Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive185

Undelete request

Resolved

 – Undeleted. J Milburn (talk) 14:11, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Hiya, somebody please undelete Talk:Feather Linux, the deletion has been contested and article has been restored again so talk page should be too. Thanks —Magic.Wiki (talk) 14:07, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Done. J Milburn (talk) 14:11, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Move Constantina Diṭă-Tomescu to Constantina Diţă-Tomescu

Please move Constantina Diṭă-Tomescu to Constantina Diţă-Tomescu. Reason: the letter ṭ (t with a comma below) is a letter not supported by many browsers, although it looks almost exactly like ţ (t with a cedilla below). ṭ is generally not used on Wikipedia, ţ is used instead. The name of the person is Romanian and the Romanian Wikipedia uses ro:Constantina Diţă-Tomescu. --BIL (talk) 09:04, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

 Done Actually, the original location seems to have had neither cedilla nor comma, but U+1D6E "t with dot below", unless my browser is fooling me. Compare: dot: ṭ comma: ț cedilla: ţ. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:15, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Just to confirm, the original was "T with dot below", not "T with comma below". I don't claim to know which is "most correct" here, though. — Gavia immer (talk) 20:50, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

See Romanian alphabet#Unicode and HTML. Funny it shows up just fine in Windows 2000 SP4, but then I'm ahead of the curve as I don't use Internet Expletive and I also know how to install fonts. ṭ (t with dot below) is clearly incorrect. ț (t with comma below) is correct as it is the only one found in Romanian. ţ (t with cedilla) is an approximation of ț, and about as accurate as interchanging β, ß, B, В, and β̞. — CharlotteWebb 17:38, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Since Constantina Diță-Tomescu (featuring our good friend T with comma below) does in fact exist now thanks to Future Perfect at Sunrise, we might want to have the article there instead. Again, I claim no paticular knowledge of Romanian orthography, apart from the link already posted - but articles should be at correctly-spelled titles. — Gavia immer (talk) 18:52, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree. Willfully corrupting our data for the sake of "compatibility" is the best way to discourage software vendors from improving multi-lingual support. — CharlotteWebb 15:03, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Ban evasion on Maltese language

Iamandrewrice (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) is disrupting the article and talk page using the usual 78.146-149.xxx.xxx IPs. The article is an old favorite of his together with Latin Europe which was semi-protected for 14 days recently after his persistent disruption there. I'm hoping I don't need to bother Alison with this again so I'm trying here before asking for checkuser assistance. EconomicsGuy (talk) 18:05, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

backlog at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage

Resolved

 –  Done --Rodhullandemu 18:49, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

There is now a 4-day backlog. Per the instructions there, I am now reporting it here. Thank you. NSH002 (talk) 17:43, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

 Doing... --Rodhullandemu 17:59, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt response. NSH002 (talk) 18:58, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Poll on Wikipedia talk:Bureaucrat removal

There's an ongoing poll on Wikipedia_talk:Bureaucrat_removal#The_obligatory_evil_thing.. — Aitias // discussion 20:10, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Disruptive IP, feedback requested

Resolved

 – Following feedback, IP blocked two months for disruption. Will protect article if necessary. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 14:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• 76.181.250.255 (talk)

Hi. I believe I'm dealing with a disruptive contributor here. He is tendentious, resorting to unencyclopedic sources ([1]) and rejecting community input. According to DE, those are strong signs. :) He has long been involved in an edit war at Gothic music, which was brought to my attention at my talk page by an uninvolved editor (here). Both of the involved editors had been warned before, but I gave each a final, explicit warning telling them that if they reverted again without seeking dispute resolution, it would lead to a block. I thing there's pretty clear evidence that this individual previously edited under these ips:

• 76.181.232.187 (talk)
• 71.72.84.29 (talk)

This edit war seems to have begun in May 2007 and slowly escalated since. Any editor who has attempted to change the article has been reverted.

Given his response to my encouragement to seek dispute resolution, I don't think there's any reason to believe that this contributor is going to stop. See here and here. This matches his general belligerence in edit summary at the article ("Get fucked") under this ip and in earlier responses to talk page notices under previous ip (again, I feel contrib history is pretty definitive of identity there): "Blow me. It's not "vandalism", dip shit, it's the truth. Get a life.", "'stfu Thanks.'", "you are a puerile little ass-clown and you need to stop wiki-stalking me. Danke".

I don't particularly care that he's been rude to me, but I see zero sign that he's intended to follow procedure ("I tried "dispute resolution". But somebody refuses to budge....Consensus means nothing....") He obviously feels like he has the right and only answer, and he's not willing to persuade others, but is insisting on pushing his position. Since I'm primarily cleaning up articles, not dealing with edit warriors and disruptive editors, I'd like some input from other admins as to whether it would be more appropriate to block the IP for longer for disruptive editing—say two months—with instructions for how to request unblock if at some point he decides to seek WP:DR or leave it alone or to allow his block to expire and block him again, for a longer time, if he resumes the edit war. I'm leaning the former. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 00:16, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

There are two possibilities on how to deal with this, but BOTH are going to require some additional input from you:

1. We can use targeted rangeblocks to cut down on his access to Wikipedia. Sometimes this can be helpful, but usually, if he is editing from an ISP that uses a huge set of dynamically assigned IP addresses, then rangeblocks are no more effective than whack-a-mole blocks of individual IPs. If you have a full list of the IPs he has used, we can possibly see if this in an option
2. We can semi-protect the target articles he tends to disrupt. It appears from your description that he is pretty much a single-purpose POV pusher, and if we take away his ability to edit his target articles, he will likely go away. This has worked in the past for particularly persistant disrupters (anyone remember the Walt Disney World vandal from about a year ago or so?), however we would need a list of articles he tends to target.

I would agree that this is a user who does not have the Project's best interest at heart, and the above methods should work to help protect the Project. We just need more info to enact one or the other... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:49, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

How about a two-month block of the single IP, followed by the type of measure described by Jayron32 if he evades the original block. Semiprotection of Gothic music would be the next idea. EdJohnston (talk) 14:45, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks so much for your feedback. I believe there have been 4 IPs within the past year and a half (I didn't list one, from about a year ago, because it made one edit), and, excepting that one, he seems to be stable within each for a length of time. His current IP is the only one that I see any sign of him using since October of 2008. At this point, his disruption seems to be contained to Gothic music, which is currently a redirect as a result of consensus at AfD. (This article has been contentious for a long time it seems, having previously been the site of an edit-war by banned user User:Leyasu.) The only other recent article contribution from this IP is this; note that I'm linking where it was reverted, which states why, but he didn't edit-war over it.

The Gothic music article could be semiprotected, but given his tendentious editing, I am concerned that he'll just register an account. So far as I understand autoblock, he'd be able to create a new account within 25 hours or so, right? (Technical stuff--not for me. :)) Then it would be a matter of waiting until he met the threshold to edit again. I think a medium range block of the current IP would probably be sufficient, since it should be easy to see if he changes IP by a return to old behavior. Fortunately, he doesn't jump around like some disruptive editors I've encountered. :/ --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 14:31, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually, forcing someone to register an account is a good idea. Accounts (as opposed to IPs) can be indef blocked, and serial sockpuppeteers can be additionally sanctioned. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 22:02, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Once the autoblock ends, what's to stop them registering a new account? </clueless about such things> --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 22:17, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Nothing, except that now they have violated more policies, which can result in further indef blocks. Its all about giving them enough rope to hang themselves with... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:49, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

How about, then, starting with EdJohnston's suggestion of two months for the IP, and, if this is ineffective, protecting Gothic music? I'd hate to protect an article space which might potentially be developed by a good faith contributor because of the actions of a single individual, but if he proves persistent it might be necessary. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:36, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. I hope it works. I don't expect it to work, but I hope it does. I am currently dealing with a persistant vandal at the Days of our Lives related articles. He changes IPs every few hours. We have had to protect a whole batch of those articles for like 6 months just to shut him down. Likewise, about a year ago it took a whole bunch 6-month semiprotections to end this guy's (userpage deleted, but trust me he was a PITA) reign of terror over Disney World and other Orlando-related articles. I hope and pray that EdJohnston's method works, I really do. I have just become jaded from being here too long, and have little faith that anything but the "nuclear option" really works for these persistant types. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:03, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I understand. I have my own scorched earth at Dapto High School. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:57, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Help handling disruptive editor

I've been dealing with an editor who has been changing his IP address in order to evade blocks. The first two were User talk:98.180.196.203 and User talk:98.180.208.214. He has now moved on to 98.180.202.52. If another admin could help me keep an eye on this situation (and also assure that I don't get too happy with the block button), I'd appreciate it. :-) faithless (^speak) 07:07, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Update: He is now also using 98.180.202.250. faithless (^speak) 07:09, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

You are going to have to specify about what's he's doing. Is there some article, some user, something being attacked? Random IP addresses aren't clear. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 07:45, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

By this edit [2], he appears to be undoing merge consensus to make a point. Dayewalker (talk) 07:53, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

The IP editor has had at least two AN/I threads about his activitities in 2008 (he usually tries to restore the merged/redirected article Simon Tam and Planet Express first, without discussion). User:EEMIV and I have been dealing with this editor for ages, but he is (obviously) a dynamic IP, and RFP doesn't protect redirects for longer than a month. Blocking doesn't have any long-lasting effect. – sgeureka ^t•c 09:55, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

• I have protected the redirects at Simon Tam and Planet Express (which have previously been protected for the same reason). Guy (Help!) 10:07, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
• If the dynamic IP is within a range that could be blocked with minimal collateral, I would also suggest taking that action if this has been going on for so long. Hiberniantears (talk) 20:39, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Question about adoptions

Resolved

 – For the record this kind of thing is best asked at WT:ADOPT –xeno (talk) 19:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I was just wondering, can you be adopted by more than one user? Is there any limitation to how many people can adopt a single user?

Please reply on my talk page.

Axmann8 (talk) 19:50, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and no. –xeno (talk) 19:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Esasus removing PROD tags from articles

Resolved

- anyone is allowed to remove PROD tag from any article, for any reason. WilyD 22:08, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for telling me what I already knew. §FreeRangeFrog 00:17, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

See [3], [4], [5], [6]. The only "source" he added to all of these was a link to a forum, which I'm sure he knows is hardly WP:RS. Two of these were already AfD'ed and deleted (Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2007 Worf Music Awards). I don't want to assume bad faith, but it seems Esasus wants to make everyone waste their time and energy by forcing these to go to AfD, where they will surely be deleted anyway. I'm not sure why. Can the rest of these not be deleted simply on the basis of the closed AfD? I don't have a problem with rescuing articles, on the contrary, but this seems to border on the disruptive. §FreeRangeFrog 21:58, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

If they've been AFD'd and the content is identical or substantially similar they can be {{db-repost}}'d. Exxolon (talk) 22:05, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

No, in this case they haven't. The addition of these to another afd wasn't handled ideally. 87.112.17.229 (talk) 22:11, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, anyone can remove a prod for any reason, good faith or bad. It's difficult to say that the AfD tag applies to these articles too, as these articles didn't have "this article is being discussed for deletion" tags added to them. I guess the closing admin didn't feel comfortable with deleting the related articles, and while all those opining for delete make comments that strongly suggest they'd be in favour of deleting them all, not one actually says "delete them all" or the like. AfD voters can be vexingly unclear, sometimes. I think you should bulk afd the remainders, link to the old discussion in the new one, and link to the new discussion in the talk page of the old. I'd guess that the remainders will get SNOWed, but you never know. 87.112.17.229 (talk) 22:11, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• I removed the proposed deletion tags for the "Worf Music Awards" because I do not agree that the articles should be deleted without discussion (as is my right). The Worf Music Awards have been around since 2002, and, in my opinion, is a notable award. It is not my intent to "make everyone waste their time and energy" (as stated by "User:FreeRangeFrog"), and it is unverifiable speculation that these articles will be "deleted anyway" if they go to AfD. Esasus (talk) 22:14, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Since they have been deleted, clearly not... --Cameron Scott (talk) 23:13, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• Oooh, WP:NFT - a blast from the past, those gentler days when people were just that bit less viciously determined to get their new thing on Wikipedia. Guy (Help!) 10:29, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

History merge

Can someone merge the history of Gary Locke (politician) to Gary Locke? The history seems to have gotten lost in a tangle of moves and redirects, also involving Gary Locke (disambiguation). Right now Gary Locke, the main article, does not have its complete history, which needs to be fixed. 140.247.155.54 (talk) 03:35, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Done. Keegan^talk 07:00, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

disruptive editor

Resolved

 – Future requests of this nature should please go to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Sockpuppets requesting to be blocked Guy (Help!) 08:46, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Daedalus969has been very disruptive attacking other editors for no reason i think he should be blocked for a period of 24 hours to cool downI Am The Hollaback Boy (talk) 07:47, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I just posted at AIV, but the above user I Am The Hollaback Boy (talk · contribs) is an obvious sock of banned user The Hollabck Girl and is only here to disrupt and taunt [7] [8]. His report here is further evidence of that. Can some admin help clean this up, please? Thanks in advance. Dayewalker (talk) 07:49, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

This is, I think, the uber-Plaxico. //roux   08:03, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

i think we should give daedulus some slack and instead block that annoying day walker and while you're at it why not me btw whats a plaxicoI Am The Hollaback Boy (talk) 08:07, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Holocaust denial related vandalism

Resolved

 – WilliamH (talk) 11:04, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Note the bigotry fueled vandalism discussed here on the "Committee for the Open Debate on the Holocaust". At first I undid edits changing Holocaust denier to Holocaust revisionist on Arthur Butz and Jürgen Graf, however given that thread, nothing is left to the imagination. User:68.12.36.69 has already got into hot water and been blocked multiple times - User:68.13.242.42 continues the pattern and geolocates to the same place. I have therefore blocked the latter for two weeks. WilliamH (talk) 20:45, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

It does seem prudent to assume they're probably the same person. Left a brief note for this last IP; here's hoping it doesn't fall on deaf ears. – Luna Santin (talk) 21:45, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• The consensus is, is that the term is Holocaust denier, not revisionist. This has been discussed repeatedly, at the Holocaust denial talk page for instance. Good faith is clearly not the intent here, and they have as much chance at changing a 5 year long consensus as they do, um, explaining why millions of Jews vanished during the war. WilliamH (talk) 21:55, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• Please don't mistake my politeness for permissiveness -- apologies if I come across that way. :) – Luna Santin (talk) 22:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

No problem at all Luna, thanks for your help. WilliamH (talk) 11:04, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I need help on...

An article, which is considered "Good Articl" but says a lot of lies. Britney Spears's Article says that she is a soprano, i create this section on it discussion and nobody answers me. So, i need an administrator hel to change every lie which says the article, cuz wikipedia is always true. Thanks!. --190.29.158.79 (talk) 00:51, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

You do not need an administrator to edit the page. It is semi-protected which means any auto-confirmed user may edit the article. Please read WP:Signup for details about the benefits of creating an account on Wikipedia. Also if you can find a reliable reference for your claims, then feel free to change it. If you want, I will change this for you, but first you need to find a reliable reference supporting your claims. Jerry teps (talk) 01:10, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes; there is no apparent need for Admin intervention here just yet; you probably need to discuss your changes on the Talk page if other editors are reverting your edits. --Rodhullandemu 01:15, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

It would appear we do a poor job of advertising Category:Wikipedia semi-protected edit requests. MBisanz ^talk 02:31, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Since {{editsemiprotected}} is explicitly mentioned in the information seen by anons when they click "view source", it seems like this one probably didn't. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 11:12, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Arbitration Committee block of Chergles

The Arbitration Committee has announced that it has blocked Chergles (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) as a sock of already banned user Archtransit (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). For more information, please see Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Block of User:Chergles.

On behalf of the Arbitration Committee, Ryan Postlethwaite^{See the mess I've created or let's have banter} 13:50, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

FYI re soapboxing banned editor

Just for reference, there's a bit of activity regarding User:Posturewriter at present. This banned editor lost access to his/her talk page due to soapboxing, and shortly thereafter popped up with an IP, 203.87.117.105, at Editors Assistance asking for some of his/her combatants to be blocked. A couple of editors informed him/her that it would be best to go through ArbCom if an unblock was desired, but the point was missed. Another editor has released the talk page block on the main account and warned that future disruption and soapboxing outside of a block review request would respond with another lockdown. Since that outlet is now available, I've blocked the IP for a couple weeks anon-only (happy to have comments on the appropriateness of this). I'd suggest that editors keep an eye on the talk pages the IP was engaging, in case the point is missed again. Tony Fox (arf!) 17:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• Good job. I archived the EA request. Guy (Help!) 18:54, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

So far, no unblock request or talk page abuse at User talk:Posturewriter. Ho hum. SHEFFIELDSTEEL^TALK 21:46, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Azxten

User:Azxten is here mostly to promote his site, renewable-energy-future.com. See his contribs. We can deal with that. I think my removals of this link have frustrated him now, because he's just started looking through my contribs and he is reverting my removals of other people's spam links. Would someone have a word with him before this gets out of control? Thanks. - MrOllie (talk) 18:34, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

From azxten:

Right, I add content to articles and then reference my site which is where the content came from. Apparently the content is good enough to stay but my reference is against the rules. That is completely stupid in my opinion. Oh well, wikipedia can do without my help.. I'm just annoyed that the content I've contributed will stay even if I don't. I read the "rule" links that I'm sent about why my site isn't a reliable source but it says right in the reliable source page that a reliable source is only needed if the content is likely to be challenged which none of mine is.

What a great community. I build content for you, you remove my reference to where it came from, link me to a rule that I didn't violate when you read the specifics, then I break another "3 edits" rule when trying to point out I haven't broken the rule and so now I can't edit anymore. THEN I'm told to use the "discussion" page, hey maybe you should have told me that before I made 3 edits! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Azxten (talk • contribs) 18:41, 24 February 2009

You appear to have misunderstood WP:V. When it states "any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation"; what it means is that content that is unlikely to be challenged does not require a source. If a source is used, then it should meet the WP:RS guidelines. If you are correct, and none of your content is likely to be challenged, then no source reference is needed.

On your contributions to Wikipedia, all edit windows clearly state "You irrevocably agree to release your contributions under the GFDL", and all article windows include links to WP:COPYRIGHT. By editing Wikipedia, you release your contributions under that license. Just because you later decide to leave Wikipedia does not mean that you can take your contributions with you. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 20:16, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

request help in moving page

hello,

can someone please take a look into Talk:Province_of_Bolzano-Bozen/Naming#Province_of_Bolzano.2FBozen? A vote has taken place there to move Province of Bolzano-Bozen to Province of Bolzano/Bozen. Thank you. Gryffindor (talk) 20:19, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

You are probably going to want to add a request to WP:RM and they will take it from there. - NeutralHomer • Talk • February 24, 2009 @ 20:21

Editor modified a talk page message of mine without permission

Resolved

 – No admin action needed here. --Tone 17:12, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi. An editor modified a talk page message of mine here. I think that he did it knowing it was against Wikipedia policy, and there was a similar incident previously by another editor that he collaborated with. I deleted it, but it seems that some administrator action might be appropriate, for example a block. Thank you. --Bob K31416 (talk) 17:04, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see how adding an image to a section is modifying your message. Tan | 39 17:09, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

(ec) I don't think this was modifying your comment, it was adding a picture to the whole section. No reason for any sanctions, I'd say. Could you provide evidence for other incidents, as you mention? --Tone 17:10, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

This explains the comment. --Tone 17:12, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Ah, but that wasn't the situation that I was reporting. Please check the link that I gave above, where the image is entirely in my message. Thank you.

P.S. I'm working on getting the info related to the other incident. Perhaps the resolved template is premature? After all, the resolved template was put up only 8 minutes after my first message and before I had a chance to respond to any comments. Thank you. --Bob K31416 (talk) 17:59, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with the above. Since he placed the image on its own line, it's not modifying your message. Perhaps he should have signed the image comment to make it clear who left it there, though. –xeno (talk) 18:05, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for your response.

I started the section with the following edit:

---

== Damaged telephone service in roof knocking section ==

The following excerpt is from the Roof knocking section of the article.

etc. ... Bob K31416 (talk) xx:xx, xx February 2009 (UTC)

---

Now, would someone be allowed to put an unsigned contribution like so:

---

== Damaged telephone service in roof knocking section ==

How many Israelis and Gazans does it take to make a telephone call? Beats me!

The following excerpt is from the Roof knocking section of the article.

etc. ... Bob K31416 (talk) xx:xx, xx February 2009 (UTC)

---

Now is placing a picture with caption there any different? It implicitly ascribes something to me that I didn't put there. Other editors would think that I put that image there and would hold me responsible for it in their minds if they found it offensive. --Bob K31416 (talk) 18:43, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

No, they wouldn't, because the image is rendered alongside the text, rather than flowed into the paragraph. I've seen this happen on Village pump threads before. If they do, you can point them to the history. Moreover, jumping straight to ANI for a minor issue best worked out at the talk page of the user in question is rather extreme. I think a better option would have been to add a caption including the username of the user who added it. Dcoetzee 19:55, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

(outdent)So let me see if I'm following what happened correctly. Sean.hoyland added a picture with a caption to the beginning of the dicussion, possibly in an attempt to be humorous. You, Bob K31416, removed it, with an edit summary expressing that you felt it was a modificaton of your comments. Sean.hoyland later readded it with a caption that read "This image is endorsed by User:Sean.hoyland and no other users and especially not Bob who had no part in it's creation or placement.", a comment previous to the image that reads <!-- This image starts here and is an entirely seperate entity from the discussions that precede and follow it. --> and a comment after that reads <!-- This image ends here. Better Bob ? :) --> You have not discussed it on the Sean.hoyland's talk page or removed it since.

Sean.hoyland (who I see has not been notified of this thread), made an attempt to address your concerns after you objected. While the humor may or may not have been appropriate for the talk page of a surely contentious article, where exactly is the problem that requires admin intervention? Since you posted quite a bit more after this thread was marked as resolved, I assume you still want some kind of admin intervention.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 20:25, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm not pursuing this anymore. Thank you everyone for your responses. --Bob K31416 (talk) 22:50, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

FYI, I opened up a discussion for a suggested change to the guidelines here. --Bob K31416 (talk) 23:30, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Page histories returning SQL errors

Resolved

 – See Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)

[FYI cross-posting from Wikipedia talk:Village pump (technical)] For any Talk pages in any namespaces, I am seeing the following message when trying to view the page histories:

A database query syntax error has occurred. This may indicate a bug in the software. The last attempted database query was:

(SQL query hidden)

from within function "IndexPager::reallyDoQuery (PageHistoryPager)". MySQL returned error "1054: Unknown column 'ts_tags' in 'field list' (10.0.6.22)".

Any idea what's up? Is this affecting everyone else? --Dynaflow babble 22:23, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and it's actually all histories (modified header). –xeno (talk) 22:27, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Good to know it's not just me ... and bad at the same time. --Dynaflow babble 22:28, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Page histories

I can not view page histories anymore:

Database error A database query syntax error has occurred. This may indicate a bug in the software. The last attempted database query was:

(SQL query hidden)

from within function "IndexPager::reallyDoQuery (PageHistoryPager)". MySQL returned error "1054: Unknown column 'ts_tags' in 'field list'

Is it just me? — Aitias // discussion 22:27, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

• Look up there ^^^ a bit. Black Kite 22:29, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

History page has disappeared for Preston University

I don't know how it happened but the history page has disappeared for the Preston University article. I would really appreciate someone's assitance on this. Thanks TallMagic (talk) 22:28, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

They appear to be functional again...  GARDEN  22:31, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Here's the explanation: Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#DB error --Saddhiyama (talk) 22:34, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

• It's all fixed now; apparently a fix to disable slow tag search, whatever that is, broke the page history. Stifle (talk) 22:35, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Well to whoever fixed it, THANK YOU! TallMagic (talk) 00:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Fringe science

The above-linked Arbitration case has been closed and the final decision published.

ScienceApologist is banned from editing any article relating to fringe science topics, broadly construed, for a period of six months. ScienceApologist is free to edit the talk pages of such articles. Pcarbonn is admonished for needlessly stoking the fires of disputes in the area of fringe science, and is encouraged to direct his efforts elsewhere.

All editors in the disputed area are warned that further disruptive editing in the disputed area will be viewed dimly by the Committee, and may lead to further sanctions being imposed. Editors in the disputed area are encouraged to seek to engage in formal mediation to help establish consensus when coverage of fringe science in an article or group of articles is under dispute. While mediation is not binding, editors are further encouraged to abide by the results of mediation (and other dispute resolution).

For the Arbitration Committee, Gazimoff 00:56, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Misinformation? Or not.

This request is probably misplaced; if so, forgive me (I'm in a huge "RL" rush right now) and feel free to move it where it better belongs.

This person has made a short series of alterations. I'm sure one is wrong, and have reverted it. The others, I don't know. They could be corrections, or they could be insidious vandalism (debasement by alteration to well-expressed, plausible misinformation). Could somebody who knows about C19 USA, or is willing to put some time into finding about it, take a look? -- Hoary (talk) 01:33, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Improperly resolved move request at talk:Mogilev

A move request for Mahilyow > Mogilev failed to gain consensus, with three editors in favour and four opposed since it was opened, on February 4. Administrator User:DrKiernan closed the request and moved the article anyway, insisting that the the request was concluded properly. Would one or two neutral admins please review the article move? Thanks. —Michael Z. 2009-02-17 18:12 z

Under discussion now at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#DrKiernan_moving_articles_against_consensus, as well as talk:Mogilev. —Michael Z. 2009-02-21 01:00 z

(archiving comment with non-standard timestamps. Fram (talk) 08:02, 25 February 2009 (UTC))

Lots of articles "doing no harm" recently...

Hi. I don't know if I'm entirely in the right place here, but I've noticed something quite curious going on at WP:AFD today. Two separate editors have been adding keep and strong keep votes within minutes of each other, each claiming the article in question should stay because "the article does no harm." As this seems an unusual phrase (especially in the context of voting in an AFD process), I thought I'd bring it up here and see what the general consensus on an incident like this would be?

Here's the first set of "does no harms": 1, 2, and 3 ... and here's the second one 4. Am I just being paranoid or is something fishy going on here? Richard Hock (talk) 15:44, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Worthy of note... All of these are AfDs initiated by either User:ScienceApologist or User:Ricky81682. caknuck _° is a silly pudding 16:06, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

It's possible that some user has got the wrong end of the stick as far as WP:BLP is concerned... and that someone else has picked up on it... but it's a stretch. SHEFFIELDSTEEL^TALK 16:36, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

(in response to Caknuck) Am I the only one who sees a bit of heavy-handed irony with those !votes? Or is the leap from SA's well-known stance on fringe/voodoo-medicine to the Hippocratic Oath a bit of a stretch? Badger Drink (talk) 08:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• Northwestgnome (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and his comments are strangely reminiscent of Esasus (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), for sure. Guy (Help!) 16:41, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

You might want to point them to WP:NOHARM and let them know that the closing admin is likely to discount such arguments. Skomorokh 17:36, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

I've notified Northwestgnome and Esasus that their names were mentioned here. EdJohnston (talk) 19:02, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

I was puzzled by Esasus' removal of a PROD on Rowan of the Wood, given the comments in the history of the article, which mirror the discussion here. I left a message on his talk page asking if it was OK for me to restore the PROD given that his edits did nothing to help the subject squeak past WP:BK. That article certainly does no harm, but that's not the point. §FreeRangeFrog 19:08, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

• I have recieved the above mesage and I agree that "no harm" is a poor argument. If the closing admin chooses to discount such argument then so be it. In the future I will endevour to better explain my reasons on such issues. As far as the isue of removing a PROD, it is my understanding that it is my right to do so. Esasus (talk) 20:26, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

• I think most of the problem was with two accounts making the same argument in near-identical words, something that always raises eyebrows here. Guy (Help!) 21:34, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

The expression "do no harm" is found in the oath doctors take (I forget the spelling, well, not really see: Primum non nocere) and in Wiccan doctrine. I'm not related to Esasus. Northwestgnome (talk) 16:27, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Check out Ahimsa as well. I might be wrong about the Wiccans. Northwestgnome (talk) 16:40, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't think the Hypocritic Oath [sic] adapts well to inclusion/deletion debates. The do-no-harm mantra is a national joke more than anything, when medical error claims more lives than cars, guns, and drugs (the other things us Americans love). I'd be surprised if anyone takes your arguments seriously. — CharlotteWebb 17:04, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't defending my argument in the AfD, which was fairly weak, but myself against the charge of being a sockpuppet by pointing out how common the expression "do no harm" is. BTW the practice of medicine is very dangerous, which is why "first, do no harm" was said in the first place. Northwestgnome (talk) 17:09, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

BTW my edit was in support of an article on a minor artist in South Africa. The material seemed to be true, although the sources were hard to verify and the article, well, did no harm. Northwestgnome (talk) 16:57, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm going to keep saying "it does no harm" in AfD debates but only if there is some other argument for keeping. :-) Northwestgnome (talk) 17:19, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

In my view, while I'm not sure about User:Esasus's prod removals, those are his right. He has a right to comment at AFD with "do not harm" I guess but that approaches the silliness of using the five pillars or I like it or whatever and the closing admin can consider it. I also don't know what I did to earn the somewhat nasty personal attack at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bushra Khalil but this version seemed like a reasonable redirect to me. I disagree with replacing the prod notice at Rowan of the Wood. Just list it at AFD and be done with it. Prod is prod and just follow what it's for. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 23:56, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Maybe they just share a lot of interests: are there any studies available on Deletion by Geographic Location (or Deletion by Political Incorrectness Gone Mad?) 1 2 Richard Hock (talk) 14:57, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I also notice that my question was not answered in Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/David_Kuijers. Northwestgnome (talk) 21:40, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I responded on your talk page. Frankly, I find a suggestion that I only nominated that article because he is a "politically incorrect" person (your words, not mine) insulting. I nominated the article because I felt it wasn't notable enough. As I discussed, regardless of where the person was born or whatever color he is, an article that consists of an artist who just has written a book about himself and just has a gallery is at least questionable. Suggestions otherwise in my opinion as asinine given that it is solely based on the view of a single AFD. At least have some history of AFD nominations before you start insulting users. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 11:39, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Attack site

Resolved

 – No action required at this time. JoshuaZ (talk) 16:58, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

www.theduchyofeffenhauer.com. Owner (Tony Sayles) or more likely Mike Sales is indef blocked (Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Tom_Sayle). See User_talk:Jimbo_Wales#COMPLAINT. Kittybrewster ☎ 09:09, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• There are no links in mainspace, and the IP is blocked by Gwen Gale as evading another block. What else needs doing? Guy (Help!) 09:20, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Blacklist as spam? Kittybrewster ☎ 09:24, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Is it being spammed? --Carnildo (talk) 09:29, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

How bizarre, that complaint on Wales' talk page. §FreeRangeFrog 09:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I think the guy is not playing with a full deck, to put it as charitably as one can. Read the website - it's a mixture of an unsophisticated scam and outright delusion. I do not think English is his first language, either. Much of what he writes is barely comprehensible. As abuse goes this is low-level and appears well-contained, so I don't see what further action is required other than "watchful waiting", a process in which I am sure Kittybrewster will be a willing participant. Guy (Help!) 09:56, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The header of this section is practically an engraved invitation for me to dig up the WP:BADSITES dead horse again, but I can't see how anybody would apply this concept in any way to the site in question... it's got a small caption about how the author thinks Wikipedia is suppressing them, but how does that make it an "attack site"? It's too incoherent to really communicate anything, other than that apparently somebody is claiming to have a title of nobility over an allegedly sovereign nation, whose location isn't even actually mentioned in the site. *Dan T.* (talk) 13:43, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

So don't, because your input is utterly unnecessary and counter-productive, everything that needs doing had already been done, and you will only stir up unnecessary drama and make yourself look even more like a mission poster into the bargain. Guy (Help!) 18:50, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Er - that last comment seems very aggressive JzG - was that really necessary? Exxolon (talk) 19:23, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Probably as unnecessary as Dan's trolling, I will admit. Ho hum. Guy (Help!) 23:07, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh-no-he-di-int!!! Badger Drink (talk) 08:36, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Is this appropriate ?

