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User:Jan Arkesteijn and the misleading use of false colour versions of old paintings on Misplaced Pages transcluded from Commons

Jan Arkesteijn (talk · contribs)

I believe sanctions or a topic ban on this project are worth considering for the long term pattern of misleading edits by Jan Arkesteijn on Misplaced Pages, and in a slightly more complex way via Wikidata as infoboxes and reports may automatically transclude the (P18) image linked on Wikidata relating to the article subject.

The pattern of misleading use of images is under discussion at Commons:ANU, where anyone is free to add an opinion or provide further evidence.

As an example please refer to the multiple cases on the Commons Admin noticeboard, and the specific deletion request at Deletion_requests/File:Richard_Wilson_(1714-1782),_by_Anton_Raphael_Mengs.jpg where this diff shows Jan Arkesteijn replacing an official correct colour image of a painting from the National Museum of Wales with a false colour version on the article Richard Wilson (painter). Further research will show other examples of replacing museum quality images with misleadingly false colour versions, such as on Erasmus Darwin (replacing an official National Portrait Gallery image), these have not been researched for the discussion on Wikimedia Commons as that project's policies do not cover these types of rare inter-project disruption.

Thanks --Fæ (talk) 18:14, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Support. This user's esthetic disruption is extraordinary. See also . Jürgen Eissink (talk) 15:53, 8 November 2018 (UTC).

• @Fæ: So, reviewing the situation...wow. Just to make sure I understand the situation, this user has been deceptively replacing images of historical paintings with deliberately falsified versions, for years, and in spite of multiple blocks, and has gone so far as to falsify EXIF data? And, when called out at Commons' AN, he simply lied and said he wasn't doing it? Is that really the situation? I'm seeing his conduct described at Commons as "vandalism", "forgery", and "fraud". I see the number of falsified images is potentially in the thousands, and that these falsified images are in place all over Wikipedias of all languages. I also see that Jan primarily contributes by adding images to articles here, as well as other language Wikipedias, something he can most certainly not be trusted doing. He edits a wide variety of projects. I'm strongly inclined to indef here, if there are no objections, but I suspect that a global ban for severe cross-wiki disruption might be a more appropriate measure.  Swarm  talk  21:50, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Pretty much. For years they uploaded their own recoloured versions of professional photographs of paintings from archives, museums and galleries, apparently thinking these were improvements by replacing authentic copies of aged old paintings with their digitally enhanced very pink faces, super blue skies or over brightened dark backgrounds. It was only in the last series of complaints and sample cases that it was highlighted that EXIF data was also their creation, so that clearly the casual viewer or reuser would be misled by whatever copyright statements were displayed with the EXIF. There are over 1,300 instances where a Public Domain Mark license has been misleadingly declared this way, yet the source institution has made no such declaration.

Though people can take their own photographs of paintings and release them on Commons, recolouring other people's professional photographs or archive quality photographs and failing to make that clear, and failing to upload the original, so if the source goes dead we can never work out if the image has been digitally altered, is seriously misleading regardless of our endless presumptions of good faith or the retrospectively declared intention. As this activity spans 10 years and these photographs were promoted on Wikidata as the "official" versions, it is unlikely that the encyclopaedia-worthy colour correct and professional versions of these artworks will ever be repaired across all the different language Wikipedias or Wikidata.

Without intending to brag, I am technically competent at examining EXIF data and tracking down original image sources, with my own track record of uploading over a million GLAM related archive quality photographs to Commons. However properly fixing one of the cases, including amending Wikidata and repairing global usage, can take me 15 minutes, so fixing several thousand is an unrealistic backlog for the limited Wikimedia Commons volunteer time we have available from those with the right types of skill or interest. In some cases repair will be impossible due to sources going offline in the years since upload. --Fæ (talk) 22:56, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support and how to globally indef and rollback their uploads? This is global digital cultural vandalism. Why just why? Legacypac (talk) 01:25, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment Is any image NOT a false-color image? The technology for reproducing colors using RGB falls short of perfection, and the appearance of colors on anyone's screen depends on adjustments on the machine they're using. Michael Hardy (talk) 19:19, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

  There is a big difference between adjusting your own photographs and tampering with official research quality photographs from archives that have been carefully taken to be as colour correct as technically possible. --Fæ (talk) 21:20, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Nemo bis

• Nemo bis (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Nemo bis is a vocal proponent of Sci-Hub, the academic paper piracy site, see Sci-Hub (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Sci-Hub has a long-running legal wrangle with Elsevier, caused by Sci-Hub's use of university credentials to which it has no legal right, to access, store, and serve, Elsevier's copyright material in open defiance of copyright. Sci-Hub's operator, and many fans, repudiate the right of publishers to hold exclusive rights to academic papers. While this position is undoubtedly morally defensible (and I agree with it), it is the opposite of the current laws across most of the world.

Nemo bis has now stared adding "free to read" links to large numbers of articles, linking to zenodo.org: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Misplaced Pages: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com . This site allows anyone to upload papers without checking copyright status. Some of the papers are copyright by Elsevier, Nature and other well known litigious publishers. Another, by OUP, Nemo bis asserts on his talk page to be public domain based on his own reading of (current) US government copyright policy.

I think this violates WP:POINT and WP:RGW. I have blacklisted the site per WP:C while we work out what the copyright status really is for these works. Guy (Help!) 18:45, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I noticed this taking over my watchlist. It's also a problem of making 2000 revisions faster than a human could. Natureium (talk) 18:48, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

The links were checked and directed manually one by one. Also, I don't agree with the statement above that I'm a "vocal proponent of Sci-Hub". --Nemo 18:55, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• Note this came up just over a year ago. This appears to be a continuation/amplification of the problem identified then. Alexbrn (talk) 18:56, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
• yep I asked that Zenodo be removed from OABOT's suggestion lists at WT:OABOT#Zenodo which they argued against. I have reverted many of their zenodo (and other links) over the past few days Jytdog (talk) 22:01, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
  • I've also taken the initiative and ensured that Citation bot stops adding links to Zenodo, with User talk:Citation bot/Archive_12#Emergency blacklist and https://github.com/ms609/citation-bot/pull/1029 (t) Josve05a (c) 22:56, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

@Josve05a: thank you, and apologies for the inevitable inconvenience this is likely to cause you. Guy (Help!) 00:04, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• I don't understand why questionable open access links are being added when the existing DOI will probably lead to this which seems to already be open access. Is there something I'm missing? I'm not accessing from an institution or other subscriber or via any such proxy, just an ordinary NZ ISP connection. I even tried private mode to make sure there wasn't some stray cookie, or a referrer causing it. If the PDF is desired it's here . If it's feared the DOI's target will change or will be different, wouldn't it be better to link to the Nature site directly in the URL field? P.S. Since Nemo checked each addition, I'm assuming they checked what the DOI did before adding. Nil Einne (talk) 22:20, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
  • I got the above by randomly clicking one of Nemo's recent contribs since there's been no examples of the what people were talking about in the earlier comments (well not counting the previous ANI). To see if this was a fluke, I looked at the other 5 most recent contribs. Without commenting on the copyright issues, the first 3 and last one at least seem to serve a purpose in that none of the links (either the DOI or link outs in PubMed) seems to lead to open access versions . But the fourth (fifth if you include the earlier case) is another one where the existing DOI seems to lead to a full text link . The PDF is also available . So this is 2 out of 6. Again I'm using an ordinary NZ home ISP connection and tried in private mode. Have journals started to use region based pay walls and provide open access to only certain areas or is there something else I'm missing about the advantage of Zenodo over the journal site? Otherwise, considering the questions over whether they have sufficient systems in place to stop copyvios, I really don't see a benefit to adding these Zenodo hosted open access links when the journal hosted copy is already open access. If it's feared that the open access links may disappear wouldn't using archive.org or webcitation (if robots.txt allow) be a better solution? Nil Einne (talk) 22:48, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
    • I see Misplaced Pages:OABOT#I am a publisher. How do I make sure OAbot recognizes my full texts? and Misplaced Pages:OABOT#What kinds of links won't the bot add? that there is already recognition that OABot should try and recognise existing full text publication links and not add other open access links if there's already one. While it's possible the publishers in these cases haven't properly complied with normal guidelines for making full text, which is unfortunate, since Nemo manually checked all their additions this isn't a problem since if the full text worked for them they would I presume have recognised it. (I mean it's pretty hard for a human not to notice it's full text especially since you don't have to click on anything in these cases.) So I really don't understand what happened here. I tried with a proxy, unfortunately my proxy doesn't offer Italy but both Ireland and Spain also gave the working full text version from the DOI. Has Nemo somehow been blocked from the full text or is Italy or wherever Nemo is accessing from not allowed the full text? Nil Einne (talk) 23:24, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

That "manual check" does not appear to satisfy any of our normal criteria for checking rights. Try uploading an image with a rationale like that, see how far you get. Guy (Help!) 00:02, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I think that when we link to academic papers in journals, WP:ELNEVER demands that we should only link to sites that trace the provenance of each paper and for which that provenance can be unambiguously traced back to an author (e.g. arXiv, many institutional repositories, or direct links to the author's own web site) or to official published versions of the paper (on the publisher site or sites with the explicit permission of the publisher such as jstor). Zenodo doesn't appear to maintain this provenance data, so we should not allow links to it. Blacklisting links to it may be a somewhat drastic step, but given the magnitude of the problem (huge number of links, many of which appear to be either copyright violations or self-published materials) it may be necessary. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:51, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• @JzG: Where does WP:C justify blacklisting a site "while we work out what the copyright status really is"? SmartSE (talk) 13:33, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

The alternative was to block Nemo bis, but if these are copyright violating external links (as every one I have checked has been) then blacklisting serves a well established protective purpose preventing good faith users from accidentally invoking potential liability. We've done the same before. Guy (Help!) 15:46, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

For example, sci-hub is globally blacklisted. DMacks (talk) 16:07, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• If anybody doubts that Nemo bis a) doesn't understand WP:COPYLINK and b) has no interest whatsoever in understanding this policy, please see the series of discussions at their talk page which includes things like the following:
  • concerning this edit, which added a link to the final published version of this paper published in Science Signalling which per SHERPA/ROMEO does not allow the final published version to be archived.,... (Not ambiguous, not hard to figure out).... they wrote:
    • diff What reasons do you have to think that <zenodo link redacted> is a copyright violation? The author can have a contract addendum with the publisher, a specific license or other statutory rights.
    • diff Could you clarify what parts of the policies you believe to state that the non-copyvio status of the link targets needs to be verifiable? The very section you linked says something very different.
  • more generally:
    • diff I'm not hosting nor uploading or otherwise providing that copy. The responsible way to proceed, when one has a doubt, is to contact the author so that they can check their contracts and if necessary revise their archived copies. I happen to have already done so for the author of <zenodo link redacted>, but you can easily be helpful in reducing copyright violations even if you are less familiar than me with publisher policies: just point authors to the respective records on https://dissem.in/ . (totally outrageous)
    • diff I assume you just wanted to inform me of the existence of Template:Uw-copyright-link, because the text doesn't apply to any edit of mine. I'm definitely not «Knowingly directing others to a site that violates copyright».
    • diff I'm sympathetic to your concerns, but I'm afraid this is an inaccurate description of the matter (argh)
    • diff There is no reason whatsoever to blindly assume that CERN or the author of the article would be violating copyright. Civil systems exist for rightsholders to have their rights respected, and I don't think your second-guessing here is one of them. Are you sure you're not getting emotional due to personal connections to Blackwell? You may want to sleep over it
  • over at WT:OABOT they wrote this complete nonnsense:
    • diff How do you know the author did not gain authorisation for that upload?. In response to this very good answer from User:David Eppstein, they wrote
    • diff: By this reasoning, we should not use any institutional repository. Your reading of the policy is therefore clearly wrong.

It is very, very clear that to Nemo Bis, if a paper is in a repository we should assume it is there in compliance with the publisher's license agreement. This is exactly the wrong answer per WP:COPYLINK and also ignores question #4 that OABOT asks when it presents a link, namely: Is the new link likely copyright-compliant? nemo bis' answer is "I will assume 'yes'" -- the question appropriately asks for the user him or herself to make the determination before the editor takes responsibility for adding the link to WP. Since Nemo bis will not take responsibility and keeps adding links that violate WP:COPYLINK, we should TBAN them from adding links. Jytdog (talk) 19:16, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

TBAN or indef

In light of Nemo bis' disdain for WP:COPYLINK which is policy this person should be a) TBANed from adding any URLs to citations or b) indefinitely blocked. It is one thing to advocate for OA and another to push policy violations into WP. Jytdog (talk) 22:01, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support TBAN. Since this was first raised here last year the problem edits have continued, culminating in this latest batch of thousands of URL insertions, a significant number of which appear problematic. The user seems completely oblivious to the harm of these (and indeed seems to think themselves judge and jury in matters of copyright), but in other areas their editing looks productive. Alexbrn (talk) 08:24, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support TBAN as chronically willingunwilling to accept that current copyright law is what it is. The discussion Alexbrn linked is really troubling. In it, Nemo_bis appears to assert that a publisher is not allowed to declare restrictive copyright/licensing on their publications. DMacks (talk) 13:39, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Yikes, fixed a fairly critical wrong word in my comment. DMacks (talk) 16:04, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support TBAN whether he is intentionally violating WP:COPYLINK or inserting these links due to carelessness, it is problematic on a large scale and he refuses to acknowledge this. Natureium (talk) 16:07, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• Comment any URLs to citations seems a bit over the top. As zenodo.org is already blacklisted they can't continue to add links to that, so I can't see what purpose a TBAN would serve, unless I am mistaken and there are numerous other sites they have been linking to? SmartSE (talk) 19:08, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes they seem to add whatever link OABOT suggests; they take no responsibility for making reasonably sure that the linked paper is OK to link-to. See diffs above on their approach. Jytdog (talk) 19:17, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

@Jytdog: Thanks for the links. I agree they do show a worrying disregard for copyright and for listening to the concerns of other editors so also support TBAN although I still think that they should be able to add normal citations to articles, otherwise this is just de-facto blocking them from adding any sourced content. SmartSE (talk) 20:19, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for your note. I thought about a narrow TBAN on using OABOT but there is nothing then to stop them from just manually doing it. There are parameters like pmid and pmc that they can use instead.... Jytdog (talk) 20:32, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support TBAN. Nemo bis does not appear to respect Misplaced Pages's requirements for respecting publisher copyright (whatever we may think of the moral value of publishers acting in this way) and protecting the encyclopedia from legal liability takes priority over assisting readers in searching for pirated copies of references. —David Eppstein (talk) 19:33, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support TBAN - Such a sanction appears to be necessitated by the editor's actions. Next step should be an indef block. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:47, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support TBAN - linking to copyright violations is something that can have a serious negative impact on the project. Support TBAN and then escalation to indef if the disregard for copyright principles continues. cymru.lass (talk • contribs) 17:56, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment I know I am coming late to this party, but I am surprised that our long term colleague Nemo bis is challenged considering their years of good work for GLAM content. I have briefly looked at a couple of the example sources and the discussion. In the context of academic papers, which I believe is the primary locus of dispute, it is standard publishing practice to allow pre-publication versions of papers to be released by the author however they wish (like on Academia or Facebook!), without that being a breach of contract. In addition there are publishing contracts that effectively reverse the norm, such as for Wellcome funded projects where attempting to restrict access can lead to financial penalties. There is also a conflation of publishing contracts and copyright, these are legally separate issues and especially in the case of academic works may be contradictory. Where this happens I believe we always fall on the side of doing our best to comply with copyright rather than attempting to enforce contract law. There may be evidence I am missing where Nemo bis is misinterpreting the nature of the sources or the literal meaning of policy. If that may be down to a language gap issue, I would hope that sufficient good faith applies that any TBAN is limited and applied with a solid presumption of good faith on appeal, if Nemo bis commits to asking for better advice for specific sources if they are disputable. Not for one minute do I believe that Nemo bis is guilty of deliberately promoting copyright piracy. Thanks Fæ (talk) 15:51, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Nemo bis was engaging in WP:POINTy behaviour, many of the links added were not to pre-publication versions, and the rate of addition is completely inconsistent with any checking of copyright status of the links. Guy (Help!) 18:12, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps, however my first language is English and I have engaged with many copyright discussions and policy development on Commons over the years, as well as on this project, and I do not find WP:Copyrights easy to interpret, and would hesitate to advise on it. It is not unlawful for a website to host a copy of a copyrighted publication if the copyright statement remains intact, and there is no obvious common understanding of which website is designed to act or be used in direct contravention of copyright law (which will vary by host country anyway). If the locus is academic publications, then these boundaries become harder, for example even on a website that can be shown to be actively used for copyright piracy, a link to a copy of an academic paper is still unlikely to be a copyright violation, even if you can argue that a publisher has hosted it elsewhere with usage restrictions for their copy. However I suspect that the policy is not actually about literal copyright, i.e. that which could be proven in a court of law, but rather what is perceived as an issue or a hypothetical risk.

On Commons our policies benefit by the use of casebooks. Looking at key past cases can often move us on beyond single word definitions and may assist users that are struggling with how to realistically interpret copyright related policies in particular.

Sorry for the tangent, if Nemo bis has a pattern of being pointy, then civility is the issue and that focus can be examined as evidence, and sanctions or restrictions can be framed by that evidence without digging into copyright definitions. --Fæ (talk) 10:50, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• This appears closeable, perhaps? Jytdog (talk) 18:14, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/User:Mervyn Emrys/sandbox

Can an administrator please look at this deletion discussion and at the sandbox in question, User:Mervyn Emrys/sandbox? The sandbox is a hodge-podge, consisting largely of notes, which are appropriate in a sandbox, and apparently of soapboxing about what may be a plan by User:Mervyn Emrys to name, blame, and shame those who are causing climate change, “Proposal for a Project on a New Doomsday Book for Global Climate Change” or may just be grandiose chatter. User:Guy Macon has proposed to delete it as inappropriate soapboxing, and has already deleted it from User talk:Jimbo Wales and User talk:Larry Sanger. (Knowing that Jimbo Wales intends his talk page to be a free-for-all zone, I think that Guy Macon was out of line in deleting it from Jimbo’s talk page.) User:Mervyn Emrys has requested, in the MFD, that the deletion discussion be put on hold for a case at WP:ANI, but deletion discussions are not put on hold due to ANI filings, and besides, as Guy Macon notes, he hasn’t actually filed at ANI. So I am filing, to say that some administrative attention is clearly needed.

Robert McClenon (talk) 05:02, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Per WP:SOAPBOX: "Misplaced Pages is not a soapbox, a battleground, or a vehicle for propaganda, advertising and showcasing. This applies to usernames, articles, categories, files, talk page discussions, templates, and user pages. Therefore, content hosted in Misplaced Pages is not for: Opinion pieces. Although some topics, particularly those concerning current affairs and politics, may stir passions and tempt people to 'climb soapboxes', Misplaced Pages is not the medium for this." (emphasis added).

We live in a time when a member of team red sent bombs to a bunch of people on team blue, and a member of team blue tried to murder everyone from team red at a baseball game, and yet Mervyn Emrys proposes that we "compile the names of individuals and their employers who share responsibility for stimulating global climate change... Each named entry will include a brief paragraph describing the role of the individual in stimulating global climate change. This will include individuals managing major energy production industries, such as coal mining and oil production, and major energy utilization industries, such as low miles-per-gallon automobile manufacturers and electric utilities. Most of the information given will be based on the office held by the individual and the role of the employer in the industry." That is a clear case of soapboxing, and if we actually allowed such a list on Misplaced Pages would be a massive BLP violation.

(Full disclosure: I strongly agree with the current scientific consensus on climate change). --Guy Macon (talk) 05:18, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• The “Proposal for a Project on a New Doomsday Book for Global Climate Change” portion is a misuse of Misplaced Pages. We are not a webhost. It would be better suited for a private website. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:20, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
• I'm not sure exactly what admin action you guys want. What if I leave a talk page message that explains a few key policies? Will that resolve it? NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 09:11, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Looking at it I do not think they want anything, the user threatened to take this to ANI (used that as a reason to try and (in effect) shut down an AFD) and then did not launch the ANI. Thus I suspect they do not want any action beyond this being closed as NO action (and a warning to the ed to not try and use ANI to shut down AFD's).Slatersteven (talk) 14:16, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I didn't post this ANI report, but I personally would most definitely want to see a talk page message that explains a few key policies. Besides the obvious (BLP and soapboxing), Mervyn Emrys has been very aggressively attacking me, usually with totally fabricated accusations (example: I reverted with an edit summary of "WP:SOAPBOXING" and no other comment, yet Mervyn Emrys insists that my edit summary contains the word "VANDAL" in red letters. He also claimed that my revert had accidentally removed an unrelated talk page comment by another user. This also never happened, and indeed could not happen unless the "undo" button is broken.) A warning about personal attacks and about posting accusations without evidence would be most helpful. At this point I would oppose any other sanctions. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:56, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I was hoping to resolve this without sanctions, but Mervyn Emrys keeps escalating the accusations and aggression, finding new places to post them. Clearly he is WP:NOTHERE and needs to be blocked.

Misplaced Pages being open to all, if you work on building the encyclopedia for any length of time, you have the possibility of attracting your own personal stalker who considers pretty much anything you do a personal affront, and who considers it their sacred duty to "expose" the person they fixate on. It's really quite pathetic, but for some reason they just can't quite seem to figure out why no one else sees their actions as heroic. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:04, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Requested Administrative Action

I did post this ANI thread. I was, most importantly, requesting that administrators take a look at the MFD, which has been done, and provide any warnings. I was requesting judgment calls as to who needed to be warned, User:Mervyn Emrys, User:Guy Macon, or both. My own opinion was that both editors were at fault, but that it was Mervyn who was completely out of line, and Guy had made a mistake (as most of us sometimes do), but I was deferring judgment. I thought that Guy had made a mistake in deleting a rant from two talk pages that were not his own, in particular from User:Jimbo Wales, whose censorship has been the subject of an ArbCom case. I thought that Mervyn, on the other hand, was, first, engaged in what seemed to be a massive soapbox campaign, along with personal attacks, and with a demonstrably false claim to have filed here, and that Mervyn was trying to squelch the MFD with talk of an ANI thread, when we know that an XFD and an ANI thread about an XFD run in parallel. I see that Mervyn has been given a warning that is consistent with what I thought was in order. That answers that; thank you. Robert McClenon (talk) 21:08, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I am puzzled as to why you would think that I did something wrong. Misplaced Pages:What Misplaced Pages is not#Misplaced Pages is not a soapbox or means of promotion is quite clear: "This applies to usernames, articles, categories, files, talk page discussions, templates, and user pages." If you think that "advocacy, propaganda, recruitment, opinion pieces, advertising, marketing or public relations" should be allowed to remain if it is posted to someone's talk page, you should work on getting that policy reworded so that someone like me is not accused of wrongdoing for making a good-faith effort to follow what the policy says. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:03, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

User:Guy Macon – You ask why I think that you made a mistake (although, as I noted, a small mistake compared to that of User:Mervyn Emrys). I re-read talk page guidelines twice, and suggest that you re-read it once. Under “Editing Others’ Comments”, the guideline states: “Cautiously editing or removing another editor's comments is sometimes allowed, but normally you should stop if there is any objection.” You removed another editor’s comments, and I do not think that you exercised proper caution, and there has been objection. In particular, the guideline refers to Removing prohibited material and Removing harmful posts. The posts that you removed do not fall into any of the classes of prohibited material, so I assume that you thought that you were removing a harmful post. The post was not a personal attack, trolling, or vandalism. The rule then says:

Posts that may be considered disruptive in various ways are another borderline case and are usually best left as-is or archived. 

So, what you did was a borderline case, and I think that you made a judgment error, at least with regard to User talk:Jimbo Wales (a chronically controversial page, where a previous effort to remove prohibited material resulted in an ArbCom case). Two wrongs don’t make a right. Just because another editor is out of control doesn’t always require cleaning up after them. (I would say not to follow someone else’s dog onto someone else’s property to clean up the dog poop, but someone might object to that language.) I don’t think that the talk page guidelines need to be revised. I think that you (Guy Macon) did make a mistake, although Mervyn Emrys has made a far bigger mistake. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:10, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Actually, I requested the assistance of an editor per WP:Dispute Resolution, but no action has yet been taken in response to that request, other than perhaps some fact-finding. Apparently some folks are in a big hurry to come after me, for reasons of which I am unaware. What all you folks seem to be ignoring is the indisputable FACT that my original post was a personal message to two other editors requesting advice on a DRAFT proposal that was not yet ready for publication. It was NOT an article edit. And now that I have placed it in my personal sandbox so I can refine it, some of you are attempting to prevent me from doing even that by proposing to delete my sandbox.

There IS a difference between an article edit and a personal communication to another editor for purposes of obtaining advice on a DRAFT proposal. Can you tell the difference? A personal communication requesting advice, provided it is not advertising, is NOT "soapboxing," and one may wonder if communication between editors about ideas is now prohibited on Misplaced Pages? Jimbo Wales does not appear to think it is prohibited, because he explicitly invites messages be posted on his talk page, which is one of the places my DRAFT proposal was already deleted from. I wonder also if Jimbo is aware that personal messages are being deleted from his talk page without his being allowed to read them?

I think you folks all need to take a deep breath and step back a pace before you get yourselves in deeper than you already are, in terms of WP:Civility. You, and especially User:Guy Macon are missing the mark with all your unwarranted assumptions, suppositions, accusations, insults, and associated incivility. But you are building up an excellent case for WP:Harassment. If you view my communications on talk pages of two other editors as personal messages requesting advice, which they were intended to be, I think you must conclude that there really is no "soapboxing" there. There is nothing there but a request for advice. Or if you prefer, we can ask Jimbo what he thinks. Mervyn Emrys (talk) 06:47, 7 November 2018 (UTC)Mervyn Emrys (talk) 06:49, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Mervyn Emrys: the first issue here is that your draft proposal, as written, seems to be an attempt to "name and shame" evil-doers. This is incompatible with Misplaced Pages's purpose. If it matters, I think Guy Macon has been more aggressive than I would have been about removing all mention of it. But I think that's why you're facing so much pushback on this. One way to sidestep the whole issue of "this doesn't belong on Misplaced Pages"/"I'm just trying to discuss this with Jimbo!" is to email Jimbo directly. Then you won't have to deal with Guy Macon at all. Wouldn't that resolve your primary concern? You wouldn't be able to use Misplaced Pages to host your project, but there are other ways you can incorporate your ideas into valid encyclopedia articles. For example, Climate change denial, List of scientists who disagree with the scientific consensus on global warming, Individual and political action on climate change, etc. You just can't do this whole "name and shame" thing. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 08:33, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I disagree. The first issue here is that of another editor editing Jimbo Wales talk page by deleting my personal message to him there, as invited by Jimbo Wales, without discussion or offer of assistance, or even the courtesy of a question. Your proposal is that the lack of civility, insults on my talk page, being held up to ridicule, bullying, stalking me around Misplaced Pages, threats and intimidation by one over zealous editor all be ignored and I go elsewhere. Before I was driven off Misplaced Pages about ten years ago by an administrator who contacted me by uninvited email at my place of employment, Misplaced Pages policy was that uninvited offsite contacts were prohibited and constituted outing and harassment. Apparently that has changed, unbeknownst to me before I simply attempted to contact two other editors on their talk pages to discuss an idea. Mine was a proper use of a talk page, or else what are talk pages for? So your proposal would basically endorse the behavior of this editor and have me throw in the towel, allowing him to act badly with impunity? How will that improve Misplaced Pages? I think you need to dream up a more appropriate solution, and you are certainly welcome to try. Meanwhile, please take another look at the trash Guy Macom has posted on my talk page and explain to me why this should be tolerated.Mervyn Emrys (talk):20, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Let's review the facts:When User:Guy Macon discovered my message about a New Doomsday Book, did he assume good faith? No. Quite the contrary, he assumed bad intentions, summarily deleted my message, and aggressively posted insulting reasons for doing so.

Did User:Guy Macon ask if contributions to the New Doomsday Book would be required to abide by WP:BLP or WP:NPOV policies? No. I have assumed edits would have to be consistent with WP:BLP and WP:NPOV ever since I started thinking about this about ten years ago.

