Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive241

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Contents 1 User:ElBuentada 2 Henry Pollack 3 Account hacked? 3.1 Possible causes 4 Lyme disease military history 5 Justin craig 6 IP "Sockpuppets" by user Zubenzenubi 7 Request review of block placed on User:EnviroGranny 8 May 10 9 Malamockq 10 St. Paul's College, Sydney 11 Very quick one - block sockpuppet confirmed by checkuser 12 Account hijacking 12.1 User verification 13 Mr strike my leg stop i dont like fly (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) 14 block review, personal attacks, 31 hours 15 Open informal complaint about misuse of administrative powers 15.1 Blocked, again 16 User continually removing {{Non-free use disputed}} from image 17 Quick again - request block of self-proclaimed sockpuppet 18 PDFbot 19 Request a bit of help with Dismissal of U.S. attorneys controversy article 20 Problematic IP editor 21 User:BuickCenturyDriver‎ 22 Holliston, Massachusetts 23 Is 42nd Street-Bryant Park (IND Sixth Avenue Line) redirs supposed to exist? 24 User:Mitzy1978 25 Disruptive edits by Tony the Tiger 26 User:Ron liebman 27 List of cuneiform signs 28 How much information do I need to provide to stop a user from following me to every conversation? 28.1 Sockpuppetry 28.2 Co-editing 29 Possible troll 30 User:Mel Etitis - possible desysopping case? 31 Abuse of Twinkle 32 Block review 33 User:ShadowFox_S.T.A.R.S. 34 Very bad treatment of newcomers 35 Requesting block of malfunctioning bot 36 Incorrect replacement of "Portugese" with "Portuguese" 37 Block evasion by Shaligramyadav 38 Help wanted in explaining rule on "unfree images of living people" 39 Vandalistic move and insertion of copyrighted material 40 User:Prester John 41 Children of Curpsbot 42 Suggestion for enhanced Admin identification and security 42.1 Admins (or any users) with PGP keys 42.1.1 Tony's quick-and-dirty Mediawiki key-signing method 42.2 No magic bullet 42.3 Committed identities 43 "Wikipedia admins are bastards" on this page? 44 Help with autoblock caused by DavidYork71 sock. 45 Petty stalking by User:Orangemonster2k1 46 Bob2042 47 Alleged cyberstalking at Suzanne Shell 48 User:IStalkNeldav 49 Brown wikilinks 50 Personal Attacks after Final Warning 51 Vandalising my User page 52 Repeated posting of junk information by 69.140.218.130 53 DVD key in signature 54 Bobby Sands 55 Personal attacks 56 Mass blankings of a series of articles 57 Lahs08 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) 58 Racist User

[edit] User:ElBuentada

ElBuentada (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) is an obvious User:Danny Daniel (A banned user.) sockpuppet. See contributions for evidence and User:Squirepants101/Danny Daniel for information about this vandal's sockpuppets. Pants^(T) 02:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The user recreated Coca-Town, an article created by a indefinitely blocked Danny Daniel sockpuppet. Pants^(T) 02:08, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Even though one of this vandal's hoaxes have been deleted from Wikipedia (in it, the admin acknowledges that this is a sockpuppet), this user is still active and hasn't been blocked yet. Pants^(T) 00:47, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Indef blocked. Natalie 14:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Henry Pollack

Can I get a couple of admins to take a hard look at an article? I'm seeing what could be the beginning of some nasty business over the article on Henry Pollack. The subject of the article is very much watching the article and has left a message on the talk page stating in part:

If he continues I shall contact an attorney and sue for liable.

And

I hope that WIKIPEDIA takes immediate action and bans hin from editing anything that has to do with me, my family or my family home in Cuba.

Note that the segment of text which Mr. Pollack objected to was pulled out prior to his leaving the message by someone else in an effort to render the article less POV. Tabercil 05:33, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The user has made legal threats, so I have blocked him indefinitely. I've told him that I've left a message at the BLP noticeboard, where other editors can give the article more scrutiny. — Rebelguys2 ^talk 06:07, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Sue for liable? Thats a new one. Viridae^Talk 13:15, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Sue to determine who to sue? Natalie 14:37, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Account hacked?

I think we may have an other compromised admin account. I am KnowledgeOfSelf, and when I first popped on the WP this morning I was logged in and posting a few messages to Wiki Alf. During a lull in the chatter I went to my kitchen to make a cup of coffee, when I came back down and clicked on the edit tab to post a reply to Alf I noticed I was not logged in anymore. When I went to re-log in I was told I was using an incorrect password. All attempts to re-log in have failed. I hit the "E-mail new password" at the sign/in page, but I have yet to receive it. Since it seems to be taking far to long to get that new password, (over an hour now), I decided to make this account and email my KOS name, I was told that the KOS account does not have it’s email setup/or does not allow other users to email that account. This can not be the case. Because as an administrator who does a lot of RC and New account patrol I do get the occasional complaint by email about auto blocks, “My user name is not derogatory”, “unblock me now” etc. I know that I have my Email enabled, on my KOS name, in fact I received an email from HighInBC yesterday about admins accounts being hacked. I find this very troubling, and although my KOS account has not gone on a rouge rampage, I feel a pre-emptive temporary desysop may be in order. ActWonActToo 14:49, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I hate to assume bad faith, but until it actually does go rouge, I have no reason to believe anything is wrong. Others probably have other opinions. --Ali'i 15:00, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

other slight problem here - how do we know you are who you say you are (from a security point of view)? - is it possible for you to email another admin on a known email address as some form of confirmation ? (unless we have a better system set-up). --Fredrick day 15:01, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

<edit conflict twice>

Although troubling I do think we need to ensure you are indeed KnowledgeOfSelf before taking any serious action. For all we know this is someone playing tricks to get the account blocked. Not sure how that may be accomplished though. Nomen Nescio^{Gnothi seauton} 15:02, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Hmm well yes, I would like to make a suggestion, could someone attempt to email KnowledgeOfSelf through the email this user funtion? See if it will go through. If that doesn't work I could always send an email from my email address which is the same as my WP one. ActWonActToo 15:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The account has turned that feature off, so emailing him through the "e-mail this user" interface is of course impossible. If you indeed were an admin you would know that, and not ask people to try it. Shanes 15:13, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Well the editor mentioned in her/his first post that that was the case, so s/he did know it. Anchoress 15:17, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I was hoping that it was a technical blip that was not allowing this account to email my KOS one. There is no reason to be snarky. ActWonActToo 15:16, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Also, I am not a computar wizard, but is it possible to hijack the account while somebody sits at home? Assuming one uses a firewall/spyware and other stuff. Nomen Nescio^{Gnothi seauton} 15:06, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The edits by the ip and the account 'ActWonActTwo' (and the very choice of that particular username) are either incredibly convincing impostering or KOS himself, but though it floats and quacks like KOS, I'd like to be sure.--Alf ^melmac 15:09, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The risk in a pre-emptive desysopping is that we look a bit foolish if it turns out not to be needed. The risk in not doing the desysopping is potentially greater. This is good enough for me. Haukur 15:10, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I've just tried to email the KnowledgeOfSelf account - "This user has not specified a valid e-mail address, or has chosen not to receive e-mail from other users." :s --Alf ^melmac 15:11, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Tough one this one, why wouldn't the account have gone on a rampage already if it was hacked? It sounds like there could be a technical problem with the account, but maybe it would be better to shoot first and ask later - it can always be resysopped. Ryan Postlethwaite 15:13, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The people doing the rampages may have figured out that blocking Jimbo and deleting the mainpage isn't all it's cracked up to be. They may be planning something more sophisticated. Better paranoid and hysteric than sorry - I say someone get onto IRC and contact a steward. Haukur 15:18, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. ActWonActToo 15:15, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Can we use a check user to see if the two accounts are from the same IP, and if another IP has accessed the admin account recently? ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 15:14, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Possibly yes, but it could be a disaster waiting to happen, I suggest if anyone is on IRC getting the stewards to desysop the account temporarily whilst someone here files a cU request. Ryan Postlethwaite 15:17, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't like this one bit. I'm not sure if shooting first and asking questions later is the correct form of action. It's trivial for any banned troll to make a new account claiming that their "old admin account" was hacked, and thus, get a valid admin desysopped for no reason whatsoever. I think this is someone piggybacking off of the admin account hacking scare to cause trouble for the admin that banned them. We already cracked all of the weak passwords yesterday and forced the admins to change them, so I don't think we're at very high risk anymore. --Cyde Weys 15:19, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• <edit conflict>Indeed, the details sound to suspicious to me. Not at all convinced it is not a hoax. Nomen Nescio^{Gnothi seauton} 15:22, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

As I said, the account can always be resysopped, it's not like anything bad has been done from the account yet. Cu will most probably reveal all. Ryan Postlethwaite 15:21, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

If ActWonActToo is a scammer he's a very sophisticated one. Haukur 15:22, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

You think so? I see nothing sophisticated about this at all. It's very basic social engineering. --Cyde Weys 15:23, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

It's academic at this point but, yes, this would have been extremely sophisticated. Look at all of ActWonActToo's contribs and that of the associated IP. Haukur 15:30, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and another thing. During the devs' password cracking yesterday, any admin accounts with weak passwords had their passwords scrambled and instructions on setting a new password emailed to their registered email account. If this person claiming to be KnowledgeOfSelf is really is KnowledgeOfSelf, it's likely that they just lost their admin account, but not due to a hacker — it was because they had a weak password and no registered email address. --Cyde Weys 15:22, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The User:KnowledgeOfSelf account is now uploading Goatse images. See [1] - Ehheh 15:23, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Images deleted, account blocked - is someone on IRC yet? Haukur 15:26, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

It must be desysoped now. I'm telling you that is not me uploading those images. ActWonActToo 15:25, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Get on IRC someone. Ryan Postlethwaite 15:25, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• That answers the question. Nomen Nescio^{Gnothi seauton} 15:26, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • 15:27, 8 May 2007 Drini (Talk | contribs) changed group membership for User:KnowledgeOfSelf@enwiki from sysop to (none) (rogue). --ais523 15:27, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I stand corrected. Ignore everything else I said. --Cyde Weys 15:27, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

desysopped Ryan Postlethwaite 15:28, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Well this turned into a shitty morning. Thanks Drini. ActWonActToo 15:31, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Still curious how an account can be compromised while being logged in at home and presumably using security stuff on the computer. Nomen Nescio^{Gnothi seauton} 15:34, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Being logged in has zero effect on someone logging in as you illicitly (at least on Wikipedia). WP allows multiple logins from multiple machines at the same time, so the first you'd notice is probably when your cookie expires. More than that is probably stuffing beans up my nose.. -- nae'blis 15:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm at work at the moment and won't be able to get onto IRC/Skype for another three hours, I have KOS's skype contact and having had many previous chats with KOS, I will be able to tell if I'm speaking to KnowledgeOfSelf or not, if that helps in getting the account sorted out later on.--Alf ^melmac 15:33, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I guess one question that remains is, What was your password under the KoS account? Was it weak enough to be cracked? --Ali'i 15:34, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Alphanumeric, combination of lower and upper case with 5 numbers thrown in. I thought it was alright. ActWonActToo 15:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Guess there getting better then. Ryan Postlethwaite 15:38, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Assuming it was a good password (and not "Password12345", which meets the specifications he gave), I don't think we're looking at a brute-force crack. There's simply way too many possible passwords. Unfortunately, there's all sorts of attack vectors he could have been hit from. I guess the first question I would ask is, at which other places did you use the same password? --Cyde Weys 15:40, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Is it true that freenode's password database got compromised a while back? I have no source, I just heard it in passing. If the same password is used in both places... ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 15:39, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

No I don't use the same password on IRC, and no Cyde I'm not ignorant enough to do something as obtuse as Password12345. :-) ActWonActToo 15:44, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, and please don't answer that question here anyway. The person has y our password and knowing where else you use it is not a good thing. - auburnpilot talk 15:46, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

This is another very concerning incident. I don't want to speculate over what has caused this but perhaps the wording about password security at Wikipedia:Administrators could be extended to suggest admins use passwords unique to Wikimedia. Adambro 15:53, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

ActWonActToo, if you haven't done it already, I advice you to email a dev a solid proof that you are KOS (or if not applicable, submit a checkuser request). After the confirmation, I'm almost confident you can request them to change your password per choice so at the very least you'll be able to access the account. This might be a slightly more complicated situation than as with other compromised accounts. On a different note, is it possible to have two logged-in sessions at once? It's likely the hacker is still logged-in with this (or another) account waiting to have its adminship status back. Michaelas¹⁰ 16:12, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Logging on on two accounts at once isn't trivial, but it is possible. I've done it with User:ais523 and User:ais523 non-admin trying to answer WP:ACC requests (possibly the only process on Wikipedia that requires non-admins to participate to work properly...) --ais523 16:14, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Checkuser has been done. Drini has confirmed that the account was in fact hijacked and that ActWonActToo is in fact the real KOS. From m:special:log/rights:

• 16:02, 8 May 2007 Drini (Talk | contribs) changed group membership for User:Drini@enwiki from checkuser, sysop to sysop (done)
• 15:33, 8 May 2007 Drini (Talk | contribs) changed group membership for User:Drini@enwiki from sysop to sysop, checkuser (nother hacked account investigation)

—freak(talk) 16:21, May. 8, 2007 (UTC)

All I see is just a "done", not a confirmation. Can she provide us the results here? Is it the same hacker as before? Michaelas¹⁰ 16:34, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Since Drini is not here right now, I just checked and can confirm that. Dmcdevit·t 16:47, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

AWAT, if your KoS password really was nontrivial, can you think of any situations where you used it recently that someone could have snooped on? Of special interest would be if you attended any wiki meetups with others who have been compromised, or anything like that. Given the latency of the net, I would expect a hacker to try the most common passwords against all admin accounts, rather than going in great depth against any one account. So if a decent password was broken it could suggest an attack strategy other than brute force. Dragons flight 16:29, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

All these incidents are getting tiresome... The fact that a fairly strong password was cracked could also imply that someone has been running a script for a very long time and has planned this out. x42bn6 Talk 23:10, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Just a note that I have regained control of the account. [2], [3] KOS | talk 00:46, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Possible causes

Here are the possible causes I can think of:

• World News with Charles Gibson ran a story on how crooks were compromising public terminals like those in airports and internet cafes in order to steal credit card and bank account numbers. Did KnowledgeOfSelf use one, and one of the crooks steal his account in this manner?
• His home or work computer has a rootkit that his security software cannot yet detect. Since it is theoretically possible to write a rootkit that the security software cannot detect while running in the compromised environment, he might have a rootkit on his machine and need to perform a backup, reformat, and reinstall (ugh!), because that is provably the only way to bust a rootkit on an infected machine if it cannot be modified by another OS (like on a live CD, too bad no one makes a live CD that contains an OS that can write NTFS and scan for rootkits).

Jesse Viviano 16:25, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

It does not even need to be something so sophisticated as a root kit. All he needs is a Windows machine infected with some spyware or a virus. Antivirus software and Windows firewall is not some sort of magic bullet. —Centrx→talk • 16:47, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

This is out on a limb, and I'm hoping I'm not contributing to WP:BEANS, but has anyone looked at the scripts (TW, Popups, etc.) that are being used by their admins? Perhaps edits to their monobook.js page (if it can be edited by someone outside of the user...I'm not familiar with the restrictions on the page)? I really doubt this was geographical (hacking of a wireless connection, or shoulder surfing), less likely it was malware. Any possibilities it may be issues with these? ^{Review Me}CASCADIA^Howl/_Trail 17:42, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I would not worry about beans, none of this is novel mischief, but standard hacking tricks. These sorts of practices are already well established amongst the black hats. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 17:52, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I think only the 'owner' or admins can edit a user's personal monobook.js page. They could be including a script from another page, but all such pages should be protected. 131.111.195.8 18:15, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lyme disease military history

I don't know if this is appropriate to report, but Freyfaxi (talk · contribs) keeps removing tags from this article without fixing it. He's doing so with this account and with 69.120.212.35 (talk · contribs). I wanreed him at his IP, so he switched to his account. The Evil Spartan 18:12, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• Starts "A history of Lyme Disease and its discovery in Old Lyme would be incomplete without noting Borrelia's decades long association with biowarfare research..." which does not exactly read like an encycloapedia. Guy (Help!) 21:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
• See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lyme disease military history. --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 14:39, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Justin craig

I came across the page Justin craig and although it looks to me like an obvious candidate for speedy deletion I am not sure what cireteria it would fall under. I strongly suspect the contention that he is a "gay American" who intends to marry his boyfriend is intended to disparage, although of course the assertion in itself is not disparaging. Perhaps a more experienced editor could take a quick look? Thank you. Hobson 21:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Attack pages are WP:CSD#G8 and non-notable is WP:CSD#A7. Check out Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion for all of them. John Reaves (talk) 21:08, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

G10, actually. G8 are talk pages of nonexistent articles. Natalie 14:59, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] IP "Sockpuppets" by user Zubenzenubi

I'm wondering how the policies view this. A user Zubenzenubi (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) is repeatedly making comments (and now personal attacks) using an IP address instead of logging in. Obviously there's no requirement that a user log in to make edits, but what about when they don't log in to try to tilt consensus or avoid accountability for personal attacks? Paul Cyr 00:58, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

As you did not list any diffs here I have to ask ... how do you know they are from the same user? --Kralizec! (talk) 06:54, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

During a bit of a content war, the Zubenzenubi and this IP were the only ones ones reverting to include disputed content, with both of them acting within minutes of any content changes against what they wanted, using similar edit summaries.