Resolved

 – move along, nothing to see here. –xeno (talk) 22:52, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I check newpages for vandalism and what not and during my patrol I saw something rather odd:

SemBubenny moved the contents of this talk page to SemBubenny/ar2 | here. No problem there. Stuff is moved all the time. It was the next move that caught my I. He then proceeds to delete the contents of his talk page here. Now, if there's nothing wrong with this, feel free to delete this, dimsiss this, whatever, but I thought we weren't to delete the contents of our page, except in really unusual cases (death threats..etc....). Like I said, if I'm wrong, just dismiss this and leave a brief note here or on my page - just so I know and don't bug you again. Thanks — Kosh _{Naluboutes, Nalubotes} ^{Aeria gloris, Aeria gloris} 21:55, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

A user can delete the contents of their talk page at will, except for current block notices, IIRC. – ukexpat (talk) 22:01, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

No, editors may blank their own talk pages more or less at will, but deletion is highly inappropriate and rarely permissible. DuncanHill (talk) 22:07, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Dang I was temporarily confusing blanking with deleting. It's been a long day... – ukexpat (talk) 22:13, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I hate to sound melodramatic but deleting one's own talk page seems like abuse of the tools to me. To clarify: I think this user should undelete the page before someone else does. SHEFFIELDSTEEL^TALK 22:14, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm glad an admin came out and said it before I had to! DuncanHill (talk) 22:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Isn't this exactly what User:Manhattan Samurai did to evade scrutiny? Moved tpage to another page, blanked, tagged with {{db-author}}? //roux   22:16, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Restored. It was deleted along with a bunch of my other user subpages. - 7-bubёn >t 22:19, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Cool. Cancel DRAM-CON one. SHEFFIELDSTEEL^TALK 22:21, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Could you make User:Mikkalai and User talk:Mikkalai into redirects to your current name for clarity? Also, there is something very odd going on with the revision histories of those pages. DuncanHill (talk) 22:23, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

This account has right to vanish. - 7-bubёn >t 22:27, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I thought it was a rename, not an RTV. If it was an RTV then your old contributions wouldn't shew under your current name. DuncanHill (talk) 22:33, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

If it was a RTV, then he wouldn't have a new name: "The "right to vanish" is not a "right to a fresh start" under a new identity." (bolded in the WP:RTV page, not by me). It continues with "Vanished users have no right to silently return under a new identity." Fram (talk) 08:15, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Also User talk:Mikkalai/ar1 should be undeleted. DuncanHill (talk) 22:24, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

It was moved to User talk:SemBubenny/ar1 due to name change. - 7-bubёn >t 22:26, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Then there is a hell of a lot of history missing from it - and attempts to look at the history produce database errors. DuncanHill (talk) 22:27, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Someone hacked an editnotice

Resolved

 – Users have been able to put edit notices in their userspace for some time, and someone's edit was misplaced. –xeno (talk) 04:35, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

This can't be good. Will someone speak to the malfeasor in a language he comprehends? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kivel (talk • contribs) 01:57, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Er. . . evidently I don't understand how these things work because I thought that was impossible except for admins. Does that not apply to userspace? Chick Bowen 03:22, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

It is not a publicly used template, just one a user made for themselves. Chillum 03:25, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I think my confusion was that I assumed they worked like .js and .css pages, editable only by admins and the user in question. Perhaps they should. . . Chick Bowen 03:34, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

It looks like an innocent mistake in using the Editnotice instead of the talk page to discuss. No need to call him a "malfeasor" over this mistake. hbdragon88 (talk) 03:27, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Alex Rodriguez needs semiprotection

Resolved

 – Page protected. — Jake Wartenberg 04:39, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

The request at RfPP is being ignored and this is fairly urgent. For some reason the last protection was for only two days, after it had just come off of two week protection. I would think semiprotection for several months would be warranted. Enigma^msg 03:48, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• Semi'd for two weeks. We'll see how it goes after that. Tony Fox (arf!) 04:05, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• • Recommend move-protection be indefinite. Thanks, Enigma^msg 04:09, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Why? — Aitias // discussion 04:12, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

High value target, unlikely to be moved without discussion. –xeno (talk) 04:34, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

10 years, $275 million? High value, indeed! Badger Drink (talk) 09:09, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Quick request

Resolved

 – — neuro^(talk) 11:11, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi there. I was wondering if a nice admin could restore the history of User:Stepshep/Sandbox.js; I'm looking for a diff I typed down about an IP and think it might be there. Thank you, §hep^Talk 01:01, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, there are no edits there by anyone other than your logged-in name but it's all restored, I think. If you have the IP address, we can look for it that way. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 01:14, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Seems I must have been thinking of the wrong page... Thaks, §hep^Talk 02:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Daniel Westling and Daniel, Duke of Västergötland

Resolved

 – Redirected back and deleted redirect afterward. Histories merged as good as it can get. --Tone 14:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Daniel Westling is engaged to the heir to the throne of Sweden. Once they marry, which is probably not till 2010, he may be given the title of Duke of Västergötland, but he does not yet have that title. Somebody moved the name article to the title article, and now the redirect has been removed. The article should be at Daniel Westling, but the edit history is at Daniel, Duke of Västergötland. Could some kind admin fix that? Thank you. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 01:07, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Ryulong's indefinite semi protections

Resolved

 – We're trying unprotection on most of the pages, and if that goes well, probably opening up to nearly all of them (Google and Brazil are probably very high value and visibility targets, even though Ryulong was amenable to lowering them it is this commentators opinion that they would go right back up, but anyone else should feel free to try unprotection on them.) –xeno (talk) 14:51, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I have been going through WP:INDEFSEMI and lowering protections that have been in place for lengthy periods of time. I came across a few that have been in place for a minimum of six months, and in some cases upwards of twenty set by Ryulong (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) that requested his consult before lowering, so I asked him about all of them and received a curt "No" in response. I'm here to determine whether there is consensus for the following articles to remain indefinitely semi protected, this being the encylopedia anyone can edit. –xeno (talk) 23:13, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

• Haim Saban
• Shuki Levy
• VR Troopers
• Saban Entertainment both unprotected by Fabrictramp
  • The above four appear all appear to be related to a campaign of vandalism to these related topics around June 2007. –xeno (talk) 01:18, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
    • Trying unprotection on the two non-blp's and if things go well, we'll try opening it up to the others. –xeno (talk) 14:56, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• Google
• Brazil
  • ^^ These two are probably high enough visibility to warrant it. –xeno (talk) 02:03, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• Denny Crane unprotected by Black Kite
• Fraud unprotected by Black Kite
• William Prunier unprotected by Black Kite
• Triple H unprotected per [9]

This is indeed the encyclopedia anyone can edit, and unless there's a compelling reason not to they should ne unprotected. In addition, "no" it not an acceptable answer to a perfectly civil and reasonable question. Ryulong needs to improve his interaction in these circumstances. RxS (talk) 23:25, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Here's my take on them. This is just my opinion, and other opinions are equally valid.:

• Shuki Levy appeared to be vandalized by a single IP hopping vandal for a few months almost two years ago. Without getting into issues of stepping on toes, this is one I'd be willing to unprotect and watch list, ready to deal with vandalism if it starts up again.
• Saban Entertainment had sporadic IP vandalism, again almost two years ago, mostly from a single IP. I would have declined to semi-protect in the first place, instead dealing with the IP editor directly. I think an unprotect is in order here.
• VR Troopers had a number of productive IP edits in the months before the block, with only two days of IP vandalism right before the block that happened 20 months ago. IMO, the block protect shouldn't have been for more than a week.

No time to properly review the others right now.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 23:32, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

• No reason for William Prunier to stay protected that I can see - bit of socking 8 months ago. Unprotected this one and watchlisted it. Will have a look at the others when I have time. Black Kite 23:40, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Google should probably stay protected. Other than that, I don't know. J.delanoy^gabs_adds 23:42, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Brazil looks like a good candidate for staying protected. Triple H got Gr*wped in 2007 and has been protected since. I have unprotected and watchlisted Fraud - this was one IP vandal in 2007. Black Kite 23:49, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

In these cases (Brazil and Google) ideally I would like to try unprotected and if the vandalism is too much then semi protect with an expiry (3, 6, 12 months, but not indef). –xeno (talk) 23:53, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Denny Crane - same as Fraud. Would appreciate some more input on the others. Black Kite 00:11, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The first four all seem to be related, and I would hazard a guess that the vandal from 2007 has moved on by now. –xeno (talk) 00:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I do find it gets tiresome with alot of articles continually reverting vandals - ghost, lion, vampire and schizophrenia and whales for some reason - Blue Whale are some I have indef semi'ed in the past. Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The worst ones on my watchlist are penguins (understandable) and deserts (huh?) Hesperian 00:54, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm not against semi-protection in cases of exhausting vandalism, I just feel that expiries should always be set. Some of the articles I unprotected were that way since 2006 (I believe, before expiries were available, but nonetheless...). –xeno (talk) 00:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh sorry, they are not all vandals Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:19, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I have requested indef semi-protection on one article (which was granted after going through 11 rounds of semi-protection in 10 months in 2007) and I indefinitely semi-protected Big Mac after watching it get vandalized into unrecognizability in just a few days by IP editors. Oh yes, I also indef'd Joe Biden and Queer, which should stay semi-protected for (at least) four years and permanently, respectively. Horologium (talk) 01:07, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The first four pages (Shuki Levy, Haim Saban, Saban Entertainment, and VR Troopers) have been the target of a single IP hopping abuser who pops up occasionally to vandalize these and several other articles. These are the only ones that I would prefer remain semiprotected because

1. Two of them are BLPs that attract vandalism we do not want
2. And the vandalism that is introduced into the articles to begin with is BLP sensitive.

Also, I didn't have a hell of a lot of time to respond to xeno earlier.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 01:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm willing to keep a close eye on these articles (including a separate watchlist), and if the issues you mention re-occur, I'm fine with re-protecting for a definite period of time. Would that be ok? –xeno (talk) 01:22, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I really do not think unprotection is a good choice for these pages. If, by some chance, there's an IP editor who wants to edit the pages and they show up and go to the talk page, then maybe it's time for unprotection. Unprotecting just because it's been protected for a long time in my opinion is not a good reason to unprotect sensitive BLPs, especially when it's been determined that they have been vandalized in the past.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 01:50, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Hrm, ok the BLPs I'll concede if you insist, and I think Google, Brazil are high enough visibility to require it as well. Can we let VR Troopers (and possibly Saban Entertainment) off the hook to see how it goes? Old shows like that are something I could see a knowledgable IP dropping in an improvement or two quickly if required, but not so important that it would cause them to visit the talk page. (This is how I used to edit as an IP) –xeno (talk) 02:00, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

we have consistently refused to adopt a policy to semiprotect all BLPs, in favor of devising other ways of dealing with the problem, and I see no reason why these should be more sensitive than the general run. anyway, the only possible way to find out is to unprotect, and see. Otherwise, you'll never be able to tell. DGG (talk) 03:30, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

(e/c) I agree 100%. There are other methods of dealing with BLP issues than indefinite semi protection. Also, we must remember that this is a wiki and one that anyone can edit. Protection is simply here to protect articles from imminent harm, and unless the articles in question are still in harms way than protection no longer has a purpose and ultimately is going against the statement of principles. I am in support of all of them being unprotected, even including Google. I mean, we can always reprotect it. Tiptoety ^talk 03:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Endorse the continued semi-protection of Saban, Levy, and Prunier. I understand that proactive semi-protection of vulnerable BLPs has been consistently rejected (disclaimer: I think this is nuts), but once articles are shown to be vulnerable, the least we could do (not literally) is reactively semi-protect. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 03:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Swifter blocking of IP ranges would be more effective as this can at least potentially prevent the vandal from creating accounts with which to circumvent the semi-protection and manipulate admins into disrupting the article more than the vandals themselves would have by applying full protection (of what might actually be the vandal's preferred version—there could be a reverse-psychology element to this, who knows… ). Anyway I'm tempted to add an obligatory rant about flaggedrevs. — CharlotteWebb 03:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

A tremendous number of articles get disrupted once every year or two. Some more often--many school articles here get disrupted several times a term, & the disruption often involve BLP violations. Should we semi them all indefinitely? (usually when I encounter this I semi for a week, and if repeated, for the rest of the term--not years on end) Similarly for popular media figures and well known politicians. Those are the sort of articles where beginners often start is a useful way. I too favored semi protecting all blps as simpler than flagged revisions. But that approach was rejected. so if we semi permanently, it should be only the ones that are known to be very frequently and disruptively edited. DGG (talk) 13:20, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Just for your information: The fair-use rationale in a picture used in the Triple H article was "vandalized" earlier today. Oceanh (talk) 13:59, 23 February 2009 (UTC).

So it looks like we're down to discussing Haim Saban, Saban Entertainment, Shuki Levy, VR Troopers. I'm of the opinion that they should all be unprotected. Unfortunately, WP:PROTECT is not as clear as I'd like on this, but my take on it is that these were temporary disruptions by a single or small group of individuals. I've added all four to my watchlist so I can help with any vandalism, and I'm willing to temporarily protect them myself if future vandalism makes it necessary. Believe me, I get as sick as anyone about dealing with vandalism. I've been playing whack-a-mole for a week with a meatpuppet farm that has me tearing my hair out. But one of the founding principles of wikipedia is that you don't have to sign up for an account to edit, so to me that means vandalism must be really persistent for indef semi-protection to be justified.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 15:47, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

If these pages get unprotected, then they'll be hit by the vandalism. This user's been active since 2006. And everytime I block one of the ranges on the ISP he uses, he finds a new ISP. He hasn't shown up for a few weeks now, but he consistently returns and the few pages I do have protected does not stop him from vandalizing others. I am simply chosing pages that are the least watched or the ones that he hits the hardest. If you look at the history of Haim Saban, it goes back a lot to where this user was on his first ISP causing trouble.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 05:08, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

So let's try unprotection on VR Troopers and Saban Entertainment and they can act as a honeypot, if the vandal doesn't return we can unprotect the other two. A single repeat vandal does not justify locking out non-autoconfirmed accounts. As someone pointed out above VR Troopers was actually benefitting from some positive IP contributions prior to your protection. –xeno (talk) 13:47, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I have boldly removed the protection from VR Troopers and Saban Entertainment. I've already watchlisted these and can pounce on vandalism, and Xeno has indicated a willingness to do the same. If the experiment fails and they eventually need protection again, then everyone will be convinced Ryūlóng was right. If the experiment succeeds, then unprotecting was a good thing. Win-win situation.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 22:35, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

most definitely. eyes wide and protection may be liberally re-applied (with an expiry i hope) should vandalism re-occur. cheers, –xeno (talk)

Re-appearance of minor vandal

Resolved

 – User warned. — Jake Wartenberg 16:55, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

User Rich4560 was warned off in May 2008 after some vandalism. He has today made two unhelpful edits to Rail transport, and been warned again. As far as I can see all his contributions have been unhelpful. Murray Langton (talk) 14:28, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've left a final warning on the talk page. --Rodhullandemu 14:36, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Please restore File:All-Sports-Rugby-1924.jpg because will be deleted in commons

Resolved

 – Deleted in both EnWiki and Commons as lacking proper permissions. Can be restored to Commons if proper licensure supplied. Can be restored to EnWiki if an acceptable fair-use rationale is given. -- Avi (talk) 19:25, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi, i transferred File:All-Sports-Rugby-1924.jpg to commons (upload here after). But was an error. This image will be deleted because is non-free. Please, restore File:All-Sports-Rugby-1924.jpg here, when after are upload. Thanks Shooke (talk) 03:41, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Done, but I'm not sure I see the problem. If it's PD in its country of creation it's PD internationally and is suitable for Commons, yes? I put the {{Do not move to Commons}} tag on based on your say-so, but I'm not sure it's necessary. Chick Bowen 03:57, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Wait--I misread it. If this is a magazine published in the UK in 1924 it is very much under copyright, unless you have specific evidence that the copyright holder has released it under a free license. If not, I'm afraid it's not appropriate here or at Commons (note that we no longer accept images by permission). Chick Bowen 04:06, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've pseudo-speedy {{npd}}'ed it, no evidence of permission. — neuro^(talk) 17:43, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Agustinaldo

I am considering an indefinite block on Agustinaldo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log). As per his edit history and block history pretty much all his edits are original research and have been reverted. He has been significantly counseled about this but appears to be either obstinate or totally unable to "get it". I am looking for advice here on how this should be handled.--NrDg 17:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm generally against the indefinite blocking of good faith editors who can't seem to get Wikipedia policy drilled into their heads. On the other hand, I think that increasing blocks following instances of WP:OR would definitely be warranted. Trusilver 20:16, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Main Wikipedia Page - Number of Articles

Resolved

 – Wrong venue. — neuro^(talk) 11:10, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I, Axmann8, as a user of Wikipedia with multiple edits pursuant to the GFDL, move that the main Wikipedia page, that displays all of the current languages of Wikipedia, be reflected to show that there are "2,761,000" articles on the English Wikipedia.

The reason is thusly: Currently, both the Netherlands and Portugese versions of Wikipedia display their article count to the nearest 1,000th, not the nearest 10,000th.

The English Wikipedia should be reflected to count the aditional 1,000 articles, as 1,000 articles, even though minute in comparison to the upwards 2 million articles currently on the English Wikipedia, is still significant enough for the change.

Respectfully submitted,

-Axmann8 (talk) 23:52, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

• Please propose this at Talk:Main Page. Administrators don't have a specific role in determining content. Mark this as resolved when you have started a thread there. Protonk (talk) 00:23, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

People at the English Wikipedia have no control over what happens on the main Wikipedia page. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 00:58, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

As noted above, if you want to discuss changing the portal page at http://www.wikipedia.org, English wikipedia is not the place to do it. You want to take this up on Meta. — Gavia immer (talk) 01:08, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I just wanted to say that each language's article count is expressed to three significant figures. That seems to me like a great approach and not in need of change. SHEFFIELDSTEEL^TALK 23:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Backlogs

WP:AIV and CAT:CSD really need admin attention. If somebody could head over there, it would be much appreciated. --L. Pistachio (talk) 02:07, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Regex error in Spam blacklist on Meta

Seems there was a small regex error which accidentally blocked all .com domains for about 3 minutes.. It's been fixed, but the fall out is, well.. still falling. FYI.. --Versageek 02:21, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Attempted move blocked

Resolved

 – Moved by Redvers.

I attempted to move 1990s in South Africa to History of South Africa (1994-present) but the move was blocked with the message "This page-move has been automatically blocked, because it looks like page-move vandalism. If you think this has been done in error please leave a message on Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard." Please can someone help resolve this? My motivation for the move is as follows: "Other articles in the history of SA series are based on historical eras, not decades. There is no article for the period 2000-present. This article is still short and could easily be expanded to cover history up to the present." Zaian (talk) 18:52, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I think all the blocker saw was a certain name pattern of South Africa. An admin should be able to override it. — neuro^(talk) 19:05, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Moved, as requested. Sorry about the redaction above, Neuro. ➲ redvers ^{sit down next to me} 19:18, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the prompt help. Zaian (talk) 19:46, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Funny I had no trouble moving it to the correctly punctuated title History of South Africa (1994–present) which does share all the same words. Of course the only resemblance I see between you and a certain pattern vandal is the gratuitously long edit summary you tried to use for the page-move. Could the blacklist possibly affect that? — CharlotteWebb 03:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I removed the blacklist entry involved. --Carnildo (talk) 05:44, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Chergles, AKA Dereks1x

The Arbitration Committee recently sitebanned Chergles as a sockpuppet of the banned editor Archtransit/Dereks1x. See Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Block_of_Chergles. This person has been emailing me, and now that I've stopped answering he'll probably approach someone else. So here's a heads up for admins who aren't already familiar with his approach.

He will email claiming to be the 'real person' behind one of the 100+ sockpuppets, say he was indeffed due to accident, incompetence, or malice, and politely request assistance clearing up the matter and getting his editing privileges reinstated. He may offer to supply identification to 'prove' his identity.

If asked to drop the charade, he will merely continue with a different permutation of it. Always claiming to be the innocent party, and always seeking help. He often approaches previously uninvolved Wikipedians who may be unfamiliar with his history. So posting here to give a heads up and perhaps save other people's time. Durova^Charge! 20:54, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Has he been using EmailUser or regular email? MBisanz ^talk 21:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Good question. It wouldn't be surprising if he uses the site's system for a first approach (he's had my email for a long time although we've seldom corresponded). Think it would be a good idea to cut off the socks' email access? Durova^Charge! 21:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Reblocked with email disabled, he still has his talk page and arbcom's email. MBisanz ^talk 21:36, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

For what it's worth, the amount of email recently sent from Chergles' IP is small -- granted, of course, that this would omit any emails sent from other addresses, or from outside Special:EmailUser. – Luna Santin (talk) 21:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

After I drew the line with him on the Chergles account (basically saying come clean if you want help from the people who would help you), he emailed me from an account that had been indeffed a long time ago. Claiming 'someone' had given him my email address, and then spinning a long tale. Usual modus operandi for this banned editor's appeals is to start from some long-dormant sock, claim to be mistaken identity, etc. So what I wonder is whether to block those socks' email access, in order to limit the target pool to email addresses he already has--most of whom are already familiar with his lines. Durova^Charge! 21:49, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've got neutral feelings, there. I think I'd be more comfortable with it if we left talk pages open (at least for now), or if I saw an account sending out masses of spammy emails -- speaking of which, please do let me know if some other account(s) might be worth checking in that regard. – Luna Santin (talk) 22:18, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

He's more likely to select one person at a time, send a carefully drafted request, and slowly work his way through the admin corps until he finds a soft spot. That's why it's been tolerated for this long. I'm proposing email blockage, not talk page protection. Durova^Charge! 22:26, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Any unblock request for this individual should be referred to ArbCom, which implemented the block by vote and has access to the checkuser data. Anyone with information concerning other socks or activities of this individual should also kindly e-mail us. Thanks, Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:01, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've contacted Brad and the Committee, although there's not too much more to be said. Primarily hoping to give the admin corps a heads up. Durova^Charge! 02:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This doesn't surprise me. Having been intimately involved in the Archtransit debacle, this is totally his MO. He knows how to play by the rules long enough to not get noticed, and he learns well from his past mistakes. Considering he actually got the admin mop once, and was gearing up to getting it again this time, I am not surprised. I fully expect to see him around again in a few months. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Zamora needs attention

Resolved

 – discussion continued at User talk:Fandezamora/Zamora (pianist).  – ukexpat (talk) 04:39, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Dear admins,

Please, I request the inclusion, disambiguation, and protection of Zamora because there is a Venezuelan pianist, composer and writer, called Alejandro Zamora (his artistic name is Zamora, and he is not known by his first name).

Another people with last name Zamora is known by both, his first and last name.

So, the Venezuelan artist should point to Zamora because his artistic name coincides exactly with this name, and the Zamora disambiguation page should point for the other people.

About his inclusion, there are an old debate about him that have 2 years old when he was not so notable like nowadays and nobody did nothing again to include him in Wikipedia. Actually he has succeded on the United States and you can find his works on notable online and retail music & book stores.

Note about the request of indefinite protection:

Some days ago the page was created by another fan of Zamora and it was vandalized by people coming constantly. Another admin probably saw the old debate and ended deleting and protecting the page.

So, please I request the revision of inclusion of this artist, his disambiguation & protection, and once created the page, please protect it at least during a time.

p.s. Sorry for my english, but its not my native language.

p.s.2 The Wikipedia entry is still showing in the google cache:

http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:I47c7Hkyt08J:en.wikipedia.org/%3Ftitle%3DZamora+zamora+oasis+instrumental&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1

Thanks. --Fandezamora (talk) 23:13, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

That's not the way it works. There is no article for Alejandro Zamora. If in the future there is one, it can be titled Zamora (pianist) and added to the disambiguation page. – ukexpat (talk) 22:06, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

He is not only a pianist, he is a composer and writer too. However, if disambiguation is not posibble, Zamora (New age pianist) or (pianist) should be ok only by the fact that he is known more for his piano music, than by his books?

--Fandezamora (talk) 22:24, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alejandro Zamora, for the reason there is no article currently. Kevin (talk) 22:09, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. So please tell what is the right procedure in order to include him in Wikipedia.

Thanks. --Fandezamora (talk) 22:14, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

The best approach is to create the article as a sub page, something like User:Fandezamora/Zamora (pianist). You will be able to work on it in user space without fear of it being deleted. I have created that subpage for you. Please also read WP:YFA, WP:BIO and WP:RS. Once the page is ready for the mainspace, it can moved there.  – ukexpat (talk) 23:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. I did copy & paste of the original Wikipedia entry, and fixed some grammatical errors.

So, please tell me now what is the second step for publishing it out of my user space, on the Zamora disambiguation page.

Thanks- --Fandezamora (talk) 23:32, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Just a very gentle point here: Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/Alejandrozamora. I would hope that the episode won't be repeated and this is a different person who is here to contribute positively to the encyclopedia by following guidelines and creating valuable content that adheres to said guidelines. §FreeRangeFrog 23:48, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Sure, I am here to politely discuss where to place this artist on the enciclopedia and for this reason I am requesting admin assistance in order to do the right procedures. --Fandezamora (talk) 23:58, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Excellent. We do always try to assume good faith and welcome all contributions. §FreeRangeFrog 00:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. fine.

How I said previously, I did copy & paste of the original Wikipedia entry and the article is ready now for the main space, so please tell me now what is the next step for publishing it out of my user space, on the Zamora disambiguation page (and for protecting it indefinetely against vandals).

Thanks again- --Fandezamora (talk) 00:06, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Sure. Before we do that though, have you addressed the issues for which the original article was deleted? I.e., if the subject did not meet the notability guidelines (I assume those would be WP:MUSIC), does he/she meet them now? §FreeRangeFrog 00:23, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Sure. You can read his references or search his albums or books on Amazon.com. --Fandezamora (talk) 00:57, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The references in the draft do not establish notability as required by WP:BIO and WP:MUSIC - you need "significant coverage" in reliable sources. – ukexpat (talk) 01:19, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

There are a lot of reliable third party references:

1. Several references of cultural government agencies of Venezuela 2. The database of books and authors of Venezuela. 3. Newspapers, official biographies and blogs.

And finally the most reliable third party source: Amazon.com

What more he needs? There are a lot of other artist with less references published on Wikipedia. --Fandezamora (talk) 01:34, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

None of those sources you cite would be considered reliable or valid in any way. To start with, for example, if you're claiming that the subject has published books and you're providing a reference to that, you need to link to the publications, not to the website of the national library or to the CENAL. The other is a blog, a few don't even work and the rest are links to your own website. Go ahead and source everything correctly. Yo hablo Español perfectamente y puedo evaluar si tus citas y ligas a publicaciones u otros recursos en línea se considerarian válidos bajo los reglamentos de Wikipedia. §FreeRangeFrog 01:45, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. no problem / no problema,

you can go to the book database and search the isbn of his book (please note that this is the book database, the music sheets books containing ismn's are not listed there. So you will need to contact the ismn agency for that because this agency does not have an online database. anyway the music sheet books are listed on amazon.com

And about your worries with the official governmment links, there is the procedure to search in the national agency of venezuelan books and authors:

go to: http://www.cenal.gob.ve/

click the "isbn en linea" logo

click now "registered books" at the bottom of the page

you can be now redirected to the search engine:

i thought that its not possible a direct link with the results, for this reason i published like reference the database url only.

however you can try this link:

http://isbnvzla.no-ip.info/site_isbn/buscador.php?mode=buscar&code=&tit_nombre=thoughts&col_nombre=zamora&tit_IDmateria=&t_idiomas=&tit_date_apar=&D_sigP=%3D --Fandezamora (talk) 02:15, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This should probably be continued at User_talk:Fandezamora/Zamora. Kevin (talk) 02:34, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Ive copied and pasted this discussion like reference in User_talk:Fandezamora/Zamora. --Fandezamora (talk) 03:09, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The article of Zamora (where per suggestion was placed to avoid the fear of being deleted) along with the talk page User_talk:Fandezamora/Zamora where suposedly the discussion was going to continue was deleted, so I would like to know where to continue.

thanks --Fandezamora (talk) 04:03, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I asked the sysop to restore it. Further discussion about this should take place on the talk page of that sandbox once it's restored, as AIV is probably not the best place to converse about content. If someone wants to mark this section as resolved, I guess.... §FreeRangeFrog 04:22, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Arbitration Committee agenda as of February 26

The updated agenda of the Arbitration Committee (as of February 26) has been published here. For the Committee. Kirill ^[pf] 04:53, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Question about appropriateness of deletion

Is this deletion proper? It removes information directly related to the subject of the article from RS. Not only is it about direct criticisms of the NCAHF by a major profession and its response to that misguided criticism, it also removes information uncomfortable to the editor who made the deletion, who happens to be a strong supporter and defender of chiropractic, a profession which the NCAHF criticizes for its unscientific foundation, its quackery, and other issues. Is this a form of disguised whitewashing? I would like to hear what other editors think, and would prefer that other editors deal with that edit in the appropriate manner. -- Fyslee (talk) 04:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This is not an issue that requires admin action. Providing you have already tried to discuss this with the user in question, please consider Wikipedia:Requests for comment. Dcoetzee 05:29, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Regarding selective deletion / RevisionDelete

I posted some questions regarding selective deletion / data suppression / RevisionDelete here: Wikipedia talk:Selective deletion#Questions on my mind. Any and all input is welcome. --MZMcBride (talk) 06:05, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Attempted move blocked

Resolved

 – Moved by Redvers.