Did User:Guy Macon ask me any questions concerning the nature of my message or the proposal? No. He deleted my message without asking me any questions about it.

Did User:Guy Macon make any suggestions that might make the proposal more palatable or acceptable under WP policies? No. He deleted the message without any attempt at communication or discussion with me.

When I found that my message had been deleted, did I assume good faith? Yes. My reason for reverting the deletion suggested someone might have deleted my message along with another one by mistake, “deleting more than was intended.”

When severely provoked by User:Guy Macon such that I made an inappropriate remark to him in frustration, did I return a short time later and redact those comments “with apologies?” Yes, I did.

Has User:Guy Macon made any apologies for the insults and ridicule he has repeatedly placed on my talk page, in apparent violation of several Misplaced Pages policies? No. He has not, but keeps adding insult to injury by sneaking into my sandbox, starting proceedings against me for acronyms I don't understand, and stalking me all over Misplaced Pages, leaving disparaging remarks every place I post a message.

Isn't this a bit much to expect one to ignore? Guy Macon should be sanctioned with a block, not me. Mervyn Emrys (talk) 16:35, 7 November 2018 (UTC)Mervyn Emrys (talk) 23:20, 11 November 2018 (UTC)Mervyn Emrys (talk) 00:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

You have been invited to file an ANI case against me several times. I personally doubt that I will be blocked or even warned for doing exactly what WP:SOAPBOXING says to do, but I could be wrong. Re: "acronyms I don't understand", have you tried clicking on them? The page you end up at when you click on WP:SOAPBOXING is very clearly written. (This of course ignores the fact that you seem to have no trouble accessing our policies when you think they are on your side). --Guy Macon (talk) 17:56, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

As stated above, I opted to request the assistance of an editor instead of filing an ANI case, as recommended at WP:Dispute Resolution. Why are you so eager to have me file an ANI case against you? Earlier you also baited me to file an Arb Com case? Why are you so eager to employ the most extreme option available instead of trying to work this out as recommended at WP:Dispute Resolution? Mervyn Emrys (talk) 18:52, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Let's indeed "look at the facts":

• The last time I looked your sandbox was well on its way to being deleted as a violation of a number of policies, with not a single comment in its favor - something you perhaps should take as a hint that your understanding of what's allowed to be posted on Misplaced Pages user pages isn't what you think;
• You're supposedly the holder of a PhD, and yet you seem not to know that "SOAPBOX" is not an "acronym" of any sort, it's an ordinary, everyday English word which is a shortcut, a quick, easily memorable link for getting to the page it's connected to;
• Despite being a PhD, you were unable to ascertain that to understand what a link is about, one simply has to click on the link and read what's there when you get there.
• Contacting an editor at their place of business was not a cool thing to do, and was an invasion of your privacy, but it never was "outing", because the information that admin had about you wasn't published anywhere on or off Misplaced Pages;
• You can stop kvetching about Guy Macon now - he's not going to be sanctioned for enforcing (perhaps a little over-zealously) our policies;
• If you don't stop kvetching about Guy Macon, and don't file an ANI complaint against him, you may well be in violation of WP:Casting aspersions.

So, in other words, you are in a hole, which you keep digging deeper. Perhaps you should stop doing that? Beyond My Ken (talk) 19:04, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I object to the snarky comments of the editor immediately above in reference to my having a PhD, which appear to be thinly veiled insults against my intelligence in gross violation of WP:Civility. I request you please retract that statement. My reference to acronyms was to "MfB" which I did attempt to click on as suggested by Guy Macon, and nothing happened. But then, you seem adept at taking things out of context. For example, I am incredulous that you folks continue to try and treat a personal message to another editor as if it was an article edit. It's almost as if you are unable to tell the difference between them. But if your cabal wishes to continue digging a deeper hole for yourselves, by all means go right ahead. Oh, and by the way Guy, that pesky "rollover VANDAL" message in red is back on your little indent diff on my talk page. Is it characterizing your edit as vandalism? I would never do such a thing.Mervyn Emrys (talk) 04:08, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

This is the sixth time that Mervyn Emrys has posted something that is not true. The phrase "MfB" is not found anywhere on this page, anywhere in the WP:MfD, or anywhere on his talk page. Once or twice I could explain away as an error, but six times is clearly trolling. (If I am wrong and posted a typo somewhere that I don't know about, make that five times -- still obvious trolling) --Guy Macon (talk) 05:19, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

"MfB" is not an "acronym", it's an abbreviation. Beyond My Ken (talk) 09:11, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, it was actually "MfD" but I guess I should be condemned as a liar for having poor eyesight, in addition to all the other things I've been condemned for by this editor, who recently attempted to wipe his insulting comments from my talk page, in an obvious cleanup operation. Unfortunately, he neglected to delete all the negative comments he has posted on other user's talk pages as he followed me around Misplaced Pages, and I don't see any effort to clean up this page.Mervyn Emrys (talk) 23:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Mervyn, that "Rollback VANDAL" message is a function of Misplaced Pages. It's not something a user has added, it's a function that allows you to "roll back" a user's edit and then warn them about vandalism on their user talk page. This is nothing Guy has done to you, it always displays when you view a diff between two edits. You'll also note there are two other options displayed: "rollback (AGF)" and "rollback." The former lets you roll back the edit while assuming good faith (and leaving a template to that remark), while the latter is a neutral rollback with a neutral message to their talk page.

These functions collectively give you the option to undo a person's edits between the two diffs, and then leave them a message with one of three options: rolling back their changes and leaving them a template that it was done, while assuming good faith on their part; rolling back the edit and leaving a neutrally worded message; or rolling back their changes with a vandalism warning template.

In short, this was nothing to do with an action by Guy. You misinterpreted what is effectively a button that Misplaced Pages provides you for undoing another person's edits. — The Hand That Feeds You: 15:34, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I never suggested User:Guy Macon added the red "rollback VANDAL" note to his edits, but simply stated it was there, for which he promptly called me a liar, saying it was not there. Go figure.Mervyn Emrys (talk) 23:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Mervyn Emrys response to the above was a classic demonstration of the Law of holes: User talk:Jimbo Wales#Your talk page is being edited. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:23, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Mervyn Emrys, in any case, it appears that your "sandbox" page can be deleted as a copyright violation, as it contains the text that it is "not intended for publication...by others." Misplaced Pages's CC-BY-SA license, which you must agree to license material under if you post it on Misplaced Pages, requires that "publication by others" be permitted. Could you please clarify what you mean by that? Seraphimblade 20:33, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I was not aware that placing text in my sandbox was the same as "publication," but have been under the impression for some years that a sandbox is more like a workshop where one places text one is trying to improve, provided,of course, that one is allowed an opportunity to do so. You folks do seem to come up with some interesting interpretations of policies. But perhaps privacy and improvement are values no longer embraced by Misplaced Pages? We shall see.Mervyn Emrys (talk) 04:17, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

The above comment (diff) had edit summary "reply to threat of legal action prohibited by WP policies". That raises serious issues because there is no threat of legal action, and the WP:COPYVIO policy is being severely misinterpreted. Johnuniq (talk) 04:45, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

If somebody sends you a message citing legal sources is it a threat of legal action? In the law office I worked in when in middle school that was always interpreted as a threat of legal action. Would it be better to call it "wikilawyering" here?Mervyn Emrys (talk) 00:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)Mervyn Emrys (talk) 00:40, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Mervyn Emrys, Directly above the "publish changes" button you clicked on your sandbox page was the following notice:

"By publishing changes, you agree to the Terms of Use, and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license."

Please remove the "not intended for publication by others" language or the page will be subject to deletion as a clear violation of the terms of the CC BY-SA 3.0 License that you agreed to. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:02, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Never mind. It was deleted at WP:MfD. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:20, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Request block for Mervyn Emrys

Clearly Mervyn Emrys is not going to stop this behavior unless he is blocked.

Here is the latest: Previous:

The post to my talk page said: "I filed an ANI complaint against the arbitrary and uncivil behavior of Guy Macon yesterday". No. User:Mervyn Emrys has stated that they filed an ANI complaint. They made that statement both on my talk page and in the MFD discussion that was the original subject. However, they never filed a complaint here (at WP:ANI). I filed this complaint, after looking for their ANI complaint and verifying that none had been filed. Either they don't know the difference between referring to an ANI complaint and actually posting one, or they are making statements that are not true, either because they are confused or because they are trying to confuse us. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:04, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Please advise whether it would be better for me to file this as a seperate ANI report. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:04, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

There has often been a principle to avoid multiple ANI filings that are closely related or to consolidate them. This report is primarily about the conduct of User:Mervyn Emrys. You, User:Guy Macon, had said above that you thought that a warning would be sufficient. Since the warning has not been sufficient, this thread is still about their conduct. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:35, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support a block of between 48 hours and one week for general disruptive editing. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:06, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
• @Mervyn Emrys: to avoid a block, I suggest you drop this whole "hall of shame" thing. It's not going to work out for you if you try to do this here. We have multiple policies that explicitly prohibit this. I'm also not sure why you're posting complaints about Guy Macon on random user talk pages. If you have a complaint about his behavior, it should be made here. You could argue that Guy Macon has treated you rudely, but what people are trying to tell you is that he is right. What you are trying to do does not belong on Misplaced Pages. With regard to email, I have no idea what went on years ago, when you say someone contacted you off-site and harassed you. However, using email to contact Jimbo is perfectly fine. Please see User:Jimbo Wales#Contacting me and Misplaced Pages:Emailing users. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 06:56, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose a block at this time. The offending user space page has been deleted and ME has posted a "semi-retired" banner on their talk page, so a block seems unnecessary. This can be revisited if the editor doesn't show signs of having gained some WP:CLUE. Beyond My Ken (talk) 09:22, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

@Beyond My Ken: The user page in question hasn't been edited since 2014, so it would seem that like most "retired"/"semi-retired" statements this is not really a basis for not blocking. (At least it wasn't a deliberate attempt to filibuster this ANI thread like what I've seen from some users in the past.) I'm neutral on what should be done here, but I just figured I should point that out as you seemed to have missed it; not sure if knowing that the "semi-retirement" is not a new thing will change your opinion on the matter, mind you, since I can't fault you on the page having been deleted. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 09:27, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

• Weak oppose. . I'll be honest in saying that, based on the basic misconceptions about Misplaced Pages's purpose and the necessity of neutrality--and the level of IDHT about same--I have significant doubts about the likelihood that Mervyn will adapt to ultimately become a productive editor who is truly WP:HERE in the way we'd need him to be. He does indeed seem to be here primarily to use the project as a platform for his own polemic projects, rather than to build an encyclopedia. That said, I don't see a pattern of established disruption sufficient to warrant a block at this time; skepticism put to the side, it's entirely possible that now that the MfD was unanimously supported and closed on a WP:SNOW rationale, he receives the message and will try a hand at more conventional editing, and I have not seen a compelling argument to not afford him that chance.

But Mervyn Emrys, you're definitely going to want to do some reading if you see yourself staying here to edit conventional arrticles, and I suggest starting with WP:WWIN, WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, and WP:SYNTHESIS; Misplaced Pages editing requires that you prioritize objectivity in your approach to content, while the kind of polemics you have tried to pursue here thus far suggest you are embracing an editorial philosophy that is nearly the exact opposite of that. You're going to have to work fast to change the tone of your contributions if you want to volunteer your time here. Snow 12:20, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

I am OK with waiting longer to see if he stops the behavior on his own if that's the consensus, but prefer a block. I have been around long enough that this sort of thing is only a mild annoyance to me. The downside of waiting is that we will be leaving a ticking time bomb that is likely to blast some other editor, and a disruptive user emboldened by getting away with it this time.

In order to make it more likely that he stops, as of now I will stop interacting with him outside of ANI (and Arbcom, if it comes to that, which I doubt). --Guy Macon (talk) 16:03, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

• Warn and wait. If he decides to climb the Reichstag dressed as Spider-Man we can then block him per that policy. Kudos to Guy Macon for the comment above: yes, also WP:ROPE. Guy (Help!) 13:08, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support block. This editor has serious problems which add up to DE and CIR. Right now he is on a campaign of WP:CANVASSING: . Also, he claims to be an experienced Wikipedian (has nearly 3,000 edits), but look at this bizarre post to WP:Articles for deletion/Acid Rain Retirement Fund: . He has received dozens of notices, pieces of advice, and warnings on his talkpage, but doesn't seem to have learned from them: . He needs to assure us that he will carefully learn and abide by Misplaced Pages norms and cease creating disruption. If not, I'm afraid the CIR issues are too great. -- Softlavender (talk) 01:25, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I just went through a couple of years of edit history. For at least ten years Mervyn Emrys has been getting into fights with other editors, accusing them of stalking, showing a detailed knowledge of Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines when someone else violates them, then expressing a complete ignorance of the same policies when he violates them -- claiming that they are too complex to understand. If anyone needs diffs proving this, I can compile them. "I will say this: your current approach is not working. You may think the reason it's not working is because Guy is keeping an eye on you, but it's the reverse case: He's keeping an eye on you because your approach isn't working. Take heed." (I have stopped interacting with him except on ANI). --Guy Macon (talk) 10:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I wouldn't mind seeing those diffs, Guy; I've been interacting, in the tiny little bit of time I have to edit this week, with them, trying to inch them towards more productive approaches. If he is feigning incomplete knowledge of our processes, I'd like to know that before I invest any more time in explanatory comments. But honestly, though I may need to eat these words after seeing diffs, I'm not sure your read is correct on that: what other explanation than lack of familiarity with our processes would explain why he would go to Xavexgoem expecting assistance against you?

On the other hand, even if it isn't a convoluted fake-out, much of the problematic conduct may point to a WP:CIR problem significant enough to justify a block or topic ban. The ill-advised canvassing (which the experienced editors it was directed at either ignored and responded with warnings to) seems to have abated now, and hopefully Mervyn will accept what others have been trying to tell him about this being the appropriate space to discuss the conduct issues arising out of this situation. I've advised him further that he should consider learning the ropes here by first editing in areas that do not intersect with his apparent professional expertise / personal passions--that it would be better for the purposes of learning to prioritize our content policies (which often ask us to set-aside, or accept incongruities in our content with, our personal understanding of the "truth") if he was not working areas that mean so much to him. This would have the added benefit of demonstrating for those concerned about his objectives, that he is WP:HERE to build an encyclopedia, and not to leverage an encyclopedia's platform for a passion project.

We'll see if he finds any value in my advice and follows it; right now, his only content-facing edits are concerned with another environmental policy topic, defending one of his earlier articles from an AfD. Which, fair enough--nobody likes to see their work undone, and this article has been live for ten years (though apparently with copyvio issues for much of that time), so I wouldn't expect him to give it up without making an effort to preserve it. But after that, I would hope to see a chance in priorities. For one, the fact that he continues to litigate the issues surrounding the "Doomsday Book" could just mean that he has his druthers up about feeling "harassed", or it could mean that he is continuing to push the issue because he wants to be free and clear to continue trying to sell the idea across talk space. The question of whether or not the latter would be permissible is actually still an open one--we know how Guy feels about it, but I'm not sure I entirely agree. I know for a fact that this is a WP:SNOW issue and that such a project is never going to happen--or, if it did happen, it would be at some future date where Misplaced Pages had become something unrecognizable from what it is today. But I'm not sure Guy did the right thing in deleting those talk page posts; I would have rather had the editors they were directed towards join us in what we have all been telling Mervyn. Discussion is the heart of this project, and much content that is impermissible in itself under WP:SOAPBOX (or any other provision of WP:NOT) is still something that may need to be discussed, in the abstract, in talk spaces, if only for the purposes of convincing someone to WP:DROPTHESTICK.

None of which is meant to criticize Guy's good-faith conduct on the whole, or to give wind to the sails of Mervyn to re-launch their campaign on this issue. Quite the contrary, I agree with Softlavender that Mervyn is going to need to assure us that he is prepared to drop that matter. I would like to propose to Mervyn that the uniform opposition he is facing to his proposal indicates that he is failing to understand something fundamental about this project and its goals, and that, at a minimum, he needs to spend a lot more time working on this project, in a WP:HERE capacity, before he is in a position to properly analyze his proposal's appropriateness for this project--even when it comes to so much as putting it up for consideration from other editors. If he can assure us that he will take such an approach in educating himself to our norms in order to gain perspective on this, I maintain my position that we should give him WP:ROPE--if he can't, I may have to revisit my !vote. Snow 17:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I am listening very carefully to the places where editors I respect are telling me that I could have done things differently. Normally I would immediately respond with an indication that I get it and will adjust my future behavior, but right now that feels like feeding ammunition to a sniper who is firing on me. I will most likely talk more on this some time later, but I am paying attention to the advice I have been given.

In what may be another ill-advised attempt to stop the ongoing personal attacks, I noticed that Mervyn Emrys's latest flame said "He also said some things he should not have said, which were decidedly uncivil, but did not redact them. Some remain on my talk page". So I redacted them from his talk page. He restored them without leaving an edit comment. Should I take another shot at it, this time marking my comments with <s>...</s>, or should I just drop the stick? That horse really isn't looking too good and I am thinking that beating it some more might not convince it to not be dead...

I have started compiling a list of diffs showing the pattern of behavior that I think I see. This might take a while; I have other real-life commitments. Of course the problem is that I cannot trust my own judgement on this, so I am thinking of temporarily posting them to my userspace, inviting others to look them over, and removing anything that any veteran editor concludes is not as solid as I think it is. Good idea? Bad idea? Should I go straight to ANI with it instead, with a disclaimer that I am no doubt biased? Please advise. (To all: Please don't keep this open waiting for those diffs; if this would have been closed otherwise, pretend that I didn't mention it). --Guy Macon (talk) 23:08, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I think your initial instinct is the correct one; at this stage, best to avoid engaging in any form in any space. It's not required of you, as I don't see anyone here who has suggested you need to back off, but since that was your first impulse anyway, I will say that I think it is a healthy/helpful one. So as to your question there, I'd allow Mervyn to retain whatever version of the talk page he prefers, though I will also note for Mervyn that if he believes the comments were inappropriate, allowing you to strike them would probably be helpful, as a first step to resolving your differences of opinion, without anybody needing to explicitly own up to blame. Regarding the diffs, policy does allow you to host them for short-term aggregation in a sandbox, but I have to think it's just as easy to keep track of them without publishing them here, and often this is the least inflammatory approach, especially if you are not sure if you are going to have time to post them in an organized fashion to this discussion before it closes. Just my take. Snow 00:46, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Guy Macon, your report might have had credibility had you not violated WP:TPO by removing 13 of your own comments from Mervyn Emrys's talkpage . In addition, banning him from your own talkpage while repeatedly haranguing him on his own talkpage is not collegial behavior. You are not a neutral or disinterested party when it comes to Mervyn Emrys, and my advice would be to drop the stick and let uninvolved editors analyze the situation, with actual diffs/evidence. Softlavender (talk) 03:24, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Alas, Mervyn Emrys has now decided that editing my comments on his talk page (which he would not let me delete) is appropriate behavior, despite WP:TPOC and WP:INTERSPERSE. I reverted his edits to my comments. refrained from responding other than removing the changes he made to my comments. While I was there, I struck my comments that he has been complaining that I "refuse to redact". If he edits my comments again, I request an immediate block for violating a bright line rule after being warded not to. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:37, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Guy Macon, Mervyn Emrys has not edited any of your comments on your talk page, much less violated a bright line or done anything blockable. If you believe he has, please provide the diff and the policy. I have gone through every single edit he made to his talkpage since you started editing there, and he has not changed the text of any of your posts. At this point I think you need to back away before you receive a two-way IBan with the editor. Softlavender (talk) 07:58, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, that was certainly fast, including a massive cleanup of my talk page by User:Guy Macon, removing some (but not all) of the nasty things he said about me there, and the following edit I made in response to a list of diffs he provided:

   (For those following along at home, see.)

This is an impressive list of diffs, but mostly just different versions of the same two personal communications you deleted from talk pages of Jimbo Wales and Larry Sanger. The edit at #9 is not my edit, so I don't know why you included it. Padding?Mervyn Emrys (talk) 01:08, 12 November 2018 (UTC) And please note that pesky red rollover VANDAL tag I mentioned so long ago, to which you responded that I was a liar, is on the last diff in the list above, #13. So maybe I was not lying after all, hmmmmnnn? Mervyn Emrys (talk) 02:48, 12 November 2018 (UTC)Mervyn Emrys (talk) 02:50, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

However, I still haven't seen any apologies from Guy, just his scrubbing of my talk page. Guy, please stay off my talk page in future, unless you wish to apologize. Your self-serving edits are not welcome there. Let's keep the record unchanged.Mervyn Emrys (talk) 03:00, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I will be glad to stay off your talk page as long as you don't edit my words. "Editing my words" includes inserting your own comments, signed or unsigned, in the middle of my comments, changing the wording or punctuation, removing striking that I added, or any other change. See WP:TPOC and WP:INTERSPERSE. (You are free to delete other people's comments from your own talk page, but you are not allowed to edit them.) Editing other user's comments on any page is a blockable offense, no matter what your other behavior has been. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:37, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

The rather innocuous post in question consist of:

(For those following along at home, see.)

Pretty tame for the huge number of complaints Mervyn Emrys has posted about it. I'm just saying.

I had previously corrected the typo Mervyn Emrys talks about above ("The edit at #9 is not my edit") Not my fault that he edited my comment to re-insert the typo.

Does anyone else see the word "VANDAL" in the diff Mervyn Emrys calls "#13"? I know that I never wrote that word, because I have never seen Mervyn Emrys vandalize any page, and I don't see that word when I look at or word search the diff. Either there is a bug in Misplaced Pages's software (maybe on mobile?), Mervyn Emrys is lying, or we have a severe WP:CIR problem here. --Guy Macon (talk) 08:03, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I have no idea what Mervyn Emrys means by a "pesky red rollover VANDAL tag" or "to which you responded that I was a liar". A red "rollback VANDAL" is a revert option on tools such as Twinkle, but Mervyn Emrys has never used Twinkle or any other (semi)automated tool that I can see. Softlavender (talk) 08:17, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Mervyn Emrys, you posted about the red rollback VANDAL link more than four days ago on this thread , and it was thoroughly explained to you at that time. Why are you bringing it up here yet again? Do you want to actually get yourself indef blocked? That is what happens to editors who repeat BATTLEGROUND behavior time and time again. If you respond to this question by blaming Guy Macon, that will be further proof that you are here to battle and not to build an encyclopedia. The best thing to do at this point would be to withdraw from this entire ANI discussion completely, because at this time there does not seem to be a consensus to block you, but that could easily change if you continue battling. Softlavender (talk) 09:51, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I think we have a larger problem here. The same link Softlavender posted above also said "My reference to acronyms was to "MfB" which I did attempt to click on as suggested by Guy Macon, and nothing happened". I looked at all of the pages where it might have been and did a text search for "MfB", thinking that I might have made a typo that needed to be corrected. Nothing. I even checked https://en.wikipedia.org/Special:WhatLinksHere/MfB to see if anyone on Misplaced Pages has ever wikilinked to MfB. Nope. (WP:MfB exists, but would not have caused the described "I attempted to click on it and nothing happened" behavior.)

This is a cause for concern. Mervyn Emrys regularly posts accusations that have no basis in reality. Is he lying, hoping that nobody will check and that everyone will just assume that the other editor did what Mervyn Emrys claims he did? Does he actually believe that the "VANDAL" and "MfB" exist because he is hallucinating them? Is he just trolling us? If so, can we trust someone who sees things that are not there to edit Misplaced Pages?

I am imagining him unloading on a new editor the way he unloaded on me, a veteran editor who has been around long enough to be rather bored by internet flamers and trolls. There is a concept from the age of sail called the "loose cannon". in a battle, and incoming cannon ball can knock a cannon loose. You then have a couple of thousand pounds of steel rolling back and forth crushing people -- and it is still lit and eventually fires in some random direction. I suspect that Mervyn Emrys is a loose cannon.

Of course the possibility exists that I simply missed something when I searched and am about to be embarrassed by someone posting diffs showing the "VANDAL" and "MfB". Or that there some bug or other technical explanation for why he is seeing things that apparently nobody else can see. If so, I will apologize, but I did my good-faith best to find them and failed.

Finally, I cannot resist responding to the claim "But if your cabal wishes to continue digging a deeper hole for yourselves, by all means go right ahead" claim in the same diff. There Is No Cabal (TINC). We discussed this at the last Cabal meeting, and everyone agreed that There Is No Cabal. An announcement was made in Cabalist: The Official Newsletter of The Cabal making it clear that There Is No Cabal. The words "There Is No Cabal" are in ten-foot letters on the side of the 42-story International Cabal Headquarters, and an announcement that There Is No Cabal is shown at the start of every program on The Cabal Network. If that doesn't convince people that There Is No Cabal, I don't know what will. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Look, Guy, I don't necessarily disagree with you here, but I think it's time to face up to the fact that any inertia that would have lead to some result other than Mervyen being warned has been lost. Only two editors support the block, with two opposes (though my remains a very weak oppose and a little bit weaker every time Mervyn posts). The thread has now grown to that length where respondents become hesitant to enter the discussion, and that hesitance is likely to be even further pronounced by the fact that the formatting here is not exactly neat (that's largely due to Mervyn as well, and is actually some decent evidence that he does indeed struggle with the technical side of things) and because the posts have tended to run a little long in this instance. Unless an admin decides to review and block Mervyn's behaviour on their own initiative (unlikely at this point), I don't see how continued discussion of the same past behaviour is productive, and I'd just as soon not have you wasting your time.

And I get it--the old behaviour stays relevant because he repeats those references. But even if I switched my !vote, that would still just make three of us urging a block and that's just not enough for a community sanction. After numerous of us trying to deliver the same messages, Softlavender seems to have managed to reach Mervyn with the point that he will be shooting himself in the foot if he comments further here, and he's pledged to drop the project which was the underlying source to this conflagration. While I'm grateful that you noticed and arrested that multi-core-policy-violating attempt a polemics, I don't think there's much more to be done here and the present time, and any further discussion that might have a chance of bringing further scrutiny of Mervyn will also magnify any criticism of your own conduct beyond the level of criticism that it deserves. I think it's time to let this one go and see what Mervyn does with his WP:ROPE. If he does indeed engage in behaviour with others that continues to suggest he may be trying to game the system, it will be obvious enough and we can start fresh with a new complaint, and he will have exhausted any AGF for his second go around--and the same will be true if he just has competency issues that can't be brought under control. In any event, I think the productive utility of this thread is toast at this point, and the best thing to do will be to someone close it with a warning or just let it be archived. Snow 20:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Good advice. Unwatching all pages associated with this now (including ANI, which i only watch when something involves me). --Guy Macon (talk) 22:41, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, I guess I'm supposed to edit in chronological order, although that makes my reply to Softlavender way out of place relative to that editor's question above. First let me say that I NEVER accused another editor of posting the word VANDAL in red on any diff--I merely noted that there had been one, which he denied, and then proceeded to call me a liar--several times--on my talk page. Am I to understand now that I am not to be allowed to refute his insults with actual proof that such a label did appear on one of the diffs for deletions he made? That is, are you interested in hearing only one side of the story, or are you neutral? The evidence is in a diff provided by the editor who called me a liar, originally marked #13 in a row of repetitive diffs he provided, and then provided again by the same editor renumbered as diff #37 ( think) above. The original diff #13 also appears on my talk page, a few lines below the stop sign with the hand in it, and just before that editor started repeatedly calling me a liar on my talk page. Applying WP:AGF I assume this was a mistake, but one which led to repeated insults on my talk page which, I believe, are violations of WP:Civility. So, am I now to be punished for defending myself by bringing this information to light? Moreover, after being warned not to do so, the same editor has now returned to my talk page, leaving yet another inflammatory edit accusing me of disruptive editing. I have never edited his words, preferring instead to allow them, in meaning and in tone, to speak for themselves. If I have edited at what some consider inappropriate locations, I apologize for the error, which was stimulated by a desire to reply as near to the edits I was replying to as possible, recognizing that some edits here are quite long. My bad, I guess, but not a product of bad motives, I hope one may agree. Mervyn Emrys (talk) 04:20, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

You are not being "punished", Mervyn Emrys, but you are likely going to be blocked for disruptiveness, refusal to listen, and abject cluelessness. I told you that the red VANDAL link had, five days ago, been thoroughly explained to you, yet here you are a third or fourth time on this page yammering about it in a manner which makes it very clear you neither heard nor comprehended anything that was explained to you. At this point, the Misplaced Pages community generally cuts its losses by indef blocking someone for lack of competence, because if something simple has been clearly explained to someone a number of times and they still do not understand it, and they still bring the issue up disruptively again and again, that is too much of a drain on the community of editors who are trying to build an encyclopedia. Softlavender (talk) 05:07, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

I listened to, understood and accepted your explanation of the technical aspects of how the red rollover VANDAL tag gets put on some reverts. But do you understand that I just gave the other editor WP:AGF by suggesting that he may have inadvertently posted insults and other uncivil comments on my talk page as a result of his making a little (possibly forgivable) mistake in looking for such a tag on the wrong diff? This was not a criticism of him, but merely an attempt to stimulate a little understanding of how we got here. To repeat: apparently I mentioned the red tag in passing, he went looking for it in the wrong place, did not find it there, and started calling me a liar on my talk page. I was giving him the benefit of the doubt. FACT: I did not lie. The red tag is still there, but on a different diff than the one he looked at. And that little misunderstanding led to all this drama. Your explanation was incomplete because you did not discover this little fact.