22:24, 21 April 2007 Addition of Dell issue by User:194.46.224.144

10:43, 23 April 2007 Zubenzenubi reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "rv of unexplained deletion"

14:28, 23 April 2007 194.46.255.195 reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "Re-inserted item that is cited factual to restore balance + copyedit"

19:13, 23 April 2007 Zubenzenubi reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "OEM revolt"

00:01, 24 April 2007 Zubenzenubi reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "rv to reflect reality"

01:04, 24 April 2007 Zubenzenubi reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "Undid revision 125349111 by Paul Cyr (talk) No rationale for deletion provided"

10:47, 26 April 2007 194.46.173.27 reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "Unwarranted edits and rermoval of cited fact reverted"

12:21, 29 April 2007 194.46.162.103 reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "OEM disquiet reinserted"

22:14, 29 April 2007 Zubenzenubi reverts removal of Dell issue with summary "Undid revision 126842675 by Beetstra (talk)Reversion of well cited information"

20:11, 8 May 2007 194.46.233.166 makes a personal attack on me.

Paul Cyr 13:37, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Request review of block placed on User:EnviroGranny

I'm not a "friend" of EnviroGranny but I have been involved in one of the disputes that probably led up to his block.

As I explained to User:JzG in this comment, the user in question probably deserved blocking but the warning that was given was a bit flawed in the drollness of its tone. When giving warnings, I don't think humor is always helpful, especially humor that may not be as obvious as it looks. Furthermore, there is an appearance of conflict of interest which, although probably just an apparent COI rather than a real one, should not have been mentioned in the warning.

I would request that someone review the edits that led up to the block

Starting with the original warning [4], and then the user's repeatedly not understanding what was being communicated [5], [6] and followed by JzG not explaining to the dense user what was really going on but imposing a block instead [7]

Now, the truth is User:EnviroGuy is a bit too puffed up and self-important and probably needs a little smacking around to put him in his place. However, it should be done gently but firmly and with decorum rather than with this cute little semi-warning with the faint hint of COI followed by a block when the user doesn't get it. We can block this user again if he doesn't get the lesson but I think, in the interest of being above reproach, an admin should remove the block and leave a real warning.

In the interest of full disclosure, this comment [8] by EnviroGranny is not encouraging.

Still, in the interest of observing WP:BITE, I think we should lift the block and give the guy one more chance.

--Richard 04:50, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Really bad handling of administrator duties here, which surprises me since I usually find JzG to be one of the better admins. Edit summaries like "idiot" and comments such as "My God, you really are stupid, aren't you" [9] are entirely unacceptable for a admin regardless of the actions by a user.--Jersey Devil 05:57, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps there are extenuating circumstances we have not located yet ... ? --Kralizec! (talk) 06:41, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

He behaved like an arse, and when told he'd behaved like an arse and to stop doing it, he did precisely the same thing. What exactly does he expect? I told him to stop threatening people to keep off his Talk page, I did it in a light-earted but firm manner, and his response was to tell me to keep off his Talk page. Since the major problem appears to be WP:OWNership elsewhere, this is a clear sign he is not getting the message. It's about time he did get the message. And I won't stand for rudeness to William, either, because if there's one editors whose patience in the face of crass idiocy can be relied on absolutely, then William is that editor. As the complainant notes, Envirogranny needs sorting out. Use different humour, use a different method, but sort it out. Guy (Help!) 06:44, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict with Guy) I probably deserve some of the blame here. Although I think Guy's comments were technically accurate, I do agree they could have been more politic. I came across EnviroGranny answering a WP:3O request. His behavior was... difficult, I think it's fair to say, and I found him making apparently baseless accusations, including accusing a good-faith editor of vandalism [10] and accusing me of bias [11], apparently for asking him to consider withdrawing his request for a third opinion until he had first talked to the user in question. [12] He then graduated to demanding people not post on his talk page and threatening to report users for it. [13] [14] [15] Looking at his editing history, his start at Wikipedia seemed unusually skilled [16], and I wondered if he might have had a previous incarnation. Knowing that Guy has a lot of experience in this area, I asked him privately if he happened to recognize the user. It escalated from there, with unfortunate accusations from EnviroGranny. Having already asked EnviroGranny to consider whether he was well outside our norms, and seeing his behavior on Talk:Sprite (lightning), I do think some official sanction was in the cards eventually, and I hope that EnviroGranny will take this opportunity to mend his ways. William Pietri 07:13, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

The problem I see with Guy's warning is that it is clearly written in the tone of someone expecting the disruptive editing of EnviroGranny to continue. Such a statement was bound to produce more disruptive editing from EnviroGranny, not less - it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. It wasn't exactly civil, either. I know Guy has a lot of experience but it brings to mind the old saying "If the only tool you've got is a hammer, every problem begins to look like a nail". A politer approach may not have had a more productive outcome but it ought at least to have been tried. Sam Blacketer 09:01, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Polite had been tried and failed, and this is not, I think, a newbie. The user is clue-deficient. Hence the cluebat. Guy (Help!) 10:21, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

That isn't a good interpretation of civility. If you were going to block him anyway, why give a 'warning' in terms which could only provoke more disruption? Sam Blacketer 11:07, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think JzG's comments were any harsher than the persistent near-trolling EnviroGranny was doing, and I think WIlliam Pietri's right, EG's third edit was to Jimbo's page discussing Wikipolicy type stuff. He knew where to go right away, two months ago. Could JzG have been nicer? Yes. Should he have been? Perhaps. Would it have changed the outcome in any way? I doubt it, based on the edits shown here. ThuranX 11:49, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Your statement that JzG was comparable to EnviroGranny is a dangerous one. JzG is an admin and the public face of the Wikipedia community with a responsibility to uphold good standards of behaviour. EnviroGranny was being a disruptive editor and has since been blocked. Admins should show disruptive users the way to work constructively, not join them in a parade of incivility and insult. Sam Blacketer 12:05, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Sometimes admins should cut the crap and wield the WP:TROUT. This was one of those occasions. The user had escalated a silly dispute beyond all rationality. Guy (Help!) 12:27, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

This whole problem can be delt with very easily, Admins can learn to do the following;

1)Be Civil (no trouts, banhammers or cluebats).

2)Explain in simple terms what a warning or block is about (this is not just posting a link to a policy but saying which part of the policy has been broken).

3)Understand they are not better than normal editors and the extra powers the community has handed the come with the effect of as Sam Blacketer says of being the "public face of the Wikipedia community". Hypnosadist 15:30, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] May 10

On the page for May 10, under the heading "Events", Tony Blair's resignation is listed for 2007 - I know this is supposed to be announced this week but as it is for tomorrow I'm not sure if it's vandalism or not. Nobody knows if he's going to resign tomorrow, as far as I know.

Slowapocalypse 08:53, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Tony Blair did say last week that he would 'make a statement about his future' or some such wording, but didn't (of course) say exactly what that statement was. I don't think this is vandalism but it is crystal ballgazing of a sort. Sam Blacketer 08:55, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Ask for a reliable source. There is none as far as I know. Guy (Help!) 10:20, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

As this is now mentioned in the current events section of Wikipedia that he has announced his resignation and is covered by all major newspapers, sources should not be too difficult to find. Lemon martini 12:35, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Malamockq

Yesterday I was continually pestered by User:Malamockq for reverting his deletion of comments at the Wikiproject Dragon Ball talk page. His grounds for the deletion was that the comments were trollish and not following WP:CIVIL. So he deletes the comments and posts a notice on the user whos comments he deleted (Dark Dragon Flame) and told him he could respond in a more civil manner. When I reverted this deletion, Malamockq went to my talk page and started posting messages like please be civil and such. Of course Dark Dragon Flames comments were not exactally polite but the fact that Malamockq was trying to revive the article for a charecter in a manga that appeared for 2 chapters and after the 100th time or so of a user trying to do this, Dark Dragon Flame like the rest of us at the project were tired. Next malamockq posted a message on my talk page with the header "please do not be helpful". Can you guys warn this guy about going to people's talk pages just to troll? DBZROCKS 12:06, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

See WP:DR as instructed to at the top of this page. Paul Cyr 14:00, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] St. Paul's College, Sydney

A previous vandal is in full flood vandalising this article now. Please block him and semiprotect the article to allow a cleanup. He is also at work on St Andrew's College, Sydney adding speedy deletion tags. It looks as if he upset that he has been described as a sockpuppet. He is User:129.78.64.102. I'm off to bed. --Bduke 13:19, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

See WP:AIV and WP:RFPP (as you were directed to at the top of this page). Paul Cyr 13:58, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Very quick one - block sockpuppet confirmed by checkuser

Hello. Sunger (talk · contribs) was confirmed by checkuser to be a sockpuppet of the ArbCom-banned user Billy Ego (talk · contribs). Would someone mind blocking him? Thanks. MastCell ^Talk 16:03, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Done. Kafziel ^Talk 16:07, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

If Billy Ego has been evading his ban, it (and the accompanying block) should be reset, correct? I'd do it myself, but I'm on a public computer and would rather not access my admin account for now. Heimstern:Away (talk) 18:29, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Account hijacking

I have come back from my wikibreak, after my original account AndyZ (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves • rights) was blocked. Someone told me about this today. This is my new account, and the password is secure enough to prevent a repeat of the horrific hijack.

Is it at all possible to allow me to have admin status on this account.

Thanks, guys for your work. --Speakmans Hour 22:32, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

(ec)How do we know you are the same person? ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 22:36, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

I am doubtful that this will be done at all, especially without proof that you are who you say you are. I know of many who are pretty upset with you have (and have lossed their trust in you) by that neglectful mistake. This would need more discussion and a proof of you being AndyZ first. Cbrown1023 talk 22:35, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Check User will not be possible. So, no matter what, even if you are who you claim to be, you're kinda screwed. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 22:37, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

I was going to recommend checkuser, why not? ST47Talk 22:40, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Odds of this actually being AndyZ ... roughly 10%. Sorry, but we don't just hand out admin accounts to anyone claiming to be a former admin. --Cyde Weys 22:38, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

As it is, he'd left: why would he want it back now suddenly? Majorly (hot!) 22:45, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Agree with Cyde. This brings about the issue that there is no official system in place to identify admins. The current situation seems to dictate that there should be one. A discussion should be initiated on this. hombre de haha 22:46, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

If AndyZ had enabled email then he would have been able to reset his password and post a notice on his talk page identifying his new account. Unfortunately, he didn't do so. -Will Beback · † · 22:47, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

That wouldn't do. Surely the hijacker could have changed the email... WjBscribe 22:48, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Good point. -Will Beback · † · 22:57, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Arr, how so? Biometric identification? Phone number storage? I suppose e-mail authentication would work, but then you have the possibility that someone has the same password there. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 22:48, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

How does one identify who you say you are "in real life". Generally through the use of Identification numbers that correlate to that person's account. Whatever the IT synonym to that is should be thought about. Or just make admins install really awesome thumbscanners on their computer before they log in :D

Of course, if these people and others that are put in the same situation are expendable, and should be punished for their carelessness, then we should just act like we don't need a way to identify admins. "Adminship is no big deal." hombre de haha 23:09, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

roffle, this reminds me of the time that someone registered the account Rick Kerrigan or something, claiming to be RickK, and asked for his sysop bit back. It didn't fly because users pointed out that RickK never gave up his sysop powers. Ah, here we go: From ANI on BJAODN. hbdragon88 22:49, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

"AGF is not a suicide pact. --Deathphoenix ʕ 15:30, 29 July 2006 (UTC)" That is applicable in so many ways to so many things. Nice link. Teke 00:04, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Strange. It seems that someone removed it, because I Googled the exact term and I didn't see it in an ANI archive. Fortunately it still lives on in BJADON. hbdragon88 00:43, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

This problem makes for a good argument that we need more Wikimeetups. Meet each other in real life, get to know each other, trade phone numbers -- or at least email addresses. I happen to know (I'm guessing) several dozen Wikipedians well enough (unfortunately, none of those who had acompromised account) that if one had their account compromised, I'd be able to vouch that they are who they claim to be -- & hopefully vice versa. -- llywrch 23:42, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Not to mention keysignings -- Avi 23:49, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Wouldn't it make more sense for hiim to log onto the AndyZ account to apologize and request an unblock? That's what I'd do, if my account were hijacked. And then I'd change my password. Instead of "password," I'd make it "drowssap." -FisherQueen (Talk) 00:07, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, Mark, as a secruity measure, logged into the compromised account and changed both the password and the email.[17] Zzyzx11 (Talk) 00:18, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Note that AZPR (talk · contribs) appears to be a long time semi-bot account operated by AndyZ, and AZPR is now requesting that AndyZ be unblocked. That would convince me, unless the password to User:AZPR was also "password". User:Mark knows what AndyZ's original e-mail was before he blanked it, so I guess Mark will ultimately know whether or not to unblock. Thatcher131 00:55, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately (as I noted on my talk page), my password was password too. (The idea behind my login was that I could show that I am aware of my activities before I took my wikibreak) I did e-mail Mark though, so hopefully he can clear up the entire situation. Oh and btw, I just happened to notice the post that started this thread - that is NOT me. APR _t 01:29, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, that's really bad that we have 2 users claiming to be AndyZ, does anyone know AndyZ by email so we could get clarification of which account is his? Ryan Postlethwaite 01:32, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I've blocked User:Speakmans Hour as an imposter account, there were only 2 edits, it seams clear they were only after the admin bit. Ryan Postlethwaite 01:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

(Its fairly obvious that the aforementioned user is making false claims, his contribution list is 2 edits Edit conflict: thanks Ryan) I have e-mailed Mark. I would e-mail someone else who e-mailed me before, but that leaves User:Bobblewik (emailed regarding his date/unit fixing scripts as an inclusion in the PR one) who has left and a bunch of trolls (like User:Titanicprincess, User:Rptng03509345) who send e-mails around regarding some evil admins. APR _t 01:40, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, this is where other people need to weigh in, Andy - I didn't know you before (sorry), but you've got to understand the trust that has been lost with your account being compromised - it's not we don't trust the original user, it's the fact that we don't know who is actually attempting to use the account now, or want's to be known as the user formally known as andyZ, I haven't got any suggestions. Ryan Postlethwaite 01:47, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, at least you had a second account known to be yours. That would be a good countermeasure for hijacking, although I would prefer keysigning. -- ReyBrujo 01:46, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I would have to agree completely with Ryan, but also we're discussing reinstating a user (hopefully not also resysoping) that used the word "password" as their, well, password. ^{Review Me}CASCADIA^Howl/_Trail 01:52, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

So? People screw up royally, and you're talking about having "password" as a password as if it were a crime. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 02:28, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

WP:BOT policy saved me here :). APR _t 01:52, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I realize that, and I would go thru the same exact steps as you have if I were dealing with someone who returns right after his account was hacked for vandalizing the main page. I don't mind at all the suspicion; I probably would be suspicious myself if this had happened to someone else. Thanks a lot for your understanding, APR _t 01:52, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Suspicion? Lets see if I can overdo it. Isn’t it ironic that AZPR is a quite famous piece of password recovery software from ElcomSoft? --Van helsing 09:20, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User verification

One problem is to get some verification of a person's identity, such as for restoring control of a username. What permissions should be given that user is a different problem. For users whose identity is unknown, there may be some information which could be used for verification within their Wikipedia contributions. For example, if they've used some obscure books for sources and they still have those books they can at least verify that they are a person who does have those books. They can quickly look up any desired section of a book, and others can verify the information (even if it takes others a while to get a copy of the book, the quick reply to a challenge helps verify access to the source). (SEWilco 05:24, 8 May 2007 (UTC))

Once again, an argument for setting up something like a web or wiki of trust. -- Avi 15:46, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Rather than books as a source, I would suggest uploading own-work images of similar topics to images uploaded by the user before and where the metadata can be verified as being same camera, same date, ... Eg if you have provided an image of a place, you possibly have available more images of that place that you haven't uploaded.--Golden Wattle ^talk 01:24, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I suggest full body shots. Men need to scrawl "Wikipedia Rules" across the chest in Sharpie.--293.xx.xxx.xx 08:24, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Now, exactly how do you verify that my photos were all shot on this Edixa of mine? Compare the dimness of the picture at various points? Employ some other advanced photoforensics? This thing doesn't exactly leave a ton of metadata leaving around, being 1960s camera technology - not getting exact exposure date/time and shutter/f-stop values kind of sucks, but since the thing works perfectly, I don't see a reason to switch =) Plus, we all know how EXIF data is extremely infallible and almost impossible to falsify, right? --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 23:48, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mr strike my leg stop i dont like fly (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log)

This is new to me. User creates account to hand out barnstars with no previous contact with the recipients.[18] Also has been warned for other vandalistic edits. [19] User:ZeroTheLoser seems to be the focus of User:Mr strike my leg stop i dont like fly's obvious vandalism. Timeline of events:

(13:24, 7 May 2007) New user account created.

(13:27, 7 May 2007) Within first 3 minutes of account creation 4 unabashed acts of vandalism.

(20:36, 7 May 2007) Three hours go by (must of been nap time) and the unusual handing out of barnstars begin.

(21:34, 7 May 2007) Tops off the barnstar handing out by awarding the user page they vandalized first with a barnstar.

