warning. We'll see whether they repeat it or not. bibliomaniac15 Two years of trouble and general madness 23:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Was I not supposed to block then?—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 23:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

A conflicting series of events... I already declined a block on AIV but... --D_arkF_alls ^talk 23:04, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

OK. I guess if they do it again, I can bring it up at AIV again. Thanks.  :) Corvus cornix 23:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

See above, Ryulong just blocked them... Also, it's more of a copyvio than anything else... --D_arkF_alls ^talk 23:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, yeah, I figured it was a copyvio, but I thought getting it off the page was the best way to go, and db-ad worked. As did my appeal here. :) Corvus cornix 23:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Disruptive Editing by User:Armon

Armon (talk · contribs) has been extremely disruptive on Southern California InFocus. He appears to be taking advantage of a legitimate content dispute between other editors on that page in order to revive his little war against me. He has been threatening to take me to Arbcom for months, and he appears to be revert-warring on the page simply to antagonize me. I don't know his goals here and I don't want to know - I would just like him to stop. I have asked him over and over again to leave me alone, yet he continues. Lately he has been inserting material on that page that fails WP:V -- a self published web page that keeps changing -- and he refuses to reply to arguments in talk. I decided to avoid his revert-warring trap and instead put an NPOV tag on the page. That tag should not be removed until the dispute is resolved. Rather than discussing the dispute he simply removed the tag with a cryptic note about WP:POINT. Before that he made another mass revert with a very deceptive explanation -- the edit summary said "cleanup with cite fixes- there is still is a problem with the Townsend cite" but he changed more than that; most notably, he added "tabloid-style" to the intro even though the other editors had agreed that the opinion of one person that it is "tabloid style" did not belong in the intro and needed to be attributed as an opinion. His editing is extremely disruptive on this page. csloat 23:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to add that after he was informed about this report, Armon went ahead and removed the tag yet again, adding a nonsensical edit summary about "defacing" the article. The NPOV tag is not vandalism; it is Wikipedia policy that the tag stays on until a dispute is settled. csloat 23:54, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I suggested a rfc instead diff. <<-armon->> 00:16, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

An RfC may also be appropriate here, but the NPOV tag should not be deleted when there is a valid content dispute here. csloat 00:24, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

:::Please note two things:

• The user posting this very dramatic complaint above has himself been disruptive
• The statement contains mischaracterizations

I do not feel the drama in the note above is called for. The WP:AN/I page says that this is not the wikipedia "complaints department" I believe that if CSloat feels he has a legitimate complaint about Armon he should formally file a user conduct RFC. I believe it would be helpful for him to follow the process of stating exactly what policy he thinks other users are breaking, supplying evidence of this, and supplying evidence of his good faith efforts to resolve. Bigglove 00:34, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I actually did all that above, bigglove. Unlike your accusation that I have been disruptive, which you have provided no evidence whatsoever of. csloat 00:38, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Just want to make one thing clear, the type of rfc I referred to is a content rfc. We are at an impasse with sloat. <<-armon->> 01:09, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

:Yes, I know that Armon was talking about content RFC, and I agree we could use one. Sloat, please refer to the talk page of the article for specific comments from me about your recent disruptions. This is not the place for it. I was just pointing out that your post here was an example of the pot calling the kettle black. Bigglove 01:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)::No; what you were doing was making a false accusation with no evidence or explanation whatsoever. csloat 01:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

:::This was/is simply not the appropriate forum for any of this. You certainly had a valid beef about the tag, but the talk page of the article was the place to discuss. Bigglove 02:04, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Atomic Bombings

This article, Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki, was recently removed from full protection. It is tagged as a controversial article. Several things have happened:

Anonymous IP's have made a couple of poor edits, and one vandalism edit. An established editor created a new page out of a subsection, and deleted the subsection.

Is it possible to block only anonymous IPs and new accounts? The article creation and section deletion was done "unliaterally" (editor's words) without any discussion, so I undid it. (Also, I don't agree with it.) But I don't know how to delete the page the editor created (or if that is proper). So right now, there is duplicate text: the section which I resored and the article the editor created out of the section. I'm not sure what to do about it. Bsharvy 23:43, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

We have something called "semi-protection" which prohibits anonymous editors and newly created accounts from editing pages. See WP:PROT for more. If you want to request semi-protection, you need to go through the WP:RPP. As for the article, you can always {{prod}} the article. And if that fails, take it to WP:AFD. I do not believe it qualifies for any speedy criteria. If you convince the article's creator that the spinout isn't necessary, then the article meets G7. Hope this helps.-Andrew c ^[talk] 00:59, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Disruptive editing by User:BatWave

...has been replacing various images with Image:0906_vanessa_hudgens_nude.jpg. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dcfleck (talk • contribs) 23:59, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that's not good. Image deleted, editor blocked. Currently thinking about how best to admonish the uploader, who seems to be a good faith editor. Picaroon (t) 00:17, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure why you think that, as all of this user's contribs appear to be adding in this one image. --Dcfleck 00:21, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