You need not insult me with accusations of presumptuousness. You seem to have forgotten the only other time I mentioned this was in the context of comments by Jimbo Wales to the effect that one reason civility is important is because incivility causes editors to leave Misplaced Pages, and that harms Misplaced Pages. His idea, not mine. So why is it good when he says it, and bad when I say it? I know nobody here cares if I stay--you have all made that abundantly clear in the one-sided comments posted here and elsewhere, including some thinly veiled--and not so thinly veiled--but uncivil suggestions that I leave. Yet you threaten me with an indefinite block?

I repeat: In the spirit of WP:AGF, I was giving Guy Macon the benefit of the doubt as a gesture of conciliation, and you stuck your foot in it.Mervyn Emrys (talk) 09:26, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

It's not a tag, and it's not part of the diff or "on" the diff. It's a revert option on various semi-automated wiki tools or permissions such as Rollback or Twinkle, and (among other clickable revert options) can be clicked to revert a diff. Softlavender (talk) 09:53, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, whatever you wish to call it is fine with me. I meant it in a generic, popular sense, not in any WP jargon sense. Let's not get into semantics about it, we are already so far into the weeds that most everybody appears determined to kill the messenger rather than take a step back in favor understanding how we got here. Nobody posting here seems to think the lack of civility that is so obvious all over my talk page has any relevance to the explanations I have attempted to provide here.Mervyn Emrys (talk) 03:36, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support an indef block, given Mervyn's repeated IDHT and CIR issues throughout this thread. Enough is enough. — The Hand That Feeds You: 13:45, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• End this. Xavexgoem (talk) 13:55, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support block. Alright, at this point I can't keep advocating for WP:ROPE and I'm rescinding my previous "weak oppose" !vote; it was already an extremely questionable proposition that this editor was going to convert to WP:HERE motivations and consistency with our editorial and behavioural norms, if given the opportunity, and in face of the continuing flagrant WP:IDHT, inability to WP:DROPTHESTICK, and pronounced issues with basic competency (regarding both simple editing mechanics and appropriate approaches to discussion), I'm afraid the cost-benefit analysis has become pretty stark. In short, I don't see much chance that this editor is presently capable of contributing non-disruptively--nor indeed capable of even interacting with their fellow editors without misinterpreting the nature of their concerns and ascribing malicious intent where good-faith advice is offered on how they would need to adapt their approach. At this point, we've exhausted all allowance and effort that the community can be reasonably expected to make in circumstances such as this. If Mervyn would like to spend some time over the next six months to a year studying our policies and how this project works, he can always apply to resume editing through the WP:Standard offer. Snow 19:08, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

The user Arboleh

This user @Arboleh: is harassing, attacking, threatening me and other users in his edit summaries as well as accusing me and other users of vandalism and racism when we are clearly not, please have a look on his edits summaries here , . He is just making fake propaganda in order to divert attention from his edits and confuse people.

Moreover, I and other users have reported this user Arboleh before for sock puppetry and now he is trying to attack me and do the same thing as the suspected sock Itaren which is another unmistakable behavioral evidence that he is sock of Midddayexpress, This Arboleh also had disruptively edited some Misplaced Pages pages, attacked me, editwarred me, reported me asking for administrator intervention and the he asked for help the same user whom the user Itaren asked for help shortly after Itaren asked him!!! which is an additional unmistakable evidence that both accounts are for the same person who is indeed Middayexpress. The Somali user Middayexpress ( has the Canadian Nationality ) is a very persistent sock puppeteer who has been using many fake accounts in order to promote his racist Afrocentric agenda and vandalize Misplaced Pages, this user is trying to whitewash Horn Africans and link them to Middle Easterners and North Africans while distancing Horn Africans from their other fellow East Africans brothers which is very racist. At the same time, He is trying to black-wash Middle Easterners and North Africans and linking them to horn Africans:), this guy got really no life, he has been using hundreds of sock puppet accounts in order to vandalize Misplaced Pages and promote his Afrocentric agenda, for example, he is trying to deattach modern Egyptians from their ancient Egyptians origins and link the Egyptian civilization to Sub Saharan Africans who have nothing at all to do with Egypt or Egyptians which is extremely racist and ridiculous!!!. I have already filed a sock puppeting report against him but It was reverted because some other user before filed a sock puppeting report against the same user and the result was inconclusive because he is using proxy. You can check his IP history and you will find that he uses only proxies and that he never logged in through a legit IP address which means that he is trying to hide something, also this account was created shortly after the block of confirmed sock puppets Middayexpress, Soupforone, Geneticanthro, ....etc and he has been making the same edits on the same pages with almost identical edit summaries. You can also check the behaviors of these accounts and Middayexpress/Soupforone, you will find that the behavioral evidence is very clear and unmistakable. Thank youRyanoo (talk) 04:53, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment)  Investigating.... That first edit summary isn't really at anyone in particular, and I wouldn't classify it as a personal attack. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 05:33, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) A few things for you, @Ryanoo:

1. It looks like you're staring at a boomerang here. You have failed to engage on a talk page with Arboleh, and may break 3RR in the near future.
2. You have failed to notify Arboleh about this discussion. This is evident as a notice both on this page and in the edit window. You can copy and paste this onto Arboleh's page: {{subst:ANI-notice|thread=The user Arboleh}}
3. Some of the edit summaries were on pages you've never even edited before. That could be possible WikiHounding.
4. I do agree however, that Arboleh could assume better faith.

This judgement can't replace admin action. You may want to wait for admin input here. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 05:45, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@User:TheDragonFire300 I didn't fail to engage on the talk page, in fact he is the one who obviously did, I have asked in my edit summary to engage in the talk page and I mentioned him on the talk page in order to discuss the edits. However, he didn't engage in the talk page and reported me for vandalism and continued to attack me personally on other users pages reply!!! Ryanoo (talk) 05:49, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

That in no way excuses your failure to engage Arboleh on their talk page. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 07:47, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@User:TheDragonFire300 Regarding the first edit summary I will consider it as both personal and general attacking, he said he is cleaning biased and racist claims while they are clearly not and by this, he means that the users who did those edits are biased and racist while they are clearly not as their edits are clearly of good faith. Regarding the rest of the edit summaries, he clearly harassed, attacked, threatened me and other users as well as well as accused me and other users of vandalism and racism when we are clearly not.Ryanoo (talk) 06:00, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Wrong. WP:NPA does not cover attacks on content, only contributors. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 09:53, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@User:TheDragonFire300 I didn't know that I have to notify him and I didn't know also how that can be done. It is done now!Ryanoo (talk) 06:04, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I have already reported this user Ryanoo for Vandalisme to Admin @Doug Weller and Roxy and to the proper Vandalism channel. This user is also extremely racist and harbors white nationalist or white supremacist views. I will wait for the vandalism report, until then I have no need to engage this person, all his intentions and views can be seen in the North Africa page where he spews his racist rhetoric. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Arboleh (talk • contribs) 06:20, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

*Support topic ban of Ryanoo from Africa topics This editor has a short but storied history about arguing pointless about Africa and even the "definition of Africa", and reporting anyone who disagrees as a vandal. This includes even hilariously suggesting that an editor tried to hack their account . I am uninterested in watching this continue, and suggest a topic ban from Africa related topics as a last straw before blocking indef. --Tarage (talk) 06:23, 7 November 2018 (UTC) Striking my vote for my vote below. Both editors need to stop. --Tarage (talk) 22:04, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Tarage I don't what you are talking about?!!!, my edits are focused on my country Egypt and region ( Middle East and North Africa ) and defending our history from the Afrocentrists who are trying to steal and appropriate it. I have nothing to with Sub-Saharan Africans, apart defending my Egyptian heritage from being stolen and appropriated by the Afrocentic ones of them. Yes, I accused some user of hacking my account in my first days on Misplaced Pages because I was new to the community and didn't know much information at that time. However, this user whom I accused of hacking my account ( he didn't try to ) got blocked many times because of his bad attitude on Misplaced Pages, I have been also battling the Afrocentric sock puppeteers and will definitely continue doing this. Those Afro-centrists are 24/7 insulting us Egyptians everywhere and are doing their best to to dattach us from our ancient Egyptian origins and appropriate our heritage and culture and all our mistake is that we are Egyptians!!! which is very racist and offensive, Enough is Enough!!!!! I didn't think that I will encounter such racist people on a main source of knowledge like Misplaced Pages.Ryanoo (talk) 06:33, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

You started editing in January. This happened in May. You are not new. I've looked through your edit log. Anything of substance has been battleground edits on North Africa. You need to stop. --Tarage (talk) 06:35, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Tarage Yes, I started editing on January, However, I didn't start editing frequently and being little bit familiar until this June. Please read again what I wrote, I didn't say I am new, I said I was new, I was new to editing on Misplaced Pages until July this year, even now I am still not familiar with rules. Moreover, even the reason for suspecting this user for hacking my account at that time makes so much sense for a new user. At that time, I got two notifications from Misplaced Pages that there is someone trying to login to my account and I think you have seen that clearly in the report which you mentioned!. Stop What?!, Stop defending my history? leave my history and culture for the racist Afrocentric Black supremacists, If this what you mean, then my answer is "NO". Again in case you didn't read it, I am a patriotic Egyptian archaeogeneticist and academic lecturer and I have along track of strong fighting vandals here on Misplaced Pages and getting them blocked and admins can check my edit history, I will never ever stop fighting the nonsense of the racist Afrocentrists either here or anywhere else. By the way, what you said is totally irrelevant to the topic of the report.Ryanoo (talk) 06:55, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

You don't have a "track of strong fighting vandals", you have a lot of false reports. It is not at all irrelevant. By posting here, you have opened yourself up to as much scrutiny as the person you reported. I'm not going to continue arguing with you. The fact that you keep calling editors racist proves you do not belong here. You have a conflict of interest and are pushing a very specific POV. You need to either stop editing this topic, or be blocked. --Tarage (talk) 07:00, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Also stop editing comments after people have replied to them. I'm going to start reverting you. --Tarage (talk) 07:03, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Tarage Don't threaten me please, I am not a teenager, I am a respected 35 years old archaeogeneticist and academic lecturer. What are you talking about?!! False reports? Anyway the admins as well as other users are free to check my history. I am replying to you and I have the right to do so, we are all users here and I have the right to reply. Sorry, you are wrong here :), I am actually here for fighting the ones who have clear racist and destructive POV ( a.k.a Afrocentrists ), I am here to construct and I hate scientific dishonest people and I say it in their face and scientific honesty and self respect are my first priority. So, you aren't ok when I call racist people racist, but you are OK, when they call me racist, just for defending my history! By the way, I don't mind leaving Misplaced Pages at all :), if they don't want good scientific specialist users, I think registration on Misplaced Pages should be by using Identification card to avoid vandalism and sock puppeting which will save the community here a great deal of time wasted in fighting sock puppeting and vandalism and will also give more credibility. Ryanoo (talk) 07:16, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Ryanoo: On the internet, nobody can prove you're a respected archaeologist. Besides, we wouldn't be able to accept what you say due to Misplaced Pages's policy against original research, unless you get it published and it is accepted formally. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 07:36, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@TheDragonFire300: I can prove it easily and in fact I am very willing to do so, I can provide you with my passport and identification card or If you have an office or branch in my country or even in another country in the same region (MENA), I have no problem at all to happily visit it so they can make sure of my identity and in fact I very much support that registration on Misplaced Pages should be by using identification card or passport or whatever way which can prove the identity of the user which will save the community a great deal of time and will give more credibility. What do you mean by accepting what I say, If you mean my edits, well, I always cite published and accepted sources. Thank youRyanoo (talk) 07:47, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

If you can prove it, congratulations, but that is not a get out of jail free card. You still need to follow Misplaced Pages policy, if you're willing to listen to what Tarage and I say. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 07:49, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@TheDragonFire300: I already follow Misplaced Pages policy, could you tell me when I didn't?? Listen to what?? could you clarify it? what do you want me to do exactly?? the user Tarage accused me of somethings I never did, the only thing right he said is that I reported someone for hacking my account, and I said that at that time I was still new and wasn't familiar with Misplaced Pages rules and I did it because I got two notifications from Misplaced Pages regarding someone user trying to login to my account. I didn't try to define Africa or any of this nonsense. The problem was that another user was trying to add some Sub-Saharan African West African and East African countries to North Africa!!!, he was disruptively editing the page and was refusing to engage in the talk page, and after I refuted this user claims providing tons of sources on the talk page of North Africa he refused to continue the discussion on the talk page, he insulted, attacked me personally and threatened me as expected and at the end he refused to continue the discussion on the talk page and came to attack me personally and threaten me on my page. It was this user who was trying to redefine a very clear geographic location!! North Africa simply means the Mediterranean countries located in the northernmost North Africa, it is actually a straw-man argument!! it is like trying to include Norway in South Europe. Almost all the world organizations such as the World Bank, US Census, African Union itself, FAO, Population Reference Bureau, WTO and I can list tons of other world organizations if you want consider North Africa to be only the Mediterranean countries located in the extreme northernmost of the continent and I have never came across any organization which consider Sahel as part of North Africa!! and If you did, so please provide your sources. Moreover, this user has removed very much info related to the topic and added very irrelevant info, he turned the page from North Africa to African Sahel, It is like to turning the page East Asia to the page of Congo!! I didn't actually want to talk about this as it irrelevant to the topic of the report but as some user have already talked about it, then I have to reply.Ryanoo (talk) 08:15, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Let's start with this very report. You speak of reverts where you yourself had reverted without engaging with the other party. That violates Misplaced Pages's policy on edit warring. You also missed the edit notice at the top of both this page and the edit window to notify the reported user. Given the strong wording, this is almost certainly a policy. You also accuse Arboleh of vandalism, but that is not so. They were merely boldly removing content to which they thought did not conform with Misplaced Pages guidelines, to which you then reverted, claimed the summary was a personal attacked, and then accused them of being a vandal with this very report. Most people who disagree with you are not vandals.

Now, the edit summaries linked I believe while may not be assuming bad faith, is also not really an infraction against WP:NPA, and it was never directed at you. The edit summary Cleaned up biased and racist claims. describes the content, not the contributor, which means WP:NPA does not apply here. Once again, they've only made bold edits.

Furthermore, most of the diffs you've provided are of articles you've never even edited before. This seems very much like wikihounding to me, and point pushing behaviour. That is, you've gone and reverted pretty much all their edits over one edit you've disagreed with, and most likely had thrown the baby out with the bathwater.

Given all of the above, this report will most likely end with a WP:BOOMERANG topic ban for you. Tread carefully. I strongly suggest you've read what I've written above, and take Tarage's points in too. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 09:42, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support boomerang topic ban of Ryanoo from Africa topics: per both Tarage and my points above. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 07:32, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@User:TheDragonFire300 First off, I have edited many of these articles as well as many other articles before long time ago before registering on Misplaced Pages and while wasn't logged in, so your claim of Wikihonding doesn't make any sense!. Also, I didn't fail to engage on the talk page, in fact he is the one who obviously did, I have asked in my edit summary to engage in the talk page and I mentioned him on the talk page in order to discuss the edit. However, he didn't engage in the talk page and reported me for vandalism and continued to attack me personally on other users pages reply!!!, why aren't you trying about him not trying to engage me in the talk page??!! Sorry, but I feel you are clearly trying to confuse the issue by turning the table on me ( for some reason which I don't know, may I know where are you from? ) and totally ignoring what the user did. Secondly, you are talking only about one edit summary of this user in which he clearly described good faith edits as biased and racist!! when they are clearly not, while totally ignoring his other edit summaries which include very clear personal attack and false accusations and his behavior ( he reported me for vandalism when I am clearly not as well as attacking me on other users pages ). Haven't you seen the edits which I provided above in addition his other edits of attacking and harassing me on other user pages as well as reporting for vandalism when I am clearly not . Moreover, yes one of his edit summaries isn't directed at me, so should I overlook the ones which target others??. He even has the guts to come and attack me saying some weird Afrocentric nonsense showing his real Afrocentric face, he is blaming me for defending my country's by calling me a Euro-centrist!! LOL. For those Afro-centrists, anyone who is defending his culture and history from being hijacked by them is a Euro-centrist!!. He considers me Euro-centrist because I am defending my history, and by showing the fact that my country is a Mediterranean, Middle Eastern and North African country which it is indeed is , . This Afrocentric user wants me to remove my country from its geographic location, deattach our Egyptian people from their origins and go and give it as a present to his Black people in Somalia in East Africa in Sub-Saharan Africa. It seems that this guy didn't open a map or history book in his life and is just like in a world of imagination like the rest of his fellow Afrocentrists who are trying to appropriate our culture and history ( as well as others history such as Phoenicians, Hebrews, Greeks, Romans, Germans, Chinese and almost every ancient culture on this planet and probably other planets! ). Egypt is a Mediterranean, North African and Middle Eastern, so are the Egyptians!. Somalia is an East African country located in Sub-Saharan Africa, so are the Somalis, It is simple as that, he should love himself and stop appropriating and lumping himself with people who he is totally different from in every aspect. And regarding banning from editing Africa topics, that really doesn't make any sense, well, in fact I don't mind that at all, my edits are mainly focused on my country Egypt and my region ( Mediterranean basin, Middle East and North Africa) topics, I didn't edit much in Sub-Saharan Africa topics and I am not much interested in editing articles or topics related to Sub-Saharan Africans, but you can't prevent me from editing my country and my region topics and defend my history from being hijacked by the lunatic and racist Afro-centrists.Ryanoo (talk) 16:27, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Ryanoo: There is no immunity for reporters. At the moment, you are more guilty of what you are reporting Arboleh for. Actually, you did accuse them of being a vandal, repeadedly trying to revert them. Also, your engagement happened only once, they indeed tried to talk with you (and you just dismissed them as a vandal) and you edit warred over North Africa.

Please just read what I've posted above and stop trying to accuse everyone of being a vandal. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 21:21, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

You are wikihounding by the way. You found one of their edits, then decided to revert other edits of theirs, some on articles you've never even edited before (and I'm not about to prove you are those IPs). Even if you do edit with IPs on those pages, that still does not excuse the hounding and point-pushing on your behalf. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 21:30, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I did read all of the edits and the only one that seems to not be a bold edit is the second one. The rest have nothing to do with you, and I don't know why you report them besides wikihounding. Also, assume good faith already!Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 21:33, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Arboleh Again love yourself and stop trying to lump yourself with Egyptians, Middle Easterners and North Africans because you guys are simply not from the MENA area. Also please stop deattaching modern Egyptians from their ancient Egyptian origins like what you did on the Page of DNA history of Egypt because it is very racist and extremely offensive, respect other nations like others are doing with you, as there is no one trying to claim your history, please stop trying to appropriate others history. I am an Egyptian and you know and I know that Somalis are totally different racially, genetically, culturally, linguistically, and in every aspect from Egyptians and other MENAs. Your history is in Somalia which is an East African country in Sub-Saharan Africa, not in North Africa or the Middle EastRyanoo (talk) 16:09, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

References

1. http://www.west-africa-brief.org/content/en/six-regions-african-union
2. https://www.wto.org/english/res_e/statis_e/technotes_e.htm
3. http://www.worldbank.org/en/region/mena/overview
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/Union_of_North_African_Football_Federations
5. http://www.fao.org/neareast/en/
6. https://www.prb.org/2012-interactive-world-map/
7. https://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt/maps/64374.htm

I'm concerned about Ryanoo's trying to keep in Land of Punt (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) what appears to be a self-published source from a blog. There doesn't appear to be a "Lepoivre Bertrand" or perhaps "Bertrand Lepoivre" and I can't find any evidence of these chapters in the blog outside the blog. I think it was originally added by an IP which I presume was Ryanoo editing logged out and then by another IP. @Ryanoo: were those IPs you and who is this Bertrand? Doug Weller talk 10:17, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

What, you've never heard of Bertie the Pepper? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 10:47, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

That paragraph seems to be translated from fr:Pays de Pount, the French version of the article (or vice versa). I don't know what to make of the Charmutha series on that nant44 site. Maybe a French editor has an idea. Are there any here? 173.228.123.166 (talk) 18:29, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@ Ryanoo, I love myself thank you, and I don't care about your Middle Eastern or Mediterranean heritage but you should not scrape the term Northeast Africa from Misplaced Pages when it's a valid region of the Nile Valley that exists and that every scientific paper uses. If you want to claim Egypt is part of your Middle Eastern and Mediterranean heritage that's fine but don't censure valid information, this region exists and is very intertwined, the mere fact Ethiopia announced the Renaissance Dam made Egypt worried for its survival as 95% of the population lives along the Nile, and you want us to believe this region is not connected? you can keep your 18th century racist views of Egypt to yourself without censuring facts. I also would like people here who have the capability to create that Northeast Africa page to do so. Arboleh (talk) 19:04, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Arboleh LOL Which region are you talking about?? What are you talking about?? and which scientific papers are you talking about??! the link you provided totally contradict your claims and it shows that Horn Africans are totally different from Egyptians and other North African and Middle Easterners, check this admixture fractions of clusters of the link you cited !!! , It seems that you know nothing at all about genetics that you cited a page which totally contradicts what you said and can be used as an evidence against your claims LOL, I am an archaeogeneticist by the way. This name exists only in your dreams and your edits regarding this topic were reverted two times before by an administrator here for being very poorly sourced. Man, you are from Somalia which is an East African in Sub-Saharan Africa which has nothing at all to do with North African and Middle Eastern countries. Don't you like your area and looking for some ancestry in North Africa and the Middle East or something ???and Why are trying yourself to deattach yourself from your fellow brothers in East Africa brothers in Kenya, Uganda and so on and try linking yourself to North Africans and Middle Easterners?!!! stop this nonsense please, you are just embarrassing yourself and your people who are proud of their country and don't agree with nonsense at all. Again love yourself, your people and your great fellow East African and Sub-Saharan African brothers and stop trying to link yourself to people whom you are totally different from in every aspect!.Ryanoo (talk) 19:31, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Stop calling editors racist. Both of you. Assume some good faith dammit. --Tarage (talk) 19:33, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@ Ryanoo, this is about the term Northeast Africa being used by the scientific community and not about the Horn of Africa genetics which you can find on that page if you were not trolling, and anyways you're not related to the Ancient Egyptians. Learn to love your immigrant heritage and stop the hate. Arboleh (talk) 19:50, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

LOL You don't know even the nature of the link you cited which has nothing to do with what you say and totally contradicts your claims. WOW finally you showed your real Afrocentric face which you have been tying to hide, as other Afro-centrists, you couldn't hide your racism and started insulting an Egyptian for being an Egyptian!!! I won't reply to your insults and I will leave it for the administrators to deal with that. Ryanoo (talk) 19:57, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@ Ryanoo, If you don't behave we're gonna cut your water off :) Arboleh (talk) 20:22, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

BOTH OF YOU STOP. You BOTH don't understand that all you are doing is digging a hole deeper. You are BOTH acting like children right now. Stop posting, let everyone else view the logs and decide what to do. You are doing yourself NO favors by continuing this. --Tarage (talk) 22:01, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Request close

This discussion has clearly gone off the rails. Can we close this, maybe? No punishment needed. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 21:21, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@User:TheDragonFire300, with all due respect I disagree with your assessment, If you got offended by my little "Ancient Egyptian" jab at Ryanoo it shows clearly the bias I am talking about within the Misplaced Pages editors. Ryanoo is a racist editor and the proof is all over Misplaced Pages and yet a jab becomes an offense that derails the issue to the point where you want to recommend nothing for his racist views and constant vandalism of the Land of Punt by using derogatory and disgusting links? I think he should be banned from Misplaced Pages out right, he is a racist who spews white supremacist views and considers Africans sub-human. If you keep him, it validates what I have been saying all along, that this place is full of racist editors who dont give a damn about facts as long as it supports their racial preconceived views. Arboleh (talk) 21:49, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Stop. Calling. Editors. Racist. I'm not going to say it again. I WILL grab an admin and see you both blocked if you continue. --Tarage (talk) 22:02, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Why do you constantly accuse others of racism? I've nothing to do with any topics you've edited until now. Besides, that close comment wasn't directed at either you or Ryanoo in particular. Please stop accusing everyone who disagrees with you of being racist. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 22:54, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@TheDragonFire300, my bad I thought you had closed the discussion because of the jab, apologies. Arboleh (talk) 23:29, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Dragon, I'm afraid I disagree. It's clear to me now that both of these editors are problematic, therefor I am recommending a topic ban for both editors from Africa/Egypt topics, broadly construed. This is a supreme waste of time. --Tarage (talk) 22:03, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Very well. Withdrawn my close proposal. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 22:39, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Tarage, Can you please point to a page where I demeaned Misplaced Pages users for their racial background like Ryanoo does? So please don't equate me to him, if you are offended by my use of the word "racist" that is your personal opinion but Ryanoo comments all over the place prove you wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Arboleh (talk • contribs) 22:11, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

You are mistaking me for someone who cares about your squabble. You will stop calling editors racist or you will be blocked. Period. --Tarage (talk) 22:49, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Support topic ban for both editors Judging by this, both editors are using WP:STICKs with a bend against each other. Could an interaction ban be appropriate? _Hypercube ✎ 22:21, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@SemiHypercube: As I've been asking folks below, what is the justification for this proposal? If we're going to enact an IBAN, that makes sense. But a TBAN suggests we believe an editor cannot edit constructively within a given topic. I think there is some evidence for that in the case of Ryanoo, but all I see in the case of Arboleh is that they are unable to get along with Ryanoo (which may or may not be due to some poking going on with the aggressiveness in Ryanoo's responses). What is the evidence that Arboleh merits a ban from the topic in its entirety, or that they didn't engage in collaborative efforts, or that their editing in this area is tendentious? A TBAN seems inappropriate to counter interaction issues with another editor, and while I've seen a lot of negative response to the language each editor is using to describe the other, I haven't seen any uninvolved editors point out issues in Arboleh's editing in this discussion. Grandpallama (talk) 13:05, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

@Grandpallama: Part of the rationale for a topic ban is that these users seem to be POV pushing (Most edits by Ryanoo "has been battleground edits on North Africa" according to Tarage, Arboleh seems to be calling anyone who disagrees with them on this topic "racist") which is why a double topic ban may be needed as well as an IBAN. On a side note, pings only work if you sign in the same edit, I can tell you tried a ping. _Hypercube ✎ 13:30, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

@SemiHypercube: Yeah, I screwed up the ping. But where are the diffs of Arboleh calling anyone who disagrees a racist? I saw Arboleh call Ryanoo racist, and to be fair, Ryanoo has been skewing on the edge of that in his overblown commentaries about his own expertise and his bad-faith allegations about the motivations of anyone who disagrees with him trying to promote an Afrocentrist agenda. But when did Arboleh call other users racist, and where did he call Ryanoo racist without any provocation? We seem to have jumped quickly to that conclusion, but all the really ugly diffs and quotations people are citing are tied only to Ryanoo, and until Arboleh got riled up by Ryanoo's allegations, I didn't see such language, nor have I seen it directed at other editors. I think that's why I'm concerned--Tarage's (understandable) frustration led to an immediate call for a TBAN, but I'm seeing some dangerous false equivalency going on here, and I've seen NO evidence that Arboleh seems to be calling anyone who disagrees with them on this topic "racist"; where are the diffs of that, which is a pretty significant accusation? Again, a read-through of the North Africa talkpage shows a history of battleground behavior from Ryanoo against a number of editors, but I don't see problematic behavior from Arboleh until his motives get questioned in the middle of a condescending tirade and he's on the receiving end of a backhanded accusation of subverting the truth. Grandpallama (talk) 13:58, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I should clarify--Arboleh edit-warring and incorrectly labeling others' edits as vandalism is problematic behavior, but I'm not sure that's worth a TBAN. More in line with block. Grandpallama (talk) 14:08, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Propose bans for Ryanoo and Arboleh

I see a few potential outcomes. Note that all topic bans are broadly construed. topic bans and indefinite unless noted otherwise. You may suport multiple proposals. Feel free to support a proposal outside what I've lined below.

