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Disruptive talk page notices by User:SPECIFICO

SPECIFICO (talk · contribs · count · api · block log)

As noted elsewhere, User:SPECIFICO explicitly has stated he is an Austrian School economist who thinks those connected to the Ludwig von Mises Institute which he sees as a competing economics faction are "hijackers" and "multi-level marketing" schemers. He has made biased edits and reverts on several related articles and his POV is so strong he fails or refuses per IDIDNTHEARTHAT to understand clear explanations of policy. He now has taken to leaving me eight questionable and even baseless Talk page "Notices" over the last two weeks, including three under one header, that look like attempts to disrupt my comments and editing. He is starting to do this as well to User talk:Id4abel who also has problems with his editing on these articles.

• June 15: Edit warring warning regarding this diff at Austrian economist Jesús Huerta de Soto article, discussed at User_talk:Carolmooredc#SOTO.

This was a false accusation of 3rr where I had to explain his own edit warring to him.

• June 20: Three different warning notices at once regarding this diff at an RfC on another topic, discussed at User_talk:Carolmooredc#Section_header.

I did launch into a general soapbox discussion of editing issues, but it obviously was not a personal attack on another editor, one who I was quite unfamiliar with. And I did strike it.

• June 21: Disruptive editing warning regarding this diff at WP:OR Noticeboard, discussed at User_talk:Carolmooredc#OR_noticeboard.

Because I complained about User:SPECIFICO coming to the WP:OR noticeboard to dismiss policy issues and refusing to discuss policy. See the seven section discussion of his WP:OR entries to Huerta de Soto article.

• June 26: Edit warring complaint regarding this diff at Huerta de Soto article, discussed at User_talk:Carolmooredc#Skousen.

My first revert of WP:OR discussed at both Talk:Jesús_Huerta_de_Soto#More_WP:OR_using_Skousen and Talk:Jesús_Huerta_de_Soto#Removal_of_Barry-related_WP:OR.2FSynth.

• June 27: Edit war warning regarding this diff at Austrian economist Murray Rothbard article, discussed at User_talk:Carolmooredc#Rothbard.

My first revert of new POV controversial material. The article had been protected for two days previously because of my June 2 3rr/Edit Warring complaint about User:SPECIFICO trying to denigrate Rothbard. This time SPECIFICO was removing the fact that Rothbard is an economist from the first sentence, despite four solid refs saying so and despite previous talk page rejection of such a suggestion. This is a prime example of his extreme bias against competing Austrian economists which leads to his disruptive editing.

• June 28: Off topic personal remarks warning regarding this diff at Murray Rothbard RfC, discussed at User_talk:Carolmooredc#June_2013.

After taking my advice to start an RfC on Rothbard as an economist, SPECIFICO objected that I wrote "Sources are what counts on Misplaced Pages, not editors' personal opinions and WP:OR." (This in reply to his criticizing my RfC support for economist.)

Thanks for any help. CarolMooreDC - talk to me🗽 19:59, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

• Note At first glance, there does seem to be some merit as to the unnecessary aggressiveness. I don't have time to dig deep tonight, but hopefully someone will. Bumping because they needs to be addresses and not just archived. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 01:29, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

• Carolmooredc Addition: Thinking about it, realized the last three talk page notices came after I put a talk page message about Wikihounding on his talk page (corrected at this diff) because he followed me in 30 hours to 4 pages he had not edited before and there either reverted me or left a negative comment. So maybe this became his new mode of harassment. CarolMooreDC - talk to me🗽 12:54, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

  Editor SPECIFICO seems to be in a habit of handing out Warning with citations to WP policies to any user who has reverted his change as seen here or here or here or here(even this editor warned him for wiki hounding) (and might be many more - as edit history for user talk shows a persistent trend of showering warning to a particular editor for a period of time and then moving on to some one else - depending on who he is having an argument with) -as this usually seems to happen to any editor he might be involved in argument over content - Carol Moore just might be his recent favorite.  A m i t  ❤  17:36, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

On the other hand this should be read through for the history these two editors have had  A m i t  ❤  18:51, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

: FYI, I do refer to that ANI in my June 27th entry above. CarolMooreDC - talk to me🗽 22:48, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

The edit history shows a campaign to revise articles that touch upon Austrian Economics to push readers toward viewing that school of economics as a crank theory. Supposedly SPECIFICO is an Austrian economist so this whole thing makes little sense. I live in a mostly free country where people are allowed to support most any view they like, and advocate that view to others, but Misplaced Pages has different goals. The wikihounding that followed has not yet reached epic proportions, but it has grown well into the realm of unacceptable. Using reasonable sounding edit descriptions that conceal the actual actions taken, making a few useful edits to make finding the dishonest ones harder, citing respected sources and half sticking to what the sources actually said, deleting a claim with a valid cited source and attempting to defend the delete with no source whatsoever, and so on. It is masterful gaming of the system. I applaud the intelligence behind the campaign. There is dedication and craftiness that would be one of the biggest assets ever if applied to improving articles rather than used to push unsupported propaganda against a theory onto an unfamiliar population.

My first encounter with this editor was at 20:42 on 8 June 2013 where I replaced uncited and badly slanted text with cited text that better follows the neutrality policy within the Hans-Hermann Hoppe article. I think the second encounter is when the wikihounding began. This is were I think this Misplaced Pages system has a giant flaw in that it is much easier for an editor dedicated to making the article push one point of view rather than easier for the collaborative effort that Wikipiedia is supposed to encourage.

The first abuse of the edit war warning only resulted in a prolonged argument about how the three revert rule means whatever SPECIFICO says that it means.

The second abuse of the edit war warning had no response from SPECIFICO at all. Abel (talk) 17:29, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

User Abel's analysis of User:Specifico's modus operandi is excellent, though it would take a huge WP:ANI to document it all with diffs. It's just easier to document the most obviously behavioral manifestations.

As we all know, such subtle disruptive/tenditious editing can cause a lot of anger, hurts collaboration and can lead to edit warring. I'm quite burned out after a couple months of it with User:Specifico and barely have the energy to finish off several new or improved sections on articles on other topics that were interrupted when I first noticed this destructive editing pattern on a couple articles I've watched for a few years, as well as related BLPs. CarolMooreDC - talk to me🗽 04:14, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• In my opinion, supported by my inspection of his editions and my encounters in talk pages with him, he doesn't edit articles about austrianism trying to enhance the material, with definitions, perspectives, and critics in a neutral way. Instead, I believe he destroy the articles when he tries to harm the intelectual reputation of austrian thinkers. He doesn't respect Misplaced Pages policies about consensus and references in the way to achieve the goal of destroy those reputations, and his way to talk to users is totally wrong, it seems he believes he is an battle field with "enemies" that should be exterminate. I don't know if he is concious of the diference of an hostile schoolar debate and what are the porpouses of Misplaced Pages talks.--Sageo (talk) 16:15, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• More evidence to support my point about how this system has an enormous design flaw in that it took SPECIFICO seconds to pepper the article with failed verification, not in citation given, and such tags with completely blank edit summaries yet took me I don't know how long to hunt down and type up exact quotes to show how each and every one of those tags was complete and utter nonsense. Abel (talk) 18:58, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I should note that this one article alone has more of that type of attack. These three were together and so easier to find. Usually the attacks are performed with far more stealth. Also, this is just one article. Given the number of edits made, there are likely hundreds more to track down and correct. Abel (talk) 19:03, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• How many boards have you been to about Specifico now? As I recall they all failed to get any response. OR, NPOV, BLP etc Only in death does duty end (talk) 19:39, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

June 15th - Notice that you appeared to be edit warring. Edit warring does not require 3rr. You can edit war with less or more reversions. Given that you were repeatedly removing sourced content, this can be considered edit-warring without crossing the 3rr bright line.

June 21st - Given you had already raised this as various places, it could quite easily be seen as disruptive editing. Close to forum shopping.

June 26th - More reversion despite no traction on the OR arguments.

June28th - Given that you have repeatedly tried to get Specifico sanctioned for NPOV, OR, BLP violations at various noticeboards (and failed), your comments could certainly be taken by Specifico as a personal attack on his editing. I read that comment as you accusing him of editing out of his opinion and OR rather than from a source-base.

In short, specifico should not be templating you so much. You should not be dragging him to every noticeboard under the sun when you are in a content dispute. Only in death does duty end (talk) 20:03, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

So those were all responses to CarolMooreDC's original dated comments above?Abel (talk) 21:28, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

To User:Only in death: First, of course, you only are summarizing his/her claims all still at User talk:Carolmooredc, not my responses and corrections. Also, note that two editors were against Specifico's addition of WP:OR content unrelated to the subject of the Biography on the talk page but we didn't want to edit war by reverting User:Specifico again. I went to WP:BLPN with the OR issue and no one responded; who knows why. I asked at Editors assistance (my question) if it would be ok to go to WP:ORN since no response. Two longtime editors said yes. So I did. So that is not "dragging him/her to every noticeboard under the sun when you are in a content dispute." And this WP:ANI is a behavioral issue.

Not to ignore your mention of NPOVN - This NPOVN was regarding another editor soapboxing; when Specifico demanded evidence, and since s/he often collaborated with that editor in soapboxing, I provided evidence of them both doing it together and/or in his/her biased soapbox. That was Specifico's disruptive behavior of the month of May. I'm sure after this ANI, whatever the outcome, Specifico will find a new disruptive behavior. The only thing that keeps Specifico from totally destroying BLPs of those s/he detests seems to be taking her/him to various noticeboards. And when there are only two or three editors on an article (and s/he ignores the other two even when they explain policy clearly) that is the standard WP:Dispute measure. (I'd try dispute resolution noticeboard but s/he tends to ignore or mock usual Wiki dispute resolution processes.) CarolMooreDC - talk to me🗽 00:06, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

User:Id4abel has been canvassing like-minded users in order to bring them to this noticeboard thread. — goethean 12:35, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

How is notifying people who are already involved but possibly not aware, regardless of their feelings, canvassing? Canvassing is trying to recruit people to jump on your side. I only asked that they share their experiences to make this report more complete. Abel (talk) 12:47, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• Four points:

1. For CarolMooreDC (and Abel) – just what course of action would you recommend?

• You got me, what options are available? Abel (talk) 21:28, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

2. I have found SPECIFICO to be extremely reluctant to tone down the various warnings posted. This has been disappointing and frustrating for me because I've pointed out that the warnings were ill-founded.

3. Advice on Abel's user talkpage was posted about the need to be more neutral with ANI notification's. A positive response was made by Abel.

4. With this in mind, the concern about votestacking is not a major one. For myself, I consider myself more of a Wikipedian than "like-minded". – S. Rich (talk) 20:59, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Possible course of action: I can see from user contributions s/he is laying low right now, so I don't know if a short block would even phase her/him. I think User:SPECIFICO would take seriously something like a short topic ban, say a month from Austrian economics topics and related BLPs (and any related topics, like libertarian BLPs and topics, should s/he disrupt them). Then s/he might show some respect for Misplaced Pages processes and for other editors who have an interest in these topics.

Also, Austrian economics/libertarianism/various BLPs involved here are very complicated topics and there are a wide variety of views that different individuals can hold in relation to any of them. Therefore, it should not be assumed that those who are interested in a topic and argue to follow WP policies have some overwhelming bias regarding any topic that is in any way as strong as the explicit negative biases expressed by User:SPECIFICO in user and article talk pages, biases which have led to his/her repeatedly ignoring Misplaced Pages policies. This false and simplistic allegation has been made by User:SPECIFICO in the past with no real evidence and inferred by one or two others since then. CarolMooreDC - talk to me🗽 21:59, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I don't think a topic ban is appropriate. A substantial portion of SPECIFICO's topic edits have been worthwhile. He has more of a problem with editor interaction, which I've seen and described as high-handed at times. Rather, a one-way WP:IBAN would work better, where SPECIFICO could not violate the 4 restrictions described in IBAN. Who would be the beneficiaries of the IBAN? CarolMooreDC and Abel are certainly two candidates. For myself, I would not care to be included (as SPECIFICO may interact with me). If other editors wish to be included as beneficiaries of the IBAN, then (assuming they'd had some difficulties with SPECIFICO), they could say to him "I want your IBAN extended to include me because of ....." – S. Rich (talk) 02:08, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Alleged hounding by Badmintonhist

User:Badmintonhist's behavior, largely but not exclusively in recent days, indicates that thwarting my editing constitutes a substantial part of his participation on Misplaced Pages. He has followed me to article after article (here is a warning I left him earlier today about it, which did not stop him from continuing). In this edit to a talk page, he states that he is unwilling to accept any version of an article that I propose. He has lately decided that my disagreement with him must mean I have Asperger's. I would like to request administrator intervention (whether a sanction or a friendly push) in order to get Badmintonhist to stop harassing me through hounding and comments. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 01:28, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps she can't help herself but Roscelese habitually makes snarky, insulting comments, in edit summaries and the talk pages, about pretty much everyone who disagrees with her, particularly if the subject is a political hot button issue. It would behoove a fair minded administrator to follow this pattern which will reveal one of the most consistently rude editors in the Misplaced Pages enterprise. Everyone gets testy at times. In the case of Roscelese, however, insulting what she perceives as the political opposition is simply her standard modus operandi. 02:00, 1 July 2013 (UTC)Badmintonhist (talk) 02:18, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

This has every appearance of WP:HOUNDING. I note that Badmintonhist says nothing in defense of the purported hounding or stalking activities. Binksternet (talk) 02:20, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

The editor interaction chart is here. Most of the interaction is Roscelese editing an article first, then Badmintonhist coming in afterward. Binksternet (talk) 02:33, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Also, Badmintonhist, if you're going to make claims of an editor making insulting comments or that she has a pattern of this behavior in regard to political opposition, I'd suggest posting some evidence. I, Jethrobot (note: not a bot!) 02:25, 1 July 2013 (UTC):

A fine idea. Since I don't generally find myself if this sort of forum I'm rather naive about them. For starters let's say that her most recent exchange with me: "Do you or do you not know what a press release is?" followed by "welp" (edit summary) "So that's a 'no'. Good to know." is quite typical. She generally likes to claim that folks who disagree with her are incompetent. Give me a little time and I'll find plenty of examples. Badmintonhist (talk) 03:25, 1 July 2013 (UTC)PS As for the supposed hounding we are attracted to the same kinds of issues and I often find her editing contentious and partisan. By the way, I've been somewhat successful in amending articles that Roscelese and also Binksternet (who has weighed in here on her side) have tried to steer in a different direction, which may help to explain things a bit. Badmintonhist (talk) 03:35, 1 July 2013 (UTC) PS: The articles on Pro-life feminism and Maafa 21 are examples.