BatWave, who I already said I blocked, was not the uploader. KingMorpheus (talk · contribs) was. Picaroon (t) 00:23, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

OK, understand now. Thanks. --12.226.239.122 02:50, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• Actually, BatWave is a checkuser-confirmed sockpuppet of KingMorpheus. I've asked for an explanation. Thatcher131 03:31, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I knew that name looked familiar, see DJ BatWave (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Home-born vandal

A user has vandalized Wikipedia over and over again! His name is Gavrun. He still doesn’t stop, you should see how many messages are on his talk page! I request his blocked forever! Please! He’s making matters worse!--Angel David 00:34, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

What you should do is submit a report to WP:AIV and tell them what he did. An admin can then decide what to do. Thanks! Neranei (talk) 00:39, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

First of all, as Neranei points out, the proper place to report vandalism is WP:AIV (and you have to make sure the person has been given a final warning and vandalized past that final warning). Also note, the user in question WAS blocked yesterday for 31 hours, see the block log. If the user returns after the block and continues with the disruptive editing, then we can consider longer blocks. I'm confused why you say "he's making matters worse" because he hasn't edited since his block yesterday.-Andrew c ^[talk] 00:52, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: That's the face of countless Wikipedia vandals on a day-to-day basis. No need to fret or get too worried. As far as over and over, 1 days worth of vandalism isn't really considered that. Don't get me wrong, vandals are easily blocked within minutes when they vandalize that blatantly. If he pops up again, just take the advice of others and report to AIV asap.¤~Persian Poet Gal ^(talk) 01:23, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Mhart54com

I remember there being a specific noticeboard for this, but I can't seem to track it down. I've reported this guy up to {{uw-npa4}}, yet he persists in throwing insults. — Someguy0830 (T | C) 02:09, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

That's not cute. --Haemo 02:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Variation AGF personal attack in edit summary

CBDunkerson accused me of assuming his bad faith (no clue as to why) which I interpret as an inverse variation on the AGF personal attack described at WP:AGF#Accusing others of bad faith. It's in an edit summary where only an admin can remove it, and I would like it removed, please.

Here's the diff of CBDunkerson's the over-the-line edit summary: "Response to assumption of bad faith and refusal to accept very clear statements of my position"
Nothing of the kind happened. For the AGF claim, I never assumed or mentioned anything about his good faith, or even thought about it. For the position claim, I did accept his constructive position that he was not going to answer the topic question, which was his only position in which I had an interest. I simply pointed out that his other statements of position were not answers to my question as stated.

This is one of those situations that gets worse with my every reasonable response, and I'd appreciate some help before the situation fulminates. He certainly isn't going to listen to my advice on avoiding NPAs generally, or as being especially disruptive in edit summaries. Also, given his demonstrated misreading of fact, I think it would be unwise for me to post anything at all to his user page, even a notice that he is being discussed here.†

The background is that I asked him an on-topic question which he refused to answer as stated, and then went off on a fevered tangent based on misreading my post for calendar month. When I pointed out his refusal to answer the question as stated, he claimed he had answered it repeatedly, which claim I find to be tendentious debating. Though I had civilly given up asking, he finally did answer the question as stated. That would have been the tedious end of it, except for the variation AGF PA in the edit summary where it can't be deleted by me. I would like to have it removed by admin, and Mr. Dunkerson reminded that Wikiguides apply to everyone.

†Mr. Dunkerson's debate style has most recently been aggressive certainty of his one-and-only rightness, while making repeated mistakes of fact and interpretation — suggesting to me that he needs new glasses and debate mentoring. This loose cannon behavior is that of a WP long-timer, admin, and a 36-year-old professional adult who ought to know better, maybe used to know better, but now doesn't perhaps due to admin burnout. Having read his RfA of 03 April 2006, the editor I encountered recently doesn't even seem like the same person as then received a (111/1/0) admin approval ratio. Milo 02:31, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

As an aside, I love the C-style comment in the header! - Alison ☺ 02:35, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps not the best time to say that Allie? I think you're overreacting a bit Milo. CBDunkerson may be just a little frustrated about the debate... Doubtful it requires much admin intervention, so it may be best to talk to him about it first. Cheers. --D_arkF_alls ^talk 02:41, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

"Doubtful it requires much admin intervention" Oh? How you propose I remove the PA without admin tools? Milo 02:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

While it may be a little uncivil, I would not call that a personal attack that has to be removed from the page history. I can see that he was frustrated and the message was directed at a contributor not on content. I don't think it is worth it to remove it from the page history though. 1. No names are mentioned in the edit summary or text. 2. The attack (if it can be construed as one) is quite minor, its not like he called anyone an idiot or something. 3. The page has over 4000 revisions, deleting that one would require deletion/undeletion of the whole thing. I'd rather not crash the server now (I almost did it a few days ago with a page with fewer revisions). 4. Some of the comments made here about CBD are much worse than his comment about assuming good faith. "it would be unwise for me to post anything at all to his user page, even a notice that he is being discussed here." That seems a little underhanded and sneaky, talking about him behind his back. "needs new glasses and debate mentoring" - I would consider that a personal attack and do not see how it is really related to the topic at hand except to try to make CBD look as bad as possible. Mr.Z-man 03:26, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

We have now entered the stage known as blaming the victim. I'm the victim here, and I did nothing to deserve being victimized. CBD's edit summary personal attack came out of the blue.