Pinging Tarage and SemiHypercube, since they've advocated bans before.

1. Both Ryanoo and Arboleh are banned from Africa and Egypt topics.
2. Ryanoo only is banned from Africa and Egypt topics.
3. Arboleh only is banned from Africa and Egypt topics.
4. Ryanoo and Arboleh are interaction banned against each other.
5. Ryanoo is one way interaction banned from Arboleh.
6. Arboleh is one way interaction banned from Ryanoo.
7. Oppose any ban (mutually exclusive)

• Support proposal 2 and 4: per my previous posts. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 23:08, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support 1 and 4, but not against 2, 3, 5, or 6: Frankly this is a bit verbose and unlikely to reach consensus but sure. The problem is from both sides and I see a LOT of POV pushing and pointless bickering. I also see racism claims being thrown around. --Tarage (talk) 23:06, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

  To clarify, but not against means you will not oppose 2, 3, 5 and 6? Anyway, I think a formal proposal for bans may be neccesary. Regards, User:TheDragonFire300. (Contact me | Contributions). This message was left at 23:23, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

  It means I am not opposed to any of those passing. I support them, I just support 1 and 4 more. They both need to be banned from that topic, and they both need an interaction ban. But I'll take what I can get. --Tarage (talk) 23:41, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support 1 and 4 per User:Tarage. _Hypercube ✎ 23:50, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support 1 and 4 per above. Carl Tristan Orense (talk) 08:12, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support 2 and 4 per User:TheDragonFire300's observations. I see appalling behavior here from Ryanoo, and some less than ideal behavior from Arboleh, but the latter seems to be in exasperated response. Ryanoo seems to lack competence to edit WP, and I suspect a TBAN here will be the beginning of a slow spiral toward an indefinite block of some sort down the line. Grandpallama (talk) 11:14, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support 2 and 4 The reason why things have cooled off between myself and Ryanoo was because I was wise enough to ask for page protection for the North Africa page. If admins hasn’t intervened, I’m positive we would have been at square one. I think Arboleh may be reacting this way because Ryanoo seems to be trying to game the system to ban users he clashes with (tried the above case with Arboleh, opened a random SPI on me) rather than civilly discussing issues. I also agree with @Grandpallama: Itaren (talk) 13:29, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support 2 and 4 per Itaren. -A lad insane (Channel 2) 15:51, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Just from what I've seen on this thread I'm already sick of both of you-there seems to be a lot of anger and insults and precious little that is constructive here.

Statements such as 'I am actually here for fighting the ones who have clear racist and destructive POV a.k.a Afrocentrists' or 'I am here so as not to leave my history and culture for the racist Afrocentric Black supremacists' hardly give the impression of someone who is here to help cultivate an encyclopaedia.

I would also note whilst we're debating this that Ryanoo has stated 'regarding banning from editing Africa topics...in fact I don't mind that at all,my edits are mainly focused on my country Egypt and my region(Mediterranean basin,Middle East and North Africa topics'. So I would add the caveat that 'Africa-related topics' covers ALL of the African continent and related themes. We don't need another round of North Africa vs Sub-Saharan Africa-which is the real Africa?

So it's

• Support 1 and 4 with that caveat. Lemon martini (talk) 17:34, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Lemon martini:Both of the quotations you included are from Ryanoo, so I'm curious as to why you say you see equally bad behavior from Arboleh. Grandpallama (talk) 17:51, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support 1 and 4 per Tarage. --Kzl55 (talk) 12:08, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Kzl55:, why would interaction issues between these two users necessitate that both of them be topic-banned? Even a cursory glance at the article in question shows only one of these editors having difficulty with collaborative editing and failing to show good faith. I continue to be mystified at what seems to me to be unjustified support for a TBAN of Arboleh. If the expectation is that Arboleh needs to be sanctioned for having suggested Ryanoo's editing is racist (which the interactions show may not be entirely unjustified), that is only grounds for an IBAN. It doesn't demonstrate an inability to edit in the topic area. Grandpallama (talk) 12:59, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

  Is there a reason you are pinging everyone who doesn't respond in the way you'd like them to? You should stop. --Tarage (talk) 20:39, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

  I've asked three people to justify seeking a topic ban for a user on the basis that the user is calling "anyone who disagrees with him a racist" when the diffs don't back this up--saying that I'm pinging "everyone" is just as unfounded as some of the other statements you made earlier. I'm also worried that your own frustration with the preceding conversation led to a premature call for a topic ban for a user based upon declarations about his editing that weren't backed up by any provided diffs. Is there a policy that I've violated by seeking reasoning from some people for their support? No? Then my response is that the next time you prepare to tell me what I should or shouldn't do, you should stop. Grandpallama (talk) 14:31, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Grandpallama: I also agree with Tarage on this. I would suggest you read WP:BLUDGEON. _Hypercube ✎ 18:26, 10 November 2018 (UTC)(

  If you think my responses to the two most recent votes constitute bludgeoning, you're free to take it up with an admin. That said, I think I've replied enough to this topic, so the end result is the same, either way. Grandpallama (talk) 22:11, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support 1 and 4, could live with 2, 3, 5, or 6 per Tarage. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:02, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Hilo48 and Timeshift9

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is written about a week after I created this block. I no longer support a full-block or topic-block for @Timeshift9: after a careful consideration of other editors views. Though I remain firm in my conviction that @HiLo48: should be blocked for 3-6 months. Refer to my statements on each of them below for my reasoning. Global-Cityzen (talk) 06:11, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm requesting Timeshift and Hilo be temporarily blocked for some wanton and blatant Misplaced Pages:Disruptive editing, chiefly with respect to their continued deletion of material in the Wentworth by-election, 2018 article, specifically their refusal to engage or even offer civil points of difference in the article's talk page.

• The history page shows examples of Timeshift repeatedly editing in ways that make it difficult to directly compare his reversions of my and other editor's edits (which have added information to the infobox). For instance he'll make a minor , then the very next one will be the revert.

• At the very least general history page shows how often they are willing to violate the WP:3RR rule.

• Timeshift is guilty of Misplaced Pages:Tendentious editing, most notably in this instance on the talk page: Oh look, results aren't final/are still changing! I love being proven right...! :) Silly troublemakers proven wrong. Feeling very smug :D Timeshift (talk) 02:24, 7 November 2018 (UTC); an edit that was made two days after the page was finally settling down and is blatantly tenditious and WP:POINTY, much to the frustration of the majority of editors who are seeking to IMPROVE the page and UPDATE figures when appropriate rather than simply DELETE the figures in the infobox

• Both users misrepresent alleged precedent in relation to the infobox (see this section of the talk page and when exposed to this, simply ignore and pursue their deletions

• Neither engage in consensus building with multiple editors, and are now simply taking ownership of the page.

Hilo has form, repeatedly. Global-Cityzen (talk) 06:42, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Can this please be quickly turned into a boomerang for the lies and irrelevancies it contains? And the forum shopping? I really don't want to have to go into detail on every piece of nonsense there. HiLo48 (talk)

These "lies and irrelevancies" accusation is precisely what HiLo has done on the page's talk page, whenever he is asked to justify his and Timeshift's edits to remove information from the box. Yet again he has form in this regard; this time at another page. Global-Cityzen (talk) 06:57, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

And now the latest 3RR violation by Timeshift (here). Global-Cityzen (talk) 07:20, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

There has been a massive amount of discussion re this article. We have reached a point where both Timeshift9 and I are being accused of not having discussed things that we definitely have discussed. I can accept someone not remembering everything I have written, but I cannot abide false accusations that I have never written it at all. That is were discussion has gone. We are both being asked to repeat points we have both made before, as if demanding this is a winning argument. We have both, at times, given up on discussion at that article because of the toxic atmosphere, but it's hard to forever ignore what we see as poor content. I also have a life away from Misplaced Pages, and get rather sick of and don't really have time for having to repeat myself here. HiLo48 (talk) 07:24, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm accusing Timeshift and HiLo of repeatedly ignoring prompts that directly challenge their reasons for editing. If one reads through the talk page, they will note that both users' objections are responded to in substance, namely that;

• No precedent exists for not including figures in an Australian election infobox, as User:Impru20 pointed out on the talk page: "about the alleged "precedent", I've found that this is bogus at best. Batman by-election, 2018, for instance, didn't abide to such a "precedent", nor did Australian federal election, 2016 or others. Further, it is not that other by-election articles actually did: it is just that most of those did not see their infoboxes added until later." No substantial point was made by either of these users in response to this expose.
• When asked why they would advocate continuously deleting verifiable information by the same user, neither responded.
• We are not asking them repeat points made before, rather asking them to present any argument for the exclusion of verifiable information in an infobox whose central purpose is to convey that information to the reader

And unfortunately, when challenged on these issues of substance, HiLo simply engages in ad hominen attacks on the user, saying they are extolling in inaccuracy WITHOUT demonstrating how. Whilst Timeshift simply waits 2 days for the discussion to settle before launching into the same disruptive editing process. Global-Cityzen (talk) 07:39, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Lies. Yet again. HiLo48 (talk) 09:03, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I recommend that yas open up an Rfc at the article-in-question, in order to settle the content dispute. GoodDay (talk) 07:45, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Thankyou, I've done that (here). Global-Cityzen (talk) 08:33, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

@Timeshift9: has just reverted the same content for a FOURTH TIME IN 30 MINUTES simply saying he "disagrees". If that's not an example of edit warring I don't know what is! These numbers have been up for at least two days without interruption, it's just some of the most abhorrent behaviour you could imagine. Global-Cityzen (talk) 08:01, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

• Apparently the issue concerns whether an infobox should be included at Wentworth by-election, 2018, and if so, what it should contain. It seems the issue was raised a week ago at the relevant wikiproject and my brief skim of that suggests there is no consensus for inclusion. Enthusiasm is not a good substitute for patience. The OP's statements about "refusal to engage" and suggestions of incivility are blatantly incorrect. Johnuniq (talk) 08:27, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I've applied protection for a few days, that should allow the election results to firm up and we can go from there. TomStar81 (Talk) 08:56, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Awaiting final results is really only a small part of the issues with this article. HiLo48 (talk) 09:06, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

As an uninvolved bystander, this is not a helpful step. Getting aggressive with other editors about an infobox is a needless escalation of a dispute that was already fairly pointless to begin with. Everyone play nice. Global-Cityzen, you've been making some absolutely phenomenal (and very badly needed) contributions on women's sport recently - may I suggest that it might be a better usage of your time than this dispute? The Drover's Wife (talk) 09:03, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

• On Timeshift9, they have been carelessly reverting everything and anyone not complying with their views, even reportedly conducting at least eight reverts from four different users within a 24-hour period (up to ten depending on whether you would consider other minor edits), namely: . Note that this behaviour continued even after being notified twice on it ( ). The edit warring has continued up to the current day, with new violations of 3RR (in total, five reverts before the article's lockdown: ) and including some mocking/provocation to some of the users involved in the discussion ( ). To be fair with everybody, though, it should also be noted that the OP (Global-Cityzen) has also violated 3RR today as a result of getting involved in such edit warring, with five reverts, but this should not obscure the fact that there is a serious behavioural issue with these two users.
• The biggest issue here, however, is with HiLo48, who has been openly disruptive from the start, resorting to using arguments from ignorance and proof by assertion once and once again with a clear WP:BATTLEGROUND behaviour (note that it was them who started the discussion in the first place and that while starting a discussion is perfectly ok, the ensuing behaviour shown while engaging other people there is not). This includes:
  • Persistent personal attacks and general incivility, continuously resorting on commenting the contributor for opposing reality or "the truth" ( ) while showing a rather patronizing behaviour to those not agreeing with them (specially and most notoriously with Onetwothreeip). HiLo48 even went as far as to enter into vandalism accusations without caring to explain why ( ), despite repeated warnings to either bring such accusations to the proper venue with actual evidence or just cast them off ( ). They also threatened to report me for one comment they allegedly saw as "insulting", but curiously, just like the "vandalism", they never did it ().
  • More WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS ( ).
  • Apparent failure to understand what discussion and talk pages are for. This includes a general refusal to engage in constructive consensus-building and persistent refusal to address/reply to issues raised by others, seemingly failing to understand why they should bother to reply (while concurrently acting as if others had never addressed any issues raised by him) ( ). Note that this has continued even after this case was opened ( ). At some point of the discussion they also accused other of misrepresenting them, but never actually explained how nor addressed concerns raised at their accusations of misrepresentation.
  • Disrupting Misplaced Pages to make a point, by:
    1. Suddenly shifting the discussion focus to issues not even raised at first so as to purposely hinder any consensus-building attempt aimed at preserving the infobox (most notoriously ( ), raising the issues of Phelps' pic looking "appalling" and a alleged failure to understand what colours do mean in infoboxes, despite party labels being shown just below (this alone would raise some competence concerns, but nonetheless it would be an issue with either the pics or the infobox template as a whole, not for the particular infobox used in Wentworth by-election, 2018. This was pointed to them (and was the main motive behind the discussion being centralized) to no avail).
    2. Mutilating the infobox to make it truly useless and force a point on how "useless" it actually was (), a fact they have not even tried to hide ().
    3. Deliberate withdrawal from the centralized discussion at Misplaced Pages:Australian Wikipedians' notice board#Infoboxes in by-election articles without addressing any of the content concerns raised there, then moving the discussion again to Talk:Wentworth by-election, 2018#Still Infoboxing in order to raise the same exact issues that led to the discussion being centralized.
  • I could spent more time putting more examples or explaining this even more in-depth, but I think this is enough for it. Further, after some research it transpires that issues on HiLo48's behaviour are very recurring, for the exact same reasons as depicted above (or even others: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16)
  • Their own block log is troubling, and as far as I have checked, if it is impossible to find any issues between January 2015 and March 2018 is just because they remained inactive for that whole period. Their own userpage is very disturbing, being full of attacks on Misplaced Pages as a whole, a notorious disregard for civility policies or some other really really disturbing statements against Misplaced Pages's workings.
  • Foremost of all, Competence is required to communicate with others and present rationales when questioned by others, to collaborate with other editors, defend their editing when asked to do so and, obviously, to not ignoring some of the most basic Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines. It looks like this has been an issue with HiLo48 for years, and it seems obvious that HiLo48 is not able to learn from their mistakes and adapt. Refusing to engage with civility with other users, or even acknowledging that they cannot be "bothered" to discuss issues or even purposely provoking others for the sake of it, goes against the very essence of WP. But then, acknowledging a complete disregard for WP's workings is just unacceptable, and if they think they should not be here, nor are they here for contributing Misplaced Pages, then maybe they should not be here. Impru20 16:45, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I have neither the time nor the energy to respond to that hate speech from someone clearly obsessed with me. How many lies and personal attacks can come from the keyboard of someone before they cop a boomerang? HiLo48 (talk) 21:21, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

HiLo48, none of that is "hate speech"; it is neutral, accurate reporting supported by evidence. None of it is "lies", as each statement is supported by several diffs which bear out the statement. None of the statements are "personal attacks", either; they are all neutral observations. It seems to me that your modus operandi when you disagree with someone more than once is to attack them personally and to accuse them of personal attacks, lies, vandalism, etc. Sooner or later this long-term behavioral pattern on your part is going to end up getting you very long-term blocked or site-banned due to an inability to edit collaboratively and due to creating disruption instead. Softlavender (talk) 04:56, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

I see it differently. HiLo48 (talk) 05:02, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, of course you would say that. And you haven't refuted the dozens of diffs the editor presented, or offered any proof that what he stated is "hate speech", "lies", and "personal attacks". Attacking others and making baseless comments may seem like the easy way out for you, but it just makes the other editor's case look perfectly accurate. Softlavender (talk) 05:07, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Not to objective, open minded editors. HiLo48 (talk) 05:14, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

In other words, you still can't refute anything the editor wrote and you still can't offer any proof that what he stated is "hate speech", "lies", and "personal attacks"; instead you are continuing to cast aspersions. Softlavender (talk) 05:17, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

It seems to me that's precisely what you're doing. HiLo48 (talk) 06:02, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Yet another personal attack, which seems to be the only way you respond to evidence-based statements about yourself and requests that you actually make your case. The more you post "Nope" (edit summary) along with a personal attack, the worse you look. As Impru20 has noted, your recent disruptive behavior is not isolated, and has been reported many times on ANI, and you have been blocked five times for personal attacks. Softlavender (talk) 06:16, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

This is pointless. I don't have the time to respond to that litany of alleged crimes on my part, nor do I have the time to catalog all the sins of the gang who disagreed with me. I do note that the environment at the article became so toxic that many experienced editors gave up, and let you guys just go for it for a while. That left a short term majority of people from one side of the debate, certainly not representative of the usual editing community for Australian political articles. Being in a majority is never evidence of being right. It's really just a chance to bully those in the minority.

Meanwhile, Admins have shown very little interest in this complaint. They have told people to go back to the article's Talk page for an RfC. This is a content dispute. I suggest you go to that RfC. HiLo48 (talk) 06:24, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

I am not involved in the article, so I am not "you guys". What Impru20 posted was not a "litany of alleged crimes", it was a well-evidenced report of your recent disruptive behavior, which you responded to by falsely calling his report "hate speech", "lies", and "personal attacks". This is your pattern, and it will get you into sanctions if it continues. Softlavender (talk) 06:36, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

This discussion does pretty well in summarizing HiLo's behaviour. Bring any argument to them, no matter how well explained or referenced, that if it is against their views it will be met with outright unmotivated opposition, condescendention, incivility and a refusal to "understand" what the problem is, as well as a total disregard of WP:AGF. Impru20 06:58, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

How can I assume good faith of editors who falsely accuse me of having NEVER said things I have definitely said? And who created such a toxic discussion environment that many experienced editors stop discussing at that page? HiLo48 (talk) 07:35, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Please indicate, with diffs, where editors have falsely accused you of having never said things you definitely said. Softlavender (talk) 07:38, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

No. I really can't be bothered. If you are looking at this objectively, you will have seen how much discussion there has been. A massive amount. I wouldn't make an absolute claim about anything anyone had said or not said in that pile of now fairly useless trash. It was rather silly of those who disagreed with me to think they could. HiLo48 (talk) 07:45, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

In other words, yet another refusal to back up your claims about other editors. And this: "It was rather silly of those who disagreed with me to think they could." is borderline block-worthy, as it points up your refusal to edit or discuss collaboratively. Softlavender (talk) 07:56, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't think there is much more that needs to be said here but I find the reverting of many more times than three in a day to be very concerning. The poor discourse on the talk page is a problem, but the constant reverting seriously compromises the editing process. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:25, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I am not condoning Edit warring, but avoiding the appearance of doing so is much easier when you create a toxic editing environment, discouraging the majority of those who disagree with you from even trying. This leaves you and just a couple of others with identical views that any new editor must confront. HiLo48 (talk) 00:12, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Have you ever made more than three reverts of the article in a 24 hour period? Onetwothreeip (talk) 01:02, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

I have no idea about timeshitft, but having just commented on the RFC and seeing HiLo48's reactions to anyone who disagrees with him (who appear to be in the majority) I think that there is a problem with him. This is a case of tendentious editing.Slatersteven (talk) 10:06, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

HiLo has indeed been a frequent offender when it comes to civility issues, both on main space and project space; I believe he's even had an RFC/U on his conduct in the past. That said, he's unrelenting and inveterate to those said issues, attributing these to cultural differences, and I doubt that blocks or sanctions of any sort will induce him to change his behavior, if his screeds on his user talk page are anything to go by. Either we accept that he's going to just be uncivil, or we look at the serious possibility of a community ban.--WaltCip (talk) 12:12, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Or we have a series of rolling topic bans, this time form Australasian politics. This edit warring over such a trivial matter is an indicator of a very severe battleground (but not in a POV pushy but rather "I HAVE SPOKEN" kind of way) mentality that is hugely disruptive and wasted a lot of eds time that could have been better employed.Slatersteven (talk) 16:15, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Thinking about it, this should apply to both parties, one for edit warring the the other for incivility, both for battleground mentality.Slatersteven (talk) 18:26, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

@Global-Cityzen: Can you clarify whether you meant to suggest HiLo48 was violating 3RR? I thought you did but maybe you were simply using singular they. I had a quick look and didn't see any examples of HiLo48 violating 3RR in Wentworth by-election, 2018 Nil Einne (talk) 16:21, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Since there's an Rfc now occurring at said article, these block requests should now be considered moot. GoodDay (talk) 03:43, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

They shouldn't. One thing is the content dispute (which is what is being addressed with the RfC) and another one is the behavioural problem (which is continuing, at least from HiLo48, in the RfC or even in this very same thread). Impru20 06:38, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

This is way too extreme of a form of WP:IDGAF from User:HiLo48. It's really inappropriate for a ANI discussion about your civility. —JJB 15:24, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Trust me, it would be way worse if he was writing real replies. As noted above, this is nothing new for him and it's never going to change. We can follow GoodDay's suggestion and consider the block requests moot, but that would just be kicking the can down the road because the behavioral issues are just as glaring as ever. Lepricavark (talk) 15:35, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Then a block is needed as it is preventative not punative. It is supposed to prevent the kind of behavior we are seeing. If it is accepted that his behavior is wrong, but he is not going to change no matter how much we ask then a block (for now make it a topic ban, maybe that will get through) is the only answer. What we must not do is accept policy beaching actions on the grounds of "well what can we do?", otherwise what the hell is the point of having them. How can it be fair to have rules that only apply to some users?15:54, 9 November 2018 (UTC)Slatersteven (talk)

I just noticed this on their talk page, , it seems that they got pretty uncivil to this user. They also accuse them of vandalism in the edit summary as well. —JJB 16:40, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I've only now noticed that talk page. I don't appreciate being accused of conspiring with other editors when they've done that themselves, per User_talk:HiLo48#Wentworth_by-election,_2018. This section has gone long enough, can we get a determination already? Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:14, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I hadn't noticed that until now as well... and now I also noticed this after digging out a little further (). So I now understand this reply from HiLo48 where they accused me of having "clones". Disturbing.

Further, looks like they won't stop their incivility elsewhere even with this report ongoing (). Impru20 22:24, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I would recommend a general block then if the incivility isn't even just on the Australian elections pages. They seem to be generally incivil to multiple places (including the one you linked). —JJB 00:40, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

What more needs to be said. It's hi time hi lo is blocked indefinitely. He is here only to disrupt and has a history of incivility and personal attacks and edit warring as long as anyone in the history of Misplaced Pages. Block him before he does any more damage to the project. No one will miss him and his contributions.Merphee (talk) 09:53, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

An observation. The problem with making such wild and sweeping statements as that is that it rather encourages examination of one's own contributions. For instance, your 400 edits to articles might be mentioned. IMHO of course. ——SerialNumber54129 10:05, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Agreed. Merphee, please do not attempt to "fight fire with fire". It's one thing to make observations that raise concerns about specific conduct, and it's quite another to make blanket statements about another user being generally useless and a caliber of person that "no one will miss". It's even more inappropriate to contemplate their motives as being entirely predicated in trying to disrupt the project; when you make that implication, you are essentially saying they are here for no other reason than to troll the project, and that kind of accusation should not be made unless you are prepared to make a case with substantial evidence--you know, one of the very things Hilo has been called out for not doing himself here. Furthermore, it's an absurd assertion in these circumstances; whatever legitimate grievances may be raised here with regard to Hilo's conduct, it is abundantly clear that they care about the topics they edit and are not here to troll the project. Lastly, "clever" little turns of phrase like "hi time to block Hi lo" are not productive or useful; they contribute nothing but snark that can inflame an already antagonistic process--if you cannot contribute your insights here in a sober tone when criticizing another user's behaviour, please do not comment at all. Snow 21:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

"hi time to block Hi lo" are not productive or useful" I do agree with that point you made. I shouldn't have said that. However I completely disagree with everything else you just said. That is my opinion based on HiLo's long term incivility, bullying, throwing around accusation after accusation with no no basis, chasing new editors away, harassment, hounding and so forth. You are entitled to your opinion Snow Rise, and I am entitled to mine. I believe he probably cares about his point of view on article's he edits, but there is no way I could possibly believe based on the hard evidence over countless interactions with countless editors, HiLo cares about editors who may disagree with him. And frankly him caring about the article has nothing to do with it. It is his bullying, personal attacks and incivility that has landed him here. Again. But I respect your opinion. You need to also respect mine. Please refer to Softlavender's excellent description of HiLo's incivility below, if you are in any doubt.Merphee (talk) 03:52, 12 November 2018 (UTC)  

Of course it's your opinion and of course you are entitled to it, but some opinions are not to be shared, as a matter of policy and long-standing community consensus. For starters, you shouldn't be detailing your speculation regarding his motivations--your comments should be focused on his conduct, not your guesswork as to the psychology behind it. And saying that he is here to troll without providing evidence that clearly established such a bad faith motivation is also beyond the scope of acceptable commentary. Both of those principles are codified in WP:NPA. Clearly if I wasn't convinced there are behavioural issues with Hilo's conduct, I would not have introduced the proposal that he be blocked below, or noted my endorsement of criticisms by other editors, after I had read through the thread and followed up on the many diffs and links. But there's a right way and a wrong way to do that and your approach was needlessly personalized and aggressive, and more likely to undercut your points than to bolster your case that Hilo needs restraining, because it makes it look like he had an active foil in any of those discussions in which you may have taken part, and undercuts the perceived neutrality of your comments here. Snow 05:24, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

You keep using the word "troll" which I never said he was. However when there is such widespread incivility toward so many editors on so many different articles over such a long period of time and he is so aware of policy I fail to see how HiLo's conduct is not highly disruptive. However having said that I do think my comments were needlessly personalised and aggressive and I take your point in that regard Snow Rise. In hindsight I shouldn't have even commented at all and in fact should have stayed well out of this debate. So this is where I will close my mouth and step away.Merphee (talk) 05:53, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Been through an investigation and came out clean and it was because of Hi lo's incivility and personal attacks. Don't appreciate your comment dude. May need to go looking through your me thinks. It is as plain as day from comments here that HiLo has attacked and caused havoc since he's been here. I'm entitled to my opinion. I'm NOT on trial here SerialNumber so keep your opinion to your self! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Merphee (talk • contribs) 10:14, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Ah, civility, yes; the irony is duly noted. And please remember to sign your posts, Merphee. ——SerialNumber54129 11:13, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Merphee is entirely correct. Here is a prime example from just three months ago:

Merphee removed an uncited, unattributed POV statement from The Australian that had been tagged for three years: . HiLo48 went straight to Merphee's usertalk to harass him: . Merphee added back part of the material he had removed: . HiLo48 inserted an extremely POV quotation into the article: . Merphee opened a neutral discussion on the article's talkpage about the POV quote: . HiLo48's response was "Stop destroying the article" and he continued to deflect, bicker, and ridicule: . Merphee

correctly removed the quote and attempted to summarize it instead: . HiLo48 reverted , and failed to neutrally respond to the issues Merphee brought up about it, instead bickering, casting aspersions, and making demands: . Therefore Merphee engaged in WP:DR by opening a thread on WP:RSN: WP:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 246#The Monthly. HiLo48 falsely accused Merphee of forum-shopping: , , and then opened an ANI thread falsely accusing Merphee of forum-shopping: . -- Softlavender (talk) 12:11, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Just so. ——SerialNumber54129 20:05, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Link to the full ANI dissusion that Softlavender mentioned at the end of their message. —JJB 04:28, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Topic ban for Hilo48

From Australian politics in the hope they get the message. Slatersteven (talk) 10:17, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

• Comment: I think this is feasible, but I don't think HiLo48's problematic behavior is limited to Australian politics. I think a very very long block (3 to 6 months or indef) is what is needed, because as is evidenced above, he has no intention of stopping his abuse of other editors. I think ArbCom is going to be the next stop for this editor if this isn't solved/stopped here. Softlavender (talk) 12:17, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

True, but maybe the issue is the attitude of "well we do not know what to do so lets do nothing" had engendered an attitude that he can do as he likes. If he is sent a clear message that enough is enough and there are actions we can (and will) take it may cause him to rethink this attitude.Slatersteven (talk) 14:31, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support something is better than nothing. Lepricavark (talk) 15:02, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support I would also support a full block. —JJB 17:01, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment – a little better than nothing, but I would see it as ineffective. Overall I'll have to agree with Softlavender: this extends far beyond the topic of Australian politics. A prime example would be the behaviour exhibited in this same thread ( or as examples); the recent dispute with Merphee in The Australian pointed out by Softlavender; the activity at Talk:Gasoline (concurrent with this report being ongoing, ); a recent breach of WP:3RR at G.I. Generation (also concurrent in time with this report, ); describing the "fuck off" expression as a "too useful a tool" to deliberately provoke other editors "and draw community attention" so that those other editors get sanctioned that way; the similar uncivil + BIT behaviour at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Football (); a call for not trusting admins for not using their sysop powers on "miscreants among their ranks"; or a possible canvassing attempt to influence the discussion at Misplaced Pages:Australian Wikipedians' notice board#Infoboxes in by-election articles (). This aside from the already spotted misconduct or the long-term concerns with their behaviour. At this point, I think that only a long-term or indef block would work. Impru20 17:27, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support, but nevertheless recommend that this proposal be tabled in favour of a long-term block proposal, since every respondent to this proposal so far (of which I am about to become the fifth) seems to agree that a TBAN does not match the scope of the issues. I've been following this discussion for a few days, reserving comment. I've observed Hilo48 to be somewhat short in some of their responses in the past, but I hadn't any idea the problems ran this deep. But the pattern is well established by the numerous diffs provided by editors in good standing above, and clearly runs strong in recent interactions. The nature of Hilo's response to concerns above is itself problematic--particularly the back-and-forth with Softlavender that seems to cast a great deal of light upon Hilo's perspectives on limitations as to his conduct vis-a-vis civility and providing justification for their actions. No editor is immune from having their conduct scrutinized by the community, no matter how put-upon they may feel, and in particular, no editor is allowed to make accusations about the supposedly disruptive and bad-faith conduct of other editors without providing proof, particularly when those accusations regard supposed conduct touching upon such serious concerns as "hate speech", dishonesty/gamesmanship, and personal attack. The fact that Hilo steadfastly refuses to provide such evidence and yet simultaneously refuses to withdraw the comments in question is more than sufficient evidence to tell us that they do not feel that they need to comport with our policies where they don't feel it's "worth their time". That's an untenable attitude for for any community member to have with regard to their involvement on this project, and more than enough reason in itself to endorse a block here.

