Misplaced Pages

Immediately this move took place disruptive editing against Hansen's ideas occurred by the two anti-Hansen editors above (William M. Connolley and Arthur Rubin) at the 'carbon tax' "Kyoto Protocol" AND 'biosequestration' articles. I would like to appeal the transfer of this enforcement dispute to the biosequestration talk page. We are clearly dealing with an attack on Hansen's ideas in multiple aricles.NimbusWeb (talk) 19:04, 17 January 2010 (UTC) William M Connolley has now attempted to remove the entire paragaph (with over six references) with Hansen's ideas about carbon sequestration at coal plants from the biosequestration article. This was after a recent edit by me attempted to clarify by highlighting use of algal biosequestration at coal plants in the Garnaut Report immediately above the Hansen ref.NimbusWeb (talk) 19:43, 17 January 2010 (UTC) ARthur Rubin has now attempted to remove the same fully referenced paragraph from from the biosequestration article. How can this sort of disruptive editing be allowed to occur? These editors are providing no justification fro rmoving this material, but by simultanous attack they are making it hard for me to keep it in the article (although it is directly on point) without having to constantly revert them. Help, this is unfair.NimbusWeb (talk) 20:02, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Calling WMC an anti-Hansen editor is absurd. In addition, it's not fully referenced and it wouldn't be relevant, even if referenced, as noted on the talk page. Please continue the discussion there, and don't edit against consensus. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:14, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Conclusions are reached on the basis of evidence available. All that is necessary is to examine the edit history of you two in relation to Hansen comments. 'Absurd' is just an irrelevant appeal to a negative emotion. Why should you assume that your point of view represents consensus, especially when what you are trying to do is remove referenced material and make ideas hard to understand? The discussion board has been used extensively to try and prevent your disruptive edits. It appears to have failed. Higher level scrutiny is now requiredNimbusWeb (talk) 20:19, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Absurd is quite correct. WMC has added other Hansen comments to other articles, where I consider them problematic in terms of relevance, although not as bad as this one. Furthermore, this (and other comments) constitute a severe WP:AGF violation. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:15, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Kyoto Protocol, Carbon tax, Biosequestration

• Kyoto Protocol (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Carbon tax (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Biosequestration (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Administrator attention to recent very acrimonious edit warring on these articles might be merited. --TS 19:09, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Noted. I won't edit again unless consensus can be obtained somewhere unless any of the parties reports a clearly improper edit reason. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:11, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

If all involved will similarly down tools pending the achievement of consensus, no further action will be necessary. --TS 20:20, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, it appears I was forced to break my assertion. Tags indicating my concerns as to why NW's edits were inappropriate were removed. It seems to me that removing tags without a clear consensus to do so, or a previous discussion leading to the conclusion that the tags were inappropriate then, is disruptive. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:55, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree provided the disruptive edits on 'biosequestration' 'carbon tax' and "Kyoto Protocol' can be reverted to where they were before this blew up.NimbusWeb (talk) 20:23, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Using that argument as a pretext to carry out further edit warring, as you have just done , is rather inflammatory. --TS 20:30, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

But TS-look at what they did at 'carbon tax' they replaced the words 'carbon sequestration' at coal plants with 'sequestration' at coal plants-making the idea unintelligible. Sequestration of what? Carbon? Well why not say it-except that it creates an unpalatable precedent for teh coal industry. Why should that sort of disruptive editing be allowed to stand indefinitely. This is why formal dispute resolution should commence here. This is not a small issue for the coal industry NimbusWeb (talk) 20:35, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Beware the curse of Plaxico. --TS 20:42, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Beware editors that have retainers from the coal industry to make sure ideas requiring them to sequester carbon as a condition of operating never see the light of day.NimbusWeb (talk) 20:58, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, I'm requesting enforcement. NW is now over 3RR, despite warnings about 3RR. I've reported this at Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Edit_warring#User:NimbusWeb_reported_by_User:William_M._Connolley_.28Result:_.29. However it would be desirable to deal with it here William M. Connolley (talk) 21:11, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

WMC? Retainers from the coal industry? I think the coal industry is libeled by that statement. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:17, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Note: NW has now removed the 3RR warning, and the notification of the AN3 report from his talk page with the edit comment "minor edit". I don't think this looks like good faith any more William M. Connolley (talk) 21:42, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm fully aware of the warning but think it should be applied to WMC and AR. Please note I placed a similar warning on WMC's talk page which he also deleted. Such editing is allowed on your own talk page. So let's get this right. You two gang up and start deleting whole paragraphs of referenced material on Hansen's ideas (see biosequestration-policy implications section) and making them unintelligible (replacing 'carbon sequestration with 'sequestration). This is despite the sections being changed being fully justified on the discussion page. Particular references include Hansen writing in his open letter to Obama and his book that power plants need 'carbon sequestration'. You allege that can't refer to algal biosequestration despite Garnaut amongst others specifically making that connection. When I try to stand up to your disruptive editing you invoke 3RR and try to bully me into submission. You call me a 'noob' claim I am 'spamming'. I'm the editor who is trying to write sentences with full references. You two are the editors who are trying to delete them or make them unintelligible. It will be interesting to see who is censored and no doubt also somewhat revealing about the internal administration at[REDACTED] and how this climate change probation system works and who runs it.NimbusWeb (talk) 21:48, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

It will be interesting to see who is censored - I *think* you mean censured. In which case, we've now got an answer: you William M. Connolley (talk) 14:31, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

I have been asked to review recent editing and conduct issues relating to the above, by Tony Sidaway

It is my conclusion that Arthur Rubin (talk · contribs), NimbusWeb (talk · contribs) and William M. Connolley (talk · contribs) are all in violation of Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation, relating to edit warring (I am not concerned with the technicalities of 3RR or team tagging) and WP:NPA (again, I am not concerned who is the most egregious practitioner). If I were not of the opinion that any short sanction would simply pause the continuation of these violations I would have sanctioned all three named editors for 24 hours, so no "advantage" may accrue to either side of the dispute. Under the circumstances, I am now warning all the above editors that any infraction of the Climate Change Probation by any party will result in a 72 hour block for all three - possibly disrupting the other WP activities of all concerned. I would ask Tony Sidaway to notify me of any infraction, although I would comment that I shall take sole responsibility to the blocks imposed, after notifying the parties concerned and reviewing any response/appeal. While drastic, I feel my actions are permissible under the Probation and are designed to impress upon the editors the necessity of keeping within the restrictions. The above will apply as soon as Tony Sidaway agrees to referee the application of this warning. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:53, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. Everybody be nice, please. --TS 22:57, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Your (crossed with TS, so to be clear: LHVU's) non-neutrality in this is obvious; your ignoring a blatant 3RR violation is also obvious William M. Connolley (talk) 22:57, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

<facepalm> --TS 23:18, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree with LHvU and TS. If AR and WMC disagree with what Hansen is saying or writing then non-disruptive editing should see them inserting referenced criticism of Hansen's ideas and not simply trying to delete them or render them unintelligible wherever reference to them appears. What's going to happen if they team up to launch another attack on Hansen's ideas later?NimbusWeb (talk) 23:49, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree with WMC, except as to the obviousness of LHvU's non-neutrality. (Note, this is a rare occurance; don't take it as a trend.) Ignoring a 3RR violation after warning while censuring 1RR "violations" made without warning of 1RR is questionable. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 00:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Please don't make this more bloody than it need be. All three of you got into an out-of-control edit war across three articles. Less Heard van U is giving you the chance to knock it off and handle it the Misplaced Pages way. This doesn't make him biased. All of you have to stop engaging in personal attacks (you know who I'm referring to here) and all of you have to stop edit warring (and that applies to all). NimbusWeb has far less experience than the other two, so Please do not bite the newcomers applies. Now be nice, all of you. --TS 00:22, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

I would like the {{syn}} and related tags that I've added restored pending discussion of the material. It seems obvious that the tags are at least nominally appropriate, and there certainly isn't consensus against the tags. In fact, a previous version of Hansen's comments were previously removed from one of the article per consensus at one of the notice boards. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 00:41, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Those tags were clearly disruptive given the talk page of the article has extensive discussion in which multiple editors have attempted to answer AR's pedantic and disruptive views on Hansen's use of the word "biosequestration' instead of the synonym 'carbon sequestration'. Reinsertion would only reopen the dispute.NimbusWeb (talk) 01:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

There was no "discussion", only IPs' arguments that it's important, but without even assertions of relevance. Hansen never said "biosequestration" or "geosequestration", and doesn't appear to have said "proportional", so those words should not be in the articles as Hansen's opinion unless sourced to others referring to Hansen's comments. In fact, on one of the articles, the section was previously removed as not being sourced, per comments on one of the noticeboards. It's still (mostly) not sourced, even if it were relevant. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 01:24, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

To TS, above. I don't think he's technically a newcomer, as the questioned paragraphs had been inserted by IPs for about a month previous to the creation of NW, and he takes credit for the "arguments" made by those IPs.

And (to NW) "carbon sequestration" is not "biosequestration". — Arthur Rubin (talk) 01:36, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

The IPs could the same user - all from AU hosts, two from Sydney, two from Canberra. Similar styles too. Ravensfire (talk) 01:47, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

The sentences AR and WMC seek to either delete or qualify have direct quotes where Hansen expresses the idea that coal-fired power stations should no longer be approved or allowed to operate unless they have what he terms 'carbon captture' or 'carbon sequestration.' Both these quotes are referenced-to Hansen's Open Letter to Obama and to his book. So the question for AR is what does Hansen mean by 'carbon capture' or 'carbon sequestration' at power plants. It can only mean geosequestration or algal biosequestration. There are no other alternatives currently being debated in the scientific literature. Clearly this is what Hansen is referring to. What else could he be referring to when he uses the terms 'carbon capture' and 'carbon sequestration' in relation to on-site use at coal-fired power stations? Answer that. There is a reference to Garnaut discussing algal biosequestration at power plants in the sentence above. This is another attempt at disruptive editing. Claims that only one editor is opposing AR and WMC are also clearly ploys to attack process rather than deal with the substance of the dispute.NimbusWeb (talk) 02:04, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps if you weren't continually attacking those with whom you disagree, they'd be more motivated to address your points. You are new to Misplaced Pages but not so new as to be unaware of the No personal attacks policy. Please address the arguments and not the person. --TS 02:10, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

OK. I apologise. But isn't the claim above my most recent entry above a personal attack on me?NimbusWeb (talk) 02:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

If you remove the references to biosequestration, including the paragraph in that article, and replace it by carbon sequestration, then almost everything would be sourced. ("Proportional" still isn't sourced, possible, or likely to be relevant.) The relevance and undue weight would still be subject to discussion, but I'd probably stay out of it. Deal? — Arthur Rubin (talk) 02:21, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

It wasn't intended as a personal attack; if you did edit under those IPs, and if those IPs were warned of inappropriate behaviour (which I don't remember doing), then you are considered to have been warned. But I'm willing to work with you in cleaning up the unsourced sections. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 02:23, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

AR, I believe it is reasonable and still maintains the sense of what Hansen is arguing to replace the word 'biosequestration' the two times it appears in the Hansen paragraph in the biosequestration article with "carbon sequestration'. I'm relying on your good faith in agreeing to this. I order that the agreement not be violated I suggest that either TS or LHvU make the changes. It still seems unusually pedantic to meNimbusWeb (talk) 02:36, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

It's not just the biosequestration article; it's in all the places it's been added. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 05:59, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Utterly bizarre

This is utterly bizarre. There is an absolutely clear 3RR violation by NW, correctly reported, and we have a pile of admins (yes I know you're watching) saying "la la la I can't see it". Regardless of the article probation, that should lead to a simple block on NW. TS is saying "This is a train wreck" - no, it isn't. This is a very simple situation which had it been handled in the normal way would have caused no problems at all William M. Connolley (talk) 08:19, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

It appears that there is sanity in the world after all: William M. Connolley (talk) 11:04, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

If I gave the appearance of being very indulgent towards NimbusWeb, it's because I was--and deliberately so. He gives all the appearance of being a sincere and relatively inexperienced editor. I would have liked to see the content dispute resolved without the need to block him or anybody. My efforts were directed towards restraining the edit warring tendency to which, as a newcomer of little experience, he easily succumbed.

There was a suggestion that he might be the same editor as some of the IPs who adopted a similar stance and tone. I haven't investigated but I wouldn't be surprised if that were true. If so I think he should be commended and applauded for registering an account and thus giving all of his edits a single name. This fellow is obviously not here to cause harm but to fix what he perceives as an error in Misplaced Pages's coverage of biosequestration. He has made some accusations and attacks, but that is not perhaps surprising since he has probably read such attacks on related talk pages and may well have convinced himself that such conduct is acceptable.

This isn't to excuse his attacks or edit warring. He has had an opportunity to learn some of our community norms, and has failed to do so. But his errors are those of a beginner. He commits the beginner's solecism of characterizing edits he disagrees with as "disruptive" (some newcomers misuse the word "vandalism" in a similar context). I had hopes that you would both be prepared to back off and give the fellow some breathing space, which would have made your words arguing against his edits all the more persuasive and permitted him a glimpse of how we do things (at least, on a good day) on Misplaced Pages. --TS 11:35, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

NW had all the hallmarks of a very overenthusiastic beginner who was not going to listen to any warnings. And indeed that is exactly what happened: he got plenty of warnings, and deleted them all (which in fact is *not* the hallmark of an inexperienced editor, so there is a little puzzle there, but never mind). However, all those warnings were from me, doing my humble duty in sharing the meaning of wiki. But perhaps he dismissed them as blustering from an involved party. Arguably, he *might* have listened to a strong warning from you or LHVU that breaking 3RR was not acceptable and he needed to self revert (let alone pay some attention to the article probabtion). Alas you, and more particularly LHVU, declined to do this, instead preferring "a plague on all your houses" type warnings, which NW mistook for license to ignore my valid warnings. I would hope that you, and more particularly LHVU, might take a lesson from this: being excessively soft on overenthusiastic noobs does not do them any favours in the long run William M. Connolley (talk) 12:33, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

WMC deleted the warnings I placed on his talk page. He doesn't refer to that. I guess he lives to different rules. He claims there were 'more like 15 articles' which is a blatant three fold exaggeration designed to impugn my credibility. Hopefully the real lesson the wiki editing community learns is to watch the edits of AR and WMC very closely particularly in relation to Hansen's ideas that 1) on-site carbon sequestration should be a legal operating condition of coal plants and that 2) coal, gas and oil should be taxed and the dividend returned to people at a rate depending on their carbon footprint. No doubt also, more objective editors will see through what is going on here. Why do AR and WMC turn up in certain articles only to remove or distort comments Hansen has made? Who knows, my favoured hypothesis is that they simply don't like the way Hansen dresses. But if there are senior editors in[REDACTED] who are allowed to go around deleting whatever referenced sentences they feel like on dubious excuses which we have seen in this dispute like links are dead (when they are not), people aren't notable (when they are), precise words aren't used (when the meaning is otherwise clear) etc etc, then expect the rest of us to play catch up and seek consensus before reverting them, those senior editors should only get such privileges if they are prepared to disclose their actual identities to an internal wiki hierarchy and have any conflicts of interest fully disclosed. Otherwise the ongoing credibility of the system will be in jeopardy. This will be particularly important in areas where the coal or pharmaceutical industries or, religious organisations, multinational corporations or political parties are likely to view[REDACTED] as a form of advertising or campaign promotionNimbusWeb (talk) 10:12, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

WOULD IT BE POSSIBLE FOR SOMEONE TO SIMPLY STOP USERS MCSLY AND KENOSIS FROM ENDLESSLY REMOVING DISCUSSION FROM THE DISCUSSION PAGE?

I am really sorry to use all caps there but it seems incredibly hard to get any clear points across in the utter fog of confusion which seems to be DELIBERATELY sown here.

IN the name of God, can we NOT AGAIN HAVE THE COMMENT "THE TALK PAGE IS FOR IMPROVING THE ARTICLE". YES of course the talk page is for improving the article. OF COURSE. OBVIOUSLY. What happens is there is discussion on the talk page, (IE, DISCUSSION ABOUT IMPROVING THE ARTICLE) and McSly / Kenosis simply REMOVE THE DISCUSSION and then slap on the cover-all comment "THE TALK PAGE IS FOR IMPROVING THE ARTICLE". YES, THATS RIGHT, THE TALK PAGE IS FOR IMPROVING THE ARTICLE --- THE STUFF YOU ARE DELETING IS COMMENTARY DIRECTLY ABOUT IMPROVING THE ARTICLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It becomes incredibly ridiculous if every single time you remove something (McSly and Kenosis) you just blandly say "oh, the talk page is only for improving the article, that's why we deleted your comments" OVER AND OVER, when you are deleting comments directly about improving the article!!!!!!!!!!

Astonishingly you even deleted my comments (and others) ABOUT HOW YOU ARE DELETING COMMENTS which is THUS THE EXPLICIT REASON IT IS MAKING IT VERY HARD TO IMPROV THE ARTICLE!!!!! Can anyone see the irony here??

Can someone just get to the point and simply STOP mcsly and kenosis from endlessly removing ALMOST EVERYTHING from the talk pages????

Also you might want to actually READ MY PROPOSAL about this (which astonishingly - of course - THEY DELETED ... IN TWO INSTANCES WITHIN A FEW ******SECONDS******* OF IT APPEARING !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I gabbed about this for ages at User_talk:MalcolmMcDonald#GlobalWarmingAd . For what it's worth I for one am in the category of simply CAN NOT BE BOTHERED ANY MORE as you will see is the only possible outcome any sane person would have, when they suffer this sort of "deletion insanity" from these two administrators (or whatever they are

I urge you, someone, anyone to just STOP Mcsly and Kenosis from this endless deletion frenzy. It is nuts. It is weird. It is bizarre.

83.203.210.23 (talk) 22:31, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

• Talk:Rajendra K. Pachauri (edit | article | history | links | watch | logs)

The article in question is protected due to BLP concerns, but a feeding frenzy continues on talk. I would appreciate it if uninvolved admins would take a look at the talk page and ensure that the BLP is being complied with fully. --TS 16:34, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not seeing anything terrible - some people are attempting to conflate the head of an organisation for the body, and that is being resisted. The claims that a mistake was made by the group are acknowledged, and so claims that the individual is responsible for the mistake is a simple case of misunderstanding. Of possible concern is that there what may be an attempt to have the acknowledged mistake noted in more articles than those properly relevant, but it isn't one that has been advanced on the talkpage. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:36, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

I had approached one of the worst offenders and he agreed to remove some of the worst material, in which he advanced positions rather than discussing the content of sources. There isn't an intrinsic problem on that talk page, and discussion is reasonably orderly considering the inflammatory material being advanced by some newspapers. --TS 21:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

. Even after another editor objects to his interjecting his comments within those of another editor, continues to revert to his version. He also tells the other editor "How many times are you going to get this wrong?" and to "stop whinging" in user talk page discussion.