"Some of the comments made here about CBD are much worse than his comment about assuming good faith." That's not true, not fair to me, and over the top. I'm asking for help and you appear to be angling to justify my victimization.

" to try to make CBD look as bad as possible." You are wrong. I stated exactly what happened, no more, no less. If he looks bad, that is due to his own behavior, not my cautious and accurate description of it.

"... The attack (if it can be construed as one)" ... "I would not call that a personal attack..." Allow me to Wikiguide cite this point: WP:AGF#Accusing others of bad faith "If bad faith motives are alleged without clear evidence that others' editing is in fact based upon bad faith, it can also count as a form of personal attack." As I read it, CBD's edit summary says by Wikiguide interpretation that I PA'd him. WP:NPA#What is considered a personal attack? says that "Accusing someone without justification of making personal attacks is also considered a form of personal attack."

"...that has to be removed from the page history." Hm, that's difficult for me to judge one way or another without standards. I'd appreciate addtional opinions and comparisons.

"No names are mentioned in the edit summary or text." Ok, that helps, and his edit summary is isolated from my last summary by five edits; but, they are obviously connected by the little-edited section name.

"its not like he called anyone an idiot or something" You say that because you probably aren't a philosopher. My position in the debate is primarily based on philosophy, and maintaining perception and reality of good faith is vital. What he said is much worse to one's reputation than being junior-highishly called an "idiot", though not as inflammatory which is probably your usual standard.

Milo wrote (02:31): 'needs new glasses and debate mentoring' - Mr.Z-man wrote (03:26): "I would consider that a personal attack" Those are certainly not PAs - behavior is commentable: WP:NPA#Initial options: "Personal attacks do not include civil language used to describe an editor's actions"

"and do not see how it is really related to the topic at hand" They are directly related, as I'll explain. He grossly misread my "last June-ish" (obviously three months ago) for being June 2006 and made an emphatic point based on his error. That he might need new glasses is a perfectly fair and reasonable interpretation of his overt misreading behavior. His tendentious debating remark that he claimed to have repeatedly answered my question, when in fact he had answered his own contorted version of my question - that reasonably calls for debate mentoring, which is after all education in how to properly debate. Again, neither comment is a PA - again, behavior is commentable.

"Milo wrote (02:31): 'it would be unwise for me to post anything at all to his user page, even a notice that he is being discussed here.' Mr.Z-man wrote (03:26): "That seems a little underhanded and sneaky, talking about him behind his back." AGF - it was an hint for someone else to tell him. Really now, if I didn't want him (or you) to know, I sure wouldn't have told you that I hadn't told him, right? To the central point, one of the things I've learned about frequent communications with strangers at Wikipedia is that when they misunderstand you more than once, one wisely ceases communicating as promptly as is civil. It's too risky to do otherwise. Take my word for it that I can list the risks, but that's OT.

"The page has over 4000 revisions, deleting that one would require deletion/undeletion of the whole thing. I'd rather not crash the server now (I almost did it a few days ago with a page with fewer revisions)." Yeah, being a techie myself, I agree that is a problem. Sounds like a problem that should be submitted to development for dealing with large page histories.

So what do we have here? It's not practical for CBD's PA to be sliced out, and so far no admin here has the fortitude to tell another possibly myopic admin, while acting as an editor, that he shouldn't have attacked me, much less for absolutely no reason.

Y'know folks, access to small claims justice, and the cop on the beat to stop trouble in its early stages, is vital to neighbors getting along in the real world. Without small justice here, this is the kind of thing that causes good editors to leave Wikipedia in disgust.

So is there a just and fortitudinous admin in the house? Milo 06:52, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Milo, you continue to insist that I didn't answer your question despite my repeated statements that I did. That's the 'assumption of bad faith' I referred to in my edit summary... you are essentially claiming that I am 'lying'. I didn't really give you my answer, I was just pretending that I had. Or something. Now you claim that the situation was so dire (rather than an incredibly minor and silly squabble) that you needed to come here, not discuss the matter with me, and not even notify me of this discussion. That isn't assumption of bad faith on your part? Your refusal to accept that >my< opinion (which you had asked for) was really what I said it was, the various minor insults you have tossed my way, and your bad faith assumptions and actions are unfortunate, but not of any great concern. I'm sorry that you didn't like (or apparently heed) my mention of the need to assume good faith, but that is no more a 'personal attack' than your claims above that by saying so >I< failed to assume good faith.