I understand Slatersteven's inclination towards the most targeted possible sanction, hoping that this will prompt a fundamental change in Hilo's approach, but I join the others who have responded to his proposal in observing that the conduct in question goes well beyond the topic area that would be covered, and that the problems are more about apparent hostility toward views contrary to Hilo's own (and a definite refusal to prioritize civil discourse in many instances) than they are about over-zealousness in that one area. Moreover, taking all of the evidence presented here in its entirety, I find it highly unlikely that Hilo will actually reform in that manner as a consequence of receiving that community response--much more likely, I think, is that it will feed into their "Misplaced Pages's administrator's and administrative spaces are corrupt and the community's priority's are ass backwards--that's why they are trying to get rid of me" mentality. I just don't see the likihood that they can be won over by a TBAN, and I think a significant block may be the only way to make clear that a long-term and basic change in approach to their response to disputes is going to be required of them--whether they accept the underlying philosophy or not. Softlavender, Lepricavark, JJBers, Impru20, I'll put forward the proposal myself, so if there are any sour feelings resulting, they can be directed at me; feel free to reiterate your thoughts above in an !vote below, or not, as per your present perspectives. Snow 20:02, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose - Let's us be careful, that we're not seen as punishing an editor. GoodDay (talk) 21:36, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, I can't speak for everyone, but my endorsement of some form of action definitely arises out of a desire to prevent further disruption, not punish prior conduct. And indeed, looking at the comments of others in the forgoing discussion, it seems that most have contemplated the community's possible responses in terms of prevention. Can you be more specific about what previous comments have prompted your concerns that participants in this discussion are being motivated by a desire to punish previous conduct rather than prevent further disruption? I followed pretty much every link in the discussion above before contemplating my own !vote, but if I am missing additional backstory here between those involved in the discussion, it could influence my own support for sanctions. Snow 22:19, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm lenient in these matters, unless it involves vandalism. GoodDay (talk) 22:24, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Ah, ok--understood. I disagree that we would appear punitive by acting in this instance, given the concerns expressed, but I understand where you are coming from; I just wanted to make sure I was not missing any additional context. Thank you for taking the time to respond. Snow 22:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Well it seems the consensus is to table this for a longer block. I have no objection to tabling this (this is not an endorsement of a longer block).Slatersteven (talk) 10:32, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Longterm block for Hilo48

Per comments above from contributors who feel that a topic ban does reach to the nature of the conduct in question here, I am proposing a block as an alternative. The reasons expressed for preferring a block regard the fact that there is a perception of incivlity and general tendentiousness in Hilo48's interactions with multiple editors over a significant span of time, and a hostility in this discussion towards the notion that they may wish to reexamine their conduct, particularly as regards WP:AGF during disputes and making accusations against other editors that are not supported by evidence. The first editor to propose a longterm block contemplated one as long as six months--I think that may be excessive, but respondents can reach their own conclusions as to the particulars. Snow 20:02, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support as nom, per my thoughts expressed in the proposal above and recommending a block of 2-3 months in duration. Snow 20:02, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support this proposal as preferable to the one above. A topic ban is far less likely to be effective. Lepricavark (talk) 20:27, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support as per Snow's and my own thoughts so far. My impression based on the provided evidence is that a TBAN would just lead to HiLo's belligerence being re-directed elsewhere. A block is probably the only way forward at this stage. Impru20 20:44, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - Let's be careful that we're not seen as being punitive in nature. GoodDay (talk) 21:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support block of at least 3 to 6 months or indef. (His last block was for one month ; standard block escalation would be no less than 3 months.) As is evidenced above, HiLo48 has no intention of stopping his abuse of other editors. I think ArbCom is going to be the next stop for this editor if this isn't solved/stopped here. This is most decidedly not a punitive block; it is a preventative block preventing abuse of other editors -- there's no telling how many editors HiLo48 has driven off of articles or off of the site itself, and we absolutely cannot allow that to continue. Softlavender (talk) 02:02, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Previously said I would support this. —JJB 02:45, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support block of at least 6 months or indef. There is no evidence HiLo has changed his ways or has any intention of doing so. This is not a punitive block by any means, it is instead aimed at stopping him abuse and accuse other editors with no support for his accusations.Merphee (talk) 03:05, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support a wiki-wide block of 3-6 months for @HiLo48:, though I now oppose blocking in any capacity Timeshift9 (see below for my shift in reasoning). On HiLo, as multiple editors now reveal, the kind of behaviour that I outlined on the Wentworth by-election page (offensive commentary, refusal to engage in civil fashion on the talk page) is an ongoing issue. An escalation in sanction (up from a previous 1 month ban) seems appropriate. Global-Cityzen (talk) 06:01, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Topic ban for Timeshift9

Its takes two to tango and this was just pure battleground for no real reason.Slatersteven (talk) 10:17, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose TBAN – just as I see a TBAN alone would be ineffective on HiLo48, I think it may be too excessive for Timeshift9. As per WP:TBAN, The purpose of a topic ban is to forbid editors from making edits related to a certain topic area where their contributions have been disruptive. While edit warring is disruptive, I don't think there is enough evidence of a long-term behaviour on the part of Timeshift that justifies a TBAN (given the preventive, not punitive, nature of editing restrictions), and I'd rather see it as an isolated incident. Further, the 3RR violations (which would also involve Global-Cityzen) would have probably justified a short block at the time, but given that there have been no new discussion/behaviour issues or warring, I would say to just let it go for now. Impru20 18:03, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - we should be careful, that we're not seen as being punitive in nature. GoodDay (talk) 21:39, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose It doesn't look like Timeshift9 was the bully here. Get at the root cause of the issue which was obviously Hilo after looking at their interaction.Merphee (talk) 03:07, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per above. —JJB 04:31, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Statement. Upon reflection I don’t believe a full-scale ban would be necessary for @Timeshift9:. Specifically I think TS9 engaged in WP:BATTLEGROUND and WP:POINTY behaviour on the Wentworth by-election page within about a 4 hour period around the time I created this section, though I can’t deny I reacted by adding the original material he was so opposed to several times, possibly in violation of 3RR. Days later, and he’s actually made an edit to the infobox which sought to improve it (from “swing” to “change” of something like that). So a full-scale ban would be wrong, and (and against what I feel is my better judgement), I lean to opposing a topic ban for him. Unlike HiLo, this would appear to be an isolated case and I hope the both of us can learn from it. I’m firmly of the view HiLo should be blocked wiki-wide for 3-6 months, as I’ll explain above. One piece of advice I have for Timseshift, take a read of how to pull back from the brink from tenditious editing/editing to “prove” a point. Global-Cityzen (talk) 05:55, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Strongly oppose. Veteran contributor with a huge contribution to this area over many years. Many people behaved badly in this clusterfuck of a dispute and his conduct in no way rises to anything approaching topic ban worthy. The Drover's Wife (talk) 23:11, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Strong arguments have been made this was a one off, and being provoked is often defense.Slatersteven (talk) 10:12, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment I think this can be closed as a snow close at this point. —JJB 19:00, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Dr Nobody's behaviour at and around Irish Bull Terrier

Dr Nobody (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Irish Bull Terrier (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Well, I wish it hadn't come to this, but I tried just about everything else I can think of to get through to this editor. They have repeatedly demonstrated a ownership mentality about this article, see here, here, here, and here. They have also apparently refuse to learn how to use references and sources correctly on Misplaced Pages. They have been pointed to various policy pages regarding these policies, but has not bothered to read them or doesn't care as evidenced by their repeated insertion of unreliable and incorrectly referenced sources. I can provide more diffs if required, but since it is pretty contained I didn't think it would be hard to see.

Like I said at the beginning, I wish it hadn't come to this. zchrykng (talk) 17:53, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Additional note, I have no opinion on what is the "correct" version of the article. I ended up there and interacting with this editor solely through recent changes patrolling and have been trying to help since. zchrykng (talk) 17:59, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

I've just reverted his latest edit, as the "source", even if reliable, doesn't actually source the text anyway. I'll wait to see if there's a response to this thread. Black Kite (talk) 18:25, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

I sincerely hope they respond, but I doubt they will, at least in a positive way, at this point. zchrykng (talk) 18:27, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Black Kite I feel like I need to add Competence is required, I didn’t hear that, and Right great wrongs to the list of issues. zchrykng (talk) 17:50, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I have no idea what this person is talking about I referenced a change to the article from a reliable source. I started the article several years back as many of this breed were being put down as American Pit Bull Terriers which they are not. DR NOBODY — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dr Nobody (talk • contribs) 20:23, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

@Dr Nobody: The text you added was sourced to this page.

Your text: "The main difference between the IBT and the APBT is the head shape." Which text at your source verifies the claim that head shape is the primary differentiating factor between these two breeds of dog? This is particularly confusing because neither "pit" nor "APBT", your abbreviation for American Pit Bull Terrier, appear in your source at all.

Your text: "The APBT head is of medium length with a broad flat skull and a wide deep muzzle" Which text at your source verifies this information?

Your text: "whereas the IBT the head is short and deep throughout with a distinct stop reference" This appears to be referenced to the "Description" section at your source, which says the dog has "a broad head and very strong jaws. The muzzle is short and the cheek muscles distinct. The stop is clearly defined." Could you change your text so it more accurately restates the source's text?

2602:306:BC31:4AA0:905B:33DA:5576:AFE7 (talk) 21:36, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Hopefully this meets WIKIs requirements as I have referenced more clearly. Dr Nobody (talk) 23:14, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

@Dr Nobody: I just undid your most recent edit because copying someone else's words and pasting them, even if you include a citation, is a form of stealing called "plagiarism" and of course, we don't allow it. Thus, the previous concerns about your text still stand. 2602:306:BC31:4AA0:905B:33DA:5576:AFE7 (talk) 02:21, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

We are allowed to quote people.Slatersteven (talk) 11:05, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Have redone again for you but it doesnt show ? Dr Nobody (talk) 07:55, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

All that was done ('redone') was to revert the edit by 2602:306:BC31:4AA0:905B:33DA:5576:AFE7 which meant a continuation of edit warring and seemingly took no notice of the allegations of plagiarism. It has been reverted again. Eagleash (talk) 10:46, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I rewrote the piece there was no plagiarism. I would like to complain about this harassment please Dr Nobody (talk) 12:08, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

• I wasn't aware of this ongoing ANI, but did a "crash course" bullet-point list, of how to do it right and stay out of trouble, for this editor at Talk:Irish Bull Terrier#Reboot. I think that between this and just the drama of being dragged into ANI (especially after returning from a long absence) is probably enough, and thus oppose any sanctions at this point. Give the editor time to absorb the advice and get re-acquainted with how Pickyweedia operates.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:03, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

  SMcCandlish, I have no objections to that course of action, just as long as they actually follow through. Nothing would make me happier than they learn how Misplaced Pages works and start making useful contributions. If someone wants to close this, be my guest. It can be reopened or a new thread started if the problem recurs. zchrykng (talk) 03:14, 13 November 2018 (UTC); edited 03:15, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

  Yep. It's pretty typical for first-time reports to result in no action and for a renewed-problem report to be necessary later and action then taken. It's not the most expedient process, but it's fair and helps us retain editors.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:36, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

User:Dimas gilang persistent disruptive editing

• Dimas gilang (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Dimas gilang has a history of disruptive editing with multiple warnings on his talk page, all of which he has ignored. He has created numerous unreferenced articles and, when they are moved to draft space or deleted, he just moves them back to main space or recreates them. A recent example is Fokus (Indosiar news program) which was moved to draft space by PaleoNeonate back in September. He subsequently has recreated the page at multiple locations, only to have the pages redirected to the draft and/or deleted. Unfortunately, deletion of Fokus (Indosiar news program) has allowed him to move the article back to mainspace. Another of his creations, INews (TV program), is currently at AfD and all three of the delete voters, Gonnym, IJBall and me, have made negative comment about Dimas gilang's work. Of course we all understand that we should be commenting on the content, not on the contributor, but I think the comments demonstrate the level of frustration that we have in dealing with this editor, especially after constructive criticism has been ignored. For example, in September I politely asked him not to use flags in infoboxes and directed him to MOS:INFOBOXFLAG. Despite this, he continues to create articles with infobox flags as his latest poorly sourced article demonstrates. Note the fixes that I've just had to make to that article. In October, only 16 days ago I asked him to format infoxes correctly after this effort. I took the opportunity to mention correct use of infobox fields, date linking (clearly he has ignored that from the Jenny Tan example above), WP:NOTTVGUIDE and correct use of italics but he continues to ignore these. For example, at Seputar iNews I had removed a list of airtimes, but he just restored them. Even after asking him to format infoboxes correctly (and everything else I asked him) he persists in creating articles that contain numerous violations. See Delik (TV program) and the fixes that I had to make. UseeTV (previously mentioned) is an example of a program that was moved to draft space and which Dimas gilang immediately moved back to mainspace. It is now at AfD. Finally, at least for the moment, concerns have been raised about his assertion of ownership of articles by both HitroMilanese and myself. The latest came after he posted yet another banner on my talk page stating please don't moving & editing my article on draft. This was just before he moved Draft:Fokus (Indosiar news program) back to mainspace. This editor seems unable to understand the requirements of WP:GNG, the requirement to source articles or to comply with our other policies and guidelines. There seem to be severe competency issues that need addressing as his efforts are creating a lot of work for other editors. --AussieLegend (✉) 06:33, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Probably the worst example of this editor's blatantly bad behavior is the saga involving Kompas (news program) (which has also been at Kompas (Kompas TV news program) and Draft:Kompas (Kompas TV news program), and which is now at Kompas (TV program) and which is still failing to meet WP:GNG). The latter ruckus even got this editor blocked by Amakuru (see also User talk:Amakuru#Kompas (news program)). At this point, I fully believe this user is WP:NOTHERE to collaborate on this project, and should get an WP:INDEF block. At a minimum, they should be indefinitely banned from creating articles (probably even in Draftspace...). --IJBall (contribs • talk) 06:54, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping. Actions included hijacking an existing talk page to avoid scrutiny/patrol when recreating, like this. I remember warning with a standard COI template as well but there was no answer. My impression is that this is typical undisclosed conflict of interest and spamming... —PaleoNeonate – 09:39, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Hmm, it may previously have been disclosed. —PaleoNeonate – 09:42, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

A few more examples of Dimas gilang asserting ownership: And let's not forget the time he accused PaleoNeonate of being a hacker. --AussieLegend (✉) 10:39, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Along with all of this, in the process of nominating one of Dimas's articles for deletion, they posted these obnoxious "Wikilove" messages all over my talk page. I would support a CIR block because they seem to not understand anything on the encyclopedia, despite being here for almost 2 years.💵Money💵emoji💵 19:57, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Support CIR block per 💵. _Hypercube ✎ 20:01, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, disclosed for a second or two. Immediately after posting that he blanked the page. --AussieLegend (✉) 15:20, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

I feel like with this editor it's a game of whack-a-mole as nothing seems to stop him. As I look for articles that are not named according to television guidelines I keep on seeing the same articles I've previously tagged over and over again. Just yesterday he moved (again) Fokus (Indosiar news program) from draft to mainspace. He obviously does not care for the correct process, or for writing and other guidelines, and as a result, for other editor time which is spent cleaning after him. Also, from the types of articles he's creating, I'm almost positive it is a CoI situation. --Gonnym (talk) 12:01, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

As if to reinfoce everything that has been said here, he has just created Aiman (TV program), with all of the problems that he has previously been warned about: improper infobox formatting, a flag in the infobox, multiple invalid infobox fields, datelinking, with some incorrect bolding and unnecessary piping thrown in for good measure, all of which somebody else will have to fix. --AussieLegend (✉) 12:23, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry for my late response but immediate block is needed on this person. Misplaced Pages is a collaborative project and this person is treating Misplaced Pages as a personal blog. People like AussieLegend, IJball and Neonate are investing their time on him, we should utilize their effort in something fruitful. Dimas gilang is truly incompetent for English Misplaced Pages, he has no perception of GNG. Hitro talk 21:17, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Note that is now very likely that User:Dimas gilang is socking at 139.0.207.239 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log). Pinging Onel5969 and SkyGazer 512 to see if they have any comment... But this may now involve an account block, and an IP block as well. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 04:31, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support indef block per COI/UPE, DE, NOTHERE, CIR. For any admin observing, that's now a unanimous consensus among the 8 editors on this thread. Softlavender (talk) 04:40, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Thanks for the ping IJBall - I'm of two minds about this. On the one hand, this is a very new editor (account created in September 2018) who is adding articles from a non-English area. On the other, I understand the frustration of editors who make valid, good faith attempts to provide counsel and direction, only to be either ignored or rebuffed. Normally I might suggest that they be given a mentor, to help them learn the ropes. However, in this instance, due to their apparent attitude based on their actions, I don't think that would help, and might simply cause unneeded frustration to another editor. I don't participate much on ANI, but I must reluctantly agree that this editor has earned an indef block. Therefore I add my Support as per NOTHERE and CIR. Onel5969 11:28, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Actually, his first edit was in December 2015. --AussieLegend (✉) 12:22, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Onel5969, he edited sparsely in 2015 and 2016. He also has multiple deleted article creations, which is why you can't see all of his edits unless you are an admin . Softlavender (talk) 12:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support indef. I generally don't comment at ANI, but I am quite involved in this situation and IJBall did give me a ping (thank you for that), so I might as well pile-on. I have always wanted to try to avoid indefinite blocks for good-faith editors as much as possible; I believe they usually do not help situations and do not help improve the encyclopedia. However, this is a case where I believe it would be necessary. What I see here is this user creating a ton of clearly non-notable pages and doing multiple actions against policy, which users do sometimes, particularly less experienced ones. However, what I don't see here is the user trying to respond to the concerns more experienced users are pointing out. Not a single one of his talk page posts have been replied to by him, and he continues his disruptive behavior without acknowledging the concerns that were brought up at all. Communication and collaboration is a vital part of the wiki, especially responding to concerns about editing behavior, which Dimas gilang is clearly not doing. Thus, I believe a CIR block is the only choice now.--SkyGazer 512 13:55, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support indef since there has been no response by Dimas gilang. Excelse (talk) 20:02, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

User:Aboubacarkhoraa

• Aboubacarkhoraa (talk · contribs)

Aboubacarkhoraa has been approached a couple of times on their talk page about their contributions in French. Their replies have always been agreeable and co-operative, but again, in French. WP:CIR. Je suis at a loss que faire. Cabayi (talk) 11:53, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Cabayi, please at the very least place the {{user|}} template at the top so that people can click to the user's contributions and talk page. You've offered no proof of anything, no diffs, no link to the user at all, nothing. Softlavender (talk) 11:59, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) done. Cabayi (talk) 12:01, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I asked for {{user|}}, so people can click to the user's contributions and talk page. Since that wasn't done, I'll do it myself. Softlavender (talk) 12:21, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I have tried to help the user a little bit and then left a note on his user talk; he has more edits on fr. than here, and some deleted articles over there, and may be a little confused. Yngvadottir (talk) 20:53, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Incivility, disruptive "dumping" in threads, and activism against notability guidelines by James500

All of us are critical of some ideas from other editors from time to time, and may call something "nonsense" when sense actually cannot be made of it. But there's a major difference between that and habitual use of hostile, hyperbolic, denigrating language in a fallacious argument to emotion and argument to ridicule pattern whenever one is meeting with disagreement. Especially when it's combined with either refusal to address others' points, or a hand-wave and Gish gallop technique of using a firehose of off-topic ranting and rambling that doesn't actually address the substance of the discussion others are trying to have. That's simply disruptive.

Without digging into very far at all into just the notability-related edits of James500 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) – and I am not the first to raise these concerns about his edits :

• In response to a simple copy-editing proposal (mostly about word-order in a guideline sentence): "Utter nonsense. ... "manifestly factually untrue manifest total nonsense from start to finish" ... "Literally nothing he says is accurate." ... "This is completely misleading" ... "I am confronted by epic exaggeration ... and spectacularly misleading statements", and much more . This is all just from the first 15% or so of James500's enormous 8.8K, 1400+ word rant, all dumped as a single WP:BLUDGEON paragraph, and most of it having nothing to do with the proposed revision or the problem to resolve. (Instead it goes on at length about what kinds of publications do what kinds of reviews, how GNG should (in that editor's consensus-diverged view) be interpreted and applied, his unhappiness with "deletionist mega-trolls", and on and on, concluding with his opposition to the guideline even existing – there "no possible justification" for it, he says. Also, the frequency which other respondents agreed with the proposal for revision clearly disproves James500's claim that it is "nonsense".)
• Responded with nothing but "That is total nonsense" when asked by multiple parties and about multiple posts (, ) to stay on-topic and either use paragraph breaks or write shorter.
• Did not understand the rationale someone presented, and simply declared it "nonsense from start to finish" (followed by argumentation that missed or intentionally skirted the actual point again; other participants showed no such comprehension problems or faux-problems; it appears to be an act to excuse ranting.)
• Declared arguments for deleting an Australian lawyer bio to be categorically "utter nonsense from start to finish" (an evidently habitual phrase), but did not address any of them. Simply asserted that being a Queen's Counsel automatically translates into "notable", an idea that does not enjoy consensus (there are over 1,000 QCs in Australia alone, probably 10,000+ throughout the Commonwealth; it's an indicator of professional competence, not notability).
• "That is nonsense" again plus more off-topic hand-waving , when called out for misunderstanding WP:Systemic bias so badly that he said "I have yet to see any statistical evidence of actual over representation of any kind of topic on this project."
• Another pointless "nonsense" post again that substantively addressed nothing at all but appears to be pure battlegrounding against Hijiri88, with whom James500 is in frequent disagreement in discussions relating to notability.
• Similar ad hominem commentary, declaring other editors' input "completely irrelevant", "no value", "playing pointless semantic games", "nonsense", etc. . (The other editors were simply making the point that small-town newspaper coverage of a local resident doesn't establish notability, a view well-accepted by consensus; so, James500's straw man mischaracterizations of them are demonstrably false.)
• Yet again "that is nonsense", with no substantive commentary of any kind .
• "I disagree with everything that you say." (Followed by activism that Misplaced Pages shouldn't have it's definitions of and rules about primary and secondary sources and should instead use those from another field.)
• Labeled a section (WP:AUD) of the WP:Notability guideline "bizarre nonsense" . (Not a civility problem, but helps establish that "If I disagree, it's okay to call it 'nonsense'" is a habitual pattern, as is unconstructive activism against consensus-accepted policy material and its application, covered in more detail below.)
• Claimed to have implemented a proposed change under discussion (, ) to resolve the thread's main concern, but actually made a very different change discussed by no one , and which is unacceptably redundant wording which to many readers would read like some kind of typo. (It may have been reverted by now; I haven't checked yes, it has been.)

This sort of behavior seems most frequent in James500's "pet peeve" area: he is a consistent agitator against the very existence of Misplaced Pages notability guidelines (see , , and as just a few recent examples). This is essentially a WP:1AM and WP:GREATWRONGS exercise in activism against long-standing consensus (an activity that is frequently considered WP:NOTHERE and WP:NOT#ADVOCACY, and grounds for action in and of itself). Given this, it makes the editor's hostile and unresponsive commentary pattern doubly inexcusable.

Disclaimer of sorts: I have no prior interaction of note with James500 that I can recall. I myself was once among the staunchest opposers of WP adopting notability guidelines (at least as they were being drafted early on). I'm sympathetic to James500's viewpoint more than he'd realize. But the guidelines are part of the Misplaced Pages playbook, and the community has crafted and re-crafted them carefully for over a decade. I'm also not known for brevity; having a lot to say isn't a problem – dumping it in a massive unbroken text wall is, and so is posting piles of stuff that doesn't actually pertain to the discussion just to keep re-injecting one's "Misplaced Pages should work differently" activism viewpoint.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:30, 11 November 2018 (UTC); updated: 14:08, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Previous ANI: Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive300#Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Salami tactics
• On civility, this editor may need to be prohibited from this kind of flippantly insulting and dismissive commentary (making any real counter-argument certainly doesn't require it!). Just a civility warning might be sufficient at this time.