Strange. --Knowpedia 03:46, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Also note that the signature displays his name as "Can't we hate our allies and love our enemies". Definitely someone who knows his way around WP. --Masamage ♫ 04:09, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I got one, and was very leary. I thought it was a joke, or a poke. I need a lot of info to take things for granted. LOL. I do think it's mean though, for those who believe this is legit for Wikipedia. - Jeeny ^Talk 04:12, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I thought it was was very odd as well... at first I thought it was legit, then I looked at his edit history... and he's handing out the same exact one to many other people. ^{Review Me}CASCADIA^Howl/_Trail 04:17, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

It was weird, I guess. The random awarding is maybe a form of vandalism, but since it's all on talk pages anyway I would say it's pretty harmless. - Rainwarrior 04:24, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Barnstar flooding is an uncommon form of vandalism, but I've seen it before. Usually it's ten or twenty barnstars per person, instead of just one. It's still a vandal-only account imo. Anybody object to an indef block? ··coelacan 04:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I have mixed feelings about a indef block. I do think it's semi-harmless, to a degree though. It is a hoax, in a way, so in that respect, not cool at all. Perhaps blocking the user name, and not an IP, since it just seems to be on user talk pages? Lets keep this open for a while, so others have time to comment. Some may be in bed, at work, out, etc. JMHO. Thanks. - Jeeny ^Talk 04:48, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd say give the guy a fair warning, first, that the semi-random barnstarring is kind of weird and that he should stop. Don't ban him unless he fails to comply. --Masamage ♫ 04:59, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I also just noticed user has edit summary for all 31 edits, this is not common for a new user but most established user will not press "save page" without the edit summary. Noted the edit summary for my barnstar is different from the rest... weird!--Knowpedia 05:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

If this person's not going to use the account for anything but awarding, then it's pointless to let him continue this weirdness. Wikipedians are here to improve the articles, not to give random awards. 夢の騎士^{Yume no Kishi - Talk}

I agree with the block here. This user reminds me too much of Buenoma (talk · contribs) and Payple (talk · contribs), both of whom I blocked for the same thing (well, they were actually the same user). --Coredesat 09:32, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

It was a silly award. I don't know why he gave it out? Any action (or non-action) is fine by me. I feel so unspecial now =/ --ZayZayEM 09:36, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I dont think he should be blocked just tell him what hes doing wrong and if he continues then take action mabye ♥Eternal Pink-Ready to fight for love and grace♥ 10:02, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure what I did to get targetted, but I am curious about what to do with a barnstar it appears I haven't earned. If all of his edits are barnstars, I can see a reason for banning him, though someone needs to talk to him first. Rebochan 17:26, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• Noted user is apologetic for handing out the Barnstars and has asked for forgiveness. [20] --Knowpedia 17:58, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

hes apoligised in a wired third persion way saying we insted of I is that of any importance 81.145.242.43 20:18, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, reminds me of meta:role account behaviour. We block on sight if any account claims to be operated by more than one person. ~Crazytales 12:19, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

should we ask him?? he might just have a weird speach patten or they might be 5 guys using it ♥Eternal Pink-Ready to fight for love and grace♥ 16:38, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Strangely enough it reminds me of a IP-hopping death-threat vandal[21] with an interest in Chaos (Sailor Moon) manga[22], blanking[23] and redirecting[24] pages, random barnstars[25], bad grammar, and with an IP of 81.145.* However this is probably a coincidence so I'm willing to assume good faith at this time. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 17:20, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I had the same thought. --Masamage ♫ 17:24, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] block review, personal attacks, 31 hours

Meet Prester John. You may remember him from such threads as #Incivility, possible baiting at User talk:Kirbytime, and his eponymous debut, #User:Prester John.

He and I were discussing some T1 userboxes and the possibility of taking his "Allah is Satan" show on the road, at User talk:Prester John#"God" in Muslim articles, when he popped in here at ANI to call for Kirbytime's blocking.

Fine and good, and I support the 1 week block. Prestor John said of Kirbytime's "Piss Christ" comment: "A greater attempt to offend a class of people I have not encountered." I'm a bit surprised by that, since Prestor John baited Kirbytime, then noted that the comment, directed at him, was rather off-target, and collected it for posterity. But hey, we all handle stress differently.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I noticed that only a half hour before demanding Kirbytime's block, Prestor John was making his own personal attacks, calling other editors "leftist scum". A few quick Ctrl-F perusals of his talk page for "personal attack", "npa", and "civil" are quite revealing; he's well aware of the policies, but ignores them.

I feel that this is part of a pattern of disruption along with his insistence on maintaining an inflammatory userpage and his "Allah is Satan" campaign, and that this disruption needs to be brought to some kind of halt, albeit temporarily. I have made a 31 hour block and request that other admins review it. ··coelacan 09:06, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I found the block acceptable under the circumstances, Prestor John is aware of the policies on civility,NPA etc as they are all linked from his user page. Gnangarra 09:25, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I endorse this block and the justification. -- mattb 12:03, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Not an admin, but it seems reasonable to me. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 13:43, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Support block. Prester John (talk · contribs) stating this about any other user is one of the most flagrant WP:KETTLE situations I've seen in a while.--Isotope23 19:48, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Support, but i'm no admin. ThuranX 20:38, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Strong support. Besides these personal attacks, of which I was not aware, he has been warned several times not to add inflammatory userspace content, but has persisted nevertheless. If he objects to the translation of Arabic "Allah" as "God," I and the MOS strongly disagree, but that is one thing; announcing from his userpage "Allah is Satan" quite another.

It is long past time to put these userspace games to an end.Proabivouac 21:16, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Good block. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 21:18, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Support, though 31 hours is far too lenient. Raymond Arritt 21:23, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

My good faith unprotection of his userpage was rewarded by this, this and this. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 00:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Open informal complaint about misuse of administrative powers

DragonflySixtyseven indefinitely blocked (including username creation) my account without warning after I posted this and then this comment to the deletion review of <the number we are not allowed to utter on Wikipedia>. Despite clear Wikipedia policy stating single-purpose accounts are not forbidden, the sole reason for the block given at the time was:

single-purpose account that has served its single purpose

The blocking admin used this same reason to block at least 3 other accounts at around the same time. DS (DragonflySixtyseven's nickname for his account) went on to post to the same deletion review this and then this. No one, of course, blocked DS. I posted an unblock request with reason:

I do not believe I have done anything inappropriate to warrant the block placed on my editing privileges. My edits have been made in good faith and represent a legitimate attempt to communicate my opinion on the titular subject of an article that I feel is important to Wikipedia. I believe the blocking admin has incorrectly and without reason assumed bad faith on my part.

Yamla acted as the reviewer for my unblock request and denied it stating only:

User clearly acting in bad faith.

Without any reason given as to why Yamla had concluded bad faith on my part, I asked on my talk page why Yamla believed this and expressed that I was frustrated with both administrators for appearing to assume bad faith on part. Yamla responded on my talk page:

AmendmentNumberOne, your apparently deliberate attempt to get Wikipedia sued by posting information you know will cause the MPAA to target us is a clear indication that you have no business being allowed to edit here.

I explained to Yamla that he or she was mistaken, that I had not posted any such information, and expressed my frustration at the continued assumption of bad faith and new false allegations. In my response, I quote what Yamla had said to another editor on their talk page, JNighthawk's, about what I had done. The claim Yamla made that I had been "posting the HDDVD/Blu-ray DVD decryption key number" is patently false. DS made similar false claims:

That user was banned for making a lot of (now-deleted) articles containing the HDDVD string, and for tantrumming about how Digg was being an Evil Awful Censor.

Both claims are false. And then:

Deleted articles don't show up in the contributions log. More to the point, I freely admit that I may have misspoken as to the precise nature of the infraction, but he showed up with a Frea-Speach (sic) name and immediately started fussing about in the HD-DVD Decoder String Deletion Review. A single-purpose account if I ever saw one, and I've damn well seen lots of them.

So it appears to me I was blocked by DS for what I wrote in the deletion review, in contravention of explicit Wikipedia policy:

Administrators must not block users with whom they are engaged in a content dispute.

Despite my desire not to have an email account in order to be allowed to edit on Wikipedia, I read through the various policies and guidelines and concluded the only course of action left to me in order to be able to edit on Wikipedia involved setting an email account in my preferences. I sent DS an email yesterday and he now has unblocked my account. But DS still has not explained his actions (his unblock comment was: "==Meh== Whatever. I'm too nice sometimes. You're unblocked. Don't screw up." and he has not sent me any email reply.) At least with respect to Wikipedia policy, I do not know why he blocked me without warning and indefinitely after I posted my opinion to that deletion review. Not knowing what my "mistake" was, I feel incredibly uncomfortable asking DS directly at this point. He could just re-block me again. So I am bringing this matter to the administrator noticeboard. This is a complaint about DragonflySixtyseven's misuse of administrative powers in blocking my account as outlined above. I also believe a misuse of administrative powers occurred when Yamla declined my unblock request without having a reason supported by evidence nor Wikipedia policy to continue the block. -AmendmentNumberOne 01:00, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I do not believe it is contrary to Wikipedia policy to deny a block request if you believe the person should not be unblocked. The account seemed to be a SPA and so far, the only contributions from this account are in relation to that number. If I am not permitted to decline unblocks if I agree with the blocking admin, though, please do let me know. I'm a frequent reviewer on unblock-en-l and monitor the unblock category so I am likely to decline quite a number of unblocks in the future. Obviously, I also unblock quite a number of people. --Yamla 01:15, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

For a block, you must have a reason supported by evidence. The reason must be founded in Wikipedia policy and the evidence must exist. When reviewing an unblock request, agreeing with the blocking admin is not enough. You must agree with the blocking admin's reason because Wikipedia policy and actual evidence supports it. And you also must take care that the editor being blocked has been notified of the actual conduct that resulted in the block. You cannot keep this information from the editor being blocked.

And note that you should not approve a block over a content dispute. Posting the number to an article about the number is a content dispute. Posting the number to a deletion review of speedy delete of the same article is a content dispute. Since I did neither, and instead posted my opinion to the deletion review that the article should be kept, your denial of the unblock review was truly in error. -AmendmentNumberOne 12:29, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Note also that this user has, deliberately or not, posted that number as an examination of his contribution log clearly shows. --Yamla 01:16, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Unblocked by the blocking admin. Chick Bowen 01:21, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Chick Bowen, this matter is most certainly not resolved. Unblocking me does not do anything to prevent arbitrary blocks like this from occurring in the future. It also does not address my complaint that this block was performed in an unfair manner in violation of clear Wikipedia policy. Please remove the 'resolved' tag from this discussion. -AmendmentNumberOne 01:27, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, we need blood, blooooood! Is that an accurate assessment, ANO? - CHAIRBOY (☎) 01:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

No apology was given for what was, as far as I, a neutral third-party, can see, a block based on a content dispute. Blood is not necessary, but DS acting as if he is doing AmendmentNumberOne a favor by unblocking him is insulting. - JNighthawk 01:38, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

The block was not arbitrary, it was deserved. That number can get us in a lot of trouble we dont need. You were unblocked, so go contribute the the encyclopedia to show you deserved it instead of making a fool of yourself on AN/I. -M^ask? 01:34, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I also agree that this is not resolved. The reason given for blocking was invalid, and the reason given for denying his unblock request is demonstrably false, as I don't believe he was "clearly acting in bad faith." Also, posting of the AACS number does not violate any current wiki-policy, and Jimbo has said himself that there is the Foundation currently has no opinion on posting of the number. From what I, a lowly non-admin editor, can see from his contribution log, he had done nothing wrong and was banned for being involved in a content dispute, which is thoroughly against wiki-policy. - JNighthawk 01:35, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

In accordance with AmendmentNumberOne's statement, I've removed the Resolved tag, as the issue is still open. - JNighthawk 01:38, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

A few thoughts. With regard to Yamla's concern that the contributions of User:AmendmentNumberOne reveal that he posted "the number" ... the article title, which in this case was "the number," was the title of the DRV section relating to that (former) article. It automatically appeared as part of the edit summary without the user's having had anything to say about it or probably having even noticed. Frankly, we all should have realized that this would be the effect of not changing or redacting the title soon enough, but that cannot be blamed on this user, or on any other user who participated in the DRV.

I happen to strongly disagree with User:AmendmentNumberOne regarding the merits of the underlying issue. I also am not convinced that this DMCA dispute raises a viable First Amendment claim (and certainly not a claim against Wikipedia, which is a purely private and non-governmental entity). However, if this user is correct that he never created an article relating to the number and that his account was used solely to comment in the DRV, then while I disagree with the content of the user's comments, and I generally deprecate SPAs that take overly strident positions, it is not at all clear to me that this was a strong block.

Having said that, I understand the reasons the block was implemented and I hope that User:AmendmentNumberOne can as well. The amount of spam posted and the number of SPA accounts created that day regarding "the number" left us inundated and the people, including DragonflySixtySeven, who did have concerns had to react very quickly. I hope that User:AmendmentNumberOne can understand that these were good-faith concerns even if he did not or does not personally agree with them, and would join in urging him to accept that he has made his point and ought now to drop the matter and begin to contribute to the encyclopedic content of Wikipedia.

In response to Yamla's earlier comment, he is to be commended for taking a leading role in acting as a previously uninvolved administrator reviewing a large number of unblock requests, both those posted on-wiki and on the mailing list. Needless to say, upholding as well as reversing a block are appropriate actions depending on the reviewing admin's evaluation. Any criticism that may come along of an individual block/unblock decision is like comments that we all receive on any of our administrator actions—as long as it's kept civil and reasonable, just part of the job description sometimes. Newyorkbrad 01:39, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Quite correct there, and I hope AmendmentNumberOne will accept that even if there were a misunderstanding here, it was a legitimate one. We had a ton of spam problems with that thing.

Now, this being said. Where do we review a Deletion Review? (Deletion Review Review?) While at the time bainer's close may have seemed appropriate, the Foundation and Jimbo have pretty thoroughly indicated that whether or not to use the number is up to each individual project. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 01:49, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Newyorkbrad, please explain to me what I did to warrant the block by DS and on what basis Yamla, an experienced administrator, could conclude "User clearly acting in bad faith." -AmendmentNumberOne 02:33, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Maybe my attempt at diplomatic phrasing here was a little bit too subtle. In case anyone else was confused, "not at all clear to me that this was a strong block" = "unless there is something that I am not aware of, disagree with the block." Newyorkbrad 13:47, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Seraphimblade, while I would like to conclude this was a legitimate misunderstanding, I do not think this was so. The blocking admin was contacted after the block and notified he had made a mistake and still persisted in making multiple false claims, claims he has not yet fully disclaimed, and did not lift the block until I sent an e-mail to him to either explain himself or unblock me. He took the easy way out (in my opinion) but that still does not explain how this block happened. The evidence shows that I posted an opinion to the deletion review (I agree it was closed inappropriately) and shortly thereafter an administrator with a different opinion indefinitely blocked my account without warning. -AmendmentNumberOne 02:33, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• I concede that I acted in haste, and thence in error. We were dealing with a flood of spam, and I made a snap judgement. I regret the inconvenience, and I apologize for the hurt feelings that clearly were caused by my actions; however, I will not be committing hara-kiri, nor will I be ceding my administrator privileges. DS 02:39, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

No one is asking you to cede your administrative privileges, although I do not think you are in a position to decide whether you retain them. While an error in judgement at the outset could be accepted, you were unwilling to entertain this possibility for me or yourself during the incident. Instead you continued the conversation by making up stuff about what I did. It is hard to imagine why you did not carefully consider what you did after you were asked this:

Hi. Would you mind explaining how that user was acting in bad faith and deserved a permanent ban? His contributions only show what appear to be good faith edits. Agree or disagree with his argument, it is not a reason for banning, especially with no warning and no reason. I believe he was unjustly banned.

Worse, when you realized that you "may have misspoken as to the precise nature of the infraction" instead of carefully examining the matter, you denigated my username, admitted my posting to the deletion review motivated you, and procedeed to repeat your initial faulty reasoning for permanently blocking my account without warning. At this point, you knew exactly what my edits were. You had just referenced them. I really cannot accept your apology when you wish to absolve yourself simply by saying you acted in haste. You did not act in haste. You knew what my edits were. -AmendmentNumberOne 05:30, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

This was a perfectly proper block. Your username indicates that you may not have understood that Wikipedia is not free speech (free as in beer, yes, but not free as in speech), the issue is highly contentious and this account seems to have been registered solely with the purpose of contributing to that deletion review, displaying in the process a knowledge of Wikipedia procedures and working that is incompatible with the good-faith assumption of a genuine newbie. Read: sockpuppet. Frankly, since all you've done since is troll, I think the block should be reinstated and you can go back to your main account. Guy (Help!) 06:50, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Threatening to re-block me for bringing my complaint about DragonflySixtyseven's arbitrary block to the Administrators' noticeboard is highly inappropriate. Calling me names is likewise. The good faith assumption applies to all users. You cannot disregard WP:FAITH because you do not like the edits of a particular user. You cannot disregard WP:FAITH because the editor takes the time to inform themselves during an indefinite block incident about Wikipedia policy. You cannot disregard WP:FAITH because you suspect something about an editor without evidence. Blocking policy is very clear: "Administrators must not block users with whom they are engaged in a content dispute." 'Must not' is very strong phrasing. Provided the policy is respected and not arbitrarily ignored, actual limits do exist to the exercise of administrative privileges for the good of Wikipedia. -AmendmentNumberOne 11:46, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

You've described the concerns you had, and received an apology. In an attempt to avoid churn (basically, when a conversation degrades to the point where folks are just talking about the same thing over and over again), I'd like to know if there's anything else you're looking for at this point. Where would you like this discussion to go from here? - CHAIRBOY (☎) 15:12, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Are you joking, JzG?! Whether that is his main account or not, his knowledge of Wikipedia procedures should be commended, not scorned. Likewise, calling it trolling to bring inappropriate admin action to light is unbelievable. Gotta watch out for each other, eh, JzG? Either way, DS has given an apology and AmendmentNumberOne has been unblocked. As far as the individual level is concerned, I think that's about what's required, unless AmendmentNumberOne is looking to go higher level with policy changes. - JNighthawk 14:00, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Blocked, again

I have blocked AmendmentNumberOne indefinitely for not contributing at all to the encyclopedia portion of the project. He was never here to write articles, from what I see in his contributions, and in the two days that he was unblocked, he solely editted here and on his talk page.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 23:46, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I go for months without editing, is it time to ban me? This whole thing is a fucking joke. Boy am I glad there's admin oversight here on Wikipedia. What? There isn't? Oh, well. Carry on, then, abusing your powers. The admins in this case have broken WP:AGF, along with nearly everything Wikipedia stands for. An open encyclopedia means that you are going to run into areas where you disagree with other editors. Learn to deal with it, rather than banning them. Ryulong, you have violated the banning policy. I'm notifying you that I plan to file an RfA about this incident. - JNighthawk 03:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

First of all, you have editted articles. AmendmentNumberOne had not. Second, I have not violated any policy. It was very obvious that AmendmentNumberOne was not an account to be used to edit an article on say puppies. It was an account created to stir things up at the DRV of the article on the HD DVD encryption number (the number itself, not any other related articles). He had made no attempts to even touch an article in the time he was unblocked, and was only unblocked by DragonflySixtyseven as it was felt that he was wrong and he apologized, but that did not get any response from #1. And as I stated on my talk page before I discovered your comment here, it was not a ban. It is an indefinite block. I am not saying that if #1 creates another account and avoids the topic completely that he is banned from Wikipedia under that account. Just the one that started this thread.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 03:29, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Right on WP:BP, it states "Blocks are used in order to prevent damage or disruption to Wikipedia, not to punish users." He was not disruptive, nor damaging to Wikipedia. It doesn't matter whether a user edits in mainspace or not, as long as his general goal is to improve Wikipedia. Under WP:AGF, I'm assuming that was his intention. As he is now blocked, he is unable to edit this page and provide any insight or reasoning for his actions. Yes, while it should have ended after DS apologized, he was not overly contentious in his response. You also say that he is not blocked from creating a new account and using that, but my question there is: why would a user, unjustly "banned", want to create a new account for a project that has already shown what it does to users who attempt to help? Who knows if the user intended to become a contributor to the Wikipedia mainspace later on? None of you gave him a chance. He has shown that he's familiar with Wikipedia policy by bring this up in AN/I, and by following correct form in the AfD and DRV. There was absolutely no reason for this second block.