I attempted to move 1990s in South Africa to History of South Africa (1994-present) but the move was blocked with the message "This page-move has been automatically blocked, because it looks like page-move vandalism. If you think this has been done in error please leave a message on Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard." Please can someone help resolve this? My motivation for the move is as follows: "Other articles in the history of SA series are based on historical eras, not decades. There is no article for the period 2000-present. This article is still short and could easily be expanded to cover history up to the present." Zaian (talk) 18:52, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I think all the blocker saw was a certain name pattern of South Africa. An admin should be able to override it. — neuro^(talk) 19:05, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Moved, as requested. Sorry about the redaction above, Neuro. ➲ redvers ^{sit down next to me} 19:18, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the prompt help. Zaian (talk) 19:46, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Funny I had no trouble moving it to the correctly punctuated title History of South Africa (1994–present) which does share all the same words. Of course the only resemblance I see between you and a certain pattern vandal is the gratuitously long edit summary you tried to use for the page-move. Could the blacklist possibly affect that? — CharlotteWebb 03:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I removed the blacklist entry involved. --Carnildo (talk) 05:44, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Chergles, AKA Dereks1x

The Arbitration Committee recently sitebanned Chergles as a sockpuppet of the banned editor Archtransit/Dereks1x. See Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Block_of_Chergles. This person has been emailing me, and now that I've stopped answering he'll probably approach someone else. So here's a heads up for admins who aren't already familiar with his approach.

He will email claiming to be the 'real person' behind one of the 100+ sockpuppets, say he was indeffed due to accident, incompetence, or malice, and politely request assistance clearing up the matter and getting his editing privileges reinstated. He may offer to supply identification to 'prove' his identity.

If asked to drop the charade, he will merely continue with a different permutation of it. Always claiming to be the innocent party, and always seeking help. He often approaches previously uninvolved Wikipedians who may be unfamiliar with his history. So posting here to give a heads up and perhaps save other people's time. Durova^Charge! 20:54, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Has he been using EmailUser or regular email? MBisanz ^talk 21:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Good question. It wouldn't be surprising if he uses the site's system for a first approach (he's had my email for a long time although we've seldom corresponded). Think it would be a good idea to cut off the socks' email access? Durova^Charge! 21:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Reblocked with email disabled, he still has his talk page and arbcom's email. MBisanz ^talk 21:36, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

For what it's worth, the amount of email recently sent from Chergles' IP is small -- granted, of course, that this would omit any emails sent from other addresses, or from outside Special:EmailUser. – Luna Santin (talk) 21:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

After I drew the line with him on the Chergles account (basically saying come clean if you want help from the people who would help you), he emailed me from an account that had been indeffed a long time ago. Claiming 'someone' had given him my email address, and then spinning a long tale. Usual modus operandi for this banned editor's appeals is to start from some long-dormant sock, claim to be mistaken identity, etc. So what I wonder is whether to block those socks' email access, in order to limit the target pool to email addresses he already has--most of whom are already familiar with his lines. Durova^Charge! 21:49, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've got neutral feelings, there. I think I'd be more comfortable with it if we left talk pages open (at least for now), or if I saw an account sending out masses of spammy emails -- speaking of which, please do let me know if some other account(s) might be worth checking in that regard. – Luna Santin (talk) 22:18, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

He's more likely to select one person at a time, send a carefully drafted request, and slowly work his way through the admin corps until he finds a soft spot. That's why it's been tolerated for this long. I'm proposing email blockage, not talk page protection. Durova^Charge! 22:26, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Any unblock request for this individual should be referred to ArbCom, which implemented the block by vote and has access to the checkuser data. Anyone with information concerning other socks or activities of this individual should also kindly e-mail us. Thanks, Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:01, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've contacted Brad and the Committee, although there's not too much more to be said. Primarily hoping to give the admin corps a heads up. Durova^Charge! 02:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This doesn't surprise me. Having been intimately involved in the Archtransit debacle, this is totally his MO. He knows how to play by the rules long enough to not get noticed, and he learns well from his past mistakes. Considering he actually got the admin mop once, and was gearing up to getting it again this time, I am not surprised. I fully expect to see him around again in a few months. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Zamora needs attention

Resolved

 – discussion continued at User talk:Fandezamora/Zamora (pianist).  – ukexpat (talk) 04:39, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Dear admins,

Please, I request the inclusion, disambiguation, and protection of Zamora because there is a Venezuelan pianist, composer and writer, called Alejandro Zamora (his artistic name is Zamora, and he is not known by his first name).

Another people with last name Zamora is known by both, his first and last name.

So, the Venezuelan artist should point to Zamora because his artistic name coincides exactly with this name, and the Zamora disambiguation page should point for the other people.

About his inclusion, there are an old debate about him that have 2 years old when he was not so notable like nowadays and nobody did nothing again to include him in Wikipedia. Actually he has succeded on the United States and you can find his works on notable online and retail music & book stores.

Note about the request of indefinite protection:

Some days ago the page was created by another fan of Zamora and it was vandalized by people coming constantly. Another admin probably saw the old debate and ended deleting and protecting the page.

So, please I request the revision of inclusion of this artist, his disambiguation & protection, and once created the page, please protect it at least during a time.

p.s. Sorry for my english, but its not my native language.

p.s.2 The Wikipedia entry is still showing in the google cache:

http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:I47c7Hkyt08J:en.wikipedia.org/%3Ftitle%3DZamora+zamora+oasis+instrumental&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1

Thanks. --Fandezamora (talk) 23:13, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

That's not the way it works. There is no article for Alejandro Zamora. If in the future there is one, it can be titled Zamora (pianist) and added to the disambiguation page. – ukexpat (talk) 22:06, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

He is not only a pianist, he is a composer and writer too. However, if disambiguation is not posibble, Zamora (New age pianist) or (pianist) should be ok only by the fact that he is known more for his piano music, than by his books?

--Fandezamora (talk) 22:24, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alejandro Zamora, for the reason there is no article currently. Kevin (talk) 22:09, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. So please tell what is the right procedure in order to include him in Wikipedia.

Thanks. --Fandezamora (talk) 22:14, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

The best approach is to create the article as a sub page, something like User:Fandezamora/Zamora (pianist). You will be able to work on it in user space without fear of it being deleted. I have created that subpage for you. Please also read WP:YFA, WP:BIO and WP:RS. Once the page is ready for the mainspace, it can moved there.  – ukexpat (talk) 23:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. I did copy & paste of the original Wikipedia entry, and fixed some grammatical errors.

So, please tell me now what is the second step for publishing it out of my user space, on the Zamora disambiguation page.

Thanks- --Fandezamora (talk) 23:32, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Just a very gentle point here: Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/Alejandrozamora. I would hope that the episode won't be repeated and this is a different person who is here to contribute positively to the encyclopedia by following guidelines and creating valuable content that adheres to said guidelines. §FreeRangeFrog 23:48, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Sure, I am here to politely discuss where to place this artist on the enciclopedia and for this reason I am requesting admin assistance in order to do the right procedures. --Fandezamora (talk) 23:58, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Excellent. We do always try to assume good faith and welcome all contributions. §FreeRangeFrog 00:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. fine.

How I said previously, I did copy & paste of the original Wikipedia entry and the article is ready now for the main space, so please tell me now what is the next step for publishing it out of my user space, on the Zamora disambiguation page (and for protecting it indefinetely against vandals).

Thanks again- --Fandezamora (talk) 00:06, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Sure. Before we do that though, have you addressed the issues for which the original article was deleted? I.e., if the subject did not meet the notability guidelines (I assume those would be WP:MUSIC), does he/she meet them now? §FreeRangeFrog 00:23, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Sure. You can read his references or search his albums or books on Amazon.com. --Fandezamora (talk) 00:57, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The references in the draft do not establish notability as required by WP:BIO and WP:MUSIC - you need "significant coverage" in reliable sources. – ukexpat (talk) 01:19, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

There are a lot of reliable third party references:

1. Several references of cultural government agencies of Venezuela 2. The database of books and authors of Venezuela. 3. Newspapers, official biographies and blogs.

And finally the most reliable third party source: Amazon.com

What more he needs? There are a lot of other artist with less references published on Wikipedia. --Fandezamora (talk) 01:34, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

None of those sources you cite would be considered reliable or valid in any way. To start with, for example, if you're claiming that the subject has published books and you're providing a reference to that, you need to link to the publications, not to the website of the national library or to the CENAL. The other is a blog, a few don't even work and the rest are links to your own website. Go ahead and source everything correctly. Yo hablo Español perfectamente y puedo evaluar si tus citas y ligas a publicaciones u otros recursos en línea se considerarian válidos bajo los reglamentos de Wikipedia. §FreeRangeFrog 01:45, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. no problem / no problema,

you can go to the book database and search the isbn of his book (please note that this is the book database, the music sheets books containing ismn's are not listed there. So you will need to contact the ismn agency for that because this agency does not have an online database. anyway the music sheet books are listed on amazon.com

And about your worries with the official governmment links, there is the procedure to search in the national agency of venezuelan books and authors:

go to: http://www.cenal.gob.ve/

click the "isbn en linea" logo

click now "registered books" at the bottom of the page

you can be now redirected to the search engine:

i thought that its not possible a direct link with the results, for this reason i published like reference the database url only.

however you can try this link:

http://isbnvzla.no-ip.info/site_isbn/buscador.php?mode=buscar&code=&tit_nombre=thoughts&col_nombre=zamora&tit_IDmateria=&t_idiomas=&tit_date_apar=&D_sigP=%3D --Fandezamora (talk) 02:15, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This should probably be continued at User_talk:Fandezamora/Zamora. Kevin (talk) 02:34, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Ive copied and pasted this discussion like reference in User_talk:Fandezamora/Zamora. --Fandezamora (talk) 03:09, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The article of Zamora (where per suggestion was placed to avoid the fear of being deleted) along with the talk page User_talk:Fandezamora/Zamora where suposedly the discussion was going to continue was deleted, so I would like to know where to continue.

thanks --Fandezamora (talk) 04:03, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I asked the sysop to restore it. Further discussion about this should take place on the talk page of that sandbox once it's restored, as AIV is probably not the best place to converse about content. If someone wants to mark this section as resolved, I guess.... §FreeRangeFrog 04:22, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Arbitration Committee agenda as of February 26

The updated agenda of the Arbitration Committee (as of February 26) has been published here. For the Committee. Kirill ^[pf] 04:53, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Question about appropriateness of deletion

Is this deletion proper? It removes information directly related to the subject of the article from RS. Not only is it about direct criticisms of the NCAHF by a major profession and its response to that misguided criticism, it also removes information uncomfortable to the editor who made the deletion, who happens to be a strong supporter and defender of chiropractic, a profession which the NCAHF criticizes for its unscientific foundation, its quackery, and other issues. Is this a form of disguised whitewashing? I would like to hear what other editors think, and would prefer that other editors deal with that edit in the appropriate manner. -- Fyslee (talk) 04:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This is not an issue that requires admin action. Providing you have already tried to discuss this with the user in question, please consider Wikipedia:Requests for comment. Dcoetzee 05:29, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Regarding selective deletion / RevisionDelete

I posted some questions regarding selective deletion / data suppression / RevisionDelete here: Wikipedia talk:Selective deletion#Questions on my mind. Any and all input is welcome. --MZMcBride (talk) 06:05, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism and sockpuppeting by User:Catzeleven and User:BabyG14-x

• Catzeleven (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• BabyG14-x (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Two years ago I reverted vandalism by these users [10] and warned them. [11] [12] In hindsight, it is very likely that these two user accounts were the same person, and he got away with craploads of vandalism and has never been blocked.

Evidence:

• Manure [13] [14]

[15] etc.

• Chuck Norris [16]
• Alice Springs [17]
• Gumby [18] - This is less than two weeks old and was not reverted until I just did it.

Catzeleven in two years has not made a single constructive edit - not one. BabyG14-x has not edited since May 2007 and can be ignored. However, Catzeleven is still active and must be dealt with.

I suggest an immediate and indefinite block. This user knows exactly what he's been doing. He's been warned on both the main account and the BabyG14-x account, and has sockpuppeted in order to avoid getting to the "final warning" stage. He doesn't deserve another chance unless he asks nicely and promises to improve his behavior.

If a block is judged premature, at least a stern final warning must be delivered and followed up on.

Catzeleven isn't exactly editing very much. Nothing in two weeks, and nothing before that for several months. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 01:47, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, but doing nothing and hoping he suddenly gets a clue is exceedingly unlikely to work. He's been here TWO YEARS and vandalized repeatedly and produced NOTHING.

The most interesting thing about this is User:Kivel. This account was only created on 25th February 2009, and yet seems to already be engaged in conflict with other editors. Yet User:Kivel seems to recall incidents from TWO years previously. This cannot be anything other than some edit war, and Kivel is now trying to stir up further trouble by creating a new account. Not directly related to the above, Kivel has also been making a lot of pages moves in the past two days without seking consensus. Worse, they have been on pages than he has never edited!! This is clear evidence of an experienced user who knows the system, and is now trying to use it to have a block imposed on another editor(s) with whom he has been warring with. I suggest that a RFCU be issued so that we can find out more about Kivel before we take any further action in this case. I smell a sockpupppet. Bhtpbank (talk) 08:01, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Disabling talk page editing when blocking users

moved to Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Disabling_talk_page_editing_when_blocking_users by Skomorokh 13:40, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Blocked user wanting to vanish

I'm not amazingly well-versed in the sock stuff, but a user, Sunstar NW XP (talk · contribs), dropped by #wikipedia-en and asked that his User: page be blanked. I asked him to log in to verify it was him by editing his talk page, and it appears he did. I told him it'd be ok to blank his own talk page, but he would like to also have his user page blanked, too. Anyway, not sure what the normal thing is that is done in this case, so I'm posting here for someone else to deal with. The dude on IRC did seem calm and cool about it, so I figured the least I could do is relay the request on. Anyway, cheers =) --slakr^\ talk / 13:02, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

• At this point, I see no reason to justify extending that courtesy. If there's personal information to delete, he can pass it onto oversight team - beyond that, users who are forcibly blocked indef. are not users in good standing imo; I think he needs to provide some sort of reasoning before anything is changed on that page. Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:19, 26 February 2009 (UTC) Also, if there are concerns regarding whether the page is indexed, then what about [19]? Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:41, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
• Per Ncmvocalist's comment re "good standing". LessHeard vanU (talk) 13:39, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
• Concur with Ncmvocalist. -- Alexf^(talk) 13:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Orphan tagging

I'm sure this has been dicussed somewhere, but can we maybe get a hiatus from the orphan tagging? Tagging every new page as an orphan is getting cumbersome and distracts from more urgent work in dealing with notability, sourcing etc. ChildofMidnight (talk) 19:57, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• You are probably better off telling that to whomever is doing the tagging. I would hope that most people would have the common sense to recognize that an article that is less than a day old is probably not a good candidate for that particular tag. Trusilver 20:09, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
• I would suggest that if it is a bot then it should be coded to wait ateast 30 days from creation, and if it's a Wikipedian then a gentle slap fomr the WP:TROUT might be in order. Guy (Help!) 20:14, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It would appear to be User:Addbot - It has an emergency shutoff button but it's limited to Admin use only (this REALLY bugs me - I loathe bots anyway and having them outrank a human editor sticks in my craw) - an admin will have to shut it down. Exxolon (talk) 20:57, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
    • Of course only administrators can use it. It's basically nothing more than a hyperlink that points directly to the administrator account blocking tool. This doesn't make the 'bot "outrank" anyone. It's nothing to do with "rank" at all. It's merely the well-known (and fairly obvious) fact that only those with administrator privileges can employ administrator tools. The standard way of stopping 'bots is to use one of those administrator tools.

      There are ways to allow ordinary users control over 'bots. Sandbot exemplifies some of them. However, they involve running one's own WWW site off one's own servers (or at least off servers where one has the capability of employing server-side scripts), and as such are beyond the capabilities of many people, 'bot users/writers or not. Uncle G (talk) 10:53, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

      • And yet I do believe that some bots employ an easily implemented stratagem: if a message is placed on the bot talk page, the bot stops operating. Simple as that. Franamax (talk) 11:28, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
        • But most of the bots we run would need to ignore that. I can't imagine we want VOABot or Cluebot to halt on request from a non-admin. Protonk (talk) 21:47, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
    • The issue raise above (waiting a period of time before tagging) has already been raised on my talk page, See here. Even the user that origionaly raised this ended up saying it was a bad idea and more would come out of keeping it the way it is. Also the bot does not tag the articles as they are created as the bot runs from a periodicly generated list located on the toolserver. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 21:03, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
    • redlink fixed. Bencherlite^Talk 21:24, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
      • I defer to those with greater wisdom, but I haven't found orphan tagging articles that have yet to be patrolled useful. The naming is often off, whether the article should be kept hasn't been determined, and I think other improvements should take priority.ChildofMidnight (talk) 21:27, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
        • Forgive me for asking, but what does orphan tagging have to do with whether or not the article should be kept, and how does it hinder the improvement of these articles? Skomorokh 02:18, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
          • A fair question. In my opinion, there's a point of diminishing returns for tagging. Many new users are already bewildered and overwhelmed by one or two templates and all the warning messages they get hit with. So I would argue that for new articles the key is to get the sourcing and the verifiability in order first and then to deal with other issues. But maybe I'm wrong. However, if you check out Add's talk page, you'll find that even just the orphan tag is as much or more than many editors can fathom. And my personal experience is that getting people to comprehend notability, verifiability, and citations (which are I think VERY important) is already enough of a battle on new pages. For new pages I think the orphan tag is a distraction from the key improvements that need to be made and waiting a week or two would be helpful. I also think there should be a way to deorphan articles that are deemed okay as orphans other than just adding a no bot template or having to live with the template indefinitely. But that's another issue. ChildofMidnight (talk) 03:15, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Putting this tag on the article at all is not appropriate, early or late. It's just an editing and Wikipedia maintenance question, not something that needs to be called to the users attention. Of all the things that can be wrong with an article, this is not of very high priority. The first step is moving it there. It's only indirectedto notability--I certainly ignore it entirely in patrolling prod or speedy. If the article gets kept, then someone can do something about it as a routine maintenance task. It's good to build up the network of cross reference links, but it's of very low priority. Below not jut the ones CoM mentions, but also wikification, proper cite formatting, copyedit, correct categories, finding a good illustration, and a good deal else. DGG (talk) 06:11, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Well the plan, well my plan is to make the bot eventually kepp all of the maintenance templates and tags up to date on the articles, The only reason I started on the orphan tag was as the list was already created, I can shortly start on the uncat tag but I think it is best to make sure the orphan tag is going to be accepted and try to iron out any bumps now. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 08:08, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Orphan tagging, even of new pages, seems useful to me, but it may be better if this tag is placed on the article talk page, as it has no real indication of the quality of the article (unlike tags for sourcing, pov, tone, ...) Fram (talk) 08:25, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Many have complained about the tag, especially in article space, but the bot owner and the wikiproject using article space for its recruiting tags are not interested in discussing the issue. Certainly BAG will have nothing of user input about their bots.

The tag is inappropriate and confusing. Look at the bot owners talk page. New editors have no idea what it means. In fact, most editors appear to have no idea what it means. I disagreed with it being put on one type of article and was ignored and attacked for my opinion. I think the tags should be removed.

I also think bots ought to be automatically blocked for 24 hours for reverting human editors more than twice. I'm tired of BAG. I'm tired of AddBot. I used to write articles. --KP Botany (talk) 08:30, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The issue of the tag being placed on the talk page has already been raised on the tag talk pge and the result was to keep it in the article space with all of the other tags of this sort. The tag is no longer so recruiting per changes made to the template. Bag accepted all user input on this task and many issues were raised and fixed. I then disagree, the tag is not inappropriate and confusing, or if you find it confusing suggest a change on the template talk page. Also yes many editors do not read the tag and then ask questions about why it has been placed even though the tag clearly says why it is there. If you think bts should be blocked for reverting human editors more than twice did you think about bots such as cluebot? Also the eidts that are being reverted by human editors are all good edits are not errors. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 09:24, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Well KP may or may not have thought about it, but Cluebot already did. Franamax (talk) 09:31, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

On many pages (for example my user page and talk page) it will revert whenever there is vandalism, even if this reverts the same editor several times in a row. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 09:35, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

You should take that up with Cobi then, or bring it to BAG as a problem. Perhaps you are misinterpreting 1RR ("same user, same change"). Franamax (talk) 09:44, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Also note that BAG itself has many times clarified that its mandate is to certify that a proposed bot will operate in a technically correct manner, and that BAG expects the botop to gain community consensus on their own. There is still a grey area where BAG doesn't demand the proposal show consensus. Even project-specific bots still run into these problems. Franamax (talk) 09:43, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Cluebot only does it on an opt in basis, See User:ClueBot/Optin ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 09:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The page where you opted in? What's your point? You specifically asked a bot to multiply revert on your own page, then you point it out to KP as an example of a bot that should be blocked for multiple reverts? Sense does make not that.

Points above about BAG still stand. Franamax (talk) 09:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I am saying that if were were to revert all bots if they reverted a human editor more than twice then cluebot would be blocked daily for 24 hours. Also BRFAs now generaly do gain consensus, If they do not have consensus they generally do not pass. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 10:06, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry but you are drawing a false analogy. Cluebot makes multiple reverts where specifically requested by humans - by an opt-in provision. Is your bot designed to avoid repeating the same actions over and over?

And not to get you more defensive or anything, but Guy already suggested it: just put in a 30-day lag. Big part of the problem solved.

I'd be happy to see that all BRFAs now have community consensus. However that may extend beyond beyond just the BAG members themselves. Proper community participation on BAG itself was never completely addressed.

And before (or long after) I become tiresome, I'll try not to comment anymore here. I think I've made all my points. Best regards! Franamax (talk) 11:43, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I have said to those that have asked me on my talk page that I am considering not tagging unless the articles is not not patrolled but I currently have more pressing issues about the bot that need to be changed first. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 11:46, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I think there is consensus here for moving the tag to the talk page. We could do it in two ways: Addshore could change the bot, or we could change the tag to say for use on talk pages only. DGG (talk)

Wouldn't we need to do both? I have myself manually placed the tag. I can't be the only one. :) (I think the article talk page would be a great place for the tag, making it effectively invisible to most readers but enabling attention by interested contributors.) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 16:43, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Please see my proposed template change to try and make the template slightly shorter and easier to understand. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 20:40, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Requesting block for sockpuppet Saudagar (talk)

The following people are sockpuppets of (including one in the subject/headline)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Eugene_Krabs#Banned_user, as seen on this guy's post on my talk page. - Eugene Krabs (talk) 20:15, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Could you please stop reporting these block requests here, there is always AIV which is better for these sort of things. The Cool Kat (talk) 20:22, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't really understand how it works; that's why I post here. - Eugene Krabs (talk) 20:29, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

"{{ipvandal|''address''}} or {{vandal|''username''}}, brief outline of problem with diff(s) of post last warning violations. ~~~~. Place at bottom of page space." LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:27, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Like this? Saudagar (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Problem with system message MediaWiki:Coll-bookscategory

Resolved

Help by an administrator needed: MediaWiki:Coll-bookscategory needs to be changed to "Wikipedia:Books" in order to automatically add (user created) stored books to Category:Wikipedia:Books. Currently these are stored in Category:Books which is inappropriate. This request is related to the activation of the books tool. See the deployment guide at meta for more information. --He!ko (talk) 21:02, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

 Done.  Sandstein  21:16, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Class project using shared accounts inappropriately

YuZheng (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is an instructor at a school in China, where they are working on a class project involving Wikipedia. At first, they were all using the instructor's username, and now they have split into two usernames, one for each class: CornerstoneClassA4 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and CornerstoneClassA5 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). I don't think anyone had caught this yet, so I left a note on the instructor's page that each student really needs to have his/her own username per our policies. I'm intending to give them a bit of a grace period to accomplish this, but some extra sets of eyes on this class would likely help them make the transition more smoothly. I would also appreciate some feedback as to when/if it would be appropriate to block the class accounts. (ESkog)^(Talk) 14:45, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This raises another issue. Looking at the articles they've created and are editing, some may not pass notability guidelines, and if they do then the articles need work (text like "in our country" etc.) So the question is should we let them continue with the class project in the short term, or should we be stepping in to maintain the encyclopaedia? Canterbury Tail talk 18:53, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Point them towards the correct writing style guidelines, and offer pointers and help if you're concerned. I don't see any actual non-notable articles, though, say, Qzone fails to assert the notability, and it'd be nice if someone showed them how to establish it. WilyD 18:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Treat them the same as any other articles, let the students see how things work. Fix and tag articles as necessary, giving the usual explanations on the user talk pages with links to appropriate policies. (And keep reminding them to create their own accounts if they don't do so soon.) --Tango (talk) 19:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

My money is on never. The foundation has policies on sharing accounts, and in theory, I'm not expected to disagree with them. But this is a case where the policy doesn't fit the problem. We don't want them to all share accounts, but perhaps the teacher does, or perhaps the issue of juggling a few dozen accounts wasn't deemed worth the bother. I don't know what we gain from demanding that they split however many students they have into separate accounts, but we certainly create a big headache on their end. I would point them to our style guides and help them along. Part of the learning experience might be one in collaboration, we should work with them to ensure that frustration plays a smaller role in the learning process. Protonk (talk) 21:44, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The shared accounts issue is about GFDL and attribution. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 22:18, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Then that would not really be a problem - Beatles songs are attributed to Lennon/Mccartney and no-one knows who wrote what lines. I think it is more of a who is responsible for the account problem. Personally I'd find it easier to watch one shared account than 33 1/3 loose cannons (students) Agathoclea (talk) 22:52, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I know what it is about, I'm just not going to leap to enforce it. Protonk (talk) 02:45, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Pee Wee vandal

I have had it with this pathetic little idiot and I am not in the mood to jump through hoops to initiate a CU on his latest sock. Check my talk page history to see what I mean. I know this little scumbag is editing from his school IP at UC Santa Cruz and I want him stopped. Please, please, please would someone here with CU rights run the account and e-mail me with the IP contact info? This stops now. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 00:27, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Ordinarily I'd look askance at your language but given what he's doing I can't blame you. Strongly recommend you add RopeMarks at BoundCon 2008 - NSFW to MediaWiki:Bad image list. I'd do it myself but it's an admin only action. Personally I find the image tasteful, but that's just me :) - I can see how many people would find it grossly offensive. Exxolon (talk) 02:10, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

• Ha, ha.  :)) In all honesty, I looked at the "most recent change" on my talk page, so I didn't get to see the, um, photos. I'd gotten under this little freak's skin when I was blowing the whistle on his idiocy before I requested my admin tools back. He's a primary reason for my wanting to personally shut him down and shut him up. Thanks for the tip. I hate blowing up on a wiki site, but this has been going on for months, beginning with User:PWeeHurman, the original account. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 02:40, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Comment: Looks as if it's been tagged already...and I just got my first look at it. She's kinda cute, actually.  :)) Thanks again for the tip. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 02:42, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I blocked a couple of socks & range blocked the IPs they were coming from.. --Versageek 03:44, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Proposal regarding deletion summaries

I have proposed some text regarding deletion summaries at Wikipedia talk:Deletion guidelines for administrators#Suggestion for additional section on deletion summaries. Though an arbitration case in part about related issues will soon be taken up, I think it would be helpful for admins, independently of that process, to set some basic ground rules. I'm deliberately proposing this as part of a guideline rather than a policy, recognizing that the delete tool is used in a wide variety of situations and this statement (or one like it) would not apply to all of them. Still, I do think it would be helpful to have something. Having spent a lot of time closing DRVs over the last couple of years, I have seen too many cases in which editors have been needlessly angered by a deletion summary. Thanks. Chick Bowen 02:29, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Class project using shared accounts inappropriately

YuZheng (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is an instructor at a school in China, where they are working on a class project involving Wikipedia. At first, they were all using the instructor's username, and now they have split into two usernames, one for each class: CornerstoneClassA4 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and CornerstoneClassA5 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). I don't think anyone had caught this yet, so I left a note on the instructor's page that each student really needs to have his/her own username per our policies. I'm intending to give them a bit of a grace period to accomplish this, but some extra sets of eyes on this class would likely help them make the transition more smoothly. I would also appreciate some feedback as to when/if it would be appropriate to block the class accounts. (ESkog)^(Talk) 14:45, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

This raises another issue. Looking at the articles they've created and are editing, some may not pass notability guidelines, and if they do then the articles need work (text like "in our country" etc.) So the question is should we let them continue with the class project in the short term, or should we be stepping in to maintain the encyclopaedia? Canterbury Tail talk 18:53, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Point them towards the correct writing style guidelines, and offer pointers and help if you're concerned. I don't see any actual non-notable articles, though, say, Qzone fails to assert the notability, and it'd be nice if someone showed them how to establish it. WilyD 18:59, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Treat them the same as any other articles, let the students see how things work. Fix and tag articles as necessary, giving the usual explanations on the user talk pages with links to appropriate policies. (And keep reminding them to create their own accounts if they don't do so soon.) --Tango (talk) 19:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

My money is on never. The foundation has policies on sharing accounts, and in theory, I'm not expected to disagree with them. But this is a case where the policy doesn't fit the problem. We don't want them to all share accounts, but perhaps the teacher does, or perhaps the issue of juggling a few dozen accounts wasn't deemed worth the bother. I don't know what we gain from demanding that they split however many students they have into separate accounts, but we certainly create a big headache on their end. I would point them to our style guides and help them along. Part of the learning experience might be one in collaboration, we should work with them to ensure that frustration plays a smaller role in the learning process. Protonk (talk) 21:44, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

The shared accounts issue is about GFDL and attribution. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 22:18, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Then that would not really be a problem - Beatles songs are attributed to Lennon/Mccartney and no-one knows who wrote what lines. I think it is more of a who is responsible for the account problem. Personally I'd find it easier to watch one shared account than 33 1/3 loose cannons (students) Agathoclea (talk) 22:52, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I know what it is about, I'm just not going to leap to enforce it. Protonk (talk) 02:45, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Pee Wee vandal

I have had it with this pathetic little idiot and I am not in the mood to jump through hoops to initiate a CU on his latest sock. Check my talk page history to see what I mean. I know this little scumbag is editing from his school IP at UC Santa Cruz and I want him stopped. Please, please, please would someone here with CU rights run the account and e-mail me with the IP contact info? This stops now. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 00:27, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Ordinarily I'd look askance at your language but given what he's doing I can't blame you. Strongly recommend you add RopeMarks at BoundCon 2008 - NSFW to MediaWiki:Bad image list. I'd do it myself but it's an admin only action. Personally I find the image tasteful, but that's just me :) - I can see how many people would find it grossly offensive. Exxolon (talk) 02:10, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

• Ha, ha.  :)) In all honesty, I looked at the "most recent change" on my talk page, so I didn't get to see the, um, photos. I'd gotten under this little freak's skin when I was blowing the whistle on his idiocy before I requested my admin tools back. He's a primary reason for my wanting to personally shut him down and shut him up. Thanks for the tip. I hate blowing up on a wiki site, but this has been going on for months, beginning with User:PWeeHurman, the original account. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 02:40, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Comment: Looks as if it's been tagged already...and I just got my first look at it. She's kinda cute, actually.  :)) Thanks again for the tip. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 02:42, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I blocked a couple of socks & range blocked the IPs they were coming from.. --Versageek 03:44, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Proposal regarding deletion summaries

I have proposed some text regarding deletion summaries at Wikipedia talk:Deletion guidelines for administrators#Suggestion for additional section on deletion summaries. Though an arbitration case in part about related issues will soon be taken up, I think it would be helpful for admins, independently of that process, to set some basic ground rules. I'm deliberately proposing this as part of a guideline rather than a policy, recognizing that the delete tool is used in a wide variety of situations and this statement (or one like it) would not apply to all of them. Still, I do think it would be helpful to have something. Having spent a lot of time closing DRVs over the last couple of years, I have seen too many cases in which editors have been needlessly angered by a deletion summary. Thanks. Chick Bowen 02:29, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Request administrative assistance with whitelist request for Lyrikline.org page for Chirikure Chirikure

Lyrikline.org is globally blacklisted, there is a history of it at User:Abd/Blacklist/lyrikline.org. Whether or not this is proper and necessary is not the question raised here. Rather, I have requested a specific whitelisting for a link to the Lyrikline.org page for Chirikure Chirikure. The page hosts audio of the poet reading his work, text of some selected poetry, and translations into a number of languages (including English). The page is at:

www.lyrikline.org/index.php?id=60&L=1&author=cc00&cHash=efa2be756d

The current discussion of the whitelisting is at MediaWiki_talk:Spam-whitelist#lyrikline.org_page_for_Chirikure_Chirikure, and this is a permanent link to the present state of the section.