I also think the attack page he keeps in his talk space needs addressing.

Given his COI on climate change issues and his past involvements with RealClimate I think a topic ban would be a good solution at this point to stop the disruption he continues to cause. ChildofMidnight (talk) 19:37, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

--Heyitspeter (talk) 21:45, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Diffs of some of the uncivil edits by WMC to this project page: NimbusWeb an "over-enthusiastic noob"..."What are you on, old fruit?"..."If you don't want to be condescended to, I suggest you stop making quite so many mistakes."..."@MN:noob". (I've moved this comment from following section. You'll also find diffs from pages other than this one at that location.) --Heyitspeter (talk) 04:10, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

His edit comments also leave a great deal to be desired --mark nutley (talk) 19:58, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

We're you blocked for this kind of harassment just recently? William M. Connolley (talk) 19:51, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

William M. Connolley, your comments and edit summaries both here and elsewhere leave something to be desired in terms of civility. Please refrain from disparaging, or even veiled remarks - it is not constructive in such controversial areas. Prodego 20:01, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Think it should be dismissed, not even formatted correctly, and only one diff? And depending on others to argue the case for you? Don't assume accusations are self-evident. This feels like it's here only to attract attention. If you're going to go through with this ChildofMidnight, could you please take it more seriously? ChyranandChloe (talk) 20:17, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

What like this you mean C&C damn near deleted half my post there. mark nutley (talk) 20:27, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

He didn't delete anything there. What are you talking about? -- ChrisO (talk) 20:31, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Excuse me? He didn't delete anything in that diff, except for excess linebreaks. Are you giving a wrong diff? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:31, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Right diff, wrong interpretation. Apparently Marknutley can't read diffs. Sigh. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:33, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry chris :) and yes i do still have issues with diffs :) Actually what i meant was WMC`s edit comment weird also gratuitously refactor MN's errors And the fact that he messed up my post when he stuck his text in along with mine. I should have been clearer :) --mark nutley (talk) 20:37, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Mark, "messing up with text" here is removing excess linebreaks from your comment, it didn't change anything . And when "he stuck his text in along with mine" he was replying to your comment, with the correct indentation, so that it was clear what he was replying to. This is not unusual when replying to long comments, or comments with more than one argument. On the other hand, you did delete WMC's comment . --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:47, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Not to worry, I've noticed that certain arbitrator(s) seem to be unable to read diffs as well, so you're hardly alone... -- ChrisO (talk) 20:40, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

MN, you're still a noob in some ways. You've only just realised that bare url's don't take double brackets, because I finally got bored of your repeated errors and told you: User_talk:Marknutley#.5B.5B_and_.5B. Your edit to that talk page was broken: by failing to remove the line breaks you messed up the indentation of your quote. I fixed it for you. There is no need to thank me William M. Connolley (talk) 21:00, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

WMC, address your issues, this isn't about the complainer. Suggest you consider as a guide. Your edit summaries and comments could be less antagonistic. Not everyone is entertained by them. It's due for a block time if not a serious warning. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 20:21, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

WMC could perhaps be less adversarial in his comments and edit summaries, but I suggest that you and others should also refrain from harassing him. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:26, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

That is good advice for everyone, but I think as this process continues, people who haven't stepped up their game on the civility front are going to find that they are the tall poppies remaining after the more egregious issues are resolved. WMC really needs to take a hint here, there are few taller poppies remaining I think, if any... ++Lar: t/c 20:34, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

If this is to be a report, it needs to be refactored into standard form, no? Else perhaps moved to the talk page? ++Lar: t/c 20:34, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Please don't move it to the talk page. Just close this as resolved, requiring no action; it was a badly formatted request for a non-issue. The talk page has had enough use already as a forum for lobbing kitchen sinks at William Connolley; it's not a dumping ground for general complaining about one's (perceived) opponents and shouldn't be used as such. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 20:49, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

If we're talking about civility, I want TS's description of Kenosis as an "egregious edit warrior" discussed. Does no-one else find that somewhat incivil? I've raised this with TS; it just bounced off.

Also, I've redacted a PA from CoM's initial statement - it may look like trivia to you but CoM is well aware of what he is doing William M. Connolley (talk) 20:58, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

• Connolly is obviously not taking this seriously. Instead of apologizing for his abusive behavior and incivility he continues to refactor comments. I do not appreciate having my notice to him about this discussion refactored to indicate I made a personal attack. His claims that I am harassing him are also totally specious. I am required to notify him when his abusive behavior is being discussed and if I hadn't done so he would be complaining about that. Misrepresenting other people's comments is WP:Civility violation. We can't allow incivility to continue, he's been causing disruption and pushing his POV for far too long. His COI with Lawrence Solomon who he posts about on his blog and is in a personal feud with and his past involvements with RealClimate also makes his involvement in editing climate articles improper. ChildofMidnight (talk) 21:14, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Now that just sounds like a rant. Look, if you want to be taken seriously, reactor this thread correctly as prescribed by the template in the lead and provide the diffs to justify COI and POV. Anything less, and I think you've given him permission to blow you off. ChyranandChloe (talk) 21:19, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

It is hard to take seriously a complaint at least partly about incivility that itself contains deliberate incivility. Yor claim of "abusive behaviour" based on that one diff is indeed not credible. I've redacted yet another PA from you - please learn William M. Connolley (talk) 21:22, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

CoM, your "COI" claim was discussed at length on the COI noticeboard and rejected. You don't get a second bite at this cherry. Please drop this and move on. -- ChrisO (talk) 21:43, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Or ... close this and restart with many diffs. COI can be brought up again when things change. 22:04, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

No. I said above "refrain from harassing him". I think you will find that ignoring that advice would not be a good idea. -- ChrisO (talk) 22:11, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Note: there is some discussion of this matter on CoM's talk page. However what remains there as of this moment is partial, because CoM has been deleting my comments with a rather deceptive edit summary . Which is a bit ironic, given that CoM is complaining about refactoring William M. Connolley (talk) 23:34, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

I removed your comments from my page after you removed mine from yours. Please try to be less hypocritical and disingenuous in making false accusations about behaviors you engage in enthusiastically. Also, if I am required to refer to your per your preferences then I ask you to obey my parallel request. Do not refer to me as anything other than ChildofMidnight. If you are unable to do so then I certainly don't feel it necessary to abide by your whims of the same nature. ChildofMidnight (talk) 23:51, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Several diffs of his abusive behavior have already been provided. Among them: Diffs , and . I know he has friends and allies, but this report should not be disrupted with mirespresentations about what is a clear pattern of abusive behavior, incivility, refactoring, remocing of comments, and making false allegations. ChildofMidnight (talk) 22:18, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

This problem has been goin on for a long time. I think the diffs showing abusive refactoring, referring to other editors as incompetents needing spoon feeding, misreperesnting the comments of others, the making of false allegations are enough to warrant action, but here are some more examples per repeated requests for more evidence of William's abusive behavior.

• Here's one of his abusive talk pages titled "whinging" Please note that if this is allowed I'm going to start a page on WMC with a diff noting that this kind of attack page was endorsed per this discussion. I don't want to be maligned in his talk space space and view this type of abuse as a clear example of his harassment and disruptive attempts to intimidate other editors.
• You are dense. Nevermind, I'm sure you'll get there in the end William M. Connolley (talk) 19:58, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
• "He is clearly to busy to review the actual terms of the article probation; he is clearly to proud to undo his errors; please DO NOT invite him back in again, we do not need his elephant-like blundering in this situation William M. Connolley (talk) 10:05, 24 January 2010 (UTC)" (Sorry about the grammatical errors, but I don't want to refactor someone else's quote.
• Irrelevant digression to call someone a noob. Per William's declaration that calling someone named William, Will is a personal attack, this must be taken as the worst sort of slander!
• Another attack page titled "curse of the gnome"
• And here's one of the many instances where he dishonestly refactors my comments to make it look like I made personal attack . If he's allowed to do that then I expect I will be allowed to do the same to him when he doesn't use another editors full name.
• Here's an example where he uses his blog to engage in a personal feud with Lawrence Solomon . Clearly this COI involvement in a dispute of this type should prevent him from editing related article subjects since his involvement is not neutral. The same issues are involved with his editing of climategate subjects because he was a named party in the RealClimate advocacy website where he had a biography page included (it might still be there, I haven't looked). Misplaced Pages should not be used as an extension of his personal and professional interests in advocating a certain point of view. I certainly hope this is obvious to the vast majority of editors here. ChildofMidnight (talk) 00:02, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
• And another example where he discusses a climate scientist he disagrees with under the cateogry "general stupidity" You'll not that he does not use the individual's full name, let alone his title, once again demonstrating a level of hypocrisy that is fairly awesome. His edits to that article include edit warring to include a photo that he says on his blog "makes Lord M look like a bit of a wacko". ChildofMidnight (talk) 00:33, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

You are aware that the off-wiki links are a complete waste of time? WP:CIV applies on Misplaced Pages. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Off2riorob

Since civility is a Big Thing, could someone have a quiet word with O2RR about this , please? William M. Connolley (talk) 23:41, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

I assume that's supposed to be 'sceptic'. to you actually have a habit of calling people that? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ludwigs2 (talk • contribs)

This thread was improperly closed by Prodego who repeatedly asked me for more evidence of William Connolley's COI, incivility, and refactoring. After I spent time gathering diffs he has now collapsed the discussion hiding them. In response to Stephan Schulz's comment about off-wiki links, I'm sure he's aware that COI by definition applies to conflicts of interest that involve off-wiki interests. This discussion needs to be reopened so we can establish whether editors with clear conflicts of interest who have been involved with advocacy groups and run a blog disparaging article subjects are allowed to extend their efforts to POV pushing on Misplaced Pages. The incivility, refactoring, and misrepresentations also need to be addressed. ChildofMidnight (talk) 00:45, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree, this has been improperly closed. I see no admin consensus for either conclusion; furthermore, O2RR's incivility has become mixed into this and needs to be considered. I request that this be re-opened and properly closed William M. Connolley (talk) 10:27, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

With no-one commenting, I've undone the close William M. Connolley (talk) 15:43, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

• You linked to only a bit of the section, here it is all...

name calling

As William M. Connolley repeatedly uses the derogatory expression of septic to refer to people with opposing views to his would it be OK to refer to him as a climate whiner ? (Off2riorob)

Neither would be ok. (Prodego)

Thats what I thought. (Off2riorob)

My question and comment to Prodego was not uncivil at all, it was a question that was meant to point out how repeated long term name calling by WMC of the people with opposing views is wrong and needs to be stopped, he repeatedly calls people septic this is not a nice way to repeatedly refer to other editors at all, especially editors you are in content disputes with, I was pointing out to Prodego how poor it was that WMC repeatedly does this is and that someone doing a similar name calling to him would not be ok and WMC accusing me of incivility for this is ridiculous in the extreme. My comment was made to Prodego in his capacity as Administrator on his talkpage at a time when he was dealing with WMC's incivility issues in his administrator capacity. Off2riorob (talk) 17:13, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Around the same time as this, an editor asked WMC a question regarding the same issue...I don`t know if that`s an insult or praise :), might i ask you though WMC is it an error when you write septic`s instead of sceptic? Given one is oozing pus and the other is about questioning things? --mark nutley ....well.., clearly it isn't praise, is it. Off2riorob (talk) 17:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

In fact, the only reason WMC is bringing this up is as a smoke screen in an attempt to distract from the real issue here, which is his long term general incivility in discussion and in edit summaries at multiple climate change articles. Off2riorob (talk) 17:39, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, "septic" is an intentional smear, see this ATren (talk) 21:04, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, it clearly is a repeated intentional smear of good faith editors with a differing opinion to his. Off2riorob (talk) 22:31, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

ZP5

Apparently there is a mutual history of name calling harassment and war exchanges, between the editor and I. Haven't kept a score with diffs. When looked at from the battleground game view, I concede ... the editor is winning. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 01:42, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh yes, and the 2over0 proposed action to end this seems appropriate to me. The editor can have it. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 02:04, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Discussion of 2over0's proposed close

Administrators that are involved in issues do the[REDACTED] a service when they keep out of issues they are involved in, I dispute this closure, but it matters not, the[REDACTED] is not blind and it is clear that this report has merit and actually by closing it as if to protect WMC you do him a dis-service as the behavior has not been addressed and will for sure will be repeated. Off2riorob (talk) 00:37, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

As I said before, if anyone else had committed 10+ blatant BLP violations then they'd have been flat out banned, not just topic banned like I'd suggested. You should recuse your 2over2 - you never do, but you should. The sanction means nothing because it won't be enforced against Connolley - a repeated pattern with him, which, of course, only further encourages disruption from his camp since they know the rules don't apply to them. TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:53, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Is the prohibition on refactoring others' talk page posts specifically directed at WMC, or is it part of a broader measure? These talk pages have a strong tendency to degenerate into collections of unfocused rambling screeds detailing individuals' personal views on the topic. As such they become nearly useless for discussing specific improvements to the articles. How can we reconcile this with WP:NOTSOAPBOX? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:07, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

As proposed it is WMC-specific, as I think he has exceeded the spirit of the talk page guidelines through over-zealous refactoring. We might yet get something out of the more general discussion above, though. - 2/0 (cont.) 05:50, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

And what do you propose to do about his near-constant BLP violations? They are already against the rules - there has to be a limit to how often a[REDACTED] editor can slander public figures. TheGoodLocust (talk) 06:50, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I also dispute how you closed the following section and left this one open. There was a lot more evidence in that section and it followed the request for enforcement guidelines and formatting. It also showed that Connolley had no defense for his behavior - none. It was inexcusable and so are your actions in this. TheGoodLocust (talk) 01:27, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Administrators that are involved in issues do the[REDACTED] a service when they keep out of issues they are involved in, I dispute this closure, but it matters not, the[REDACTED] is not blind and it is clear that this report has merit and actually by closing it as if to protect WMC you do him a dis-service as the behavior has not been addressed and will for sure will be repeated. Off2riorob (talk) 12:37 am, Today (UTC+0)

I support the close as a requirement. Calling people "septics" is soapboxing, and editors on the other side of this dispute are banned from articles and topics for doing it, if not from Misplaced Pages. As shown on one of these requests, he's also reverting edits as vandalism that aren't any kind of vandalism. A temporary topic ban is warranted, considering the soapboxing, personal attacks, disruptive talk page and article edits. The unfortunate part is that there is no good in any of it, unless the goal is to bait others into incivility. There is no victory in any of it for Misplaced Pages. I support the proposed close in any case as a final warning. Mackan79 (talk) 08:56, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I object to the proposed close, pending quite a lot of things. I've asked 2/0 to clarify William M. Connolley (talk) 08:54, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't think I've encountered ChildofMidnight before, but his commenting style does indeed seem to be overly personal and could stand some considerable improvement. --TS 15:41, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

There is an unfortunate history of unproductive approaches to dispute resolution: Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/ChildofMidnight#Summary. Overall, he is generally a very strong content editor, but his skills at resolving inter-editor conflicts leave much to be desired. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:13, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

You seem to be confused about that comment. There was nothing personal about it. I was agreeing with that editor's comment on abusive and misapplied blocks without discussion. It also has nothing to do with this situation regarding William's problem's with civility, COI, refactoring, attack pages in his userspace, and disruptive wikilawyering. ChildofMidnight (talk) 17:16, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

(moved from result section)

I object to the "personal involvement" nonsense. I don't have any "personal involvements" here and haven't been on a date with Jimbo since at least November of 2009. My only communications with William were related to informing him about this discussion and answering his posts on my talk page. ChildofMidnight (talk) 17:12, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Another diff from today

• WMC links to the fools essay again - to quote from that of-wiki essay WMC references: "once a certain minimal level of literal or metaphorical illumination has been shed on a subject, increasing the level of illumination or quantity of explanation will not allow the foolish to understand any more" (emphasis mine). This was his response to me asking why he accused me of having a vendetta. The implication here is that I am a fool for not recognizing my own intentions in requesting even-handed treatment of incivil, disruptive edits. To answer WMC's charge it's not about revenge, it's about building a collegial editing environment that doesn't include calling people you don't agree with fools. ATren (talk) 20:17, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

As I predicted his incivility and poor behavior will continue. It is perfectly logical since he knows he will never face meaningful sanction and he always has the upside of goading other editors into responding in kind and thus getting them banned. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:16, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

This response by TGL is far less civil than my comment. Or is there some free pass for incivility on this page? William M. Connolley (talk) 23:25, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

You may have actually convinced yourself that pointing out your incivility -- and the response to it from this RfE page -- is more uncivil that tacitly calling other editors "fools", but you're wrong. I've yet to see any meaningful sanctions leveled against you, so what Tgl pointed out is simply a fact, as it currently stands. Whether that changes or not, remains to be seen. UnitAnode 23:31, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Are we judging by the BLP and civility violations you've committed on this page? Or are we going by the standards that everyone else must follow? The way I see it GoRight was blocked for far less by 2/0 and is suggesting a 6 month topic ban, but your demonstrated BLP violations and blatant incivility warrant the most minimal of actions by him. In either case my previous comment is plainly not uncivil - esp. if going by your apparently sanctioned labelling, 97 times according to a[REDACTED] search, of people as "septics." TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:37, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

What is the relevancy of this off-wiki essay that, by the way, looks entirely harmless? And how or why does BLP enter into this? I tend to agree with others - this is just an attempt of throwing all kinds of mud all over the place trying to make some of it stick. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:17, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

The BLP violations are well-documented, but, unsurprisingly, have mostly been "collapsed" in the following section. TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:20, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Stephan if you don't understand the relevancy of WMC linking to that essay, then there's no point in me trying to explain it to you. ATren (talk) 02:19, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

• It's relevant, because WMC is using the link to it to call other editors "fools" or "the foolish" without using those exact words on-wiki. UnitAnode 02:29, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Symmetry

The concern that 2/0 expresses below regarding a "heckler's veto" is worth considering. Part of the remedy could be that comments that may be taken as attempts to goad or provoke WMC will also be in breach of this remedy and will be dealt with accordingly. If such a provision is not added then I can guarantee that WMC's detractors will call him "Willie" (knowing he doesn't care for such nicknames), make spurious accusations of dishonesty or misconduct, and in general do everything possible to provoke him into a violation. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:21, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

So to be clear, you consider the diffs that show his numerous BLP violations and reference to other editors as fools and septics to be "spurious?" TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:23, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes. I would suggest you participate in the next Misplaced Pages:The Great Misplaced Pages Dramaout. Or take 5 days anytime. If you manage 20 edits per day, you can double your main space contributions. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:42, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I regularly take breaks from[REDACTED] and other websites. Thank you for clarifying that you consider WMC calling people "septics" and "fools" to be "spurious" allegations of misconduct. That should be enlightening for anyone who even needs it at this point. TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:46, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Mu. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:55, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Stephan Schulz: I'm not seeing your comments in this subthread as particularly helpful to moving things forward. Far too much snarkiness on this page already, why add more? ++Lar: t/c 13:50, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