  Regardless, a topic-ban from discussions of notability other than its application to specific cases at AfD (where James500 is a frequent and on-topic albeit extremely inclusionist participant) should separately be considered, given that railing against a guideline's existence is not a constructive activity and is a drain on other editors' time and goodwill – and isn't likely to stop on its own. A compounding factor is the editor's attempt, in this same context, to hijack the phrase "systemic bias" to just mean "we don't write enough about ancient and medieval dead people", even to the point of clearly stated denialism that white male Westerners are overrepresented (see and his comment above it, though there are several other examples even in just the few pages of contribs I looked at, e.g. ). Guaranteed to raise the ire of anyone who cares about WP:BIAS issues, this is difficult to distinguish from intentional trolling, and at very least seems a WP:CIR matter.
   — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:30, 11 November 2018 (UTC); revised: 14:46, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• I'm frankly surprised this editor wasn't site-banned years ago. His tone is unnecessarily aggressive at best, and he's got an extreme battleground mentality when it comes to "the deletionists". This entirely aside from his specifically targeting me for some particularly slimy "enemy-of-my-enemy" harassment. He pretended to rage-quit Misplaced Pages when I called him out a very small portion of this (specifically his trying to trick the AFD analysis tools by never bolding his !votes, which is why this happens despite his having auto-!voted "keep" in hundreds of AFDs before that point). This is not a healthy presence for the project. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 13:50, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Note that the above diffs are mostly me summarizing the disruption in response to James, to which he either feigned contrition before quickly reverting back to normal or just ignored me entirely. I find these more useful as evidence than simply providing the original diffs of James's actions, as my comments explain them in context. For the slimy harassment, the primary diffs of James's activities are located in my comment, but with the quotes about "deletionists" I didn't think it necessary as they all appeared on the live version of the same page. SMcC has suggested to me on my talk page that I give all the individual diffs of the quotations, which I might do tomorrow, but Ctrl+Fing the quotes will show them accurate, and even worse in their original context. I doubt, however, that I could be comprehensive in giving all the diffs of this editor's disruptive incivility. Anyway, in the meantime anyone with access to deleted pages might want to check out the page that was userfied as a result of Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Salami tactics and then deleted at James's request: it's more strong evidence of the editor's battleground ideology. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 14:45, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Will write/link more later tonight, but James is long overdue for a tban on deletion in general, and especially on notability in particular. Easily one of the most consistently disruptive wikilawyers I've come across in my time on Misplaced Pages. — Rhododendrites \\ 19:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose The issue is a discussion at WP:NBOOK where SMcCandlish is trying to outlaw book reviews as sources and James500 is arguing against this proposal. We're supposed to discuss these matters to establish consensus but it's a common vice for editors to go on too long and all concerned should read WP:TLDR. Preventing editors from speaking at all is not appropriate because this would distort the consensus process. Trying to silence such an opponent at ANI is inappropriate as SMcCandlish has just explained at WP:GRAPES. Andrew D. (talk) 05:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

  Then there's the kind of case where someone doesn't get what they want out of a nomination process, RfC, BRD discussion, or other thread, and feels that someone in particular blockaded or thwarted them. So they dig around in that editor's history for enough dirt – none of which involved them – to try paint a picture of their "enemy" as a disruptive editor (or bad admin, or whatever) at WP:ANI, WP:AE, WP:RFARB or some other drama-board. Even cursory review of editorial interaction is going to show the noticeboard's respondents that the real motivation is petty vengeance. The editor engaging in this will be lucky if it ends with just a snowball close against their pillory-my-opponent proposition; a boomerang is quite likely.

• Wow. So, if I may paraphrase this one oppose we all knew would be inevitable regardless of the reality of the situation: "nope nope, fake news. he's mad because he wants to outlaw book reviews?" — Rhododendrites \\ 06:10, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I wonder if Andrew would have posted such a clearly WP:BATTLEGROUND comment (which essentially amounts to "This user is an inclusionist, and therefore must be defended regardless of his other policy violations.") if the ANI thread about his misbehaviour hadn't been closed two hours earlier. @28bytes: This is why some threads should probably just be allowed get archived without a "formal" close. For one thing, saying there's no consensus for sanctions against him, without specifying that the lack of consensus relates specifically to his deprodding, and not to his battleground behaviour, disruptive comments at AFD, etc., makes it harder to bring up the other problems later. Virtually everyone who opposed sanctions specifically referred to PROD, and hardly any of them addressed the other stuff. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 10:27, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Andrew Davidson: That's a patently false statement and you should strike or correct it. I have suggested nothing even faintly, remotely resembling "trying to outlaw book reviews as sources". That idea isn't even on the same planet. PS: This has nothing to do with "vengeance" (for what? I have lost nothing and not been harmed in any way, nor was my proposal "blockaded" by this person, but is proceeding exactly as intended and as discussed ). It's entirely and only about a clearly evident pattern of disruptive and uncivil behavior (which runs far deeper than I suspected it did, judging from the evidence presented by Rhododendrites and Hijiri88; I only looked back about a month in talk-post history, in notability-related pages which is where I observed the problem occurring; that's not dirt-digging, it's basic ANI due diligence).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:24, 12 November 2018 (UTC); updated: 14:08, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Evidence of a long-term pattern

James's perspective on deletion and notability is an extreme one. That's not the problem, though. The problem is that for years, he is, in my experience, the Wikipedian most likely to expend incredible amounts of text to wikilawyer the absolute correctness of his perspective and the extent to which there is clear consensus supporting him and against others; and furthermore, that other people -- especially "deletionists" -- are the ones wikilawyering, acting in bad faith, and harassing him. His perspective is objectively correct until presented with evidence, at which point anything can become subjective (GNG, the interpretation of data (data which is probably wrong anyway because James disagrees), etc.), so he's still right. It's an exhausting time sink, and the battleground approach he takes throughout often turns the whole discussion toxic.

James routinely acts in contempt of standard community norms when they do not suit him. A handful of such examples would be ok -- we aren't robots, after all, and nobody asks for absolute conformity -- but persistent, seemingly antagonistic refusal to many users' requests are disruptive/tendentious and counter-collaborative. For example, when it's clear he's going to be in the minority, he refuses to bold his !votes (seemingly so that AfD stats cannot track it). He wrote an essay encouraging others to do that same -- a wild wikilawyering exercise that was nixed from projectspace at its MfD. Another example is how James removes all messages from his talk page and does not archive them. This is standard for someone evading scrutiny, and extremely uncommon for anyone else. Again, not on its own grounds for a sanction, but combined with all of the rest shows a pattern of disregard or even hostility towards established practice and other users' polite requests. Then there's refusing to indent threads like everyone else (which is included in Misplaced Pages:Tendentious editing, from which James argued to remove it back in 2011, so it's something he's known for many years now). James frequently responds to someone on the same indentation level, even after being asked to do so many, many times. For examples, . The last two are both examples of extensive wikilawyering, and he defends the practice of not indenting at length and declares that closing admins must carefully consider his non-indented comments or should be desysopped (a declaration that also came up when talking about not bolding !votes, which, as it happens, is also addressed in the deletion review link). Yet another example: it's well established at AfD (a venue James knows well, which makes the following seem disingenuous) that just linking to a search engine is insufficient to demonstrate significant coverage/GNG. Yet he defends doing so and even says that asking for sources at AfD is equivalent to insisting an AfD be referenced like an article. This last example is less ubiquitous in his edits than the others, though. Another example, posting to a thread after it has been closed: here a thread created by a banned editor was closed with no support at all; James posted under the closed thread to argue the opposite -- that AfDs with only delete votes should be relisted and AfDs with no participation should be kept as no consensus. And then there's stuff like "'Plagiarism' is not a valid concept, it is a political weapon"...

The wikilawyering/battleground is everywhere upon even just a spot check for large text additions to Misplaced Pages and Misplaced Pages talk namespaces. Especially at any notability-related page (I would invite any skeptical editor to look through the archives of Misplaced Pages talk:Notability, Misplaced Pages talk:42, etc.). In terms of WP:BATTLEGROUND, James makes constant references "deletionist", "ultra-deletionist" , etc. bogeymen and all of the terrible things they do. It's an always-available, imaginary evil to play against, to make his ideas sound sensible, rather than way outside of consensus themselves. He also frequently responds with insults or dismissals of people's comments (along these lines, though not always as clustered together).

You may look at some of these diffs and say "hey some of these are a few years old now." It's true. Most of my interactions with James were in 2014-2015. He did not edit from early 2016 until earlier this year, when we find ourselves back here for the very same sorts of things. Speaking of my interactions, it will also become clear in looking at some of the diffs above that I have been directly involved in many disputes with James. Take that as you will.

In short, because James has shown a long-term pattern of wikilawyering and a battleground mentality when it comes to discussions of deletion and notability, I would Support an indefinite topic ban on discussions related to deletion and notability, broadly construed. At this time I would abstain from taking a position on a community ban until I have time to take a closer look at his mainspace contributions, which may well be good. As I recall, James has some expertise in law (this is not me taking a wikilawyering swipe, to be clear), and that's a kind of expertise Misplaced Pages could use more of. My hope is that this is one of those situations when issues really are constrained to a particular topic area, and can be addressed with a lesser restriction. If mainspace contributions are good and the problems are indeed limited to deletion/notability discussions, I would certainly oppose a site ban (I'm only mentioning it because it was brought up above). Apologies for this wall of text. This is already the most, I think, that I have ever written on ANI, but I think that when it comes to a major sanction of an established editor, a long post is called for. — Rhododendrites \\ 01:47, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Rhododendrites, I think it is inconsistent to accuse me of "expending incredible amounts of text" in a post more than 8.6 kB long, preceded by a post that was more than 10.7 kB long before it was expanded, and many others that are not particularly short. Especially when many of these criticisms relate to things that happened a long time ago and are stale. Am I expected to answer all of these many criticisms without writing something of a similar length? James500 (talk) 03:02, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

  Evidence age matters when reporting an incident; that report is by me, and uses fresh evidence. Rhododendrites' evidence from further back establishes that this is a long-term abuse pattern and not a one-off temporary problem. It's the furthest thing from inadmissible or irrelevant. If I'd known of the depth of this problem I would have proposed a broader t-ban at very least, or perhaps an indef or site-ban. There is also no valid comparison to be made between your habit of dumping massive, attacky, off-topic, anti-consensus rants into ongoing discussions, and someone providing a comprehensive multi-year summary of your problematic edits. If the only response you can muster to this ANI is to point fingers at someone else in a nanny-nanny-boo-boo manner, this is not a good sign. No, you are not expected to post a huge rebuttal. You are expected to make it clear that you understand why some of your editing patterns are a problem and why that problematic activity is going to stop.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:40, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

  I am not allowed to respond to a criticism even if it is factually inaccurate? Even if the problem alleged does not actually exist, did not actually happen, and is not supported by the evidence provided? Or even if the criticism misunderstands a relevant policy or guideline, or misunderstands something I said? Or even if I stopped doing the thing I am accused of long ago? Or even if other editors in this dispute have engaged in incivility etc towards me? Even if the only editors who agree with the criticism are involved in this dispute with me? If that is the case, I clearly have no choice but to say whatever you want me to say. It goes without saying that I will accept the community's decision in this matter and do whatever the community asks me to do. If I am not allowed to say anything in my defence, I think I should wait to hear what some uninvolved editors think before saying anything. If they tell me I am in the wrong, I will apologise 100% and modify my editing 100% in accordance with their wishes. If they would like me to explain myself, I will be happy to do so. They can even set me a word limit, and I will stick to it, if they feel that necessary. James500 (talk) 05:27, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

  No one said anything about what's "allowed". I'm trying to advise you how not to get blocked or banned. You can take that in the spirit in which its offered or ignore it.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:32, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

  James, as an outside, uninvolved editor, I have to say: your response above is exactly the kind of problem people are talking about. You took a comment that said you should not go tit-for-tat with someone, and turned it into I am not allowed to respond to a criticism even if it is factually inaccurate?. This is the problem I am seeing. You twist others statements into pretzels, then complain about how salty said pretzels are. There's a repeated pattern of taking specific words from another person's statement, and using those out of context to claim the editor meant something other than what they clearly said. It's that confrontational "gotcha!" style of arguing that's exhausting other editors' patience with you. — The Hand That Feeds You: 14:40, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

  I understand what you are saying. I am sorry for my response to SMcCandlish above. It was a mistake. But most of the time I cannot actually understand what SMcCandlish is saying. I, for example, have absolutely no idea what the expression "nanny nanny boo boo" means. If he had used the expression "tit-for-tat", as you did, I would have understood immediately. He and I have a communication problem. I cannot understand most of what he says. If he is going to continue to talk to me, I am going to need someone to translate what he says, because I cannot understand him, most of the time. James500 (talk) 15:58, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• I would support a notability/AfD ban. According to AfD stats, he's voted delete exactly once, at Misplaced Pages:Articles_for_deletion/The_Female_Struggle (another delete vote shows, but it was actually a keep vote incorrectly identified by the software.) Obviously there's been some gaming of the statistics as noted above, and there may be valid reasons to consistently vote keep/have an inclusionist point of view, but his votes stand out for two reasons. First, the use of statistics from book searches to keep articles, and to be fair, he has been in the right on several of these I've checked. But for other articles, especially articles unrelated to books, he is completely unwilling to vote delete, often citing non-existent or irrelevant notability guidelines without explanation in an attempt to keep the article, and argues against any notability guideline that could be deletionist in the slightest. I'm not sure a site ban is warranted, though. SportingFlyer talk 06:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

As an aside, I've linked to several user pages and discussions with specific people above. I intentionally didn't link to usernames to avoid any sense of canvassing, but now I wonder if that conflicts with ANI norms of talking about people's discussions without notifying them. I will presume not do so myself unless told otherwise. — Rhododendrites \\ 06:16, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

It doesn't conflict with ANI norms. I have seen people pilloried for canvassing when they name-link a large number of allegedly aggrieved parties. The ANI rule is to notify people about whom one is making a report, i.e., the person potentially subject to sanctions. If someone else ends up also potentially subject to them, they'd be notified if they're not already involved in the thread. We also typically name-link people if we've made a specific claim about their involvement, statements, understandings, etc., in case we might be mistaken.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: Tell that to this guy Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 11:48, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) Comment in defense of above site-ban reference I'm not actually proposing an SBAN or even an indef, and at this stage would be satisfied with a TBAN. My reasoning for saying that I am surprised he hasn't been site-banned is that having a battleground mentality this virulent is normally a quick ticket to a community indef (functionally the same as a site ban), and while I too have not examined James's mainspace edits, I do note that since returning this year his article edits are roughly equal in number to his WP:-space edits, and many (most?) of the former are actually deletion-related (this applies to all of the ones on European literature, lists of star systems, and years/centuries in philosophy), and so would be covered by Rhodo's proposed TBAN anyway. The harassment of editors he sees as "deletionists" in non-deletion-related areas, such as requesting that an editor who was blocked partly for harassing me be unblocked, is also, IMO, the worst thing about his behaviour, and experience has taught me that TBANning editors who do this won't actually stop it. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 11:42, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• support TBAN from notabilty and deletion discussions. That was a lot to read, and yes, this person is disruptive on these topics and refuses to accept the community consensus (such as it is) or even to see the need for it. Hopefully they will contribute in other areas. Jytdog (talk) 09:48, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

**@User:Jytdog: If I was to accept what you consider community consensus on notability and deletion, would you change your !vote? If I was, amongst other things, too agree to refrain from !voting to keep articles that should not be kept according to what you consider community consensus, would you change your !vote? James500 (talk) 10:50, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• • I have to observe that this is a spectacular example of a WP:NOTGETTINGIT and WP:CIR problem. This is not about negotiating with particular individuals to WP:WIN them to your side by slightly tweaking your tactics. The point is complete cessation of tendentious and uncivil verbal combat against site-wide consensus about what notability is, why we have it as an inclusion criterion, and how it is applied by the community.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:01, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

    I have struck my comment. I am sorry that I made it. I think that I now understand what you want me to refrain from doing. I agree to refrain from doing what you have just told me to refrain from doing. I will never open my mouth on the subject of notability again. James500 (talk) 15:34, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

So, is anyone gonna look at this?

So far this thread has received commentary from the editor who filed it, the editor who is the subject of discussion, another editor (me) who was pinged, another editor involved in the dispute that led to this thread and with a long history with the subject of the thread, and a battleground editor who defended the subject of the thread with a bizarre non sequitur because said subject agrees with him on one hot button issue. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 07:54, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• I've been reading this thread and there's quite a bit I could say. But anything I did say would only be throwing petrol on the fire without doing anything to help the situation. I do agree though that the stuff about "forbidding book reviews" is just obfuscation. Reyk _YO! 08:19, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Posted a comment in the previous section. Waiting to see how James responds before making any further statements. — The Hand That Feeds You: 14:51, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Frankly, I agree entirely with this thread, but I'm so tired of this crap that I don't feel like contributing to it, and I'm sure I'm not alone on that front. That's all I'm gonna say. ansh666 19:02, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose: James500 exclusively votes to keep articles, but his participation at AfD has been generally productive. The AfD tracker shows that "without considering No Consensus results, 81.9% of AfD's were matches and 18.1% of AfD's were not". This is pretty good. If there are problems with participation in notability discussions, then there are probably better ways of dealing with the situation, such as ignoring their comments. --K.e.coffman (talk) 02:39, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• @K.e.coffman: I can only presume you didn't read all of the above (though can't say I blame you). One of the very issues above is that James found a way to game those stats, refusing to bold his !votes except in certain circumstances and thus controlling which are tracked by the tool. If you actually look through his contribs to AfD rather than use the stats tool to do so, you will see that his record over the years is poor. Regardless, none of this is about accuracy at AfD, it's about a years-long pattern of disruption, battleground mentality, etc. around the topics of deletion and notability. I can pull a lot more diffs demonstrating this, but if all of the above didn't convince you, I don't know what will. — Rhododendrites \\ 02:49, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

I see what you mean, and I do recall the "Salami" essay MfD. But it seems that the non-bolding of !votes has stopped, and I'm going by personal experience with seeing James500 at AfD. Most recently, I saw his edits at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/University Over the Abyss where I was going to vote keep, because it was a notable book. I'm sorry that your experience has been negative; I generally try not to get into repetitive discussions, hence my advice to ignore posts like that. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:08, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

That you have had positive experiences doesn't invalidate the heap of diffs to the contrary, unless you're saying all of the above is perfectly acceptable? Or you just don't believe it's evidence of a pattern. There are so many diffs, that I wonder what sort of evidence you would consider sufficient, if anything? Again, this is more about discussions about deletion and discussion of notability than accuracy at AfD. — Rhododendrites \\ 03:30, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

@K.e.coffman: TBF, leaving out the "no consensus" results kinds misses the point, since it leaves out the cases where there would have been "consensus" of one or two editors ("soft delete") had it not been for him showing up and undermining that, and there is also the fact that he actively tried to trick the AFD stats tool by not bolding his !votes. This, for example, doesn't show up as an AFD in which he cast a !vote, despite the fact that any human being who can read can see he clearly did -- and in fact the AFD only took place because he disruptively requested a bunch of articles he hadn't read be undeleted "just 'cause". All of this was outlined, somewhat briefly/simplistically, in my own comment above, and Rhodo at least also alluded to the refusal to bold !votes in order to trick the AFD stats tool -- did you read them? Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 07:19, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• After reviewing this thread a few times over the past few days, I feel I can say definitively that I don't plan to comment on it in detail. The early grave of a no-consensus closure-by-default is sufficient, in my view. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:34, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• I don't know what that means. Are you saying that in your view there is no action justified, or is this a non-comment to justify spending time digging through ANI yuckiness? I would ask you the same as coffman, then: what, exactly, would be convincing if not the evidence above? — Rhododendrites \\ 03:40, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• It means I've seen him at AFD and haven't seen anything beyond "annoying" in his behavior, certainly nothing that would justify sanctions here. None of the specific diffs presented here are enough to convince me otherwise. The warning that the ANI regulars are aware of him and if he becomes more tendentious, he is more likely to be sanctioned in the future, is probably sufficient here. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:49, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• Several times it's been bad enough to come to ANI. On one or two occasions it did. On the others, James did, as above, saying "I'll stop" when confronted with the possibility of ANI. There have been breaks, but no stopping. Eh. Perhaps the single most consistent and problematic long-term wikilawyer I've come across in my time on Misplaced Pages. Anyway, if I see a request for more evidence/diffs, I will drop more links. I'm less than convinced people will actually click them, though, so I'm going to allocate time elsewhere for the time being. — Rhododendrites \\ 04:26, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

@Power~enwiki: I hadn't seen him at AFD but in a discussion about notability in general (which he apparently considers to be part of a deletionist plot to destroy the encyclopedia), and called him out on his combative language. He responded by, several months later, requesting that an editor who was indeffed (partly) for harassing me be unblocked for apparently no other reason than that he didn't like me, and showing up on an ANI thread to defend another user whose harassment of me was under discussion (he had never edited the noticeboard before). You might call this behaviour "annoying" but I call it downright disturbing. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 07:19, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Request for advice

I would like advice as to what I should do from an uninvolved admin. Should I respond to the allegations, or apologise for saying the word "nonsense" or for saying anything else that I actually said, or offer other concessions, or wait and see, or something else? Please tell me what to do. I am absolutely terrified and in enormous distress. James500 (talk) 08:04, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

You could apologize for all the disruption demonstrated above. Are you really claiming that saying the word "nonsense" is all the wrong you've done? Because if you are that recalcitrant in your unwillingness to abide by our policies I imagine the number of editors who think the solution is an indef block will rise substantially... Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 09:42, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Advice from an uninvolved admin is pretty much what this process is for: the closer (more often than not an admin) either imposes a community-suggested sanction that keeps the editor out of this kind of trouble, or a warning that advises how to avoid ending up back here again for the same issue (or – should it apply – summarizes that the community take on the matter is that the reported editor did nothing wrong and the filer is being a bonehead or has a nefarious motive).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:17, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• There's independent advice at WP:ANI advice and this generally seems quite sound. As the issue here is that James500 is accused of being prolix, points 6, 7, 10, 11, 16 seem most appropriate. In summary:

6. Keep it brief.

7. Don't badger

10. Keep calm

11. Don't get upset

16. Speak moderately.

Andrew D. (talk) 16:04, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Davidson above gives good advice, but forgets to leave edsums explaining why an edit took place. This is considered incredibly rude, so don't you forget. -Roxy, the Prod. wooF 19:32, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Not leaving an edit summary is "Incredibly rude"? I think not, but in any case, it's specifically not required. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:06, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

I seem to recall an editor getting site-banned at one point where their lack of edit summaries was seen as disruptive, they were placed under an editing restriction requiring them to use edit summaries, which they initially abode by but then started to ignore. It's kinda off-topic here except that Roxy recently opened an ANI thread on Andrew requesting he be banned from de-prodding, and was overruled by a large number of editors claiming that we don't ban people from doing things that policy allows them to do. Anyway, sometimes editors go out of their way not to leave any form of edit summary (even an automatic one indicating which section of the page they edited), and while that's not forbidden, I do think it's a pretty clear sign of someone trying to hide something. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 07:29, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Uncivil comments and edit summaries from 86.178.176.182

Diffs: . I have requested SBA Airlines to be semi-protected to avoid further disruption from this IP.--Jetstreamer  13:56, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Blocked. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 13:57, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

User:Fred Bauder moving questions

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

This has been closed while I was writing out a more detailed closing statement, but I will post it here as a summary of everything that is going on, for the record:

• There was little feedback on the original block before things escalated, but it doesn't look like there are significant sentiments that Boing! said Zebedee's initial 24h block for edit warring was inappropriate, though one user did state that they felt the block was inappropriate.
• Fred has been discretionarily desysopped by Maxim for self-unblocking and wheel warring, per IAR. There does not appear to be any objection from the community about this action. Formal and final judgment regarding this matter is, of course, reserved for Arbcom, and their decision is still pending. The case request is currently open, and any users who want to leave feedback for the committee may still comment.
• Fred has been blocked indefinitely by Future Perfect at Sunrise. There is no consensus regarding this block, so it remains a standard block under the discretion of individual administrators. Fut.Perf. has stated that they consider the situation resolved and that they have no objection to an unblock at this point, pending an unblock request from Fred. This has been made clear to Fred.
• There is a "clear consensus" against a proposal to site ban Fred.
• Fred is tentatively disqualified as an Arbitration candidate due to the active block. The decision as to whether he will qualify after being unblocked is up to the Electoral Commission. The Commission is aware of the situation and their decision is pending.

To be sure, no one other than Fred deserves the blame for Fred's poor judgment. As can be seen from the feedback, he was totally in the wrong, and he's now facing the consequences. However, any way you look at this, one of Misplaced Pages's oldest contributors, earliest administrators, and original Arbitrators, is now desysopped and indef-blocked due to, ultimately, an Arbitration Election dispute gone awry. This is not acceptable. As someone below has pointed out, the community appoints a three-member commission which has the full mandate and authority to decisively resolve disputes related to the elections. Links to "contact the coordinators" are plastered all over election pages. One must reflect on whether any of this would have happened if anyone, at any step of the way, had brought the issue to the Commission for a decisive resolution, as they should have. This should be a lesson for all of us, not just Fred. Any future disputes under the purview of the 2018 Arbitration Committee Elections need to go straight to the Commission. I suppose we have forgotten why we have a Commission, but this sure as hell is a good reminder. This particular situation, however, is what it is.  Swarm  talk  02:47, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

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

User:Fred Bauder has been edit warring to remove questions from Misplaced Pages:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2018/Candidates/Fred Bauder/Questions (and copy them to the talk page instead). Misplaced Pages:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2018/Candidates/Fred Bauder/Questions is the correct page for questions, it is where everyone expects to find them and will look for them - he does not own the page and he does not get to decide that questions should be moved elsewhere. After edit warring by Fred and after his ignoring a warning I gave him, I have blocked him for 24 hours for edit warring. I appreciate that, as some of the questions he moved were mine, I was possibly not the best admin to do this. So there's an element of WP:IAR in this, but I'll hand it over to others for judgment. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 15:16, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Good block. Edit-warring on his own arbcom candidacy page is such an obvious competence issue, especially in someone with so much experience on Misplaced Pages, that I can only assume that (along with what appear to be intentionally stupid answers to the questions) this whole candidacy is someone intentionally trying to martyr themselves rather than someone standing as a candidate in good faith. ‑ Iridescent 15:19, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Note: Fred Bauder has unblocked himself. Another obvious competence issue. WP:RFAR next? Bishonen | talk 15:26, 11 November 2018 (UTC).