As is stated clearly in WP:BP, "Accounts that appear, based on their edit history, to exist for the sole or primary purpose of promoting a person, company, product, or service, in apparent violation of Conflict of interest or anti-spam policies, should be warned that such edits are against Wikipedia policy. If after the warning such edits persist, and the account continues to be used primarily or solely for the purpose of promotion, any uninvolved admin may block the account for up to one week. If such edits persist after the block, the account may be blocked indefinitely. A legitimate content dispute is not a valid reason for such blocks." There was no warning. There was no one week block. Both you and DS immediately skipped to blocking indefinitely, in direct violation of Wikipedia policy. - JNighthawk 04:08, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

He was damaging and disruptive to Wikipedia. And the whole purpose of Wikipedia is to build an encyclopedia. Not initiate threads like these. And I would assume that the original block was a decent enough warning that if he repeated being disruptive, he would be blocked, again. And entirely new users who are so familiar with the processes of Wikipedia are generally suspicious accounts to begin with. I have blocked accounts in the past that have had absolutely no article space edits and solely user page/user talk page edits. While AmendmentNumberOne actually editted outside of his user space, it was solely to this board and the DRV for the code. It was clearly obvious that he was not here to write an encyclopedia, but to stir up trouble.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 04:14, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

"And entirely new users who are so familiar with the processes of Wikipedia are generally suspicious accounts to begin with." Suspicious of what, exactly? Lurking before becoming an editor? Actually attempting to get familiar with the Wikipedia process before contributing? I disagree that it was clearly obvious that he wasn't going to help write an encyclopedia. I can easily see a user's first edit being on a topic he is highly passionate about. Regardless, it looks like this discussion is going nowhere, so I will be continuing through with my RfA. - JNighthawk 04:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

(EC)There's plenty of oversight. Don't think so, do what I do. Monitor this page. The guy zero'd right in on an incredibly contentious issue. We know that using SPA's for deletion debates is highly frowned upon, unethical, and prohibited by Wikipolicy. That he now makes a mountain from the molehill he dug, and plays out all this to 'defend' the Constitution, is just shoveling dirt onto the pile fast. An Admin blocked what certainly acted like a SPA. Good for him. Keep it up, I say. I'm not an admin. I'm a user. This isn't bad admin, no donut, this is good admin, donut. and so was the reblock. ThuranX 03:32, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Single purpose accounts are not against Wikipedia policy. I disagree that he made a mountain out of a molehill. He was unjustly blocked. - JNighthawk 04:08, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

For the record, you've linked to an essay, not a policy or guideline. Just think that distinction needs to be made when you link to it in the same breath as "not against Wikipedia policy". EVula // talk // ☯ // 04:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

True enough, but WP:BP also states that single purpose accounts are not, in itself, a violation of Wikipedia policy. However, I would argue here that this user was not even given the chance to prove that it was not a single purpose account. - JNighthawk 04:27, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Fully support this block. That person has done nothing of value to the encyclopedia, and 100% of his edits were whinging about censorship and abusive admins. We're an encyclopedia, not a free speech message room. Block and move on. We get trolls like this all the time. Antandrus (talk) 03:34, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I concur. He's done effectively nothing but bitch on about how the man is keeping him down. He'd be better off with a myspace page, since that's effectively what he's using here as. HalfShadow 04:23, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User continually removing {{Non-free use disputed}} from image

I have nominated Image:254524.1020.A.jpg, uploaded by Machocarioca (talk · contribs) for a non-free use review, since I do not believe the fair-use rationale given explains any critical commentary in the article as required by Wikipedia:Non-free content#Images. This user keeps reverting me without changing the fair-use rationale. I consider this tantamount to removing a speedy deletion tag from one's own article, but I won't edit war over a random movie poster. Can someone, or a couple of someones, step in and either confirm my interpretation or explain why I'm wrong? (ESkog)^(Talk) 19:26, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

It is a poster for a film, being used in and only in the article about that film, to "to illustrate the film, event, etc. in question" to quote from the relevant tempalte language. That looks like a classic caase of aceptable free use to me. Does anyone else disagree? DES ^(talk) 19:39, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, there was already a picture of the DVD cover on the page, so why would an additional picture of the movie's poster be useful? One should be good enough. Phony Saint 19:45, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

That is another question, but it is at least arguable that a poster from a date much closer to the original release of the film is better than a recent DVD cover, to provide better historical contextx. Also the older poster is far less likely to actually impair any comercial interests than the newer cover. While excessive use of images under a fair use claim is clearly a bad idea (and agaisnt policy) I'm not aware of a strict limit of one to an article. DES ^(talk) 20:00, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

If it has to be one or the other, I think it would be better to keep the movie poster, for the reasons specified above. *** Crotalus *** 20:54, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Quick again - request block of self-proclaimed sockpuppet

Hi - I've been dealing with a number of sockpuppets of the banned user Billy Ego (talk · contribs) (e.g. Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Regulations). Would someone mind blocking Reguboard (talk · contribs), a self-proclaimed sockpuppet who showed up to disrupt my RfA? Thanks. MastCell ^Talk 20:26, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Moved to WP:AIV. --24.136.230.38 20:30, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] PDFbot

Please shut down PDFbot. I have outlined several, recent errors that it has made on its creator's talk page ([26]) and Dispenser's user page says that s/he is on hiatus/wikibreak, so it is absolutely imperative. « D. Trebbien (talk) 20:31, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Moved to WP:AIV. --24.136.230.38 20:37, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Problems have been dealt with, please unblock. —Dispenser 04:22, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Request a bit of help with Dismissal of U.S. attorneys controversy article

I am not sure if I am in the right place to request assistance - this article is on a very active, touchy, politically-charged subject and we are just now about to attempt to break the article into pieces because of its length. It seems to me that none of the presently active editors is completely fluent in the way of the Wikipedia (we have at the moment, no disputes to speak of), so before we get too far, I thought it might be worthwhile requesting some assistance in getting the article into a proper form, e.g., Help with the overall formatting of the article. Creation and use of sub-articles? Proper use of references in the article lead paragraph? And also being sure the article stays NPOV. There seem to be obvious truths about the controversy that can't quite be explicitly stated, e.g. the Bush administration's motivations. What is the policy regarding YouTube.com references? So this is to request a look, a few (several?) quick edits, advice etc. to get us going in the right new direction with the article. (I admit I could do a careful read of Wikipedia policies, etc.; I am learning, but have run out of time for now. Also, a neutral administrator's edits/comments would carry far more weight just now.) Thanks so much - Bdushaw 22:44, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• I'm a friendly co-editor on the page in question. It looks like the right place for this question is elsewhere, since we're not having any troubles or disputes. It's really a "looking for wisdom and advice" item. I'll check the other administrator or project pages, and post a note here when done. Cheers -- Yellowdesk 00:02, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• I think we'll take these general advice questions to the Wikipedia:Peer_review page, after a little planning and effort and discussion at our end. -- Yellowdesk 03:48, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Problematic IP editor

75.3.2.96 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) has already had a block for edit warring and personal attacks, and is carrying on with more of the same - [27] [28] [29] [30]. Thanks. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 22:45, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• ... and I'm a vandal, apparently. Heh! - Alison ☺ 23:31, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• And it continues... One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 00:32, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Seen enough yet? One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 02:29, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• He got warned again by myself and User:Jossi. He didn't stop. I had to block him for 31 hours for incivility/revert-warring/personal attacks. Now, he's ranting on his talk page about racist anti-Irish editors and admins. *sigh* - at least the disruption is over - Alison ☺ 03:22, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:BuickCenturyDriver‎

Please could people review BCD's talk page, he's made a statement that he took over User:AndyZ's account but only after the password was released (read what he has to say, it's more informative than I could put it). We need to come to a conclusion as to what we do now. I now feel that the block is only punitive and BCD should be unblocked, on a servere warning that anything like this is not to happen again. Ryan Postlethwaite 23:43, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Copied from what I wrote this on BCD's talk page: BCD, you were under incredible pressure to admit things. Getting caught with your hand in the cookie jar is always an embarrassing situation. A late admission of guilt is much better than not admitting to things. Yes, admitting this right away would have been much, much better, but we can't change things now. And the fact that BCD did not block every person he encountered until the acct was desysopped does also help me to believe this. In weighing everything, I too will support an unblock (non-admin that I am). I think BCD (as editor) was a valuable contributor, and hopefully will be again. If unblocked, I suspect BCD will have more people watching over his shoulder than almost any other user. I hope BCD can regain our trust, and an unblock will allow him to do so. Flyguy649talkcontribs 22:38, 9 May 2007 (UTC) Flyguy649^talk_contribs 23:49, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• I agree, as I see, do others. Blocking at this point serves no protective purpose and this particular editor has been very constructive in the past and just got carried away, it seems. You can bet they'll be watched like a hawk from here on in. I'm going to wait a while here and be particularly bold and unblock with a heavyweight warning if nobody strenuously objects. This is going to drag on forever if it's not committed to history, and soon. - Alison ☺ 23:51, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I've unblocked him. Here's my explanation on his talk page: Given BCD's apology, and absent any compelling evidence he was the original cracker of AndyZ's account, I think it's reasonable to unblock him, and I've done so. Chick Bowen 00:13, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I'd still like to know why I was blocked.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 00:14, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

He states that in the apology. Viridae^Talk 00:16, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Ya, I would like to hear that too, using an admins block button is surely against some sort of policy. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 00:16, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

He does mention so half-way or so down under the section titled "Response" on his talk page. --Iamunknown 00:16, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I think you were the 1st person he saw (no excuse I know). Ryan Postlethwaite 00:17, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

It seems that curiosity gave the cat a near-death experience. bibliomaniac15 00:19, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that's a satisfactory answer. I wasn't even editting at the time of my block (we had a bad thunderstorm and I unplugged everything).—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 00:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Your name may well have been at the top of an edit history or somesuch. I'm hoping that the guy's first edits on returning will be a full and complete apology to your good self - Alison ☺ 00:36, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I find the explanation very hard to believe. This explanation was practically fed to him. Even though the perfect opportunity to get unblocked came, he denied it and avoided it for nearly forty-eight hours. He came up with alternate explanations of his own, and made four unblock requests. And now he "admits" to wrongdoing, basically repeating the explanation that was offered earlier. The sequence of events is just so implausible. Ryulong was not online. He has never edited the Main Page. So how on Earth did BuickCenturyDriver (logged in as AndyZ) "find" Ryulong. And why would someone just having fun, testing the admin features block someone indefinitely with a demeaning block reason? Wouldn't Buick, the dedicated vandal-fighter be tame with his new-found discovery? Or at least block an actual vandal? Or do something about the Main Page? I'm sure Buick just wanted his account back so badly that he thought the best thing for him to do was make up a false story. I mean… I don't mind as long as he proceeds to do good. -- tariqabjotu 01:01, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Hmm. That's certainly plausible, but even if that's true, I wouldn't see any reason to block him again.—Preceding unsigned comment added by bibliomaniac15 (talk • contribs)

So, this is essentially a coerced confession, now?—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 01:37, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

What it comes down to, for me, is this: we don't have enough to consider him community-banned. What he did was lousy and stupid, and of course Ryulong in particular has ample reason to be thoroughly pissed. But there's no precedent here: if you give admin buttons to someone who doesn't know how to use them, of course they screw up. That's why we have RfA. His confession and apology were coerced and sort of half-hearted, but that's not the issue for me. The issue is that we just don't have enough to block him indefinitely. I considered shortening it instead--maybe I should have. If I did wrong, please don't hesistate to say so, but this is what seemed to me the clearest way out of this. Naturally, people should keep a close eye on him, as I'm sure they will (and I would think under the circumstances the checkusers too should feel able to see what he's up to). Chick Bowen 02:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

He's not an admin. He'll likely never be an admin, after this stunt. But unless he decides to do it again, he's got a better-than-even chance to become a productive editor again, and if he does screw up, he'll be banhammered so fast his head'll spin. I say unblock (if not immediately, no deadline). -- nae'blis 03:55, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

If he steps a centimeter out of line, he'll be blocked (and then banned) pretty instantaneously. I don't believe him or trust him, but I don't really see anything to lose by unblocking him now. Grandmasterka 05:16, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I have asked Dmcdevit about this but he is traveling and may not be able to respond for a while. I'm pretty sure that BCD is not the vandal behind the password cracking attempts, but only the checkusers will know for sure. He probably is only guilty of experimenting with AndyZ's password which was exposed in the deletion log. As such, a short block for disruption and a warning is sufficient. (If the checkusers do feel he could be the culprit behind the whole thing, Dmcdevit can reblock when he gets back.) Thatcher131 05:46, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Holliston, Massachusetts

At Holliston, Massachusetts, there have been 22 vandalistic edits by 72.74.231.236. Can an administrator rollback these edits, please? Cool Blue^{talk to me} 23:55, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Is 42nd Street-Bryant Park (IND Sixth Avenue Line) redirs supposed to exist?

This isn't an article, but it's in article space. --NE2 00:20, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately it needs to exist (the history) due to GFDL concerns... Cbrown1023 talk 00:55, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

What? I see no information here, I just see a bunch of page moves. It started as a redirect, and every single edit has been to modify the redirect. What GFDL concerns are there? --Golbez 01:02, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I just looked at what I suppose is the reasoning and I still don't get it. The history is merged. The other redirect has no history whatsoever. All of the history of the information is merged onto one page; this "article" can be safely deleted. --Golbez 01:03, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Looking through the history, it seems very doubtful that any of these edits would be subject to copyright, so there are probably no GFDL concerns. The only version with copyrightable content is a cut-&-paste that was never changed on this page. Christopher Parham (talk) 02:57, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

All that needs to be done is to move that page to Talk:42nd Street-Bryant Park (IND Sixth Avenue Line)/History 1 and put a link to it on Talk:42nd Street-Bryant Park (IND Sixth Avenue Line). Then the new (empty) page in article space can be deleted. This is documented in the deletion guide somewhere. I'll do it in a little while here unless someone else beats me to it. CMummert · talk 03:09, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:Mitzy1978

I blocked this account indefinitely for recreating an attack page and other vandalism. It seems to have performed several page moves... Could someone have a look and help me fix it? Grandmasterka 05:01, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Moves reverted. Voice-of-All 05:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

...And handle their unblock request. The attack page was Grace Bonney. Grandmasterka 05:06, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

He's dealt with, thanks. --Golbez 05:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Disruptive edits by Tony the Tiger

TonyTheTiger (talk · contribs) has been going around, calling himself Director of Wikipedia:WikiProject Chicago. I didn't know we had such a title, but apparently they do; and if it makes him happy to push people around there, fine. But now he is singlehandedly insisting on adding Jon Corzine to the purview of the WikiProject, on the grounds that he once attended the University of Chicago. This has been strongly objected to by Alansohn, Grammaticus Repairo (the preceding link was changed from an 'edit link' to what I presume Septentrionalis meant Carcharoth 01:22, 9 May 2007 (UTC)) actually this one, thanks. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC) and myself; but he continually reverts. Not yet to the point of 3RR violation, but could some admin have a word with him? He seems to have an undue appreciation of the power and glory of adminship. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:50, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Please see my side of the story at TonyTheTiger (talk/cont/bio) 22:20, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Also note that this ANI seems to be retaliatory as a result of the post I am directing you to. TonyTheTiger (talk/cont/bio) 22:27, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Not so; I didn't know it existed. Tony's argument appears to be quite literally that the Project can do whatever it likes, bot-assisted, and any objection is a claim to WP:OWN the project. Perhaps it would be sufficient to call off SatyrBot, which is doing all this pointless tagging. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:44, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