• Far more concerning is this edit summary; an editor who thinks that edit-warring is OK if your fourth revert is 24 hours and 1 minute past the first one is someone who hasn't read WP:EW, which states "Any appearance of gaming the system by reverting a fourth time just outside the 24-hour slot is likely to be treated as a 3RR violation". I almost always block editors I find gaming the system like that, so I would strongly suggest that you don't. Black Kite (talk) 13:45, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

• Not only that, but the three edits from today at this article suggest that a reading of WP:BRD might not go amiss either. The IP does not need consensus to revert Badminstonhist's edit, and BH should not have immediately re-reverted. The more I look at this, the more problematic it appears to be. Black Kite (talk) 13:50, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

• But these reverts mentioned above by this IP edit's and its summaries bring doubt too(these are the only two edits done by this IP). This might be just an involved editor logged out to make a point.  A m i t  ❤  17:56, 1 July 2013 (UTC)
  • I assure you, it's not me. I would not have been violating 1RR in order to revert, so had I desired to do so, I would have done so under my own account. Whether it's someone else, I don't know. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 18:05, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

I went back about 15 months ago figuring that this was around the time I first had significant interaction with Roscelese . Instead I found a series of what are supposed to be "edit summaries" directed at her fellow editor Collect, who, judging by his numerous barnstars, at least, seems to be a respected contributor. Here's some examples:

• enough trolling
• ahaha so much fail, Collect
• blah blah blah
• I'm seeing some real WP:COMPETENCE issues here
• Supporting what you write with sources? That's crazy!
• How many times will I have to repeat myself
• Oh yeah, I'd forgot you're one of those people who wave the BLP flag to cover up POV-pushing
• More nonsense from edit warrior

Those are just her "edit summaries." I didn't look too closely at the actual "dialogue" which took place at the Talk page for Pro-life feminism but I did catch this one:

Where the hell do you get the idea that you can make these rubbish claims about the monolith of Irish women?

Around this same time she told another editor "your edits are ridiculous" and chided someone else on his/her presumed bigotry. I'm sure I'll have more examples of the Rosclese style later. Badmintonhist (talk) 17:31, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

This is all very interesting (and I'm sure it will be even more interesting to read that discussion), but none of it explains or justifies your hounding, stated intention to prevent me from editing, or "diagnoses." Does this mean that you recognize that you were wrong and are planning to change your behavior? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:54, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

This really doesn't have anything to do with what appears to be, at first glance, a pretty clear cut case of hounding. If Collect has an issue with Roscelese, he can bring it up himself, and Collect is no stranger to commenting on noticeboards and such. Can you address the issue of what appears to be a case of you following around another editor to unrelated articles and not bring up irrelevant comments that are over a year old. Gamaliel (talk) 17:59, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Regarding my supposed hounding, as I have said, we tend to be on different sides of topics we are both interested in. As for the article on Care Net I had already effectively relented on the point about CommonwelthCitizen's version rather than Roscelese's version being our starting point, by editing from Roscelese's version. Badmintonhist (talk) 18:27, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Here's an idea. Instead of self-righteously declaring yourself superior based on someone else's alleged wrongdoings and your own amateur psychoanalysis, you ditch this sort of behavior entirely, then you report it when someone else engages in it. The issue here is your uncivil behavior, which you're beginning to escalate yet again. I've talked to you about this before, and you are well aware this is a problem. I suggest you both avoid each other for a few days before trouts and blocks result from this discussion. You've already crossed the line with your comments above, please try to control yourself. Gamaliel (talk) 18:33, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

I'm utterly puzzled by what you found objectionable about my previous comment. Surely not the term "aspies" which people with Asperger's syndrome themselves use, and even if you did object to that, which you shouldn't, what was objectionable about myfirst sentence? I find this all quite curious. The foulest of four letter words can pass muster here but a comment that someone finds vaguely insensitive gets canned. Badmintonhist (talk) 18:58, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

You should not be commenting in such a personal matter about other editors, especially ones you are in a conflict with. I don't understand why that would be such a curious concept. Gamaliel (talk) 19:05, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

I think User:Badmintonhist is being a hypocrite when he criticizes Roscelese: "insulting what she perceives as the political opposition is simply her standard modus operandi" because this is exactly how I see Badmint's behavioral pattern on talkpages. He seems to prefer taking jabs at other editors rather than discuss content issues, and takes disagreement personally. He has also encouraged battleground behavior in other editors, e.g. at the SPLC and Media Matters articles, so I'm not surprised to see his conduct brought here for further scrutiny. El duderino 03:56, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Apparent block evasion by RetroArch editor

Not sure if this is true block evasion or just that the editor in question has more than one IP address to begin with (or, perhaps, that there's more than one insane individual in that camp), but 77.166.85.169 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is now going around to the same spots as our friend at 84.26.108.111 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (who was blocked on Friday), once again accusing people of being "technically challenged", playing favorites with Higan (emulator) (and on his own talk page), etc.

The attitude is just the tiniest bit calmer at the moment, but otherwise the same as 84.26. We do happen to have a merge discussion underway at Talk:Higan (emulator), which I was going to formalize today when I had time. But yeah, same general pattern of paranoia, makes me believe this is the same person. — KieferSkunk (talk) — 15:43, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, as you probably saw, I came to this conclusion as well, and outright asked him. I figured he'd probably answer honestly, as he's been rather open and brash about not following policy, but he hasn't edited since... Sergecross73 msg me 15:46, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Possibly meat puppetry, but my money is on sock puppetry. Either way, there is puppetry going on. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 15:50, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Labels like "insane" can be provocative; let's not add more fuel to the fire. bobrayner (talk) 17:33, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Sorry. It's just that there's been such a history with this person/team that it's hard to imagine what might be going on with them. — KieferSkunk (talk) — 17:49, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

This is the original IP he was using. Then he switched to another one, and then back to this one. It's probably a work/home thing. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 05:02, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Funny how a holy trio (Harizotoh9/KieferSkunk/Sergecross73) are colluding at every opportunity with their paranoid and delusional fantasies that the same person they previously banned is trying to '*ban evade*' / *stalk* / whatever irrational accusations they can come up with.

Funny also how they are allowed to get away with this to the point where they start making inflammatory comments regarding an entire community/team - and how the other Misplaced Pages admins just allow them to run roughshot with this.

Funny also how these same trio are end-user videogame skiddies - totally unqualified to actually make any decisions at all on any of these subjects since their technical merit is rather .... lacking.

Oh well, I'm glad at least one person in here picked up on the rather personal bias that is peppering KieferSkunk's allegations so far (accusations such as someone being 'insane', whatever). I'm wondering - what do your lovely 'Misplaced Pages policies' have to state about ad-hominem attacks, ganging up, stalking and not allowing an entire team to correct you on obvious misinformation?

Frankly, like Squarepusher, I can no longer be bothered to talk to you guys - it looks more and more like a desperate clown show to try to get you guys educated on *anything* in particular. So continue spewing forth your misinformation, delete what you like - it's obvious to three guys in particular, 'neutrality' can not be assumed and it's just a matter of trolling (as evidenced by KieferSkunk's earlier comments - 'Merge: At this point, I have to agree with the folks below that there doesn't appear to be enough reliable source material to warrant a full article. I say merge and redirect. (And that has only a little to do with the rather long and vitriolic dispute with the IP editor claiming to be this project's lead developer.) ' (backtracking on earlier 'votes' he makes because he doesn't like the person). One other example - "Perhaps I've given you way too much slack, and we should have just blocked you four hours ago. Certainly would have been less disruptive" - delusions of grandeur believing he is solely in charge of such decisions. ONe more example - oh wait - that already passed by the Administrators' noticeboard - where you admitted to *trolling* just because you don't like the person involved.

Anyway, since a holy trio has decided to set itself up as judge, jury and executioner, I'd have to say - delete any page you want, censor anything you want, create as much misinformation as you want, believe things based on ignorance - we as developers will no longer try to factually correct you since it seems the facts don't matter.

I have to agree with Squarepusher - you've made yourself look quite bad. I can no longer take this 'encyclopedia' seriously - if this kind of activity and 'decisionmaking goes on', people could rightfully call this the 'Reddit/4chan of encyclopedias'. 77.166.85.169 (talk) 10:06, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Wow, another anti-Misplaced Pages rant... Sergecross73 msg me 13:01, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Not that I expect it'll make much difference, but people are allowed to change their minds. I voted to give you more time to establish notability in your article. Nothing came of it - only a couple of marginally acceptable sources were offered up at any point in your long diatribes against Misplaced Pages. Based on that (and that ALONE, I'll add), I opted to change my vote to support the redirect - I added the note about the dispute because part of my decision was based on how it didn't appear that you were willing to work constructively with us and nobody else appeared to be willing to work on the article at all.

And as for my "trolling": I apologized directly for engaging in trollish behavior. This is me taking responsibility for actions that were unconstructive. It's me admitting that, yes, I can get riled up, and I occasionally do let people get under my skin, and sometimes I don't handle it the best way possible. I like to think it reflects a level of maturity and self-awareness that people appreciate in communities like this one. Perhaps you might give it a try sometime? — KieferSkunk (talk) — 22:10, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Last note, btw: You said "we as developers will no longer try to factually correct you since it seems the facts don't matter." As a matter of fact, the applicable policy to that one is Verifiability, Not Truth. Misplaced Pages readers must be able to independently verify your factual statements. Otherwise, it puts your article in the category of "Just take our word for it", which is not how things work here. If you have a problem with that policy, you should take it up at the policy page itself. Keep in mind, though, that that policy is one of Misplaced Pages's core policies, and has gone virtually unchanged for more than a decade, with the consensus of thousands of users. You are certainly welcome to contest it if you think it's wrong, but I'm just guessing here that you're not going to get very far with it if you go in with the attitude you've been displaying here. — KieferSkunk (talk) — 22:24, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

And lest I be accused of playing favorites with other articles that don't abide by the Notability and Verifiability policies, Misplaced Pages editors are not omniscient. We aren't capable of knowing every single article on the project that doesn't meet those standards. We rely on alert editors who find such content and flag it for review, or in more obvious cases just correct the problem. Someone just pointed out that the MAME article doesn't even meet the standards in its current form. That will need to be addressed too. I just wanted to head off that particular argument at the pass, since I know it would be coming otherwise. — KieferSkunk (talk) — 22:39, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Further disruption by IP

The IP, out of arguments, has resorted to tagging all my articles for "notability". He made a very clear declaration of doing so in bad faith. I've warned him several times to stop, of no avail. Normally, I'd feel this is so overt that it would invoke the "any reasonable admin" clause of INVOLVED, (Many of his comments show he absolutely has no conception of the GNG, or willingness to learn it, so its impossible for this to be done in good faith anyways) but this guy's already so full of conspiracy theories regarding Misplaced Pages and its editors, I'd really prefer to have someone else help me with this. Sergecross73 msg me 14:42, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Likewise, that's why I'm not enforcing a block on this user either - he's already accused Sergecross, myself and Harizotoh of being part of some "holy trio". Of course, he's also accused Misplaced Pages of being a "hive mind", so I guess it probably doesn't matter that much. — KieferSkunk (talk) — 15:36, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

WP:DUCK

To avoid erroneous accusations in the future, RetroArch is in no way associated with Retrolord. Just thought I'd let y'all know. ★★RetroLord★★ 14:45, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Difficult user