We are entirely agreed that conduct rules apply to everyone in every situation... which is why I have responded to your insults and assumptions of bad faith with reminders that you should not be doing so. In brief; don't go about insisting that I'm lying to you (about my own opinion no less) and there'll be no reason for me, and other respondents above, to remind you of civility and the need to assume good faith. This was an incredibly minor disagreement which you have gone out of your way to inflate into some kind of notable disruption. There's no need. We disagree about whether spoiler warnings can be used without impacting the layout of articles. My original statement of that fact should have been the end of it. So why all this noise and bother? --CBD 11:44, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User:130.132.208.28 sockpuppetry

An anonymous user from 130.132.208.28, is now claiming to be more than one person (alter-ego calling themselves Cyrus) to attempt to win their argument on Talk:Guitar. This discussion on NPOV has been going for some time no with no resolution in sight. The user refuses to follow Wikipedia etiquette such as signing their posts, no personal attacks, and use of sockpuppets. MegX 02:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User MegX has abused me and avoided addressing my point of view since I started posting on the page. She has attacked me as a sock puppet and as a nationalist. She has similarly abused a previous editor on the site and was engaged in an edit war with them. She continues to be discourtious and does nothing but attack other editors personally. She insinuated herself into a discussion I was having with Peter Blaise and subsequently tried to intimidate me by playing tricks such as above. CyrusMilani —Preceding unsigned comment added by CyrusMilani (talk • contribs) 19:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User Jason Gastrich would like to be reinstated

Resolved

 – Per JzG, "Absolutely no chance whatsoever."Proabivouac 10:09, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

See the discussion here - Nascentatheist 04:49, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Bad idea for the exact same reason it was a bad idea the 5 other times he was unblocked. There's a good reason he is banned, he's one of the project's most disruptive and notorious sock puppeteers, and there's no evidence that anything has changed. Bad, bad idea. I strongly oppose unbanning. FeloniousMonk 04:54, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, bad idea. I closed Wikipedia:Suspected_sock_puppets/Jason_Gastrich on Aug 31 with a finding that User:Creashin was Gastrich's sock puppet; I don't see him changing his ways in just a week. --Akhilleus (talk) 05:19, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I was going to ask "has he stopped using socks"...but Akhilleus has answered that question. He needs to show evidence that he has reformed first. Guettarda 06:02, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I forgive him, but I don't trust him. Sorry, but no. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 07:29, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• Absolutely no chance whatsoever. Last time he asked for an unblock it was found that he was actively sockpuppeting at the time, and the ban was roundly endorsed. Jason Gastrich is simply not capable of following Wikipedia policy where it conflicts with his own personal agenda, whihc is pretty much all the time, since his POV is so far off neutral. Guy (Help!) 08:47, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• Nope, forget it. He consumed far too much volunteer time and evaded his ban far too much. Durova^Charge! 13:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
• No way. Eusebeus 20:06, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Is this acceptable?

Resolved

 – User:JzG removed it. --MichaelLinnear 23:20, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Is keeping a record of (spurious) sockpuppetry accusations, such as held here User talk:Kitrus accepted? Interesting juxtaposition of warnings and records http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Kitrus&action=history. Thoughts? -- Avi 06:41, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• I always enjoy accusations of sockpuppetry against the likes of Jayjg, they make it so much easier to work out that the accuser is deluded :-) No, this is not an acceptable use of user space. Guy (Help!) 08:31, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
  • I thought so. Thank you, and it's good to see you back, Guy! --- Avi 12:36, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
• Funny, before other things came up for Jayjg, he was editing so heavily any sockpuppeting would have prohibited a job, eating, and sleeping. --MichaelLinnear 23:19, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Individual removing WikiProject templates from numerous pages

To whom it may concern,

I would like to bring to your attention that recently, there have been mass removals of the template called WikiProject Dravidian civilizations from the following users: Sarvagnya, Gnanapiti, and Mbrdnbry. NOTE: Mbrdnbry is a new user who has recently joined and edited as of Sept 7, 2007. With all due respect I find this users action to be rather odd by just joining and all of a sudden doing these mass removals of the WikiProject Dravidian civilizations template back to back here, right after users Gnanapiti and Sarvagnya have done the same to other related articles back to back here and here.

Furthermore, I would like to explain that there has been an AfD case against the page on Dravidian civilizations here. The outcome of this AfD was a "no consensus to delete". However, the same users who have tried to get this article deleted have condutcted these mass removals of the template for our WikiProject. Strange enough with this new user Mbrdnbry, this individual has stated "rm possible hoax until issue is resolved" when in fact this new user account wasn't around at the time of the AfD. How could this user have known about this? This leads me to believe that someone who has been invloved in this case could either be behind this or perhaps be using this acount as a sock. The leads are too convincing. I am a little confused with this user's statement. For one the issue regarding the AfD has been resolved or ended and the closing admin has stated that the article was not a hoax. Another strange thing is calling our template a hoax when in fact it was the article itself that these individuals are calling a hoax. The template that has been removed from Mbrdnbry along with the other two mentioned above is from our WikiProject Dravidian civilizations.