If this article is going to be tagged by the Chicago Wikiproject, they need to be putting in time and effort expanding and improving the article. If they will do that, I see no good reason not to let them tag the article as coming under their project. I do agree it's a bit of a tenuous link though, but if they're going to help improve the article, don't look a gift horse in the mouth. -- Nick ^t 00:10, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the backup Nick. We are working with User:SatyrTN and his bot User:SatyrBot just to get our articles tagged. We don't make any promise of editing any one of the 7500 articles tagged by us already or the 5-10,000 or so that will likely soon be tagged on any schedule. We will be using our tags to assess where our efforts are needed and will tag all articles to better assess where we will put our efforts. As I stated, we are currently taking inventory. When we get everything properly tagged then we can assess articles. Then we can determine where our editorial efforts will fall. We will in general help articles we tag, but of course make no promise about any particular article. We welcome any editor who want to contribute to our efforts. Come partake in this week's WP:CHICOTW. TonyTheTiger (talk/cont/bio) 00:43, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

There has recently been significant agreement at Bot approvals that mass tagging with project templets is a dubious use of a bot, and that any such bots ought to be specifically approved for such use. This editing appears to me to be marginal at best. DES ^(talk) 00:49, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I should have seen this coming a mile off. If anyone (in this case, Tony) engages in widespread and rather indiscriminate bot tagging of articles to fall under the "scope" of a WikiProject, they will (quite rightly) rile editors when they get a few false hits. See also the discussion at: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject reform#WikiProject scope. I would urge Tony, if he must continue with such bot-tagging (and it might be better to stop, given the Bot approvals comment above), to politely remove the WP:WPChi tag if people keep saying that such-and-such articles are not really within the scope of the project, and to reassess his inclusion critera. Carcharoth 01:43, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• I've struck the parts of being "director" of a Wikiproject. Such titles don't make a lot of sense on Wikipedia. >Radiant< 10:39, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I am the person who makes WP:CHICOTW run and who is attempting to get WP:CHIASSESS and WP:WPChi going. title or no. TonyTheTiger (talk/cont/bio) 14:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
    • And that is much appreciated. But you get the same salary as the rest of us. >Radiant< 15:35, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

dispute resolution accepted. I am drafting a neutral statement of the issue at User:TonyTheTiger/DR bot. TonyTheTiger (talk/cont/bio) 14:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• I actually asked Tony about this bot job earlier: User_talk:Ccwaters/Archive2007#Chi_athlete_tags. Indiscriminate project tagging has little if no effect on the individual articles. If anything, it waters down the project. That's the project's problem. Its a battle I choose to walk away from. ccwaters 13:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:Ron liebman

• Ron liebman (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) - name conflict with living notable person (see Ron Leibman actor biography) - user account has edited the article about the actor. It may be the actor - anything is possible - but the account is also closely associated with a cloud of New York Library internet access socks (see User:Moe kaplan and associated socks), which is pretty suspicious for a working, active actor. Admin with experience handling username confirmations etc requested to review. Georgewilliamherbert 23:08, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • From this user's edits to Ron Leibman, this user is apparently someone else with the same name, apparently a baseball statistician or something, which is consistent with their edit pattern. I don't see a real problem here. Let's just make sure the user says they aren't that person. Mangojuice^talk 23:31, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
    • I don't know that it's not an impersonator. The whole series of sockpuppet accounts, including a bunch who have been nothing but disruptive, had the same "First last" cap-lowercase username pattern. Another editor believes that this is a serial pattern vandal who tried to impersonate the real Leibman from the start. At least, someone should try and verify that it's really him. Georgewilliamherbert 00:43, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
      • Moved this from WP:UAA; if this is wrapped up with a possible sockpuppet situation, it's more complex than what UAA was intended for. I have no problem blocking the account if it's a potentially disruptive sockpuppet, but I think it should be on that basis. Mangojuice^talk 03:19, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
        • A suspected sockpuppet report has been filed for this user at Wikipedia:Suspected_sock_puppets/Ron_liebman. Cheers, Skinwalker 12:41, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
          • A new IP address is doing the same thing: 149.4.108.154. -Ebyabe 15:47, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
            • And yet another one: Special:Contributions/149.4.108.130. Plus he's kind of been making unpleasant comments towards me. Check his edit summaries, please. See, I'm nice, at least. :) -Ebyabe 18:19, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] List of cuneiform signs

Could some other admins familiar with our image use policy take a look at the Cuneiform signs uploaded by Mstudt (talk · contribs) for List of cuneiform signs. Mstudt, one of the copyright holders for these signs, has uploaded them granting permission for Wikipedia to use them, but not releasing them under a free license. They have been tagged as "fair use". (Please see Image:B578aellst.png and Image:B333v4ellst.png for randomly selected examples.)

When I informed Mstudt of our policies regarding non-free images and that such images would be considered replaceable, Dbachmann (talk · contribs) expressed concerns regarding my intelligence stating that I am "obviously uncapable" of realizing that we could use these images.

Because it is possible for someone of the requisite skill and determination to produce freely licensed versions of these images, I believe that they do not qualify for fair use under WP:FAIR#Policy #1. Could another admin take a look? Thanks. --BigDT 15:11, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Is this an example of an image in question? (My apologies to anyone running a high resolution, I'm balancing viewability and page usage.) Anynobody 04:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes. --Iamunknown 05:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC) No, that is not one. It is a public domain one from Commons. --Iamunknown 06:41, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

They're ok to use¹ because the editor created and uploaded them to the commons and released the copyright into the Public Domain{{PD-self}}. (¹ Unless you can show that it isn't the editors work, in which case it probably should go). Anynobody 06:32, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

No they are not, this image is un-free and stored locally (unless I'm missing something, where are these public domain Commons images?). --Iamunknown 06:41, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

::::You're missing something: go to the image itself, on the preview page below the image it you will see a box that says:This is a file from the Wikimedia Commons. The description on its description page there is shown below.. Follow the link to the commons. Anynobody 07:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

For anyone wondering, Fair Use only applies to images with a copyright, when someone could conceivably sue for infringement but for the Fair Use rule. Public Domain is free to use. Anynobody 06:36, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Could you link me to one of the disputed ones? Anynobody 07:07, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Sorry didn't see the link right away, yep you're right this technically should go. The author probably should also change the copyright though. Anynobody 07:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I think most of the ones in Mstudt's log are the disputed ones. The uploader is claiming copyright over them (which is fine, though I'm not sure if they are eligible for copyright) but licensing them unfreely. I, however, think that free equivalents could be made and these images thus fail our non-free content policy. --Iamunknown 07:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

This is now being discussed at User talk:Dbachmann. Just for background: the uploader is an academic expert on the topic and co-author of the book from which these images were taken. If I understood correctly, she at first planned to make them available free (that's why some were uploaded on commons), but then had second thoughts, apparently because she felt copyrights of her co-authors and/or publisher might be infringed. Now she and dab have been trying to find ways to secure the images and still take her concerns into account. Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:40, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] How much information do I need to provide to stop a user from following me to every conversation?

Almost every edit I make, in every conversation, with every person and on every page.. Smee shows up and posts an innocent comment.

I don't want to file something improperly, but I feel that I'm being harassed and stalked. Whether or not it fits the definition of it here, I do not know.

I have asked him pointedly to stop, yet he persists.

Presumably his motives are to get me to tell him to stop, so he can create logs of me making accusations.

But if he would stop.. I wouldn't have anything to complain about.

Its called creating the conflict.

He improperly labeled my 1st (one-time-use) account a sockpuppet, and then only when an admin gave an opinion, did he go back and correct it to something less accusing.

He created a sockpuppet category. He created a suspected sock puppet category.

He reverts my 3O requests. He deletes my article tags. He comes from out of no where and begins editing the exact statements in an article that I'm working on, then he stops editing that article as soon as I leave.

I made an attempt to get an agreement from him, based on civilized conduct, to not delete my article tags, unless he had consensus, 3O, wiki ruling, or my permission, and he repeatedly refused to agree. Yet a 3O opinion was given which supported exactly the agreement I was trying to gain from him.

How much information do I need to provide to make this stop? Lsi john 18:27, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• I am afraid to even comment here, for fear of further baseless accusations. In any event, it should be noted that where appropriate and possible, when this user has complained, rightly so or not, I have stated that I am willfully refraining from further comment on pages User:Lsi john has commented on. Smee 18:33, 9 May 2007 (UTC).
  • See? exactly. He is so enmeshed in this he cant help but place an innocent comment. Check the time stamps on that promise.
  • And please feel free to read the history of my posts today from my user contributions and when you get there, look and see how many times he popped in.. just to say hello or help explain MFD, presumably because an admin/editor wouldn't have been able to explain it himself.

• • I believe there is sufficient evidence to suggest he is harassing me, if anyone cares to really look and see all the 'coincidental' and 'helpful' times he enters a conversation.

He's trying to drive me off wiki. I told him when we went to MedCab before, just tell me to leave and I'll leave.

Smee I ask again, just tell me to leave and I'll leave. But otherwise, I really need you to stop harassing me. Lsi john 18:58, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• Please, see my comments to this user on his talk page. I have stated that I will do my best to avoid posting on users' talk pages where this user has previously posted. His claims of "harassment", are incorrect, and inappropriate. Smee 18:59, 9 May 2007 (UTC).

There's no reason to avoid posting where Lsi john has already posted, and to do so, in fact, would be difficult since Lsi john is posting to many Scientology-related articles where Smee has been posting since long before Lsi john was even a Wikipedia user. Smee does need to, IMHO, tone down his approach to his edits, his talk-page posts, and his automatic reverts, but I don't see any evidence that Lsi john is being harassed or stalked by Smee or by anyone else. wikipediatrix 19:18, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

For a little more history, folks, please see this conversation on my talk page this morning]] - Alison ☺ 19:08, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

and [here] and [here] and [here] and [here] for a bit more background.

Some of that is repetition, others of it will contain specific pointers to examples.

And [here] is a specific example of where he repeatedly refused to give what was a simple good faith promise to honor article tags.

This is not a new development. It is an on-going situation of 'polite abuse' and harassment.

Lsi john 19:15, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Please pick your battles. Although I essentially agree with your analysis of Smee's stubbornly contentious editing, this is not the same thing as "harassing and stalking". The fact remains that Smee is a valuable editor to Wikipedia who has contributed greatly to many Scientology articles, even though he and I often differ on his methodology. wikipediatrix 19:24, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• wikipediatrix, coming from you that is most appreciated. Thank you for the kind comments. Smee 19:31, 9 May 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Sockpuppetry

(copied from my talk page. There were accusations of sock-puppetry due to Lsi john having admitted to having more than one account. Smee had previously tagged one as being a sockpuppet of Lsi john [31] - now speedy-deleted)

I've looked over the creation dates and activities of the two accounts in question here and believe there is no case of sockpuppetry to be answered, at least not amongst these two accounts. The username block and the dates make it quite clear that it was a newbie mistake on Lsi john's part. I see this has all moved to WP:ANI again so I'll address it over there - Alison ☺ 19:22, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• Whatever about what happened previously, I felt that Smee's tagging of John's old account was inappropriate as there had already been issues between the two of them at the time and, given the history of both accounts, it's obvious that it was just a poor choice of username, followed by a username block. I'm not sure why Smee did this, but it was bound to annoy John - Alison ☺ 19:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
  • And after clarification from a neutral, previously uninvolved editor in the matter, I tagged the associated category for speedy deletion. Smee 19:33, 9 May 2007 (UTC).
    • Smee is a veteran editor. Smee knows the rules very well. Smee knows policy and procedure very well. Yet time and again, Smee has to wait until a 3O is given before he politely reverts his position. It is these repeated events which come together to form harassment on his part. And yes, I have opened AN/I because it has now gotten to bad that he is popping into conversations with admins/editors just to define MFD for me.. as if I needed it.. Its designed to harass and annoy me, not help me. But its nicely worded to look like help. Perhaps its called Gaming the system?
    • By the way, I've offered Smee the opportunity to simply tell me to leave. This isn't about accidental overlap of articles. This is about him intentionally seeking me out and following me around and editing conversations, discussions and articles at the same time I'm there. Not mere coincidence. Lsi john 19:43, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
    • It got significantly more pointed after I filed my previous AN/I which I felt that I had to subsequently withdraw in an effort to get him to stop. Lsi john 19:46, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
• I have stated repeatedly here and on the user's talk page that I will do my best to avoid commenting on talk pages where the user perceives some sort of "harassment", if such commenting can be avoided. And my obtaining of Third Opinions is part of the process, and my reversal of my stance after such opinions are given only goes to show my willingness to engage the process. Smee 20:03, 9 May 2007 (UTC).
  • FYI, I am going to remove this page from my watchlist, so as to avoid further conflict from a user that is frustrated and upset at circumstances. Thank you all for your WP:AGF in all this. Yours, Smee 20:49, 9 May 2007 (UTC).

I am currently co-editing certain articles with both Smee and Lsi john, so I will not get involved in admin actions in this case, but I would advise both Smee and Lsi John to stay away from each other for a while. I would also want to offer specific suggestions to them, as follows: To John: If you perceive harassment or wikistalking, keep a log of these incidents, and if that perception remains you may need to file a user RfC so that the community can address the issue and provide feedback to both you and Smee. To Smee: You may not be harassing/stalking another user, but that can be his perception and the perception of others. You may want to re-read Wikipedia:Stalking. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 21:26, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• I'll endorse that!! Definitely. BTW, User:Lsi john is currently indisposed, having been blocked for 3RR violation - Alison ☺ 21:50, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I mean no disrespect because that solution sounds ideal, and fair minded on the surface. However there is a circumstance which leads me to a couple of questions. I'm presuming you are unfamiliar with this, but very recently Lsi john proved a bit elusive on one of the talk pages. The whole discussion is about editors who may have issues with a source from either the GAO or the FBI, I understood what his intentions were and that I wasn't going to actually get an answer, but I wanted to make 100% I wasn't being unclear. This is from Talk:List of groups referred to as cults in government reports:

[32] [33] [34] [35]

[36] [37] [38] [39]

[40]

makes it difficult to WP:AGF I realize that Smee and myself haven't been perfect. However given the other person's behavior it seems unfair to make Smee stay away from regularly edited articles. Anynobody 05:59, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Co-editing

I've had a very quick look at both users recent contributions. This isn't just Lsi john's imagination; of the pages Lsi john has edited recently, Smee has edited about half of them. But this is not necessarily a worry either, because the overlapping pages are all on similar topics, topics that both users have been editing for a long time. Regards, Ben Aveling 10:34, 10 May 2007 (UTC) (Originally posted at 22:44, 9 May 2007 (UTC) and seemingly accidentally removed [41].)

You're right Ben Aveling they have both been editing the same pages for a while. Here's a couple of examples

List of groups referred to as cults in government reports Smee: Created article 07 March 07 Lsi John: 1st edit reverted Smee around May 4th

Youth for Human Rights International Smee: 1st edit: Revision as of 18:50, 23 March 2007 added template Lsi john: 1st edit:Revision as of 22:10, 5 May 2007 removed cited source

Anynobody 11:07, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Possible troll

Jac16888 (talk · contribs · logs · block user · block log) has made a bunch of very suspicious edits (mostly on Scrubs (TV series) related pages, but others) today and yesterday. The thing that tipped me off to the possibility that he's a serious troll was that he took a disambig page (Fat Boy), nuked it, filled it with nonsense, and then took it to AFD to delete. Can someone with more time (I have to wander away from the keyboard for a while) look through all his contributions closely and determine if he's a troll? Georgewilliamherbert 22:58, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't appear that way. Jan noh wan san? blanked the page and added "a designer beanbag. Avalible in many colours and styles. very comftable" with the edit summary of "Created page with 'a designer beanbag. Avalible in many colours and styles. very comftable'". I would assume that Jac16888 didn't know to go through the edit history and restore a previous version but instead thought it was a nonsense newly created article. His edits show that he has reverted other edits by Jan noh wan san? like this and this. Jan noh wan san? was clearly a vandal and was blocked accordingly. IrishGuy ^talk 03:22, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

When Jac16888 nominated the page for deletion, the edit history did not contain any revisions before Jan noh wan san?'s creation of the page. As I mentioned on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fat Boy, I only then noticed that the page had once been a valid dab page, restored all revisions and reverted (see the log and this). Maybe I should have not restored everything, as the edit history looks a bit confusing now. Anyway, Jac16888 did a good job removing the vandalism by Jan noh wan san?, although Fat Boy should have been requested for speedy deletion and not brought to Afd. Prolog 08:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:Mel Etitis - possible desysopping case?

This admin keeps tagging various album covers (which I have put an album cover tag on) because they lack "fair use rationale." Well, I finally did put a fair-use rationale on Fab-fnts.jpg

http://tinypic.com/5xpzig2 Cover of From Nothin' to Somethin' by Fabolous. Copyright 2007 Desert Storm/Def Jam Recordings. This cover qualifies as fair use because it is only used on the artist and album pages. Any other use may violate copyright laws.