I have asked for a close so that I can proceed. I have jumped through every hoop raised. The proposed external link has been proposed, 16 February, in Talk for the article, having suggested Lyrikline.org for general consideration at Portal_talk:Literature, at Portal talk:Poetry on February 13, and on WP:WikiProject Poetry on February 16. There has been no response to any of these comments; the pages are generally inactive.

I am requesting administrative assistance to whitelist the site or the specific page for en.wikipedia. Blacklist administrators are busy, some may feel that they have a conflict of interest, and there is some natural inertia. The additions to the whitelist page are described in the discussion, reviewed by Lustiger seth. Regex expressions are given for both whitelisting the whole site or just the specific link. (In addition to adding those links to the file, MediaWiki:Spam-whitelist, the addition should be logged, the file shows the log location at its head.) Editing the blacklist and whitelist files is dangerous, caution should be exercised.

Note that the original "linkspamming" came from a user at de.wikipedia, who stopped before the site was blacklisted, and actually started removing links once he realized they were unwelcome. De.wikipedia has whitelisted the entire site, and, according to Lustiger seth, an administrator here and on de.wikipedia, there has been no problem. It seems unlikely to me that an external link to Lyrikline.org would be harmful for any poet hosted there for whom we have an article, in general the link would be valuable, not merely harmless or linkfarm-y. The pages meet WP:EL, easily. The various arguments that have been raised are addressed in the discussion on the whitelist page.

To show the ultimate significance, User:Abd/Lyrikline poets shows a list of poets hosted on Lyrikline, wikified so that blue links will show what articles we have (with the exact spelling, we almost certainly have more articles than this). There are over 600 poets that are hosted on Lyrikline, and being hosted there is prima facie evidence of notability, and I consider Lyrikline.org to be a reliable source. If the whole site is whitelisted, I would monitor links to lyrikline.org; it was an agreement by a user to do this on de.wikipedia that removed the remaining objections to whitelisting there.

Please consider assisting by providing a decision on the whitelist page and by implementing, at least, the single whitelisting, or, for minimum fuss (do I have to do this for every single link? With a few hundred or more?), the whole site. --Abd (talk) 00:19, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• In what way is this not forum shopping? There is an open request at MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist, and apart from the fact that people seem to disagree with your wanting to remove blacklisting of the site in general I don't see any reason why you would need to canvass another venue. I also note that you seem to be repeating (again) your version of events without noting that others have reviewed and rejected your take on it; you give a strong impression of WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT to say nothing of WP:DEADHORSE here. Looking at your user space, it seems to be full of essays saying how everybody else is wrong about things and you (alone) are right. I understand that you are sympathetic to and have become friendly with the Lyrikline webmaster, who is understandably keen to get blacklisting removed, but your requests for this have been rejected due to past spamming and polling every venue under the sun, as you did with lenr-canr previously, is simply not acceptable. Guy (Help!) 07:17, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• Indeed, how is this not forum shopping? But thank you for bringing these problems up here to a wider attention. You requested whitelisting, several editors and admins have responded to that. Similar for de-listing on meta. It was strongly suggested to you that you should contact the appropriate wikiprojects for that. You did that, but, until now, they don't seem to be impressed by your request. You strongly suggest how editors that do comment are not looking at the evidence properly, though you strongly indicate that you don't know the full evidence (as you indicated, because you don't know where to look). However, you fail to ask nicely what proof there is, but you first suggest that the blacklisting was a '... total error ...'. And for every editor that comments or is involved in some form of blacklisting you say or suggest that they did not evaluate the full evidence ("Grounds for the block, Ed?"). That goes for JzG on newenergytimes.com and lenr-carn.org, it goes for User:A. B. on uofa.edu (and you saw there what happened yesterday; For single articles it is indeed possible to keep an eye, if it is the full scale and there are no people ready and willing to keep an eye, blacklisting is the only solution to keep spammers out (for now, where is the abuse filter), wikipedia is a spam heaven), and for User:Hu12, User:MER-C, User:EdJohnston and me on lyrikline.org. For lyrikline specifically, the specific link you are wanting to add is an external link, not an unreplaceable and highly necessery reference to source otherwise unsourceable information. There is no hurry for that (and hence no reason to comment here); for the whole domain, the link was coi-cross-wiki-spammed with disregard of local policies and guidelines, and though the links are all marginally on topic, a) on some wikis there were sometimes directly better pages that could be linked (linking to a german version of the page on a Farsi wiki version while there is a Farsi version available), b) other pages that should be linked and got ignored while links that are inappropriate were added (adding a German version of page A to a Russian wiki, where there is not Russion version of page A, but there are Russian versions of page B, C and D which were not added), and c) sometimes all links on a certain wikis were almost fully inappropriate (linking a German page to a wiki in a Brahmi language, while there are no pages in that Brahmi language anywhere, even the English wikipedia guidelines suggest that other language links should be avoided, unless they are the best .. and which are the best is better discussed first, then just blatantly added). In all the cases where you have your essays or discussions, the link was blacklisted because editors edited in disregard of policies and guidelines (which are written by many editors, admins and non-admins), and I think the de-blacklisting of ufoa.edu has shown how persistent spammers are. Moreover, the ones that are active on blacklisting and have the knowledge to see what is going on, on a regular basis clean and warn and ignore the request, it is not a light decision with incomplete or inappropriate proof that makes us blacklist. The page regarding uofa.edu was for 20 minutes difficult to control, and I don't think it is over. Imagine to do that on a large number of articles! The mop is here, but the taps on the wall are not there for nothing! Appropriately closing them keeps the dirty water out. And when you have some people with a bucket, or sufficient floorcloth, and maybe even a couple of moppers as well, you can consider opening some dirty taps.

If you want to forumshop and to help, consider finding manpower, and then release the floodgates slowly .. you are right, blacklisters should not be the ones to decline whitelisting requests or de-blacklisting requests (though they should at the very least comment on the why), but as there is still a lack of manpower there (with sufficient knowledge to evaluate all sides of the situation), that is all we have (and suggesting that the ones that do comment do not evaluate properly, again, does not help your cause). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:12, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• It's very, very simple. There is a lack of "manpower." The requests at the various projects and portals and article talk have gotten no response, not rejection, and it's blatantly obvious that nobody's home. The whitelist request for the specific page has not been rejected, it's been sitting there for a week, with positive comment, some issues raised and answered, and no decision. Probably another admin is needed to close. Where does one ask for admin help? I thought this was the place, but if there is a better one, please let me know. I could have asked an individual administrator, I've got lots of friends, but thought that it was better to put it here. Beetstra has acknowledged the cogency of my perception of problems, at various points, including above, and I'm trying to resolve the problems, one step at a time. This request is for a very specific page, so all the allegations about linkspamming are moot. Because you, Beetstra, suggested that local whitelisting of the whole site was a solution, and because I agreed that this would be the most efficient response, together with a little vigilance against possible linkspamming though the original cause for global blacklisting disappeared, even before the blacklisting, I've also suggested that as a possibility. Neither option would affect the use of lyrikline.org on other wiki.
  • I suggested whitelisting if an appropriate, local project would find it useful. They have been contacted. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 15:49, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
• Wikipedia suffers from laundry lists. Why does Beetstra mention uofa.edu? We now have a clean article as a result. It's still possible that continued linkspamming could occur, in which case we would have to address that, though I consider it less and less likely, I've contacted the school. If they don't want their site blacklisted, they will be cooperative. (Basically, if other articles are affected, uofa.edu could go back on the blacklist, but the specific link to the site for the article could be placed on a transcluded and protected page. Likewise vandalism of the article with promotion can be handled by page protection.) The idea that we had a serious problem with 20 minutes of edit warring from IP in Africa is preposterous. We have a project replete with fluff like that, and it isn't an emergency, it's easily handled here because of the attention now focused on the article (myself, A.B., Beetstra), and usually quickly without much fuss. I'd have blocked the IPs immediately (24 hours), as soon as there was one unjustified revert from them. Warning shifting IP is pretty useless anyway, and a short IP block doesn't do much harm, if any.
  • Page protection and blocking is just as harmful as blacklisting a site. Blocking is here totally useless as the IPs are way, far out of range. Page protection disables all editing and makes it impossible for new and IP editors (or all non-admins) to edit the page. That also is quite disruptive. Blacklisting would make all editing by anyone still possible. You choose the least disruptive one. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 15:49, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• Please, would a neutral admin look at this? If questions need to be asked about the whitelisting that aren't already answered in the discussion on the whitelist page, it would probably be best to ask them there. I'm not in a rush, but I do want an answer! Any admin can close there, and if assistance is needed from an experienced admin, I'd suggest asking Lustiger seth who is very familiar with the issues, and who hasn't closed it himself, I'm pretty sure, because he pledged not to take local action, but only assists with global blacklisting issues, if I've got it right. --Abd (talk) 15:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
  • This is already over and over suggested, wait for the wikiprojects/portals. You might want to have a read through Wikipedia:Canvassing. You say yourself you are not in a hurry, and none of the editors closed the discussion there, we are all waiting for the knowledgeable editors. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 15:49, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

This is not WP:CANVASS. I'm asking for neutral administrator to review the arguments. If not for linkspamming, this link wouldn't be controversial at all, and the linkspam/blacklisting process isn't designed to hold editorial intentions hostage to a handful of administrators who monitor the whitelist page. What knowledge is relevant and requested? What is the issue? Note that a whitelist entry does not guarantee that the link is acceptable, though it should guarantee that it isn't blatantly unusable. The web site satisfies WP:EL, and not one credible allegation has been made that it doesn't. I'm not in a hurry; making a whitelist request and waiting a week for an answer to the very narrow meaning of a whitelist grant, isn't "hurry," it's patient. --Abd (talk) 19:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• I was hoping for a neutral administrator to review this; however, Stifle has entered a decline, with the following reason:

•  Declined as we do not link to copyvios. If that particular item is not a copyvio, please put the content on Wikisource and link to it there.[20]

The comment indicates that the arguments and comments in the discussion were not read, or if they were read, they were not understood. Stifle has confused "not copyvio" with "public domain." They are not public domain, they are copyrighted, sometimes by lyrikline itself and sometimes by other copyright holders who have given permission, and this was discussed; hence "put the content on Wikisource" is a suggestion that I violate copyright. In the discussion, JzG appears to have the position that we need "documentary proof" of permission, as he has also asserted elsewhere, but this argument was refuted not only by me, but by DGG (elsewhere), and in this discussion by Beetstra and Ed Johnston. I've already written too much here, will a neutral administrator please review this? --Abd (talk) 19:59, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Given the number of people with whom you have already discussed this, I can only assume that your definition of "neutral admin" means "admin who agrees with Abd". Past experience indicates that these may be in short supply. Guy (Help!) 20:01, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually, no. I've discussed this with a lot of people, on and off-wiki. There are admins who agree with my position, and, in fact, among those who have discussed it on-wiki, a majority have agreed that whitelisting the whole site is reasonable. Want diffs? I'm not disclosing the off-wiki discussions. But it's moot. I'm not asking people "who agree with" me. If I wanted to do that, I'd have asked one who has already agreed. And I'd do it off-wiki, and you wouldn't know. I'm asking here, in a neutral forum, for a neutral administrator. Stifle is hardly neutral, but I'm not making that point, this is a matter under long-term discussion. The comment above was uncivil and simply obscures the issue, the whitelisting of a single link, with unnecessary conflict. --Abd (talk) 20:21, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

"Want diffs?" - Yes please. //roux   21:01, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

For background, on the blacklisting of lyrikline.org, see evidence file at User:Abd/Blacklist/lyrikline.org. That file is not complete, it shows only a little of the cross-wiki "linkspam," and the cross-wiki stuff I have only begun to analyze. It's irrelevant to the present issue, which is about one link, but the original case is routinely raised with delisting or whitelisting requests.

Multiple issues are raised and conflated in blacklist/whitelist discussions. I will only address one issue here. The denial of whitelisting just entered was explained as due to copyvio.

In the discussion on that page, there was ample reference to the issue of copyvio, and Stifle's comment shows that he didn't understand the situation, as explained above. Here are diffs from other commenting just on copyvio:

• Beetstra wrote, in part: you have shown that the site has been allowed to publish the material, and I do believe that this site does try to be in line with the law, hence I don't think that that is resolved here. [Abd comment: I'm sure he meant to write, "not resolved" or "is an issue". Beetstra's reservations about the single whitelisting are rather mysterious to me, but they are clearly not based on copyright issues. He has reasonable arguments for maintaining the global blacklisting, which don't apply here, and he has generally agreed with locally whitelisting the entire site, but wants to "consult."
• EdJohnston wrote, Per the above findings, I'd agree that the copyright status of Lyrikline is OK. He went on to review why it's quite unlikely that there is any significant copyright problem.
• Hu12 kindly, and without being asked, whitelisted the English language home page of Lyrikline.org, when I restored it (he had previously deleted it as spam), and he added the link to the article. He did not specifically mention copyright, but if Lyrikline has any kind of extensive copyright problem, surely whitelisting the whole site would be a problem! The one page we are considering here has no unique characteristics with regard to copyright as far as anyone has asserted.
• DGG, in a similar case where copyvio had been asserted and "documentary evidence" of permission demanded (as JzG did with this request), wrote on JzG talk about copyvio and permissions with [21], and then on meta, [22]: it would seem to me highly likely they did get the permission they claim. That alone is enough reason not to blacklist it--it is not predominantly devoted to copyvio. This other case is relevant because no evidence of actual copyvio was presented in either case, just assertion by JzG, picked up by others (or independently?). See also this recent comment from DGG on this, it is very clear and applies as well to lyrikline.org.
• The copyright issue was addressed by me in my request, because it had been raised before; and, not surprisingly, it was raised in this request by JzG. In none of the copyright discussions on lyrikline has any credible evidence of copyvio been asserted. The copyvio issue was rejected by consensus, the only dissent being from JzG, who appears to have an axe to grind, and Stifle who clearly didn't understand the issue (with his suggestion that I copy the content to Wikisource).--Abd (talk) 01:52, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I am not, here, providing diffs of agreement that whitelisting the whole site is appropriate, because this is already too long, but I'll note that on de.wikipedia, the whole site was whitelisted when efforts to get Lyrikline.org delisted at meta failed, and that the suggestion of complete local whitelisting came from Beetstra, in the instant discussion, and that Lustiger seth, knowledgable about the Lyrikline case, has supported my views and opinion on this and on problems with blacklisting/delisting/whitelisting process. But I did not raise the broader issue. If I can't get one single link whitelisted, if it is denied (as another was recently denied) based on spurious arguments and clear lack of consideration, what hope is there of getting the whole site whitelisted? If there were danger of linkspam, that's where it would be, not with one specific link! --Abd (talk) 01:52, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't really care what happens off-wiki - I am sure you will find many banned former users who will support you to the hilt, but it won't help you much here. You asked at the whitelisting page, you didn't get the answer you want, and no doubt you will consider this as further confirming evidence of the Vast Sinister Conspiracy at work. I just wish you didn't immortalise and endlessly rehash every single dispute in which you lose. Guy (Help!) 20:28, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

How about that for some radical assumptions? None of the users I've discussed this with are "banned former users," haven't had any contact with them for a long time, except for two recent snailmails from federal prison. In any case, as I wrote, the off-wiki discussions are moot.

(univolved) The request wasn't neutrally framed, so it looks like forum shopping, intentional or not. I see no reason for the blacklisting to be lifted. Verbal chat 20:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

No request was made by me for the "blacklisting to be lifted." This is about a whitelisting request for a specific link. The blacklist was not intended to be used to control content, only to stop extensive linkspam. When the request sat there for a week, even though cogent argument had been made and supported by others that the whitelisting was appropriate and not a risk, nothing was happening. In that context, asking for admin help isn't "forum shopping," it's asking for help! In any case, neutral reports seem to be the exception rather than the rule here, first example I looked at, a little earlier this evening: [23]. Examples abound. I gave a little of the argument here so that an admin might see why this was of interest. Perhaps this was the wrong forum. In any case, now that the whitelisting request has been denied, though not by a clearly neutral admin, can Verbal -- or anyone -- point me to the equivalent of WP:DRV for blacklisting/delisting/whitelisting appeals? --Abd (talk) 01:52, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

• Just for the sake of clarity, Abd, you stated above "I am requesting administrative assistance to whitelist the site or the specific page for en.wikipedia" and "Please consider assisting by providing a decision on the whitelist page and by implementing, at least, the single whitelisting, or, for minimum fuss (do I have to do this for every single link? With a few hundred or more?), the whole site." Ignoring that there may be a concern with the "few hundred or more" in reference to a site blocked due to linkspam, it does appear that you requested (multiple times) for the whole site to be whitelisted, rather than only focusing on the specific link. - Bilby (talk) 04:30, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

• Thanks, Bilby. If you read the discussion on the whitelist, you will see that I requested one single link. Beetstra suggested, not I, that the whole site be whitelisted here, and other admins have supported that. Note that Lustiger seth certified the whitelist regex to be used, and he's opined elsewhere that there would be no problem with overall whitelisting, but he has promised not to interfere in local en.wiki process, he's admin on de.wikipedia and coordinates blacklist activities, his admin bit here was requested because of occasional usefulness. However, for general whitelisting, Beetstra wanted to get support from a WikiProject (which is reasonable, though not necessarily practical). I continued to ask for the single whitelisting, no more than a couple of minute's work for an admin, less time than it takes to write a thoughtful reply. If granted, then I'd probably ask for another. Whitelisting the whole site would not result in hundreds of links without further discussion, but only a few at a time, probably, unless general support appears. (Lots of editors have now seen Lyrikline.org and I can't control what others might do, but I would watch all the additions coming from others and make sure that they don't violate guidelines or consensus.) So, in bringing in a fresh set of eyes, I pointed out two results that I desired: single whitelisting, which is thoroughly harmless at worst, or site whitelisting, which, if there were a likelihood of continued linkspamming, could be more dangerous. That is a separate issue. The problem here is that the single request has now been declined based on a rejected argument, copyright violation. Elsewhere, just today, I saw justification of blacklisting because "whitelisting needed links is easy." It isn't, and this example shows it, and this isn't isolated. Nobody has opposed this link in the specific article, nor, indeed, has anyone opposed it for other possibly related articles, such as Shona language. (I don't know of any other articles where a link to the page for Chirikure Chirikure might be relevant.) So all this talk and debate and flap over two links at most.--Abd (talk) 15:24, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

• This is a good place for general attention when it involves OWNership of a specialized part of Wikipedia process. The problem involved both getting this specific approval, and the site in general. (I don't see that asking for one excludes also asking for the other) The reasons for both this link & the general case have been given by Abd above, and my view of the reasons has been correctly presented by him. I hope Guy does not consider me a banned former user coming from the Darkside. I think he is taking an uninformed opinion about the nature of the site, and turning them into policy--or else a prejudice that if a site has ever been spammed, it can never be used. To summarize, this site is an official project of the Zentral- und Landesbibliothek Berlin (the Berlin Central and Regional Library). It therefore must be assumed to meet German copyright law, which is in general stricter than US copyright. If they put material there, they can safely be assumed to have permission. I can not see them putting up illegal material. All libraries, even outside of Germany are strict about this--I certainly never put material on my libraries site that was not PD or material for which the university owned the copyright, or where we had obtained permission. The deWP is stricter than the enWP on copyright--for example, they do not permit fair use material; if they whitelist the site, they know what they are doing. In some matters of V, they are apparently more flexible than us, but not on copyvio. I urge immediate whitelisting of any specific site there on request from an established editor. Whether we need to keep it on the general blacklist would depend upon the use for spam. I hate spamming as much as anyone here, and it is possible that this might be used that way if we had no restrictions, but I think it needs a discussion. That spam has happened in the past is only imperfectly correlated with the future. In general it is better to block spammers than blacklist sites -- exactly analogous to protecting pages. . DGG (talk) 05:49, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, DGG. You read my mind. Maybe that's because you read what I write! Whitelisting should be easy, if it's easy, then there is far less damage from blacklisting. See my response to Beetstra below (to be made). Spammers, especially the professionals, don't normally use autoconfirmed accounts to request spam links, it's far more efficient for them to use IP or new accounts. Occasional spammers may, and more likely COI or SPAs. Anyone requesting a suspicious link is going to get looked at, and I've seen an article deleted within minutes (improperly, in my opinion, but that's another story) because a probable COI editor asked for whitelisting of a needed link. (That whole matter has eventually been resolved by delisting of the site, it was a regex error in the first place, and the article is pending restoration. It's a marginally notable company, don't know if a stub can be maintained.) Blacklisting is intended for efficiency in dealing with a difficult problem, but inadequate attention has been paid by the community to the reverse process, so the result is content damage and, indeed, tedious discussions like this! (And, short of this, I've seen more than a few editors driven away by the blacklisting process, and we have seen external media damage to our reputation result as well.)--Abd (talk) 15:34, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

No, whitelisting should not be easy. Getting blacklisted is hard, and an abused site rightly has a significant bar to overcome before a whitelist request is granted because otherwise we might just as well not bother with blacklisting at all. Abuse is common, frivolous or fraudulent claims against blacklisting are common, genuine and actionable requests for whitelisting are actually quite rare compared with the size of the blacklists. And this is not actually a problem, since Wikipedia is not a linkfarm. 80.176.82.42 (talk) 00:06, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Familiar arguments. See the introduction to the whitelist request that this AN notice was about. Here are the problems with it: An editor decides that a web site would make a great external link for an article, back in 2006. No problem. Over the next year, he adds a few more. No problem. Then, apparently he has some spare time, so he starts adding lots of the links, on de.wikipedia, en.wikipedia, mostly, and many links to other 'pedias. The web site is Lyrikline.org, and it has pages for over 600 notable poets, and with each page there is audio of the poet reading the work, translations in various languages, a bibliography, and a biography. It's edited and it's reputable, supported by the Berlin library system, the Goethe Institut, and other weighty institutions. The links generally meet WP:EL; they are exactly what is described in WP:ELYES. However, the volume of links added attracted the linkspam volunteers, who do not in their work normally consider content issues, content isn't mentioned in the linkspam reports or original blacklist discussions (And this is probably necessary, it takes too long to make content decisions.) Quantity of links is considered linkspam, with little review. So the site is blacklisted, in this case globally. Now, even if the original editor was dead wrong (He wasn't, actually, he was acting within guidelines, reasonably interpreted), Lyrikline.org didn't do anything wrong, nor did I, an editor desiring to add a specific link, one page, to a specific article. Above, the IP editor suggests that the "site rightly has a significant bar to overcome," but this is a content decision, and content is being effectively punished or inhibited, as well as editors who had no connection with the linkspam. The IP editor also seems to confuse whitelisting a specific link with defeating the blacklist. No, "easy whitelisting" means, to me, that an autoconfirmed editor ought to be able to request whitelisting of a specific link, and, for that link, unless it risks significant linkspan, a quick review of reasonableness, not of ultimate appropriateness, which is up to the article's editors, should be enough. Linkspamming should be irrelevant to content, just as contributions of a banned editor may not be excluded simply because they came from a banned editor. The editor may be blocked (that's an equivalent to the blacklist), but if the editor, contrary to policy, comes in from a library, say, and makes an edit, and it's identified as from a banned user, it can normally be reverted on sight, but any other user, not banned, can put it back, taking responsibility for it. The content isn't blocked, the user is. I'd have the whitelist page be semiprotected, with another page devoted to requests from IP and new editors. It would take an autoconfirmed editor to bump up such requests to the actual whitelisting request page. I would presume that any whitelisting request nominated by an editor in good standing, and approved by another, might routinely be implemented by an admin, with fuss, if not directly implemented based on single nomination and admin acceptance. Not "automatically implemented." I'm not proposing we change how we make decisions, but a single-page whitelisting can do practically no harm that can't be easily reversed. If massive linkspam appears for that page, the whitelisting can be removed quickly, but it's unlikely to happen. Note that this is a higher bar, just not offensively higher. This whole sequence, and what I've seen happening in blacklist/whitelist discussions here and at meta over the last few months, has convinced me that there are indeed problems with the blacklisting process, though they shouldn't be difficult to fix, but what is more significant is whitelisting, which has become, as the IP editor seems to think it should be, an onerous and difficult process, while, at the same time, in blacklisting discussions, it is glibly asserted: no problem with blacklisting, because if a link is needed, you can easily get it whitelisted. No. Not easy. Quite difficult. I wasn't the first person to request a link to lyrikline.org, I became aware of the blacklisting from a prior denied request.

The result is that, even if Lyrikline.org is RS, most editors won't bother with whitelisting even if it's easy. I have no doubt that several hundred links to the web site are appropriate to en.wikipedia, and possibly more than that. This wouldn't be only external links, it would include usages of the site for verification of content, i.e., as RS. It may be possible to find the information elsewhere, but, quite often, those other available on-line sources aren't RS themselves. Given what I've said, how many links did we have a few weeks ago? It was zero, though I've found, I think, one page where there was a link without the http://. Because of the original alleged linkspamming, the article the user created on Lyrikline.org was immediately deleted by an admin active with blacklisting. This article contained enough information to clearly verify the high notability of the site. I'm saying that the effort to prevent true linkspam is necessary, but we should take care that we don't throw out the content baby with the spam bathwater. The IP comment above seems to assume that WP:ELYES doesn't exist. It does. --Abd (talk) 23:25, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Hmm. I said on my talkpage that I would withdraw myself from this discussion, as I am too involved. But there are unanswered remarks to my address here.