And I think singling out Stephan for a comment like this is nothing short of incredible given some of the bad faith comments being thrown around by everyone else. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:54, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

If it was the only comment along these lines I'd made, I'd call it singling out. But it's not, I have given this feedback or similar to a lot of participants. EVERYONE needs to up their game here. So I guess you didn't help either. :) ++Lar: t/c 15:30, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Everyone... except you, of course William M. Connolley (talk) 16:03, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

You aren't helping your case here, WMC. Nice reference to Keane in your edit summary though. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:32, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

WMC, Sure, I'll do my best to up my game. We are none of us perfect. That includes me, and I always welcome feedback. Anyone is always welcome to stop by my talk page, as long as they are willing to engage in honest discourse. I hardly ever remove stuff, either. But some of us are farther from perfection than others, and this section is about sanctioning you. As other sections have been. Which is a disturbing pattern, isn't it? ++Lar: t/c 17:31, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh, give me a break! WMC is a big boy. If he can't handle "Willie" without responding, then he's no better than those who've responded badly to his "septic", "waste of time" or "fool" insults. Once again, the "poor WMC is being harassed" meme resurfaces, when it's WMC that's hurling all the condescending insults. ATren (talk) 02:23, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

In one of the earlier threads, I believe it was ChildofMidnight who said "Will *blah blah blah," and Connolley reverted the "Will" and put in "PA redacted" to make it look like ChildofMidnight was behaving poorly. That sort of behavior is not good. TheGoodLocust (talk) 02:27, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

While CoM's use of "Willie" is impolite (and unwise), it's not even close a personal attack, and WMC's editing of the comment is way out of line, and far more concerning than the initial impoliteness. UnitAnode 02:34, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

He actually used the term "Will," and it all seemed very natural to me. Here is the diff though to make it easier to judge. TheGoodLocust (talk) 02:38, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

WMC should just comment that he prefers certain forms. Redacting other people's comments that way isn't on. ++Lar: t/c 13:50, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Not exactly the first time this has come up. For instance, last July, with Thegoodlocust in particular, rendering the feigned incomprehension above a bit bothersome. It's an uncivil form of needling; as Risker pointed out, most people learn that it's rude sometime around kindergarten. WMC overreacted as well; as usual with these threads, it's a race away from the high ground. MastCell  17:33, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent> "Feigned incomprehension?" So, if you'll notice I haven't refered to that man by his first name. In fact, that whole thing started with him doing something very similar to me, when I believe I called him either Will or William and he decided to exercise what I interpreted as some sort of powertrip. The fact of the matter is, believe it or not, that most people don't know his preference not to be called William, Will, Bill or anything of the sort, and despite that being a natural way of referring to someone with a username like that he gets quite upset when it occurs and inserts things like "PA redacted" into other people's comments. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:51, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

In fact, being called "Will" is far better than the various insect extermination references some of those same editors have directed towards me. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:55, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

• I've experienced some similar nonsense with WMC in the past. I believe I misspelled his commonly misspelled last name. He seems to be hyper-sensitive to any apparent slight against himself, while not being equally sensitive to his obvious slights against other users. UnitAnode 02:49, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
  • There seems to be a lot of that going around. MastCell  04:49, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
    • True. (signed) --Lars.  :) (no, that's not my name, but usually I just make a joke about how you really only want one of me around) ++Lar: t/c 13:50, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't know why I'm being singled out. Shouldn't everyone be focusing on content rather than other editors? For example dave souza has been making accusations of bad faith towards various editors. And he's not the only one.

My main concern is that my good faith editing and report here were turned around by those who disagree with me on content issues in order to make all kinds of accusations against me and to try and intimidate and chase me off. That's abusive. I'd like to be held to the same high standards that everyone working on contentious articles should be. The problem is that there haven't been any enforcements to address William's rank incivility, personal attacks, and other problems highlighted here by numerous editors. And I still have not received a response regarding the attack pages in his userspace. I do not think those are appropriate and I'd like to see them addressed.

If we can stop the one-sided enforcements and hold everyone to high standards going forward there is a good chance that we can make headway with a more collegial, cooperative and respectful editing environment. The focus should absolutely be on sources and content. I couldn't agree more. ChildofMidnight (talk) 18:07, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

There has been talk of how no one has demonstrated any pattern of bad behavior on WMC's part. I've been doing some digging, as I remember very clearly being attacked by him on more than one occasion. I found this, which is a multi-edit diff in which I had asked him to stop removing people's talkpage comments at Garth Paltridge. I'll be adding more here as I find them. UnitAnode 18:35, 27 January 2010 (UTC) This was part of WMC edit-warring to remove comments from the Patridge talkpage. UnitAnode 18:41, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

And this one, in which he removes a bunch of comments from his talkpage (which isn't prohibited in itself), while also seemingly challenging me to some kind of fight, with his, "Come on if you think you're hard enough." UnitAnode 18:45, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It is hard to tell if you're being deliberately stupid or just stupid. What's wrong with that? TheGoodLocust (talk) 18:58, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

• It's a problem, for sure. But the larger problem is that -- despite how he treats those with whom he disagrees -- nothing is ever done about it. I doubt that my establishing that this pattern of behavior extends back to at least October (and everyone knows it goes back further than that) will change anything. But, unlike the "you haven't edited the mainspace enough" charges that they level at you (and you really should do more mainspace editing) they can't say the same about me. UnitAnode 19:06, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Result

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

I am a little uncomfortable that the first result is setting up a heckler's veto, but WMC remains free to point out instances of incivility at articletalk and usertalk. Personal attacks are, of course, unacceptable and may lead to blocking or other restrictions, particularly in the probation topic area. If another uninvolved administrator agrees, can we please log the sanctions, close this thread, and move on with improving the encyclopedia? - 2/0 (cont.) 23:07, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is strong enough. WMC has been showing a pattern here and just requesting things doesn't quite cut it. Stronger measures seem called for. At the very least change all the "requested"s to "required"s ++Lar: t/c 05:04, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Further if we were going to close one of these two in a row as no action, maybe this is the one to close and the other one the one to act on, it has more meat. IMHO anyway. ++Lar: t/c 05:06, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I would be fine with required. As Short Brigade Harvester Boris suggests above, by barring William M. Connolley from even legitimate refactoring we are losing something in terms of keeping those discussions focused on improving the article rather than degenerating into general discussion of the topic. Still, there are other avenues open to him and generally others are available to do what is necessary. Say, six months for that one? Prodego also recently left him a civility warning, but adding a logged warning to express personal opinions civilly or not at all would probably not be too harsh. A note that civil does not describe veiled insinuations would also not be amiss. - 2/0 (cont.) 05:46, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I think there are enough other people involved that the possible loss of focus negative effect from losing his contributions is far outweighed by the probable avoidance of disruption positive effect from losing his contributions. 6 months works for me. Note that I still think the other case shouldn't be closed, it seems to touch on other aspects of problematic behavior but starting here might help. More can be done later if necessary. With that sorted, I should add that I support the proposals for ChildOfMidnight and Off2riorob as written. ++Lar: t/c 15:34, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

• I concur with 2/0's wording, since holding WMC to a greater duty of diligence than heckling accounts almost invites efforts to have him removed temporarily by means of sanction from the editing environment. Regarding ChildofMidnight and Off2RioRob I defer to other editors opinions. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:27, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I could go with the standard wording there - ChildofMidnight is warned to comment on the content, not the contributor, and leave it at that. I am not sure that it really expresses the heart of the issue, though - it is more like WP:NOTBATTLEGROUND but, from where I stand, it manifests as appearing to be spoiling for a fight over an editing disagreement rather than as the entrenching in a PoV that that policy usually is invoked to describe. I am sorry, but that is how it appears to someone following your edits after the fact and without the benefit of access to your actual reasoning processes. Maybe: ChildofMidnight is warned to be more civil in interacting with other editors, and is reminded that Misplaced Pages is not a battleground.

In any case, there should be no need to replay the recent RfC/U in microcosm, so I will preemptively support any similar wording in the interests of winding down this thread. I will say that the relevant part of the section Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/ChildofMidnight#Outside view by Gladys J Cortez expresses some of my concerns pretty succinctly. - 2/0 (cont.) 06:42, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It is also worth noting that Misplaced Pages is not the civility police for the internet - off-site comments are generally irrelevant unless they are being used as an extension of an on-site debate. - 2/0 (cont.) 07:27, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Required is in, but on thinking further, we could except archiving any thread that has gone stale - would no comments for two weeks be a good standard? - 2/0 (cont.) 18:17, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Sure, or even one week. But perhaps having bots do it might be a better approach? ++Lar: t/c 18:46, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I thought about just letting the archivebot take care of it, but on the usueally less active talkpages there is sometimes a single thread that veers way off topic, in which case just removing that would be better. I have acted on suggestions that are even years old on some of our more disregarded articles that I probably would not have thought of if the thread had been automatically archived. - 2/0 (cont.) 19:03, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Attention: This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.

Request concerning William M. Connolley

User requesting enforcement

TheGoodLocust (talk) 06:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

User against whom enforcement is requested

William M. Connolley (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated

Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

1. Connolley refers to skeptics as "septics," while I was initially suspicious about this given his past behavior I assumed good faith and said nothing about this apparent typo. However, he later linked his own blog from his talk page where he brags about denigrating skeptics in this manner saying that it describes their manner of debate quite well - implying, since "septic" has to do with sewage, that they are essentially shit.
2. Connolley controversially and against consensus removes a section that has been in the article for quite some time. He describes it as "boring" and not "sexy" enough in the edit summary. Note, he removes this and adds in the glacier criticism after I point out that his and KDP's refusal to allow the glacier criticism into the article is inconsistent - they were saying it can't go in since it refers to a specific report, but the article already contained at least two criticisms that were report specific.
3. This is his first reversion - re-deleting a section that has been in the article since February of 2005 in what honestly comes off as some sort of "revenge" edit for having to concede the inclusion of the glacier information.
4. Connolley breaks the 1rr rule for the IPCC article, while a skeptic would've been immediately banned for such an infraction, Connolley's edit stands for 3 hours without any admin action. Only when a skeptic asks him to self-revert does he do it.
5. Connolley essentially tells another poster that he is foolish - again, by linking to his blog where he explains that "no light can help the foolish see better."
6. Connolley's "spoon feeding for the hard of understanding" where he explains that when reliable sources are "wrong" we shouldn't include them. The problem (besides civility) is that "wrong" is a judgement call -[REDACTED] works on verifiability, not truth (Misplaced Pages:Verifiability), and despite being a[REDACTED] editor for many years, he is arguing against core[REDACTED] policy. In fact, when Connolley was explaining how the newspapers were wrong and he was right, he claimed the IPCC had not broken its policies, but Connolley "proved" they had not by pointing to small section of their rules and said the rule wasn't there. He used this same argument when he first shot down the glacier segment(this diff is only a small part of the argument to confirm what I've said). Unfortunately for him,[REDACTED] policy was proven to be the correct way to go, the newspapers were proven correct, and Connolley was proven incorrect when the IPCC itself admitted they didn't follow their rules properly.
7. Connolley putting in a picture of a prominent climate skeptic. WMC says on his blog that, "The problem, of course, is that the picture makes Lord M look like a bit of a wacko." But that apparently doesn't stop him and his friends from attempting to insert it.

Connolley edit wars with a global warming skeptic on the article about that same climate skeptic - he ends up banning him .

Connolly edits a climate skeptic's article to make it look like he believes in martians - an obvious attempt to discredit. When someone attempts to insert that he denied believing this, that it was mere speculation, Connolley's friend removes the reference and that edit also shows the current version, which doesn't even quote Singer, but does an even better job of making him out to be some crazy dude.

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

1. Warning by Prodego (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction)

{{{Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction)}}}= Indefinite topic ban.

Additional comments by editor filing complaint

Connolley had a six month topic parole on this very subject and is well aware of[REDACTED] policy. He continually ignores[REDACTED] policy when it disagrees with his viewpoint, is constantly uncivil, has a habit of BLP violations against skeptics and most importantly he has had free license to do this.

He has been doing this for years and encouraging the same behavior both through his actions and through demonstrating that the rules don't apply to him. He thinks those that disagree with his worldview are sewage - anyone with a bias like that is incapable of editing this group of articles in compliance with[REDACTED] policy, and, even more importantly, in the spirit of wikipedia.

If any more evidence is required then feel free to do a[REDACTED] or google search of his username - or just start here .

Oh, and the reason I included some older diffs towards the end was to demonstrate that this problem is systemic, long-term and incurable. In fact, I honestly think it'd be good for his mental health to quit editing these articles and I really mean that without malice.

Cheers, TheGoodLocust (talk) 06:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Addendum I: Oren recently posted to the original research noticeboard about Connolley's behavior in these articles and this seems highly pertinent to this discussion.

Addendum II: A longstanding page that contains BLP violations against 6-7 climate skeptics. Connolley's denigrating epithet (septics) has a long and consistent use.

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested

Discussion concerning William M. Connolley

Statement by William M. Connolley

• Your reasons are spurious at best (User:Marknutley)
• For the same reason that the Hitler article mentions that he was a dictator and that he was mentally erratic (possibly due to syphillus) - it is the truth, it is verifiable (User:Thegoodlocust)

Comments by others about the request concerning William M. Connolley

Please could you explain specifically how you think any of the above diffs violation probation? --BozMo talk 06:43, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Edit warring, incivility, BLP violations, tendentious editing - the diffs explain it pretty well don't they? Do you think I should take this to another forum considering the other problems involved? TheGoodLocust (talk) 07:19, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

If the diffs had explained it "pretty well" I would not have asked for further explanation. So, lets try to assume good faith with your list and start at the beginning. Where exactly are you claiming "edit warring", and with which diffs? I have been through the above list twice now and I am struggling to see what accusation, with support, you are making. --BozMo talk 10:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Assume good faith? Why are you saying I'm not? I believe policy states that telling people to assume good faith can be a sign of not showing it oneself. Anyway, look at diffs 2 and 3 - he is removing a section that's been in the article for 5 years, and he did it twice and without consensus. I understand that the pattern is usually "tag team action" so 3rr isn't broken, but no matter how obvious such a pattern is it will always be disputed. TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:20, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't get it. WMC says he uses "septic" because he doesn't like the fact that the term 'denialist' lumps them with Holocaust deniers. It's not like you can really expect people to use the misleading branding "skeptic". And it's more than a little misleading to use an arbcomm decision that was later voided by the arbcomm. Guettarda (talk) 07:46, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

He complains because it won't "catch on" due to that. Refering to someone as "shit" rather than genocidal is hardly an improvement - and doing it on wikipedia, while bragging about it on his talk page is hardly good behavior. Oh, and if nobody minds, can any facebook friends please identify themselves as such when defending him in the future? TheGoodLocust (talk) 07:51, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I do not use Facebook and have no intention to do so in the foreseeable future, if ever. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 08:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Likewise, if you disagree with WMC, you should also disclose that. Or, better yet, utterly ignore such a stupid request as "facebook friends please identify themselves". Ravensfire (talk) 13:57, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

My disagreement with him is both obvious and irrelevant. But when his facebook friends show up to defend him out of the blue or edit war with him on his behalf then I think that is relevant and should be disclosed. In this case, the second person who showed up to defend him is such a "facebook friend" (and I've noticed a pattern where they will occasionally show up to defend each other). TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:26, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Regarding WMC's revert parole that you cite, you of course considered this, did you not? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 07:55, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

So one of his friends makes an appeal for leniency and arbcom makes a mistake? What of it? He's been shown so much leniency that AGW advocates now accept that the rules don't apply to them. This has to stop. TheGoodLocust (talk) 08:05, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From Heyitspeter: Even WMC's comments on this page have been very uncivil (e.g., a few highlights, NimbusWeb an "over-enthusiastic noob"..."What are you on, old fruit?"..."@MN:noob"..."If you don't want to be condescended to, I suggest you stop making quite so many mistakes.") I think it would help if he stepped away from the GW articles. The tenor of the discussion surrounding them has suffered as a result of his additions/subtractions. --Heyitspeter (talk) 09:40, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Also, isn't this comment by WMC (second of two at this diff), from the same page, a WP:BLP violation? I'm not clear on that, but other warnings I've seen around (e.g.) would suggest it is.--Heyitspeter (talk) 10:03, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Edit: WMC is still making problem edits. e.g., "This entire section is stupid, <- including WP:V violation, and <- uncivil--Heyitspeter (talk) 18:52, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Why are you editing a closed section? and no, that edit isn't the problem - the problem is the revert, which re-adds a very very stupid section William M. Connolley (talk) 19:00, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

From EngineerFromVega: WMC has been acting as an owner of page IPCC and straight away dismissed my proposal for a change as 'silly games' . If I were him, I'd have taken a comment on a talk page with good faith.EngineerFromVega (talk) 10:42, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From MalcolmMcDonald: even as people discuss WMCs editing he has just removed 2 more of the key-words ("McIntyre" and "Balling") that readers need to navigate the GW topic and inform themselves. As the number of skeptics peaks post-Copenhagen and Climategate, the sacrosanct section on them (quaintly named "Debate and Skepticism") has lost more than half the names that were there yesterday. We know that "search" is the way to find things, William told us so: Good grief, how much spoon-feeding do you need? - surely it can't be right to remove the means to do so. MalcolmMcDonald (talk) 13:45, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From Scjessey: While it is clear that WMC may have been a bit short on civility a few times (and this was noted and acknowledged in another thread), it is also clear that this is nothing more than gaming and harassment in an attempt to seek the upper hand in content disputes within this topic. It is important that any administrator reviewing this discussion examines the diffs, and not accept the spin that accompanies them. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:14, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From ATren: If I recall correctly, this is the third or fourth complaint filed against WMC on this page, all from different editors. This one in particular is both detailed and rationally presented, yet the "WMC is being harassed" meme still persists. How many well-presented and evidence-filled reports do there need to be before people stop blaming the complainant? Here we have evidence of WMC labeling people "septic", clearly a personal attack when one reads his blog entry specifically dealing with that smear. Then we have multiple cases where he's called editors foolish or a waste of time (see also ZuluPapa's evidence on talk, which WMC himself removed (!!)), the 1RR violation listed above, editing against consensus, and removal of talk page comments. And this is all from the probationary period -- I can dig up dozens of diffs from before the probation which demonstrate the same behavior.
Now, earlier on this page, JPat was article banned for an entire month for making two reverts. That was overturned on appeal (though only after extensive explanation and apology by JPat) but it demonstrates the double standard of enforcement of this probation when editors like WMC get away with much worse for much longer. It's time for admins to take a close look at the evidence above, the disruption it causes, and take action once and for all against WMC. I suggest a lengthy topic ban, several months at the very least.
If no action is taken here, then this entire "probation" is meaningless and should be dissolved. ATren (talk) 14:42, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@ATren, In all honesty the problem is that the complaints, as this one I am afraid, are incoherent, and not rationally presented. People are vaguely unhappy but no one seems capable of putting their finger on anything concrete which is specifically forbidden. What is the headline problem here? Perhaps there is some kind of general conduct complaint which is valid as an aggregation of these complaints none of which is good enough to stand on its own? Otherwise how is saying "septic" instead of "sceptic" or "skeptic" forbidden exactly? I objected to that ages back but couldn't really find a good policy reason to insist on it. AFAIK WMC is allowed to imply that an edit is foolish or that someone is being foolish because that is about the behaviour/action not about the person. He does not appear to make a personal attack. None of the edits quite look like an edit war. And glaring or facing off is apparently not a crime... --BozMo talk 15:56, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