Lastly, I would like to respectfully resquest for your advice as to what to do. My WikiProject group have had a lot of problems with some of these individuals, not to mention the numerous removals of our WikiProject templates. Your advice and assistance would be very much appreciated. Thank you. Wiki Raja 07:50, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Pfenzer

This user is making it their sole purpose to continually insert a dubious claim into the Snake Rattle 'n' Roll article: that the developers ripped off his idea when making this game, and of course, he's the only one who knows "the truth". After he posted a message on my talk page, I explained that such statements can not be included in articles without actual sources to back them up. However, he has continued to re-insert the claim, and left this message [46] on my talk page. WarpstarRider 09:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Needahotel.com

Please help! I created a factual and non flattering article on a company called Needahotel.com. In it's first draft it appeared to be advertising which I quickly corrected. It is a very similar entry to those of other corporate entries. The admins basically just agreed with each other one after the other and made no atempt to assess the pages content independently. They were very unprofessional in their approach. Only one or two bothered to suggest ways in which the article could be improved or brought up to standard. All arguments centered around the page seeming to be SPAM. How could it be SPAM? Please help in resolving this and having the page reinstated. The page has not been given a chance. If it is not aloud to remain then how are other independent sources meant to be able to contribute to the article?--Darragh.Flynn 10:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Hi there Darragh, on wikipedia, we have guidelines which show how a company is notable. Take a look at WP:CORP which is the guidline for companies and WP:WEB which is the guidline for websites. You will have to find reliable sources that show how the company/website is notable for the page not to be deleted. I'm sorry, but I don't believe this website at present is notable enough. Ryan Postlethwaite 10:22, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you Ryan Postlethwaite for the advice. I was in the process of locating further references on the site when it got deleted. Now I am unable to recreate it. Bit of a bother.

• Travelport (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), Galileo CRS (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) and Jeff Clarke (CEO) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) were all promotional in tone and written entirely by single purpose accounts with usernames suggestive of roles within the company. Travelport is the parent of Needahotel.com (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views); Darragh.Flynn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is also a single-purpose account. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Needahotel.com shows clear consensus. Looking at the history of these articles, and Darragh.Flynn's advocacy for this article, I'd say we've wasted enough time on this, Wikipedia is not a business directory and has no aspirations to be one. Guy (Help!) 11:39, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Nor would I ever consider Wikipedia as a business directory. This is corporate information on a company that is researched and studied by academics around the world as being a prime example of the Irish economy boom times. I am constantly answering the phone to students who are seeking information on the company and details such as the ones I put on the Wiki entry. Also, how dare you suggest that I am wasting your time. I posted here looking for help. GET OFF YOUR HIGH HORSE GUY. --Darragh.Flynn 12:04, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I looked at the deleted article and it is excessively promotional in tone. If you want to write a neutral article, that would be fine, but there's no way the article as it stood was appropriate. Regarding your final remarks to Guy (one of our most respected editors and administrators) you may want to look into a Dale Carnegie course. Raymond Arritt 13:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I think what Guy and Raymond are saying is that Wikipedia, by virtue of its prominence on varous search engines, is targeted for quite a lot of promotional material. People who are serious about the encyclopedic mission of the site tend to react strongly, and negatively, to such material. Articles on companies and websites need to be based on independent, reliable sources that establish the company's notability; the more you avoid promotional material drawn from the company's website, the better. If you feel that needahotel.com can meet the criteria set forth in WP:WEB and WP:ORG, then the best course of action may be to work on a less promotional version of the article in your userspace (e.g. at User:Darragh.Flynn/Needahotel draft). When you feel it meets the notability criteria, you can propose that the article be re-created, using your draft, at deletion review. If you want to recreate an article that was deleted via the "Articles for deletion" process, then it needs to go through deletion review. Best of luck. MastCell ^Talk 15:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

It's also worth adding that, because Wikipedia uses nofollow tags, it won't boost the search engine rankings of any website you mention/link to — iridescent (talk to me!) 16:11, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

== Thanks to those who took the time to explain their position. It is appreciated. If the article in its current form is regarded as advertising then I did a poor job on the second edit. The company in question has an annual turnover of 100 million and it is not seeking to boost search engine rankings. They pay another company thousands for that task. This was purely designed in the hope of publishing some basic stats on the company so they would be easily accessible to students who seem to favour writing papers on the success of the company. To be honest, I am exhausted and disappointed at the poor attitude of some of the admins. I guess you resign supreme in your little kingdoms. I really couldn't be bothered trying anymore. Let someone else contribute if they want.--Darragh.Flynn 17:23, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

"I am constantly answering the phone to students who are seeking information on the company and details such as the ones I put on the Wiki entry." - That's not what Wikipedia is for. If you work for the company or act as some sort of PR/representative agent for the company, you should probably not be writing about it here as you have a conflict of interest. Wikipedia is not the place to just post information from personal knowledge about a company. It needs to be notable, it should have reliable sources or at least be verifiable with reliable sources (ideally sources independent from the company), andit needs to be neutral. Mr.Z-man 17:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I've userfied the the article for Darragh and I'll keep my eyes on it. If it gets up to scratch I'll run it through DRV. Ryan Postlethwaite 17:39, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Good solution. I'd be willing to advise him on how to bring the article up to snuff. Raymond Arritt 20:25, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Block evasion (again)

Resolved

Another sock of User:Float954: see WP:ANI#Block evasion and revolving IP vandalism above.