I am having some difficulty dealing with a user in Species in Defiance. the user 173.2.197.76 who recently started logging in under his/her account of ]. The article, which someone tried to speedy delete shortly after its creation, contains an enormous amount of poorly- or un-cited material. After posting about the need for this in article talk, I made a removal of material that wasn't only uncited, but simple OR. It was reverted, and I decided to stop trying to deal with the user; they aren't listening and are apparently operating with an understanding of Misplaced Pages that seems out of sync with everyone else here. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 19:25, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

• Do you mean Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici (talk · contribs)? If so, you needed to notify the user on their talk page. I've taken care of this. I, Jethrobot (note: not a bot!) 19:52, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Yes, that was me editing anonymously. I believe Jack Sebastian is at fault here. Yes it was my fault in not adding in citations to the page earlier...but now Jack says that even links to information posted on the official website of the TV series are not a "reliable source", which is truly baffling. Once more, the drama begins...--Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici (talk) 19:57, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Links to the "official" site are handy to show a fact or two, but they don't prove it passes WP:GNG. To show a topic is "notable" (Misplaced Pages's definition, not yours or mine) it requires press or similar coverage outside of the ownership of the topic, from a website that passes WP:RS, ie: mainstream websites, newspapers, books, etc. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 00:53, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I am not opposed to the article's existence; the assertion that my issues (with the the way the article is being constructed) are all about the Deletionist Vs. Inclusionist drahmaz is simply childish. I just want the article (any article I work on, really) to actually have a chance to reach GA status. Species in Defiance is unlikely to survive an AfD in its current state (and I cannot submit it for such, as I would surely come across as having a vendetta), and that would simply be a damn shame. Rather than making this about me, I think that V should spend his/her time actually working to improve the article, not just stuff it with an indiscriminate collection of facts and hope that something sticks. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 17:34, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

My earlier posts were made out of frustration; I put more time into adding citations for everything, though now what constitutes a good "citation" is being debated. But I did need to get those initial citations done. I don't understand what needs to be improved to avoid AfD status.--Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici (talk) 20:42, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Thomas Paine1776 move warring and content warring at Decline of Detroit

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

Take a look at the log of Decline of Detroit and you will see User:Thomas Paine1776's repeated attempts to whitewash the article of negative content and to move the title to a more bland name. This editor has been overly promotional and disruptive in the past at the Detroit article but had seemingly accepted consensus by staying away from it for the month of June. Now he's on the move again. Binksternet (talk) 01:48, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• This strikes me as an editing matter for the talk page of the piece. TP1776 clearly has concerns with the POV of the piece and I'm not sure that he's in the wrong about them. Carrite (talk) 02:02, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• It became a behavioral matter when TP1776 repeated his move after being reverted by two editors, when he repeated his deletions/whitewashes after being reverted by two editors. The guy is uncommunicative, so your suggestion we engage his concerns on the talk page is impractical. There is a long history here, with lots of discussion visible at Talk:Detroit,_Michigan/archive6#Decline_of_Detroit_Section and four more threads underneath that one. You can see TP1776's talk page contributions stopped on March 15, 2013, though we were talking through April about issues crucial to him. Binksternet (talk) 02:20, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Well, the move bit is simple. It's protected for now, and any move should follow an RM discussion. Placing a note on the talk page with some diffs should help the next time this comes up, if there is a next time. And I do believe that talk page sections/comments are the best way to win an audience for you--more helpful than just diffs. Drmies (talk) 02:37, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• I agree with Carrite--I don't really see the whitewashing in their edits. I do, however, believe that the title is itself POV since it's recentist. But moves should be properly discussed, and thus I've move-protected the article for two weeks. Odd how empty the talk page is. Hint. Hint. Drmies (talk) 02:16, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
• POVFork. AfD nuclear may become an option. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 03:00, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• No, it is a valid topic, supported by dozens of books that bear on the issue of Detroit's decline. Detroit's decline is the top example of urban decay in the US. Binksternet (talk) 03:59, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

"Detroit's decline is the top example of urban decay in the US." Is POV. We don't write titles to state a thesis. Alanscottwalker (talk) 09:50, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• It is not a POVFork. It is an expansion of the section found in Detroit, referenced by multiple sources. According to your logic, Fall of the Western Roman Empire is a POVFork of Roman Empire. --NeilN 04:33, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

According to Fall of the Western Roman Empire, it occurred 1500 years ago. So, no the same logic does not apply. According to your logic, where is the article Decline of Britain? It was surely the world super-power that is no more. Where is the Decline of the British Empire? Alanscottwalker (talk) 09:50, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Valid topics. I look forward to you starting the articles. And if "Decline" is POV, so are "Growth", "Boom Years", and "Recovery", all of which are pretty commonly used. --NeilN 13:48, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

What articles are you talking about with those titles? Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:08, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

"Decline of Detroit" is recentist as well as POVish. The Roman Empire fell, that can't be denied, and we've had 1500 years to ponder that. This one, we're right in the middle of it. But "decline" isn't even defined--in economic terms, social terms, what? The wildlife living in those urban prairies or whatever they're called won't think of it as a decline. Maybe the morals of the people of Detroit have improved greatly, or their health, now that they have vegetable yards on every block. Moreover, this is probably going to be over in a few years, at which point it will be clear that the title should have had some years attached to it as well. But we should discuss this on the article talk page. Drmies (talk) 14:38, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

The article takes the name of the section header in the Detroit article. Here's one with similar headers: History_of_the_Las_Vegas_Valley. Here's a FA with "decline": . Here's one with "economic collapse", "chaos", and "economic miracle": History_of_Germany --NeilN 14:42, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Context. It needs context and perspective. We don't have New York Dropping Dead ref: , and we don't want Misplaced Pages buries Detroit. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:10, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be better to hash out a proposed name somewhere that isn't ANI? The article appears to be move protected, so there is no imminent threat of shenanigans - so how's about we all have a nice cup of coffee and discuss it somewhere? UltraExactZZ ~ Did 14:47, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Oh no, no more coffee. Why don't you putzz your moneyzz where your mouth izz and clozze thizz thread? Thankzz, Drmies (talk) 18:54, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Stacking sources in a list in the discussion page illustrates it is not balanced, and hardly encyclopedic content, WP:Is not a newspaper. Actually, its the complaining editor that appears disruptive - removed a good citation regarding revitalization investment previously to begin balancing the section - and seems to have a history of receiving comments regarding behavior. The city is in the midst of a major revitalization, so inserting a 1970s view is an out of date view of the city and gives undue weight. Many cities saw change after the construction of freeways in the 1950s, again not notable, so Detroit's newer configuration, investment, and migration patterns are typical of cities like Atlanta, thus an assertion of decline is opinion. The Detroit region is actually much more populous and probably more prosperous at present than it was in the 1950s, apart from the 2009 recession and subsequent recovery. No mention is given to the role of public sector unions and union agreements in straining the cities finances, the city presently takes in quite a bit of money from casinos, large corporations, and contains massive Chrysler assembly plant, has a major university employer as well. The city of Detroit proper at present has a much higher population density than Atlanta for example, similar in demographics to Detroit, with suburbs and freeways. The comprehensive study of city's residential property does not support the blight theory, in spite of assertions, the Detroit Free Press noted that the good news from the study was the city of Detroit properties are mostly in good condition, the comprehensive study recommended only 1% of properties needed demolition and a substantial portion of those have been demolished or are being demolished, a collection of commercial buildings await developers, or need permits to demolish, thus the pessimistic view is more WP:Funcruft and WP:Coatrack, and not realistic or encyclopedic. The stats also show 2.9% homeowner vacancy in the city of Detroit which is in line with the national average, as opposed the pessimistic assertions of so called sources and blogs, and the city's 15% apartment vacancy rate is not untypical, especially in light of redeveloped high rises seeking tenants. The numbers of crimes in the region have decreased with the suburbanization of the area. The FBI has cautioned not to use its crime data to generate crime rates to compare cities and the American Association of Criminologists has denounced the use of crime rates as an "irresponsible misuse" of data, this is noted in the city's crime article, the use of weasel words such as 'dangerous' cities should be removed, such words are media hysteria, not for and not encyclopedic in tone. The Forbes source (cited by the CBS source) discourages using crime rates as well, such usage is arguably not encyclopedic, and needs to be rewritten in the article. Sources cited are loaded with opinion. One of the sources added is a blog. There is need to clean-up these additions to make them encyclopedic. Thomas Paine1776 (talk) 22:24, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Sorry, but that's not to the point and it needs paragraphing. This is not the place to wage this content discussion in this way and, at any rate, this didn't address the non-consensual moving you did. Someone close this? Drmies (talk) 22:53, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

The move is basically to a neutral title for that article, which it should have. Have also sought to accommodate and include the encyclopedic content and reasonable concerns of others including the editor in question.Thomas Paine1776 (talk) 23:09, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

IP address causing problems

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

An IP address who has been blocked twice before due to his/her disruptive edits is back at it again. He/she is removing highly relevant material without any sort of edit-summary and playing around with population statistics and figures without any references to sources. He/she is also distorting sourced information that is relevant to the article and subject. See: 1,2,3, 4, 5. Proudbolsahye (talk) 05:56, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Edit Warring by user Viriditas

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

Despite a recent two-week block and a warning by an admin to not edit war, the user is engaging in the same problematic editing style, this time by the user's who not only initiated a wholesale deletion of sourced material that either included material that the user deemed appropriate or of a nature that three users (including myself) judge legitimate for inclusion, but did not even discuss the user's reasons for the deletion on the talk page. Usually 3O, DRN or even arbitration would be okay to handle a situation, but given this user's yen for edit warring I believe administrator intervention is necessary (or at least be helpful). Gobbleygook (talk) 05:59, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I have not been involved in any edit warring at this time. The opposite is true. Gobbleygook returned on 30 June from an extended absence to make an unbelievable six reverts, stalk me to Sally Field, an article he never edited before that I was currently editing, and continue his stalking over at Talk:March Against Monsanto:

• 15:37, 30 June 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+220)‎ . . The Young Turks ‎ (inclusion of material approved as per 3O)
• 15:40, 30 June 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+324)‎ . . Cindy Sheehan ‎ (Undid revision 560856752 by Viriditas (talk) as per talk)
• 15:47, 30 June 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+1,018)‎ . . Glenn Greenwald ‎ (→‎Political views: OR)
• 15:51, 30 June 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+97)‎ . . Molly Ivins ‎ (Undid revision 560856889 by Viriditas (talk))
• 16:11, 30 June 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+1,286)‎ . . Cenk Uygur ‎ (as per talk, at least two editors have already noted the issue of removing description of Uygur as a progressive. Also add citation sourced by user Viriditas)
• 16:42, 30 June 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+316)‎ . . Cindy Sheehan ‎ (→‎Political views: secondary sources)
• 16:53, 30 June 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+88)‎ . . Sally Field ‎ (→‎Activism)
• 03:04, 1 July 2013 (diff | hist) . . (+299)‎ . . Talk:March Against Monsanto ‎ (→‎Tag re-added)

Putting aside the fact that the edit summaries are completely false (he edits weren't approved by 30, the 30 actually recommended against his edits, and this edits weren't "per talk" at all), what's even stranger is that his recent absence from 05:31, 21 June 2013—15:37, 30 June was filled by the instantaneous appearance of new user Gretchen Mädelnick (talk · contribs), a user who has now just as suddenly "disappeared" upon Gobbleygook's return to Misplaced Pages. As I've said several times before, this editing behavior is identical and indistinguishable to the now indefinitely blocked Festermunk (talk · contribs) who had a reputation for using sock puppets, ignoring the outcome of discussions, edit warring over his disputed additions, including an obsession with labeling BLP's as "leftist" and "progressive", and stalked users to articles they never edited before, Unfortunately, an SPI did not turn up any matching technical data, with the CU saying they were editing from different continents. Viriditas (talk) 08:02, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Get over yourself. The world doesn't evolve around. Nobody is chasing you, other than the creatures in your fantasy. Maybe it's actually your behavior which attracts edit warring. I'm noticing you're halting the addition of even harmless non-controversial information, always under the guise of 'we' and whatnot. Basically borderlining gaming the system. Also, I told you before, I'm sick of your accusations towards my direction here and there. I have decided to file a complaint against you. It's time you need to learn to put a sockpuppet in your mouth now and then, before making allegations. It's also time you learn that not everybody has as much time to spend on the Wiki boards as you do, hence the 'disappearances' as you call it. Gretchen Mädelnick (talk) 15:09, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