The current request was made because, in the editor's words, WMC "is constantly uncivil, has a habit of BLP violations against skeptics and most importantly he has had free license to do this." Remember the terms of the probation: "any editor may be sanctioned by an uninvolved administrator for disruptive edits, including, but not limited to, edit warring, personal attacks, incivility and assumptions of bad faith." Civility is extremely important for increasing productivity and the likelihood of consensus, as opposed to the current battleground mentality we've seen on the articles in question.--Heyitspeter (talk) 22:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@BozMo: You should consider the fact that not all editors complaining here have a one-to-one link to discuss and post. All complains are indeed coming from different editors and there is a genuine possibility of them being incoherent. Arguing on this basis is somewhat analogues to hiding oneself from the broader truth. EngineerFromVega (talk) 16:05, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@EFV I was not, I am afraid, talking about incoherence between complaints but that no editor had yet come up with a coherent complaint. This complaint will almost certainly get struck off because it fails to state a problem and demonstrate it. It is too much to expect busy admins to go fishing through all the edits of an individual to see if there is a transgression. Someone needs to pinpoint a problem, explain it and demonstrate it. --BozMo talk 16:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@BozMo: TheGoodLocust has already given detailed description of complaints in the first post. All other editors are presenting supporting arguments, which are bound to be a collection of isolated complaints. If you can kindly point out actual problems with the original post, others will be happy to discuss them. EngineerFromVega (talk) 17:08, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@EFV AFAICT he has given a list of diffs with his interpretation of them but not even attempted to give "an explanation how these edits violate" probation which we put in bold letters at the top of this page. He needs to pick a violating behaviour (e.g. editwarring, the first on his list) and then produce his evidence of edit warring. If he is not sure how to present this kind of argument he needs to go and find someone to help him. At present this is not a valid request for enforcement. --BozMo talk 17:20, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

BozMo, for JPat's article ban, there were two diffs presented and little more, and you recommended strong action. Here, TheGoodLocust provides a whole list of diffs, along with discussion as to their relevance to this probation, and you're left wanting for more. OK, here it is specifically: personal attacks, incivility and assumptions of bad faith present in most of those diffs. In particular, calling opposing editors "septic" which is basically akin to calling them a piece of shit. The other diffs provide more examples. What more do you need? ATren (talk) 17:56, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

If WMC was calling editors "septic," that would be problematic. However, in the list of diffs presented, I'm hard pressed to find that because the diffs are not clearly presented. If you would like to file a clear request, that would probably be helpful. I would note that I was strongly admonished for my reports earlier lacking substantial evidence by the same admin who restricted Mr. Patterson, so I assume he did more research than just clicking on my two diffs. Of course, since Mr. Patterson, at that time, had edited only two articles (and one of them he had not edited for over three(?) years) it was reasonably easy to follow all of his edits. I assume that the fact that WMC edits lots of articles makes it far more imperitive to file clear reports. Plese do so. Thanks. Hipocrite (talk) 18:00, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@ATren: He presented a list of complaints, but they were incoherent and more than a little dishonest. His evidence included a sanction from several years ago, that was voided. His evidence included evidence of WMC's decision to not use the (eminently acceptable) term "denialist" (and note, he's not using this for editors) because he thought it was unfair to tar them with associations to Holocaust denial. And so on. How can you defend that sort of nonsense? Guettarda (talk) 18:02, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

"he is last years (or the year before that's) stale pie. It was never notable, but pushed in by the septics at the time." - (emphasis mine) - this was TGL's first diff. Are you defending WMC calling editors who oppose him "septic", which is another way of saying they're shit? ATren (talk) 18:08, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Nope. Someone should probably tell him that's incivil, and to stop being incivil. Perhaps even put him on a civility parole for a limited period of time. It's a shame this shotgun complaint was focused on all kinds of things and proposed an irrelevent topic ban. Throwabunchofshitseewhatsticks is not appropriate. Redraft the complaint if you'd like.Hipocrite (talk) 18:11, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Incivility is a violation of the probation. ATren (talk) 18:14, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Nonsequitor. Hipocrite (talk) 18:16, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

And if the beholder is you, Hipocrite, "WMC could be more civil." (see below). So why is this not a violation of the civility clause of this probation? ATren (talk) 18:28, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

(undent) Uh, it is? We don't topic ban people for one shot of incivility. We tell them to stop being incivil. I'd happily tell WMC this if doing so wouldn't be adding support to the other bullshit in this shotgun complaint. I might even have done it if the complainer had any level of capital with me that I'd be willing to assume my reminder about civility wouldn't be used as ammo to further diminish the scientific accuracy of an encyclopedia. However, since the proposer, and every single one of the people arguing here (except, ironically, me), has merely lined up on their sides, I don't quite feel like giving an inch to be taken for a mile, yet again. Hipocrite (talk) 18:31, 25 January 2010 (UTC) From TenOfAllTrades. I'd be a snappish too, if there were such a concerted, ongoing effort to harrass me and smear my name on- and off-project. Forum-shopping and abuse of Misplaced Pages dispute resolution boards is just not on. I count three threads just on this page aimed at sanctioning WMC, two of which have aleady been closed as unactionable. There's another pair of threads on the talk page (action, deemed unactionable and/or misplaced), with a third section removed in its entirety as being a platform for a personal attack on WMC. There have been a couple of misguided attempts to use WP:COIN (Misplaced Pages:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard/Archive 39) which were again unactionable bordering on vexatious. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:46, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From Hipocrite WMC could be more civil. Of course, all of the SPA's who have been following him around could stop following him around. Hipocrite (talk) 15:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

• I'd strongly recommend that anyone concerned over the ownership issues, incivility, and other problems displayed by WMC and others at the GW-related pages simply disengage. Let it become the echo chamber that many seem to wish it were. Let the embarrassment that it causes the project build, until it reaches the breaking point. Nothing is going to be done here. No one has the stomach to sanction WMC for his behavior. And he's adept enough at what he does, to be able to walk a fine line, in which he maintains a somewhat plausible deniability with regards to the practical effect of his actions. Reporting his behavior here is an utter waste of time. UnitAnode 16:03, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From Mark Nutley Interesting defence from WMC there. Get people to look else were by posting diffs to anyone but himself. I fail to see how what i wrote has any bearing on this case? --mark nutley (talk) 17:29, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

• The evidence that GoodLocust, I and other editors have worked up is more than adequate to demonstrate a clear COI, abusive POV editing, a long pattern of incivility, a BLP violating approach to smearing article subjects, wikilawyering over content, and abuse of editing privileges to keep attack pages in user space in an effort to harass and intimidate good faith contributors. ChildofMidnight (talk) 18:16, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Then, please, present it and show us what you only claim you can show (so far).--BozMo talk 18:57, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Numerous diffs have already been supplied. Which examples of William's COI, improper refactoring, wikilawyering over content, abusive POV pushing, incivility, and abuse of userspace for attack pages aren't you seeing? ChildofMidnight (talk) 19:54, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From ChrisO: I have to say that I, like BozMo, really don't see the gist of this complaint. It comes across as a grab-bag of disputable diffs and some frankly weird assertions (clue for ATren, "septic" does not mean "shit" - get a better dictionary). I've already said that I think WMC could stand to be less adversarial. On the other hand, this complaint looks like a pile-on by editors with a common POV who are seeking to relitigate issues endlessly in an attempt to get WMC topic-banned. It looks to me like a harassment campaign, frankly. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:57, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry chris but your wrong there :)

Pronunciation: \ˈsep-tik\

Function: adjective

Etymology: Latin septicus, from Greek sēptikos, from sēpein to putrefy

Date: 1605

1 : of, relating to, or causing putrefaction

2 : relating to, involving, caused by, or affected with sepsis <septic patients>

3 : used for sewage treatment and disposal <a septic system>; also : of or relating to a septic system <septic effluents>

• As the diffs presented occured in the last few days Chris, your argument that your fellow editors are trying to relitigate is demonstrably false. Also, you need to stop making improper insinuations about those who are working in good faith to address William's disruptive behaviors. His incivility, refactoring, attack pages in user space, wikilawyering over content, abusive POV pushing, and COI are all evident in these recent diffs from the last several days that have been presented by several editors, and the problem needs to be addressed. Should editors be allowed to carry out personal feuds with their personal and professional adversaries? Should editors be allowed to use Misplaced Pages to promote their personal POV? Is the continuation of William's long history of personal attacks, including the numerous examples from the last few days, something that should be allowed to continue? Should we allow editors to keep attack pages in their user space where they go after editors they disagree with? Let's stay focused on the core issues here and avoid disrupting discussion with irrelevant insinuations ascribing motives to those trying to deal with this problem. ChildofMidnight (talk) 20:08, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

"Should editors be allowed to use Misplaced Pages to promote their personal POV?" I dunno, what do you think? Hipocrite (talk) 20:09, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@ChrisO: Once again, the "WMC is being harassed" meme. Where are the diffs of this supposed harassment from TheGoodLocust? Why aren't they being presented here? ATren (talk) 20:13, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

• Oh, if you insist - "Honestly, the best thing to do in reponse is to play dirty. They break[REDACTED] rules all the time and know how to game the system with socks, email lists, and wiki-lawyering. A coordinated attempt to correct the bias on[REDACTED] is the only way to counter them – they’ve been doing it for years." - TheGoodLocust thegoo t .
• "For example, the blog “real climate” is constantly used by Connolley et all as a “reliable source” to alter articles. And so we have an interesting situation where a (co)author of a blog can quote himself (or people with whom he has input) in order to make his own case on wikipedia. Hell, he can just make up or order any source he needs if he wants to – it is ridiculous." - TheGoodLocust
• "Correct, he finally got booted off his own article and now relegates cleaning duty to two of his biggest lackeys – Stephan Schulz and Kim Dabelstein Petersen. Sorry, but having your friends on facebook constantly editting your article is just as bad but more subtle." - TheGoodLocust
• "Let's test that out Connolley, we can topic ban SPAs for a few months and then see if that calms things down a bit. Besides, I think you'd welcome the break. " - TheGoodLocust

But hey, you know, orchestrating an off-wiki harassment campaign isn't haras... wait, yes it is! Hipocrite (talk) 20:26, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Okay, I think that counts as wikistalking since I never posted any links to my comments at WUWT, but I encourage anyone to actually look at those links to get the full context on some of them. The situation is obviously frustrating and I thought I could vent at a "safe place" without being harassed for it. However, the one diff you provide for me to wikipedia, the last thing you mention, is blatant misrepresentation which is shown by this diff. However, if you don't mind bringing up links from off-wiki websites I noticed one a few days ago that accused you of being a sock account of another person on this page (also defending Connolley) - mind if we checkuser you to make sure? TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:50, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Were in the above does TGL actually encourage people to harass WMC? What you have posted is not harassment it is someone speaking in a manner born of frustration mark nutley (talk) 20:47, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Where he says "A coordinated attempt to correct the bias on[REDACTED] is the only way to counter them," you know, because off-wiki coordination is A+! Hipocrite (talk) 20:49, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh, so we're bringing off-wiki evidence into this? OK, then, I'll start digging for WMC's off-wiki incivility too. Here's a start:

• "the wacko POV-pushers lost... I've been busy with the wacko's on wiki, as you'll see if you visit Talk:Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident."

I'm busy right now, but I'll try to find more tonight. ATren (talk) 20:43, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Are you saying that it's ok if the other guy does it? That's an interesting take, I guess. You asked for examples of harassment from TGL. I gave you them, in off (and on) wiki spades. You responded not with a "thanks," but rather with a "Oh yeah? Well, well, well, here's some minor incivility not directed at any individual off wiki by WMC." Do you understand why I think you're fully engaged us vs. them at this point? Have you commented negatively about TGL's offwiki harassment campaign, or onwiki incivility? Have I commented negatively about WMC? And with that, I take my leave. Hipocrite (talk) 20:49, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Hipocrite, TGL's evidence is all on-wiki. You brought in off-wiki evidence, to which I responded with similar off-wiki evidence from WMC, but this doesn't change the fact that TGL's evidence is right there for all of us to examine. WMC calls editors "septic", he calls them a waste of time, he removes talk page comments, he edits aggressively and condescendingly on both articles and talk. It's all there, regardless of who reported it. Would you prefer if I took the same diffs and start a new report? Would that disarm the "harassment" charge? ATren (talk) 20:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent> My "offwiki harrassment campaign?" You posted comments I made to articles about Connolley's abuse. I comment all the time at WUWT and he has been the subject of a few articles. Hell, he's been in all sorts of publications as examples of wikipedia's problems. For crying out loud how could I have harrassed him when he wasn't anywhere near the conversation? TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:54, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

The "topic parole" is a phrase I've never seen before. What is more relevant (but a full click away) is that the revert parole was revoked as an unnecessary move. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

That's interesting that you never heard of it Schulz since you are the one that appealed for it to be removed from Connolley. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:36, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

After reading that Arb thing, again, i'm joining Stephan in never having heard of "topic parole". Could it be that you are misreading something? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:37, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh that is my mistake, I thought "topic parole" was an adequate enough description, but if you insist, not that it really matters, I guess we can call it "revert parole on global warming-related articles," but I don't think that really flows off the tongue as well. TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:41, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

So now that we agree on the name, can you explain why you harp on a revoked parole? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:55, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From Verbal: A stop should be put to this pathetic and continued (unorchestrated but pernicious) campaign of harassment against WMC, by block and sanctions against those responsible. Enough is enough, and those behind this are not only damaging the encyclopaedia by harassing a valuable editor, they are attempting to subvert a whole area of the project to suit a fringe POV. Verbal chat 21:21, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

So you feel it is appropriate to refer to other editors as "septic", as in "of, relating to, or causing putrefaction"? ATren (talk) 22:01, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From ChrisO (second comment): I recommend that this be closed. Nothing actionable has been posted, WMC has already been advised to take a non-adversarial approach, and the other editors have already been advised not to harass WMC. Nothing new has come up and this discussion is clearly going to produce nothing more than further bickering. -- ChrisO (talk) 21:24, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

• "Advise" him all you want. WMC is who he is, and acts how he acts. He's not going to change, and he's not going to magically start treating those who disagree with his POV with respect. He doesn't need to be "advised", he needs to be "warned" that if he continues to engage in his own brand of disrespect and incivility, he'll simply be blocked. That's, perhaps, a message he would understand. UnitAnode 21:37, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I had privately emailed Dr. Connolley last night asking him to slow down. His recent bitey and uncivil behavior has impacted the efforts to lower the temperature of discussion quite severely. He agreed to slow down somewhat. I recommend no further action as long as he keeps his word. --TS 21:50, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm very disappointed that TS should have chosen to give a rather partial account of a private email conversation. I shall not be trusting TS to keep private conversations private in future. You may take it that whatever promises TS may have chosen to make on my behalf are entirely void William M. Connolley (talk) 22:29, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, then, there's no promise. There needs to be an enforcement provision. ATren (talk) 22:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

As I say below: you should ignore TS's rather regrettable text entirely William M. Connolley (talk) 22:55, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, I think that's far less than is warranted for his history of abuse; but, if it must be that, then let's formalize it: the next time WMC uses condescending terms, removes talk page comments, bites new users, edits divisively, or engages in any other uncivil behavior, he is topic-banned for 6 months. Given his long history of aggression on these articles, that's a slap on the hand, but it gives him one more chance to reform his behavior. ATren (talk) 21:56, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

No, that would be utterly ridiculous. Quite OTT. --TS 22:04, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

No, it's not at all ridiculous. It's putting some teeth into the agreement, that's all, as is done all the time when editors don't abide by the rules. If he keeps to his word, it's an irrelevant provision, so where's the harm? ATren (talk) 22:08, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Concerns have been raised, he's promised to address them. If he doesn't then we discuss whether we need teeth. --TS 22:13, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Where is this comment from WMC as regards his promise to address these issues? Off2riorob (talk) 22:29, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Please ignore TS's text, which is only muddying the waters William M. Connolley (talk) 22:55, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Last chance , or not, action or not, the wiki has become well aware of this issue and whatever happens here , it is over, the wiki has had enough,multiple articles locked by edit warring and clear repeated incivility, that is the reason for this probation pages existence and if individual editors and groups of editors believe they can continue with the line walking on policy and civility that they have been doing for a long time they are living in the past, people are not blind and they can see exactly what is going on. Off2riorob (talk) 22:20, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

@ATren, Could you accurately raise what the issue is first? If the issue is "uses condescending terms, removes talk page comments, bites new users, edits divisively, or engages in any other uncivil behavior" then first complain clearly that this is the issue and justify that it is true. Then we can discuss which parts of it are against the rules. Then we can enforce it. For example the state of the talk pages (full of stuff irrelevant to the article) means removing talk page comments is not absolutely prohibited. Condescension is hard to define. Biting is clear, has he done this? etc. You might well succeed but at present what some people feel is recognised and other feel is simply asserted. --BozMo talk 22:15, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

BozMo, let's start with TGL's first piece of evidence: is calling someone "septic" considered civil? ATren (talk) 22:26, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Calling somone a septic is uncivil. Since I haven't done it, I'm not sure what your point is. Calling someone a member of a pro-GW cabal is... well, what is it, in your opinion? Incivil, perhaps? William M. Connolley (talk) 22:57, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, discounting the diff I already provided, and the blog you provided from your talk page, anyone can do a wikipedia search of your use of the term septic and judge your actions from the results. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:07, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh look, you even created a section devoted to "septics" for the articles you edit. NPOV? There were quite a few results in that search - and they weren't flattering of your attitude. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:11, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, now that I think about it, that link shows you committing BLP violations against 6-7 individuals. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:26, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

• With WMC's latest mini-speech, can we please finally deal with WMC's incivility. He's made it clear that either (A) he refused to agree to stop being uncivil, and what TS reported is untrue; or (B) he did agree to that, but he's so angry about TS revealing that he agreed to it, that he's taking back that pledge. Either way, it seems we can expect more of the same from him on this particular set of articles. UnitAnode 22:46, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

This is supposed to be civil? What is this "mini-speech" nonsense. You haven't got a clue what I said to TS. You should ignore entirely his partial account of the conversation and make no deductions whatsoever from what he said: this has been a very regrettable lapse of manners by TS that has done nothing but muddy the waters William M. Connolley (talk) 22:50, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

What tony was doing was trying to help you, you should apologise for what you wrote not compound it with further rudeness --mark nutley (talk) 23:01, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I find it interesting that TS would even dare to mention this to Connoelly considering they share the same ideological perspective - kudos on that TS. His response to this revelation, as with the "revenge edit" I posted on my evidence, indicates a pattern of lashing out against perceived slights in unproductive ways. TheGoodLocust (talk) 22:54, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

• Frankly, WMC, it's already out there. Requesting it be "ignored" now is a bit of locking the barn door after the horse already ran away. Either you made some sort of pledge, and you're upset that TS told us, or you didn't make the pledge, and TS is being untruthful. UnitAnode 22:56, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, to be fair, Connolley could've given TS the mistaken impression that he was going to cool off - a breakdown of communication could've conceivably occurred at either end. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:01, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

From Alex Harvey: I already expressed my view that climate change probation is completely illegitimate, and nothing has changed my mind so far, so I can't really now say that I wish to see William Connolley sanctioned by it. Rather, it is my hope that there are at least a few honest, decent admins left in the community who are quietly finding this hypocrisy of banning GoRight whilst doing nothing about the POV abuses of the warmists hard to watch. To these people, I suggest you go up and read again what UnitAnode just said. This situation will, inevitably, take care of itself. The general public will not tolerate the abuse of Misplaced Pages forever, and that's a fact. Sadly, one possible outcome may be that Misplaced Pages itself will end up shut down, but more likely it'll just be forced to either reform itself, or it will be bought and end up commercial. I believe, this can all be sped up by appealing directly to the public, not to any Misplaced Pages forum. William Connolley just has too many friends here, and this cannot work. The general public, on the other hand, would be certainly on the side of having Misplaced Pages made into a neutral source of information. Alex Harvey (talk) 01:16, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Proposal

There's only good solution here. Give the tools back to WMC and bar all the harassers per Verbal. We've already lost Kenosis, we cannot let the climate change articles fall to the "skeptics". --- 32.173.35.150 (talk) 23:09, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Give tools back to a guy who edit warred with people and then banned them? Including in climate change articles? Who are you exactly and were you being sarcastic?TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:15, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

WMC notified us off-wiki that he was in trouble. Our forums have been watching and we are going to stop people like you from bothering him. Kenosis is already gone, we cannot lose another. -- 32.173.243.1 (talk) 23:21, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

TGL, ignore this, it's just someone trying to make a point. ATren (talk) 23:23, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

What point? Every week or so somebody comes around complaining about WMC. Either he's the most unlucky guy in the world or we need to stop the harassment. He knows who's harassing him and what quicker way to stop it than letting him block them? Fine someone else block the harassers.