Dikd (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) signed up and made a few trivial edits to the same block of articles, but quickly shifted to the same long-running pattern of removing templates and tags witout consensus. [47]. Gordonofcartoon 11:06, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Dikd has now been blocked.¤~Persian Poet Gal ^(talk) 17:00, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Godzilla Boy (talk · contribs)

User has repeatedly changed a section title inappropriately ("Kaiju UNLEASHED" in all caps and bolded, italicized) in Godzilla: Unleashed. He has previously been blocked for similarly disruptive edits to the page. Just64helpin 11:15, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I have left a note at his talk page to avoid such conduct. --JodyB _{yak, yak, yak} 11:21, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Don Murphy

Resolved

Can someone take a look at the current edit war happening over the external link to Murphy's site? I'm bringing it here instead of WP:RFPP because it is a bit more complex than a general edit war over an external link (see talkpage). I'm a bit too close to the situation to feel comfortable handling this one. Also, just as fair warning, this involves a subsection of a linked website that is trying to out the identities of Wikipedia editors, so if you are concerned about your identity being investigated/revealed you may not want to handle this one.--Isotope23 ^talk 12:10, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• Lame. Murphy's site itself is fine, the stupidity on the message board is the problem, and nobody's linking to that (although it's on the home page). Guy (Help!) 12:20, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Someone brought it to RPP already. --D_arkF_alls ^talk 12:22, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
    • That was me, I submitted it to RPP before I saw this posting. I'll withdraw it since Isotope got here first Lurker (said · done) 12:26, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Ah, request was declined anyway Lurker (said · done) 12:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
• Unfortunate because the edit war is still happening... page should be protected or the edit warriors dealt with.--Isotope23 ^talk 12:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Moreschi (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) has protected it. I've opined on the talk page as to what I think the right thing regarding the site link is. Oddly enough, my opinion wasn't met with universal acclaim. :) ++Lar: t/c 16:29, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Thanks... marking this resolved as the edit warring is over for now.--Isotope23 ^talk 17:35, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Romanianization 'see also' section

Please someone put back those links[48] as I don't want to break the three revert rule. I stated my case at User:Tankred's and User:Dahn's talk page, but I got no answer. I tried to ask questions on the article's talk page too, but it somehow won't display them.
Romanianization is a form of discrimination connected to the Treaty of Trianon just like the links that I'd like to provide. I think they should be included there, so the reader gets an idea of the whole concept. Squash Racket 03:59, 7 September 2007 (UTC) (copied here from Administrators' Noticeboard, more appropriate here)

User:Codyfinke6

Hello, I made a request earlier this week that this user be blocked (again) as that he is consistently making disruptive/unproductive edits and/or creating articles that are no-notable (I cannot find the archive of it). He has be requested to stop by myself and at least 10 other editors or administrators, yet he ignores our requests and continues to do so.

He has created at least nine non-notable articles that met the criteria for speedy deletion, two of which he tried to recreate several times. Several articles that he did create, he was asked to modify so that they met the criteria of a notable article, yet he did not and another editor had to. When he does create an article, it is usually just a sentence or two long, does not cite any sources and he fails to place a {{stub}} designation.

Here are some articles he has made disruptive/unproductive edits to:

• Burger King products - keeps putting incorrect or conflicting data in;
• List of CBS slogans - created an article that was basically a duplicate of the main article;
• CBS Records - put incorrect or conflicting data in;
• Dice Game (pricing game) - deleted a section of the article without sating reasons why, was requested to do so and did not. The edits to the article were were reverted and cited for vandalism on it as a result;
• Farmer Jack - deleted a section of the article without sating reasons why, was requested to do so and did not. The edits to the article were were reverted and cited for vandalism on it as a result;
• WLS-TV - put incorrect or conflicting data in;
• WNYW - keeps modifying their slogans with incorrect data.

Mr. Finke will not respond to any posts on his talk page, so this has been very frustrating to many editors who have tried to engage him in a productive dialog to help him understand what he has been doing violates the policies of Wikipedia. He has already been blocked once and I believe that he needs to be blocked again, for at least 30 days if possible. This will hopefully get the point across that he has been causing harm to this community.

Jerem43 16:51, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

This sounds strongly like User:MascotGuy. Corvus cornix 17:16, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Has this user made any constructive edits? If it's not something from the sock drawer (as suggested by Corvus) maybe it's time for a WP:CSN? --Rocksanddirt 18:09, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I am afraid that any sanctions against him would be ignored as that he does not read his talk page. ---Jerem43 19:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Then why not just block him like all of his other sockpuppets? Corvus cornix 20:23, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

2 CFD discussions

Resolved

Perhaps not exactly the right place to raise this, but it's probably the most expeditious and not wholly out of line, so here goes...