As your second edit to Misplaced Pages - the day you signed up - was to award the Resilient Barnstar to Gobbleygook, stating "Tries to post the truth despite heavy opposition, opposition may include Wiki's own administrators", I would say that if you ain't got much time or interest for admins affairs, you are at least a quick study! Iselilja (talk) 16:59, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for the compliment. Which reminds me of the fact that I need to improve that somewhat. Gretchen Mädelnick (talk) 17:18, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I can tell you are most definitely on your last editing legs with those wild accusations. An SPI cleared me of sockpuppetry and if you bothered to actually go through Festermunk's edits, my editing style with that user's editing style are totally different, but you still won't drop the insinuation that I am Festermunk. It's telling that you never addressed my point about your edit warring over the Cenk Uygur article, but I'm sure your sockpuppetry discussion would give the admin's here more than a hint as to why you didn't want to address that issue. Gobbleygook (talk) 19:24, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Where are the diffs, Gobbleygook? Stop needlessly harassing an esteemed editor of this encyclopedia who is actually here to build content productively, and go back to forming cabals of POV-pushers for political advantage with other Misplaced Pages social networkers. This is one more reason why all noticeboards and WP:AE should be replaced with magistrates' courts, where each side can present evidence, where the police and judicial aspects of adminship can be separated, and where impartial and dispassionate administrators can make informed decisions. Wer900 • talk 20:08, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Appeal to authority is borderline instigating and by no means not convincing. Secondly you're making assumptions here. Anyone trying to improve and help Misplaced Pages doesn't make a - supposedly - esteemed editor always right nor righteous. For example, as I mentioned before, V. even holds back non-political non-offensive additions. He may mean it well, but that doesn't make his decision right. Gretchen Mädelnick (talk) 20:16, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

At least you've shown more insight than Viriditas's blocking admin JamesBWatson (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA). Wer900 • talk 20:29, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Closure at Port Moresby International High School

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

This Afd was closed by someone who is not an admin( just stating fact, not taking issue with that person). There are concerns with the keep rationales which ultimately has lead school article to be kept. None of the rationales are showing any sort of notability at all, the comments are all aimed at "We keep all high school articles" Which I believe is in contravention of WP:ORG which states "No company or organization is considered inherently notable. No organization is exempt from this requirement, no matter what kind of organization it is. If the individual organization has received no or very little notice from independent sources, then it is not notable simply because other individual organizations of its type are commonly notable or merely because it exists". The other thing being linked and conveniently ignored where it suits is Misplaced Pages:Notability (high schools) which further states "However, this is not a loophole in Misplaced Pages's guidelines or policies. Like any other topic, articles on schools must be able to meet notability standards, such as those at Misplaced Pages: Notability and Misplaced Pages:Notability (organizations and companies) specifically" Either way I don't believe that policy is being followed or are there valid rationales on why this school is notable. I have not raised this issue on the talkpage because as stated the closer is not an administrator and DRV didn't seem appropriate as it was not deleted. I have not notified anyone of the discussion because I largely think that what they will say is irrelevant to a reviewing admin. If anyone feels differently please notify whoever you think should be. Hell In A Bucket (talk) 08:55, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• There is an accepted notability for high schools that has been around since the 2005s and many bytes and bits have died before and after that arguing the point. On that basis, a keep close is consistent with the community norms for this kind of article and DRV is highly unlikely to overturn the close - and DRV is absolutely the place to have this discussion. DRV reviews the closure of all xFD discussions, not just deletions. I suggest you open a discussion there is you do want to contest this. Spartaz 09:24, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
  • The common outcomes is at . Spartaz 09:26, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
    • I will take it to DRV. Hell In A Bucket (talk) 09:30, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Unfortunately, it's very easy (especially on en.wikipedia) to mistake descriptive documents for prescriptive ones. This has, at times, led to circular reasoning which is very hard to break out of, and leads to "keep" or "delete" decisions divorced from policy because, hey, we kept/deleted some similar articles last year, and those in turn were kept/deleted because of a document describing the outcomes of AfD discussions on other articles...
• AfD is surely a place to assess each article on its merits. It is perplexing that discussion on an article's AfD can be overriden by the result of a discussion on a previous AfD of a different article. I have unhappy memories of a time when this circular reasoning delivered results which directly contradicted the outcome of an RfC... this isn't a failure of one particular notability guideline but rather of how we think about process and precedent. (Sorry, somehow managed to start typing a reply to Spartaz without getting an edit-conflict with subsequent edits closing the thread &c...) bobrayner (talk) 14:32, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
  • A certain degree of consistency is appropriate for an encyclopedia. We can best attain this by having criteria that are unambiguous and not subject to interpretation, with as few borderline cases as possible. The virtue of the high school practice is that it does just that,avoid the previous situation with a dozen high school AfDs a day that yielded results not much better than random, and creating a situation where nobody could tell in advance if their work on an article of this type would be wasted. The flip side, that we almost never accept primary schools, is equally useful in advising people. DGG ( talk ) 17:49, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Edit warring and personal attacks by user Wran

Whenever me or others ask User:Wran to justify her/his controversial changes s/he replies with comments that could be described as either upsetting , or as personal attacks ("you are the one who needs to learn how to read") ("you're blithely fooling around") ("adapting the same language used against me"). S/he keeps (i) removing cited content without giving a comprehensible justification , (ii) tampering with quoted/referenced material in violation of WP:INTEGRITY (this is explained here), (iii) breaking 3RR , (iv) engaging in lame edit-warring , (v) misquoting policy to justify original research , and (vi) employing circular sourcing . Furthermore several of her/his edits indicate that s/he has insufficient competence to edit: . I have opened eight threads so far on her/his talk-page to ask her/him to give reasons for her/his actions but Wran's responses were highly contentious and failed to address any of the concerns I raised. I would like to stress that this is neither a content dispute nor a personal dispute. Wran regularly refuses to work together functionally, declines to communicate with anyone, and has repeatedly shown bad faith. S/he employs trolling and harassment tactics instead of carefully explaining her/his "corrections" to articles. This sort of activity is not just the sign of her/his poor understanding of Misplaced Pages policies but also a sign that s/he is disrupting Misplaced Pages to illustrate a point. Despite the fact that Wran has been given a reasonable timeframe (nearly two years) to reflect on her/his actions, her/his activity continues to cause a major disruption. —Omnipaedista (talk) 13:32, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Postscript: An apparent sockpuppet has just begun to mass-revert me using the same idiosyncratic edit summaries as Wran did —in an attempt at retaliation, I guess. --Omnipaedista (talk) 14:37, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Interesting case. In the matter of content, Wran is correct (in the half dozen edits I looked at), and you are wrong to make reverts like this. In the matter of behavior, they're in the wrong: they are indeed rude and boorish. Then again, comments like "Wran has been given a reasonable timeframe (nearly two years) to reflect on her/his actions" is incredibly patronizing. As for the troll, I'd welcome a CU pushing some buttons, where we'll probably find that an LTV who enjoys watching this board and fucking around with us has adopted Wran's persona for a day. If CU establishes that the Male Member is indeed Wran, I'd be very surprised but there's blocks right away; if not, perhaps an interaction/hounding ban could be a solution. Drmies (talk) 15:05, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. One comment regarding content: I admit that this revert was hasty. It was made after I saw Wran's tampering with citations in a relevant article (and have explained why the latter edit was inappropriate). I had no objections when Wran reverted me on this one . I do not deny that several of this editor's contibutions are of value; that is why I do not see this as usual content dispute. I realize that the tone of the last sentence may sound patronizing but that wasn't my intention; I only want to stress that I have tried so many times to establish a proper conversation with Wran but her/his responses were always disorienting and arrogant. I cannot see why I should assume good faith anymore. Should I have to make a CU request personally? --Omnipaedista (talk) 15:45, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Well, admins with CU probably also patrol this board. I could say something like Hey! CU requested! and maybe they'll hear that. I think it should be done if only to clear Wran (if possible, of course) and focus the discussion. I don't know to which extent you and Wran overlap in editing interests, and it would be beneficial to hear from them here. Given y'all's difference in number of edits and articles edited, I imagine that an interaction ban would not necessarily be a big issue for you. Drmies (talk) 16:18, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I assume the latter includes: "undo editor Y's edits to any page (whether by use of the revert function or by other means)." You see, I have been editing Greek philosophy and mythology articles for the past five years and I consider myself to be a fairly established user editor on these topics. Wran has recently started to make some undeniably unconstructive edits to those areas. So, I fail to see how would an interaction ban be helpful. In any case, I am curious to see the CU results. --Omnipaedista (talk) 21:09, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Fixing the bad sitenotice for VisualEditor

When doing a live beta, letting people back out is crucial to avoiding discontent, as well as providing a place to post bugs. Neither of these have been done. As such, I would suggest the following sitenotice be added immediately.

Misplaced Pages is happy to announce the live Beta of VisualEditor, a tool that offers a way to edit pages without needing to learn wikimarkup. This has been automatically activated on all accounts. If you need to edit without VisualEditor, you can choose "Edit source" instead of "Edit". For bug reporting, go to Misplaced Pages:VisualEditor/Feedback.

To opt out of VisualEditor, simply go to Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets, scroll down to "Editing", tick the box labelled "Remove VisualEditor from the user interface", then scroll to the bottom and click "Save". You can reactivate it at any time by unticking the box.

I've used a little colour to make sure people see it. I suggest Sitenotice, as whatever hack is being used for the uninformative message literally takes 3 seconds before it appears on the otherwise completely-loaded page. This provides the necessary information, explains what's happening, and tells people where to report bugs, and how to opt out - things that should have been done 15 hours ago. Thank you. (Crossposted to WT:Sitenotice)

Adam Cuerden 14:38, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Looks good to me. I've already disabled VisualEditor, as it is only half functional, and I prefer editing manually/properly anyway. I also object to the primary "Edit" button taking you to the VisualEditor, given the fact it's only half-finished - it should say "Edit with VisualEditor", and the "Edit source" button should still be the primary edit button, for the short term at least. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 14:44, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
• comment; you realise that this site notice would display to all logged-in and anonymous users (who don't have the VisualEditor), with absolutely no way to disable it, yes? This is not a workable solution. Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 14:50, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

From the top of MediaWiki talk:Sitenotice: Misplaced Pages has five kinds of top of page messages that can be used to convey information or announcements to readers and editors. The "Sitenotice", found at MediaWiki:Sitenotice, is displayed at the top of all pages for all logged-in users, and for anonymous users if MediaWiki:Anonnotice is empty; this latter message can be used to display information only to readers, not editors. Alternatively, by 'blanking' the anonnotice and replacing it with

, the sitenotice can be used as a "logged-in-notice" to display information only to editors.

But, again, with absolutely no way to disable or hide the message. Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 14:54, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Site notices are dismissable. It's the current hack-y notice that you're using for VisualEditor that isn't dismissable. That's why sitenotice id has to be incremented when a new sitenotice goes up. Adam Cuerden 14:56, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

They are? Huh. And: we're not using a hacky notice, we're using CentralNotice - if it's not dismissing for you, we have a problem and that's a distinct bug report I'm happy to happen. I this move would be highly damaging, and to be blunt while I'm not in a position to speak for the Foundation I strongly suspect that making such a prominent notice will not be appreciated. If you want to talk through interim steps to see if it helps - listing the gadget in the FAQ, for example, comes to mind - I'm happy to do so, but I'd ask that we wait for a couple of hours at least until more people have woken up (particularly those in the office). Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 14:59, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Are you seriously trying to claim that explaining where to report bugs and how to opt out of a beta are bad things, but having an uninformative, undismissable message isn't? Adam Cuerden 15:00, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I'm saying that going "there's new stuff, here's how to opt out of it" rather than "there's new stuff" is likely to lead a lot of people instinctively reacting by disabling it. I know full well that a lot of people instinctively react to new software or changes (heck, I'm still on monobook. I definitely know that). What I think we want to avoid here is crossing too far to the other side - at the moment, people struggle to find out how to turn it off if they dislike it. But I don't want us to be in a situation where we've enabled people to, en-mass, opt-out without giving it a look or testing it solely because it's new. The software eventually being workable depends on the idea that many eyeballs make bugs shallow. Without some attention, this will be a lot suckier for a lot longer than it can be. I want to keep people informed, and I'm happy to discuss how we can go about increasing the prominence of the escape route, as it were. But we have to strike a balance between damaging the software greatly and damaging the community greatly. I think this solution falls too far on one side. Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 15:06, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Comment - I'm in favor of Adam's suggested notice. The VisualEditor rollout was not done correctly. Are there any UX people employed by WMF and are they familiar with the concept of banner blindness? You can stick notices up there all day that features are going to be rolled out but generally users ignore banners. The banners that appear on this site are usually asking for money, or inviting people to events or straw polls that have extremely limited appeal to casual editors. Hence, they are conditioned to ignore them. I personally use this site dozens of times per day and the VisualEditor rollout caught me completely by surprise. I was then irked that it was not immediately apparent how to turn it off, and the preference is buried in the "Gadgets" tab which is the opposite of intuitive. Get the banner up there so people can turn this off. --Spike Wilbury (talk) 15:21, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
  • If banner blindness is the reason that people are unaware this is going on, I'm not sure a new banner will help. :/ I agree with Adam that this information needs more prominence, but note that it is now the first thing people see who follow the link in the existing banner. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 15:26, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
    • Is it the best banner, no, but the proposed one is useless for IP editors. How VE caught you off guard is your own issue; its been everywhere I've been and I have seen a lot of discussion for it. Its sort of saying Misplaced Pages's disclaimers on editing, which appear on every page you edit, are non-existent or not noticeable. Some personal responsibility has to exist, and if you have been on Misplaced Pages in the last month, you should be well aware of VE. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 15:30, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
      • Count me among the dumb ones, then. Drmies (talk) 19:16, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
• I don't know about you, but that wraps strangely on my monitor. Lots of white space with line 2 only 25% of the size of line 1, and line 4 has only 3 words. Also, I don't think it is necessary to put the opt-out instructions in the site notice itself. Having a link to such instructions, i.e. one click away, should also work fine. Perhaps something like:

Misplaced Pages is happy to announce the live Beta of VisualEditor, a tool that offers a way to edit pages without needing to learn wikimarkup.