That's an emergency desysop situation, isn't it? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 15:27, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

No material has been removed. Lengthy repetitive comments and campaigning by users opposed my candidacy have been moved to the talk page where further comments can be made, and anyone can view them. User:Fred Bauder Talk 15:28, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

The block was made by a participant in an edit war. I have the right to have a page to respond to questions that is not cluttered up by campaigning against me. User:Fred Bauder Talk 15:30, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Yes; per WP:NEVERUNBLOCK this is straightforward admin abuse. Desysop at minimum and probably a lengthy block (or even siteban) for intentional disruption. ‑ Iridescent 15:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• I have emailed Arbcom to request temp desysop. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 15:32, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• As someone not involved in the edit-war, I've reinstated the 24 hour block. If he unblocks himself again, I'll set the wheels in motion for a full community ban. Fred, do you really want this to be what you're remembered for? ‑ Iridescent 15:36, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Iridescent, it looks so. ∯WBG 15:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I need to be able to participate in this discussion, at least. User:Fred Bauder Talk 15:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@Fred Bauder: then you post your response on your talk page and ask for it to be copied across, or request an unblock to participate. Like any normal user. ∰Bellezzasolo✡ Discuss 15:40, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Fred do you understand that an Admin should never unblock themselves unless they imposed the block? ~ GB fan 15:41, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@GB fan: Since he was editing the policy page in question long after the Sysops are technically able to unblock themselves by following this procedure but should absolutely not do so … Self-unblocking is treated extremely seriously by the community and has resulted in several users losing their sysop privileges wording was added to it, yes, he's well aware. ‑ Iridescent 16:03, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

To add another option to Bellezzasolo/s comment above, Or you request an unblock using the normal process. ~ GB fan 15:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

For the record, I've re-blocked Fred after his second self-unblock, but made it indef for the time being. Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:11, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal: Community ban

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

In light of the above, and User:Fred Bauder now twice violating a core Misplaced Pages policy, I propose a formal community ban from Misplaced Pages and revocation of all advanced user rights. He can apply for unblocking in six months per the WP:Standard offer. ‑ Iridescent 15:41, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support as proposer. ‑ Iridescent 15:41, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support, obviously. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 15:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Clear and obvious abuse of Admin privileges.Nigel Ish (talk) 15:44, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Note that several people (at least me and Boing) have also asked arbcom for an emergency desysop. Bishonen | talk 15:45, 11 November 2018 (UTC).
• Support desysop, ban. Not sure about having a minimum appeal time per NETPOSITIVE. ∰Bellezzasolo✡ Discuss 15:46, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support That's just not cricket - TNT 15:47, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Supporting a desysop and indef block only (not a community ban) - TNT 17:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support Just goes to show you what happens when early era admins continue to have rights that they should never have been permitted to keep. Nihlus 15:51, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

While this is a good point, the question is: does this isolated offense merit a community ban, or just a timed block and a detooling? Would not the latter course solve the problem? Carrite (talk) 17:25, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support -- Cluelessness, at it's best and he's past AGF.∯WBG 15:52, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support for the same reason that Iridescent said. LakesideMiners 15:53, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Also noting, after looking over a few recent edits in contentious areas made by this user, that the notion that this person was running for a position where he would be judging other people's adherence to the core values of the project was an absurdity all by itself. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:53, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
  • On second thought, retracting support, since I see other commenters' point about a full community ban being overkill. But I'll still keep it on the record that I believe there is not just this one episode of administrative meltdown but also a substantial history of very bad content editing, displaying a deep disconnect with Misplaced Pages's editing norms (with respect to NPOV writing, NFC etc). This would be just a matter of potential application of DS or other normal sanctions in a normal situation, but with an editor who is at the same time running for Arbcom this is quite deeply concerning. Fut.Perf. ☼ 19:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - Per mominator; this is behavior unbecoming of an administrator and should not be tolerated. Vermont (talk) 15:58, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support desysop and community ban. The two self unblocks and rollbacks to edit war are clear misuse of admin tools. -★- PlyrStar93 _{→Message me. ←} 15:59, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support per Iri. Nick (talk) 16:01, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Give the guy a break, there is clearly a concern but Fred is a good contributor to the wiki and is also a human being, let's support him rather than attack him unnecessarily. Govindaharihari (talk) 16:02, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support You don't get a break for wheel warring. Administrator is a position of trust, and wheel warring breaches that trust. --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 16:04, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
  • wheel warring is simply a removal of admin position not needed a community ban, Fred is not a danger to the project.Govindaharihari (talk) 16:07, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
    • That would be as clear-cut an example of the Super Mario Problem as one could imagine; what you're effectively saying is that a level of disruption that would get any ordinary editor blocked shouldn't get an admin blocked because admins are somehow more important. Note that Fred Bauder could put a stop to this even now (although he'd probably still lose his legacy sysop bit) just by apologising and agreeing that from now on he's willing to comply with Misplaced Pages's policies; note also that he hasn't done so. ‑ Iridescent 16:14, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
      • Iridescent, Fred is a candidate at the elections, that is important imo that he is allowed and assisted to contribute. I am sure if you ask him that moving forward he will comply with Misplaced Pages's policies. Govindaharihari (talk) 16:20, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
        • I think that opportunity has now gone well and truly away. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:22, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
          • there are always opportunities to move on Ramblingman Govindaharihari (talk) 16:30, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
          • I thought the same about Trump at the "Grab her by the pussy" stage ;-( Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:26, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
            • Nope, I never ever abused my tools as an admin. Horrible abuse of position. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:14, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. I don't think the questions asked here were fair, in many cases. Common sense should inform participants that off-base "questions" should be frowned-upon. Bus stop (talk) 16:08, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Not the issue at all, it's the self-unblock which is desysop-worthy. Beyond My Ken (talk) 16:30, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• That is myopic. Anyone would be rattled by irrelevant and off-base questions and comments. Everyone has their breaking point. An administrator is not superman. Bus stop (talk) 20:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support obvious wheel warring is obvious. zchrykng (talk) 16:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support very poor behaviour. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support – Appears interested only in exercising the latent power granted to him by his vestigial administrator flag, whilst doing none of the actual work administrators are supposed to do. His desires should not be indulged, and his disruption halted. RGloucester — ☎ 16:13, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

What the hell? it seems the above ANI was right, he does appear to just want to abuse power. I am not sure a community ban is needed, but it is clear he should lose any special privileges if he is not capable of abusing themSlatersteven (talk) 16:21, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support - oh, good gods. Unblocking yourself TWICE, after being told you can't do that is ... just... I don't have words. Ealdgyth - Talk 16:22, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - Simply unbelievable lack of clue by a veteran editor and admin. I'm flabbergasted, really. Beyond My Ken (talk) 16:24, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose One of "the Hardy Boys" that Admins fought so hard to retain, why desysop this one when you didn't desysop the last one? -Roxy, the Prod. wooF 16:30, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Point respectfully taken, but this probably isn't the place to make that point - one thing at a time? - TNT 16:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Sure, but it stinks that one of the most vociferous supporters of the Hardy Boys is one of the most vociferous desysopers in this thread. Hypocritical much, said Zebedee? -Roxy, the Prod. wooF 16:41, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Ooh, Roxy, just when I thought we were friends :-( Hardy did not abuse admin tools. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:48, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Who the hell are the Hardy Boys?Slatersteven (talk) 16:45, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• I dunno, but the argument makes a lot of sense to me: if one person isn't sanctioned, nobody should be sanctioned. Beyond My Ken (talk) 16:57, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@Slatersteven: It's (I assume) a reference to this case, in which Boing! said Zebedee also argued that an admin should be desysopped but on that occasion Arbcom declined to do so. (I think Roxy the dog may be misremembering Boing's arguments, given the 'hypocrite' comments above, as Boing argued in favour of desysop in both that case and this.) ‑ Iridescent 16:55, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

A later issue, I think, in which I argued against sanctions for the same person - no idea where it is on AN/ANI right now, or why it is relevant here. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:00, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support per all of the above. Iridescent, does something need to be posted at WP:ARC for a formal desysop? TonyBallioni (talk) 16:33, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• @TonyBallioni: Probably won't hurt, but I think this can just be emailed in (as many have done)? - TNT 16:36, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• "You are in a queue. You are number 79 in a queue. Please hold. Your message is important to us..." ——SerialNumber54129 16:47, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Desysopping will be under WP:LEVEL2, so Arbcom will have it in hand already from when they received the email notifications mentioned above. (I assume they're discussing it privately via email, hence the lack of visible activity.) Regarding formal banning and/or removal of other permissions, I'd be inclined to go by the book and leaving this the full 24 hours before getting a 'crat to do the necessary. Yes, it will potentially lead to pile-ons, but since this is a very long-term editor and former arb we're talking about here—and there's a non-negligible chance that he'll agree that in future he won't interpret "ignore all rules" as "do whatever the hell I feel like"—we IMO owe him the courtesy of giving him the chance to post an appeal, rather than just summarily ejecting him. ‑ Iridescent 16:44, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Seems fair, it gives him a chance to show he does get it, or the abuse becomes so serious even his supporters will have to admit there is no valid reason for not supporting a community ban. But I think that admins will have to watch what goes on , just in case he does go in for some seriously heavy abusing (such as blocking all access for users he desires to "teach a lesson", AGF went out of the door long before Elvis left).Slatersteven (talk) 16:51, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support - I'm stunned we've even got to this point. Incredible failure of judgement here. stwalkerster (talk) 16:39, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support I'm shocked just like everyone else about this. funplussmart (talk) 16:42, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  On second thought I don't think a complete site ban is necessary, although I definitely do support a desysop and possible action from ArbCom for this blatant wheel warring. funplussmart (talk) 18:27, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support - being around for 15 years and being a former arb doesn't it any less disruptive. Although Fred's contributions to the project over the years should be appreciated, this is where to draw the line. They can always be unblocked once they make a serious commitment to disengage from this behavior, but as for adminship, they'll have to go through the proper channels all over again.—Mythdon (talk • contribs) 16:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
  • You don't just get unblocked from a community ban. Govindaharihari (talk) 16:45, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Not unless they appeal successfully to the community. I think you meant to say a single admin can't overturn the block without community consensus.—Mythdon (talk • contribs) 16:48, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Of course he should be de-sysopped, and of course he should be blocked. These would solve the immediate problems. An extended ban is disproportionate. And before anyone mentions Super Mario, we wouldn't ban any other editor for one incident of this behaviour either. -- zzuuzz 16:46, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Except it's not a one-off, it's a three-off; the initial edit-warring that got him blocked, the self-unblock, and the wheel-warring over the self-unblock. Per my comments above, I wouldn't be averse to getting rid of the "after six months" clause and allowing him to appeal immediately, but in the absence of any undertaking not to continue being disruptive I don't see any benefit to unblocking. ‑ Iridescent 16:49, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• It is a single situation a single problem Iridescent, just this arbcom election. Why don't you ask him Iridescent? Govindaharihari (talk) 16:55, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• comment Please remove this if it's inappropriate for a non-admin to do so, but i'd like to chime in from the perspective of a neuroscientist. People can sometimes reach a state where they get so emotional that they're not thinking rationally. Effectively their prefrontal cortex stops working. This isn't a justification for improper behavior (except for an occasional crime passionel under some laws), but i think it's fair to judge a person on how often he gets into this state and how much was required to trigger it -- not on the number of mistakes he makes upon entering an irrational state. That's the best predictor for future behavior. Once in such a state, rational arguments such as policies become irrelevant. However, the ability for a person to recognize such a state, or accept it when other people signal it and take a break accordingly is also a predictor for future behavior. Again, my apologies if inappropriate for a non-admin to chime in.PizzaMan ♨♨♨ 21:04, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose (multiple ec). I see the rationale for removing advanced permissions - and I am sure ArbCom will have a due consideration of the issue - but I do not see a reason for community ban. A community ban is supposed to prevent very serious, long-standing issues. What issues does the community want to prevent here? Edit-warring? Usually we block users who are edit-warring, not community ban them. Fred Bauder has never been blocked before (except for self-imposed blocks), and I do not yet see any evidence that this is a recurring problem, so once the advanced permissions are gone I do not see any reason for the block or ban. Or just make it 24h block to start with.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:50, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• We generally do not community-ban people for one ill-conceived session of edit-warring. But a day- or week-long block is fine to stop the disruption. Obviously he should be desysoped for the wheel-warring and self-unblocking, as I'm sure he soon will be. 28bytes (talk) 16:54, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• It's not the edit-warring, it's the self-unblock and the wheel warring that followed the edit warring. The lack of clue is so egregious that a CBAN is a legitimate response. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oh, the lack of clue displayed is certainly egregious, I agree, and the self-unblocks and wheel-warring certainly warrant a desysopping. But if he's managed to edit (relatively) cluefully for over a decade and has one flip-out during what's certainly a stressful ArbCom run in which people are bringing his real-life failings into wider public view, maybe let's not jump straight to a full-on ban, and see if he's able to get himself sorted once this episode has passed. 28bytes (talk) 17:29, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Interestingly (or not), it is not the questions related to his real-life issues that he moved. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:18, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• 28bytes, cluefully? Certainly.............. ∯WBG 18:22, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• If your point is that his Trump-related edits were also bad, I will readily agree with you. But while we're on the topic of bad edits, I'm curious why you chose to edit-war with Fred, using the rollback tool and no edit summaries. That is not a legitimate use of the rollback tool. 28bytes (talk) 18:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose a community ban; I support a de-sysop and a short block. If the behavior continues after a block expires, I would support this action. This isn't a Super Mario situation; we wouldn't indef a non-admin for edit-warring on their ARBCOM candidacy page. The self-unblocking is stupid and justifies a de-sysop but nothing more. power~enwiki (π, ν) 16:56, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• More power means more responsibility means harsher sanctions. Regular editors haven't been vetted by the community as trusted users. The community ban is a perfectly reasonable response to an admin unblocking themselves twice, the second time after being specifically told that the first self-unblock was in violation of policy. So while these actions all occurred at around roughly the same time, they also occurred under different circumstances, and therefore treating them as a series of violations instead of one big one is a legitimate community response. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:05, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support, though it truly is sad to see an otherwise well-respected admin and former ARBCOM self-destruct in this manner.--WaltCip (talk) 16:59, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that he won't be able to wheel war when he is desysopped. wumbolo ^^^ 17:01, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Topic ban from arbcomship. I have no comfort in him being elected. wumbolo ^^^ 17:04, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Probably the only way to do that is to community ban him. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:07, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Why? @Beyond My Ken: ——SerialNumber54129 17:08, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Just a gut feeling that attempting a "topic ban from ArbCom" wouldn't fly, and might not even be in the community's purview to impose. It seems more likely to be ArbCom or WMF territory. I could certainly be wrong, thought, hence "probably" and not a firm statement. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:12, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• That depends on what you mean by "a topic ban from ArbCom":

• The community cannot topic ban someone from standing for arbcom other than adjusting the requirements for candidacy such that they do not qualify. There is no opportunity to do that until next year. This has no impact on whether someone is elected - every eligible elector is able to oppose any candidate for any or no reason.
• The community could topic ban Fred (or anyone else) from commenting on Arbitration committee proceedings in which they are not a party and/or from initiating such proceedings (or a subset of these). Whether a given edit was a violation of such a ban though would need to be determined by arbcom or the clerks and only they could remove any such comments (excluding BLP vios and obvious vandalism). Any further action would be for the community to determine though unless the committee passed a motion/made a temporary injunction.
• In theory a complete ban from commenting on arbcom proceedings could be applied, but given that participating in dispute resolution in which you are a party is permitted by WP:BANEX it would in practice be no different to the above. Thryduulf (talk) 20:49, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Strongly admonish Boing for edit warring, violating Misplaced Pages:Edit warring#Administrator guidance (WP:INVOLVED) and Misplaced Pages:Rollback#When to use rollback. Dangerously close to another desysop. wumbolo ^^^ 17:19, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose any ban. This was clearly a stress situation. Indef for this is way over the top. Unless there is past history of continued problems/disruptions to the project, people should not be banned. Such a Ban is just loss for the project. He should be unblocked upon a successful appeal even if it has been made few minutes later. Support : The Advanced rights can be removed for obvious and blatant misuse. --DBigXrayᗙ 17:03, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• shame it's a shame that this over the top community ban was proposed by user Iridescent and embarrasing that it has pile on support. Govindaharihari (talk) 17:04, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd be more ashamed at your ad hominem arguments towards people voting in support of the community ban.--WaltCip (talk) 17:08, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@WaltCip: FYI, but your link theer is to a comment by BMK (and not an ad hom), and, likewise, looking at Govindaharihari's five posts to this thread, I see no ad hominena at all. Clarify? ——SerialNumber54129 17:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I had meant to link this diff. I saw what I believed to be ad hominem in using an editor's own block log as an argument against said editor proposing a community ban on the admin in question. That is not relevant to the behavior at hand.--WaltCip (talk) 17:17, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@WaltCip: I see what you mean! Funnily enough, I read it the opposite way—as G. trying to show how TRM had moved on from all the trouble. It certainly shows how dangerous it is making links to things without explaining them properly! ——SerialNumber54129 17:23, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I think the issue is acting like a twat on the "you really should show why you are one of the best of the best" forums. It may have been a one off, asking to become a judge whilst being filmed selling drugs is not a good way to keep your job as a Lawyer. Its about the apparent contempt for us, not just policy. An appearance he has made no real effort to change.Slatersteven (talk) 17:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support desysop; Oppose community ban; Support a shorter block; Support topic ban from Arbcom Election. Clearly the wheel warring is a problem, and Fred shouldn't be allowed to run for ARBCOM. I feel that this should be treated as a single instance of edit warring (it's a pattern) and we don't ban people for that, or we shouldn't.--Jorm (talk) 17:16, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose community ban. This violates the principle that blocks should be moderate and escalating, leaping all the way to the death penalty. He should, however, immediately be de-tooled for unblocking himself and wheel-warring. Carrite (talk) 17:16, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose While behavior unbecoming of an admin and potential arb is evident, this was clearly a very upsetting situation. A sanction/desysop yes, a community ban, why?(Littleolive oil (talk) 17:18, 11 November 2018 (UTC))
• Comment. Removal of sysop access is a prerogative of Arbitration Committee. Ruslik_Zero 17:19, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• And Question: what the heck was information about this person's personal life being dragged out and aired at an ArbCom election? Why is that not being addressed (Littleolive oil (talk) 17:18, 11 November 2018 (UTC))

• Oppose Per WP:OVERREACT. Seriously, desyop will stop the problem and even a long or indefinite block can be good. But site banning is for people who have been causing problems for an extended period of time. Heck, maybe Arbcom is the way to go here but a site ban this fast over what happened doesn't feel right. JC7V-talk 17:19, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose We desysop for wheel-warring. We block for edit warring. We don't (or shouldn't) ban people for one or two incidents of edit warring. He should obviously be desysopped, but there is absolutely no justification for a indefinite ban, and there is no particular necessity for not allowing regular unblock appeals but instead requiring community consensus before unblocking. Galobtter (pingó mió) 17:20, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose site ban Support, if it was a new editor they'd have been WP:NOTHEREd. Reduce the block to 2-3 days. Flooded with them hundreds 17:22, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Ah, but, you see, it's not a new editor -- it is a 16-year veteran -- and there is ample evidence that he IS HERE to improve the encyclopedia, missteps of judgment notwithstanding. Carrite (talk) 17:29, 11 November 2018 (UTC) P.S. Flooded with them hundreds, the motion is for a community ban, so "reducing the block to 2 or 3 days" is nonsensical. Clarification needed. Carrite (talk) 17:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

My bad, I misread the proposal, I thought it was to desysop them. Flooded with them hundreds 17:47, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, they might; or they might just get 24 house at WP:ANEW for a short edit war. Flooded, how can you both support the site ban and call for a reduction to a couple of days :) ——SerialNumber54129 17:33, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I misread the proposal! The block/site ban is punitive and not preventative. Therefore, I support desysoping but oppose a lengthy block. Flooded with them hundreds 17:47, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@Flooded with them hundreds: Thanks for clarifying! No problem at all there. ——SerialNumber54129 17:52, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

This is actually not a good argument. We can always take an isolated incident of bad behavior of any editor - edit-warring, POV pushing, incivility etc - and say that if it were a new editor they would have a chance to be blocked per NOTHERE. This would mean any bad behavior must immediately result in a community ban, which is not our current practice.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose The self-unblock and wheel warring were offenses in his capacity as an administrator and the desysop takes care of those. This leaves the original edit warring as the sole offense as an editor. An indef is disproportionate for a first-offense edit warring block. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:30, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose any form of ban. A proper cool down block, and the desysop is for ArbCom to decide (open a case if you feel so inclined). --Dirk Beetstra 17:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Removal of advanced permissions is obviously in order. An block is obviously in order. A site ban is an overreaction. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:37, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose any ban. It's a crying shame to see all the drama here. So much grief could have been avoided by asking the three-member Electoral Commission to intervene. Isn't it their job to moderate the Q&A boards? There is a precedent for moving stuff to the talk page, set at requests for adminship. Taking this issue here is bypassing the Electoral Commission's authority. wbm1058 (talk) 17:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
  • absolutely - yes it is . Govindaharihari (talk) 17:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• I will note that if he unblocks himself again, that is clear grounds for emergency desysop by steward. It could be argued that a steward could have done so already even though his last self-unblock was 2 hours ago. Of course, ArbCom can order a desysop too, though it is surprising they have not done so already. --Rschen7754 17:44, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• On retrospection (as to my own !vote), a CBAN might be construed as too harsh and violative of practices of gradual escalation but, at the very minimum, along with a de-flagging, he seems to be in dire need of a TBan from APOL, as the discussed edits at the ArbCom Q-page and his own t/p suggests.......

Carrite mentions notwithstanding missteps of judgement.But, there is a continued series of mis-judgements and he is yet to show a sign of self-correcting them.

IMHO, we have a serious problem with an editor who brushes off any concerns about his editing with some IDHT tactics, coupled with a cranky behaviour. And, that I've a hard time in believing that he is not indulging in intentional stupidity. We are talking about someone who is entirely clueless about a host of policies including EDITWAR, BLP, NPOV and that which governs sysop-actions.

He might have done good work, at some point of time but that has ceased for long and at this very moment, his disruption far exceeds the benefits of his presence to the community.

And, if this proposal fails to pass, I would still oppose any unilateral unblock unless Fred explicitly agrees to abide by the current policies of the site; not his noble interpretations of them.∯WBG 17:56, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support Wheel warring over self-unblocking is absolutely beyond the pale. He is not competent to edit here. Pawnkingthree (talk) 18:03, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose community ban (while supporting desysop and block). Per DBigXray, Carrite, Dirk Beetstra, Wbm1058, et al. Happy days, Lindsay 18:09, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. A site ban, for a bonehead heat-of-the-moment move? Nah. This will clearly lead to a desysopping, but a site ban presumes he's of not contributory value to the community as an editor (or at least that any such positive contributions would be outweighed by a pattern of disruption unlikely to stop, which isn't actually in evidence here).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:11, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose community ban. I support desysop for the blatant wheel warring. Cullen Let's discuss it 18:14, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment - From my reading of this, there's no consensus for a community ban, but it seems clear that there is a consensus for a desysop. WaltCip (talk) 18:17, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Seconded; that's very much my assessment too. ——SerialNumber54129 18:19, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• WaltCip, Serial Number 54129, except that the community can't de-sysop? Isn't it? ∯WBG 18:27, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

What's happening here is the estabishment of a consensus: the community decides what is to be done, and then whomsoever it is necessary to ask (somebody, anybody, nobody) will action the consensus. It would be odd if the commnunity was to only have the authority to come to conclusions it had the authority to finish off. They don't call functionaries functionaries for nothing; they exist to function on our behalf. ——SerialNumber54129 18:32, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Point taken. ∯WBG 18:38, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

No problem whatsoever, Winged Blades of Godric; on a lighter note, I see Ivanvector recommends you be immediately banned, just down there. Now, where's my "Start new thread" pen... ;) :p ——SerialNumber54129 18:46, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

WP:LEVEL1 calls for an emergency desysop for an account intentionally abusing the tools, but provides for automatic restoration of the bit if the user comes up with a reasonable explanation and unless there is strong objection from the community. This thread is the strong objection. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 18:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose - The flagrant disregard to policies here is astounding and them unblocking themselves twice is astounding too .... but I feel community banning them is a tad over-dramatic, They need desysopping (if that's not already happened) but banning them IMHO is OTT> –Davey2010 18:25, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose ban (edit conflict × all of them) (note that a block in this context is a ban; all those "supporting a block but not a ban" are making a circular argument). Unblocking yourself is a bright-line desysop offence and I assume that Arbcom is already pushing the appropriate buttons to effect that per WP:LEVEL1, but unless we're talking about banning Boing! said Zebedee who was also perpetuating the edit war and Winged Blades of Godric who started it, there's no case for banning one of the involved users but not the others. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 18:29, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Ivanvector, you do seem to have a peculiar sense of equivalency, appreciated:-) ∯WBG 18:44, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Yeah I'm more concerned really (since people seem to be completely ignoring it and the Fred Bauder issue is really already resolved with a desysop imminent) about WBG misusing rollback to edit war and Boing! for edit warring and then blocking the person they were edit warring against (pretty bright line WP:INVOLVED violation with no particular necessity of IARing) - that merits a trout for both at-least. Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:49, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Just to be clear as mud, I wasn't calling for sanctions. I meant to call to attention the absurdity of community banning an editor for getting into a silly edit war one time, and edit warring over where to put questions to an arbcom candidate is one of the silliest edit wars I've ever come across. This really seems to have been inside baseball, procedure for the sake of procedure. Folks get into one-off edit wars all the time against (I assume) their own better judgement, but they don't get community banned for it. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 18:55, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  (edit conflict)I'm not calling for sanctions either; just that we shouldn't completely ignore misbehaviour just because it is overshadowed by much more egregious misbehaviour (IMO letting things slide without any comment makes it seem valid under policy thus making new admins/rollbackers/editors think it is perfectly valid to do such behaviour). I have to agree on it being a very silly edit war. Doing 6 reverts in 6 minutes is completely unnecessary escalation of something that could've easily been hashed out on a talk page. Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:08, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Understood. I endorse the block for edit warring, fwiw. Wheel warring is sanctionable by desysopping, which should be inevitable at this point. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 19:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  I get that:-) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Winged Blades of Godric (talk • contribs) 14:04, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Galobtter, I understand that using rollback was not optimal but I am very willing to use it liberally, in dealing with extreme stupidity; which this was.∯WBG 19:04, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  So it's going to be WP:IDHT from you, unfortunately. I hoped for more than that. wumbolo ^^^ 19:24, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• I'n not sure about an indefinite community ban but some sort of substantial block is called for. We do usually extend blocks if the blocked editor does something to compound the block, and wheel warring to unblock yourself (and carry on the edit war) absolutely meets that. Hut 8.5 18:36, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• If there were a pithy name for the opposite of the Super Mario effect, this would be a perfect example of it. A ban is grossly disproportionate for a brief edit war on a non-content page. And however low an opinion you have of the arbitration committee, they can probably figure out whether to desysop someone for unblocking himself without this much kibitzing. —Cryptic 18:44, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Maxim has desysopped . Now; how about reducing it to time served and all getting on with something else...? ...at the risk of sounding like Ritchie333 there :D ——SerialNumber54129 19:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• (+1) Wot SN sez. Fred has lost his bit and stays indeffed. Surely, there's no consensus to CBan (or any other amendments to his current scenario) and hence, let's wrap this up.......sometimes I feel that Ritchie is the most rational person on the wiki.......∯WBG 19:20, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@Winged Blades of Godric: I thought that was Drmies  ;) ——SerialNumber54129 19:26, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose a desysop is necessary, but a complete ban is excessive. The Super Mario principle doesn't really apply here because a non-admin would not be able to unblock themselves. While I'm not trying to single anyone out, I'm mildly disappointed that this proposal gained so much early support. Sometimes we can get a little carried away. Lepricavark (talk) 19:25, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support desysop and some sort of block. Undecided on ban. My impression of Fred's POV on all this is that he believes different rules apply to him than everyone else. I don't think this attitude is compatible with editing wikipedia. However the incident itself possibly not banworthy per se. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 19:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - A site ban is not a proportionate remedy. Of course the desysop was necessary and a block is reasonable until calmer heads prevail.- MrX 🖋
• Oppose per others. Correctly desysopped and correctly blocked to prevent any further disruption. But an indefinite ban? Nope. The dust is still settling. Let’s wait a while to see his response. Aiken D 20:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose a site ban, which is an excessive inappropriate measure for a productive Wikipedian whose misdoings primarily relate to admin actions. Even the wheel warring was not that bad. It was not like he was on a block rampage, although I do appreciate we need to hold admins to a high standard and can understand why editors support a dysop, even though I weakly oppose a dysopp. I feel that a short-term block and admonishment for wheel warring as a final warning of sorts is preferable.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 20:15, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Question Misplaced Pages:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2018: "An editor is eligible to stand as a candidate who: ... is in good standing and not subject to active blocks or site-bans." If there is no site ban of any kind, then Fred still eligible to stand as a candidate, correct? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:17, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• It probably goes without saying that he would not be successful and should probably withdraw per WP:SNOW. Aiken D 20:28, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• He is subject to an active block, so that might at least temporarily disqualify him. Lepricavark (talk) 20:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) @Aiken D, not necessarily; there have certainly been candidates in the past who have just come off the back of sanctioning or desysopping and have stood on a "vote for me if you disagree with the way I was treated" platform. None of them have ever won, although Giano II in 2007 and The Rambling Man last year both got respectable levels of support. Per the first comment in this thread I obviously feel Fred Bauder should be blocked or banned, which would render the point irrelevant, but if he's not under any kind of sanction he's perfectly within his rights to stand. ‑ Iridescent 20:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose as severe overkill. A desysopping (and removal of all other user rights except either auto or extended confirmed) is sufficient here. There is such as thing as WP:NOPUNISH, and it is part of the blocking policy. I had attempted to leave a comment about their fitness as an administrator a few days ago when I saw Ceoil's report, but it was closed before I could hit post. Mr rnddude (talk) 20:51, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose yes, an admin self-unblocking is scandalous, and, yes, it crosses the brightline for desysopping, but desysopping, on top of the original block for edit warring (his first ever), is sanction enough here. A CBAN would be a massive overcorrection. The disruption and damage done to the project was minimal.  Swarm  talk  20:52, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - the guy flipped out, that's all. Behind every editor is a human being with emotions. A one month-block will cool him down. GoodDay (talk) 20:57, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Iridescent, you should withdraw this proposal as ill thought and ill timed. It hasn't got a chance of producing anything remotely beneficial to the project and I can not believe you would initiate such an off-topic discussion as this. Of course he should not be banned for this, and of course you know it damn well to be so.--John Cline (talk) 20:59, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Er, no; that you disagree with something doesn't automatically mean that you're right and everyone supporting it is wrong. I have absolutely no patience for people who attempt to play the "the rules don't apply to me because I'm so damn important" card on Misplaced Pages, and the more I look into the history here the more, similar, problems I'm seeing. ‑ Iridescent 21:12, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Er yes, can't you see the feedback from the community here, your patience in irrelevent. Govindaharihari (talk) 21:20, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Govindaharihari:, just stop. You're not doing Fred Bauder any good, and every comment you make edges closer to WP:NPA territory. You have a point of view on this matter, and you've made it more than clear to everyone. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:29, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose Desysop is required and the restoration of the block. But a ban appears to be a case of overreaction to me. All these events (edit and wheel warring) unfolded in a very short time frame. This is serious but no longterm kind of disruption which requires a ban. --AFBorchert (talk) 21:26, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Two unblocks of himself is just too much....William, is the complaint department really on the roof? 21:54, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support totally unbecoming behaviour, Huldra (talk) 22:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