Where there is smoke there is usually fire. I've already demonstrated around 10 BLP violations against climate skeptics perpetrated by him (and there are certainly far more out there). It is clear that he can't edit these articles neutrally. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:40, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Many prior warnings

I counted three sections on this enforcement project aimed at sanctioning WMC, two of which closed to no benefit and further WMC bickering. There's another thread on the talk page which he abused to harass another editor , and a talk section that WMC removed in entirety from the talk page by edit waring. When will the offender get the warning message that his behavior is creating unproductive attention and long disruptive complaint sessions. If many warnings will not avail, then it may be time to remove the source for a while. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 23:53, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

This is a case of throwing as much mud as possible in the hope that some of it will stick. By repeating the same complaints over and over again, complaints largely without merit, you are effectively trying to hound WMC out of the topic so that you can have a free reign. This sort of behavior is totally unacceptable. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually I plan on taking a long break after this is settled. Misplaced Pages certainly doesn't need me to improve articles nor does it need Connolley. TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:01, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Well you have that partly right, I suppose. Besides, you aren't really a prolific editor of article space anyway. -- Scjessey (talk) 00:05, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

That's because I prefer to persuade people that certain edits are the right way to go instead of tag-teaming my version with friends until everyone else gets fed up and moves on. I've editted many science-based articles without incident - only when I encounter certain groups do I get hassled about them. TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:10, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Result concerning William M. Connolley

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

How far does the scope of this probation reach? In particular, are actions on user pages of editors involved in climate change that clearly come from participation on climate change articles covered? I found this gem, and consider it a serious personal attack, and possibly even halfway to a legal threat. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 01:22, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Are you suggesting that KimDabelsteinPetersen is a single-purpose account and therefore qualifies under the umbrella of climate change probation? In his defense, I'd like to point out that there is one talk page and one article he edits frequently that is unrelated to climate change - the rest are all strongly related to climate change. TheGoodLocust (talk) 01:57, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Given that Kim has more edits to his least-edited article in the top ten than you have to your most edited article, that's a bit rich... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:34, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Is there a convenient way to tell how many of a person's edits consist solely of removing and reverting other editor's content? From my personal experience that seems to be his greatest contribution to[REDACTED] and, I imagine, a person can get quite a high edit could with such behavior which would make gaining adminship rather easy. TheGoodLocust (talk) 09:37, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, I decided to look at his past 50 edits and, color me shocked, but of the actual article-space edits they were all reverts. I'm not certain why you always try and focus the conversation on me Stephan but it is rather disconcerting. TheGoodLocust (talk) 09:43, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I kindly asked him not to attack other editors in climate change articles. TheGoodLocust (talk) 02:07, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Hi, I don't know whether you've noticed but the topic here is a particularly savage attack on one of your fellow editors. Now is a poor time to add on your own irrelevant personal attacks. --TS 10:14, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I am well aware of the attack on Kim and I asked the editor to stop. However, I've posted no attack against Kim here, but I did respond to a comment I considered rather rude that was directed at me. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:43, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

"He deserves capital punishment" seems like a death threat to me. -Atmoz (talk) 03:55, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

That sort of behavior is grounds for a block regardless of probation. Regardless of how far behavioral standards have fallen, it's absolutely over the line. If it continues after the block expires, then let me know and I'll reinstate it. MastCell  04:49, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I strongly agree with MastCell regarding that edit.

In general, I think behaviour on threads related to or clearly inspired by climate change disputes should be covered. The standards for the several talkspaces differ somewhat, but harassment at a usertalk page or edit warring at a noticeboard are unacceptable regardless and may lead to sanctions. - 2/0 (cont.) 07:59, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I have already warned that editor (see log). He has repeatedly been posting frankly libellous material on the talk page of Talk:Michael E. Mann: see , , . He has also previously posted personal attacks against editors in general and this is not the first time he's gone after Kim: . I note that the personal attacks for which he was blocked were posted after I had warned him, and indeed the warning itself provoked a personal attack against me. This is clearly someone with a substantial history of making egregious personal attacks and disregarding warnings; I think a 31 hour block is insufficient in the circumstances. -- ChrisO (talk) 08:36, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Kim is an SPA, to be sure, but this sort of harassment of anyone, SPA or not, is totally unacceptable, endorse the block. It's an IP, you may want to ask a CU for a quick check for collateral damage, before extending the block too far into the future. (oh wait! I'm a CU... :) ) OK then... I am not seeing a high potential for collateral damage as there are no named editors on that IP or even on the whole range. So on the next occurance of this sort of thing, a much longer block is called for, in my view. Try a week next, then a month? ++Lar: t/c 13:22, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Could you leave out the flinging of SPA accusations, please? William M. Connolley (talk) 16:55, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

"guv"? Look, it's my job as a CU to evaluate this sort of thing. KDB is an SPA by any reasonable evaluation. It's a valid observation to make in context. Your comment and tone are unhelpful. You appear to be part of the problem. Up your game. That includes your edit summaries. ++Lar: t/c 17:39, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

What exactly does it matter whether i'm an SPA or not? Yes, i edit mostly but not solely in the climate change area, because that is where my readings over the last 3-5 years have been. I also edit Linux related articles (albeit seldom), and have a few lists that i maintain. Again: Does it matter to this? At all? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:50, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It doesn't. Some are understandably concerned because most SPAs tend to edit Misplaced Pages to further an agenda. The species of SPA that edits because of knowledge in a particular field is rare, but desirable. Lately, there seems to have been an increase in the species of SPA that seeks drama; they confine themselves largely to places like WP:ANI to stir up trouble. So SPAs have a bad rep. I think the quality of your work speaks for itself, and I see no reason why you should have to justify your actions. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:59, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Conversely, I think it matters a great deal whether a participant is an SPA or not. In general SPAs are frowned upon and are not given quite as free a hand as editors who have demonnstrated wider ranging interests, and in part that's because many, but not all, SPAs do seek drama and do seem to want to push a particular point of view. KDP is an SPA, by their own admission, and therefore their edits are going to get more scrutiny, rightly or wrongly. But in this case, I think the jury is still out on what sort of SPA exactly it is that KDP is. High quality work to be sure, but is it scrupulously neutral and is KDP completely drama free? (but then, who among us is?) ++Lar: t/c 18:39, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

There are an infinite number of directions we could take each report. I think we're all in agreement that the range of topics editing by Kim is irrelevant to this particular report. Perhaps we could all strive for greater focus, to avoid turning each individual brush fire into a conflagration.

This is a useful illustration of how threads on this page get off track. A specific request for specific action is made with supporting diffs (OK). One individual can't resist using the opportunity to goad another editor (bad). The bait is taken rather than ignored as obvious provocation (bad). Personalized argumentation about an issue irrelevant to the initial complaint dominates the thread (bad). I think we can all try to do better. MastCell  19:01, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

In some probations, SPAs are under different restrictions. So that would argue for relevance. I just went and reviewed the terms of this one and I didn't see anything specific though. Still I do think it's relevant. Argue over? no, not good. Note? yes, relevant. Done. ++Lar: t/c 21:51, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It may well be relevant to some other hypothetical enforcement request; it's just not relevant to this one. Since any available surface is being turned into a battleground (see above and below). I'm suggesting that we try to limit ourselves to dealing with the relevant, concrete specific of each thread, instead of noting/discussing/arguing about things that might be relevant to some hypothetical future thread. MastCell  22:01, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I couldn't agree with Scjessey more. The quality of Kim's work definitely speaks for itself. TheGoodLocust (talk) 18:11, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I too absolutely agree William M. Connolley (talk) 19:30, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

• Thanks for looking at the IP range, Lar. I'm a bit hesitant to issue long blocks to IPs off the bat, since they may be shared or dynamic, but based on your investigation (and on edits like this) I think this is a long-term stable IP. I'll leave things where they are for now, but would have a fairly low threshold for re-blocking if things repeat themselves. MastCell  17:21, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
  • 31h to 1w to 1m is not an unreasonable progression in this particular case in view of a) the nature of the edits and b) the nature of the IP block. Suggest anon only of course, let them get an account if they want to continue to contribute. ++Lar: t/c 17:41, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

This seems to have run its course, so I am closing the thread. Please unarchive if there is more to discuss. - 2/0 (cont.) 18:51, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm rather uncomfortable with the involvement of User:Rtol (Richard Tol) on Talk:Rajendra K. Pachauri. Apparently he is a co-author of a hack job on Pachauri in Der Spiegel and he seems to have been using the talk page to promote the same attack piece and a stronger version which is apparently to be published soon in the Wall Street Journal. Tol has publicly called for Pachauri's resignation so this puts Misplaced Pages in a difficult spot. There do seem to be potential Conflict of interest and Biographies of living persons issues associated with behavior like that. --TS 11:09, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It is not a hack job tony, don`t be so dramatic. Richard has already excused himself from debating on this particular aspect of the pachauri article. So as he has removed himself from the debate what exactly is the problem? --mark nutley (talk) 11:14, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It's an article that is "not a hack job" but calls for Pachauri to resign. How does that work?

If Tol had "removed himself from the debate" that would be all well and good. However he made two edits to the resignation thread this morning. So there seems to be a marked distinction here between what some people are saying is happening and what is actually happening. --TS 11:36, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I asked richard to post any new links to the discussion. He replied to kims question about who Samson was. He has not put forward any arguments for inclusion of new text since he removed himself from the debate. This i believe is what you were worried about? --mark nutley (talk) 11:44, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I had spotted it too but I think that should be ok. If everyone knows who he is and he is only on talk I think we can live with it. On policy even heavily conflicted authors are allowed on talk in general, unless they are disruptive. However I think this thread should be moved from the probation page to WP:COI where it belongs. --BozMo talk 12:39, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

His removal seems to have been short-lived William M. Connolley (talk) 22:18, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

well, we have other activists working on this file full-time. I suggest they all go. Spoonkymonkey (talk) 16:34, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Welcome back. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:37, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Just in this discussion. Until Misplaced Pages stops being a platform for a select group, I'm not touching any more articles. You can look through my edits. I didn't push a political POV, I just cleaned up a lot of sloppy writing. I thought my work had value, but now I believe Misplaced Pages is like Greenpeace: tens of thousands of dedicated, true-believing college kids standing on street corners in America collecting donations for a group that operates in secret and really plays them for fools. Spoonkymonkey (talk) 16:59, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I'd like a clear outline of what qualifies as conflict of interest so we can apply topic bans to those who have, are and will violate these principles. TheGoodLocust (talk) 17:40, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

In this particular case the conflict of interest comes from Tol being an active party in getting Pachauri to resign (ie. directly involved in the conflict). That Tol is also an economist with special focus on climate change is not a conflict of interest, unless he unduely focuses on his own work, or in other ways puts his own work before others, which in fact he hasn't. And imho his work on Economics of climate change is highly laudable. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:27, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

But this relationship doesn't work in reverse? As we both know Lawrence Solomon wrote an unflattering article on your friend WMC and yet he has no problem editing Solomon's article. TheGoodLocust (talk) 18:39, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

He also wrote an unflattering story on me, which i've responded to. All that shows is that Solomon apparently has a conflict of interest with regards WMC (and me), but not the reverse. I have no grudges, dislike or personal involvement with Solomon (i suspect the same is the case for WMC). He can write whatever he likes. This has btw. been turned over on AN/I a couple of times. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:14, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

To be more specific, Tol is an active party in the Pachauri debate. WMC is not an active party in the Solomon thing. Notice also that Tol (imho) is welcome to write and contribute on the Pachauri article, but that he should keep away from the specific instance where he is an active party. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:17, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

So two journalists and a scientist have a COI with Connolley but Connolley doesn't have a COI with them? Please enlighten me further. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:19, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

That is correct. Someone may not like me, but that doesn't mean that i have the same feelings towards them. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:41, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Actions speak louder than words. TheGoodLocust (talk) 22:05, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh and here we have a journalist expressing his feelings that Connolley, as a friend of those involved in climategate, shouldn't have so much editorial control over that article. TheGoodLocust (talk) 18:45, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, I found another, here we have Tim Ball, a climatologist, who wrote an unflattering piece featuring Connolley, being editted by Connolley. At what point is this a COI? TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:09, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

So, what you are saying is that external parties can "veto"/"out" editors that they do not like? Try extrapolating that into the future - whenever someone doesn't like an editors style, he can just "veto"/"out" him, by writing an Op-ed, doesn't matter if its correct or not. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:21, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

You seem to be under the impression that those articles would perish without Connolley's contributions to them. I don't think any single editor could be that important for improving an article and the concious or unconcious desire to retaliate against perceived slights, something these pages have demonstrated Connolley has a tendency to do, is too much of a risk to ignore potential COI.TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:24, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

No, i'm not of that impression. And i suggest that you either delete,strike or substantiate that Connolley should have an "concious or unconcious" desire "retaliate" against Ball, Solomon or Delingpole. (you can delete/strike this comment afterwards) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:39, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I didn't say anything about his retaliating against those people. I said he seems to have a habit of editing out of revenge (as shown by his removal of the Landsea section in the IPCC). However, of the diffs (I believe I linked them already), Connolley seemed quite intent to make sure that Solomon wasn't described as an environmentalist and also was keen to keep in content that appeared to discredit Ball's credentials (as far as climate is concerned). While such edits aren't especially blatant in denigrating these subjects, if someone wracked up a large number of these edits to such articles, then these small things add up to give an overall impression, as Delinpole's article says, of propaganda. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:47, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

So removing Landsea from the IPCC article was revenge? On whom? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:55, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent> It came off as a revenge or retalitian for having to inlcude the glacier information after I pointed out that your arguments for exclusion were completely inconsistent with the standards of what was already in the article. Although, I suppose, you could say it was "revenge" against JonGwynne since I believe he was one of the people who originally pushed for its inclusion 5 years ago, and who filed at least one major complaint against Connolley. Or, if you prefer, this edit comes off as particularly retributive. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:39, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Strangely enough i do not agree. That was the result of a long discussion on WP:WEIGHT, the removal of one old item, to give room for a new item, accomodated weight - and was (imho) a good compromise. You are reading a lot of bad faith into something that has a simple good faith explanation. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:18, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent> lol, please show the discussion regarding the weight of the Landsea section. As far as I remember it there was no discussion about removing it, he just did it and added the glacier section after I made it clear that your arguments against inclusion of that section were entirely inconsistent. TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:59, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Nb. this has become off-topic, so i wouldn't mind that it got closed. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:27, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I too am still concerned. I don't think COI or BLP are singularly appropriate. Richard Tol has co-written a hatchet job on somebody else and then he has come to the talk page of that person's Misplaced Pages biography to promote it. There seem to be both COI and BLP implications to this activity. Am I really supposed to be less concerned now because all he is doing is continuing to use a Misplaced Pages talk page to promote the idea that this person should resign from his position? That's the very reason he came to that page in the first place, and it's the activity to which I object.

I don't think this can even remotely be considered to be an acceptable use of Misplaced Pages. --TS 18:31, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

If that's an accurate characterization of events I would completely concur with that view. What are the key things for a previously uninvolved person to look at to come up to speed, do you think? ++Lar: t/c 18:44, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I believe this is in time-order

• Rtol states he is Richard Tol on his user page.
• first post by Rtol on the issue - states that "It is significant, because Pachauri may well have to resign if the allegations would be true."
• German op-ed on the issue by Richard Tol. I don't speak german.
• Rtol links to the german op-ed, stating it is the "First call for Pachauri's resignation in a major, by an academic, not anonymous" There is no note that he is the author.
• Rtol notes Richard Tol wants to have RKP removed.
• KDP notes Rtol is an author of the oped.
• Rtol notes he "should not be involved in debating whether should be reflected in Pachauri's article."
• MN states that Rtol should have said he was a co-author.
• Rtol notes that he was aware his peice would be publishd on Jan 24 around noon. (Complier's note - non responsive?)
• WMC calls Rtol's pushing the piece and not mentioning he signed it "very poor faith," and calls the whole thing "tawdry."
• Rtol states his opinion was clear for all to see.
• Rtol states that the reason he did not mention he was the author of the piece before it was published was that "I never write about unpublished material." He further states that WMC should provide evidence of someone else's bias.
• Rtol adds others who called for resignation to a list he curates.