This has been automatically activated on all accounts. If you need to edit without VisualEditor, you can choose "Edit source" instead of "Edit". For bug reporting, go to Misplaced Pages:VisualEditor/Feedback.
To opt out of VisualEditor, simply follow the directions at SOME LINK PAGE.

Dragons flight (talk) 15:39, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Just Curious - why is this in ANI?  A m i t  ❤  17:18, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Because we're trying to protect the encyclopedia from further damage while this thing is still unusably bad? The notice that now appears at teh top of the info page is a great help, thanks. Yngvadottir (talk) 18:08, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Just positing out loud, but I seem to remember that the last couple (in my mind) UX changes (Notifications, Watchlist changes) have been met with "Fire and Pitchforks mobs. While it's not appropriate for here, I would like the UX team to come up with a way of communicating change prior to implementing it as the current user acceptance is not working for a portion of the community. Hasteur (talk) 20:17, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• There were big "VisualEditor is coming!" threads at just about every project page I watchlist, several weeks ago I think? Presumably the people who are vehemently opposed to major UI changes decided to vote against its coming by not raising their concerns... *shrug* --Demiurge1000 (talk) 21:34, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

How patronising. I was caught off guard because i don't watchlist lots of project pages, and those i do don't get visits from me all the time. Maybe they didn't "decide to vote" but weren't aware.... That being said, when i tried to edit this morning and the edit button went to some bizarre unrecognisable place, it didn't take me long to cancel, hunt around, and learn how to edit the way i understand already. A site notice is likely a good idea. A working Visual Editor is a better one. An opt-out of something that doesn't work (yet) is the best. Cheers, Lindsay 22:11, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

UI changes often meet resistance; it's hardly specific to enwiki. How do people deal with this problem in the rest of the world? bobrayner (talk) 23:11, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• I had to disable it because it didn't work when I used it. Viriditas (talk) 23:40, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
• It seems impossible to disable now. I had checked the option earlier, but the VE just comes back! Someone not using his real name (talk) 00:07, 4 July 2013 (UTC)
  • I'm editing logged out until this crap is fixed. It seems the only way to get rid of it right now. 86.121.18.17 (talk) 00:10, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

User:Dougweller misuse of full protection

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

Dougweller fully protected this page directly after editing to his favored version. The protection policy states that "Administrators should not protect or unprotect a page to further their own positions in content disputes." Which this user is apparently doing. He continues to edit through the full protection, despite consensus currently running counter to his views on the talk page. An administrator editing through their own full protection is a clear COI violation. In summary, the protection was out of policy, and the protection to a favored version even more so. His claim in the protection summary, that it is a BLP issue, is not, as far as I can tell based in policy, since "BLP applies to all material about living persons anywhere on Misplaced Pages" while an external link is clearly not 'on Wikipeida'. Regards, Crazynas 19:21, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Seems like a clear case of WP:IAR to me. And he did say anyone who wanted to challenge the edit could do so privately. Perhaps that would have been a good idea. As the website in question routinely outs Misplaced Pages editors, I assume that's the reason for him removing the URL (and that's all he did). §FreeRangeFrog 19:28, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I did contact him first. Crazynas 21:21, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I'd close this, but I'm walking out the door. Suffice it to say that DougWeller has asked for advice and the matter is being discussed. IAR is a perfectly valid policy for this action, which cannot be discussed on wiki. Any questions, feel free to pass them to the Arbitration committee. There is no rush for the article to be unprotected until this is resolved. Worm(talk) 19:30, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

WTT, just to be clear, you're invoking a Smoke-filled room in this case? Crazynas 19:38, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

ECx2 - I agree with the above. Dougweller made only two edits - both removing the URL to the subject website. Since the website contains or has contained material that violates our BLP policy, removing a link to that website is reasonable - the content might not be on wikipedia, as Crazynas correctly notes, but it is the inclusion of the material via the link that causes the problem. Given that the inclusion of the link is under discussion at the article's talk page, I'm not sure what else needs to be done here. UltraExactZZ ~ Did 19:33, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Doug has no authority to protect a page based on his not liking something. He removed the external link, whose presence follows weeks of contentious debate, and was likely disruptive editing in itself. A minute after his removing the link to Wikipediocracy.com, he locked the page, so misusing the tools to get an upper-hand in a content dispute (in which he did not even allow others the opportunity to engage). He has admitted to these gross errors of judgment, but still has not removed the page lock. He should be desysopped immediately. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 19:39, 2 July 2013 (UTC) 20:46, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

It is possible that the reason the article is still protected is because no one wants to touch it with a ten foot pole. And given the reception Doug got when he took administrative action there, I can't say I blame them. Doug seems to have conceded that he overreacted, discussion is now ongoing, and there is no requirement that we have a link to that website RIGHT NOW. Given that consensus in that discussion seems to agree that the link is appropriate, I expect it will be restored shortly. And the earth will continue to spin. UltraExactZZ ~ Did 19:43, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

This is all a bit silly, since (a) we've seen this movie before and we all know how it turns out; (b) Dougweller left a link to wikipediocracy.com in the article; and (c) there is nothing preventing anyone from creating links to

Might I suggest that all combatants put down their clubs and parse WTT's statement very carefully, but I'll provide a crib sheet for those who don't have time. An Arbitrator has indicated that the admin in question is seeing advice about how to defuse this. The arbitrator further indicates that IAR is applicable and cannot be discussed in public. The arbitrator requests that questions be directed to ArbCom. While I have disagreed (both privately and publically) that ArbCom has made bad decisions in the past, I see no reason to doubt the necessity of restricting the editing of an article about a webiste that is critical of wikipedia. Hasteur (talk) 20:27, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Dougweller has already admitted his error in protecting the page because he did not like something he'd just removed, the gravity of which increases the longer the improper page-protection stays. ArbCom really has no moral authority to lecture the community about its private wisdom, after its repeated and shameless outing of Malleus F. Next year's ArbCom may have some credibility. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 20:33, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict)(Damn, I thought I'd done this when I got home an hour ago, didn't notice the edit conflict - I apologise for that, but my wife was waiting for me to come watch TV.).It's a bit odd that although there was a discussion about my actions at Talk:Wikipediocracy that this was brought here by someone who wasn't involved there and after I posted as follows: "Ok, any Admin who wishes to revert, go ahead. I've managed to get some advice on this and although I don't like links like this specific one at this specific moment, we evidently do allow links that attack or out editors here no matter what they say. Dougweller (talk) 4:27 pm, Today (UTC+1) Dougweller (talk) 4:27 pm, Today (UTC+1)" And yes, this was about outing. Although I may have encountered this editor before, I don't recall any such encounters. I really don't understand what's going on. I thought someone would have unprotected it by now, so I look at the talk page and see a request to add the protection template, which I've done. Now I'm being accused of being involved in a content dispute (which I gather is about links but as I haven't actually been involved in it I'm not aware of it) and an immediate de-sysop is being requested. I have not admitted to gross errors of judgement (check the talk page to see what I actually said) and there is a discussion as to whether the link should be restored. I repeat here, any Admin who wants to unprotect is free to do so without me suggesting they are wheelwarring. Dougweller (talk) 20:39, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for removing the protection. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 20:46, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

You're welcome. Ironically I think it would have been removed at RPP in my absence(since I'd made it clear I wouldn't object) if this thread hadn't been opened. Note that I saw my action as short term and not involved in whatever content dispute there was about badsites or whatever. And I'm still not convinced that protecting privacy is less important than having an url in an article for something that can easily be found with a search engine. Dougweller (talk) 20:53, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Actually I have the feeling it is a good thing you did remove the full-protection yourself. Lectonar (talk) 20:55, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• This drama was a good way to attract attention to that website normally ignored by most. Streisand effect and all that. Someone not using his real name (talk) 21:19, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Crazynas 21:25, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• I had never seen that site before. But this project does have problems which should be highlighted. Taroaldo ✉ 22:08, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Between editor troll Keifer and your own posts Crazynaslt it surely is a Streisand effect. Perhaps not pointing it out may have helped? Complex stuff, clearly. Pedro :  Chat  21:31, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Implying that we, not the incorrect full-protection was the cause of the effect? Crazynas 21:38, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Not exactly, no. Implying that by banging on about it you get the effect. Complex stuff, as I said. Pedro :  Chat  21:49, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Why is it that whenever an admin does something controversial, someone is bound to demand a de-sysop? Some people can hardly wait to gripe about admins. AutomaticStrikeout  ?  21:34, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• As far as I'm concerned the issue is resolved (Dougweller unprotected the page). Crazynas 21:48, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

• Indeed. Close anyone..? Pedro :  Chat  21:52, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

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

Arbcom

If anyone missed it, the drama continues at WP:RFAR. Someone not using his real name (talk) 01:58, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• @Automatic Stikeout above. Because abuse of administrative tools should be cause for desysopping abusive administrators, plain and simple. Does this rise to that level? Maybe, maybe not. It's certainly discussable... I personally have no tolerance for an administrator making an edit and then using full protection to enforce that edit. Having deletion and protection buttons does not make Administrators the "boss" of content any more than an untooled editor. Carrite (talk) 02:23, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
  • In general I agree it's a bad idea. But inflexibility is rarely a good thing, and if in a BLP article there is repeated addition of offending content and an Admin removes that and protects the article, it's certainly acceptable. This was, IMHO, similar, although I can see now that there is strong feeling that we should link to the home page no matter what it says. I'm not convinced. From my perspective, I saw a problem and tried to deal with it. It didn't occur to me to read the talk page first - maybe I should have, but as they say hindsight is 20/20. I then asked for advice, listened to it and what was said on the talk page, stated that I was ok with being reverted, told the Admin who had thought of reverting me, and posted to RPP repeating that. I then went about my real life affairs. When I found out that nothing had happened I unprotected the page. I don't think my actions were those of an abusive administrator. Other people will no doubt disagree with me. Dougweller (talk) 05:03, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
    • FWIW, I think AGK's analysis at the RFAR page is pretty close to the mark. And, whatever one thinks of that website, you have to agree that the epic flipout about your protection should give them content for weeks. There was no abuse here - you acted boldly, saw that consensus leaned in a different direction, and approved someone reverting. I still think no one reverted because that article (and its topic) are a goddamn trainwreck of drama and outing and wtfomgbbq. So you came back later, shrugged, and reverted yourself. That's not the hallmark of an admin drunk with power. UltraExactZZ ~ Did 12:22, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

      Unilaterally removing the content (http://wikipediocracy.com) was likely disruptive, given the weeks of discussion on the Wikipediocracy article, with extensive discussion of the external link, but even more likely done in good faith.

      • The pre-emptive page-protection was the serious misuse of tools, a clear violation of several policies, the reversal of which Doug approved rather quickly. The "epic flipout" was by administrators not correcting the policy violations as soon as they were recognized. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 12:51, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

        Shit happens. It was a mistake that was corrected as soon as the person making it realised that there was a discussion about it. We're all allowed to make mistakes, so get on with your life. Making this kind of big drama of it is just plain silly. And requesting a de-sysop for it is clearly over the top. Thomas.W (talk) 13:15, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• • • • (ecx2) But that's my point. The protection caused drama, which almost immediately spawned a fairly heated talk page thread and an equally heated ANI thread (and now, indirectly, an RFAR). And that drama, for good or ill, likely gave some admins pause - I'm sure as hell not going to wade into that sort of a dispute by doing anything that might be seen as wheel warring. I think this topic gets a lot of editors on both sides of the discussion very very angry - as your comments yesterday demonstrate. You feel very strongly about this issue, as do others - and that's not always a recipe for calm and reasoned discussion. Not assigning blame, but everyone reacting to everyone else just escalated the issue and pissed a lot of people off. I think that whether Doug should be sanctioned for protecting the article should be less of a topic for discussion than why he believed (as I and others did) that the article needed to be protected in the first place. The discussion at the talk page (and, God help us, at RFAR) could serve to clarify that question. UltraExactZZ ~ Did 13:24, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Page protection against administrators?