Yet this admin felt the need to remove this very descriptive info. I think this calls for desysopping. What do you think? Tom Danson 01:23, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Has this editor misused admin tools? Navou 01:24, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely not. That is not a sufficient fair use rationale. See WP:FU for more information on how to write a good fair use rationale. Sean William 01:26, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• I think this calls for me to start laughing so hard I blow tortilla chip chunks all over my monitor. No, it doesn't call for desysopping, and you're ludicrously out of touch if you think it does. FCYTravis 01:27, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
  • ( blow[ing]] tortilla chip chunks I have not laughed so hard in a long time....) ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 01:28, 10 May 2007 (UTC))

Laugh all you want now, I checked out what is needed in a fair use rationale, and this covers all the bases. Tom Danson 01:32, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The laughter was about the chips bits on the monitor and your request for desysopping. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 01:36, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Even if it were a decent rationale (which it isn't), what does that have to do with abusing admin tools? — Malcolm^{Use the schwartz!} 01:38, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay then, if that isn't a decent rationale, what would be? (I'm telling you, album covers are fair use) Tom Danson 01:44, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Fair_use_rationale_guideline -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 01:50, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. "This is fair use because we're using it in an article" isn't fair use. For an example of a fair use rationale I've written, see Image:Wotsits-ReallyCheesy.jpg. --Deskana (AFK 47) 01:51, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Come on, not everyone knows what it takes to get desysopped, be nice. —dgies^t_c 02:23, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Was Mel Etitis informed of this discussion here? Acalamari 01:46, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Nope. We're just going to desysop him behind his back. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 01:53, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Well I let him know. It's only right if he's about to be stripped of his adminship ;-) Will (aka Wimt) 01:56, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Heh. :) Acalamari 01:58, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Not that I consider Mel one of our better admins, but this is -- how shall one say it -- the most tortilla-chip-chunk-blowing stupid rationale for desysopping one can imagine. Raymond Arritt 02:30, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• <self-pity>This is why I tried to make a page about the rationales for desysopping, but I got yelled at.</self-pity> Chick Bowen 02:49, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with all the statements above that Mel's actions are not only far from a desysopping offense, but also justified. That said, I think there is a genuine question raised by the original post, which perhaps got sidelined in this discussion. The specific points are:

• If an album/DVD/book cover is used only on the respective album/dvd/book page, does one need to add a FU rationale besides the ones already mentioned in the biolerplate template  ?
• If the answer to the above is yes, can someone point to a specific example of a satisfactory FU rationale on some album cover page (I clicked on some 20 random links in the Category:Album covers and didn't find anything suitable) ? Am I right in assuming that it would be ok to cut-paste this text to other images used in the exactly analogous manner ?
• Is it FU to use a album cover on the respective artist's page ? If so, can someone again point out a illustrative example ?

If, as I would expect, this has already been discussed at some wikipedia talk page, a link would be great. Thanks. Abecedare 02:53, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Regarding your first question, you're making some incorrect assumptions. "To the uploader: please add a detailed fair use rationale for each use, as described on Wikipedia:Image description page, as well as the source of the work and copyright information." Album covers need fair use rationales, for all articles in which they appear, even the article for the album. For example, a high resolution album cover does not automatically meet the non-free content criteria; in fact, it fails them no matter where it's used. So in this case I agree that we should totally desysop Mel for requesting fair use rationales where they're needed. ShadowHalo 03:07, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The main problem is identifying instances where usage contradicts our image policy. Rationales for including album art in articles in albums are far from uniform, the polite thing to do is help an editor identify several key points (lo-rez, lack of free alternative, etc.). I find it ironic that WP:FURAT provides a perfectly apt rationale template for album covers with the added disclaimer that one should "not copy these examples word-for-word". Before the more anally-retentive elements begin correcting me, fair use rationales are necessary from a legalistic standpoint. However, demanding that contributors supplement a copyright template with a rationale which might as well come in a template is one of the quirky illogical qualities that make our image policy so incomprehensible to newbies. ˉˉ^anetode╦╩ 07:17, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Good lord, how hard is it to take one second to say "I believe this image qualifies as far use on the article blarg blarg, as it is a low resolution image intended to illustrate the topic of the article, and that a free image cannot be found, "? Swatjester 03:53, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Obviously harder than posting to AN/I and asking for a desysopping. Phony Saint 04:01, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That is not a fair use rationale, and I would dispute it if I came across one. A fair use rationale must relevant and specific to the use of the image in the article; a boilerplate text will not suffice. And don't give me the "otherstuffexists" argument, because I would dispute that other stuff too. --Iamunknown 04:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

One of the most common uses for fair use images is to illustrate the article topic. This is a permissible use under WP:FU; according to section 8, "Non-free content contributes significantly to an article (e.g., it identifies the subject of an article, or illustrates specific, relevant points or sections in the text); it does not serve a purely decorative purpose." This is necessary when the article is on a modern copyrighted work, such as a video game or a film. In this case, the fair use rationale is inevitably going to be very similar among large categories of images (sometimes with only the article title changing) because the images are being used for the same purpose. Crotalus horridus 06:33, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

And before someone points it out, yes, I know this doesn't apply to living people or currently-existing buildings. I was referring to such things as album cover art, movie posters, or game screenshots. Crotalus horridus 06:34, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I think it would be hard for the rights owner of an album cover to argue it was not fair use in illustrating an article on the album (although most of those articles fail WP:NOT a directory), but fair use would be debatable and often flat wrong in illustrating the article on the performer. Guy (Help!) 06:55, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed completely. Sorry if I wasn't clear; what I meant above was purposes like using an album cover to identify the corresponding album, using a video game screenshot to identify that video game, or using a movie poster to identify that movie. Obviously, for articles on people, we should use free use images if it is at all possible. Crotalus horridus 07:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely right. I've long argued for some commonsense to be applied to album covers, but: this is an issue to be discussed elsewhere, and indeed there's a thread about it at WP:ALBUM. Desysopping? No. Admin intervention needed? No. Next! --kingboyk 11:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

To Crotalus: Sorry, but "illustrating" the article topic and "identifying" the article topic is not the same thing. "Identifying", the way I understand it, means to clarify what object is being talked about. This would apply only to cases where without the picture a reader might not understand what the object of the article is in the first place. (For instance, if a book has been published in several editions and the article is going to specifically discuss this publication history, we might need an image of each to clarify: look, this is the edition I'm now talking about.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:50, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Back to the original issue, one does not need admin-bits in order to tag an image that has a bad fair use reasoning at all, so any chance for Mel to lose his admin-bit is slim to none. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 08:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. I was discussing the issue of fair-use rationales in general; in this particular case, I don't see any impropriety on Mel Etitis's part, and as you point out, admin powers weren't even used. Crotalus horridus 08:21, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks to Will and Acalamari for alerting me to this discussion.

It's worth adding to the above that I explained to Tom Danson early in my discussions with him that adding fair-use tags wasn't as admin action. More importantly, he's omitting a crucial point. The images in question had no sources or fair-use rationales, and were tagged accordingly; he removed both tags, adding a source but no rationale — but he wasn't the up-loader, so couldn't know what the sources were. There followed an increasingly bizarre series of justifications, in which he claimed to have been the original up-loader, but mysterious figures had overwritten his images (and, somehow, deleted all trace of their actions from the histories). --Mel Etitis (Talk) 08:17, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd also say that the image was far too high a resolution to qualify as fair use. I've scaled it to 250x249 pixels, reducing the file size tenfold, and uploaded the new version. It should be easier to make a fair use case for this lower resolution image, which is still perfectly okay for indentification purposes. --Tony Sidaway 08:44, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

This doesn't mean we should keep the image of course. There are many other points to fix. --Tony Sidaway 08:47, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't know about any of you guys out there but I have a stack of album covers here at my house and every one of them says it't copy right. Im not sure how fair use comes into play here. --  Planetary Chaos  Talk to me  16:58, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

?? If they weren't copyright, there would be no fair use claim. Not sure what point you're trying to make. Fair use is when we use a copyrighted image under a provision of US law. --kingboyk 17:16, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• Dunno, but this one gets shortlisted for this month's "most baseless request for desysopping" award. Guy (Help!) 17:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Abuse of Twinkle

Lothslo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) created his account at 22:20, 9 May 2007. His/her first edit was to add Twinkle script to his monobook. This user than began reverting the contributions of User:Tankred en masse using Twinkle's non-admin rollback function. I have indefinitely blocked Lothslo for abuse. With the exception of the edits made to Lothslo's user, talk, and monobook pages, I rolled back all edits. Based on previous disputes with Tankred, I would not be surprised if the person behind Lothslo is the banned sockpuppeteer User:VinceB, a regular on this page. Olessi 03:48, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Before this gets raised, it's no easier to use twinkle to revert vandalize than it is to use god mode lite, or any similar rollback monobook. It's actually harder with Twinkle, because it pops up a window to leave a message for the vandal you've reverted, thus somewhat discouraging mass reversions rapidly (well relatively at least). Swatjester 03:56, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that option can be turned off. John Reaves (talk) 03:59, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that Twinkle is particularly relevant here - the same reversions, if done by hand, would warrant the same response. Ironically, using Twinkle makes it easier for someone else to notice what you're doing. CMummert · talk 04:03, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I had not noticed monobook scripts being used for abusive purposes before, so I figured I would mention it here just in case. Thanks for the explanations. Olessi 04:37, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Suggestion: rollback his monobook edits so should he ever be unblocked he doesn't have access to twinkle? Swatjester 07:49, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

If it becomes a serious problem, I suppose we could always rollback his monobook page and protect it. Mangojuice^talk 14:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Block review

Chemist3456 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log), especially edits to Astrology - cute, but no thanks. I diagnose hosiery and have blocked, please review. Guy (Help!) 06:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• I smell socks here - right from the first edit ("rvv" on an RfAr??) - Alison ☺ 06:56, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Reviewed, and endorsed. Dirty socks allright.- Phaedriel - 11:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:ShadowFox_S.T.A.R.S.

Can an admin take a look at this user's talk page? The user is constantly changing my comments on their talk page by substituting words for curses etc. to make me look like an idiot. The user also has a hefty talk on why they hate wikipedia with an image saying "wikipeida sucks". He/she is doing this because of edits they made on Resident Evil articles that were reverted or changed by myself and others over a long period of time, as they were not fact nor sourced etc. The user disappeared after a while when a some of us editors found he/she was constantly reverting articles anonymously, but has resurfaced lately. Now all they're doing is continually changing my comments on their talk page and making multiple personal attacks such as "You can blow and be ass raped by a homeless transexual for all I care. ^.^". I added some warning templates but this has just resulted in more personal attacks. I've been patient enough with this user but now its getting ridiculous. Everything is on their talk page, check through the history. Parjay 10:48, 10 May 2007 (UTC) Dear Sir at first i was not posting anything on shells webpage untill i was accused of it and i didnt read my messages and i got banned and as far as i can tell im still banned But i had to post this so i could defend myself without setting with my hands under my legs and tape on my mouth like i was trying to do..but you guys made the statement that i was the owner of wiseman music studios.com and the owner of that site is named tim meany check the who is on that as i cant spell the guys last name as for who is attacking me its more then just shell the lady that posted was name kay hession she is a crook out of florida whom cant sue me because im posting the truth with my real name and im not breaking the law unlike her..i never posted that sick stuff above and ask mrs.shell why she is the owner and editor of badadvocates.com attacking others and how she is posting peoples home address with that of a fifteen year old up on her website and sense you like dig look at this

http://digg.com/business_finance/Webmaster_Settles_With_IA_Goes_After_Teenager

shell likes attacking people who cant or shell thinks wont fight back and what about shells business profane-justice.org why is it okay for her and not for me? Thank You for your time Billy wiseman

[edit] Very bad treatment of newcomers

The treatment of newcomers on Wikipedia is appauling, I am new here and have been insulted and all of myb edits doubted just because some users consider me inexperienced and unable of closing Good article candidates, they said on my user talk page "Some users might not take well to a new user reviewing the article for gGA status". I was criticsed for closing this FPC by a user saying that it was not accurate, there were 9 opposing and 13 in support - this is not the required 2/3 of support for an image to be promoted, then User:PS2pcGAMER thankfully left this comment on my user talk page saying that my actions were right and their was no consensus to promote the image. Could an admin please look at this FPC and please comment on whether my decision of not to promote was right, I believe it was because their were 14 in support and 8 oppose, so could an admin please look at that. I have reviewed several article and failed some and passed one or two for GA status, I then got this message just before saying that my judgement was not suitable and that I stop reviewing articles for GA status until I'm more experienced. I think these comments are unfair and it seems that when a user dis-agrees with a decision by another user they are just not assuming good faith, being uncivil and are bringing up things to use against the user, in this case it was the fact I'm new here, this kind of behaviour is nasty and it will put new users of editing here this is supposed to be a friendly community, you dont have to be an admin or a b'crat in order to make a good decision, whether your account is 2 days or 2000 days old it doesnt matter, as long as you know the policies. See the comments on my editor review as well, I contribute here often with this account and I'm being asked to slow down, you want people to contribute and when they do, you tell them to slow down. The Sunshine Man 11:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I looked around and found Wikipedia:Editor review/The Sunshine Man on which I think some sensible and useful comments have been made. In particular I'm concerned by your statement that you are "a regular closer of feature picture candidates". If you truly are a newcomer (and your first edit does seem to have been just seven days ago so I'll take your word for it), then you cannot possibly be a regular anything on Wikipedia yet. I also question whether you can have sufficient experience to know how to close featured picture candidates satisfactorily, and your recent experiences seem to bear this out.

So of course you should not be mistreated, and I'm sorry if that has happened. However I suggest that it will probably improve your experience of Wikipedia if you just slow down a bit. --Tony Sidaway 11:59, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

FPC is not a vote, and the threshold of promotion is 2/3 in favour. In this case, the arguments in favour of promotion are stronger than those who oppose. You do have some discretion, see for example Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Electron shells. As one of the major closers of FPC noms (before my elbow happened), I'd say you were wrong.

However as I cannot shoulder the burden, you have my approval to close FPCs. I don't see any other volunteers, and KFP is too absorbed with admin tasks. MER-C 12:06, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

With regards to this nomination on FPC, I count only 8 opposes, not 9. One was a combined oppose to a specific edit and a support for the original. Furthermore, it is not a hard and fast rule that 2/3 support is required as the discussion and reasons for support/opposition is also taken into account to better reach the consensus. This is why it was recommended that you participate in more elementary work on Wikipedia before diving into contentious and complicated Wiki Bureaucracy. Diliff | (Talk) (Contribs) 12:33, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

It was me that presumably triggered Sunshine Man's complaint when I left him some advice on his talk page, under the heading "Some friendly advice". I'm sorry that he took it the wrong way but perhaps that just reinforces the need for him to get involved in other areas before the administrative tasks. —Moondyne 13:19, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Moondyne's advice was politely delivered and IMO entirely valid. It rather bothers me that everyone is eternally quoting WP:CIVIL at each other, but we don't even have a WP:THICKSKINNED. We should, and this is a prime example of why. The problem here is not that an editor was uncivil, but that an editor is way too quick to take offense at friendly advice. Hesperian 13:23, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I left a message for this editor, hoping that he won't abandon the project. Basically, I encouraged him to get more experience editing articles before brancing out into other areas. We'll see if it makes any difference. Pastor David ^† 15:52, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Requesting block of malfunctioning bot

Scepbot is fixing double redirects, but not keeping anchors: [42] Another bot that fixes double redirects handles these properly. --NE2 12:04, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Moved to WP:AIV. --24.136.230.38 12:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I have blocked the bot until his owner fixes the problem. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 12:15, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. I cleaned up the missing anchors on the articles I noticed it on. --NE2 12:24, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Chris, Sceptre got caught by the autoblock. If this happens again, we probably all ought to remember to uncheck the autoblock flags! Guy (Help!) 13:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Incorrect replacement of "Portugese" with "Portuguese"

Hi, MetsBot replaced the word "Portugese" with "Portuguese" in the article "Richard Hakluyt". Unfortunately, in the context, "Portugese" is correct because that is how the word is spelled in a book title of 1609. How do I stop MetsBot (or other bots) from trying to "correct" this old-fashioned spelling? Cheers, Jacklee 12:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

People aren't supposed to be running fully automated spellbots, for this reason among others. Haukur 13:57, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That is true, I would be interested in seeing the the bot approval that allowed that. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 13:59, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Agree with Haukur. To answer the question, though, the first step is to contact the person involved, which I see you've done. If he's not responsive then is the time to seek admin intervention. That said, I'm curious about this so I will also ask him myself. --kingboyk 14:00, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't seem to even have spelling corrections listed as one of its activities. It's also a little strange because the owner says s/he's on wikibreak. Anchoress 14:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Note, Mets501's user talk page says "I am taking a wikibreak to get ready for upcoming exams." ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 14:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That's right. He'd respond to an email though, I'm sure. He's not totally away from Wikipedia, he's just busy. --kingboyk 14:07, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

But I think the point is, if s/he's on wikibreak, who's running the bot? Anchoress 14:24, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Meanwhile, would the bot be stopped from replacingthis word if it had an HTML comment stuck in the middle of it (so Port< !-- don't change this spelling -- >ugese or some such)?

Atlant 16:47, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I'll send an e-mail to User:Mets501 advising of this thread. Newyorkbrad 16:54, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Hey guys, sorry about the confusion; that was all 100% manual with AWB, I was just on my bot's account so as to not "litter" my contributions with mechanical edits; I would never run an automatic spell-checking bot. I responded more in full on my talk page. Again, sorry for the confusion! —METS501 (talk) 18:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Block evasion by Shaligramyadav

Two days ago, I reported this user for deleting text from the Nair article without discussion and making threats and personal attacks. He was blocked for 48 hours. He re-appeared yesterday as Harphool hooda and is making the exact same edits as before (see this versus this). Also, his contributions are being made only to the Nair article. This is exactly the same as the contributions made by Shaligramyadav (minus the one image and the attacks on my talk page). I think it seems rather evident that he is the same person. Do I still need to request a checkuser? The evidence seems pretty solid. The edits are exactly the same. --vi5in^[talk] 15:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help wanted in explaining rule on "unfree images of living people"

Hi. I need some help in communicating with User:Custodiet ipsos custodes about the used of an unfree image of a living person in Rend al-Rahim Francke. In a discussion that also involved an AFP image listed for deletion, I have been unable to explain him that there's a policy to follow that is more strict than fair use law (what I believe is his main misconception). As he's about to violate the WP:3RR, I believe reverting his action wouldn't be a helpful step on my part at this point.