Given that Rtol cannot recuse himself from the debate that he stated he should recuse himself from, I suggest he be recused from the debate by force. I further suggest that transparent dishonesty ("I never write about unpublished material." vs "More tomorrow" referring to his yet unpublished Der Speigel piece as evidenced by ) deserves attention. Hipocrite (talk) 19:18, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It's one of those situations where the bulk of any damage (by using Misplaced Pages to overpromote a resignation call) has already been done. Perhaps Richard might agree to stop adding to that talk page, though. --TS 19:30, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

The concern seems warranted for discussion here; however, where has the editor crossed the line? It seems as if the editor has managed themselves within reason. Motion to close (maybe with genital precautionary notice).Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 19:41, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

• What sort of genital precautions did you have in mind? :P (just kidding - I know what you meant, it just happened to be an unfortunate typo). MastCell  20:06, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
  • Perhaps WP:DICK was what was meant? or perhaps not. ++Lar: t/c 20:10, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I said it above and i`ll say it again, since Richard removed himself from the debate all he has done is add some links and answer a question kim asked. He is no longer debating for the new text to go in and is doing noting wrong. @ Hippocrate, richard posted the link spigel Richard Tol (talk) 13:26, 24 January 2010 (UTC) says I never write about unpublished material Richard Tol (talk) 22:04, 25 January 2010 (UTC) That`s a day later check your dates again and redact your statements about dishonesty please. mark nutley (talk) 21:41, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I will redact nothing. He said "more tommorow" when he meant that he was publishing his article tommorow. That's writing about unpublished material. Hipocrite (talk) 22:04, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It is precisely the promotion of his call for Pachauri to resign, by adding external links, that is problematic in my view. He is creating a presumption that there is a general call for Pachauri to resign--a presumption that is at the very least rather premature. --TS 21:50, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Google news search disagrees and so discussion of it does not seem premature. TheGoodLocust (talk) 22:01, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Attention: This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.

Request concerning Gavin.collins

User requesting enforcement

Dmcq (talk) 21:09, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

User against whom enforcement is requested

Gavin.collins (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated

Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

1. 27 jan: Latest note from Gavin.collins showing problem with accepting scientific opinion can be a different article from the public perception. Refusal to follow dispute resolution process and soapboxing
2. Warning by me saying it all looks like Misplaced Pages:Civil POV pushing and saying yet again they should take his dispute to an appropriate forum if they disagree with the consensus.
3. Talk:Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change#Content_Fork 22 jan started thread which is still current saying title leader and hatnote ar POV and OR and article is a fork. Soapboxing
4. 19 dec a third opinion says GC doesn't understand the subject of the article
5. Talk:Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change/Archive_10#What is to be done? 19 dec started saying title is OR and content is POV. Soapboxing
6. Talk:Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change/Archive_10#Proposal to retitle to "Climate Change Opinions" 14 dec started trying to change the article topic. Soapboxing
7. Talk:Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change/Archive_10#Background_to_RfC 14 dec started saying the article is a fork. Soapboxing
8. Talk:Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change/Archive_9#RFC on Merger with Climate Change 10 dec started saying it is clear it is a fork. Soapboxing
9. Talk:Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change/Archive_9#Content fork 9 dec started saying article is a content fork. Soapboxing

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

1. Warning by ] (] · ])
2. Warning by ] (] · ] · ] · ] · ] · ] · ] · ])
3. ...

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction)

topic article ban

Sorry I see topic here means the whole business of climate change or global warming Dmcq (talk) 08:28, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Additional comments by editor filing complaint

Not just the sections set up by Gavin.collins keep on saying the subject is OR and POV, suchlike comments have been put into a number of other sections as well. I would like to see them not continually reraise their concerns on Talk:Scientific opinion on climate change against consensus. Their concerns have contributed nothing to the article for over a month but taken up a lot of space and time. If they haven't consensus and still want to push they should follow the WP:DISPUTE resolution process and raise it elsewhere, they can then either achieve an aim or else they should abide by anything decided there. For this since they have repeatedly ignored requests to raise it to a noticeboard or otherwise follow a process I would suggest a topic article ban on anything to do with the subject matter of the article being point of view or original research. Dmcq (talk) 21:09, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Simplified version. I believe that Misplaced Pages:Civil POV pushing describes what's been happening fairly accurately and I'm requesting a topic article ban because of a refusal to follow the WP:DISPUTE policy. Dmcq (talk) 22:49, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Gavin.collins has been posting a number of comments to my talk page at User_talk:Dmcq#Ad_hominen_attack about this request. Dmcq (talk) 17:19, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested

Discussion concerning Gavin.collins

Statement by Gavin.collins

This request has arisen because Dcmq's disagreement with me about the status of Scientific opinion on climate change, for which there is evidence to suggest is a content fork - the name of the article is a bit of a giveaway. Instead of dealing with evidence that this article is a content fork as an open window, it seems that he is treating such criticism as unwelcome and a personal affront to him, which by definition precludes any access to reality that healthy criticism provides. I already explained to him that his personal attack on me is neither justified nor civil. If only he would assume good faith, I think he will see that discussion of the issues is both natural and constructive.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 22:27, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

This comment was posted in the uninvolved admin section of the website, not in reply to a question:

Then in fairness you must step aside and let the discussions about the article content enter the dispute resolution stage if you are not keen on facilitating them. We are currenly discussing whether a referal to the Mediation cabal would be the way forward. Feel free to facilitate these discussions if you wish. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:26, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Comments by others about the request concerning Gavin.collins

Is there a problem with the prior warning to be corrected, before proceeding further? Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 21:33, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

From Nigelj: I seem to have spent a good while debating this with Gavin over the weeks, but it is a baffling point, and it never gets anywhere. I notice that he has involved himself in a discussion at WP:Village pump (policy)#What is a content fork? as well, where he put similar points forward and was told, "I think that's going off on a tangent", "Nah, Masem is correct", "the entire issue of notability is a red herring", "Gavin, I think you're missing the gist here" and "You seem to be conflating that issue with your pet notability issue, which isn't really helping the central topic here", by several experienced editors before initiating an AfD on one of their articles. --Nigelj (talk) 22:08, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Is Gavin simply guilty of being "wrong on the internet", a problem that can be resolved as soon as he realises nobody else agrees with him, or is there a conduct issue? --TS 22:12, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

From Short Brigade Harvester Boris: This may seem like a minor issue compared to personal attacks and the like. But the disruption caused by people attempting to wear down others by making the same arguments over and over and over again is one of the main things that causes these articles to be so difficult. Gavin appears to be so fixated on this issue that it is probably unrealistic to ask him to change his approach, so I suggest that he cease editing this article and its talk page (or be directed to do so).

As a possibly relevant aside it's hard to argue that one of the longest-standing articles on the site (since September 2003) is a fork. It's more plausible that other articles are forks of this one. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 23:11, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Forcefully removing Gavin would deprive a Dispute Resolution. There was an RFC related to these issues that could be better addressed. Perhaps the message should be, time to agree for the next resolution level. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 23:44, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Comment from 2over0: The discussion leading up to my block of Gavin.collins six weeks ago (before the probation was enacted) touched on a similar topic. If this discussion indicates that some sanction is called for, would an article ban be sufficient? - 2/0 (cont.) 00:06, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

My preference is for the least restrictive remedy possible, in this case an article ban (including a talk page ban). If the problem spreads to other venues it can be dealt with at that time. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 03:22, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Agree; however, no ban is the least restrictive remedy. The appropriate means to move the article dispute forward is where this should end up. AGF in Gavin, that he has a valid dispute, and this compliant can be closed. (Really, the other enforcement distractions may have kept folks attention off that page.) Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 04:01, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

It should really have been enough with a trout-slap... But since that appears not to be enough, i agree with Boris, that the least sanction, is the most appropriate sanction. Article (+talk since that is where most disruption happened) is enough, that should be a sufficiently large trout, which can be expanded if needed - which i truly hope it wont. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 15:19, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Could you explain how a "slap" to GC will improve the article, sounds like unnecessary punishment to me? Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 16:57, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

I haven't finished going through this but I think the general sense of what is being said above is being firmly told by the community "stop doing that you are in the wrong and being a nuisance" should be sufficient to get a change in behaviour from editors but in the case of GC may not achieve any change. --BozMo talk 17:45, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

As ever, it's Monty Python, and BozMo sums it up well. . . dave souza, talk 18:44, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

I find the report deficient for any sanction. All of these sections are said to show soap boxing. I look at a short one, like this, and the report seems inaccurate. Then we have some general statements from editors who have disagreed with him that he doesn't get it. People make silly arguments all the time. In these contexts I often notice people preemptively saying that an issue that is raised has already been resolved, true or not, good argument or bad, without ever really engaging the issue. If there's real disruption fine, but I don't immediately see it. I also don't believe the purpose of this process is to preempt the need to address points in detail, or to pursue dispute resolution if necessary. Mackan79 (talk) 18:52, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

By the way, one reason I see discussion not working on these pages is because someone makes a suggestion, and people simply say "you're wrong, discussion closed," rather than looking, as we should, for other possible improvements that may address concerns on each side. Then people fight about whether the discussion is closed. I am sure there are reasons, but it is a major defect in the area that allows these disputes to go on and on without improvement. Editors on both sides would be smart to keep saying "Well how about this then," to see where there can be movement, and IMO the dispute resolvers might do more to discourage the deadlocking and push things in other directions (which blocking does not necessarily do). Mackan79 (talk) 19:12, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

• Comment I agree with this this point. The problem I have experienced to date is that administrator intervention has not improved matters in this regard. Last time I made an improvement to the article by removing original research from the lead and replaced it with reliable secondary sources, I received a block. Before that, an RFC which I intiated was closed before a wide range of editors could become involved, and I received some "Some serious advice and warning" If adding solid gold sources such as these has become a crime, I can't see how any improvement to this article can be made if ""you're wrong, discussion closed" is the sole response.
  I can see that the administrators have a difficult task in trying to please everybody, but if every criticism of this articles weaknesses are simply dismissed, and improvements are blocked, I am not sure what is being achieved. It seems to me that this approach encourages groupthink which characterises debate and discussion as unhealthy, and criticism as evil. Saying that general sense is that I should be "Stop doing that you are in the wrong and being a nuisance" is just another way of Shooting the messenger. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 19:42, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

GC, the trouble is not that you have a different view than the other editors, that is always encouraged, otherwise how would new input present itself? And it is also laudable that you are fighting for your particular viewpoint. But.... There comes a time when consensus is sufficiently established, and when you've turned over, and repeated, your arguments so many times, that it becomes disruptive. That point (imho) has passed a couple of times, in this particular case. It is the failure to back away from the horse-carcass that is the problem. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:55, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I think that's a key point. The point of consensus building is that, at some stage, a consensus is reached and the editors abide by it. A consensus doesn't require everyone to agree with it, but it does require editors to recognise that there is a consensus and react accordingly. I've not been involved with Gavin or this particular issue but it seems to me, based on what's been said, that this is a classic example of tendentious editing, where someone repeats his arguments endlessly without ever acknowledging that the conversation has moved on. It's a form of low-level disruptive editing that can be extremely aggravating over time, to the point of driving away editors who are fed up with the endless circular arguments. Gavin's problem, it seems to me, that he is unable or unwilling to accept that he has (in effect) lost the argument and that it's time to move on. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:06, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

As 2/0 advice, bring it in to WP:OR/N and argument the case there. Your edit above looks very good . You got a block for this on a technical reason, not for the content itself. Please bring it in on the WP:OR/N board which is the next logical step as pointed out by 2/0. Nsaa (talk)

• I think a "key point" is that consensus can change, but there are editors who have banded together at these articles to give the impression that that they won't let it change. UnitAnode 20:10, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Consensus changes when new information, or new analysis, or a new viewpoint, is available from respected sources. It shouldn't change because so many people are reciting the same erroneous or unsupported views that those who know what they're talking about get fed up with repeating themselves and find something more constructive to do with their free time. --Nigelj (talk) 20:53, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

It's what Ben Goldacre calls a "zombie argument". Except, I suppose, that the difference is that at least you can whack a zombie's brain to kill it for good, but these arguments just go shuffling on. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:58, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Zombies don't call for sources like GC did. GC's call for sources is what Misplaced Pages humanity is about. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 21:41, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

BozMo's suggestion may not be terrible, but let me request that we focus on where Gavin reraised this issue so as to prompt this request. It seems to have been his comment here. The comment seems to me directly relevant to WMC's suggestion that there be an AFD for Climate change consensus, which I believe he suggested was the content fork. Gavin commented that he didn't agree with that approach. Is this disruptive? I don't see it. Mackan79 (talk) 21:28, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

I am not making the case, I am only explaining my judgement which (as has been a courtesy habit) I leave for a second uninvolved admin opinion. As far as I went back Gavin.collins started arguing that "Scientific Opinion on Climate Change" was a POV fork going back to at least 10 Dec and was still going on on 27 Jan . In this period it went through an RFC which was closed under snow, got taken to various policy pages, changed in form to rename, merge etc., went through article and individual talk pages, got GC blocked for making his change against talk page consensus breaking 3RR had warnings from different admins but still after all the explanation given by many parties (plus a few agreements on bits and pieces) essentially the second edit shows a deep seated view that he is right and anyone who disagreed with him is wrong. --BozMo talk 21:47, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, yes, I think you're right the last edit you link does look more like carrying on rather than trying to do something more constructive. There are almost always other options to pushing for a name change in any case. Mackan79 (talk) 22:01, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

I think there is a larger issue here with Gavin's general discussion behavior. I'm not involved in the climate change stuff but have seen his contributions there and follows the same pattern that he has used in the past and currently at other places like WT:FICT, WT:N and so on. He has a very passive-aggressive tone, and presumes that policy and guidelines as he interprets them are the only correct answer, and generally is not open to the idea of "consensus drives policy". Everyone's free to their own opinion and the like and contribute to discussion, but Gavin seems to latch onto a specific cause with a few policy/guideline in his hands and fights even when there is strong consensus against him. The problem is there's absolutely nothing wrong (in terms of guidelines or policy for discussions) with Gavin's approach beyond rubbing people the wrong way and extending the useful life of discussion of a topic until he's either exhausted everyone else. There needs to be some understanding from Gavin to know when a discussion has passed an appropriate point and when consensus is overwhelmingly against his ideas and to just drop it. --MASEM (t) 22:51, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

With respect, that wider issue is not really for this page which exists for raising and dealing with probation violations on Climate Change only. There are other places for that, this should close as soon as we have decided what we do on Climate Change articles. --BozMo talk 22:57, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Sure, sure, I understand that it's only in the scope of this topic, but I only offer these points in consideration of whatever remedy is needed here and Gavin's long-term behavior in consideration. --MASEM (t) 23:01, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

The policy I was quoting was WP:DISPUTE "If the previous steps fail to resolve the dispute, try one of the following methods. Which ones you choose and in what order depends on the nature of the dispute and the preferences of people involved.". I read that as saying it is wrong to keep on with an argument without progressing, basically that don't flog the dead horse is covered by the policy. Not that I think one should be completely policy bound anyway but it is better if one tries to stay within them. Dmcq (talk) 23:28, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

• Comment As Mackan79 has already pointed out, I am open to going through the process of dispute resolution, and the fact that I have been persistent is in no way a black mark against me. I have participated in similar case, in which my proposal to clean up the original research in the article Kender was stonewalled by multiple editors for an extended period using many of the same tactics that have been employed here, namely to attack me, and blame me for the disagreements rather than address the content issues.
  The result of the mediation case was that the original research was removed, and replaced with sourced content. I don't wish to say that I am being stonewalled in this case, just that I feel three criticims of the article I made are, at least in part, valid, and I don't see why I should be forced out of participating in these discussions because some editors disagree with me, and have formed an opinion that voicing criticism indicates that I am acting in bad faith. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:51, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I notice that mediation was started by BOZ (different from BozMo!) after months of disruption and it ended as stalled after a few more months. There was some improvement to the article but many editors just left, there's comments like 'It would most certainly NOT mean "working" with Gavin again'. I shall repeat again, it is up to a person who feels they have a dispute or problem to either progress it or drop it. Not doing so and continually going on about the dispute is a conduct problem as it causes disruption. Please follow WP:DISPUTE when you feel you have a dispute and you are not making progress, just keeping on soapboxing against consensus is disruptive. Dmcq (talk) 12:50, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

In fairness to me, I welcomed the Kender mediation as means to end the personal attacks which had become a feature of the discussions, but once the mediation process was over, it seems BOZ could go back to saying what ever he liked, but that is his business. A feature of our discussions was it is difficult to accept arguments in the absense of source that "there is not a problem" as being little more a brush off. Sourcing in the lead of the article Scientific opinion on climate change is key to understanding what this article is about, yet it is currently sourced by original research. You can label my patience and persitance as Civil POV pushing if you like, but we really ought to be focusing on the article's content issues, not what you think of me or what my motivations are. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:46, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Your 'patience and persitance' is a conduct problem as you should follow WP:DISPUTE. Instead you are causing disruption. Follow the policy. Dmcq (talk) 14:37, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Why would it now be an article ban, just because of a general sense that he's difficult to work with? If he's so difficult to work with, then as he says, we should just ban him. I strongly oppose the strengthening of any sanction proposal on the basis of bluster, as this would be a bad idea even if it were applied evenly. Consider that yesterday WMC explained his problems as having to deal with too many "idiots." I'm still not sure there is disruption here to require a sanction; it is certainly micromanaging, but if there is such concern about his claim that this is a content fork then that seems to be the issue. Mackan79 (talk) 18:52, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

• I concur with Mackan here. This instabanning of one side, while coddling the hell out of the other has to stop. UnitAnode 19:00, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Let me understand this right. Is it that you are supporting that disruption should continue on this article talk page because you think Gavin.collins is a climate change sceptic and you think I am a believer and you think this would in some way balance WMC actions? This is your way of improving Misplaced Pages? Dmcq (talk) 18:00, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry but that's a bit ridiculous, Dmcq. My view is that we should have standards, and we should be able to say what they are, and admins should apply those standards. This will lead to much less disruption on the talk pages, because it will show that the system works the way a system is supposed to work. Mackan79 (talk) 08:48, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

If you don't want disruption can I ask you not to try making a point by supporting the continuance of disruption on this article thanks. Dmcq (talk) 11:16, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

You can ask me anything, civilly, but I'm surprised you haven't picked up that I do not find anything about Gavin.collins' actions so disruptive that he should be banned. I do think your confrontational style on the talk page has been unhelpful, and clearly we disagree about whether editors should be prohibited from continuing to state civilly that they disagree with a particular position, where it is relevant. I'm not sure that discussion will go further here at the moment. Mackan79 (talk) 20:08, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Well why don't you raise the point somewhere if you believe my interpretation of WP:DISPUTE is wrong? I believe in ending disputes rather than continuing them. I do not think Misplaced Pages is a talk shop for people to go on about things for months or years on end without any new ideas, it is not a social network site for people with nothing better to do than complain. Dmcq (talk) 21:32, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