• • • • • The article has a history of inducing bizarre behavior in normally reliable administrators. Salvio Guiliani removed a request for an outside administrator (and threatened blocks) to remove the protection (with the approval of Doug), Bbb23 blocked me for "edit warring" (one of the reverts being restoring a needed hyphen), etc. Perhaps there should be a protection on the page against administrators? Maybe administrators should be required to get prior approval from ANI/AN before using/abusing their tools? There is more of a history of administrative abuse than of edit warring. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 14:14, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

        • • • What I, as an until now totally uninvolved editor, see when looking at the article and its edit history is a systematic attempt by one or more users to use the article, and the drama created around it, to draw attention to the subject of the article. Or in other words a series of deliberate attempts to create controversy here in order to promote the other site. Thomas.W (talk) 14:21, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

You don't seem to be an administrator or a regular around these here parts. Names and diffs are required from the lower classes. Just a friendly warning.... Kiefer.Wolfowitz 15:46, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Not being a regular here adds extra weight to my comments as it makes me see things clearer. Just FYI. As for "lower classes" I guess that says a lot more about you than about me or anyone/anything else, because I don't see any stratification here, or any "us vs them". But I do see people who seem to get a kick out of creating unnecessary drama. Thomas.W (talk) 15:57, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Kiefer.W: "The lower classes"? There's no such distinction - being a regular only means you have a reputation. Being an admin only means you have access to some extra tools. But being a new editor, a new visitor to AN/I, or even an IP editor doesn't make someone a member of a "lower class", and people here really ought to know better than that. — KieferSkunk (talk) — 17:59, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

@K-Skunk: K-Wolf forgot to use the sarcasm font. Carrite (talk) 18:13, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

All too easy for sarcasm to be lost in translation. I advise being careful with it. :) — KieferSkunk (talk) — 19:41, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Thomas.W,

Names and diffs, please. Why are you badmouthing editors without naming them? Kiefer.Wolfowitz 20:01, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Insults and harassment against a French sysop

Hello,

Please check this, that can be translated by « You know who I am ? You bloody vermin, you will suffer when I am back ». We don't know who this account belongs to on WP:fr but can you please block it ? Thanks by advance. — S t a r u s – ¡Dímelo! – 20:05, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Username seems to be the same on fr.wp and is indefinitely blocked there. The user is clearly here (as there, apparently) only to harass. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 20:08, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

The username on WP:fr is supposed to be a sockpuppet but we have no information yet about it. — S t a r u s – ¡Dímelo! – 20:10, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Blocked. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:11, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for your action - --Lomita (talk) 21:42, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Though the account is blocked now, nobody seemed to care to remove the not so veiled threats against 2 other :en-accounts from User talk:DieuDuSite. Also, the content on User:DieuDuSite isn't that appropriate. IMO, both pages should be blanked and eventually a block-note added. --Túrelio (talk) 06:18, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

 Done now by Future Perfect at Sunrise. --Túrelio (talk) 13:49, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Featured picture candidates/Medea statue in Batumi, Georgia

I'm a little concerned about the fact that several Georgian editors have appeared out of the woodwork to support an image which barely has a chance of surviving a deletion discussion, let alone a chance of passing at FPC. It was nominated by Giorgi Balakhadze (talk · contribs), and Fiqriasidamonize (talk · contribs) (who has only a couple of other edits), MIKHEIL (talk · contribs), Medgeorgia (talk · contribs), ITshnik (talk · contribs) and Jaba1977 (talk · contribs) (all of whom otherwise haven't edited in weeks) all arrived in quick succession, supporting the image without comment. It's clearly been advertised somewhere, but it is not clear where, and this just reeks of meatpuppetry and/or canvassing. What is the procedure, here? J Milburn (talk) 23:50, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

It's ok, it was my first try and I made some mistakes, in the future I'll be more careful, by the way at the time when they supported that image, it hadn't been nominated for deletion.--g. balaxaZeႫ 01:07, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

No, it isn't OK. Where did you advertise this nomination? J Milburn (talk) 09:39, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I found it. It's on there (translation. Armbrust 15:05, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

That's probably the most blatant canvassing I have ever seen. J Milburn (talk) 16:26, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

User: 71.70.201.160

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

Please use administrator intervention against vandalism. WP:AIV  A m i t  ❤  04:02, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Uhh, no, probably not since AIV usually refers LTV elsewhere, like here. Seeing as the IP was blocked 4 minutes after this was posted at ANI, I'm closing this. Rgrds. --64.85.217.52 (talk) 10:51, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Zollerriia

Zollerriia (talk · contribs) has been editing Misplaced Pages since 2010. His userpage has claimed since 2011 that he retired, but this is clearly not so. I first noticed a problem with his behavior when he removed Template:Start date and age from a page because it wasn't being used to indicate the age of a human (diff). I checked his recent contributions and found several problematic edits, such as requiring items in a list to all have pages of their own and leaving messages to editors who disagree in the page's source (diff 1) (diff 2) (diff 3), flagging every edit he makes as minor, even extremely major ones (diff), removing links for no reason (diff), and blatantly lying in his edit summaries (diff 1) (diff 2). I'm assuming good faith, but his talk page shows that multiple people and bots, over a span of several years, have all informed him that his edits are not all constructive, but he does not appear to have replied to anything. --71.199.125.210 (talk) 04:13, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Hullaballoo Wolfowitz and Margo Feiden Galleries

Dear Administrators,

When Misplaced Pages changed its rules to allow an individual to edit content about him or herself, I finally allowed a friend, a professional technical writer, Robyn42, to contribute content to Misplaced Pages based on my career as a gallerist, an author, and a member of New York's professional theater community. Recently another contributor, Chicago57th, has also contributed content about me with my approval.

Suddenly a man identified as Hullaballoo Wolfowitz embarked on a strange (the kindest adjective I can use) campaign against me and my gallery, unilaterally deleting wholesale from Misplaced Pages content that mentions my name or my gallery. Further, of his many deletions Mr. Wolfowitz did not present even one for discussion within the Misplaced Pages community. Instead, Mr. Wolfowitz sought to justify his behavior not by offering good reasons that stand up to scrutiny but, instead, resorting to spurious attacks on my character and conduct.

In the article on Joel-Peter Witkin, Mr. Wolfowitz deleted my gallery’s exhibition for Witkin, saying that the text was “unsourced” and “promotional.” As anyone can see, the "Chronology" section of Joel-Peter Witkin's article contains more than 100 similar listings for exhibitions of Witkin’s work. Fewer than 10 of those exhibitions are sourced. Surely, each listing is equally “promotional” in mentioning the venue for the exhibition cited. What is the rationale for deleting only one, the exhibition at my gallery? If Mr. Wolfowitz were to delete each of the similarly unsourced exhibitions from this section, Joel-Peter Witkin would be left with fewer than 10 exhibitions, not the 100 exhibitions that remain in "Chronology" now.

In the article on Raphael Soyer, Mr. Wolfowitz again deleted my gallery from a list of galleries and museums where Soyer exhibited. Mr. Wolfowitz also deleted my gallery’s highly-regarded, scholarly catalogue, “Raphael Soyer: Looking Over the Artist’s Shoulder.” My gallery’s Soyer catalogue is in the collections of museums, libraries, and galleries all over the world. Yet Mr. Wolfowitz deleted it, saying (amazingly) that it was “off-topic.”

In the article on Kurt Vonnegut, Mr. Wolfowitz deleted Vonnegut’s exhibition at my gallery in the section “Art Career.” Our first contribution was a single sentence: “He exhibited at the Margo Feiden Galleries Ltd. in New York." Mr. Wolfowitz deleted this material, saying it was “unsourced” and “promotional." We put it back, sourcing it with two university library archives that include the material. Mr. Wolfowitz again deleted our contribution saying that it was “spammery” and objecting to the library archives as sources. We again posted our contribution, this time with additional material sourced with three newspapers. Mr. Wolfowitz deleted that as well. Had all this behavior been a good-faith effort on Mr. Wolfowitz’s part, he could have used the Talk page to ask for even more than our five sources. The fact is that Vonnegut was represented by my gallery, which curated his art and gave him a one-man exhibition in 1980. Mr. Wolfowitz’s repeated deletion of this well-sourced exhibition makes it clear that his concerns are not as he states them to be. It is also clear that he is not concerned with the opinions of the Misplaced Pages community but is determined to delete my name and any reference to my gallery for reasons best known to himself.

In the article on the film The Misfits, Mr. Wolfowitz deleted the depiction of the film’s actors discussing the script with playwright Arthur Miller. This "backstage moment" was drawn by the artist Al Hirschfeld. The production aspect of this film is a significant topic in American film history, and this image serves the article by being the unique visual documentation of it.

In another article, Mr. Wolfowitiz again deleted an Al Hirschfeld image and the accompanying text—this time for the celebrated canine actor Skippy. Mr. Wolfowitz described our content as “particularly outlandish promotional editing.” However, this is a case where the subject’s portrayal by Al Hirschfeld, the chronicler of twentieth-century performing arts, truly contributes something substantial about the fame achieved by the article's subject, a dog. If Skippy, a dog, deserves his own article, should not that article include Skippy's rare distinction among animal actors of being portrayed by Al Hirschfeld? Doesn’t such a rare distinction at the very least merit discussion before the content is deleted?

Mr. Wolfowitz applied the same heavy hand in his deletion of Hirschfeld images, this time from the article on actress Dolly Haas. Dolly Haas was married to Al Hirschfeld for 50 years. Two of the drawings Mr. Wolfowitz deleted served the article by documenting Haas’ American stage career, a topic that had been completely absent before we made our contribution.

Now to Valerie Solanas, where Mr. Wolfowitz has displayed a particular animus against me in his edits and comments. To begin with, he deleted the widely-published accounts of my meeting with Valerie Solanas on the day she shot Andy Warhol. Once more, Mr. Wolfowitz made these deletions without any discussion on the matter. In point of fact, when another editor attempted to revert Mr. Wolfowitz’s edit and initiate a discussion within the Misplaced Pages community, Mr. Wolfowitz went into the article and deleted our contribution again, before the discussion had run its course. What Mr. Wolfowitz called a “self-sourced account” was in fact sourced with three major articles and interviews: The New York Times, Interview Magazine, and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The controversy is there for you to read in all its detail on the Talk Page Talk:Valerie Solanas.

In summation, one test of Mr. Wolfowitz’s behavior is this: what if every editor behaved as he did—deleting contributions without discussion, removing important exhibitions and catalogues of artists’ work, again without discussion, and removing objectively sourced and documented accounts with the claim that they are “self-sourced?” In short, if everybody behaved as Mr. Wolfowitz did, Misplaced Pages could not function at all. I will also add that Mr. Wolfowitz used inappropriate language throughout.

These are but a few examples of Mr. Wolfowitz’s behavior, by which he has gone through Misplaced Pages deleting my name and that of my gallery over and over and over again, almost everywhere that they appeared. In light of this pattern of behavior by which Mr. Wolfowitz is attempting to erase me, I am requesting that he be blocked from editing material relating to me or to my work.

Respectfully, Margo Feiden Factor-ies (talk) 06:53, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I went ahead and notified Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk · contribs) regarding this discussion. I, Jethrobot (note: not a bot!) 07:02, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Factor-ies (talk · contribs) followed shortly after: . I, Jethrobot (note: not a bot!) 07:04, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• I have not reviewed any of the content, and so I am making no comment on it. My general opinion: this is one example of why no one should edit articles about themselves or their corporations, or add/delete material about their activities or their corporations' activities in any articles (Snowden and the Booz Allen editors are a recent example). If a person's information is notable enough to be included, a third party will likely add it, and that's the way it should be. Taroaldo ✉ 07:13, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• Granted, I have not looked thoroughly into Hullaballoo Wolfowitz's edits mentioned here, but so far, I am not seeing any problem with HW's edits. Unsourced edits are being added to these articles and HW is merely removing them. I suggest to the OP that if they want to add content to these articles, they should source these edits to third-party reliable sources. The fact that there is other content that is not properly sourced is not a reason to add more unsourced content. See WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 08:18, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Please extend every courtesy to another scion of the Wolfowitz clan. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 08:35, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• I'm not sure Misplaced Pages ever specifically "allowed" someone to edit articles about themselves - even Jimbo's phrase was that they should only ever propose changes on the article talkpage. I usually go so far as to say that they can remove WP:BLP-infringing content if it's not properly sourced. Major changes should, ethically, never be done by the subject - period. No comment on HW's specific actions here, yet (✉→BWilkins←✎) 10:16, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
• There's a lot to digest here, but after a broad overview I'd say Wolfowitz acted appropriately and even commendably. Our policies relating to conflict-of-interest editing are, to be fair, somewhat complex. The reason it isn't utterly prohibited is because article subjects need the right to remove false information about themselves from articles. Also, some very broad types of COI are almost impossible to avoid: if neither believers or non-believers could edite articles on religion, there wouldn't be many editors left. Beyond that though, most other COI editing, and in particular spam and self-promotion, IS prohibited. To quote WP:COI, "You should not create or edit articles about yourself, your family or your close friends. If you or they are notable enough, someone else will create the article. You should also avoid writing about yourself or people you know in articles on other topics." Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 12:01, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
• First, WP does allow people to edit articles about themselves and their interests, whether avocational or commercial. It very strongly and rightly recommends otherwise in the case of a strong commercial connection, but there has never been consensus to prohibit; although Jimbo is indeed one of those who advocates prohibition, he is not dictator, and his opinion should not be quoted as policy. I have looked at some of the edits. I'm pretty drastic myself at removing promotional links & mentions , but at least some of the items mentioned seem to at least need explanation: (1) For the Witkin show, I do not see the basis of rejecting this particular one, and I do not think it would have been removed had another editor added it. (2) The Vonnegut material was indeed documented from the first. The published Lily Library and University of Delaware archives descriptions are appropriate sources for plain description. In the past, many such descriptions were unpublished and cryptic, but the availability on the web has made these widely available (and used in WP), However (3) For the Soyer catalog, I do not see it in WorldCat. (4)For the Hirschfeld drawings, they were added as NFCC,and the criteria for their relevance is rather strict (in my opinion, stricter than it should be but that's another matter) Hirschfeld made a great many drawings, and illustrated large parts of the cultural world of his period in ways that add a justly famous degree of understanding, so the decision of which ones to add is exactly the sort of thing that is most subject to COI and is best done by a uninvolved editor. I note that the captions for them included, unnecessarily, the name of the gallery--including that is a very clear indication of promotional use, and would certainly lead any unbiased person to be exceedingly skeptical about their insertion. This illustrates the problem: a promotional editor may make good judgement, or not,and must be judged by the results. Had MF used better judgement in writing the captions, and judging what images to include, the effort would have been more successful.