Would another admin please look at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2007_September_5#Category:Wittgenstein and Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2007_September_6#Ludwig_Wittgenstein and see whether it is appropriate to close the latter one which only began after a user depopulated the first cat under discussion in an effort to moot the debate. Although there seems to be good rationale for closing one and merging the debates, I have participated in both so I would like an uninvolved 3rd party evaluate and decide whether to do so and actually do it. Cheers, Carlossuarez46 18:17, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I'll take a look at it. --Kbdank71 18:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I've repopulated the first category and closed the second discussion. --Kbdank71 18:39, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Carlossuarez46 19:02, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User:feline1 accusing me of witch hunts

cross-posted from User talk:Spartaz due to his recommendation

I noticed that you had blocked User:feline1 for making some rather rude comments earlier. He is now making some very rude comments to me at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/David Talbott along the lines of claiming that I'm setting up sockpuppet accounts in order to start witch hunts. I asked him to stop harassing me at User talk:feline1 but he pleads ignorance. Can you please help? Nondistinguished 20:26, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

not blockable behaviour. Spartaz ^Humbug! 20:36, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

(Sorry I'd already started typing this before Spartaz replied - I may as well post it!) Am I allowed a say in the matter? :) It just seems to me that Nondistinguished is the same person as User:ScienceApologist, who I'd encountered before on the Immanuel Velikovsky article. I'd recognise his aggresive editing style anywhere, not to mention his penchant for 'wiki-lawyering'. He seems to have a real bee in his bonnet about deleting "non-mainstream" and "pseudosience" articles. Anyways, I cast my vote on the deletion of the David Talbott article, if the community majority vote the other way then I'm happy to abide by the decision. I've no interest in fighting about it!--feline1 20:39, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

What's with all the ad hominems? Are editors allowed to simply spout their opinions regarding the personal character of other editors? I thought we were supposed to discuss content and how to best build an encyclopedia, not make personal accusations! Is this how the Wikipedia community responds normally? If so, then I want out. Normally I would simply ignore this kind of baiting, but in the case of an encyclopedia that works under consensus, such rude behavior can be very damaging to the project, I would think. Nondistinguished 20:47, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

AN/I is that way ---> Spartaz ^Humbug! 20:49, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Feline1 are you saying that nondistinguished is a sock puppet or new account of scienceapologist? --Rocksanddirt 22:55, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Long term vandalism by 201.9.xxx.xxx IP range

Someone has been vandalizing The Fairly OddParents and related articles for some time now. The vandal will make a few to several dozen edits every week or so under a different IP starting with 201.9. The edit is subtle, almost always changing a date to be one year earlier, such as this recent series of edits. This has been happening at least since March 2007, earliest edit I found was this one.

Checking the other contributions of the vandal's IPs on these two pages shows that many of the edits go unnoticed, and many are still present. I corrected quite a few before discovering the number of edits (may exceed hundreds).

CoJaBo 21:10, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I've rangeblocked 201.9.0.0/16 for 1 week. Its a big IP range of a Brazilian ISP, so I did not block account creation to avoid excess collateral damage. Be on the lookout for possible similar vandalism from new logged in users. If that occurs or vandalism persists from more IPs or after the block expires, contact me. Mr.Z-man 22:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Vanessa Anne Hudgens

I have protected this page, because it is the subject of some vandalism regarding the recent release of a nude photograph of this actress, including the posting of the photograph itself. I don't have time to do this now, but I'd appreciate a few admins looking at the "Photo Controversy" section, determine what, if anything, should remain (it's all well sourced, but may not fit BLP), and possibly looking through the history to see if there's anything that needs to be oversighted. Ral315 » 21:52, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Persistent vandalism on The End's Not Near, It's Here

Hey all,
This is an issue that's been ongoing since early August, as far as I know. A string of very similar IPs have been vandalizing the above named article, all adding the exact same ridiculous block of text, suggesting that Donkey Kong and Rosie O'Donnell were guest stars in the episode, among other things. I've submitted this to AIV previously, and the IPs in question were banned, and the article was semi-protected. However, it expired three days later and the vandalism was picked up almost immediately by a fresh set of IPs.

216.208.153.226 [49] (this one slipped through the first time)
209.226.39.141 [50]
216.208.153.230 [51] (this IP also vandalized a string of game show-related articles)
206.47.105.218 [52]
206.47.105.212 [53] [54]
209.226.39.147 [55] [56] (this IP also vandalized a page previously vandalized by 209.226.38.87, which was blocked after the previous AIV report)

The last one listed is the most recent; I've bypassed AIV to come here, as I think this deserves more than a standard vandalism block. I'm not going to suggest another range block, as I am aware that many innocent users would be affected, but perhaps an admin wouldn't mind going through and blocking the couple IPs that have been active thus far, and then keep an eye on the article to block any further disruption? Thanks. GlassCobra (talk • contribs) 22:09, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Sweetbox

Could somebody with a strong stomach and an expertise in popular culture please look over Sweetbox (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), it is quite, quite nauseating. In the old days I'd have asked User:Bdj but he's Left The Building, to the regret of many. Guy (Help!) 22:42, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

As their name is so close to my own user name I couldnt resist making a start including tagging it as unsourced but it needs more work, SqueakBox 22:52, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Which part of the article requires admin intervention? Firsfron of Ronchester 22:54, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

As its clearly not a speedy or even deletable I suspect admin intervention isnt required but I didnt postt he thread, SqueakBox 22:56, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

A little help at Dragon Ball Z, please?