Thanks in advance, --Abu badali ^(talk) 15:21, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

more...

He's now also doing that for Image:Morgan Tsvangirai.jpg in Morgan Tsvangirai [43]. --Abu badali ^(talk) 16:08, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I've commented on the images in question. In my view two of those are clearly replaceable, the other might be ok. I will leave him a note. Mangojuice^talk 16:21, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I've also commented, and raised the matter on the admin channel. I've raised the need to get a free image of Rend al-Rahim Francke on the talk page of the article, and tagged the image itself on the page so people reading the article will be aware of the pending deletion. I'll now go and have a little chat with User:Custodiet ipsos custodes . --Tony Sidaway 16:40, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalistic move and insertion of copyrighted material

User:Ckenniss has moved Decline of the Roman Empire to Decline of the French Empire. He has replaced most of the article text with what user:Stbalbach has observed seems to be a copyrighted text.[44]Ultramarine 17:19, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I moved it back - the server let me. I gave an "only warning" on the paqe, I hope it's enough. The Evil Spartan 17:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:Prester John

User:Prester John has been removing every mention of the word "God" in Islam-related articles, even when next to the word "Allah". Obviously, he wants whoever reads these article to believe Muslims believe in a god called Allah. See his contributions for more detail. He has even created a userbox entitled "Allah is Satan". People like this have no place in Wikipedia, people like this have a certain agenda that they wish to apply. I hope immediate action is taken regarding this user. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 17:47, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

See this as well. He has been warned too many times. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 17:50, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

I've asked the user to explain the "God" removals. We'll see what comes of that. Some of the userboxes may be T1. I've already taken User:Prester John/Userbox/Hate. ··coelacan 18:56, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

On second thought, User:Prester John/Userbox/Moman was only intended to inflame. I don't know why I didn't catch that the first time around. ··coelacan 20:51, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

May I suggest, if it's technically possible, looking very carefully through the history of articles this user has requested be speedied? I've noticed that the third of three ways listed on his talk page to "welcome new users" reads, "When a Liberal writes an article you may need something like this: {{db-author}}." He may be tagging things he doesn't like with spurious db tags in the hopes that admins won't look very carefully at the speedydelete request. --Dynaflow 21:00, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh Dynaflow, please look through my history to aleviate your fears. Klaksonn People may have a different opinion than yours that doesn't compromise their ability to edit in a "Wiki" fashion. There is no agenda. The referencein the incident you are refering to uses the quote "Allah". Why would we not use the phrase that is part of the reference? It is POV to render this to "God". There has much debate for over a thousand years as to if this is true. Many scholars conclude that Allah is in fact Satan, another POV, albiet the polar opposite POV. To avoid confusion or favoring one opinion over another, let's just use what the reference uses shall we? As per Wiki normal procedure. Prester John 00:57, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

P.S. Klaksonn. about being "warned too many times", I think you are refering to other past incidents, where I have actually complied with the final ruling. In great contrast to yourself I might add. Prester John 01:10, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

He is in violation of WP:MOSISLAM.--Kirby♥time 02:42, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Not true. Read it again. This time pay real hard attention to the phrase "unless used as part of a quote." Prester John 02:46, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

These edits were not inside quotes. ··coelacan 02:53, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

No. They are WP:OR. Prester John 03:40, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

To cut to the chase: you are engaging in tendentious editing and promotion of the notion that Allah is Satan. The word اﷲ translates to God in English, and there's no original research in that fact. If you continue to remove "God" from Muslim articles without gaining consensus on the articles' talk pages, I will block you to prevent further WP:POINT disruption. ··coelacan 03:49, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Wait. Your contention is that it violates WP:OR to equate the word "Allah" to the word "G-d"? Does that apply as a matter of linguistic schism, meaning that 'Dios' 'Dieu' 'Gott' and so on should be eliminated by the same rules, or as a matter of religious schism, meaning 'Ad-nai' and 'El-heynu' should be removed because they might not translate into 'G-d'? Your coments that 'Allah' is actually Satan suggest the latter. If so, how do we handle matters of Latin and Aramaic/Amharic words for 'Supreme being'? Do we go by chronological manifestation, or by 'this is the English wiki so use English'? ThuranX 04:19, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

What you are doing is very offensive to Arab Christians.--Kirby♥time 03:42, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Listen. Both of you. Here's what you are going to do. You are going to go and read, and cognitively understand, Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Islam-related articles). Once you have realised that these issues have been dealt with long before us, you will accept that all quotes (per general wiki procedure) and all WP:OR will be rendered as per wiki policy. Threats of blocking just do not cut it. Especially from admins. Prester John 04:01, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

This isn't going to be resolved until you understand that "Allah" is an Arabic word. Nobody in France prays to God. Neither does anyone in Germany. They pray to Dieu and Gott, respectively. It's the same fucking thing, except in a different language.--Kirby♥time 04:06, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Do you really think I don't know that "Allah" is an Arabic word? Like I said, This issue has been resolved in Wikipedia many times before us. Please read, Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Islam-related articles). In summarry If Allah is used in the quote we use Allah. Prester John 04:46, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

So then... [45] canbe explained how? ThuranX 04:51, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I read the MOS page on Islam-related articles, and I understand the quote exception to be intended to prevent tampering with text taken directly from sources (in line with common good journalistic practice). I do not read that to apply to all texts referencing the quote, which seems to be (and forgive me if I am mistaken) Prester John's assertion. I find the justification of the above edit as application of the no original research policy rather odd and would appreciate further explanation of this. What's more, I'm very unconvinced that simple transliteration of "Allah" into "God" is at all a contentious editorial decision. I'd like to point out that Christianity does not own the word "God", even the capitalized form. -- mattb 05:09, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Please see this [46]. A greater attempt to offend a class of people I have not encountered. Prester John 05:26, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Should a person like him be allowed to edit this encyclopedia? ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 19:38, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Why not? It's our model and we are incredibly lenient in most issues. If he continuously violates consent then he can be blocked but a preemptive permanent ban is not something we do. For better or worse we are very liberal in that regard and many users who probably hurt article quality are allowed to edit but 'kept in check'. I would say attempts to provoke are very unhelpful... but, that's life on our little Wikipedia. And that's not good. Even when Prester is making good edits such as his recent cleanups on Sahaba from (R) and Prophet attacks his edit summaries are "dream on", "yeah yeah yeah", and "wikify". Removing "Prophet" is not wikifying... you should be clear in your edit summaries especially when you're doing useful work. gren グレン 04:34, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

His edits are disturbing, I'm surprised no one has suggested that someone who says "Allah is Satan" should be banned from editing. Some are even defending him. What a shame. ^Klak_Sonn^Talk 18:31, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

From the main page: "Welcome to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit." It doesn't say "anyone who agrees with our point of view". We don't require people to subscribe to our own idealogies as long as they can play by our rules. The problem isn't the existence of different, even diametrically opposing, viewpoints, but rather when editors' expressing those viewpoints becomes disruptive somehow. -- mattb 19:47, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

You can HOLD personal ideas diametrically opposed to anyone. YOu may not hand them out on wikipedia; especially contentious and extreme minority views like 'Islam is really Satanism', which is what was being done. Policy was clearly cited here, and should be enforced. So long as he stops with ridiculous agenda edits, he can edit freely, within our rules. Remember, Wikipedia's rules are more like those of the High School Debate team than those of a Revolution. Free as in beer, not free as in speech. I love that adage-set.ThuranX 23:34, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Children of Curpsbot

Curps (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves • rights) (now retired) created a multi-function adminbot starting circa September 2005. The most well known function of this bot was to watch for pagemove style vandalism and counter it by issuing rapid blocks. In doing so, Curps countered a major problem Wikipedia was having at that time, and this use of his bot was widely endorsed and openly celebrated. However, Curps's bot did not stop there and he also added functions to counter vandalism with reversions and blocks and to block newly registered accounts with questionable names like Mr.AssShitHead. These later functions, which Curps never publicly explained in detail, were more controversial. In particular, many criticized him for using the vague statement "user..." in issuing username blocks and not clearly identifying which actions were being done by a robot versus which actions were being performed manually. Even back then, engaging in these sorts of actions with little discussion or approval was not really in keeping with the spirit of the bot policy. Curps retired in July 2006.

However, unknown to everyone (as far as I can tell), is that two other admins had secretly started running Curpsbot derivatives before Curps's retirement. On the plus side, this meant that page move vandalism was still protected against. On the negative side, these bots continued issuing username blocks and engaging in other activities (like vandalism reversion) without being identified as bots, or being acknowledged/discussed by the community. I only realized what was going on after reviewing Wikipedia log data. In each case the bot has been modified and evolved from the original Curpsbot design. For example, in one case the annoying "user..." summary was eliminated, and in another case the operator apparently scaled back the level of antivandal activities. However, I consider the log evidence incontrovertible that two admins have run Curpsbot derived adminbots for large stretches of more than a year.

That is until recently. One of these two admins has recently announced his retirement. The other has apparently disabled most (all?) of the adminbot's functions during the last few months (possibly deliberately, possibly because Mediawiki changes caused those functions to stop working, and possibly because I told him I was going to start this discussion). Given that the bots are now largely inactive, I am going to refrain (for now) from revealing the two admins in question. Rather than trying to lynch the specific operators of these bots, I'd rather have a discussion about adminbots in general and Curpsbot functionality in particular (there are plenty of examples from Curps' logs). Are these acceptable activities for bots to run, and if so how should they be discussed and approved? What should happen to adminbots run in secret (p.s. these two are not the only bots in the logs)? If we are going to give more than lip service to the notion that bots need to be approved, we would need to both send a clear signal that secret bots are not okay, and provide a viable forum for handling these issue. (I think the amount of hassle and unnecessary overhead created by past adminbot debates largely encourages such activities to be run in secret.) Dragons flight 02:51, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Betacommand is the most recent discusion that had some discussion on the use of semi-automated tools that users with administrators powers used. hbdragon88 03:02, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The community seems unwilling to discuss the idea of an admin bot without resorting to hysteria, so it is possible that these admins had to ignore the rules to improve Wikipedia. I cannot be sure without looking at the log evidence itself. Is there any particular action that seemed incorrect? ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 03:08, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

There are a few examples of things I would consider mistakes. Things analogous to blocking "ThePenIsMighter" because the bot saw "penis", come to mind, but the problems I saw were quite rare (probably less than 1% of actions). Also, it is worth noting that if adminbots can run from many months without drawing attention to themselves, then they clearly aren't doing much harm. If I thought they were harmful, I would have blocked them already and the above would have been a much different post. Dragons flight 03:53, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

(I'm hoping that I'm inserting this into the proper branch of this discussion.) The situation that led to the ArbCom discussion about Betacommand grew out of the fact that Betacommand never uswefully responded to concerns about his automated edits. I mention this only to point out the lesson there for anyone wanting to run an AdminBot: explain yourself often & completely -- & be willing to admit mistakes & be overruled from time to time. Do that, & I expect opposition to AdminBots would decline. -- llywrch 21:41, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• I don't like the idea of adminbots, and I like the idea of secret adminbots even less. If these were autonomously blocking people, we need to come down on it hard, to prevent a recurrence in the future. The operators should both lose whatever bot flags they have, and also their seats on the BAG (if they have them), at a minimum. As for the other stuff, it's hard to discuss acceptable degrees of functionality without knowing exactly which tasks the modified bots were performing. Can you provide a list? -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 03:21, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

My feeling is that (pending community consensus otherwise) admins should not be using fully automated bots. I have no problem with admins using scripts and semi-bots to expedite deletions and so forth as long as each action requires a final manual confirmation, and with the understanding that if the admins screws up by confirming things he shouldn't have (using bad judgement in other words) he can't blame it on bad bot code or something, but has to take full responsibility. Thatcher131 03:30, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Here is the problem though, if we outright bad the legitimate uses of adminbots (there are a few places they could help), then people are going to feel strongly enough and run them "underground". The only way to stop illegal adminbots, is to legalize some, and provide restrictions. It should increase quality, since the code will be reviewed. It reminds me of Prohibition, where people would drink alcohol regardless of legality, and the lack of standards in the illegal distilleries made for toxic concoctions. Prodego ^talk 03:36, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

That analogy's not great, since people here feel more strongly (and uniformly) against adminbots than the average US citizen did against booze. Given that this is the case, we also have an option that wasn't open to the US Gov't regarding alcohol sales: extremely draconian penalties for violators. If it were public knowledge that anyone running an unauthorized adminbot would be desysopped (if appropriate), permanently lose the approval to run bots of any sort, and pick up a lengthy block (i.e. several months at a minimum), I doubt we'd have much problem. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 04:36, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

And that would be a very ridiculous response to actions that were A) intended to improve the encyclopedia and B) did improve the encyclopedia. Whatever else I may believe, I certainly wouldn't stomach giving out months long blocks unless someone's actions were actually shown to be harmful. Dragons flight 04:51, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

You don't think that ignoring policy and running an unauthorized bot would do harm to the encyclopedia, or that people can inadvertently cause problems while intending to improve the encyclopedia? For example, if there's an admin running an unauthorized bot that blocks bad usernames, and the bot gets a screw loose and blocks a big run of reasonable names for valid contributors, how would that not damage the project? It'd damage our credibility, it'd bite newbies, it'd drive away good contributors... the list goes on and on. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 13:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Blocking an editor for months because their bot might have problems and go on a rampage is a lot different than blocking someone because they did go on a rampage. Dragons flight 14:08, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

You'd be blocking them for a month for betraying the community's trust and doing an end-run around the processes designed to regulate a very controversial area of the site. In that sense, blocking for what the bot might do is much better than blocking for what the bot did, since it's preventative rather than punitive (insofar as someone who got caught with an unauthorized, malfunctioning adminbot is extremely unlikely to have any positions of authority to abuse in the future). -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 15:04, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The bottom line, as far as I'm concerned, is that process and transparency matter. If an admin wants to improve the encyclopedia, he has lots of ways to do so that don't involve breaking the rules and violating the community's trust. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 13:37, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

This strikes me as being in no way an AN/I issue, and should be brought to a wider audience if possible. A number of compromise suggestions have been proposed in previous "adminbot" requests, such as strictly limiting the number of sysop tools the bot had, and providing some sort of throttle/panic button for admins in case the bot goes rogue. Overall, though, I have to wonder (emotionally, not logically) if the recent wave of compromised administrative accounts will make people less likely to support adminbots in the future. There's a wide latitude of valid opinions between "I for one welcome our new robot overlords" and Skynet-related hysteria, and dismissing it all or arrogating decision to a subset of users seems counter to Wikipedia tradition. I in no way endorse the use of unauthorized adminbots though; if we need more admins to provide these 'automatic' functions, we should be trying to promote them, until such time as the Turing test is met. -- nae'blis 03:50, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

It's an incident regarding admin privileges. For the record, as well, I prefer to edit-summary my username blocks as User... in a tribute to curpsbot. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 05:51, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• pops head out of locked room labeled 'work'* Many of you likely do not know me, some of you may... my feeling on the whole issue regarding this is that there are some functions which are legit. Auto-unprotecting and protecting pages, or performing page moves for certain reasons. I do have a suggestion on the whole matter of an adminbot: Since the majority of the functions require an administrator flag, any adminbot must publish its source code so that users who have an understanding of the code can interject when they see a potential problem with the code, as like any other OpenSource software. Anyway, that's my two bits on the issue. --AllyUnion (talk) 06:55, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

While I mostly agree with the above, there would also be some disadvantages to publishing the complete source code to a "Curps-like" bot. In particular, I believe part of the reason why Curps never made his bot code publicly available is that, if the vandals had known exactly what rules it used for detecting bad usernames and pagemove vandals, it would've been trivial for the vandals (at least some of whom were also using bots) to avoid them. After all, if you know the bot will block you if you make N page moves a minute, all you need to do is to program your vandalbot to make N-1 moves a minute instead.

That said, it would certainly be possible and reasonable to publish most of the source code, except for a few configuration details that need to be kept secret. There's an interesting analogy here: MediaWiki itself is, of course, open source. However, MediaWiki contains a little-known feature that prevents anyone from saving any page that matches a certain regex. This regex is specified in the site configuration file, which, on Wikimedia wikis at least, is most definitely not public information.

Of course, my personal opinion on adminbots in general, which I've stated before, is that it shouldn't matter how you do your edits or your admin actions — what matter are the results. If I block an account named JimboWalesFucksLittleBoys, who cares if I do it with a bot, with a script or entirely by hand? Conversely, if I go and block Jimbo himself for no good reason, or do something equally silly like deleting the Main Page, I expect to be blocked and desysopped for it — to prevent further damage — just the same regardless of whether the immediate act was done by a bot or by my own fingers.