DGG ( talk ) 17:32, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• I don't see where the reporting party tried to work this out with HW before coming here. I would also note that COI editing is not against policy, no matter how unwise it is. Each edit is supposed to be based on its own merits. I suggest closing and taking any concerns to the actual editor on the article talk page. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:42, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• It is strongly discouraged for very good reasons. The number of reasonable COI editors I've encountered I can probably count on one hand. Most are blatant COIs and end up getting blocked, or everything they do is reverted because it does not fit within the scope of the project. Taroaldo ✉ 20:08, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• Agreed. There is such a thing as a COI editor who makes positive contributions, but far more often they try to sell something, push an agenda, or just "get their name out there". The current case appears to be a mixture of all three. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 22:32, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• Hullaballoo raised this at ANI a month ago .
• I agree with you, DGG. Many good editors edit about their avocational interests. Bearian (talk) 20:29, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• Dear A Quest For Knowledge: Thank you for your comments on this, and your even-handed approach. Speaking to the subject of sourcing, of course it is very important. However, Mr. Wolfowitz was not consistent in his treatment of what he terms “unsourced” material. If being unsourced is sufficient grounds for immediate deletion, why did Mr. Wolfowitz not delete all the other unsourced material in the same article? Mr. Wolfowitz specifically targeted material about me, using a rationale that he did not apply to any other equivalent material. However, Mr. Wolfowitz removed material that he termed “unsourced” when solid sourcing was clearly there for all to see. Factor-ies (talk) 08:30, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

• Dear DGG: Thank you very much for your contribution to this discussion. The Soyer catalogue we published can be sourced, for example If unsourced material was Mr. Wolfowitz’s objection, I would have been happy to add a source. I am fairly new to Misplaced Pages and was guided by the other material on that page. As to the Hirschfeld drawings, which included the gallery’s name in captioning, it is commonplace in the art world, in fact the industry standard, that when art is reproduced its location is noted. Would you not, in captioning a photograph of the Statue of Libery, say that it stands in New York Harbor? It is important to know where the original art is located, and examples of this practice can be found within Misplaced Pages on the pages for Mark Rothko, Isamu Noguchi, Henri Matisse, and Paul Klee, and many others. If including my name in the caption was what bothered Mr. Wolfowitz, he could have, and should have, notified me. We could then have opened that discussion to the Misplaced Pages community. Thank you again for your discussion here. Factor-ies (talk) 08:30, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

• Dear Dennis Brown: Thank you for joining in on this discussion. You are correct that I did not try to work these problems out with Mr. Wolfowitz before reporting them here. After reading your comments, I think that perhaps I should have done so. I did know that it was an option, but Mr. Wolfowitz himself never engaged with me, although he clearly had reason to. He could have, and should have, asked for sourcing--although sourcing was already provided for content that he deleted as uncourced. Such was his demeanor that I felt I needed to go to the Misplaced Pages community. Factor-ies (talk) 08:30, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

• Dear Taraoldo: Thank you for your interest in these issues. I contributed content that I felt would stand on its own merit in an encyclopedic reference. Your experience with other COI editors is clearly unfortunate, but I feel certain that you would agree that my contributions should be judged on their own merits. Interested parties can help build Misplaced Pages and indeed, very often, interested parties have more knowlege and more accurate information than anyone else. On the other hand, third parties knowledgeable enough to write on a specific subject will almost never be purely unbiased. Let me ask you this: if Madame Curie suddenly came back to life, would you prohibit her from including her own biographical details in Misplaced Pages, or adding to articles on radioactivity? Of course not. The point is, if I am not able to add my gallery’s exhibition for Joel-Peter Witkin, and Joel-Peter Witkin cannot add it himself, would I have to rely on somebody that saw the exhibition in the Spring of 1970, remembered it, and cared enough to add it to Misplaced Pages? That scenario seems unlikely, and yet many people born after that exhibition should have the right to find that information on Misplaced Pages. Factor-ies (talk) 08:30, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

BLP semi?

I just discovered that Sherman Alexie has spent the last two weeks in a vandalized state (due to IPs) while two registered users touched it without noticing the vandalism. The page has been viewed almost 14,000 times in the last month. If this is happening on a page like Sherman Alexie, I'm concerned that the system for catching vandalism has broken down. Is there any good reason not to semi all BLPs at this point? Viriditas (talk) 10:17, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

WP:VPP Sædon 10:19, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Or WP:RFPP? (✉→BWilkins←✎) 10:49, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I have pending changes protected for a month.....Lectonar (talk) 12:33, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, I also went to pending-changes protect the article, but Lectonar got there before me. Bwilkins, it makes no sense to refer Viriditas to WP:RFPP, as this wasn't a request for protection but a request for input on whether all BLP's should be semi-protected. I suppose WP:VPP is your man per Saedon, yes. But I'll say I'm in favour of general semi of BLP's, despite the obvious objection that that'll make it even more frustrating for the non-wiki-savvy person who tries to remove negative stuff about themselves. Bishonen | talk 13:16, 3 July 2013 (UTC).

VPP might be the place to go, but one does not have to be a prophet to see that this will never catch on; I'd be in favour of pd lvl. 1 for BLP's....but neither that nor semi will catch dedicated people who really want to do harm (imho, the worst BLP violations come from registered autoconfirmed users anyway). Lectonar (talk) 13:22, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

WP:RFPP would be the right place if Viriditas was requesting protection for a single BLP but if we're talking about all BLPs then that would need to take place at WP:VPP. As an aside, I would wholly support such a proposal, if not protection then at least pending changes. Sædon 20:17, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• Let's hear it once again for IP editing... Ya wanna smack down vandalism, banning IP editing and requiring sign-in-to-edit would vaporize between 50 and 90 percent of it in an afternoon, I'm guessing. Carrite (talk) 18:22, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
  • I think that's a really good policy suggestion. Was the vandalism really severe/obvious or was it more subtle (like changing dates)? (It's hard to tell from the link since it's no diff. DrPhen (talk) 22:16, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
  • And what percentage of good quality edits would that also prevent? Vegaswikian (talk) 22:21, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Threat of future disruption to Misplaced Pages if changes not made

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

• BlazeT3ck (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Operation: Bot Roast (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

User has twice threatened (in this edit summary and this talk message) to "let millions of people not have access to this place". While not a legal threat, this threat of a denial-of-service attack is clearly designed to have a chilling effect. —C.Fred (talk) 12:52, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Petty threats to me. Obviously not here to edit constructively. Elockid 12:59, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Indeffed. WP:Not here and pure vandalism for removal of very clearly referenced information. Pay no more attention. Canterbury Tail talk 13:13, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Is that Wiki-terrorism? -- Jodon | Talk 13:23, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Not to reward bad behavior, but since the person being removed doesn't have an article and is only "accused", doesn't naming them go against WP:BLPCRIME? "For people who are relatively unknown, editors must give serious consideration to not including material in any article suggesting that the person has committed, or is accused of committing, a crime unless a conviction is secured." --NeilN 14:01, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Prolongued incivility and possible indef. block evasion concerns

UrbanNerd (talk · contribs) has been persistently incivil to a number of editors (myself included) over an extended period of time. Generally, he is ignored, though, from time to time, he receives a message reminding him of WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA, WP:AGF, and the like, and he has been blocked numerous times for personal attacks already. Still, the ignorance seemingly enables him to continue and the warnings/reminders/bloks are simply dismissed.

Some examples:

• 22:44, 2 July 2013: "Moxy, may I remind you this is not the place to gossip with the ladies... thanks. Once again Miesianiacal believes that BRD doesn't apply to him and he can add his usual british trash to every article and when reverted just reinstates and starts an edit war. I have never seen an editor with such a enormous bias and such disregard for BRD still editing here."
• 05:06, 2 July 2013: "Please follow BRD when your nonsense edits get reverted."
• 05:05, 2 July 2013: "Miesianiacals bias additions -- You added material which was filled with british trash as usual..."
• 21:34, 30 May 2013: "Even more Monarchist crap -- i've removed yet more monarchist rhetoric by everyones favorite monarchist editor..."
• 00:28, 29 May 2013: "Are you high on meth? Seriously?"
• 03:59, 22 May 2013: "o one here is an 'idiot' besides yourself..."
• 16:30, 21 April 2013: "I can assure you pal that I have lived in Ottawa for MANY years... more than your 26 years on this earth. I also have studied the city formally for years. So I can assure you I do in fact know this city better than most, including you. So your opinion of me is irrelevant and i could really care less. Your out of date 'inner-greenbelt' mentality at looking at the city as if it was 1988 and you were 65 years old is laughable."
• 19:53, 2 March 2013: "Wow, I'm going to try and stay civil here, but your comments/actions are so far beyond comprehension i don't know where to even start. You can't be that simple, you have to be putting on an act."
• 18:08, 24 January 2013: "remove excessive canadian bias by known bias monarchist editor, and general pain in the a**."
• 03:01, 19 December 2012: "We both know that no one at the NBA article objects to your little pansy team count. No quit being a ass clown as usual. You're a terrible editor."
• 02:57, 7 November 2012: "Wow, your lack of intelligent contributions is breath taking... Stop making up fake consensuses and edit warring."
• 14:41, 25 October 2012: "it was changed to DMY yesterday moron..."
• 03:30, 25 October 2012: "Probably added by a useless Ozzy like yourself. Now go back to being irrelevant."
• 02:23, 16 October 2012: "Hey buddy, has your acne medication gone to your pee brain? F*ck right off with your attitude. At the time the news story came out it read that he resigned affective immediately. It has since been updated. It's easy for someone like you that sits at his computer all day dreaming of having any resemblance of a social life or even a single friend to get updates and then criticize others/act tough. You're not tough, you're an jag off. Please don't be so abrasive in the future. Thank you."

On a related but tangential matter, there's much to suggest UrbanNerd is the new user name of the indfinitely blocked Po' buster (talk · contribs) (that being the subsequent user name of the indefinitely blocked PhilthyBear (talk · contribs)): the general attitude illustrated above, plus the content and target of some of the attacks, as well as many similarities in patterns of editing (southern Ontario and Canadian urban-related matters, populations/demographics, lists of largest buildings, Ottawa, the National Capital Region, Toronto, Fanshawe College, Gangs in Canada, removing French language material, etc.), the very short time between when Po' buster was blocked and UrbanNerd began editing, and more.

Since UrbanNerd has been editing under that name now for over three years, I am not sure whether or not a sockpuppet investigation or checkuser is of any value anymore. Perhaps others who know better can advise on that.

I do believe, though, that, for however long UrbanNerd continues to edit here, some serious civility restrictions need to be placed upon him by the community. Do we have a precedent to follow? --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 17:58, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• The block log, together with this edit summary from today, suggest to me an editor that simply can't edit collegially. I'd be interested in what others think. Black Kite (talk) 20:15, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

  AGFing that edit summary, that could simply mean he is removing a "strange" message. However, the edit to his userpage that caused it to be speedy deleted as an attack page yesterday is quite illuminating. Resolute 21:55, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• I have made a number of comments in recent discussions about the lax attitude the Misplaced Pages community seems to have about chronic incivility. I have pointed out that this has a negative effect on productive editors and can eventually cause people to give up on the project. This seems to be another good illustration of the ongoing problem. (This user had a nice attack page deleted just yesterday.) Taroaldo ✉ 20:18, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• I am surprised, and disappointed, that UrbanNerd has gone on for so long in this fashion. (Interestingly, UrbanNerd's talkpage has just been sanitized since this ANI was posted.) The examples given are not just disruptive, they are abusive. It is time to put the burden on UrbanNerd to overcome this sad legacy. I recommend an WP:INDEF, and then let UrbanNerd plead a case for unblocking. – S. Rich (talk) 20:45, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• It's a wonder he's not been indef'd already for a slew of policy violations. I'd support S. Rich's proposal of an indef. Dusti 21:02, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Btw - let's add this to the mix. Dusti 21:05, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• The suggestion that the UrbanNerd account is a sock is interesting. I don't have knowledge of the previous user names, and I think 3 years is well beyond the stale range for a CU anyway, so that could only be judged on behavioural evidence. That, however, may not really be required. UrbanNerd is an alright content editor, but he is singularly incapable of interacting with people. Any edit he dislikes, or any of his edits that get challenged are inevitably responded to with a barrage of insults. The examples Miesianiacal notes above are really just a small sample set. Even if he evades one now, an indef block is inevitable unless UrbanNerd learns to interact with others. Resolute 21:55, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• For what it's worth I also believe that this user does more harm than good. I am struck by their constant assumption of bad faith/stupidity on the part of other users (ie. , among many others. Follow almost any discussion they're in, and you'll see much the same) and a general failure to discuss changes substantively (ie. ). The pattern is repeated and constant. I tried to engage the user as kindly as I could, but was called "queer" and my message was deleted (). I think it's best to spare other editors the headache and time lost arguing constantly with someone who simply won't engage in a proper substantive debate.Peregrine981 (talk) 22:29, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• UrbanNerd should of course be given a chance to respond, but there is compelling evidence here of a long-standing problem that requires intervention. Gamaliel (talk) 22:37, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
• Support indef block. Off-the-charts incivility including very childish name-calling, over a period long enough that they can't claim they just had a bad day... or week... or month. Misplaced Pages isn't the schoolyard. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 23:38, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
• Support indef block given the block history and continuing disruptive beahviour. Dbrodbeck (talk) 02:24, 4 July 2013 (UTC)
• Support indefinite block. Multiple persistant and continuing behavioral problems make this user a net negative to the project. Inability to collaborate with others is more than amply demonstrated. This block is long overdue. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 02:33, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

If I may add another example:

• 07:24, 1 March 2013: "reverting to 21:20, 16 February 2013‎ revision by User:Ccyyrree per WP:BRD and WP:STATUSQUO"
• 13:02, 1 March 2013: "Undid revision 541454110 by 117Avenue (talk) Revert back to longstanding as per WP:BRD"
• 02:12, 2 March 2013: "To what long standing version are you talking about"?
• 19:53, 2 March 2013: "your comments/actions are so far beyond comprehension i don't know where to even start. You can't be that simple, you have to be putting on an act."