My reasons for 'declining' the specific whitelist is that I do believe that there is reason to go on and whitelist the whole domain (and that would take away a lot of work, and as this specific whitelist request concerns an external link, not a reference, I do not see haste in whitelisting, I would be much more inclined if it would be a reference that a part of the article could not be sourced without). BUT, there have been concerns of copyright (which I indeed think are unfounded), I am not 100% convinced that the site is actually adding to wikipedia (some of the material must also be available somewhere else), the site was massively cross-wiki spammed (and I do regard that most of the additions outside of en and de were inappropriate or at least very badly chosen (simple copy-paste of one link following interwikis), in disregard of existing local policies), the editor was warned a couple of times (there is also a warningless block), and the editor appears to have a COI (as being affiliated with the Literatur Bruecke Berlin; "Literature bridge Berlin"). I have therefore suggested (and that suggestion was followed) to seek expert advice and if they do think that the site is useful, to whitelist the whole domain. Unfortunately there is no response from them there.

I agree with DGG that spam happened in the past is imperfectly correlated with the future, but many cases do show that follow up is often necessery (and it also sometimes gets resolved positively), and that is just more reason to involve knowledgeable editors in the subject with it. I am not sure if it is better to block spammers (if they are affiliated with a major organisation), protect pages (which disables good faith editors to edit unrelated matters in the articles) or blacklist a site (which may hamper sourcing, but further enables all forms of editing to articles, including content edits by the same major organisations). Probably the best is to circumvent all three of these options! --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:29, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, Beetstra. You've been quite helpful, and I've acknowledged that elsewhere also. Your approach to whitelisting the entire site is very reasonable, but your approach to the single whitelisting was improperly linked to that. If the single site was usable -- and you clearly agree that it was -- then you could have (I'd say should have) right then, whitelisted it, would have taken you a minute. And that discussion would have been done, probably. By linking this to whole-site whitelisting, in the name of efficiency, you practically demolished efficiency, leading to far more wasted time than a couple of harmless whitelisting requests, quickly granted (or denied). The page protection I suggested would be semi-protection, which is far less damaging, and the Talk page wouldn't be protected, leaving the door open for COI and SPAs and anonymous editors to make suggestions. From a review of the original blacklisting history, see User:Abd/Blacklist/lyrikline.org, I have tentatively concluded that blacklisting was a reasonable measure, initially, given the volume of links being added. However, given that few or none of these were clearly inappropriate, and many were appropriate, and that the editor attempted to respond and follow guidelines (see the example on nl.wikipedia), that the editor stopped adding links apparently before the global blacklisting forced it, and even attempted to undo the "damage," by removing links, even while disagreeing with the conclusion that links were inappropriate, and that this IP, which is stable and clearly identified with User:Lyriker and user Lyrik on de.wikipedia, almost totally stopped editing, maintaining the blacklisting would seem to be overkill, even globally, though, as I've said, your position on that is reasonable and the global blacklisting is not presently being challenged by me. But I see no reason at all to not whitelist the site here, the arguments you have (elsewhere) made for continued global blacklisting -- that the site isn't in the language of the 'pedia -- don't apply here, as can be seen from our article and its link, Lyrikline.org. Once again, possible concerns about linkspamming here don't apply to a single-page whitelisting. --Abd (talk) 15:50, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, that part is true, whitelisting of the single site would have been fine while waiting to go on with the rest of the discussion. I'll acknowledge that mistake. I'll rectify that. Actually, I am now thinking of that, I am going to suggest and implement a intermediate solution on the whitelist here, the site does allow for that.

We disagree (still) on appropriateness/inappropriateness of the links added on the smaller wikis (even on some of the bigger ones, like nl), but that is outside of the scope of this discussion. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 16:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I believe this is resolved, would someone close? Thanks, Beetstra, for your thoughtful and considerate response. Where we agree is more important than where we disagree. --Abd (talk) 17:23, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Bug in the redirect-tracking system?

Moved to WP:VPT

 – Martin^msgj 13:15, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

• Just now http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:WhatLinksHere/September_11_attacks&hidelinks=1&limit=500 listed that:
  1. User:Patricius Augustus/GI Joe Continuum redirects to 9/11.
  2. 9/11 redirects to September 11 attacks.

  #2 is true, but User:Patricius Augustus/GI Joe Continuum now redirects to User:Patricius Augustus and before that was a text page about the GI Joe fictional scenario. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 07:24, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree it is very strange. This link shows the error more clearly. Martin^msgj 11:29, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Look at it in edit mode. Whoever made the redirect didn't delete the previous text so it still shows up in the search because it is the current version. John Reaves 12:04, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

It's still not a redirect to 9/11 though! Anyway, this is clearly not in the right place, so I'm going to move it to WP:VPT. Martin^msgj 13:12, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Several sock accounts used for vandalizing

I recently tried to report some of Am6212 (talk · contribs) socks, as can be seen here Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Am6212#Report_date_February_4_2009.2C_20:12_.28UTC.29. As you also can see the obvious wasn't "enough", even though the socks had been blocked previously. Anyway, all of them are used only for creating edit-wars and for vandalizing, most recently there were also this user which shows the exact same pattern, Chcoc (talk · contribs). They obviously haven't done anything constructively, so all of his socks deserves to be blocked for the good of Wikipedia, and also if the user Choc's edits could all be auto-reverted, that would save some time. The TriZ (talk) 18:42, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

It would be appreciated if someone could take a look as soon as possible. The TriZ (talk) 13:23, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Problems with WWE Alumni Page

Resolved

 – User blocked indefinitely.

There's a user who has been drastically editing the WWE Alumni Page, but gave no heads up on the discussion board about it, so he's basically vandalizing it. Now the new edit is making it hard for the page to load up because he has numerous images on the page that separates the table of contents from the article. Please restore it to where it was much easier to navigate the page.Cena Jr (talk) 20:05, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

It helps if you link to the article you are referring to. JPG-GR (talk) 21:55, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

He is referring to me and the article List of World Wrestling Entertainment alumni article. Of course I remove violations of WP:RS, WP:V, WP:BLP, add content, add 350 references and images, get called a Nazi in the process and somehow I am at fault. — Moe ε 22:08, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm going to guess List of World Wrestling Entertainment alumni. From the talk page, It looks like it is being worked towards a Featured List. I don't see any TOC on the article page, so I don't understand the issue. I don't see any admin action at this point; rather issues over content and organization. Some of the stuff on the talk page is pretty childish including some comment blanking. It appears to me that User:Moe Epsilon is acting in good faith here. I am a bit concerned over the comments about consensus at User:Cena Jr. These guys really need to cool down and go through Wikipedia:Dispute resolution if they have to. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 22:15, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Opposition to marking this resolved? iMatthew // talk // 01:29, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Note, I did not call him a Nazi. However, he's childish for blanking comments. So I guess it's ok to bastardize articles and alter them without consensus agreement first? What a very loose rule. And you wonder why Wikipedia is unreliable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cena Jr (talk • contribs) 03:23, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

<sarcasm>Yes its damnable what I have done to the article! I added references! Block me now, I'm obviously out of control.. </sarcasm> — Moe ε 03:59, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh YES, let's go change articles from a simple format to something ridiculous just because I have too much time.Cena Jr (talk) 20:07, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Cena Jr

It is apparent that this user is a WP:SPA account. He continues to disrupt the creation of the WWE alumni article by blanking portions of it claiming that it is slowing down the load time or that portions of it is copyrighted, which is nonsense. In addition, his userpage seems to indicate he came to Wikipedia to push that fact is more important than consensus [24] and he is soapboxing on his talk page about some kind of RPG. [25] — Moe ε 06:58, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I left a note on his talk page that this thread has been posted as well, hopefully this can be moved over to another area of WP:DR, and resolved at perhaps WP:RFC before it escalates any further. I'm personally not involved, but just wanted to make sure that procedure was followed when posting a new thread about a user. Best of luck folks. ;) — Ched (talk) 12:58, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually, no. I had stumbled onto the WWE Alumni page to check something out, and truth be told, this guy went and bastardized it. I've been reading that page for ages, and what he has done to it makes the page too slow. And then he has about 25 images separated from the article at the top that are in no sequential order, have no purpose, and are possibly copyrighted. Cry me a river Moe.Cena Jr (talk) 20:07, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

If you are concerned about copyrights, you can always check the image's talk page. You would see that they are all free-use pictures (including some I took myself). GaryColemanFan (talk) 06:30, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm starting to understand something about the image problem. It really helps if you separate issues and don't lump them together with a lot of emotionalism. I will leave some feedback on the article talk page. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 20:14, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Important thing though is that the images do not need to be stacked up like that in the article as it only causes confusion and it's causing problems for the page to load up.Cena Jr (talk) 17:48, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

User who started thread has been blocked as sock of Cheatum Jr (talk · contribs). Tagging thread as resolved. D.M.N. (talk) 22:01, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Obama article probation

If a vandal violates the Obama article probation, do they get summarily blocked, or do they go through the normal warning pyramid? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 23:43, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Case by case basis after warning by only uninvolved admins. If it's apparent good-faith editing and not an egregious vandalism attack or nasty BLP violation, why would anyone be summarily blocked anyway right off the bat? rootology (C)(T) 02:39, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

My concern was over a pretty egregious vandalistic edit, but the ip got blocked quickly. Thanks. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 00:12, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Might Be Nothing, But Figured I'd Mention It

Duffbeerforme (talk · contribs) has been around for for a day or two, but has been proposing several articles for deletion with a fairly consistent tone towards deletionism. I certainly hope i'm wrong and this is nothing, but I found it curious and I was wondering if this account was from another user who was just looking for a sock for deletions. Would a sock check be warranted? Spinach Monster (talk) 16:17, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

: No, he hasn't been around "for a day or two", his first edit was more than a year ago. I've reviewed a bunch of his edits, and I don't see him breaking any policy, and while he is nominating quite a few articles for deletion, that appears to be in the context of an apparently good-faith cleanup effort. If you have specific allegations of this user breaking policy, you need to present specific diff evidence, not merely make vague allegations of one "ism" or another. 87.113.105.126 (talk) 16:46, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

My apologies, I saw the contribs wrong, as did another user who skewed me as well. However, please don't misconstrue my my good faith mistake as an attempt against this editors' good faith clean up effort. If I had seen the contribs correctly at first, I wouldn't have made this comment. Being concerned is nothing to be ashamed of if you think there's a reason to be concerned. Spinach Monster (talk) 16:52, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

While you're here, why not start an account? Spinach Monster (talk) 16:56, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

What's wrong with my statement? Once a week = one day every week? February 27, 20, 13, 7...

I'd like him to be a sock (obviously), but I doubt he is (see [26]). He just seems to be frustrated over lots of his own articles being deleted (see his talkpage), some of them speedy (see [27]).--Avant-garde a clue-hexaChord² 16:58, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

We all made good faith mistakes here, IMO. Hopefully a way can be found to help him when he feels his work has been treated wrong. I know how frustrating it can be. Spinach Monster (talk) 17:05, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Just to let you know, those nominations were as part of a good faith cleanup effort, which I have done before and will continue to do. It has nothing to do with the suggestions of some that articles I started (not my own articles) be deleted. Only one of those articles have been deleted and that was an incorrect use of a CSD, the rest remain (eg the mentioned Trevor Adamson) so there is no frustration from that. Duffbeerforme (talk) 05:48, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:UAA

Resolved

 – Case is on the Daniel. — neuro^(talk) 04:06, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Bit of a backlog at Wikipedia:Usernames for administrator attention if anyone has some spare time... – Toon^(talk) 03:44, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm on the tagging. — neuro^(talk) 03:48, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Most of them need blocking, actually, so that rules me out. — neuro^(talk) 03:51, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Case is on the Daniel. — neuro^(talk) 04:04, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Zamora (pianist) needs attention

The talk page [[28]] was forgotten and Zamora (pianist) is still awaiting admin revision for his disambiguation, protection, and publication in the main space.

So, please I would be glad for any attention from the sysops.

Thanks. --Fandezamora (talk) 18:13, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

The next step is to list the page at WP:Deletion review, following the instructions there. Given that there is a valid deletion debate, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alejandro Zamora, the necessity of overturning it needs to be clearly established. Furthermore, since there is history of sockpuppetry and conflict of interest regarding this subject, I think care is advisable. Chick Bowen 18:33, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Fandezamora is a sock puppet of Alejandrozamora, who has also created Zfans and Luisadelvalle, all of them already blocked in eswiki. Locos ~ epraix Beastepraix 18:54, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Zamorafan too Locos ~ epraix Beastepraix 19:04, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I thought that was quite clear. Was attempting to be polite about it. . . Chick Bowen 19:27, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

This comment is insulting and false.

I come here to discuss politely his publication in the main space following the policies and guidelines, because it is impossible to have a polite discussion in the eswiki.

The page was moved here by the same admins to a secure editing place by fear of being deleted, and it is being updated and maintained for the same admins of enwiki.

Additionally, how I've said previously, I come here to discuss politely his publication in the main space following the right policies and guidelines, so I ask you a polite treatment too.

Thanks- --Fandezamora (talk) 19:42, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I can't assume good faith, also the subpage shows no relevance and i suposse is a autobiography. The eswiki administrators erased zamora under that argument and the others before mentionated. See this link in the spanish village pump http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:C/M#Zamora Locos ~ epraix Beastepraix 19:56, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Politely: Your pages are protected because you keep making sockpuppet accounts to recreate them or ask for undeletion. Creating another sockpuppet account to ask for undeletion, as you have done here, only makes it more likely that administrators will keep those page protected. Likewise, if you create more sockpuppet accounts in the future, this will not help you get those pages back; rather, it will make it much more difficult, since Wikipedia will have to take your past actions into account. It's best if you stop sockpuppeting, because it does nothing to advance your interests. — Gavia immer (talk) 19:58, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

You are making false accusations, so I will like to request again polite treatment and focus the discussion in a cronstructive matter.

Thanks. --Fandezamora (talk) 20:13, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

• You have already been told of the only possible next step, which is to list the article at deletion review. Instructions on how to do this are here. If you are still not sure, ask me on my talk page and I'll create the review for you. Thanks, Black Kite 20:20, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Another sokpuppet (User:Fandezamora2). Locos ~ epraix Beastepraix 20:34, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

dont you get tired of this? (User:Fandezamora3). Locos ~ epraix Beastepraix 20:37, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Again, your accusations are falses. If you read the spanish discussions, you can see that I am recognizing the ownership of these accounts because you block every account that tries to discuss anything about Zamora. So, I request again a polite treatment here and if you have any other comment, please do it of a constructive way.

Thanks. --Fandezamora (talk) 20:50, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

• I'll say this again, because you're clearly not reading it - the only thing that you can do here is to list the article at deletion review. Instructions on how to do this are here. If you are still not sure, ask me on my talk page and I'll create the review for you. Creating multiple accounts to keep trying to restore the article is utterly pointless, they will merely be blocked. Thanks, Black Kite 12:08, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

The fair use image and categories at User:Fandezamora/Zamora (pianist) should probably be nowiki'd out. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 00:15, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

• Done. Black Kite 12:08, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Personal Union

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Resolved

 – This is not an admin issue. Take up dispute resolution methods. The admin noticeboard is not a place to continue content disputes begun elsewhere at Wikipedia. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 14:22, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I am becoming really tired with disruptive account Bizso and needing help. This newly created SPA account has during last 15 days started massive rewriting of article from Croatian and Hungarian history. In beginning it has been possible to believe that he is good faith editor with thinking that he is knowing history better of everybody else, but now this is not possible. In article Croatia in personal union with Hungary it is possible to see that he is not disputing existence of personal union [29], but in articles about kings of this personal union he is removing title King of Croatia using like reason that title is not writen in article on Britannica [30] which is writing shorter title version in articles of for example Stanford university [31]

Maybe I am little paranoid, but it is weird that we are having user which is edit warring in articles related with history of Hungary, without that he lives in Hungary and without that he speak Hungarian. If we add to that that he is knowing history of blanked talk page which was edited by banned user from Washington metropolitan area and he is using puppets for edit warring [32] maybe is time for 1 nice banning ?

If this is not OK I and other involved users (my thinking) will accept mediation which will be enforced--Rjecina (talk) 08:57, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

OK Rjecina, you accused me last time of being a socket puppet. You could be banned for personal attacks alone. You can't accept it that there are so many users who can't put up with your nationalistic POV pushing and altering Wikipedia articles to suit your views. You falsify historical articles and remove Britannica and Encarta references!!

That banned user might have been a socketpuppet, however, he still made relevant and valubal comments on the talk page that you are censoring! I add also my comment here:

Rjecina, you state that I am an SPA account like you state many more things without reference. I do not introduce anything disputable, what I do is correct factual inaccuracy introduced into the articles. In a broader sense I revert the artcles to earlier versions (before the incorrect facts were introduced) and provide references. The articles about the rulers of Hungary were all correct and in accordence with Britannica and Encarta at the date of their creation, 2001/2002 and it wasn't until February 2007/August 2008 when they got changed by various IP addresses. Also, articles in other languages are correct as well, it's only the English and Croatian ones that have problems. So this is not a nationalistic dispute, what it is that it somehow hurts your patriotic emotions. That's different things. I would be glad if you you metnioned that I solely use verifyable english sources such as Britannica 2009 and Encarta and that I also discuss them on the talk page. So first I think you should answer those questions there on the talk pages.Talk:Croatia#Questions,Talk:Triune_Kingdom_of_Croatia,_Slavonia,_and_Dalmatia, Talk:Kingdom_of_Hungary_in_the_Middle_Ages, Talk:Croatia_in_personal_union_with_Hungary,

I do no edit warring, the one one who doesn't like historical facts is you because you somehow have a conflict of interest with the history of your country, Croatia. Furthermore, you do edit warring, and you revert my changes without discussion and remove Britannica and Encarta references. Please respond on the talk pages.

I would like to mention that I filed a report against Rjecina earlier that he has a conflict of interest due to his nationalistic feeling. He has been in Conflict with previous Hungarian and Serbian users. See a copy of the report on my talk page.--Bizso (talk) 08:05, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Rjecina, so I would like to ask you that read BRitannica and Encarta.

And Lands of the St Stephen were the official name for Kingdom of Hungary. It misght be worth stating that you introduced the factual inaccuracy there too. What you think Kingdom of Hungary was is called Hungary proper. Please consult to a historian!--Bizso (talk) 08:13, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Also I only remove other titles of rulers because they had like 150 and they should be listed in a separate section like the one I created called "Titles". I deleted king of Croatia among other, because King of Hungary includes king of Croatia as croatia was part of Hungary. However King of Hungary doesn't include king of Bohemia for example so I listed it in the lead. I do this based solely on Britannica 2009, and Encarta 2009 references.

From Hungarian regional admin board:

The title of the Hungarian rulers was King of Hungary, and not King of Hungary-Croatia. Croatia was governed by a ban. Please, check it on www.britannica.com All the articles are wrong. Most of the articles were changed in February 2007 by various IP addresses. the King of Hungary was not crowned separately as king of Croatia. He was king of the Croatian people as well as king of the Slovaks and king of the residents of Buda and so on, but these are not mentioned in the articles. Croatia was governed by a ban at that time.--Bizso (talk) 11:04, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

See below. The admin noticeboard is not the appropriate location to decide between two competing versions of an article. This content dispute is the purview of dispute resolution. Please take this elsewhere. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 14:22, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

User:Rjecina

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Resolved

 – This is not an admin issue. Take up dispute resolution methods. The admin noticeboard is not a place to continue content disputes begun elsewhere at Wikipedia. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 14:23, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Rjecina (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log)

• Reporting User:Rjecina: Censoring Wikipedia. Misleading Reader. Conscious and Intentional Violation of Wikipedia policy on Balance, POV forks Do not hide the facts,Characterizing people's opinon Biased statements and on the general concept of Wikipedia Neutral Point of View Policy. The issue is with regard to the Current Academic Level Dispute around the validity of Pacta Conventa and the circumstances of Hungarian-Croatian historical relations. He also seems to have a conflict showing an impartial attitude towards Croatian-Serbian relations, which results in edit warring between him and multiple other Wikipedian users. On the occasion I continue to insist on presenting all competing academic viewpoints and correct factual inaccuracies, He threatened to block me. He removes sourced, reliable, varifiable, third party english reference provided by various editors so that only one of the viewpoints that is supported by his/her patriotic or nationalistics feelings, are maintained in a double-edged academic level dispute. The issue is still disputed among historians to this day, and Wikipedia policy states to allow all significant viewpoints to exist in an article beside one another. In addition, He also changes historical facts in non-disputable areas, and refuses to be corrected by proper sourced reference. He "patrols" all relevant articles and intentionally maintains Factual Inaccuracy, Ambiguity and Biased Point of View.
  
  

Croatia was part of Kingdom of Hungary from 1102/1091-1918. It is disputed whether Croatia joined to Hungary by a personal union in 1102, or was conquered by Hungary in 1091. Croatia was given limited internal autonomy over some of her affairs; sometimes more, sometimes less. The Lands of St Stephen was the official name for Kingdom of Hungary. This is stated in virtually all reliable, verfiable sources and historical maps including Britannica 2009 and Encarta. Rjecina cannot accept this fact owing to his patriotic/nationatistic emotions, thus he alters history at least on Wikipedia. What user Rjecina presents is that Kingdom of Hungary and Kingdom of Croatia were two separate independent kingdoms and the only common between them was the ruler. This is in fact not true. Croatia was ruled by Hungarian kings and a ban was appointed to the administrative district that was Croatia. When he asserts these facts, he furthermore doesn't provide any references, or when he does so, the references he cites in fact support the contrary what he states or refer to enirely different historic periods (Kingdom of Croatia before the Hungarian rule). Hence, in fact he attempts to manipulate the reader hoping that she/he doesn't check the references. See.[33] and [34].

See some example sources, including Encyclopedia Britannica 2009 and Encyclopedia Encarta 2009 that state the academic level viewpoint that Croatia was in fact ruled by Hungary, Britannica 1911 especially stating the Croatia was a province of Hungary. Rjecina cannot accept this, thus he censors Wikipedia and engages into edit wars. See Talk:Croatia_in_personal_union_with_Hungary titled Croatia-Slavonia in the Kingdom of Hungary. but it appears he has removed other users relevant and valuable comments again for I don't know how many times now.[35] [36]. He deleted my comments too, removing circa 30 sources including Britannica and Encarta among other english academic sources [37] He is stating the Britannica and Encarta peddle Fringe theories Talk:Kingdom_of_Hungary_in_the_Middle_Ages The problem is that Rjecina cannot discuss nor edit these articles in an objective manner, beause he doesn't acknowledge all competing viewpoints. Although this is fair enough, because everyone is entitled to have an opinion regarding a matter. But Wikipedia should be objective on the other hand, and should not include personal reflections and assertions of the users who edit it, without any references.

He introduces false facts[38] and doesn't respond on the talk page Talk:Croatia#Questions and also fails to explain himself here when he removed references againTalk:Croatia#User:Rjecina. He cannot accept the validity of Britannica, nor the 1911 edition nor the 2009 edition, just because it says something else that he would like to hear. Hence, as he can't edit britannica or encarta, he changes articles on Wikipedia. see Talk:Triune_Kingdom_of_Croatia,_Slavonia,_and_Dalmatia As a result he removes Britannica 2009 refernces 1st time[39], 2nd time [40], 3rd time[41]. Now, he removes references from Encyclopedia Encarta.[42] He calls Academic refernces "Spam"[43] He deliberately maintains ambiguity and makes disruptive edits here[44], here [45], here again [46], again [47], he sometimes deletes it altogether [48] When I add the other competing academic viewpoint (that he personally supports) to an article to balance it out and include all significant viewpoints, he changes that too![49] Even the one that he supports, which suggests that he is simply stalking me now.

He maintains ambiguity although article is tagged for in need of Copy-Editing[50] However, he also engages in nationalistic conflicts with other users hereTalk:Jasenovac_concentration_camp#Removal_of_images and censors images that hurt his nationalistic feelings regarding history of Croatia and Serbia.[51]He not only deletes talk pages, but also censors articles by removing additional realibly sourced information because he can't take it. He removed sourced information from Encyclopedia of the Holocaust by Shelach[52]

He blanks talk pages that do not suit his personal view. He removed sourced references from talk page.[53] [54]Removed even more sourced references from talk page but left other viewpoint there. He deletes the competing academic level viewpoint and on top that removes references and replaces unreferenced tag and maintans a POV frok[55]. He removes citation needed tags and introduces inaccuracy to suit his views, removes other additional inforamtion thus maintaing biased sentences[56]

On top of all this, he is constantly accusing me of being a socketpuppet of other users that dare to question Rjecina's neutral point of view and of those who also oppose Rjecina's nationalistic POV pushing. He calls me Vandal[57], and my edits disruptive[58] without any basis.

He now has started reverting other users' edits too, because he believes that they are me.[59][60][61][62] [63] [64]

Some quotes:

You are facing with group of people coming from Croatia whose hurt nacionalistic pride cannot stand seeing these pictures here. These people want only to destroy this article - if not completely then just as much as they can. This is a consequence of Mr Wales' idea that everybody can contibute knowledge - which makes this and other articles unprotected against malice and ignorance.--71.252.55.101 (talk) 20:10, 14 February 2009 (UTC) Actually that groups of people only refer to Rjecina, as he simply patrols pages.

You deleted the truth. You didn't care about the sources, there were only 11 about the conquer of Croatia, but you deleted it Toroko (talk) 23:02, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Although the status of Croatia in the Kingdom of Hungary is still disputed; according to all sources here: Whether you call it conquer, annexation, addition or union; the important thing is that Hungary had control over Croatia, but gave her some extent of internal autonomy within the Kingdom of Hungary (Lands of St. Stephen) and in this relationship Hungary and Croatia were not equal parties--Bizso (talk) 22:01, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Related talk pages: Talk:Croatia#lol.2C_funny_-_Union_with_Hungary,Talk:Croatia#Congratulations.21, User:Bizso/Reporting_Rjecina#Discussion_2

Therefore I would like to Request the following: User:Rjecina has shown no sign of being capable of distancing himself from his nationalistic/patriotic emotions with regard to the issue on the Valditiy of Pacta Conventa and historical Croatian-Hungarian relations and history of Croatia-Serbia. Hence, User:Rjecina is unable to positively contribute to Wikipedia in an objective manner, which is required by Wikipedia's Policy on Netral Point of View. He is effectively censoring Wikipedia due to patriotic feelings for his recently independent country. He furthermore deliberatly prevents the improvement of Wikipedian articles with regard to these topics by engaging in edit wars and calling other users vandal and disruptive.

Therefore, I request that User:Rjecina be blocked or banned from English Wikipedia for an unspecified period of time.--Bizso (talk) 10:59, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

• While patrolling Special:Recent changes I noted that User:Bizso is canvassing comment in respect of their complaint against Rjecina. I also note that Bizso has posted exactly the same content at the WP:AN/Geopolitical etc noticeboard (as have I). LessHeard vanU (talk) 11:56, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, because Rjecina has posted his accusations twice already, here and on the other noticeboard. I'm sorry, I didn't know that informing other people about this thread is bad. All I wanted is that users who have conflict with Rjecina could express their opinions regarding this matter.--Bizso (talk) 12:19, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

This is not an administrator issue. Please solve this on your own at the talk page of the article in question, or seek outside help/mediation as described at Dispute Resolution. Admins hold no power over content and do not use their admin powers to settle content disputes. We may block users who edit war, who harass other users, or who are otherwise disruptive, but we do not use our magical admin powers to decide whose version of an article is "better". Please seek dispute resolution, this discussion does not belong here. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 14:18, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Need admin to move over redir

Resolved

We have Ilya Piatetski-Shapiro as a redirect to Ilya Pyatetskii-Shapiro. It should be the other way around. Please help. Thanks. McKay (talk) 11:29, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

• Done! ➲ redvers ^{see my arsenal} 11:43, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

• • Merci! McKay (talk) 12:10, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Is edit-warring the way we establish consensus?