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

Desysop

I have desysoped Fred per WP:IAR for now. I will post a note at WP:A/R about this too. In an nutshell, my reasoning is that it is a Sunday so it's unclear when Arbcom would even pass a desysop motion, and it is not unreasonable to think that Fred would unblock himself again. Maxim_(talk) 19:11, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, Maxim. I can speak from experience that it would take weeks if not months for this commitee to agree on emergency desysop, which is obviously unrealistic in this case. Now that this is out of the way what's remaining should probably be discussion for process and aftermath. Alex Shih (talk) 19:36, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Clearly ArbCom has an unusual definition of "emergency". Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:17, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Whoa, Alex Shih--not the ArbCom that I know, which was very quick to desysop two admins, just before my time. Drmies (talk) 02:26, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Unblock

As a candidate in the arbcom election can we please now allow him to participate. Govindaharihari (talk) 20:55, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Er..no. Not only is there no hecking way he's getting elected to AC, the block should stand. - TNT 20:57, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Turns out he's disqualified anyway - TNT 21:06, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Why is that? Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:25, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• To stand for ArbCom you must be "in good standing and not subject to active blocks or site-bans" (WP:ACE2018/C). Hut 8.5 21:43, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Ah, thank you. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:07, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• He has lost his tools... for now anyway. That solved the unblocking himself stupidity. He will not be edit warring anymore (or he will be reblocked). So the block needs to be lifted so he can participate in this discussion and the ArbComm case and the election process. Guy has a right to defend himself. Legacypac (talk) 21:00, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Seeing as he's likely going to be brought before Arbcom, it's fair that he be unblocked so as to give his side of the story, etc. GoodDay (talk) 21:05, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Why can't he do that like every other blocked editor - respond to talk page, copied to appropriate venue? - TNT 21:06, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

All editors are equal, some are more equal than others. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:08, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

He can't because he's indef banned. GoodDay (talk) 21:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

He's not in any fashion "banned", right now he's indef blocked. You're participating in a high-level discussion about Misplaced Pages policy and admin/editor behavior, please get your terms right or stop commenting. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:23, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Don't be rude. GoodDay (talk) 21:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

You're right, that was rude, Stricken. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:49, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

@GoodDay: He can still edit his user talk page, and I seriously doubt that'll need to be revoked any time soon - the length of the block doesn't have anything to do with that - TNT 21:16, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Ok. GoodDay (talk) 21:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• If Fred Bauder is brought before ArbCom for a formal hearing, I don't think it's at all unreasonable to unblock him for that purpose only. Any other edits of any kind would then be met with an automatic re-block. This is very frequently done for editors of all types not only for ArbCom, but for AE, ANI and AN. Fair is fair.In the meantime, though, I see no reason for him to be unblocked. There is no inherent right to run for ArbCom (or indeed to edit Misplaced Pages), and in all practical real-world terms, his candidacy is dead in the water anyway. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:23, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  Beyond My Ken, indeed. Given the display I've seen, I don't see my self re-instating his nomination. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 21:40, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

He's already the subject of an ArbComm case. Legacypac (talk) 21:48, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

As the admin who last reinstated Fred's block and increased it to indef, I'll just say here that of course I won't object to a regular unblocking now that the situation has more or less been resolved. Personally I might tend to wait to see an actual unblock request first, but if and when other admins are satisfied there's no further need for it, feel free to go ahead. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:49, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. Probably best at this point to wait for the unblock request...I'd hate to unblock someone while they're still in the heat of the moment and have them run off and get themselves blocked again. ~Awilley (talk) 23:03, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Agreed. I see no compelling reason to unblock without so much as a word from Fred requesting it. Arbcom is obviously going to uphold and codify the desysop, the basically have no choice. If Fred wants to state anything there’s no problem copy/pasting it on his behalf even if he is blocked. Something about his behavior in this sordid affair suggests to me he may just walk away, unless and until he indicates he wishes to be unblocked I believe the status quo should stand given the apparent consensus above. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:07, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• As a final procedural point of order, the matter of Fred's eligibility to run for ArbCom will be decided by the Electoral Commission, which is specifically authorized by the community to handle these kinds of situations. Their final decision is still pending.  Swarm  talk  23:23, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

POV-pushing on Suicide and Talk:Suicide

An editor with a dynamic IP address (most recently editing the page as User:2600:1700:8680:E900:8C6F:CAC6:D0E0:A9EB) has been posting long screeds on the suicide article talk page and edit-warring over usage of the WP:MEDRS tag on the page. They don't appear to have been editing the article itself, but instead repeatedly post large rants on the talk page, demanding that suicide be discussed purely as a matter of human free will and not as a medial problem in any manner. This user started an RFC about this issue, and the consensus was that the article's presentation of suicide as a public health problem is a largely accurate reflection of how sources discuss the topic, but they have continued their same behavior.

- removing the MEDRS section from the talk page once - second time - third time

Just look in any section of the talk page to see what I mean about the rants.

Note: I'm not really sure how to notify an editor on a changing IP address. I'll post a notice to the talk page of the IP address linked above, since that seems to be the most recent one they've posted from. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 20:59, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Sysop assistance requested: Talk page of User:2600:1700:8680:E900:8C6F:CAC6:D0E0:A9EB is blacklisted; content is at the user page instead and needs to be moved to the talk page. Home Lander (talk) 21:06, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

 Done--Ymblanter (talk) 21:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Oh, did I post that on the user page instead of the talk page? Sorry, my mistake. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 23:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Red Rock Canyon could you have created that message on the talk page since it was black listed. I doubt it. --DBigXrayᗙ 15:25, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Blocked one week for disruptive editing, IDHT behavior, refusal to accept consensus and edit-warring against it.
   — Berean Hunter (talk) 03:16, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
  • I've changed that to three months to match Bbb23's block duration here. I think block evasion may possibly be thrown on the heap now. My block is a hardblock.
     — Berean Hunter (talk) 03:55, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Removal of sourced info, adding unsourced info, and victim blaming on Alexandra Waterbury

2604:2000:12C1:845B:350F:DA6B:571F:9A5B has made continuous edits on Alexandra Waterbury that are disruptive to the article (). We have engaged on the article's talk page but I am having trouble communicating with them and would like some assistance, as I believe they are newer to Misplaced Pages. I need some help in resolving the ongoing dispute, as I do not feel I can properly explain Misplaced Pages policies on disruptive editing, credible sources, etc.. -- Willthacheerleader18 (talk) 22:45, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

User:Weeb Dingle and accusations of WP:Hounding

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

As a number of editors know, I edit and watch a lot of sexual topic articles (among other type of articles). In July 2017, Weeb Dingle posted an "I say delete it" section to Talk:Extramarital sex. I think I didn't notice at the time, but I noticed when he added on to the section on April 22, 2018, and I replied. The discussion eventually became heated, to the point that Weeb Dingle began accusing me of stalking him to articles. The stalking claims are seen here, here, here and here (all on the same day -- May 13, 2018). I stated, "I am not stalking you. You are popping up at a number of articles that are on my watchlist, which is indicated by the fact that I have edited enough of them or their talk pages before you even showed up at them. But if you want to report me for WP:Hounding at WP:ANI, be my guest." After more of the same in July (seen here and here) and completely fed up, I told him, in part, "Do not speak to me about civility and targeted harassment when you are going on with idiotic, uncivil and harassing claims, such as 'Setting aside the creepy behavior.' and are now accusing me of having sockpuppets because, like others, you apparently can't read my block log appropriately. If anyone should be taken to WP:ANI right now, it's you. Do stop responding to me with nonsense. WP:OR and uncivil, harassing nonsense will not be tolerated. If you edit appropriately and stop the WP:Personal attacks, there is no issue." After more discussion at Talk:Romance (love), he made the stalking and/or "targeted" claim again (in September) and yet again (most recently). My most recent response is seen here, where I also pinged Drmies for a possible intervention. I've repeatedly told Weeb Dingle (for example, here) that "All of these articles showing up to, where I appear, are articles that are already on my watchlist; I have been at these articles long before arrived, which is easy enough to check by clicking on the 'Edits by user' link, entering my name, and then pressing 'Submit.' " I told him that I am likely to revert and/or correct his poor edits if they are poor. I've told him that reverting and/or correcting edits is something I am likely to do at any article I am watching.

When I weigh in on an article matter that Weeb Dingle has posted to, I do not want to be attacked by Weeb Dingle because I reverted him at some other article or criticized his edit(s) or rationale. I want the stalking accusations to stop. Dating is on my watchlist too. Because I know how Weeb Dingle will react to me at an article I weigh in at, I thought twice about commenting in the "Dating among children impossible?" discussion there. Tomwsulcer was in an argument with Weeb Dingle. As seen there, I eventually weighed in and felt the need to state to Weeb Dingle, "And before you again claim that I am stalking you, I am not. This is just one of the many articles on my huge watchlist." This is the type of thing I'm dealing with at any article Weeb Dingle pops up that I happen to be watching. Even the Weasel word article that he's recently posted at was on my watchlist until earlier this year when I cut it since I am always looking to cut an article from my gigantic watchlist. If I were to comment there, you can bet that there would be more stalking claims from Weeb Dingle. I'm not asking that Weeb Dingle be blocked, but I am asking for the stalking claims to stop. For those interested, the Editor Interaction Analyzer shows articles where our edits have intersected. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 03:53, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

My quickie guess is that Flyer is reasonable. I follow Dating and Weeb Dingle became argumentative when all I said was he'd need sources to back up additions about the subject of children dating.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 11:24, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Improper page moves

ChupaCol123 has been monkeying around with pages about Sky (United Kingdom), Sky UK and Sky Limited, using cut and paste moves to change article titles to his liking. Whether or not the moves are legitimate (they have not been discussed anywhere), the use of cut-and-paste moves needs to be sorted out. Given the amount of cutting, pasting and changed redirects, it will take an admin to sort this out. WikiDan61_ReadMe!! 19:34, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

ChupaCol123 (talk · contribs) - Sky (United Kingdom) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) - Sky UK (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) - Sky Limited (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs). Just adding some links to make checking on these a bit easier. MarnetteD|Talk 20:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Update: ChupaCol123 has been blocked as a sock. Can an admin take on the task of cleaning up this particular mess of page moves? WikiDan61_ReadMe!! 21:36, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Cut-and-paste moves can usually be reverted normally, like any other edit. The big headache is when the two articles (original and pasted one) have divergent histories. That's when you have to do a history merge. Luckily, it doesn't look like that's necessary, and someone seems to have reverted these edits already. If there's still cleanup necessary, feel free to point it out. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 23:47, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

User:John.menzies61202

User:John.menzies61202 is uploading non-free images / copyrighted publicity photographs from British television shows via Wiki Commons and releasing them into the public domain despite not owning the rights. It may just be that they do not understand the guidelines here but it probably needs admin intervention to stop the problem from escalating, given that they uploaded numerous images and it appears the sole purpose of the account. Wiki Commons contribs / upload log. I have privded a selection of edit differences here to demonstrate how they are then adding them to Misplaced Pages articles - .Rain the 1 23:54, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

@Raintheone: Why did you not make any attempt at raising the issue on John's talk page before reporting at ANI? Tornado chaser (talk) 03:11, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Edit-warring IP issues death threats

Per WP:Death threats, all such threats should be taken seriously. The Spanish-speaking user 190.158.26.48 (talk · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log)) has a long history of making threats after being reverted or warned for edit-warring. Most recently today here and here today, and thus they were blocked for 31 hours. This IP has not been very active this year, but last year they made another death threat here.

However, the same person appears to have edit-warred using other IP addresses. This IP for example has been blocked for 2 years, as has this one, and this one for three years (apparently with another threat redacted by admin), another blocked until Jan 2019 (again with likely threads redacted by admin), another for 3 years, another for 1 year, and who knows how many others. I am quite sure these are all the same person, and clearly this is a long-standing pattern of abusive behavior, so I do not see how a 31-hour block will stop this person from behaving this way. 73.168.15.161 (talk) 05:05, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

A permablock is needed. These are blatant death threats.Slatersteven (talk) 10:47, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

We don't do permablocks on IPs, especially not dynamic ones. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:01, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

All those blocked proxies (see WP:NOP) are clearly the same user but clearly not the same as this IP, and they have long-term blocks because they're open webhosts and we block those when we see them. The IP you reported is Colombian, is posting threats in Spanish (versus the proxy abuser's broken English threats), and is not an open proxy as far as I can tell. I've reported this to WP:EMERGENCY because of the violent threats, but there's not much else we can do here. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 12:22, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

That's a reasonable explanation, thank you! I knew that a permablock would not happen, and was not sure about a year(s)-long block, but a few days seemed pointless. 73.168.15.161 (talk) 12:43, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

For the record, I have no doubt that all of those long-term blocked IPs are the same person as the IP who was blocked yesterday for death threats, despite the different languages used to make the threats. They went out of their way to restore content here and here and here that the other IPs have added before, and have attacked User:Sro23 repeatedly. 73.168.15.161 (talk) 12:51, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

'Porn' complaint

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

On Nov. 12, the user who calls himself "The Rambling Man" (aka "TRM") immediately deleted the following request from his Talk page, and took no action on it. (The link in question was to a silly old American pop song on YouTube, and was meant as a joke.)

Stan Lee

Very reluctant though I am to post on your talk: If you're going to crack a joke about me supposedly posting a link to "German porn" you'd better make it damn clear you're joking. Unfair – please go back in & fix. Sca (talk) 22:13, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

This is over the line. I request a retraction and an apology at Misplaced Pages talk:In the news. – Sca (talk) 05:34, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

@Sca: Don't link bootleg YouTube videos anywhere on Misplaced Pages. I've now removed the link from your above post. Please be more careful in the future. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 07:50, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Hijiri: How was I to know it was bootlegged? It's been posted on YouTube for almost nine years and viewed nearly 1.8 million times. Sca (talk) 21:28, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

@Sca: Look at the account name, and if that's unclear look at the channel page. If it doesn't appear to have any direct connection to that particular artist or record company, or has an "eclectic" selection of videos uploaded, then it's probably bootlegged. The number of views and the longevity of the video is irrelevant, since there could be myriad reasons a copyright-holder chooses not to enforce that copyright that do not mean the video is in the public domain and uploading an entire song unedited to YouTube is not considered fair use; and heck, the way YouTube has been going recently, we have no way of knowing if the copyright holder actually does earn revenue from bootleg uploads, while deeming it not worth the effort to upload an "official" version, but that doesn't change our policy that bootleg YouTube videos are never to be linked anywhere on the site. Anyway, the rule is "if in doubt, leave it out", so if you find yourself fretting over whether the video is "official" or "bootlegged", you should assume it is bootlegged and not post it. I should also probably point out for your benefit that arguing over this kind of thing is a quick path to a block: just as this guy. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 23:38, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Hijiri: I'm not arguing. I'm just explaining how the situation seemed to me at the time. I'm no expert on cyber copyright. (I don't know what a "channel page" is.)

It would be nice if you were to voice a degree of collegial understanding – perhaps even congeniality. Have a nice rest of your day. Sca (talk) 03:12, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Oh, I didn't mean to imply you were arguing. I was just cautioning you that it might look to others like you were. (I don't have the authority to block you, or the inclination to ask someone else to do so, so even if blocking you was my intent ... well, it's not.) I apologize for not being clearer on this point. Anyway, a "channel page" is the page of a particular YouTube "channel", which is an account that uploads videos. Clicking on the username of the uploader will take you to their channel page. If it says something like "This is the official channel of John Artist." or "This is the official channel of Recordcompany Records, known for albums by John Artist." that means it's probably safe (explicit impersonation accounts with large number of views are likely to be banned fairly quickly), but if there is no connection to either John Artist or Recordcompany Records anywhere on the page, it should be presumed to be just some randomer's YouTube channel, and if some randomer uploads entire copyrighted songs said randomer is a bootlegger. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 06:07, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Range block

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

Repeated addition of unsourced content - I've encountered a bunch of sequential IPs all editing the same topics over the last hour or so...

• 62.149.77.141 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.142 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.143 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.144 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.145 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.146 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.147 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.148 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.149 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.150 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.151 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.152 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.153 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.154 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.155 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.156 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.157 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 62.149.77.158 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)

Is a rangeblock possible? GiantSnowman 11:49, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

I've blocked 62.149.77.128/27 for 2 weeks. Let me know if this hasn't solved the problem. -- Longhair\ 11:56, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll keep an eye out. GiantSnowman 12:00, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

zh-lta, cross-wiki abuser Zhu Ming (10RR already)

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

• 222.69.191.205 (talk · contribs)
• Mingzhu (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Mingju (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Zhu Ming (thinker)
• Misplaced Pages:Sockpuppet investigations/Wirterss/Archive

I already posted in SPI, AIV and Misplaced Pages:Requests for page protection, but it seem so urgent i have to start a thread here

the zh-wiki lta keep spamming himself Zhu Ming to zh-wiki, despite he may pass GNG, but his promotional tone made him blocked in zh-wiki, the article title for him was SALTED, but he was very active to spam himself to en-wiki and wikiquote and somewhere else. Recently he discovered the article title Ming Zhu had been unprotected , so he return again. After the title was protected again, he start to vandalize Mingzhu and Mingju. Matthew hk (talk) 15:06, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Blocked by GeneralizationsAreBad--Ymblanter (talk) 15:18, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

And they also protected both articles.--Ymblanter (talk) 15

19, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

IP refspam

This IP editor has been adding links to his own primary research papers to a large number of articles over a long period of time (since at least October 2016 March 2012, but there may be more IPs I haven't come across). Talk page messages and warnings have not worked. He has been blocked twice. I don't know what else to do short of calling him on the phone and telling him to stop.

• 85.248.18.227 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 147.251.89.175 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 147.251.157.75 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 78.102.206.133 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 176.74.129.208 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 89.221.212.98 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 195.168.25.212 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 147.251.89.170 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 213.220.227.250 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 98.155.90.49 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 147.251.157.92 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 94.113.98.71 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)

Please make it stop. Natureium (talk) 15:30, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Seems tricky - what with inserting blank PMIDs there's not even a keyword (e.g. author name) to filter...? --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 16:13, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Disruption by Dudeskin8

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• Dudeskin8 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

User keeps making anti-Islam POV edits to various pages. This user was given a final warning and an ARBAP2 discretionary sanctions notification but continues their behavior. Requesting a block. EvergreenFir (talk) 21:00, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• I've blocked indefinitely. PhilKnight (talk) 22:21, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

User:Falconfly

For several years Falconfly has been adding his personal speculations to articles relating to paleontology, frequently violating WP:NOR by backing them up with sources that do not, in fact, directly support his claims. Calm, reasoned discussion has repeatedly proven ineffective in curbing these tendencies, as he takes an overly defensive attitude towards content he adds and regularly exhibits disproportionate incivility in response to any (or no) opposition towards his edits. This is chronic, recurring behavior and administrator intervention would be appreciated.

Summaries of select incidents are provided below.

• Flying volaticotheres

Beginning in 2015, Falconfly began to modify Misplaced Pages articles to suggest that volaticotheres, a group of extinct mammals, were capable of powered flight. No peer-reviewed scientific paper to date has ever concluded that volaticotheres were flight-capable. He focused his efforts in particular on Ichthyoconodon, a volaticothere known only from fossils of its teeth. (Note: Chaoyangopterus has been shown to be a sockpuppet of Falconfly.) Similar edits were made to related articles such as Argentoconodon, Triconolestes, Volaticotherini, and Volaticotherium. He went as far as to commission illustrations that depicted these animals in flight, which he then added to Misplaced Pages. Falconfly engaged in several bouts of edit-warring on the aforementioned articles, particularly between September 2016 and September 2017, and has also attempted to justify his edits by citing a self-published, non-peer-reviewed article that he wrote himself (a violation of WP:NPOV). Most of his commissioned images were later removed from Wikimedia Commons for not having followed the proper procedure outlined by Commons:OTRS (see below).

He refuses to relent despite several attempts to explain to him why these edits constitute WP:SYNTH, including a discussion at WP:NORN, and has continued to push his views on this subject as recently as March 2018.

• Images on Wikimedia Commons

In 2016 and 2017, several images commissioned and uploaded by Falconfly (including some of the aforementioned depictions of flying volaticotheres) were nominated for deletion for not having been uploaded under proper OTRS procedure. He seemed to take these actions personally, displaying an uncooperative, combative attitude throughout, even as other editors were civil. This culminated in him threatening legal action on most of the parties involved, which got him permanently banned from Wikimedia Commons. He has continued to try and get the images reinstated by harassing a previously-involved user who has no say in the OTRS process.

• Mystriosuchus tail fluke

In similar vein to the volaticothere example above, Falconfly is convinced that the extinct reptile Mystriosuchus had a tail fin, a conclusion that is not actually stated by the source he cites for this claim, and has tried to add a commissioned illustration depicting this speculative notion to its article. In December 2017, this violation of WP:NOR was again pointed out to him on the paleoart review page of WP:PALEO, resulting in heated discussion and edit warring that led to a temporary block for Falconfly.

• Maniraptoran reproductive behavior

Most recently, Falconfly has been pushing his view that most Mesozoic maniraptoran dinosaurs reproduced like megapode birds today, burying their eggs inside a mound and the young being capable of flight upon hatching. Though some elements of this reproductive method has been suggested for some Mesozoic maniraptorans, none of the papers he cites extends this entire suite of behaviors to nearly all maniraptorans like he implies. (In fact, several of those same studies outright contradict his claim by providing evidence that the eggs were only partially buried and were attended by a parent.) Once again, this has already been civilly explained to him, to no avail.

• Inflammatory edit summaries

Falconfly often makes inflammatory remarks in his edit summaries, insulting other users on a regular basis. (A perusal of his contribution history will uncover many more examples.)

• Other

As previously mentioned, Chaoyangopterus is a demonstrated sockpuppet of Falconfly. He continued to deny this after the sock account was blocked, despite unambiguous evidence. Chaoyangopterus’ talk page shows that the issues of SYNTH and edit warring were also prevalent on that account.

He repeatedly put words in other users’ mouths in an otherwise benign discussion regarding a page he created. (The unsigned comments are his.)

His block log shows that he has already been temporarily blocked several times for edit warring or harassment of other users.

Shuvuuia (talk) 21:11, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

And still with this. May I remind literally all of this has been met with outright obtusity and pettiness (i.e. several artists like Julio Lacerda repeatedly sending their confirmations on the part of commission permissions, numerous edit wars and personal attacks on my person, for starters) on YOUR part? I swear, you imbeciles beg to humiliate yourselves. BTW, this constitutes another personal attack on my person; I strongly recommend you to desist, lest you be faced with legal action. - Falconfly

Are you serious? Retract that right now or I'm going to see you blocked for making a legal threat. --Tarage (talk) 21:21, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Depends. I am contacting wikimedia to sort issues out. I will retract this if you allow me to discuss those issues and drop this nonsense against me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Falconfly (talk • contribs) 16:25, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Depends nothing. I'm getting an admin. Also this: https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Deinonychus&oldid=868254730 is still edit warring even if time passes. Use the talk page. --Tarage (talk) 21:26, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Oh well, given your hilarious petty responses I expect you to be punished as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Falconfly (talk • contribs) 16:30, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Not surprisingly, Falconfly has threatened their way into a block. I think we can call this resolved? Ivanvector (/_Edits) 22:13, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm content with closing. --Tarage (talk) 22:18, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal: site ban (Falconfly)

Thanks for closing, Tornado chaser, but I think we're not done here. Falconfly is a user with a long history of personal attacks, attempting to WP:OWN articles, making legal threats (this is far from the first and they have doubled down on their talk page), and most importantly, using the website not to build an encyclopedia but to try to publish their own research, and to a lesser extent to promote their own work. It's long past time for this user to be shown the door.

• Support site ban, as proposer. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 23:01, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• Not yet. Although this may turn out to be unnecessary, I think I'd wait to see how this plays out before proposing a site ban. They are currently indeffed, so will need to retract the legal threats and give assurances that they understand where they have been breaching our content policies before being allowed to edit again. Falconfly has been an editor since 2006, but their block log only dates from December 2017, so I'd be tempted to see if there is a chance that they can reform before writing them off completely. If they can convince an admin that they can safely be unblocked, they will be under scrutiny and it would be simpler to get consensus for a site ban if they breached unblock conditions. --RexxS (talk) 23:21, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Yet - There's really no reason to think that this editor is going to change their viewpoint or their way of editing. I don't think we lose much of anything by giving them the heave ho. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:58, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - Editor clearly doesn't have the temperament or perhaps sanity to edit here. I've seen a lot but not inventing dinosaurs and then commissioning fan art for them. --Tarage (talk) 00:11, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - It's been years and this user's editing patterns have not changed. If anything, he has become more confrontational and unwilling to listen over time, characterizing all opposition as "spite" and "harassment". Shuvuuia (talk) 01:37, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support site ban Although ENWP does not take into account activity offwiki, the behaviour in Commons is sufficiently parallel to the behaviour exhibited here that an exception can be made. Commissioning someone to create images of their opinion of how a dinosaur behaved then trying to shoehorn into articles here is blatant OR. They threatened legal action on commons and indefinitely blocked, that block still stands and they've doubled down by also threatening legal action here. --Blackmane (talk) 01:52, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support site ban I mean, making a legal threat, on ANI? Come on. Add in the other persistent behavioural issues, and I think that they need to regain the trust of the community before they edit again. ∰Bellezzasolo✡ Discuss 01:59, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment Since I'm so personally involved in this I will refrain from placing a formal vote on this, but Falconfly has caused nothing but anger and disruption among the wikiproject editors since he began, and I most certainly will not be sad to see him go. Unlike every other discussion, bringing things onto the talk page did nothing to even slightly slow the edit warring or rule violating, and talk pages instead became a cesspool of personal attacks and threats and uncooperative behaviour. While RexxS has a reasonable suggestion for opposing at this moment, the behaviour of falconfly has gotten worse exponentially over time, and I would rather not give them another chance after their recent contributions, over 50 edits in three days which require reviewing, reverting, and getting involved in more and more edit wars. IJReid  02:05, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

IP Block by me

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

Please see my talk page: 87.254.67.90 Tbhotch/EN is protesting an indef block I made to an IP. The blocked involved repeated uploads of pornographic images. If any admin here believes I have erred, they have my blessing to change the block. I personally feel that the IP was given instructions on how to appeal the block, but you all work it out. — Maile (talk) 21:34, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd happily block them from now 'til Kingdom Come, if I thought it would help, but this is the Manx sicko who changes IP at will, so the indef is kind of pointless. Favonian (talk) 21:38, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

(ec) Blocking everything and then waiting for unblock appeals is a loss of both editors and admin time. This is a very dynamic IP, it is also range blocked for a month, and the vandal is already using new IP addresses in another country. To save me or another admin having to unblock this address due to unnecessary collateral in a few months, please consider unblocking. -- zzuuzz 21:39, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for your input. — Maile (talk) 21:43, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Albertpda decimating Vietnamese football teams articles again

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

• Albertpda (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Already blocked once for this, he's back at it. Could an admin just indef this VOA already and be done with it? Some of the articles probably also need semi-protecting because he's apparently socking and IP-hopping as well. Softlavender (talk) 04:01, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

See also this thread on Drmies' talkpage: User talk:Drmies#What is your authority?. And this Trollerei (that's a German word, hence capitalization and spelling): Talk:Vietnam national football team#Unnecessary sections and tablets must be removed. -- Softlavender (talk) 04:13, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• NOTHERE. Drmies (talk) 04:28, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

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