117Avenue (talk) 06:06, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Strange username/IP and the Dantherocker1 association

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

I discovered this afternoon that my talk page was vandalized by a strange name: 2602:304:cd01:1f59:54d7:14eb:ae2f:5335. Furthermore it appears to have used by a sock farm from 2011, (original account User:Dantherocker1), who caused a major disruption throughout Misplaced Pages and eventually started harassing me on Misplaced Pages and YouTube. NHRHS2010 the student pilot ✈ 21:41, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

You can't claim that an IP is being used by the same person who was using it in 2011, without some evidence to back that up. Do you have any? 78.149.172.10 (talk) 21:45, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I am being suspicious because the Dantherocker1 sockpuppets have targeted me in the past. So it could be either him or someone copying him. NHRHS2010 the student pilot ✈ 21:49, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• The "strange name" is just an IPv6 address. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:15, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

37.117.127.158 is doing disruptive editing again.

The user with this IP address 37.117.127.158 is at it again. He has committed disruptive editing on film infoboxes on The Lone Ranger (2013 film), as you can see it here and here in Transformers (film series).

The user with this IP address has done this before and was discussed and archived here. This user was warned by Dennis Brown on his talk page and was quiet for a few days until he came back to do his disruptive film editing on the film infoboxes. BattleshipMan (talk) 22:34, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

• I think a block may be required to stop the disruption, but want more input. I think my request for him to "stop" on his talk page could not have possibly been more obvious. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 22:38, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
  • You forgot to notify him so I did it myself. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 22:50, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
    • One of the negatives of the new, "quieter" message notification system is it's harder to assume anyone's definitely seen their warnings. I guess a short block is the way to go, proceeding to a longer one if they come back and keep it up. Infobox formatting is pretty minor disruption though, and it's possible they genuinely think it looks better that way. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 22:52, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
      • Do you think he'll ever stop his disruptive editing on film infoboxes after we blocked him for a short time. BattleshipMan (talk) 23:46, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

User:Jc37 and edit-warring

Please can some uninvolved admins cast their eyes on the rather complex case listed at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit_warring#User:Jc37_reported_by_User:BrownHairedGirl_.28Result:_.29?

I thought that WP:AN3 was the best place to report this issue, tho it's not a perfect fit. If another forum would be more suitable, I would welcome suggestions. But whatever the venue, it would be good to have assistance in resolving this. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:16, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

There is an RFC at WikiProject Ireland, where I think it is more suitable to take this rather than pursuing the conduct issues.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 23:59, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I hope that the RFC will produce a consensus outcome. But RFCs remain open for a long time, and in the meantime Jc37 continues to edit-war, citing a CFD close which didn't even mention his desired change ( a change which got no support at CFD, or in the RFC). Is there any way of persuading him to just accept the the status quo ante pending the RFC outcome? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:09, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

There doesn't appear to be any harm in allowing the discussion to resolve the matter. Should consensus stay where it appears to be then Jc37's edit will be undone. As long as he accepts what the RfC decides there is no disruption to prevent.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 01:14, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

First off, thank you TDA for the AGF.

BHG has left out a few things, such as I was the closer of the discussion, then I implemented the close and a few others have tried to revert it based upon their personal declared POV/biases. That's textbook disruption. But rather than be a rouge admin, and implement some variation of WP:RBI for disruption (as all too many admins all too often do), I chose instead to try to engage with them, and suggested that the subpage one editor wrote up as a proposed synthesis of several discussions be now proposed as a guideline. If this has actual consensus, then an rfc should be fairly simple SOP. Discussion, regardless of outcome, is a good thing.

But impatience apparently set in, and despite the fact the "there is no deadline", they've continued to revert the close.

Proof? read User talk:Fayenatic london#Ireland_categories, my talk page, User_talk:BrownHairedGirl#Note, and of course the edit history of the category in question.

Closers simply should not be attacked like this. If they're doing this to me, someone who even they have professed to have liked at some point, how then are they treating other closers?

Oh and, as I asked for the discussion, I'll obviously respect it. Indeed, my intention has been to add a note to the cfd close after the rfc closes, noting the result of the rfc. (Though I would hope that the rfc was advertised at least at one or more of the WP:VPs.)

All this aside, I'm very disappointed in the editors with whom I have worked with, discussed with, etc., over the last several years. I have little doubt that they now have few kind things to say about me (How dare I implement a close contrary to their interpretation of my close!), but I guess c'est la vie. - jc37 09:12, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

• Comment. I think everyone involved in the RFC should just wait for it to be closed before worrying about restoring the categories to their preferred set-up. I don't understand what the hurry is and the way the RFC is going it should produce a result everyone can be happy about. I know—users are attempting to restore the status quo ante—but really, if all users were just patient for the RFC to close, there would be no problems at all. Good Ol’factory 00:58, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Arbitration enforcement action appeal by drg55

Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found here. According to the procedures, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" is required to overturn an arbitration enforcement action.

To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).

Appealing user

drg55 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) – Drg55 (talk) 06:04, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Sanction being appealed

http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Drg55

Administrator imposing the sanction

Future Perfect at Sunrise (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Notification of that administrator

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=User_talk:Future_Perfect_at_Sunrise&diff=562793562&oldid=562793465

Statement by drg55

1. Rush to judgement, I was topic banned from Scientology and religion before I had a chance to respond. 2. I am being accused under Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Scientology#Single purpose accounts with agendas I have exposed in http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Bare-faced_Messiah#Complaints_by_User:Drg55 that user MartinPoulter has an agenda against Scientology, http://infobomb.org/ Not only is he giving talks "around the country" (usually in pubs) http://biasandbelief.wordpress.com/martins-talks-and-lectures/ but he has a 20 year history of attacks on Scientology in alt.religion.Scientology http://www.spaink.net/cos/mpoulter/scum.html ("Three religions take your pick" by Martin is incoherent undergraduate abuse) Martin mentions "bias research" on his user page, but does not mention his history of antagonism to Scientology http://en.wikipedia.org/User:MartinPoulter#Scientology.2FDianetics He claims credit for writing the Bare-Faced Messiah page along with Prioryman who complained about me leading to my block. 3. Scientology is one of the most popular items on the internet in Misplaced Pages we out rate Christianity yet what is characteristic is a new form of fascism which is intolerant of other points of view, I described it as (unreconstructed neo fascist) hence the rush to block me contrary to neutral point of view. 4. The edit which resulted in a warning for me was my deletion of a line from a newspaper article which was factually incorrect by comparison with the book. Prioryman calls this original research, I call it an unreliable source. http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bare-faced_Messiah&diff=560476870&oldid=560410248 http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bare-faced_Messiah&diff=559685829&oldid=550158142 Additionally in the summary of the book I added in that disaffected Scientologists were a source, Prioryman said that was original research, so I deleted the lines about FoI docs and stolen diaries being used in the book, as they were not sourced either. I think a little common sense would apply as per WP:IAR. http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bare-faced_Messiah&diff=560477183&oldid=560476870 5. Fut.Perf says: "I don't think I need to read much further than the "unreconstructed neo fascist" bit or the "our critics are generally insane" bit here . Topic-banned. Fut.Perf." Actually our critics are generally insane and go completely overboard applies mainly to the sources used in the book and some of the other attackers over the years and is one reason why we are still here. It is a bit of a freudian slip where Fut.per identifies editors as critics. 6. The article has a section "Reaction from Hubbard's followers", surely here one would find some comments. I put some in http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bare-faced_Messiah&diff=562506859&oldid=562495611 Prioryman called them bad sources. There is a difference I have had trouble getting across to him that while yes a blog may not be a very good source, just like newspaper articles which are rushed and rewritten from previous articles as source, but if a person makes a personal statement in a blog, and the object in this case is the "Reaction from Hubbard's followers" then it is factual and valid. Similarly with the Scientology website and and Independent Scientologist website on Bare-Faced Messiah (wise old goat - Michel Snoeck), which is referenced here http://scientologistsfreezone.com/links.shtml. As it happens while I used to be an official for the Church and I have discussions with them from time to time I have been told they don't like me referencing Freezone Scientology, and they would prefer if I wasn't editing Misplaced Pages Scientology references for that matter. I don't happen to agree with the Free zone, but then I don't always agree with current management either, however I support the Church for pragmatic reasons, more right than wrong. I put these quotes in because Prioryman wanted me to get a source to say that BFM was based on disaffected Scientologists so I found one. He deleted it and I admit I put it back in with further comments. I might get a better source later on if I am permitted to continue editing. 7. I therefore request that the block be lifted, or if I am to be blocked Martin Poulter is also blocked. I still don't know Prioryman's orientation because he didn't answer my questions, but it can be expected that at least half of editors in Scientology issues are from opposed sources. The answer I think is a bit of tolerance all round. 8 The internet war with Scientology began originally by anti religious kidnappers and skeptics, the article "cult" (the most visited in Misplaced Pages) states that ideas of "brainwashing" in new religious groups are discreditted "In the late 1980s, psychologists and sociologists started to abandon theories like brainwashing and mind-control. While scholars may believe that various less dramatic coercive psychological mechanisms could influence group members, they came to see conversion to new religious movements principally as an act of a rational choice" https://en.wikipedia.org/Cult#Anti-cult_movements_and_their_impact Legal victories such as the destruction of Cult Awareness Network https://en.wikipedia.org/Cult_Awareness_Network played a part. Scientology now has sufficient religious recognition that views otherwise should be viewed as prejudice. However pockets remain and Martin Poulter thinks we are a cult and it certainly drives the skeptics to drink. I don't really mind contrary views in[REDACTED] as long as I can get in balancing statements. I appeal to administrators to allow me to continue.

Statement by Fut.Perf

Apparently Drg55 thinks that calling other people "unreconstructed neo-fascists" and "insane" is okay if it's not directed at fellow editors but at people outside Misplaced Pages. Well, it is not. Moreover, the "neo-fascist" bit clearly was directed also at fellow editors. Drg55 apparently cannot see anything wrong with it, and just wants to be allowed to continue editing as before. Recommend speedy closure and rejection of this appeal, and possibly a block for repeating the insults even in this appeal. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:29, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Statement by (involved editor 1)

Statement by (involved editor 2)

Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by drg55

Result of the appeal by drg55

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

No idea why this is on AN/I, but let's be direct here: scientology is a ridiculous cult and we do not need members of said cult to build our articles on the subject. Your violations of policy aside, after reading your contributions it's clear you lack the competence to contribute to WP in a constructive fashion. I understand we have a certain level of decorum here, wherein we generally don't call out editors on their beliefs, but in cases where editors are attempting to push an abjectly inane belief system we need to drop the facade and simply call a spade a spade. 09:38, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Edit Warring by user Viriditas again

Despite a recent two-week block, a warning by an admin to not edit war and a recent AN/I report, the user is engaging in the same problematic editing style, this time by the user who initiated a wholesale revision of currently disputed material despite being notified (by me) of the proper editing Misplaced Pages procedures in cases of dispute over contentious material, starting with 30 (or RFC), then DRN, etc. The editor doesn't seem to understand the basic Misplaced Pages principle of trying to collaborate in cases of disagreements, so at this point somebody has to just step in and do something about this user's habit of edit warring. Gobbleygook (talk) 07:39, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

The recent ANI report you refer to was filled by yourself, and I believe you were told not to fill more of these ANI reports. Regards,Iselilja (talk) 08:33, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

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