Discussion moved to Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Is_edit-warring_the_way_we_establish_consensus.3F. Not an administrator-specific issue. Skomorokh 21:39, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

User: 68.39.239.92

I could use a hand reminding 68.39.239.92 (talk · contribs) to be a bit more civil. A disagreement over whether an edit should be labeled as vandalism or not has taken a personal turn on my talk page and Clark89's talk page as well.--Rtphokie (talk) 21:21, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Changing community ban of Dereks1x and Tvoz problem

Resolved

 – Quack quack. Sceptre ^(talk) 22:39, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
'Background of proposal: I am proposing an end to the community ban of Dereks1x after a 45 day trial period. Several months ago, Dereks1x's possible sockpuppetmaster, Seattlehawk94, ran a checkuser on me but was discovered to be a sock of Dereks1x himself. He managed to talk his way out of it. Seattlehawk94 accused me of being a sock. Since then, I have looked at Dereks1x and it's clear to me why the community has handled the situation wrongly resulting in a lot of drama. The unban is justified and would end years of drama. Seattlehawk94 is not a nice guy but his Dereks1x ban desires looking into again. I think Seattlehawk94 is just one of several people, all of which have been falsely labelled as Derek except one person. We just don't know which one. I investigated this months ago and even wrote to a few of the users and put away the findings. I've only decided to bring them in the open because there was another mention of Dereks1x a few days ago. Involved editors: Original opponents of Dereks1x (Tvoz trio): Tvoz, Bobblehead, Jersyko Users the trio were opposed to: Dereks1x, Doc United States Events that happened 3 years ago, the Tvoz trio were in dispute over trivial matters related to politicians, such as how much to write about John Edwards' wife's cancer, if Barack Obama should be called Barack Obama or Barack Obama, Jr., if Barack Obama did not take his lawsuits to trial or if he wrote briefs. These are all things that can be discussed. According to what I've learned, Dereks1x asked his doctor his medical opinion about Mrs. Edwards' cancer (his doctor would naturally live and edit in the same city). In response, the doctor wrote a medical opinion in the talk pages, a rather bland and neutral opinion which was supported by other doctors on Wikipedia. Trying to gain advantage in a content dispute, the Tvoz trio sought ban of Dereks1x. Instead of just sockpuppetry, they sought the most outrageous accusation in order to win their quest for a ban. They accused Doc United States of impersonating a doctor. When the doctor proved his degree, the Tvoz trio reverted the proof. A another user VK35 (I assume Doc United States=VK35) later proved that he was a doctor and Jimbo Wales unblocked him but a few week later, another administrator blocked VK35 for the same reason even though he was not privy to the proof. Jimbo Wales had access to objective proof that he has kept private because of privacy reasons. See Jimbo Wales' reasoning here [65] Since then, there have been many users accused of being socks, many of them quite innocent looking and good contributors, like Polounit, VK35. It's possible that some of them were socks but if the ban was wrong to begin with, anyone would be unhappy if they were banned. One user, Chergles (the one that caught my attention a few days ago) was declared to be the sock of banned user Anacapa and Archtransit and maybe Dereks1x. This shows the unreliability of the checkuser's secret conclusion because Chergles is from a different part of the country than Anacapa (various posts mention it but I won't for privacy reasons). Looking at the temperment of Chergles and it's very much different from Dereks1x or Anacapa. I have looked at the original ban and see that it was flawed to begin with. I also see that the Tvoz trio created quite a bit of drama advocating bad editing. In essence, if there is a positive spin to politicians that Tvoz supports, Tvoz will be for it. If there is some not so favorable information, Tvoz will advocate suppressing it. Even when Todd Palin got an article, Tvoz opposed it and blamed it on a Dereks1x sock. The community disagreed with Tvoz and forced withdrawal but not before Tvoz accused enemies of being a sock. This is not the Wikipedia way which advocates neutrality. Evidence of Tvoz and Bobblehead stalking others The Tvoz trio have probably been laughing their teeth out at the Wikipedia community for going along with their plot for 3 years. It's not fun for me when I'm being accused. One instance of stalking by the Tvoz trio (Tvoz and Bobblehead) is when one of the accused Dereks1x socks started writing an article called the Astronaut Hall of Fame. Tvoz and Bobblehead followed this person around and started to make all kinds of changes in the article just for harrassment. You can see that they don't edit that article anymore. That shows their lack of good faith and use of WP to harrass. Proposal Because the basic reason for ban, i.e. Dereks1x's accused sock Doc United States/VK35 is really a doctor and did not impersonate a doctor, the reasoning is flawed. Therefore, the ban must end. Collaborating editors who concur with the main facts: Funpika, Jimbo Wales. Funpika says it IS relevant if VK35 is a doctor. Jimbo Wales also wrote that it is relevant. So while they haven't been asked their opinion about the ban removal, they have supported important points in this discussion. Unban proposal specifics 1. Dereks1x is unbanned. Dereks1x must refrain from editing any American politician's article 45 days. 2. Tvoz, Bobblehead, and Jersyko must refrain from editing any American politician's article for 45 days. 3. Dereks1x, Tvoz, Bobblehead, and Jersyko must not have any contact with each other for 45 days. They must not edit any article among themselves. If they discover that another is editing, they must withdraw. (this prevents harrassment like Tvoz/Bobblehead did in the Astronaut Hall of Fame and other articles) 4. If there is a controversial edit by any of the above, the community should discuss it with the above users with respect and the above users must reply with respect. 5. At the end of 45 days, any of the above users will be banned if they violate terms of the proposal. If they comply, the ban will be completely lifted. By having this unban, innocent people like me will not have to endure the stigma of being accused of being a sock. Some of the accused users have been very productive (such as VK35 and Polounit) and have not been in conflict with the Tvoz trio. This suggests that they may be innocent users who have been wrongly tagged as socks and leading the trail in completely the wrong direction. Advantages for Wikipedia to accept the proposal Opponents of this proposal should be prepared to explain why a doctor can be banned for falsely claiming to be a doctor when they are really a doctor. This has the possibility of becoming bad publicity for Wikipedia if the public learns that people are being banned for false reasons. A graduated unban is the correct and safest way to proceed. The advantages to Wikipedia are that some very good article writing editors were accused of Dereks1x socks. I suspect that at least one of the socks was not a sock and the checkuser trail has gone on a tangent chasing a non-sock. Another advantage is that there is irrefutable proof that some collateral damage has happened. Collateral damage is actually a Bush-type mind control term because such damage actually hurts innocent people. It's like if someone murdered your mother and said it was just "collaterl damage". Likely reception at WP:AN: Some people will try to attack me, just like Dereks1x sock, Seattlehawk94 The likely reception is that administrators and checkusers will not like to hear that there was a wrong ban so they will accuse me of being a sock, most likely Dereks1x's sock. This is just bad behavior. I'm just mentioning it because I was picked on by a Dereks1x sock (Seattlehawk94) but I think he is just one person of several who are accused of being Derek and I'm also mentioning it because Dereks1x was just discussed on AN 2 days ago.Klemm2 (talk) 22:23, 1 March 2009 (UTC) NOTE: I have done some investigation and there is proof that all of the above users, Tvoz, Dereks1x, Jimbo Wales, etc. are not in Texas. I am at the University of Texas. Klemm2 (talk) 22:24, 1 March 2009 (UTC) Don't pretend you are not a sock of Dereks1x. D.M.N. (talk) 22:26, 1 March 2009 (UTC) There is little value to discussing this here in view of the Archtransit debacle and the recent Chergles block. If there is any new evidence to be submitted, please forward it to the Arbitration Committee. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:28, 1 March 2009 (UTC) Community ban lifts are discussed at AN or ANI. The trouble is that several people have been blocked or accused as socks. By discussing it here and not writing to AC, AC cannot ignore it as easily. This is a big problem that needs to be solved since Dereks1x is picking on me and you are picking on others whom you wrongly suspect to be Derek. I will leave it at that. As I said, I think this will end up nowhere because of WP culture. Klemm2 (talk) 22:32, 1 March 2009 (UTC) @ Klemm2 - and you gained all this knowledge after one day on wiki? Also per NYB. — Rlevse • Talk • 22:34, 1 March 2009 (UTC) Any objection to closing this nonsense? Should a CU confirm that Klemm2 is Dereks1x before doing so? //roux   22:35, 1 March 2009 (UTC) I will help you with the CU. I do not want my main account blocked since I have been editing for 5 years. Here is my work IP.129.111.56.199 (talk) 22:37, 1 March 2009 (UTC) Closed. This is obviously a sock trolling AN. Sceptre (talk) 22:39, 1 March 2009 (UTC) Septre, You are just a child. Please don't hide this thread.Klemm2 (talk) 22:43, 1 March 2009 (UTC) I usually work at work and not edit. Also note that I don't like Dereks1x because at least one sock has picked on me. However, sorting out the mess is the right thing to do and the way to do it is a trial unblock of all involved. I see there is no uproar about Tvoz' bad behavior. Good bye. I will not argue this any more. Klemm2 (talk) 22:41, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Inappropriate title for a Redirect

Discussion moved to Talk:Nigger lover — Gavia immer (talk) 01:19, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Hidden page game

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Arbitration has opened. Please pursue the matter at that venue. Durova^Charge! 03:48, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I recently came across the silly shadow world of Wikipedians creating so-called "hidden pages" in their user space, for other game players to find and sign in, whereupon they are awarded (or claim for themselves) a hidden page barnstar. Has this ever been discussed? I would feel like such a fussbudget for denying Wikipedians any harmless fun and games... but I can see where it would invite account abuse (e.g. sockpuppet accounts to avoid detection by other game players) if people really get into it.Wikidemon (talk) 22:03, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

It's pointless Myspacery that is more-or-less impossible to stamp out without expending an enormous amount of energy. //roux   22:09, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) But what exactly is the problem? Even creating accounts for such a game would be acceptable under our policies because socks are bad because they are used to circumvent and manipulate. If the second account is only used for something like that, where is the harm? SoWhy 22:11, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

(ecx2)I'm pretty sure this has been discussed somewhere (or was that some other silly/harmless/even-sillier-than-that pastime of the junior 'pedians?) It's a wee bit MySpacey, but--like those annoying fake "new message" bars, and increasingly goofy userboxen, and all the rest of the kerfuffles--since it hasn't broken the 'pedia yet, most people smile indulgently and hope the participants get bored with it quickly. (And then there are those who rant and holler and yell "THIS IS WIKIPEDIA! It's not supposed to be FUN!!", but again--most people just smile indulgently at THEM, and hope they get bored with their sanctimony.)

So--short form: it's probably all right, though (IMHO) quite silly and pointless. I'm happy to be disagreed with, however.GJC 22:16, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

How is this even a "game"? Surely such pages show up in trivial special:allpages queries (e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:AllPages&namespace=2&from=Wikidemon), and so aren't "hidden" at all? 87.112.17.229 (talk) 22:34, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Per the below using certain tools is considered cheating, like opening your eyes while counting in hide and go seek (another silly but endearing game that can be dangerous if taken to extremes)[66]Wikidemon (talk) 00:10, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Please don't tell me we should care about this. so long as the people doing it are also building the encyclopedia, we should stay the heck away from whatever keeps them happy (bound by common sense, of course). We don't need to send another set of contributors packing because of some unpleasantly parsimonious interpretation of NOT#MYSPACE. Protonk (talk) 22:58, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Apparently using Prefixindex, et al, is considered "cheating"; also, as Wikidemon pointed out, a lot of users will create alternate accounts and hide the secret pages in their userspace. This page outlines some of the more general "rules" for the games, as well as some of the arguments cited for and against these. As for how to handle them, you're welcome to start up an MfD for any you find; this discussion held that these should be considered on a case-by-case basis, although there was a clear consensus that hiding secret pages in the userspace of a sock account was unacceptable.

Personally I think these are a waste of time, but unless I happen to notice one that's really ridiculously over the top, or notice that someone's not doing anything but this (as Protonk just alluded to), I'm not going to go hunting them down. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 23:07, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I've seen several thread like this about "guestbook" pages. So long as there's no violation of NPA, I don't understand what the big deal is. Wikipedia has grown to be one of the top sites on the web, so we're going to attract a lot of young users. That's not a bad thing. They are the future of this site. I understand that guestbooks and game pages aren't encyclopedic, but do we really want to chase off the editors of the future - and get a reputation for being so stuffy. I'd say welcome the new generation, and gently guide them into productivity. After all, we are supposed to not WP:Bite — Ched (talk) 00:19, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Send their user pages packing. Why not? Is the Wikipedia foundation buying server space for them? What if it becomes real popular and takes up 10s of thousands of user pages? Just nip it in the bud. Wikipedia user pages aren't for game playing. They should be tagged for speedy deletion whenever seen. That's all. --KP Botany (talk) 00:29, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

We really should be cracking down on people using Wikipedia for purposes other than building an encyclopedia. Games are great, but if they aren't somehow related to our goal(like playing Whack-A-Mole at WP:AIV) then it does not belong here. There are lots of wikis out there for that kind of thing. Chillum 00:32, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I know you're an admin and all Chillum, but I just don't agree with you on this one. If we "hook-em" to use the site, and then we guide them into being productive - it just seems to be a win win situation to me. In a couple years - these "kids" will be admins., I think it's better that they have positive memories of their first edits. A couple K of disk space isn't that big a deal. — Ched (talk) 01:39, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

@KP Botany - one $200 1Tb HD can handle all the text they can throw at us. And I'm sure Brion can handle the bandwidth. — Ched (talk) 01:52, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

We don't need to be the fun police. The editor is what is related to our goal. If we piss off someone and send them packing we forgo their future contributions and any positive word of mouth they may offer. This is why we don't have a 90/10 rule like conservapedia. It is why we should apply some common sense when talking about this sort of thing. If someone's only edits (or the bulk of their edits) are to their myspacey user page, sure, nuke it. But if we have people making a reasonable amount of contributions to the encyclopedia, I don't see the benefit of getting our knickers in a twist because someone just isn't "following the rules." Just click "unwatch" and it will be better. Protonk (talk) 03:01, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, here's where to start looking. MER-C 02:54, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

You're going to alienate a heck of a lot of people if you start going down this road. I've noticed many editors take as much pride in their (admittedly sometimes silly) user pages as they do in the content they produce or the administrivia they're involved in. And besides, what are you going to use as criteria? The number of user boxes? Bad color combinations? Images of frogs? There should be some sort of speedy delete option for user pages that are obviously spam (and on Wikipedia, therefore heavily indexed), but other than that... leave them alone :) §FreeRangeFrog 03:14, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

CSD-G11 applies to blatant spam in all namespaces. Any userpage that is promotional can easily be blanked and {{NOINDEX}}'d or deleted under G11. (Just FYI). Protonk (talk) 03:17, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I say let them do it, but if you catch them, kindly ask them to donate $10 to the foundation to cover the cost of their game-playing on the server space. And, quite frankly, no individual page hide-and-seeker is actually ever going to generate $10 worth of expense. bd2412 T 03:20, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

But we are already getting free labor from them. :) Protonk (talk) 03:24, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

You're joking? You've just decided for the Wikipedia community against Wikipedia policies and guidelines that it is okay to use Wikipedia user space pages for social networking? I suggest you announce your change to the entire community then. --KP Botany (talk) 04:45, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

No, that would be absurd. What is being argued is that this little crappy game is of no real harm; and that eradicating it from Wikipedia would, pragmatically speaking, take away editing time from admins and others which could be used for more productive uses. No one has claimed that the entirety of Wikipedia's policy against using it primarily as a social networking site has been brought down by people playing this silly game. What is being argued is that it, while a nuisance, is not really worth fighting. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 04:56, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

You are reducing the results of leaving this game around to an absurd conclusion; that the end of Wikipedia As We Know It can only result from letting people play this silly game. Yes, it is a violation of the rules, no one has contested that. What has been contested is whether or not it is worth the time and effort needed to force people not to play it. And the world is not a binary place; it's a rather simplistic oversimplification to say that everything which is allowed is encouraged. (Or rather, "that which is not forbidden is compulsory") When a user does nothing EXCEPT use wikipedia for social networking purposes, they get blocked. They will continue to get blocked tommorrow, and forever. When a user spends most of their edits working on the encyclopedia, and has an occasional thing like this lying around, it isn't worth it to make them get rid of it. Again, this is not a black-and-white issue; it's not binary choice between "Stop all violations of every rule always" and "Let it be a free-for-all and stop protecting the encyclopedia against anything". That is an absurd reduction of the arguements presented by those opposing you. Time is a limited resource, and the time spent chasing this problem down is better spent fighting real problems... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:14, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Past MfDs have fairly clear established that these "hidden" or "secret" pages are not acceptable. When I come across them, I delete them. --MZMcBride (talk) 05:21, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

And I have no problem with admins doing so. What I have a problem with is demanding that admins delete them. I don't cry when they are gone, but I do not wish to be told which parts of my volunteer job I must do... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:25, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I think you have to look at this kind of thing on a case-by-case basis. I've actually had some users worry that comments to each other are too friendly. Wikipedia is supposed to be a community, and friendly communication nurtures that climate. The issue comes down to what someone is primarily doing on wikipedia. The primary purpose is to make the product as valuable to the reading public as it can be. If someone comes here primarily for the purpose of networking, that's obviously not serving the purpose. But that does not mean we should discourage networking among those who have the proper primary goal of wikipedia in mind. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 05:27, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Assuming you mean that you're just speedying them with no process MZMcBride, I'm curious as to what CSD category you feel they meet. I don't think there's a "we've deleted this kind of thing before so we're not doing an MFD this time" CSD category...--Dycedarg ж 05:46, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Better indef me then. I found one of those pages, and got a barnstar to boot! I still don't get why everyone has to act like killjoys about the whole NOT#MYSPACE provision. Yes, the original view of userpages differs from how a lot of users would like them. Also note, the original plan was for everything about wikipedia to be discussed only on the mailing list, with no equivalent of AN/VPP or the policy talk pages. People like baubles. They like barnstars. They like userboxes. They also like writing and improving articles. Honestly, so long as the people who made these pages are adding to the encyclopedia, I don't see what we gain by playing the cop on the beat here. What do we gain, at the margin, from deleting someone's guestbook or hidden page? Jayron has the right idea, basically. We do indef people who do only myspacey things, and we should continue to do so. We also do delete things which appear to serve only that purpose for people who do only myspacey things. Where we should throttle back is when we have people who make good contributions to the encyclopedia. Is it worth forcing them away in order to feel better that the rules aren't being ignored? I was semi-joking above when I remarked about these people providing free labor, but that is the crux of it. We have thousands of editors who add content for free. Since we hope that they don't do it for personal benefit, we have to wonder why they do it. We also have to be careful not to use policies intended to broadly define what we are as limits on what these volunteers can do in their spare time. Protonk (talk) 05:43, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

(ec X 2)Bugs, you're conflicted out of this one due to User:Baseball Bugs/hidden. I'm telling Elmer Fudd. Wikidemon (talk) 05:51, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

No! Not dat! Actually, I created that page as kind of a joke, since I was seeing that kind of thing turn up elsewhere. It's about as "hidden" as the nose on my face. I continue to believe something like that, by itself, is on the same level of evil as tearing a tag off your own mattress. It also gets very little traffic. As I said, if someone's primary purpose on wikipedia is to make it another MySpace or whatever, then they are in the wrong place. But using user talk pages to further the community effort, should not be considered a crime. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 06:44, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

(unindent)Gosh, I feel like such a heel for even bringing this up. Next thing you know I'll be yelling "get off the lawn, kids." I think I agree with Protonk that we should have a little patience and not enforce a Wikipedia=no fun policy. Today's eager youth are tomorrow's good editors, and if we sour their experience it hurts everybody. Yes, from this conversation it looks like the pages technically shouldn't be there and it is okay to delete them. But I'm not going to tell you where any of them are - you'll just have to find them yourselves! If you do delete anything, please polite the the little ones, and also don't mention my name. (slinks back into mainspace) Wikidemon (talk) 05:51, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for making you feel bad. If it makes you feel better, I wasn't really trying to aim vitriol at you so much as I was aiming for those folks who agreed with you in a particularly vocal fashion. I also think there is something to be said about people like me (~40% wikipedia and wikipedia talk edit count % and rising) who don't contribute that much to the encyclopedia, instead engaging in the myspace-lite of AN, AN/I and other venues where much is said and little is done. :( Protonk (talk) 06:01, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

The problem here is the creation of accounts, and the use of Wikipedia in general, solely in order to play these games. In years gone past, these people would have been "sandbox fairies" — editors whose sole edits to the wiki anywhere are entirely non-project uses of the sandbox and its sub-pages. Since creation of such pages is now restricted to account-holders, placing the sort of pages, that the sandbox faires created, in user space is now more the norm. A quick check of Special:Prefixindex/Wikipedia:Sandbox reveals not nearly as much accrued there over the past year or so as there was a couple of years ago when I was last involved in purging it. (I've just deleted the pages that were either completely stale drafts or outright problems, such as the long list of actual people's names and addresses that one person was keeping there and the attack page written eight months ago by a purportedly since-reformed editor. Most of the remainder that's there now is test-page content that isn't really worth bothering to delete, in my view. Every deletion, after all, increases the database size. And it is the sandbox.) Uncle G (talk) 06:18, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

this thread sure grew to be a hot topic. I know you guys (adminz) have a lot of stuff to cover here, so - I started a thread at WP:NOT here. Seems like a topic that should be talked out. And while I do think we need to lighten up a little, I also understand what Uncle G means when he states "...solely in order to play these games." By the way - is the prefindex thing supposed to be a big secret? — Ched (talk) 16:17, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Policy is fairly clear about using Wikipedia for off topic purposes. Any idea in acting otherwise needs to start at the relevant policy's talk page and gain consensus. Until then we should continue not allowing these things as we have for years. Ched's posting at WT:NOT is a great start. Chillum 17:37, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I greatly oppose having these 'hidden page' games like this. It's pointless, and it needs to stop (hopefully). Versus22 _talk 20:24, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Tell anyone with one of these pages that they'll never pass an RfA due to it, and watch how quickly they disappear. Most of the editors with these kind of pages are simply here to try and become an administrator (and most will fail for that exact reason). Daniel (talk) 22:42, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

The silliness has nothing to do with creating an encyclopedia. Delete the pages. Someone might wish to start "Hideandgoseekpedia" -- somewhere else. Edison (talk) 04:06, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Delete them, whatever happened to the yearly donation drives and precious server space if we allow such things like this to occur? Hypocrite, much? ηoian ‡orever ηew ‡rontiers 04:40, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I checked the editor of the one mentioned, [User:Bahamut0013/Secret pages], and found a remarkable amount of useful contributions in an area where we need work. I have no problem suggesting to the people who come here only to play that they do some work or go elsewhere, but I am not going to discourage contributors like that. the ratio of useful/useless edits is at least 100/1. They're worth a lot more than $10. DGG (talk) 05:26, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

If they contribute to the encyclopedia, let them keep the pages but tell them they shouldn't be using all their time for the game. If they have very little article edits, delete the pages and give the user a warning. If they have 0 article edits, delete the pages and block them and say they will only be unblocked if they show they can write an article on their talk page. This is how I deal with them, at least.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 05:43, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I really think people are making a mountain out of a molehill here. It's not like these pages suck vast quantities of bandwidth or drive space, after all. It's all text. Jtrainor (talk) 08:21, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

That's kind of like saying that if a person steals a [thinks randomly] deckchair from Wal-Mart, it's not expensive and they won't make much of a loss. But because Wal-Mart don't make their resources available for that purpose (their land, their heating, lighting, and the deckchair), they need to draw the line there rather than allow more than one person to go and start stealing things.

I'm sure there's all sorts of things wrong with that analogy, but I hope that my meaning is clear... ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 08:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The meaning is clear, but what's wrong with the analogy is the trouble. To equate use of userspace with theft is a little troubling, but even if we agree with the comparison, we have to attach some value for the contributions made by the editors. We don't pay them (er...us). So maybe we can think of it as employing a carpenter to make a desk and letting them take home the joining material. Or whatever you like. They are adding to the encyclopedia. If they choose to not add to the encyclopedia because we don't let them fool around in userspace, that is a net loss for us. We've gained the joining materials and lost the desk. Protonk (talk) 10:19, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

If people who play this game are properly contributing to the encyclopedia, for heaven's sake, let them play their silly game! It's not our job to forbid any kind of fun anyone might have around here, and I'm pretty sure that the few kB of text these pages cause aren't of much concern to our servers. --Conti|✉ 14:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The Wikipedia community is weak enough already, we don't need conflicts over a harmless game that gives people practice editing and navigating Wikipedia. rspεεr (talk) 15:13, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

It could be argued that it would be harmless if I used Wikipedia for my shopping lists, or to track the changes in the software I make, or to publish a local town newletter about local farming. But that is not harmless, it is a dilution of our goal to make an encyclopedia. If we allowed people to use Wikipedia that way then such content would become larger than our encyclopedia. People are always looking for free hosting.

Wikipedia has a purpose, we are not just here for the hell of it. Pretty much all major community forums with a specific topic discourage off-topic postings. We are not going to run out of users because we don't let them post off-topic content. Chillum 15:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

By that logic, we could (and should!) forbid everything that's not directly related to creating an encyclopedia, like most everything you find on user pages. Like this, for example. --Conti|✉ 15:40, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The "hosting" argument is played out. A hidden page consumes no more resources than this page or this page. Let's get down to it. We are "okay" with barnstars and "wikismiles" and stuff like that but we don't like hidden pages (by we I mean the people who write these policies and post in these discussions). So we look for a way to treat those as suspect while treating other material as benign. I'm not trying to make a "OMG OMG Hypocrite" argument. I'm just trying to note that our treatment of hidden pages isn't exactly on the same level as our treatment of barnstars and other things. Protonk (talk) 18:28, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Can I ask what is the harm of something that you only find if you look for it? What is actually wrong with 'Myspacing' if it doesn't hurt anyone. The only time it should ever be deleted is if people spend more time on their pages than the encyclopedia. But what about the people who delete these pages and devote themselves to doing so? Why are they here? They don't spend the majority of there time improving the encyclopedia. If any of these pages should be deleted then the userspace shouldn't exist as that falls under the MySpace category. Chubbennaitor 19:09, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

'Quote'"Per the below using certain tools is considered cheating, like opening your eyes while counting in hide and go seek (another silly but endearing game that can be dangerous if taken to extremes)[67]Wikidemon (talk) 00:10, 22 February 2009 (UTC)" Is everything bad and irrespnsible t you? I feel sorry that you don't understand the word fun? Chubbennaitor 19:12, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia isn't supposed to be fun. Viridae^Talk 23:16, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Any editor displaying signs of enjoying himself should be blocked immediately. DuncanHill (talk) 16:08, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Even though we are all volunteering our time, this is supposed to be a second job. (man, and we wonder why our editor growth rate is slowing and why we are losing admins...:/) —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 16:15, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride and deletion

So at 06:41 today, MZMcBride deleted my "secret page". While I don't really care if my 'secret page' is restored or not (I haven't looked at it in ages, and I couldn't tell you when the last edit was), I'm wondering about precedent here. Since when have secret pages been banned, and since when have admins been allowed to summarily delete pages in userspace with no discussion? If I was a total myspacer and only tried to hunt down these 'secret pages' and the like, obviously this would be different, but I think that I contribute to the encyclopedia: I have 3 FA's, a MILHIST A, 5 GA's (including that A) and 16 DYK's under my belt. "Please contribute to the encyclopedia more" is just an insult. —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 14:16, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

see WP:AN#Hidden page game--Jac16888^Talk 14:18, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Merged threads and notified MZMcBride (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA). –xeno (talk) 14:21, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I was actually going to notify him after I found diffs, but sorry about that.

Looking through the logs, here are a few that he deleted (disclaimer: they could be crappy contributors, I have no idea): [68], [69], [70], [71], [72], and one deleted under WP:CSD#G6, [73]. If the discussion is still ongoing, why are these being deleted? —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 14:22, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

MZMcBride has some helpful advice for those who might complain about his deletions. Mike R (talk) 15:16, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Note, the above comment was removed as "trolling". I have restored it, because it is not trolling, but rather a valuable insight into how efforts to persuade MZMcBride to modify his behavior will likely be met. Mike R (talk) 15:21, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I wouldn't quite put it that way... anyway, I apparently missed the sarcasm in your "some helpful advice". --NE2 15:26, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't really see how that helps with his page deletions. Montgomery' 39 (talk) 20:39, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:BITCH is a valid rationale. I suppose I could be lumped into the "deletionist" category, and I could care less, but less than 5% of my deletions have been contested at DRV, and less than 1% of those have been overturned. Those who often do the most complaining often have less than valid rationales. Most of the time, it is purely emotional. If people can act civil and politely ask why their page was deleted, and what they can do to improve it and/or resubmit it for inclusion, then you won't get canned responses (e.g. Go to DRV.). seicer | talk | contribs 15:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

"WP:BITCH" is trolling, plain and simple. --NE2 17:11, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Take a look at some of the shortcuts for the page. "STFU" says it all really. --.:Alex:. 22:34, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Eh, this is a bit complicated. I appreciate the VestedContributor argument, however, there's also something to be said for applying the rules fairly to everyone. If we say it's not appropriate to have a "secret" or "hidden" page (and really, they obviously weren't too secret if it took ten seconds for me to find them), then it's important that we apply to rule to everyone. Otherwise we quickly run into issues of, "well, I have 50 article edits, can I have a secret page now?" and things like that. And the continued presence of these (and the related barnstars used as reward) only serves to spread this activity even further. --MZMcBride (talk) 16:49, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, I can can see your side of the coin now. ;) Again, I really don't care about my secret page (I had forgotten about it actually...but its deletion was a hard thing to miss on my watchlist!); I just wanted to raise this before too many were deleted and there were 25 complaints, not just one. You might want to hold off deleting them until the discussion above is finished though.... —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 17:31, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

With all due respect, I think that is precisely the opposite of the intent here. We obviously (as you note) don't want to get into the "I have made 50 contribs, can I muck about in userspace yet?" point, but I don't see that as a real threat. I also don't see the boogeyman here. If you feel that policy is forcing you to delete these pages then we should consider changing that policy. I am very worried that we aren't thinking of this in the appropriate way, as an effective wage paid to free labor. Protonk (talk) 18:24, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

What CSD category do these user pages fall under?--Dycedarg ж 18:33, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

They don't fall under any speedy criteria. Davewild (talk) 18:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

One question. Why are people like this editor aloud to go round devoted to deleting pages that aren't harmful to people who don't want to find them aren't blocked? Because they aren't contributing to the encyclopedia at all. Chubbennaitor 18:53, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I presume the first sentence was the question and the second the answer, yes? Guy (Help!) 19:42, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

So they're not speedyable, which makes this IAR then. I don't think that's the best approach for this, considering the rate complaints are piling up on his talkpage someone's going to file a DRV at some point. We could just do a group MFD (like we've done before for this sort of thing) and save some unnecessary drama.--Dycedarg ж 19:43, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Can the BITCH page be removed? I don't think that that's offending people less than a secret page that you can only find if you look for it. It's using a swear word which I completely oppose. We come here as volunteers so what is the problem with a page that's a little fun? Chubbennaitor 19:00, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Do you have a problem with pages, such as don't be a dick (given the helpful acro DICK)? seicer | talk | contribs 19:30, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Great. Although I'm still not quite sure that'll get what I've decided to do. Plus, I'm not the best on the shortened names. Like MFD etc. Chubbennaitor 19:46, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Bitch isn't a swearword, its the name for a femable dog. It just happens to have been appropriated for use as an insult as well. Viridae^Talk 23:04, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I gather MFD would be contingent on the pages being restored first... –xeno (talk) 19:47, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Any swearing pages that have a meaning shouldn't exist it's offensive. We delete swear words on pages why not use this as sometthing as similar. What do you mean, xeno? Chubbennaitor 20:00, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

The "secret" pages could be undeleted, then sent to WP:MFD for a proper deletion discussion. And lots of pages contain swearing - fuck, shit and so forth. WilyD 20:06, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Exactly. They could go to DRV but then the issues of whether the deletions were out of process and whether the pages should remain would be conflated. @Chubb, the WP:BITCH page just recently came off MFD, closed as no consensus leaning towards keep. –xeno (talk) 20:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, for any deletion that isn't 100% by the books, DRV is a bad option. Undelete and MFD. (Incidentally, that may be one of the merits of following the speedy deletion policy closely. There's nothing wrong with tardy deletion.) WilyD 20:18, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Undelete and send to MFD, out of process deletions such as this shouldn't happen, even via IAR. Plus, that remark in the deletion log is as The_ed17 says, an insult to a content contributor and coordinator of WP:MILHIST. -MBK₀₀₄ 20:29, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