• I would encourage Gavin.collins to appeal this article ban to the Arbcom. In such appeal, include relevant facts about the one-sided nature of nearly all administrative actions at this enforcement page. I don't think that the current group of "uninvolved" administrators will change course unless forced to do so by the committee. UnitAnode 20:51, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

• I doubt you can make a credible case that enforcement has consistently been biased one way or the other. After all LHvU and to a lesser extent Lar are involved, and they're hardly biased in favor of the "GWCab" as their friend Cla68 calls us (if anything the opposite). Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 21:07, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

They are, indeed, truly "uninvolved" admins. However, their sane voices are too often ignored. Name one major sanction against the "GWCab" that has arisen from this "enforcement" page. If you count the civility "requirement" about WMC, I'll just have to laugh. That is a joke, as was demonstrated when he flouted it immediately, and nothing was done. UnitAnode 21:11, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Result concerning Gavin.collins

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Well I have finished reading this and have indeed given this user calming advice before to no avail, but am uninvolved on the probation definitions. I propose that rather than prohibiting Gavin.collins from any Climate Change articles we simply prohibit him from ever again initiating or contributing to any discussion on any page on Misplaced Pages on whether any Climate Change articles are POV forks or need merging or demerging. I think this is minimal in impact and will allow him to contribute to articles but will stop a prolonged discussion which has become tenditious, bordering on obsessive. Do we have a seconder?--BozMo talk 21:05, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Could be, though the demarcation might get a bit blurry. I was more leaning towards an article ban, myself. On the other hand - Gavin.collins, would you be willing just to drop this particular issue? We can always come back here if the problematic points resurface in other issues. - 2/0 (cont.) 00:09, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

If you both feel that this article is not a content fork and that a mediation case would not be productive, then come out and say so and I will drop the issue. Likewise with the issue of the lead being comprised of originial research; if this is not an issue, then say so. The two issues are linked in my mind (together with the issues of the article's name, and the arbitary segregation of source scientific sources from other commentators), but I can decouple these points. Otherwise just ban me, and be done with it.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:15, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

You remain free to seek mediation or other steps in the dispute resolution process, but your current conduct at Talk:Scientific opinion on climate change has been disruptive. Whether I think the lead comprises original research is completely immaterial - that would be for Misplaced Pages:No original research/Noticeboard. If you agree to stop blustering at that talkpage, I think we can just drop this and move on. I think that that is the best result you can hope for at this board, which is focused on behaviour, not content. - 2/0 (cont.) 10:09, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't have an opinion on the content fork issue and haven't even read the article concerned to comment on the OR issue but I do notice a considerable weight of opinion against this going back many weeks, and that you keep arguing it absolutely relentlessly across different pages. I am not very keen on you starting again on a load of policy pages on this same issue but I would rather you carried on contributing to Misplaced Pages. But yes I would accept that you agree to drop this issue and find somewhere else to contribute as an outcome. Or what I proposed above which is intended to be light touch --BozMo talk 10:42, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Clearly from above comment which I have moved to the right place Gavin.collins does not seem to recognise any problem with his behaviour, and just wants this process to get out of his way. I don't think a co-operative solution looks promising: I move to article ban. --BozMo talk 15:11, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Banned from Scientific opinion on climate change and Talk:Scientific opinion on climate change for three months, with the exception of being free to open a thread at an appropriate noticeboard (there does not seem to have been an WP:OR/N discussion, which would seem the next logical step) or a mediation case? Gavin.collins is arguing from policy (whether correctly applied or not I would not venture), so I think we need to leave pursuit of further dispute resolution open. Beating the same drum at the talkpage has become disruptive, though. - 2/0 (cont.) 18:33, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Attention: This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.

Request concerning William_M._Connolley

User requesting enforcement

Heyitspeter (talk) 04:43, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

User against whom enforcement is requested

William_M._Connolley (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated

Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

Violations on Climate Change project pages and articles

WP:Civil / WP:NPA

1. "spoon feeding for the hard of understanding"
2. "AQFK's assertions of impartiality indeed appear 'laughable'...Could we try to stick to reality, please"
3. [http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Misplaced Pages:General_sanctions/Climate_change_probation/Requests_for_enforcement&diff=338742824&oldid=338736723 NimbusWeb

an "over-enthusiastic noob"]

1. "What are you on, old fruit?"
2. "If you don't want to be condescended to, I suggest you stop making quite so many mistakes."
3. "@MN:noob"
4. "repair for the incompetent"
5. "this entire section is stupid"
6. Unproductive jab ("utter rubbish").
7. Adds an insinuation that an editor is a fool to his comment
8. Adds an accusation of bias to his comment
9. "MN is, as usual, defending anything anti-GW, regardless of reality"

WP:Consensus / WP:Disrupt violations

1. Removes entire section with no consensus
2. Again, 24 hours later

These removals were in violation of WP:V, a policy WMC knows well as a one-time administrator. See in particular "The code section was utter rubbish, based on a misunderstanding by Newsnight" (Newsnight is a programme on the BBC)

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban, or other sanction)

Topic ban (Edit: I don't really care how it's dealt with, frankly, I just think it should be dealt with. Whatever makes the most sense.)

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction)

{{{Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction)}}}

Additional comments by editor filing complaint

The current request is filed a) for enforcement with respect to William M. Connolley's WP:Civil and WP:NPA violations that weren't dealt with in the earlier requests, and b) for enforcement with respect to violations committed since those threads were closed (these include further WP:Civil and WP:NPA violations, along with WP:Disrupt and WP:V violations). WMC has received repeated warnings for his behavior and has demonstrated that he has no plans to alter it. It would help if he stepped away from the GW articles. His additions/subtractions are hindering, not helping.

(A little background: Two requests were recently filed against WMC, but neither dealt with the current concerns. The first covered his refactoring of user comments, resulting in WMC's being "required to refrain until 2010-07-27 from editing others' talkpage posts in pages subject to this probation even in cases where the talk page guidelines would otherwise indicate that it could or should be done; he is further warned to refrain from using septic and similar derogatory terms, and to promptly refactor any unintentional typos." (see original text here). The above diffs do not concern his use of the term "septic," as he has been formally warned about this. The second request was closed without result as it concerned refactoring too.)

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested

Discussion concerning William_M._Connolley

Statement by William_M._Connolley

was correct. As noted, there are no RS for that section (or rather, there are no RS for the first part; the rebuttal is fine, because it is by people who have a clue), and it is wrong. There is no consensus to *keep* that section William M. Connolley (talk) 19:49, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

TGL said If I'm misunderstanding his actual role then he is free to correct me - yes, you're hopelessly confused. You can look at the papers if you want. GIGO does appear to apply William M. Connolley (talk) 22:28, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Comments by others about the request concerning William_M._Connolley

My complaint listed some blatant BLP violations and the result was an ambiguous sort of "Please don't do that again" (without referring to the BLP violations). Honestly, if someone has a consistent long-term pattern of making BLP violations against skeptics (he does) then they shouldn't be editing those articles. TheGoodLocust (talk) 05:39, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

As for your comment on Newsnight, Connolley seems to have a problem with lots of sources (New York Times, BBC) when they don't get things "right" (in his mind). Unfortunately, he has been shown to be wrong in his declarations of what is correct and what is not, which is why WP:VERIFY is followed - not an editor's opinion on whether the sources are right or not. Honestly, this bending/breaking of[REDACTED] policy comes off as intentionally obstructionist and even when presented with evidence of his own WP:CIVIL violations he refuses to acknowledge the evidence that everyone else can clearly see. TheGoodLocust (talk) 05:44, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From Short Brigade Harvester Boris: One senses a "piling on" here: as soon as one complaint against WMC is closed another is filed, covering the same issues as in previous complaints (as TGL points out). Pressing the same issues over and over and over again until one achieves the result one wants isn't really in the spirit of dispute resolution. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 07:22, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I tried to make this clear. The current request concerns numerous violations committed since the earlier enforcement, and numerous violations that were not dealt with as a category by the earlier request (and not because they weren't actionable). Consider this a second installment to be dealt with while remaining cognizant of the other "ruling," rather than an attempt to push out that ruling. It's quite the opposite, really... (p.s., TGL didn't say that this covered the same issues raised earlier. He mentioned BLP violations which aren't under consideration.) --Heyitspeter (talk) 07:54, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Statement from Unitanode

As there are recent diffs involved, which do appear (at least on the surface) problematic, I see no problem with this request. WMC often uses his edit summaries to belittle sources, edits, and editors. He needs to stop this, or be stopped from doing it. UnitAnode 07:41, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From ChyranandChloe: How do we deal with civil PoV pushing? That's what I'm wondering about. Was civility intended to allow issues to be raised over and over again like a child at a toy shop until they get what they want? And that a stern no, you do not understand, would be impolite? ChyranandChloe (talk) 07:59, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From Off2riorob: I would have thought that considering the only very recent additional civility conditions applied to WMC in reference to demeaning other editors that this edit on his talkpage from yesterday is a violation of those conditions, he clearly refers to editors as the idiots. Off2riorob (talk) 08:14, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From ChrisO: Sigh - here we go again. It should be obvious to all by now that there is an ongoing campaign against WMC by his detractors on and off-wiki. Frankly it is hard to assume good faith of this complaint. At what point will this be declared vexatious? -- ChrisO (talk) 08:16, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, his off-wiki detractors include several journalists and scientists (and whose articles WMC edits). Is this what you were referring to? TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:37, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm aware of LS and Delingwhatver- who else are you thinking of? Can't think of any scientists. You can't possibly mean Watts-up-with-my-failure-to-understand-wiki can you? He's not a scientist. So who are these masked scientists? I think the world should be told! William M. Connolley (talk) 19:44, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Timothy Ball for one. You've edited his articles, he's been critical of you and he is indeed a scientist. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:00, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From Oren0: On the one hand, these repeated WMC threads are tiresome. On the other hand, these diffs are all from the last few days. What does it say that different editors keep putting up new diffs of the same type of behavior and nothing ever happens? It seems to me that the community needs to decide whether repeated and unapologetic violations of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA will be overlooked because WMC is seen by many as a longstanding positive contributor. Almost any other editor would have been sanctioned or banned by now. Do the rules apply to everyone or not? Oren0 (talk) 08:42, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Most of the diffs cited by TGL are old - pre-dating the civility parole (or whatever you want to call it) imposed by 2/0 on 27 January. It is frankly debatable whether the two diffs post-dating that warning are violations at all. Using old diffs is not a sign of a good faith complaint. This complaint is almost entirely an attempt to re-litigate the last one, which was closed in a way that evidently didn't suit TGL's goals. -- ChrisO (talk) 08:46, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

:)

ChrisO, I'm the one filing the request, not TGL.

That diffs pre-dating the results of the previous request were included in the current filing wasn't hidden, it was pointed out in the "additional comments by editor" section. The earlier filing had nothing to do with the current violations. Would you retract the accusation of bad faith? I think there may have been a misunderstanding.--Heyitspeter (talk) 09:40, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From Mackan79 Unless there's something really bad here, which I don't see, I don't see the point in adding sanctions to sanctions that were just imposed. Try something and see if it works, don't try something and then immediately try another thing. Mackan79 (talk) 09:01, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Striking comment, on the basis of the above enforcement against Gavin.collins which was strengthened for some weak bluster on his part in response to the proposed remedy. WMC's comments yesterday attributing his problems to a group of idiots is at least equally problematic. I do not agree with this pattern of enforcement, but if that is the standard then WMC's sanction should be increased in the same manner, and this report should not be dismissed. Mackan79 (talk) 19:01, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From Nigelj There is more to writing an encyclopedia than trawling through blogs and the popular media, finding something that mentions a topic, and sticking it straight into the article. People with very little background in climate change science, data analysis, computer programming, computer modeling or any other related field are going to have a hard time applying WP:WEIGHT and other necessary judgement calls to what they read in the popular press. Even the journalists and the bloggers are having a hard time getting up-to-speed, and many of them are failing to do so in this complex subject area. Some bloggers and journalists that do understand the issues, unfortunately are using the fact that they know that most of their readership do not, to blind us with science and pull the wool over our eyes for political reasons, or 'just because they can'. For the few regular editors who do understand the issues involved, having repeatedly to defend well-written and balanced articles against such non-expert or uninformed edits can be tiresome. Sometimes, the easiest way to close down a discussion that is based on false premises, and so is going nowhere, is to point out the obvious - that the contender is not fully aware of the facts. This may be disappointing to someone who feels that they have found a choice quote and wants it prominently displayed in the article. But, really, they wouldn't expect to be able to do that on the Laws of thermodynamics or Semiconductor device modeling, so why do they feel that they should be considered domain experts on complex global warming sub-topics? Without WMC and a few others' overview and expertise, WP would be little better than Conservapedia in these areas by now. People are going to have to learn to live with that disappointment. --Nigelj (talk) 09:44, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

• So, calling other editors "idiots", and "yahoos" yesterday isn't a violation of his restrictions? That just doesn't make any sense. I fully understand that their is WMC fatigue at this board. However, that doesn't mean that he should be allowed to blatant violate hid "required to" restrictions, just because there have been 3 threads about him lately. If "idiots" and "yahoos" do not constitute a violation of it, what will? UnitAnode 14:52, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Lenience is usually given to users on their own talk-page when a sanction has just been invoked. Lets people blow off steam. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 16:56, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, no. That "lenience" is for blocked users, not people who were just sanctioned for incivility. That doesn't even make any sense. UnitAnode 17:05, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

That's today's excuse. Tomorrow it will be he's being harassed. The next day it will be some technicality like "does linking to an offsite essay on fools really constitute and attack?" The next day it will be "it's been FOUR whole days since his last attack so cut him some slack". There will always be an excuse. ATren (talk) 17:17, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Phonetically noob looks like it stands for newbie, or is there a darker sense of the word? --BozMo talk 16:47, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Yet another justification from people regarding WMC's name-calling. UnitAnode 16:50, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually Bozmo there are two ways to use noob although it can be used derogatory manner this was not the case when WMC used it against me, the context is everything with this word :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Marknutley (talk • contribs)

Bozmo, see Noob. -- ChrisO (talk) 17:03, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Well Nigel, I can only speak to my experience and observations where WMC and his friends do everything they can to keep out newspaper articles they don't agree with and, in fact, "blogs" are oddly enough not a problem when they link back to WMC's ex-blog (which they seem to do a lot). Your "expertise' argument makes little sense due to WMC's controversial edits regarding pro-AGW political organizations and his BLP-violating tendencies (towards skeptics), and, in fact, I believe he is was "climate modeller," which basically means he plugged in number into a computer program - this would give one very little expertise in the actual processes themselves (e.g. GIGO). TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:44, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Considering the complaint here is that WMC is not acceptably civil, do you think stating that he "basically plugged in number into a computer program" and "this would give one very little expertise in the actual processes themselves," and finally, stating he was involved in a garbage-in-garbage-out operation above, below or at the level of civility that WMC would have to demonstrate to avoid sanction, so that he can understand exactly what degree of incivility you consider appropriate. Hipocrite (talk) 19:48, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I have a background in comp sci and GIGO is a well-known and fundamental principle. If I'm misunderstanding his actual role then he is free to correct me, but to the best of my knowledge that was his role - and it doesn't make a person an expert climatologist just like coding a word processor doesn't make a person a good writer. Thanks for proving my earlier point about how those who comment on WMC will be attacked or threatened. Gee, I wonder why you guys think you can do that as much as you want? TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:57, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't think I'm attacking you, I'm trying to figure out what you, think is an acceptable level of incivility. As I have a background in banking, I can tell you that calling my collegues "fucking assholes," is considered perfectly civil, but assuming that they do and do not understand certain things in the field in which they profess knowledge is considered a serious slight. As such, would it be appropriate for me to call you a fucking asshole? No, obviously not! As such, please refrain from questioning if an identifiable living person lacks the credentials which they have demonstrated, and avoid using lingo that while considered civil in your local area, is not considered broadly civil. (Like saying someone is working with garbage data). Hipocrite (talk) 20:06, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I specifically linked the GIGO article so it could be understood instead of misconstrued in order to make an incivility accusation. As I said, it is a well-known principle, and if you look at the context I was making it clear that making a modelling program isn't going to give a person a fundamental understanding of the data or how that data was derived. Seriously, try holding WMC to the same bizarre standard you are trying to hold to me. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:16, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Whatever you meant, remind me not to ask you to help with my CV: You make WMC sound like a data-input clerk who couldn't even get that right, inputting garbage and so getting garbage out. And you say he has 'very little expertise' in climate physics itself? On what do you base that assertion? --Nigelj (talk) 20:25, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent> I have no idea if he has significant expertise regarding climate physics. The point I was making is that neither does anybody else. Being a "climate modeller" is something you'd put on your resume to show your programming experience - not an expertise in climatology. The problem is that people keep on fluffing up his credentials as a way of saying he doesn't need to follow[REDACTED] policies regarding sourcing, verifiability, BLP and civility. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:38, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Right. So you're here to bring him down a peg or two, using your knowledge of his academic and professional career. Good plan. --Nigelj (talk) 20:46, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

You were the one fluffing up his record and saying other people were quoting blogs (not being critical of WMC's blog inserting activities) - I was merely correctly the record. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:56, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

So why did you bring up your unverifiable beliefs about his career? WMC's reputation here rests on positive contributions he has made to Misplaced Pages over the years, he has to follow policies as everyone else has to. These policies include commenting on actual edits rather than making unsourced allegations about people's credentials. Please comply. You've made some allegations above, please supply diffs. . . dave souza, talk 21:08, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Sure, here is a diff of him quoting his own blog. Are you telling me you were seriously unaware of him and his friends quoting his old blog as a reliable source? TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:46, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Eh, it's not his own blog, and at first glance it's expert opinion by Beate Liepert which appears to meet rs for selfpublished sources. Rather off topic, if you want to keep trying please take it to the talk page of this notice board. Thanks, dave souza, talk 22:02, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, but he is one of maybe 10 contributors to that blog - it isn't like it is HuffPo where there are hundreds of contributors. TheGoodLocust (talk) 22:10, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Dear Thegoodlocust;

WMC dosen't contribute there anymore(), and all, and was only involved in the technical side, basically. Could you please stop casting aspersions about identifiable living persons? I think everyone would really appreciate it if you considered removing all of your comments about WMC's real life occupation and competence.