Apparently, theres some disagreement as to whether there is a live-action movie coming out soon and it's getting a little edit-warry over there. Perhaps if an admin had a word? HalfShadow 22:53, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Neo_Yi (talk · contribs)

I am getting very tired of this user. This user is not following fair use image rules. I have tagged a lot of their images. Can someone else deal with this user? Alpta 23:01, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

User harassing me

User Rjecina sent me this message after i reported him for encouraging edit wars. Now he has written on his userpage that he is going to spy on me and a couple of other users. I am not sure if thats against the rules, but it most certainly feels uncomfortable. Paulcicero 23:01, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If by 'spy' he means 'take notes on behaviour', then that's acceptable as per this arbcom decision. It's bad manners to use that term though. —Crazytales talk/desk 23:11, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes... on the other hand, if by "spy" he means follow you around to other articles and make trouble there, then that's a problem. MastCell ^Talk 23:13, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

To be fair, though, it doesn't seem as though English is Rjecina's first language. HalfShadow 23:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Paulcicero has been spying my edits and has reported my for creating Wikipedia:Croatian Wikipedians' notice board. This is funny because "my" notice board is copy of Wikipedia:Serbian Wikipedians' notice board from word to word but his home notice board is OK for him. !! About spying evidence is his action about notice board and his reaction on my comments on Wikipedia:Hungarian Wikipedians' notice board about user:PANONIAN. I have writen comments in 15:23 he has send warning to PANONIAN about this discussion on 16:56. It is possible to see that my moves has happen only like reaction on his moves. About others which I spy they have confirmed before that they are spying on me so there is no problem Rjecina 23:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

You are the one with stated POV pushing on their user page and said you have to spy on others. Left warning on your userpage.Rlevse 23:19, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If we will play about "spying" please see list on PANONIAN user page. There is 33 users which he spy or better to say he is looking "contributions of other users that are interesting to me". Is this wordings OK ?? Rjecina 23:21, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Well rjecina if you werent spying on me, how did you find out about this incident-report? Paulcicero 23:22, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Quit fighting, it's lame and not helpful to Wikipedia. If you really have problems then both of you stop editing the articles where you overlap. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 23:25, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

You are right, sorry for the discussion. I just wanted to find out if he could write that on his user page. Paulcicero 23:27, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I have been looking on user:Ante Perkovic discussion page if he has answered to my writing about Wikipedia:Croatian Wikipedians' notice board . In my surprise I have noticed that somebody has deleted this notice board and then I have started to look how when and where has this been deleted. It is very ease to see how I have been on wiki around 2 hours before I have noticed this. Better question is from where have you heard about this notice board ?? From spying ?? Rjecina 23:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• Ja, really. Besides, he says the other users are interesting and should think it a compliment. You all need to learn to get along. Also, it's better to bring specific actions here, they speak louder than words.Rlevse 23:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

He just wrote that now, earlier it said he wished to spy at us, by the way isn´t his whole page in violation with wikirules? See [57] —Preceding unsigned comment added by Paulcicero (talk • contribs) 23:34, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

People have more freedom on their user page in general. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 23:41, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• • Yes and I am interested in work of other users like they are interested in my work. Definition on my user page is changed ! Rjecina 23:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If it spawns "behaviors that are found threatening or disturbing, and beyond those that are sanctioned by society" it's harassment which isn't condoned by Wikipedians, see Wikipedia:Harassment. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 23:41, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

PS: It might be this: Wikipedia:Harassment#Wikistalking. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 23:43, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If we want to speak about stalking my only comment is that person which stalk me from August now demand that I be blocked because of stalking. Examples of this statement is possible to find on pages: Independent State of Croatia , Jasenovac concentration camp, Chetniks... My edits have been very soon reverted from this user. In my thinking I must survive users like him if I want to be on wiki. I do not even demand that he be blocked because I know very good that on 1 user which let me know that he is looking my edits there is minimal 2 - 3 which are staying in shadows.. I will not take anymore place on this noticeboard. Rjecina 23:58, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Beware of edits by 63.162.143.21‎

Is there any place better than here to warn editors to be on the lookout for edits by 63.162.143.21‎? I have just found two more instances of vandalism by this user. He has a long history of vandalism (see User_talk:63.162.143.21). Many edits look normal but there is enough vandalism that I distrust all of this user's edits. Editors who are familiar with the subject matter of his edits, should check his "contributions" to see if other edits are in fact vandalism. Sbowers3 00:22, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Dizzydaboss187

This user has vandalized the article Jacksonville, Florida numerous times (7 to be exact) - all in the past two days. He just blanked the page 5 minutes ago. He has been warned one too many times. He should be blocked. - Jaxfl 00:23, 8 September 2007 (UTC)