So, how do you undelete the page? Montgomery' 39 (talk) 21:16, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Note: MZMcBride deleted information I was collecting for an article. No warning or notification given (or reason). He states "discussions have established secret pages are inappropriate". I've never seen that. If I was given the chance to put these pages in my main area before deleting I would have gladly done so. I need my page back. In more than a year and 5000 edits, no one has done this to me. And why would this type of activity be a priority when so much other work needs to be done. It's disillusioning. Thank you. Mjpresson (talk) 20:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I've undeleted the page, which MZMcBride probably deleted solely because it was called "secretpage" (User:Mjpresson/secretpage). It has nothing whatsoever to do with any "hidden page" games, and it sure as hell wasn't a CSD G7. I hope marking this deletion as a G7 was just a simple mistake on MZMcBride's part. --Conti|✉ 21:20, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

It's a "mistake" he made 172 times. Mjpresson (talk) 21:50, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Also, this guy has no right in telling us what to do on wikipedia (other than no vandalism and all that other stuff). I mean, seriously, secret pages are fun to do and do not disrupt anything. Montgomery' 39 (talk) 20:42, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• This just seems like a boneheaded move all around. The pages deserve to be deleted, in my opinion, but that has not been established as a policy. The fact that they are in userspace just guarantees this would be a major issue. Personally, I'd be pissed if an admin unilaterally deleted something in my userspace before running it past me, and I'm an admin, so it shouldn't be too difficult to figure out how your everyday editor would feel and react in such a situation. Hiberniantears (talk) 20:45, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

You hit bullseye when you made that last sentence. I'm not pissed that my page was DELETED, I'm pissed that this guy is acting like a jerk who thinks that he can go around telling established wikipedians what to do and deleting their pages without ANY warning. He states that we should "contribute to wikipedia". Just to support my statement, I WILL say that I have made 2,000+ comments on wikipedia ALL having been done in good faith with NO vandalism whatsoever. Montgomery' 39 (talk) 20:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• I agree with Hiberniantears. This shouldn't have been deleted speedily out of process. If this is going to be deleted, there has to be a consensus or at the very least a community wide discussion. WP:BITCH only applies to people's behavior and has absolutely no bearing on article deletion. - Mgm|^(talk) 20:56, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Also, I wonder how MZ would react if someone else deleted a page in his userspace and used the same argument. For the argument to hold the deletion has to be within policy to begin with. If it's even slightly controversial, it's not something a single admin should act on. - Mgm|^(talk) 21:02, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I think these deletions were completely uncalled for and in violation of our policies. We have policies for deletions and they apply to all admins all the time, not only to some and if they feel like it. It's nothing bitchy about asking an admin, as a representative of this project, to follow the rules and not go around deleting pages he does not like. One should ask MZM to hand in his mop if he does not like the policies... SoWhy 21:29, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Here is a response by MZMcBride about these deletions. Interesting and possibly revealing. Mjpresson (talk) 21:22, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Makes you wonder if he'd say anything if someone blocked him without consensus or a heads up... Kind of a put your money where your mouth is moment. Hiberniantears (talk) 21:29, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, last time this happened. ;) WilyD 21:35, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, he keeps saying that there was consensus but hasn't provided any diffs. I think we may have a violation of Remedy #3: "MZMcBride is strongly admonished for his conduct in this matter and is instructed to refrain from any further incidents of wheel-warring, taking administrator actions in disregard of on-wiki consensus, or deliberately disobeying decisions of the Arbitration Committee. MZMcBride is warned that any further such incidents are likely to lead to the suspension or revocation of his administrator privileges." Perhaps a visit to ArbCom is warranted? -MBK₀₀₄ 21:50, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

That thought occurred to me as well. Policies such as the deletion policy are codified consensus and taking admin actions like deletions that go against those policies is in fact nothing but "taking administrator actions in disregard of on-wiki consensus". I would hate to go this road but MZM's admin actions and behaviour have been subject of multiple discussions here now and yet such incidents happen again and again... SoWhy 21:53, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) "Any other content not suitable for an encyclopedia" ← Seems quite fitting to me. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:01, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with the deletions I see no reason why anything should be hidden here on wp-en. I would would even agree to ban the ability to hide any page. I also that the deletion were poorly done, doing the right thing in a disrepectfull way can look a lot like trolling. —Preceding need to oreview more. Giggles4U (talk) 19:20, 24 February 2009 (UTC)unsigned comment added by Giggles4U (talk • contribs) 19:15, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. No consensus on the deletions. No warning to the editors. Editors who's pages were deleted were in good standing. These good standing editors were then told to stop bitching. The whole thing is an obvious way of causing trouble, which is disruption... the very thing we are supposed to prevent in the first place. Hiberniantears (talk) 21:58, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

All due respect, Hiberniantears, you're getting played (there's no Wiktionary entry for this?). My essay has absolutely nothing to do with these deletions whatsoever and I never cited it anywhere. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:01, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

My bad... sorry about that. That does make it a little less over the top. I still see the situation as needlessly slapping around editors in good standing though. Hiberniantears (talk) 22:05, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I am another editor who honestly couldn't give two figs about the pages. What grates me is MZMcBride's attitude towards the matter, and frankly, towards everyone involved. There are so many ways this mess could have been avoided, a better way of doing this. His approach came across as both WP:POINTY and the summary of the deletions as a veiled WP:ATTACK. That's just poor; really poor. I understand MZMcBride's intentions completely, it's just that the approach he took just doesn't help things at all. --.:Alex:. 22:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree that he be deleted A1a6s (talk) 03:15, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:EfD? ;) —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 03:21, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I nommed the don't be whiny bitch user subpage as an MFD for deletion here [74]. ChildofMidnight (talk) 04:29, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I wonder if anyone can quantify the harm that MzMcBride has done here. Has he done any harm at all, really? More harm than the people who made those secret pages? If he hasn't, then why is it that the secret pages people are allowed to have a bit of harmless fun, and MzMcBride is not? Hesperian 05:14, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Things stop being 'fun' when they encroach on the rights of others. You know the difference between the secret pages and deleting against any apparent consensus about whether or not they're an obvious detriment to the project. MZMcBride takes things away from others, the others aren't causing harm, unless you intend to argue their actions are somehow worse than all the jawing you do at your job, while on the clock. And remember, they're all volunteers. ThuranX (talk) 05:22, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Frankly, I think deleting crap like this helps define our culture; a culture in which we are united in our focus on creating a great encyclopedia. From that perspective, these hidden pages do harm our culture, and the mass deletion of them has tangible benefits.

We have a standard refutation to people who insist on their right to free speech and/or free web hosting on Wikipedia; you've probably used it yourself. So it surprises me to hear you characterising this as a rights violation.

Hesperian 05:30, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I know, you'd seriously think that he'd sacrificed babies to Satan or something, rather than deleted a few unproductive and useless pages which I would class as more of a "cleanup task" than any violation of policy. Orderinchaos 10:10, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

What's wrong with these pages if they don't hurt the encyclopedia? Chubbennaitor 16:25, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

A question more pertinent to this discussion would be what's wrong with deleting these pages if they don't help the encyclopedia? Hesperian 01:34, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

The question most pertinent is how does having admins who ignore policies, ignore requests to discuss their actions, and ignore concerns about their behaviour benefit the encyclopædia? DuncanHill (talk) 01:38, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

It's not so much as the pages themselves, than the manner in which this deletion was conducted. The mop is for cleaning messes, not making them. MZMcBride should double-check his grip on that mop handle, because this is completely the wrong way to go about it. His approach has only provoked unnecessary drama and arguing amongst both parties. An MfD should have gone ahead, as there is clearly room for discussion on the matter. Considering there was a previous MfD that resulted in a no consensus at the time, this should have been reopened rather than simply deleting them like this (which reeks of "I don't like it"). --.:Alex:. 19:32, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

List of pages deleted

I've compiled the following list should someone feel consensus around undeletion and mass-MFD has been reached. I also left MZM a query to this effect. –xeno (talk) 21:23, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Batch MFDs are gross and rarely productive for a number of reasons. If there are individual editors who would like individual pages restored and brought to MfD, I suppose that's reasonable. Thoughts? --MZMcBride (talk) 21:52, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I actually don't have a well-formed opinion of my own about these. But I think some policy about them needs to be divined, one way or the other. –xeno (talk) 21:55, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry but since all of those deletions were clearly outside policy, you should restore them all and then take those to MFD you think should be deleted. Deleting all and then make it the burden of others to MFD them makes a travesty of our deletion policy. SoWhy 21:59, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Clearly outside which policy? You do realize we had a massive MFD for "secret" pages a while ago, right? --MZMcBride (talk) 22:03, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Can you link to it for those who have missed it? --Conti|✉ 22:04, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Secret pages is the last I'm aware of; there may be a more recent one since. – iridescent 22:07, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Yes I know. And consensus was "case by case basis", not "they are not allowed". And the result never was incorporated into WP:CSD and CSD is the policy that tells admins what can be speedy deleted and what not. Not an 10-month-old MFD that does not even have a clear consensus. Regards SoWhy 22:09, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

And from that MZMcBride has clearly violated the ArbCom admonisment he was given in the wheel war case to not ignore existing consensus and use the sysop tools out-of-process. I'm thinking it is time to go to ArbCom. -MBK₀₀₄ 22:13, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

What's happened here is flagrant disregard for our WP:CSD policy. I've been trying, but I'm struggling to see any conclusion other than that. Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 22:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I'll undelete anyone who protests here or at your talk page, and then if you feel the need to MFD, have at it. –xeno (talk) 00:26, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) I have no idea how this view became (somewhat?) widespread that pages can only be deleted if they fall under CSD, but please try to remember that policy is descriptive, not proscriptive. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:31, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Now I'm quite confused. Which, of the processes listed at WP:Deletion policy#Processes, do you believe you were following? Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 23:09, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

My God, what will these users do without their secret pages? Heaven forbid they do something remotely constructive instead of creating "secret pages" for little Myspace-y games and go on hunts for sekrit page barnstars. This senseless destruction will surely be the demise of the wiki. I propose MZMcBride be banned for this mass-secret-page-murder. Mr.Z-man 22:29, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Hanging's too good for him. I suggest locking him in a secret page^Wdungeon and giving him only printouts of MfD debates to eat. — Hex (❝?!❞) 22:33, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I second the motion to have MZMcBride banned for his novel interpretation of the "ignore all rules" guideline (that being, that if it helps the encyclopedia, you shouldn't allow silly rules to stand in your way). Mahalo. --Ali'i 22:35, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with all this, but I think that this debate is turning into a mob, dummies and picket signs galore. We should all keep a cool head about this situation and burn him at the stakes conduct this in a civilised manner. Montgomery' 39 (talk) 22:37, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Please, won't someone think of the users? What about all those frustrated MySpacers fruitlessly searching through a "really difficult" set of clues for a page that doesn't exist anymore? Stone him!. Black Kite 22:41, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

What about "Pages can only be speedily deleted if any of the criteria for speedy deletion apply to them"? Does that make sense to you? --Conti|✉ 22:37, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Er, where's that from? :-) And I personally interpret that to be somewhat circular logic. You can cite speedy deletion as your reason for deleting page iff the page meets the criteria. But that doesn't preclude other types of deletions.... --MZMcBride (talk) 22:42, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

From my mind. :) My point was that we have the speedy deletion criteria for a reason: Everything that does not fall under these criteria should not be speedily (which means without any kind of consensus or consultation from anyone) deleted. We have various processes for everything that's not a candidate for speedy deletion, and I think one of them should have been used. --Conti|✉ 22:50, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, the past discussions, especially the past MFD (referenced above) indicated to me a consensus to delete these pages. Being a slave to process sounds like a rather unfavorable role. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:54, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Not a batch deletion like you undertook but on a case-by-case basis. To me it seems as though you have violated the admonishment that ArbCom gave you and you should loose your mop. But we'll let ArbCom handle that since I don't see this going anywhere but an express-lane to RFAR. -MBK₀₀₄ 22:57, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

@MBK004: Are you going to initiate a RFAR? — Aitias // discussion 23:28, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Not in the next couple of hours, I'm about to step out. If one hasn't in about 4 hours, I most likely will. -MBK₀₀₄ 23:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Seems we interpret the closure of that MfD differently. What about "the rest of those pages should be on a case on case basis"? Acting as if one is above the rules isn't a very ideal thing to do, either. :) --Conti|✉ 23:04, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I went through each page individually, though.... --MZMcBride (talk) 23:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Your deletion of this: User:Mjpresson/secretpage points to the contrary since the content of the page isn't what one would expect for a secret page, and isn't deletable under any deletion policy. -MBK₀₀₄ 23:20, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

(ec) Good to know. How come you deleted User:Mjpresson/secretpage, then (which I undeleted at the user's request)? --Conti|✉ 23:20, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

At the time of deletion the page was blank - [75] - well actually all hidden text, but would've appeared blank. Black Kite 23:24, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Note: I had nowiki'd the text temporarily for my own purposes. The page as Not blank, as you claim, and contained valuable formats and links I needed. Mjpresson (talk) 00:53, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

And that would make it a CSD G7? --Conti|✉ 23:26, 23 February 2009 (UTC) Actually, it might. "If the author blanks the page (outside user space), this can be taken as a deletion request." Huh, never noticed that line before. --Conti|✉ 23:29, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Still not technically a G7 ("outside user space"), just pointing out that the current useful content would not have been there. Black Kite 23:31, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I just noticed that, too. I need a pause, brain's not working, apparently. :) So my question remains after all. --Conti|✉ 23:33, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• IAR deletions are fine when applied to shite in user space, though best not tried against articles, except exceptionally. RMHED. 23:02, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
• The real question is why the hell do so many people give a crap about what other people have in their user space? If someone is editing the encyclopedia and does something a little myspacey to their user space, how does that bring down our little project? There are plenty of other things to do here than go around slapping editors who are doing something goofy but otherwise harmless. Hiberniantears (talk) 23:44, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I can only speak for myself. As for me: it's because they are inherently violations of WP:NOT#WEBHOST; they have no purpose within the context of Wikipedia (unlike userboxexn, which give fair warning of ideological and other biases). --Orange Mike | Talk 23:49, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I'd say that with everything we do, we should ask ourselves "does this help the encyclopedia?" The obvious answer to having "something a little myspacey [in] their user space" is that it does not, in any way, help build the encyclopedia. I'm a cantankerous old fool, so this is just my opinion. --Ali'i 23:55, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

My general opinion on the matter is that aggravating hundreds of editors with little justification does not help the encyclopedia. Deleting these userpages, with no more justification than the deliberate misinterpretation of an MFD that did not close with a consensus, is likely to do this. If they were so bad then someone should have run another MFD. They weren't going to burn down the encyclopedia in the time that would have taken.--Dycedarg ж 00:06, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I doubt more than half a dozen were mildly pissed off, serves 'em right for having the shite in their user space. RMHED. 00:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Process for the sake of process for the sake of process for the sake of process for the sake of process for the sake of process for the sake of process for the sake of process for the sake of process never helped anyone.

This issue should be over, someone took the initiative to take out the trash, everyone agrees that the trash is trash and I see no need to bring the trash back inside and make a mess just because someone thinks the trash was taken out improperly (enough metaphor for you?). John Reaves 00:25, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Real constructive. Thanks for that insight. Just for the record, had I voted in the MFD, and were I to vote in a future one, I would vote to delete the pages. I also don't think MZMcBride deserves to be blocked. My point is that this isn't worth pissing people off. The RMHED comment takes the cake, and just makes us look like a bunch of spoiled brats who are acting pissy because we didn't get what we want in a disaster of an MFD. Think of all those wierdos who have crap like Jimbo's head floating around their user page. Hiberniantears (talk) 00:33, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Artist's impression

How dare you call Jimbo's head "crap". The Godhead should be shown due deference, I for one would welcome its addition to every Wikipedia page. RMHED. 00:45, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Are you crazy?! You'll wear it out! Do you want Jimbo to have to go to conferences looking like this? — Hex (❝?!❞) 00:58, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

(did not read whole thread) I'm right on the fence on this one. I don't believe these pages should be restored en masse, or that MZMcBride should be sanctioned for an activity that did not injure article space, and that he believed to be a good-faith effort to improve the encyclopedia. However, I would not have deleted any of them without community consensus, given the wide allowances given to users to have a little fun in user space, particularly users who make legitimate contributions; I myself would have !voted to keep them, in light of them doing no harm (I don't believe they would significantly affect contributions to articles one way or the other). I move that all the affected users be informed on their talk page, that any such page be restored on request and afterwards eligible for MfD if anyone is interested. Dcoetzee 00:42, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Wow. This has expanded slightly since I started it...And yes, I did just read all of it.

I am in total accordance with Dcoetzee. I still want to see where this "consensus" is, though. A MfD case from April 2008 that resulted in "no consensus" is MZM's so-classed consensus for deleting these...

And what happens if speedy deletion of stuff in user space is allowed after this? Are signature collections next? Award pages after that? Userboxes last? —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 02:14, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

And am I missing something, or is he still deleting secret pages, while this is ongoing? (with the deletion summary "made extra secret") —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 02:17, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

All finished now. As I said earlier, fair treatment seems best here. --MZMcBride (talk) 02:26, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Leave the pages deleted, and move on to building an encyclopedia. Lets stop letting these pages distract us from our goals. The consensus for these pages not being appropriate was formed at WT:NOT and is described at WP:NOT. Chillum 05:40, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

If consensus on how to interpret that page with regards to this issue was as clear as you make it out to be, then the last MFD for these things would have ended in delete, and this thread would not exist. But fine, I don't really care either way. My whole point was that MZM should not have deleted them in that manner, because out of process deletions generally cause more trouble than they solve. Now that they're gone, they can stay that way. If the issuse dies with the closure of this thread, I will be happily surprised.--Dycedarg ж 06:36, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

You mean violating policy is good as long as the violating admin stops after he completed what he set out to do? Even if he completes it while his actions are still under discussion? Somehow this whole thread was completely useless if the outcome is "Who cares? They are gone now". I think the problem is not the kind of pages deleted but the way it was done. Next someone will delete articles like Wikipedia because they think we don't need an article about the project itself and the AN discussion will result it "Ah well, it's deleted now, let's move on". Am I the only one who is dissatisfied when legitimate complaints about policy violations end in such a result? SoWhy 07:29, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I personally am extremely annoyed by the manner in which the deletions were carried out. It was a gross abuse of administrative powers, and a deliberate subversion of consensus. What I meant with the above statement was that since I think the pages should have been deleted (albeit properly), if no one else cares enough to file a DRV I am certainly not going to do so and will be quite happy to avoid the ridiculously long discussion that would have resulted.--Dycedarg ж 08:11, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

While I see no benefit of keeping the pages concerned, I see a lot more harm in deleting them (and annoying/alienating contributors to the project) than leaving them there. I think

• they should not have been deleted out of process (the quoted MfD does not give the authority);
• they should all be undeleted promptly;
• the manner in which these deletions were carried out (and continued to be carried out while discussions took place here) is appalling and shows disrespect for the community. (Deletions continued for nearly 18 hours after the first complaint on his talk page, and 12 hours after being informed of the thread here.) Martin^msgj 10:04, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Whilst I've never really liked secret pages, the way this was executed was wrong. Had a non-admin tagged all these pages with a speedy tag, they would have been promptly declined. The discrepancy of power between admins and non-admins is disappointing to say the least. It seems that if you get the tools, it's fine for you to make up the rules as you go along. Seraphim♥ 10:13, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Power without responsibility - the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages. DuncanHill (talk) 15:48, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm with Seraphim on this. I've never been a fan of the secret page games, but I'm even less of a fan of using WP:IAR to summarily delete them without warning, discussion or consensus. There are already enough Wikipedians who think admins view themselves as above the law and capricious -- why give them more proof when there was absolutely no urgent need to delete the pages?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 18:21, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Have a cup of tea

What is everyone's problem with these pages? Wikipedia should not be seen as a job all the time. And could notice have been given before the deletion was done so that people could express their opinions? Simply south is this a buffet? 12:28, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Stop trying to drag out the drama for the sake of creating drama. seicer | talk | contribs 12:49, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I am not creating drama, i asked some simple questions and also stated that this project should not be made to be serious all the time. Simply south is this a buffet? 13:04, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Not really dragging it out since over 40 pages have been created again (none by me)... Hiberniantears (talk) 14:15, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I dunno, all this this "hidden page" retardedness really doesn't seem to have much of a justification. If people want to play games, then they can go load up a facebook app, as this isn't the place for it. So for what its worth, I heartily endorse the deletions...MfD 's are not needed for blatant gibberish...and hope that they continue. Tarc (talk) 14:39, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Although in this case, it just created more work, and either annoyed people, or gave people the opportunity to make fun of people who were annoyed. None of which contributed to building the encyclopedia. That's been my point all along. Hiberniantears (talk) 15:35, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Of course, bad example, life isn't worth living if you can't take a break from the task at hand. Well those that don't contribute should be warned but I'm sorry; just coming along and saying, oh this doesn't contribute to WP and deleting is worse than not helping WP. A Userpage isn't contributable to the WP. Why not delete them?

Well, once the pages are gone, there won't be any more need for some to bitch about it. I'd gladly trade a little consternation and drama now in order for it to be done with. Tarc (talk) 16:06, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Removal of the pages should help maintain a focus on creating a good encyclopedia. There should be no sanction for deleting them and no mass re-creation of them. Edison (talk) 18:09, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

So, you feel we should just tacitly approve of blatant policy violation, misuse of administrative power, utter disregard for consensus, and the alienation/aggravation of over a hundred editors many of whom were longstanding editors with lots of mainspace edits under their belts, because we agree with the end result? What about when something happens like this in the future, except to a page you like? You'll argue that policy should only be violated when you happen to agree with the outcome? The whole problem with this is that the community is supposed to decide these things, consensus is supposed to reign supreme, and instead we get one administrator deleting over a hundred pages with no consensus, discussion, or warning, and falsely justifying it to those who complain by saying that it was approved by discussion when it was most certainly not. This is not how Wikipedia is supposed to work, this is not how administrators are supposed to act. They are not supposed to be a police force able to arbitrarily force their will on an unwilling community because they feel like it's justified by policy.--Dycedarg ж 18:30, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:NOT is also policy, and these secret pages were/are a violation of this policy. Count me in the group that has no issue with MzMcBride taking out the trash. Resolute 18:55, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

And policy is clear that "Reasons derived from Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not" are not grounds for a unilateral/speedy deletion by an admin. Davewild (talk) 18:59, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, however lets not step up on our pulpit and cast down one "policy violating heathen" in suport of other policy violating heathens. McMcBride probably should have MfDed them, however his only failure here was that he circumvented process to get to the proper outcome. Resolute 19:05, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

There is no consensus that these pages were/are a violation of this policy. The reason deletion policy exists is so admins can't arbitrarily delete things based on their interpretation of policy as opposed to the community's (except in the narrowly defined set of cases in the CSD categories). The belief that it's OK to blatantly disregard policy and consensus because WP:IDONTLIKEIT is, in my opinion, completely ridiculous and completely contrary to the manner in which the project is supposed to operate.--Dycedarg ж 19:09, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

And creating these pages under WP:NOHARM is any better? Resolute 19:19, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Creating the pages was not an explicit policy violation, and there's no consensus against them. Deleting them was an explicit policy violation. Quite frankly, they needed no justification in policy to create them whatsoever.--Dycedarg ж 19:28, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

"His only failure was that he didn't follow policy." Yeah, can't fault him for that. Oh, wait.. --Conti|✉ 19:14, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:IAR is policy, and that seems to be his rationale. Regardless of the drama surrounding his methods, the end result was right. All that is really left is for people to form up on either side of the trenches and argue ineffectively for a while. Resolute 19:19, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) That is your opinion. Others have different opinions. There is no consensus on this matter. But most of this thread was not about whether such pages are acceptable or not but whether an admin can go ahead and delete them outside policy. I think some people missed this and are still debating the nature of the pages when the problem is the way these deletions were done. Regards SoWhy 18:33, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I have read this entire thread and I still can't understand what all this bollocks is about. Yes, I agree that creating secret pages is time unused improving/upgrading articles, but so is creating such a fuss about a load of rubbish. Just quit your bullshit and consider using your time more constructively instead of wasting your time.--O'DELAQUATIQUE (talk) (contributions) (e-mail) 19:20, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Er, this reading of that past MfD is rather faulty. It did not close with a finding of "no consensus", it closed on a matter of process; the closing admin did not believe that a mass AfD on the concept itself of secret pages was proper. They should be evaluated case-by-case. Perhaps this is one of the few times where I'd see a valid WP:IAR invocation, in that bypassing MfD to delete dozens upon dozens of cruft userpsace pages for the sake of the betterment of the Wikipedia is actually a good thing. Tarc (talk) 19:26, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

There is no consensus on that page, and the closing admin says as much. He doesn't say that the mass MFD was not proper. He said that the only consensus that existed was to get rid of the worst of the pages, and that the mass MFD was not going to accomplish that, so individual mfds should be conducted for those pages. Not that he expected individual MFDs for every single secret page out there.--Dycedarg ж 19:37, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

You have a very odd and selective reading of that closure, then, as it in no way prohibits MZMcBride from looking at each page, and deleting them as a speedy. There's just no collective policy for "secret pages" to wipe them in one fell swoop, unfortunately. Tarc (talk) 20:04, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually while personally I would not/have not created such pages I don't see the difference between these pages and signature books or this sort of thing (or is there a difference when it is primarily admins who are doing it?). I agree with this view (expressed when someone said that signing signature books did not contibute to the encyclopedia) - "Sure it does, if it contributes to a collegial atmosphere of friendliness. Snapping at people who are just being friendly doesn't improve the encyclopedia at all, as far as I can tell". So long as those who have created these pages remain primarily focused on building the encyclopedia then this sort of thing helps keep editors instead of just driving them off by unilaterally speedy deleting their pages while implying that they do not contribute to the encyclopedia. Davewild (talk) 19:30, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Nicely put. I keep a handful of quotes on my user page, this among them: "Community is built by allowing the free activity and interaction of members, not by blocking harmless behavior even if many or even most think it "useless." If something is useful to my neighbor, it's useful even if I have no need of it at all." I support what I believe to be the traditional, prevailing view: that these pages are a problem only when they are the main or sole focus of an editor. When an editor is predominantly occupied with article editing, these auxiliary pages serve to help him de-stress and like editing at Wikipedia a bit more. Such functions are valuable. Now that we've past the easy part of creating the largest reference work in all of history, Wikipedia's stability and success depends on creating a respectful, pleasant community entirely online. If that doesn't scare you, it should. Treat each other with tolerance and goodwill. --Kizor 19:55, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Let me split the comment... there. I should add that a few of the arguments about the harm of secret pages seem troublesome. First is the idea that non-article-writing-related editing is harmful in and of itself by taking effort away from writing the encyclopedia. Volunteer workers donate their labor to us, and its amount is not fixed. I have trouble accepting the notion that removing and forbidding things considered fun would cause volunteers to funnel the same effort (or, indeed, more effort at all) into more productive things.
Second is the performance effect. Wikipedia:Don't worry about performance has no formal status, all it has are arguments from a developer and the ultimate authority on Wikimedia servers and software. 'As a technical matter, it's our responsibility to keep the system running well enough for what the sites require. In other words: it's not a policy issue. If and when we need to restrict certain things, we'll do so with technical measures.' ..." '"Policy" shouldn't really concern itself with server load except in the most extreme of cases.'
Hope that helps. --Kizor 20:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

• If I may interject, as a thusfar uninvolved observer, I think that we should step away from arguing the merits of the pages themselves and focus on MZMcBride's actions. There is clearly some merit to the view that this individual improperly deleted these pages outside of process. What action is going to be taken in this regard? Given prior history, I submit that this incident should be brought to the attention of the Arbitration Committee for disposition. Nutiketaiel (talk) 19:43, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
• This is just about flexing admin muscle... completely pointless. Hiberniantears (talk) 19:53, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
  • And here come the "admin abuse" cries. Sigh. Tarc (talk) 20:04, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
    • What would you call deleting pages in defiance of both policy and consensus?--Dycedarg ж 20:05, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
      • Since there was neither consensus nor policy preventing it, I probably wouldn't say much. Tarc (talk) 20:49, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
    • Since an arbitrator has already accepted opening a case on the basis of this affair, you might want to consider giving the benefit of the doubt. ;-) --Kizor 20:28, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
    • It isn't a cry of admin abuse. I am an admin, and thus seek to protect my ability to slap around the serfs as I see fit. Also, I'm just running up my edit count so that nobody calls me a dormant admin. It is about showing contributing editors a little respect. Hiberniantears (talk) 20:35, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh goody goody!!

It seems that Mcbride removed another secret page, right here. This time it was with a different explanation ("made extra secret"). It was all done AFTER this conversation was started. Montgomery' 39 (talk) 21:56, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

See the comment from the_ed in the above section that begins with And am I missing something and MZM's reply. –xeno (talk) 21:59, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Arbitration

I have filed a request for Arbitration here: Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration#MZMcBride -MBK₀₀₄ 19:49, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for taking that initiative. Nutiketaiel (talk) 19:58, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I concur. This action seems appropriate considering the situation. --.:Alex:. 20:31, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I've noted my opposition there. Discussion is still taking place, arbitration seems premature. --Ali'i 21:01, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

What's the intention of this action at arbitration? If you're forcing the matter to be heard by...authorities, that forces editors who couldn't care less about this conversation to care. I happen to think that secret pages, while somewhat benign and banal, foster in part a sense of community as well as a sense of relaxed atmosphere. Unfortunately, the editors it seems to be popular with in my experience don't really need much more relaxing. These secret pages and the barnstars that are given for finding them were at issue during an MfD of an "Awards Center" where participants became so focused on receiving awards, barnstars, and collecting other ephemera that editors cut corners severely, worked with each other to promote articles at WP:GA that they knew were not quality articles, and repeatedly nominated poorly written undersourced articles at WP:FAC, all so they could have another award. It started as so much fun, but it wasn't maintained by anyone with a voice of reason and it got out of hand.