With the most abject politeness

Hipocrite Hipocrite (talk) 22:13, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent> And yet he made a post after his apparent depature, and, indeed has blogged several times on the subject of climate change there. I didn't notice the website saying he worked only on the technical side of things - how would you know something like that Hipocrite? Anyway, I didn't bring up his outside occupation, one of his defenders did with the "expertise" argument for BLP-violations and incivility - I was merely correcting the record on what his actual expertise consisted of. TheGoodLocust (talk) 22:23, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I tried asking polietly above. I'll try begging now. Please stop refering derogatorily to peoples offwiki careers and remove your prior discussion of how WMC was a glorified data monkey? Thanks! Hipocrite (talk) 22:26, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I've collapsed the above comments as rather off topic and a personal attack referring to a users offwiki work. Can we keep civil and on topic? I believe sanctions may be in order regarding the attack in the collapsed section above. Vsmith (talk) 21:37, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm sure you do Vsmith, you've long defended Connolley and his activity while sanctioning those who point out his faults and activities. TheGoodLocust (talk) 21:47, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

See WP:AGF & WP:NPA. . . dave souza, talk 22:02, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

What happened to the collapse? Might i point out something here to everyone, when a RFS is brought against WMC it very quickly degenerates into a slanging match. All this achieves is the entire request is ruined by the bickering, i see people annoyed at 2/0 for quickly closing these requests out. Look at what he has to deal with. I would ask everyone that is someone makes a comment they disagree with (like TGL and Hippocrite above) they should take it to the users talk page, and keep these requests for sanction to actually deal with the request and not fill it up with bickering mark nutley (talk) 22:41, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I broadly agree with MN above. Filing an enforcement request against WMC does not give one open license to denigrate him personally and professionally, as has repeatedly been done above. On the other hand those who have complaints deserve for them to be taken seriously (at least up to the point where they become clearly contentious). As a tactical matter in disputes like this the first "side" to quit slanging mud is the winner. Taking the high road gives your concerns credibility rather than turning the light on your own behavior.

And 2/0 is stuck in the middle. No matter what he does, someone will object that it is too severe / not severe enough / biased toward the other guy's side / biased toward the other other guy's side / ad infinitum. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 22:56, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

EC...Thegoodlocust decided to undo the collapse and keep up his attacks. I don't plan to edit war over it and I guess other admins watching are offline(?) it's Friday evening/night slowdown time I guess. Or just watch and let 'em dig a deeper hole... and my connection is really slow for this looong page (maybe snow 'tween me and the satellite?) Vsmith (talk) 23:03, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Another admin asked for me for a diff and then you collapsed. Apparently I was either going to get banned for making unsubstantiated accusations or for uncollapsing your collapse. No wonder few people want to call out WMC with the chilling behavior of some admins - and I say few because I often see other uninvolved editors comment on the unfortanate state of the global warming articles. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:25, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Please note I'm acting as an editor, not as an admin. Your diff from 2005 does not say much about current behavioural issues. . . dave souza, talk 00:00, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent> The point was that NigelJ was criticizing others for using blogs as sources (not something I usually do), but WMC and his friends have a habit of quoting not just blogs, but WMC's own ex-blog. It was a minor point meant to highlight the inconsistency of criticism and as for the date of the diff it was just the first one that came up in a search - there are plenty out there. TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:18, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

From JPatterson - It is obvious to me that WMC is a valued contributor here and perhaps it is true that expertise, like love, covers a multitude of sins. What puzzles me is why someone with such a command of the science needs to resort so often to condescension and personal denigration of those who disagree with him. Poking and prodding frustrated editors has no upside that I can see. His defenders, and they are legion, rightly advise his detractors to argue the content and not make comments about the editor. Would that they would offer the same advice to William. If he would take it, it would go a long way towards blunting the criticisms of one-sided enforcement. And if he has grown so weary of fending off the hordes that he is no longer capable of civil discourse perhaps a break is in order. There are many others willing and able to take up his cause in his absence. JPatterson (talk) 23:35, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Agree that I'd like to see WMC show more politeness, the stress of being hounded by persistent civil pov-pushers is some explanation but not an excuse. Having said that, he's shown care to make his remarks general and not personal attacks, and civil discourse isn't the same thing as extreme politeness, desirable as that often is. This whole section seems to be based on one revert one day, and after discussion another revert more than 24 hours later, complying with the letter of the sanction. Comparing his behaviour to other more egregious cases isn't useful. . . dave souza, talk 00:00, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Out of curiousity, how long has WMC's behavior been harmed by "persistent civil pov-pushers?" He's been making BLP violations against skeptics for many years - what is his excuse for that? And what is the excuse for not sanctioning him for such behavior? TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:20, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

From Heyitspeter: Just thought I'd point this out for those who love irony. It wasn't included in the above diffs. At this diff, you can see where WMC's response to the formal enforcement warning ("to refrain from using septic and similar derogatory terms") breaks the terms of that warning ("this is silly and a victory for the yahoo's"). Concerns with the grammar and civility of this sentence are brought to his attention, at which point he addresses the grammar concerns but declines to address civility, adding, "I lack your patience with the idiots," transgressing the enforcement again.

A condition for a personal attack is that it is personal. This is a personal attack. Talking about the stupidity/idiocy/yahooness of Misplaced Pages editors in general is an opinion, not a personal attack. Despite what it may seem, this is not Mrs. Merdle's Finishing School for Young Ladies. I can say "fuck" here. I cannot say "fuck you" (in the singular). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:38, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Hey Stephan Schulz. Would you mind reading my comment one more time? I know this thread is getting very complex. This wasn't in regards to WP:NPA, this was in regards to WMC's ignoring the warning given in the earlier enforcement on this page. I quoted the relevant text in the comment you're responding to here: WMC was "warned to refrain from using septic and similar derogatory terms."

That said, if "warnings" don't hold weight then this may not be too important. --Heyitspeter (talk) 03:38, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

This is most definitely not a Finishing School, and we are also not toddlers (I hope). Given these things, when someone refers to 'yahoos' and their 'victory', it would take willful blindness not to acknowledge that this is directed toward a specific group of editors, and is -poison- to working collaboratively. In other words, WP:BATTLE. Arkon (talk) 00:44, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

So is creating a page where he categorizes prominent climate skeptics as "septics" a personal attack, a BLP violation or both? I'd love to see a defense of this. TheGoodLocust (talk) 00:42, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

That's absolutely ludicrous, Stephan, even for an ardent WMC defender. Claiming that insulting an entire subset of your opponents by calling them "idiots" and "yahoos" is just beyond the pale of what can be accurately called reasonable discussion. If I (or ATren, or TGL, or Heyitspeter) wrote, "The pro-AGW crowd are batshit insane liars", we would be blocked almost before we clicked save. UnitAnode 00:46, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Might I suggest that you model the behavior you wish to see in others? A very quick look at your talk page shows you referring to another editor's comments as "utter bullshit," and that you have been warned by an admin for referring to good-faith edits as "vandalism." Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:31, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh, stop Boris. Comparing saying "That's bullshit" in reference to someone's statement is not remotely similar to saying that other editors are idiots and yahoos. As for the "vandalism" thing, I should probably let your utter misrepresentation of the facts fall on its own, but I'll just say that what the other editor was doing (while not, technically, "vandalism", as I acknowledged and apologized for), was WELL outside of policy. One way or the other, stop deflecting from the issue by attacking me. We're discussing WMC's complete flouting of what was supposed to be a civility requirement. I note also that your "quick look" (yeah, right) led you to the ONLY two remotely contentious threads at my talkpage. UnitAnode 18:10, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm the editor in question and I was none too pleased by the exchange. UnitAnode wasn't merely out of line to accuse me of vandalism and mass-revert my edits, he was just flat-out wrong as a content matter and pursuing an attempt to change policy. I'm not going to carry onto this page a claim about UnitAnode's edits in a different topic area, and would not have said a word if I were not being accused here again, but this is the third major arbcom, article probation, and/or Arbcom-related topic area where I've seen this kind of behavior in recent weeks. I'd appreciate a toning down by about 95% of accusations of misbehavior leveled by all sides at the long-term productive editors around here with which one simply happens to disagree regarding content. - Wikidemon (talk) 20:49, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

That's not to condone in any way WMC's (do I have to spell it out every time, really?) approach. "idiots" and "yahoos" is indeed farther over the line on the WP:CIVIL scale than "bullshit" and "vandalism", though the effect is the same, to alienate people you're supposed to be collaborating with and cut off any chance for productive discussion. It takes us off track, and I don't think it's fair, to bring up UnitAnode's behavior, or mine, or anyone else's in this section, which is supposed to be about a single editor. - Wikidemon (talk) 20:56, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I said I was wrong to classify it as vandalism. That should have been the end of it. Please let it go. UnitAnode 20:58, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Excuse me, on the letting-go front I am responding to a statement you just made about me. I believe I just said that this section should not be a general forum for criticizing other editors. If you're willing to do that, then let's do it! We're in agreement about the substance of the present conversation, about 80% anyway. You can have the last word but please don't put me down yet again here. Thanks, - Wikidemon (talk) 21:12, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Request for analysis

Comment to 2/0 Can I ask you to go through the diffs provided, and explain how each is not actionable, or not a violation of the probation? Arkon (talk) 17:26, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I'd be interested in seeing your diff-by-diff explanation of this as well 2/0. UnitAnode 17:34, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I as well. ATren (talk) 19:06, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

As an uninvolved administrator who agrees with WMC on actual content issues, I too would "fourth" this request. NW (Talk) 21:45, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree .. why not, we must be fair here. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 23:01, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I venture to suggest that this is not the portrait of an editor we should be topic banning. WMC has been markedly more diplomatic in expressing his opinions since the recent sanction was imposed than at some times past. This is precisely what the sanction was meant to drive home - supporting or opposing an edit with well-reasoned policy-based arguments is good; supporting or opposing an edit with reasoning and reference to past history of the editor can be good or bad depending on how it is done, though sticking to the first approach should obviate any need for it; commenting on a specific editor or group of editors is usually bad, or always if a comment is denigrating or insulting. If he starts attacking other editors then we should do something about it, but at present I think the point is taken. There are plenty of people watching his edits, so I feel confident that yet another enforcement thread will be raised and further sanction imposed if and when he steps over the line. There is *far* too much drawing up the battle lines in this topic area and at this board, and quite generally it interferes with article building and probation enforcement both. - 2/0 (cont.) 19:26, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

2/0, this wasn't what people asked for. Anyone can give a minimalist summary of a given diff. Also your descriptions are in many places misleading/wrong. I haven't looked through all of them, but some highlights so far include "AQFK's assertions of impartiality indeed appear "laughable"... Could we try to stick to reality, please" summarized as "fails to refocus debate", and "That you can't tell them apart is quite significant" summarized as "adds suggestion that another editor take more care to previous." In diffs 13, 21, 29, 39 you imply that WMC appeals to WP policy, which he emphatically does not. And compare your summary of what is currently diff #9 with mine.

Here is the request that was seconded, thirded and fourthed: "Can I ask you to go through the diffs provided, and explain how each is not actionable, or not a violation of the probation?" Please either edit the list you've given to match this request or create a new one. This is frustrating and unhelpful.--Heyitspeter (talk) 02:03, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, I looked at another diff after reading HeyitsPeter's analysis (which I thought was good), in this instance I looked at #37, where you say Connolley is defending WP:BLP, but if you look at the actual edit and the source, then the editor was going by the source (the Times) pretty much word for word. This sort of standard is entirely inconsistent as well since Connolley has been shown to violate BLP quite often (against skeptics) and much more blatantly. TheGoodLocust (talk) 03:03, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Eh, it doesn't really matter in the end, as what was asked for wasn't a description of 67 diffs, it was an explanation of how each of the diffs provided in this request are not actionable, or not in violation of the probation (I hope it's recognized that these diffs could be determined to be actionable, 2/0).--Heyitspeter (talk) 03:20, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps I missed it, but I didn't see your analysis (which was overall rather interesting) of his BLP violating categorization of prominent climate scientists as "septics?" I'd say that anyone compiling such a policy violating list is inherently incapable of editing those articles neutrally - his pattern of BLP violations is reason enough for a topic ban. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:03, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

• Your glossing over his referral to those who requested sanction against him for his incivility as "the mob" and "yahoos" in #2 is quite disappointing. This was the exact type thing for which he was sanctioned. And the edit was almost immediately following the sanctions. UnitAnode 20:55, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I think it's time for an RFC/U to get the biased admins off this enforcement page. ATren (talk) 22:11, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Give people a chance... If I had a nickel for every time I came across as an asshole online over a misunderstanding I'd have a lot of nickels. 2/0's been open to changing his mind/perspective before due to concerns raised. It feels like the pattern you're following is "Mistake->Fuck you" where you could follow "Mistake->You made a mistake!->Sorry about that." or, I suppose, "Mistake->You made a mistake!->Fuck you->Fuck you." Just a thought. It's difficult to operate bilaterally with people that are explicitly attacking you.--Heyitspeter (talk) 03:07, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Concur with HeyItsPeter. WMC's edit here is a clear violation of assume good faith and a personal attack on my character. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:13, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Trying the Community's Patience

I think the sheer volume of insults, toxic debate, article ownership, and constant POV-pushing by WMC that have resulted in complaint after complaint, appeal after appeal, de-sysoping, and arbcomm work suggest that WCM has seriously tried the patience of the Misplaced Pages community and that he has become very much of a net liability to the project, and I would suggest a ban, at the very least from AGW articles and perhaps from Misplaced Pages editing altogether.Spoonkymonkey (talk) 16:48, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

This spin-doctored fantasy stuff really has to end. There is no way that comment fairly reflects reality, and this entire thread is another example of the "fling mud until something sticks" approach I outlined in the previous anti-WMC thread. I think WMC could make a logical case that he is being unfairly harassed by ideologues. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:18, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

While I don't agree with the solution proposed in the initial post of this sub-thread, the main thread isn't "flinging mud" at all. And if it were, WMC provides the dirt, mixes it with the water, and smears it all over himself with how he treats other editors. He calls people "idiots" and "yahoos", even after a motion is passed requiring him to stop doing so. He's become a problem editor, that much is clear. How to solve that problem is what needs to be discussed. UnitAnode 17:29, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

No. The problem here is that WMC is now under constant attack from editors who disagree with him. Under such an onslaught, he is struggling to remain diplomatic. Probation is designed to reduce conflict and calm down problem areas, but here the process is being abused by editors who seek to have WMC thrown out of the project. Shameful wikilawyering, basically. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:50, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry Scjessy, when exactly has he been diplomatic? He has been uncivil to anyone who does not agree with him for years, I have looked at the history of his contributions and he has a terrible habit of putting sarcastic comments and insults into his edit summarys. So either he has been besieged for years and has valiantly kept his temper as you suggest (obviously not looking at his history) or he is just plain old rude and always has been. Do you not think that given his history people have just gotten fed up of it? and this is why they are complaining here? mark nutley (talk) 18:01, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh please. He responded to the warning not to use derogatory terms with two more derogatory terms! How can it be more obvious than that? This was not baiting; none of the so-called hoards of harassers appeared there, it was only 2/0 stating the decision. If I got a warning on my talk page telling me not to say "foo", and I responded with "FOO! FOO!", how long would it take for me to be blocked? The continued protection of this problem editor by his ideological allies must stop. ATren (talk) 18:05, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I have to agree with Mark and ATren. Claiming WMC is simply a victim of attacks is willfully ignoring the evidence at hand. UnitAnode 18:06, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

See how you all gather to pile on? You are making my point for me. -- Scjessey (talk) 18:10, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, so our arguments in support of maintaining civil discourse are "piling on", "harassment", and "wikilawyering", while WMC's "idiots and yahoos" insults are no big deal? Perhaps you should consider your own position. I would suggest that the "piling on" and "harassment" charges are more aptly directed at those who defend WMC's smears, and who have defended this kind of incivility for years. ATren (talk) 18:17, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

How is the world is calling your fellow editors "idiots" and "yahoos" being diplomatic? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:14, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

It depends on whether or not the yahoos are behaving like idiots, I suppose. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:59, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

This is just so far over the line that I find it impossible to imagine you didn't know that it was completely inappropriate to post it before you hit save. Good grief! UnitAnode 21:01, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Well Scjessey, you once said that "billions" would die due to global warming. I know if I really believed that then I'd feel obligated to do whatever it took to stop that - as such, your defense of WMC is not surprising.TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:06, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I really don't think anybody cares what you think. Your function on Misplaced Pages appears to be to provoke drama and assume bad faith wherever you go. Certainly there is little evidence of you having made any useful contributions to article space. -- Scjessey (talk) 20:12, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Based on this and your other posts here, you should either voluntarily remove yourself from this discussion, or be involuntarily removed by an administrator. You need to stop this stuff now. UnitAnode 21:03, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

There needs to be a measure of understanding for editors on both sides, and I think this incident shows it. If you ban editors for petty infractions, as is often happening around here ("Ooh look what he said here. This is not encouraging"), then it looks bad when the same won't be applied evenly. It definitely shortens the time frame that this process will be widely accepted. Mackan79 (talk) 20:46, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

No-one has been banned for petty infractions, as you know well William M. Connolley (talk) 22:31, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

To the contrary. A couple of days ago, BozMo moved to ban User:Gavin.collins with this comment. In your shoes, I know I wouldn't be comfortable having this reasoning applied to myself. I'm sure you believe there are extraneous circumstances only in his case, but it was petty, as it would be here. Mackan79 (talk) 04:30, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I find that diff very interesting since Bozmo is saying Gavin doesn't recognize the problem with his behavior, which I must say is the same impression I have of WMC due to the several times he has denied (despite being shown the diffs) he has called other "septics." I do agree that a problem cannot be solved unless it is first recognized. TheGoodLocust (talk) 06:52, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Calling opposing editors "yahoos" is "expressing disappointment"?

2/0, your analysis classifies WMC's statement "This is silly and a victory for the yahoo's" as "expressing disappointment". Further, when he called us idiots, you said it's "not actionable", even though both of these insult occurred just below (indeed, in response to) your own warning stating "(WMC) is further warned to refrain from using septic and similar derogatory terms".

2/0, how can you justify this position? If "idiots" and "yahoos" is not derogatory, what exactly is?

Frankly, this gives the appearance that the original warning was a sham, simply made to give the appearance of even-handedness. And your recent defense of his brazen violation make it seem even more so. Once again, I am asking that you step back from enforcement of this page. ATren (talk) 05:06, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

• I have to agree. This "analysis" of his insults is quite odd. The "blowing off steam" de facto exemption isn't meant to apply to this type of case. It's meant to apply to blocked users who are angry at the blocking administrator. This smacks of rationalization of bad behavior. UnitAnode 05:25, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Result concerning William_M._Connolley

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Move to close as no action. Heyitspeter, I usually look to you to be something of a moderating voice - what happened? This looks more like an attempt to drive off someone with whom you are in a content disagreement, and not like you at all. While the standard of discourse could be higher all around (hint: including at this page), this does not appear to be actionable. - 2/0 (cont.) 10:30, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

This whole section is a mess that isn't at all productive. Close. Prodego 06:54, 31 January 2010 (UTC)