More recently, a discussion is taking place at WT:Featured article criteria about making sources better for FAs, and I'm quite astounded at the opposition to it. It appears people just do not wish to do the work involved in getting an FA and would rather have a lowered standard. I surmise this is because they can get... more bronze stars. The mentality is connected to these secret pages. I don't have much to say about what MZMcBride did as an admin, but I'm starting to develop a well-reasoned argument why secret pages should be removed. I will participate in the discussion about getting rid of secret pages; I read the initial ArbCom notice and it is not clear right now what this will be about. --Moni3 (talk) 21:17, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

MBK004, who left the request, does point out that has no opinion on secret pages and focuses entirely on the appropriateness of taken administrator actions. His request and other edits support that statement, as does the arbitrator who's accepted the case. Again, hope that helps. --Kizor 21:26, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

The appropriateness of the secret pages bears directly on the appropriateness of MZMcBride's actions. If the pages were inappropriate, then his actions were appropriate and vice-versa. So making a judgement on the one requires making a judgement on the other. -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:54, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

The request for arbitration is not about the secret pages. It is about the actions of MZMcBride. If there still needs to be a discussion of secret pages, I submit that this is not the appropriate forum. Miscellany for deletion seems to be a more appropriate forum; for those who feel that MZMcBride acted legitimately in his decision to speedily delete the pages, perhaps a discussion at Criteria for Speedy Deletion to explicitely incorporate such language in the guidelines would be in order. Nutiketaiel (talk) 21:24, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I feel that this "Hidden page game" section here is the appropriate forum. We have a discussion going. Assuming that MfD is not fundamentally unlike AfD, it is - alas - not a place for productive discussion, just a tool of last resort. The raised stakes make it far more polarized and less civil than WP:AN.

There is another matter. In my nerve-hit opinion, a serious one. If the secret pages go to MfD while most of them are - or just were - deleted, it is going to affect the situation, and it will be an effect achieved not by its merits but by the use of force. That is obscene. --Kizor 21:30, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

The RFArb was a knee-jerk reaction by people who prefer a witch hunt to following dispute resolution. How ironic that the people complaining about MZMcbride bypassing policy and guidelines completely side stepped WP:DR and ran straight to "the last resort" rather than follow any of the other potential steps outlined in that policy first. How even more sad that Arbcom accepted it. Resolute 06:05, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Data

Secret, in closing this MFD from last year, recommended that such pages be approached on a case by case basis. Out of interest, does anyone have any information about how such pages have been treated subsequently? Is anyone aware of any subsequent individual deletion discussions? --bainer (talk) 04:14, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I grepped the deletion log for "secret" and "sekrit" in the log_comment field. Here's what I found:

• Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:DCFan101/Secret Page Challenge
• User:HJH Lady Renegade/Secret Page
• BB_Pacifica/realsecreatpage/myrealsecretpagenumber2/myrealsecretpagenumber3/yeahyoudidit/myrealspecialsecretpage/youwin/iamgivingyouahint/xyz/vxy/myuserpage/youronfire/stopdropandroll/Igiveup
• User:Tyw7/73f&
• User:Earthbendingmaster/Super_Secret_Page
• User:Earthbendingmaster/Secret_Page
• User:Skittlesrgood4u/Super_Secret_Page
• User talk:Skittlesrgood4u/Super_Secret_Page
• User:IXella007/Templates/Hidden_Link_Barnstar
• User talk:Sandro67/The_Secret_Page
• User:Little_Mountain_5/Secret
• User:Pokemon_Buffy_Titan/Fake-Out_Secret
• User:Meldshal42/SSSSP123
• User:Meisfunny/Ultimate Secret Page

Note: This list is in no way conclusive. --MZMcBride (talk) 05:12, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• Not "secret pages", but a similar myspace issue was handled at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2008 April 11. It related to pages listed at User:Keilana/Deleted cabals. That involved IAR deletions of 14 deleted cabals, as well as an MFD, an RFC, and two ANI threads. I closed the DRV as "IAR deletion not endorsed due to lack of consensus to do it that way, no consensus that the pages should exist so not undeleting, if anybody asks for a specific page back and explains how it help the encyclopedia any admin may undelete". Only one was undeleted. As I recall it was moved elsewhere and the redirect later deleted. GRBerry 14:21, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I remember that one. Despite the stuff that went on at that time, it's interesting to note a couple of the "caballists", once their stuff was taken away, actually improved decidedly as editors. Orderinchaos 01:57, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Secret go bye-bye

This is why the secret pages have to go. What a monumental waste of time. Doing away with them in no way hinders the ability of editors to socialize with each other. It just removes Wikipedia as a lame target of disruption in yet another way. It removes the incentive to discuss their presence, debate their deletion, and take sides about the issue. It's a game. Wikipedia was chosen as the board. Wikipedia is not a game board. It actually is an encyclopedia. People ought to chew on that for a while and think about the compatability of being an encyclopedia with being a social networking site for children. The two aren't. --KP Botany (talk) 06:41, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

• If anyone has links to similar "not MySpace"-type MfDs, that would also be appreciated (in the same vein as bainer's request above). So far I've found the following:
  • Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Chess championship
  • Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Masky/Quests/Quest1Index
  • Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:DoomsDay349/WikiPlomacy
  • Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chess championship
  • Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Esperanza/Coffee Lounge/Games
  • Also of interest: meta:Wikicommunity
• I'd hazard a guess that a search for terms like "games", "WP:USER", "WP:NOT" and so on would find others. Probably too many to list here, but a couple more examples might be instructive. Carcharoth (talk) 07:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
  • You forgot the entire BJADON mess, see the template at Wikipedia talk:Silly Things for a list. --Conti|✉ 11:55, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
    • That was fundamentally a copyright problem, I think/hope. --Kizor 14:18, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
      • Yes, it was. BJAODN was not compliant with the GFDL. I fixed some of the entries so that they were, as I recall. Uncle G (talk) 10:23, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

• Part of the time wasted is spent here, complaining about them. The actual time wasted by editors looking for, making, and logging into these pages is probably minimal. But fine. If you guys think it is best that these folks "just do games like that on some facebook app", then people will follow your lead. People who might have made some reasonably constructive contributions (remember that these are the folks we are discussing, not the "20 edits and they are all to a secret page crowd") might just leave if we come along and break up their fun because people think they should be editing articles. This is purely a social convention. We allow barnstars, elaborate userpages, user essays, user chess games, wiki-smiles, etc. We just happen to think that the "secret pages" are less desirable. We don't like them, so why should anyone else? This is fundamentally the same as far as the encyclopedia is concerned--mainspace doesn't care if your non-article edits are to a user essay about how much you like WP:AFC or a template to send cups of tea to people or on a secret page so that people will try to find it. The articles don't care. The only variable here is us. Can we step back and think that maybe we are being too intrusive? Or maybe (if that doesn't bother anyone), the lowest energy route is to do nothing for anything but the most egregious cases. This isn't a law and order problem. We won't get "more offenders" if we don't "crack down" on the misdemeanors. It's a community of human beings who all have their own kick. They all have something that keeps them here, helping us. We (as external observers) can't determine what, specifically, that is for each person. so we can't just say User:Bob doesn't like his secret page enough to leave or help us less wholeheartedly if we delete it but User:Jane does--delete bob's but not Jane's. We just have to guess. And wouldn't we rather just leave things up to Bob and Jane? Isn't that more in line with the wiki way? Protonk (talk) 08:14, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Call me jaded if you must, but honestly, I can't really fathom any user coming here for the "secret page games", or any user leaving solely due to the removal of said games, possessing the modicum of maturity required for worthwhile, well-written contributions. It's a tantalizing hypothetical, but in the end, it's rather like owning a car dealership and debating over whether or not to include pre-recorded loudspeaker announcements on behalf of blind people who'd be otherwise unaware of your excellent signage. Badger Drink (talk) 08:56, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, we tend to find it difficult to visualize other points of view. I'm not saying that as a diss, just that it is hard for you or I to imagine someone who is sort of interested in the wiki (say, ~20 contribs a month), but also has fun w/ userspace (say, 20-30% of contribs). It's hard for me to imagine because I have ~500 edits/month, among other reasons. But the whole basis of the wiki is that we try to draw in as many disparate views and sources of effort and expertise as possible. For many people, if the barriers to participation are even a trifle, they won't do it (hence why we are successful and why citizendium is not). My point is not that those folks with secret pages are all on the margin, ready to leave at the drop of a hat. But that some probably are, and that the self-righteous feeling we gain from knowing that people aren't mucking about in userspace isn't worth a fixed typo, IMO (I guess that's where my bias comes in...). Protonk (talk) 10:29, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Protonk. We also need to delete barnstars, elaborate userpages, user essays, user chess games, wiki-smiles, etc. Clearly, all of those things are demonstrations that people aren't doing their job when they come here. They were hired to write articles, and if they want to get paid, that's what they'd better do. For the same reason, I'd like to see the removal of our 'E-water Cooler', the Village Pump. That's nothing but a place for people to stand around gabbing. There's facebook for that, or they can go to the local bar after work. If editors want to get paid, they'd better be on here eight hours a day writing and nothing else. I notice raul654 was one of those wasting corporate resources in the Chess Championship linked above, and now he's an admin, so perhaps HR should reassess his file. ThuranX (talk) 12:48, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Whoa, back it up! The things you're talking about getting rid of is things that help civility getting rid of barnstars and wiki-smiles would destroy wiki-love. I hope you were being sarcastic because that's a terrible idea. The Cool Kat (talk) 13:42, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I think he was being sarcastic. If not, can I get paid monthly? I find it easier to pay the bills that way, especially on part time wages. Jack forbes (talk) 13:52, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I've never had a "secret page" and never will, but I have to say I do wish certain Gradgrindish editors would concentrate on building an encyclopædia instead of spending their time hunting them out to delete them and then wasting everybody's time with the "omg people are having a bit of fun we must stop it!" antics. Editors are (mostly) human beings, and human beings need sometimes to let off steam. Some do it by playing little games of hide and seek, some by writing snide and bitey little essays with redirects from WP space, some do it by rambling off at a tangent on the refdesks. One size does not fit all, and if we start making too big a deal about these odd little bits of userspace we actively undermine encyclopædia-building by preventing editors from having their little bits of stress-relief and "getting to know you" pages. DuncanHill (talk) 14:40, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

In my day we used to go outdoors and play sports etc to let off steam. Yours grumpily, Jack forbes (talk) 14:46, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

And we walked to school. Forty miles. Uphill. Both Ways. Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 14:48, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Walked to school? In my day we didn't even have have legs, we had to drag ourselves there on our bellies over hot coals and broken glass. DuncanHill (talk) 14:56, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Walked to school? No legs? Young people today don't know when they are well off. Now, when I was in the war..... Jack forbes (talk) 15:01, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

And stay off my lawn, you kids! *shaking fist while holding on to my walker* --Fabrictramp | talk to me 15:02, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

So much hyperboleee-haw, Protonk. There are all sorts of things one can't do on Wikipedia, making it your social networking website being just merely one of them. En.wiki is one of the most hostile places on the web. I leave all of the tim. Now I just have a thick skin. It's required.

If and editor is going to leave because their "secret" non-wikipedia page was deleted, they were going to leave anyhow. The over the top speculation is not necessary, and the rampant protection of the speculated thin-skinned giver-uppers and leavers is not necessary.

What Wikipedia should be worried about retaining is expertise, not social networkers. There are already free web-sites for the latter. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. --KP Botany (talk) 05:22, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

• We shouldn't make a habit of deleting pages because a collection of users doesn't think that other users would be helped by it. I'm not joking when I say that as regards the mainspace, there isn't a lick of difference between "secret pages" and all the other crap that we do on our userpages. The difference is that the editors who congregate here have a particular view of the type of person who would have a secret page. It isn't hard to see that. Read some of the comments above. Thuran was being sarcastic above, but the VP is practically useless and it consumes more time an effort than these secret pages do by at least an order of magnitude. I don't see what is so hard about leaving things be. Protonk (talk) 05:40, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

All you bastards need to stop assuming I'm being sarcastic. I'm just here for the 401(k), and Payroll's had me in the queue for sixteen months for a meeting on establishing my withholding amount. (/sarcasm.)

This is a stupid abuse of time and editors. I agree fully that Wikipedia is not a social networking site, and I fully support elimination of such users. But this 'don't waste our time and bandwidth meme is idiotic. You may as well say 'Registered Editors who are currently logged in cannot browse random pages and read', because they're equally wasting bandwidth and shirking some apparent burden of writing/editing required of them. What's to stop me from randomly ramping up bandwidth use by picking a random article, then clicking the first blue link I see as fast as I can over and over? or better, writing a program that does it for me, even faster than I could? And then running that program on every computer in my house? that would eat up more bandwidth, from one user, than all users engaged in pagehunting at any given time. There's a reason donations are made to the foundation; and if things get so tight that pagehunting is a real dent in bandwidth, this project has already been over for a month. Protonk's right. You're assuming that everyone 'wasting' time on these other things is a 14 year old popularity contest nimrod. EVEN if that's true, that's not foundation for alienating them just because you're older and think you're better. Really, beyond a skimpy NOT and a lot of IDONTLIKEIT, there's no good argument yet. ThuranX (talk) 05:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you both for reading my mind. However, I don't congregate here, if by here you mean W:AN. I can't even usually find it. And, since I'm nowhere in the vicinity with my thinking that gives me any clues what you are talking about, please do tell me what I am thinking so I know.

Your continued freak out on the issue of bandwidth and children and other time wasting simply is not the issue in its entirety.

Oh, and I know they're not really secret. Duh.

What's hard about leaving things be is it requires that it be a formal leave it be. Because, without a formal give in, this issue will arise again and again. Some dopey admin will mistakenly delete a pure garbage page, and some owner of said page will freak out, then the whole community will freak out about singular points, "Oh, my gawd, it does NOT waste band width, which is essentially free" "Oh, mercy me, it will cause users to quit," "Oh, they're evil, they must be deleted," "Oh, they waste bandwidth which is precious,"

ArbComs will be raised, RfCs promised, names called, incivility will abound, bullshit will be passed around, hostility will abound2. People will get pissed off at editors who support it, or editors who don't want to allow it.

Editors will not only think they can read others' minds, but boldly assert the thoughts of other editors.

Where precisely do you draw the lines of allowing things? This is a good point. The pages assert that they are for an extra-Wiki purpose, and a community of members with extra-Wiki purposes. None of the other pages and vices mentioned assert this. The users of said "secret pages" have allowed that they have done everything necessary to get their pages deleted. Delete them. --KP Botany (talk) 08:19, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh, my mind is pained from all that being read. --KP Botany (talk) 08:19, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Well what about pretty much everything in Category:Wikipedia humour then? WP:EUI? Frivolous userboxen? The upages that directly clone Facebook? (I forget whose that is, it's awesome) It's all about letting off a bit of steam in the face of serius biznes of editing. It's not just unproductive kids, and it manifests in lots of ways. I like reading through the RefDesks and maybe answering a few at the end of a long session of editing. Other people like hunting for sekrit pages. Some take pictures of themselves in bathrobes. Whatever. Really, the only determinant should be whether the editors are making a net positive contribution and not causing harm. Franamax (talk) 08:38, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

If we are discussing, at the moment, the pages themselves, rather than MZM's actions, I'd like to chime in for a moment. Many of you have cited that these pages are a "waste of time" and thet people could be doing more constructive things with that time. It's not a zero-sum game here: banning this sort of activity will not promote more constructive editing. In fact, it does quite the opposite: admins will have to waste time cleaning them up and enforcing such a rule... Just look at the length of this discussion! It should be quite clear that there are many differing opinions here, and many different interpretations of policy and the last MfD discussion, so it is logical to say that many admins would take different actions and respond differently in any given scenario. This is why we have the consensus building policy.

I'll use myself for an example. I've been editing for quite some time, and I'd like to think I'm in good standing with five digits of edits, most of them to the article namespace. I discovered secret pages a while ago and spent a few hours blazing through it. I wrote an essay about them, and then moved on. That's it, a few hours of my life were spent and then I went on to "productive things" without any needling from anyone else. Had I been forcibly (and quite possibly sarcastically) prohibited from doing this, there would have been some hard feelings. I'm not such a dramatc person that I would have huffed up and left, but I can surely say that Wikipedia would have recieved far less constructive edits from me. I edit for the enjoyment of sharing knowledge with others, and while I'm usually not prolific in the project spaces, I do enjoy the interation with other editors.

What would be gained from banning this practice? Nothing, in essence. You cannot legislate behavior and attitude... people will not do "productive things" by disallowing a certain practice. bahamut0013^words_deeds 14:01, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

My whole view on the situation is that deleting "secret" pages would set a dangerous precedent on Wikipedia. Has anyone thought about Wikimeet ups that are organised on wikipedia? What about the cabal pages? Arn't they also "social" in nature? Im just thinking that your going to piss of alot of people if you go around deleting a harmless page that helps users establish relationships. Wikipedia is a community, this is largly because of the social aspect which in actual fact makes the other users seem less forign to one another, and more likely to work together for the common goal. The latest generation of editors are very social by nature and I fear that making Wikipedia stictly on-topic will actually push users away because it's largly the friends you make here that make you stay during tough times. Its the same as "Blocking all non-work related sites will make my users more productive" in schools and companies, We all know that is a myth and a farce because users will waste even more time circumventing blocks or inventing new ways to bend the rules. Besides, if people are really pationate about secret pages they will throw a small draft article on the secret pages and claim that it serves 2 purposes, which would supposedly "waste" more diskspace and negate any deletion criteria. I also note that Diskspace is REALLY REALLY REALLY cheep and bandwidth generated by secret pages is no where near that of which has been generated by self perpetulating drama on AN. Neverloan the process of deleting secret pages would be a clusterfuck, a huge waste of time and would chew up more immediate space (Revisions are kept + deletion log entry's) than if they were left alone. add on top of that several people leaving because "Wikipedia has become a Bureaucratic cesspool". </rant > :)   «l| Ψrometheăn ™|l»  (talk) 10:39, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

In the arbitration request page, arbitrator Newyorkbrad notes that "Typically, I sign secret pages and hidden guestbooks with the comment "I never sign guestbooks. Signed, Newyorkbrad" and "I can think of at least a couple of editors whose first edits consisted of excessive prettying of their userpages, and signature-pages or hidden-pages or the like, who are now administrators." I hope that this puts an end to the repeatedly used argument that editors who use or have such pages are disposable. --Kizor 19:20, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

It seems that those who support allowing these pages rather than delete them cannot argue for their support without making things up about those whose opinion differs. Who said that any editors were disposable? The pages are. What is ridiculous is all this unsupported talk, "oh, they'll throw fits and leave if they have to follow the rules." Good golly miss molly, get a grip. If they're going to throw fits and leave because they have to follow the rules and want independent rules just to accommodate their behaviour, they'll find something else to throw fits and leave about.

To contend that one must design an encyclopedia user space around the possibility that rules enforcement, designed to keep the primary focus of this online space in line with its purpose, could send editors packing is absurd. Communities have rules. Good, bad, indifferent. This is an encyclopedia. For enforcing that idea, an editor is being threatened with arbcom to supposedly prevent editors playing games here from leaving.

And Wikipedia keeps saying they want experts contributing. That's the real laugh. --KP Botany (talk) 04:40, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Communities have rules, true, but both communities and rules can evolve. A significant part of the discussion above is about what the rule should be. Furthermore, all communities, explicitly or implicitly, prioritize rules. The rules about civility, verifiability, proper sourcing, etc. are important for building an encyclopedia, and need to be vigorously enforced -- maybe the rules about secret pages and game playing, as long as the "misdemeanors" are at an overall low level, perhaps don't need to be enforced as strongly. BTW, how exactly do secret pages keep experts away? -- ArglebargleIV (talk) 12:40, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I find this response to be insulting and condescending, enough to be wholly inappropriate. I would prefer it if those without a personal stake went through the argument. --Kizor 14:54, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Kizor - can you just clarify exactly which response to be insulting and condescending? Because I cannot see anything in ArglebargleIV's comment that could reasonably be construed as either. DuncanHill (talk) 14:59, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

By the indentation, Kizor's responding to KP Botany, whose comments are far more potentially insulting and condescending. WilyD 15:58, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Nice indirection there KP. Do you have a response to the first sentence Kizor posted? The one mentioning the arbitrator? The one wasting something-or-other playing games with secret pages? Should we have an RFC on NYB? Any comments at all on that sentence? Franamax (talk) 23:01, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

You can have an RFC on NYB if you want to, or you can try to. I won't block you--well, I can't block you, but I won't do anything to try to stop you. I'm not interested. --KP Botany (talk) 02:31, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I have to say, the edit summary for that last comment caught my attention.... Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:49, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

So can we agree then that you're unwilling to comment on Kizor's quotations of Newyorkbrad? Specifically, you wish to discuss everything but the outlook and practices of a sitting arbitrator, which appear to run counter to your own position? I'm looking here for just comments on that first sentence. It appears that there are widely divergent views on the "secret page" practice. Franamax (talk) 03:02, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Except that NYB never said that he has a secret page or guestbook. Rlendog (talk) 20:12, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I just really continue to have no idea why I should comment on New York Brad or start an RFC on him. Please feel free to let me know on my talk page or collude with me in secret to get his ass fired or whatever it is you think I should do to him. Sorry, NYB, something must be terribly wrong with you as hard as I am being pushed to start an RFC about you..... --KP Botany (talk) 00:17, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Closure please?

It seems to be KP Botany arguing for removal of the SPs against numerous other editors who see nothing wrong with them. (No slam against KP, he has comported himself fine in this debate.) Is there any finality we can find with this? This section's screens long, over a week old, and there's little consensus to remove them. ThuranX (talk) 20:27, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I tried to close it a few days ago after the arb got filed but someone thought there might be useful discussion still to come. I think that useful discussion has run its course and agree this thread should be closed. –xeno (talk) 20:32, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Before closing, can this loooong debatebe be summarized so that we can use the conslusions for later debates? (I read some of it and decided it was too long to read it all and then gave up so I would like to see if any conclusions were drawn.) Thanks. --Tone 20:34, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Please, please, close it, as I am now being badgered into starting an RFC against a user I'm pretty sure I've never interacted with. There is really no point in continuing to allow this space to be used for a weird and unexplained tangent. --KP Botany (talk) 00:17, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Just don't edit it and the thread will be archived automatically. So long as everyone resists the temptation to have the last word, manually archiving the discussion is unnecessary. Besides, that big blue box never stopped anyone really interested in continuing a discussion anyways. Protonk (talk) 02:59, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Wikipedia:Books

As the new Extension:Collection has been implemented, some administrative and policy questions arise. It'll create a "add a book" link for content pages (already the case for registered users), see Special:Book. The book can be managed there, it contains a link to http://pediapress.com/ to order as a printed book and a link to download as PDF. There is also the option to save and "share" your books, either in a user subpage, or in a subpage of Wikipedia:Books, see Special:PrefixIndex/Wikipedia:Books/ for "community" books, and Category:Wikipedia:Books for all. This system has already been (ab)used to create inappropriate pages, such as attack and spam pages (examples in Wikipedia namespace: 1, 2, 3). I have added {{NOINDEX}} to Template:Saved book to prevent indexing of this kind of books, and also because they are not part of the Encyclopedia. But we need more rules and restrictions, otherwise, it'll get out of hand. I think we should completely disallow the sharing of books in Wikipedia space, and only allow autoconfirmed users to save their books in userspace. What is really the interest of sharing books ? It is prone to WP:MYSPACE/sharing concerns, and would distract from our goal to build an encyclopedia. A few example books for readers created by the community would be worthwhile, but I think further steps in this direction would be detrimental. Cenarium (talk) 19:38, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

To prevent indexing is a good idea for now. The community needs some time to develop guidelines and rules for stored books. But I would not impose premature restrictions until the community had a chance to catch up with this new feature. I'd propose to discuss this topic on the tool's feedback page. --He!ko (talk) 21:06, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

If we don't impose restrictions quickly, we'll have thousands of those pages and it'll be harder to detect inappropriate pages such as User:Pooblahtest/Books/Mrs. Wishin and User:Bobby1773/Books/robsmith. On the other hand, we can loosen the restrictions later if we want to. Also, what should be done of this kind of things: User:Janime6/Books/Boobism, User:Therealtomgowner/Books/Tomg.synthasite.com, Wikipedia:Books/new stadiums in Bulgaria, Wikipedia:Books/FATHER OF SAIYANS (has been nominated for deletion, see here), Wikipedia:Books/Graal, Wikipedia:Books/Kuwait, Wikipedia:Books/sabina wantoch, Wikipedia:Books/yeah. See for example Wikipedia:Books/HCDF for blatant advertising. Many users save those pages as their first action: 1, 2, 3, with only a help/intro page as content. Guidelines can be discussed at Wikipedia talk:Books, but I think we need to take action swiftly if we don't want to be overrun. Cenarium (talk) 21:58, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, this is only gonna get worse. I'd suggest we disable the project-space sharing (whatever it takes to do that) until we have both a useful set of standards and a way to enforce them. — Gavia immer (talk) 22:08, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Um, yeah, what does this have to do with Wikipedia? That MediaWiki can do this functionality does not seem to me to mean that its usage on this specific Wiki is useful towards its goals, which is to build an encyclopedia. Why is this not a completely seperate Wiki rather than enabled here?!? --Jayron32.talk.contribs 22:21, 28 February 2009 (UTC) Sorry, I misunderstood how this worked. This doesn't seem all that bad now that I have researched it a bit more. Nevermind any objections from me. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 14:07, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

How is this not useful? Some people don't want to have to print out dozens of articles; this offers a useful way of organization and transmission of certain article revisions. --Der Wohltempierte Fuchs ^(talk) 22:30, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

God forbid editors should make and share assemblies of articles with others! While I do accept that this feature, as with every other feature of Wikipedia, may be abused by some, I find claims that the book extension has nothing to do with building an encyclopædia to be bizarre at the very least. Readers of Wikipedia (who are in fact much more important than editors) are very likely to want to be able to assemble collections of articles, and to be able to export them or have them printed - indeed, as readers of the various help desks and village pumps will know it is a feature which has been regularly requested over the years. DuncanHill (talk) 22:30, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Any reader can create a book in Special:Book, then export or print it (and also order it). It's not about that, it's about storing books in user or project space (only available for registered users since it involves creating pages).

Sharing books, collections of articles, is not the purpose of an encyclopedia, Wikipedia is not a social networking site. Creating a few books maintained by the community or wikiprojects for presentation and as examples to readers is one thing, and good, but allowing any user to store books in project space is looking for problems (see above) and distract from encyclopedia building (let's say that improving our lists is more important than creating books). So we should disable automatic creation of books in project space imo. As for books stored in userspace, I propose to restrict it to autoconfirmed users, because it'll limit the problematic books and books by new users are generally tests or drafts of new articles. User books can be found (and so shared) in Category:Wikipedia:Books. Cenarium (talk) 01:40, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

You know, you're right. I propose we delete all userspace and project space as they are not the purpose of an encyclopædia. Encouraging editors to get to know each other, or to share interests, concerns etc should all be prohibited. Can you spot the sarcasm yet? DuncanHill (talk) 13:50, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Sarcasm... go tell it to Mrs. Wishin. In a few weeks, we'll have thousands of books and who is going to check all of them ? Users can share their books through Category:Wikipedia:Books and subcategories already. But creating and having them in project space is a waste of resource and volunteer time, it has no purpose. Cenarium (talk) 15:03, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like a job for a new CSD. I've made a proposal at WT:CSD#Books. MER-C 02:18, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

So what happens, when we start getting loads of people who turn up to edit the articles to ensure that the book they print reflects their opinion? Surely this is a threat to NPOV? Just my thoughts... --Cameron* 14:24, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

We do what we already do when people turn up to edit the articles to ensure that the website they view reflects their opinion. DuncanHill (talk) 14:28, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I have proposed to disable book creation from Special:Book in project space, and instead let wikiprojects make one or a few books on their subject in project space, so that they are checked for quality and be helpful for readers. See detailed reasoning, please, participate there. Cenarium (talk) 17:08, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

• How are these not covered by existing XfD criteria? - Mgm|^(talk) 10:27, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

i wana add my profile in the list of pakistani media persons........how can i do

i wana add my profile in the list of pakistani media persons........how can i do

anwar hashmi —Preceding unsigned comment added by Anwar hashmi (talk • contribs) 06:42, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Mr Hashmi, sorry to disappoint you, but I don't think you should try putting yourself on the list, because you are not notable. --Eaglestorm (talk) 07:18, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

AfD Creation Issue

First of all, I hope I am in the right place. If not, please let me know. I created an AfD for Corpse Road (movie/series) unfortunately, while the main article tag appears to be properly applied, the Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Corpse Road (movie/series) and the Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2009 March 2 show the title as /series) and not the full name. Don't know if I messed up or stepped on a bug to create this mess. Any help in fixing this would be appreciated. Thanks... ttonyb1 (talk) 07:57, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Looks fine to me right now.

For future reference, please take these questions to the technical section of the Village Pump. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 08:34, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Exaggerated figures

A certain user is re-adding highly exaggerated numbers for Iraqi and Syrian Turkmen, whose numbers according to western experts estimates is no more than a few hundred thousands.The same POV-pushing is going on Template:Turkish ethnicity. Ellipi (talk) 10:55, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Admin attention requested re vandalism to article List of Keeping up with the Kardashians episodes (which I reverted)

Here's the background: Sometime yesterday, another IP editor deliberately vandalized List of Keeping up with the Kardashians episodes. I'm not exactly sure why or how, or who did it; nor am I a member of WikiProject User Warnings; so I can't provide any links or diffs or notify anyone. I reverted the vandalism, but some admin attention on that page would still be appreciated. --76.6.36.188 (talk) 17:42, 28 September 2011 (UTC)