I don't run any bots myself, nor have I ever, though I did think about setting one up once. (I ended up patching MediaWiki instead to prevent the problems the bot would've been watching out for.) I have, though, written and used a lot of user scripts, including some for doing semi-automated admin tasks. In any case, I'd consider myself equally responsible for my actions whether I did them manually or with the help of a bot or a script. After all, I'm the one who made the script do those actions. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 17:51, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• This situation isn't nearly as bad as some people think. There was an RFA nom for an admin bot about a month ago that would have passed if it were not withdrawn just before the ending date. There was some hysterics, but not much, and overall the community accepted the idea. The main quibble is that people wanted the bot to be open source. >Radiant< 10:01, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• ProtectionBot was needed to solve a major problem at the time and its task was relatively uncontroversial. I don't think we can expect to enjoy the same level of support for an evil fair use-deleting bot, or rampaging proxy-blocking bot. – Steel 12:13, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Try it. Do not a priori assume that the community will reject it. Do not base that assumption on incorrect evidence. Try it. >Radiant< 13:23, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I maintain that adminbots are The Way Forward and the quicker we get rid of this ridiculous, irrational skynet-type hysteria the better. If admins have to run bots in secret until then, so be it. Philosophical objections along the lines of "I just don't like adminbots" are equally unhelpful. – Steel 12:13, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

There is not, nor has there ever been, such a creature as a "Curpsbot derivative". —freak(talk) 22:00, May. 8, 2007 (UTC)

Time to let the cat out of the bag: One of these admins is Misza13, who issues username blocks not even a second after the username is registered. I do not know whom the other one is. Dekoibi 21:54, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

No big secret - all VCN members who hang out on IRC are aware of its presence. Somehow, there were no complaints (vandals excluded) about it since it started operating (Oct '06). Thus, I see no reason to change the status quo, as on the occasions of username vandalbot attacks it decreases fellow admins' workload significantly (it watches over pagemove vandals too). Миша13 14:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That's unfortunate, and I view it as a serious violation of trust based on policy and precedent. Since you have made yourself available for voluntary recall, please see your talk page. -- nae'blis 20:35, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, Misza13 (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves • rights) runs a blocking and deletion bot. No, he is not one of the two I was talking about above. Dragons flight 15:34, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

See relatd discussion at WP:AN#User name blocks. DES ^(talk) 21:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Suggestion for enhanced Admin identification and security

I was wondering if it would be possible to set up some sort of secure secondary identification system for Admins (and perhaps all users). This would be similar to what bank and credit card sites do now (i.e. require answer(s) to some random question(s) or just a secondary password).

The purpose of these secondary IDs would be two-fold. First, they would allow compromised account holders to reliably identify themselves in some manner (again the technical details are vague, but perhaps a secure page where they could login and have some confirmation produced on satifactorily answering a question or two). Second, perhaps this could be used to further protect the Main Page, announcements that go at the top of all pages, and other WP:BEANS items I have no idea about (so before you deleted the Main Page or added something to every page as a banner or blocked Jimbo, you would have to enter a second password unique to yourself).

The secondary ID would not be needed for routine edits or routine admin functions, just those that could really screw up the encyclopedia. It could also have much more stringent failed attempt limits to thwart brute force attempts to crack it (two or three wrong tries to log in and you are blocked for an hour or a day). I hope this idea is helpful, Ruhrfisch 15:44, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

PGP key signing would be a pretty good way to do it. --Cyde Weys 16:03, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

see the next heading, Cyde -- Avi 16:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Admins (or any users) with PGP keys

Perhaps those of use with PGP or GPG keys should at the very least engage in encrypted challenge-responses with some subset of each other, and even if we do not sign each others' keys, we WOULD have a method of confirming a user's ID, even after comprimisation, by using their key to verify themselves from any address. -- Avi 15:51, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm communicating with Avi right now; anyone else? --Cyde Weys 16:43, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I actually performed an encrypted challenge-response with Alphax, but then I changed my e-mail address and decided to generate a new key instead of changing the ID on the old key for various reasons, so this new key does not have his signature, but he is open to the idea. Then again, he has not contributed in months. I hope everything is OK. -- Avi 16:53, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

My PGP key has been sat on a subpage since I started editing. This would seem to me to be proof enough that it belongs to me. As long as it's uploaded or properly identified by the account before the account is compromised it should be good enough. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 17:38, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

If Avi shows me his passport, I'll sign his key. :-) Wikimania 2005 had a keysigning.The keysigning session at wikimania 2006 didn't happen, because the person who was supposed to organise it bugged out at the last moment. Can we have a keysigning in Taipei this year? Or someone already submitted a proposal? (Submissions 'till May 15 :-) ) --Kim Bruning 16:58, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

No way I can make it to Tapei, Kim. Sorry :( If you care to drop by the middle atlantic states of the east coast of the US in the near future, maybe we can arrange something . -- Avi 17:04, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

So how do we know that I am who I am so my key belongs to the person I say it belongs to, namely me? I've been looking for a reason to use GPG since it's so shiny. Luigi30 (Taλk) 17:40, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

That is why encrypted challenge-responses are a poor substitute to face-to-face meetings. Newer versions of GPG allow for a level of confidence in the signature--intentionally vague:

• 0 - No comment
• 1 - No verification
• 2 - Casual verification
• 3 - Extensive verification.

Compare how the levels are described here: http://www.linuxsecurity.com/content/view/121645/49 with http://www.aperiodic.net/phil/pgp/policy.html

While one would think that nothing beats face-to-face with government-issued ID's, some people would still only rate that a "2" and would require years of relationships (brother-sister/co-worker) to go 3. It is up to you to decide on a recognition/identification scheme if you cannot make a face-to-face, and then how much trust to give that. -- Avi 18:00, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Alternatively it is possible to have full trust (after proper email verification) that my key belongs to me and I am who I say I am. No passport required. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 18:20, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

If somebody could direct their fellow users to a crash course in how to use this PGP shit, this thread would be significantly more useful. —freak(talk) 18:04, May. 8, 2007 (UTC)

So... how do the people who only speak English ensure their security? :) – Riana_ऋ 19:50, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Our articles on Public-key cryptography topics might help. It goes something like this: Download GPG; generate a keypair (two related keys are created - a public key and a private key); keep the private key very private, and widely distribute the public key. When you want to prove you made a message you sign the message with your private key and others use your public key to authenticate the signature. It's impossible*¹²³ to discover a private key from a public key or a signature, and the private key is kept safe at home and is even password-protected, so you generally know that the person who uses the private key to sign a message is the owner of the public key. For example, I have published my public key in my userspace. Anyone signing a message with the matching private key is me. If my account is compromised and gets blocked and de-sysopped, I could make a new account and using a PGP-signed message ask for it to be immediately re-sysopped (subject to other approvals), having proved I am the same person who uploaded the public key, ie zzuuzz. But as Avi says, it won't prevent your account being compromised in the first place. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:36, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

This still doesn't make sense (to me at least). How are the public and private key connected and how do you use someone's public key to authenticate their private key? John Reaves (talk) 20:46, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

The public and private keys are mathematically related. If I have your public key, and you sign with your private key, even if I cannot tell WHAT your private key is, your public key responds to it, so if I trust that you are the owner and controller of the private key, I can safely feel that everything signed by your private key comes from you, and everything I encrypt to your public key can only be seen by you. -- Avi 21:23, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• I wouldn't mind signing a PGP key but I have next to zero experience with that. Radiant! 10:42, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Tony's quick-and-dirty Mediawiki key-signing method

This is easy and it'll at least help to prove that you are who you were when the key was signed.

1. Produce a GnuPG key pair.
2. Record a sound file containing the sound of your voice reading the fingerprin of the key pair.
3. Upload the sound file to Wikipedia, whilst logged in, and link to it from your user page.
4. Put the public key, ascii-armored, on the sound file's page or your user page or somewhere, whilst logged in.
5. Arrange to contact another Wikipedian by phone and read the signature to them,
6. If they agree that the voice on the phone is the same as the voice in the recording, they download your public key from Wikipedia, sign it and upload it.
7. You download the signed public key.

If at some point you need to confirm your identity, send email signed with the secret key. It can be confirmed against the public key. --Tony Sidaway 00:41, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Of course if you're already known and trusted by another Wikipedian whom you've met then you probably don't have to go through the pain of this, but it might be nice to sign your friends' keys and then offer to be the signer for people whom you don't know but are prepared to phone you and read a fingerprint at you. --Tony Sidaway 00:45, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Why not have all admins submit a public key when they pass their RfA? Then at the very least we know we have the same person we promoted. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 00:47, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] No magic bullet

The idea of using some type of key-trust network will not make any admin's account any more safe than it is. There is no substitute for a strong password. What this will allow us to do is verify the identities of wiki users. For example, let us say that my account gets compromised, and gets desysopped. How am I to prove that either 1) I have regainded control or 2) this brand-spanking new e-mail address is really Admin:Avraham? I can meet with someone (steward/Bcrat) in person and show my bona fides, or I can show knowledge that only Admin:Avraham would know. If I can show that I control a particular public key that someone already has checked and knows it belongs to Admin:Avraham, then that is pretty good proof (pun intended) that this new account is the Admin, and not a hacker, and sysop powers should be returned.

But there is absolutely no substitute for a strong password, unless we all go to RSA tokens (like some of us have at work) -- Avi 19:23, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

That is the point of uploading signatures, yes, so that you can recover the account once your account has been compromised. -- ReyBrujo 20:41, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Is there any other place on Wikipedia where this is being discussed? I'd like to go complain about the current 'log in with our special image to type thing.' I didnt screw up with an idiotic password like 'F*ckyou' or 'Iluvwiki'. If i'm going ot have to go through Maxwell Smart rigamarole to log in, why bother? ThuranX 03:10, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

The captcha only appears if you mistype your password once. If you input it correctly, the captcha won't appear. So, take it easy, this is not the end of the world. -- ReyBrujo 03:19, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

THe 'Captcha' hit me because in ligth of all this I CHANGED to a MROE secure password earlier today. I had an alphanumeric, but decided to go for a more complex, random pass earlier. Somehow, Wiki didn't accept it after all, so I had to use my old one. ANd I hit the captcha. IF the captcha's really only a new feature for the bounced attempts, it might be ok. but if that's going to be an every time occurance, I think WIki will lose a lot of people. ThuranX 03:24, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

All that is needed is a 1 hour lock-out after any 3 logon attemps from the same IP address are wrong (admin accounts only).--Dacium 02:55, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Committed identities

Somehow I missed this thread. A couple of days ago, I created Template:User committed identity, which helps you publish a SHA-1 commitment to your real-life identity, for exactly this type of situation. The nice thing here is there's no need for a key infrastructure, and it does what is probably needed in this circumstance. Mangojuice^talk 14:26, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Wikipedia admins are bastards" on this page?

Maybe it's Happy Hour, but did anyone else just see this in 50-point red font at the top of this page in the last ~8 minutes? Can't find it in the page history or MediaWiki recent changes, but I'm not looking too hard yet, seems to have been transient... -- nae'blis 22:28, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

• It's obviously in some transcluded template somewheres - Alison ☺ 22:37, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

That would be an edit by User:Jesus the Tank Engine to {{quote}} a bit ago.[47] Looks like he just surfed the list of transcluded pages to find one that wasn't protected and vandalized that. --tjstrf talk 22:38, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

and vandalised again by sock, User:JttE. Blocked now & template semi'd (it's highly transcluded) - Alison ☺ 23:28, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Looking at the transclusion list, shouldn't nearly all those templates and subpages probably be at least semi-protected? We don't need anyone editing the /header page, for instance. --tjstrf talk 23:40, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Incorrect, I had a reson to edit it last week, and did that edit. -M^ask? 22:14, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Were sources provided? (SEWilco 23:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC))

Do you have to source common sense? _{just kidding don't ban me}--Dacium 02:53, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help with autoblock caused by DavidYork71 sock.

I was looking through CAT:RFU and I came upon PalawanOz (talk · contribs) who has been caught by an autoblock of a sock of DavidYork71. I see no connection between PalawanOZ and typical DavidYork behavior, and in fact PalawanOz predates DavidYork et. al. by 7-8 months, so I was prepared to lift the autoblock. But I see that the blocking admin, Orderinchaos has caused 2 autoblocks based off this sock. Bearing in mind that DavidYork is a notorious puppeteer, I am very wary of releasing the wrong autoblock. Is there any way to find out which autoblock is causing trouble? Am I off-base here? WP:AUTOBLOCK describes the problem well but I've never seen a good page explaining how and when to lift autoblocks. —dgies^t_c 04:38, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

This one might need a checkuser. While autoblocks will affect innocent users of ISPs with dynamic IP addresses (like AOL or some Optus numbers), this IP appears to be assigned to the Australian Dept of Defense, and seeing several Wikipedians innocently sharing that IP seems a bit ususual. Thatcher131 05:30, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Well it could just be a firewall/proxy situation. As far as I can tell PalawanOz has never gotten into trouble to it seems a bit strange they would have created a bunch of socks to edit on completely different topics. Usually people get blocked, then make socks. —dgies^t_c 05:52, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, probably just ordinary collateral damage then. Thatcher131 01:21, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Petty stalking by User:Orangemonster2k1

Orangemonster2k1 (talk · contribs), an editor with a history of poor impulse control (and a recent block for same) and of stalking my edits has, once again, a bug up his butt, insisting on edit-warring over my bog-standard removal of a vanity edit from Corbin, Kentucky. It's pretty clear to me that he's not even reading what he's reverting nor that he actually cares about the content: it's yet another opportunity for his months-long petty little vendetta (which he has been cautioned about), and frankly I've had enough of this nonsense. His normal M.O. is to do bad things, get called on them, and then make faux-sincere apologies. A few weeks go by, and then it’s rinse lather repeat. If someone could have a word with him to get him to actually stop doing it, period/full-stop, I’d be grateful. --Calton | Talk 06:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Since he was recently blocked for 48 hours for exactly this, I've blocked him for 72 hours. Raul654 06:26, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. Hopefully that will be taken as a message that will actually sink in. --Calton | Talk 08:20, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Orangemonster2k1's unblock request is not giving me a lot of faith that he understands what's going on. Given his history of resuming bad habits after blocks expire, could someone re-emphasize the point of the message to (hopefully) prevent a recurrence of this situation? --Calton | Talk 02:32, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bob2042

Seems to be a single-purpose account for a schoolkid mucking around. Promotion of the nonsense word "bagoscary" everywhere....[48] [49] [50] [51] Saying I am leaving bagoscary...[52] [53] and of course... the old your mum joke.[54] Would be pretty funny if he wasn't disrupting Wikipedia so much. --Kzrulzuall ^{Talk• Contribs} 10:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Alleged cyberstalking at Suzanne Shell

69.20.127.250 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log), who says she is the subject of the article Suzanne Shell, says she is being followed and harrassed by the holder of the account Wisemanstudios (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) in this edit [55] (to the main article page!). Wisemanstudios was warned and blocked for revert-warring and linkspamming in that article a day or two ago, trying to add a link hostile to the article subject to that same article. 69.20.127.250 has apparently gone and directly confronted Wisemanstudios directly on his talk page. Personal attacks are flying, and I have a feeling legal threats are right around the corner. Can a sysop or someone else entitled to the power of the banning bat take this one over? --Dynaflow babble 10:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The can of worms seems to be opening: User talk:Wisemanstudios#Wisemanstudios is using Wiki to stalk Suzanne Shell. They're probably both going to end up needing to be indef blocked before this is over. [EDIT:] I spoke too soon. These are different users attacking Wisemanstudios on Suzanne Shell's behalf: Dsshell (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) and 65.185.137.147 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log). Hmmmm... --Dynaflow babble 11:07, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Semi-off-topic, but User:Wisemanstudios should probably be blocked under WP:U, since it probably qualifies as a promotional username (referring to Wiseman Music Studios). -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 15:28, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I reported that username to WP:UAA when I warned him for linkspamming. I assume the admin who reviewed it didn't think warranted blocking on WP:U grounds. --Dynaflow babble 18:28, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Ms. Shell has denied editing her own article, and there is an IP claiming to be her: 69.20.127.250. I suspect the latter to be User:Wisemanstudios, given the edit here (read the very last sentence). 65.185.137.147 is claiming to be an associate of Suzanne here. This is turning into a mess... Veinor ^{(talk to me)} 16:16, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Also see Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Dsshell. Veinor ^{(talk to me)} 16:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That's what I get for skimming. Going by timestamps, it looks like user Dsshell left a complaint at at Wisemanstudios, and then somebody who might be someone's IP sockpuppet copy-and-pasted the complaint, verbatim, into the article, with the added line at the end about attacking 15 year olds. The other IP left a message on its talk page for Venior [56] saying that vandalism to article KPNX is the work of Wiseman studios. The first IP has a lot of vandalizing edits to that article. --Dynaflow babble 17:34, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

From the checkuser case: Confirmed. Wisemanstudios = 66.233.207.183. Voice-of-All 17:53, 10 May 2007 (UTC) . . . so who the hell is 69.20.127.250? The IP matched with Wiseman studios was doing things like this: [57], which seems to be in character, but that doesn't explain what's up with the other IP. --Dynaflow babble 18:08, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That IP was autoblocked eventually as being used by Wiseman: see this. Which presents another conundrum: how was that IP able to edit another IP's talk page and other edits while Wisemanstudios was supposedly blocked (originally on 22:50 May 9)?I am stupid, nowhere does the autoblock say it was that IP. I must be going quackers. Veinor ^{(talk to me)} 19:08, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

69.20.127.250 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) just contacted me at my userpage to express his suspicions about who 69.20.127.250 is -- and then apparently realized his mistake: [58] and then [59]. As Homer Simpson would say, "Doh!" That IP has just pretty much admitted it's an impersonator, and we can presume it's also a sock. Block with prejudice. --Dynaflow babble 19:58, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Yup: quacks like a sock. --Dynaflow babble 20:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Should this thread be copy-pasted to the Talk page of the article in question so, in case this happens again, whoever has to handle it won't have to start from scratch? --Dynaflow babble 21:04, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you all for helping Suzanne like this. I have been 65.185.137.147 in this matter beforehand. I have finally created my own login account as MMHen-I had never tried using Wikipedia to a large extent like this before-this was my first foray into this encyclopedic world, and it was to help Suzanne! This guy has been a thorn in our sides for going on two years-there are more than just us he has attacked.MMHen 21:14, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:IStalkNeldav

Blocked as username violation. ~Crazytales (argumentum ad infinitum) 01:14, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi, can someone please block this user, as he is claiming to "see me" on my talkpage. Also he is clearly potentialy trying to stalk me as you can see from my username. Neldav 14:43, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

It was done a few hours ago, as a breach of WP:USERNAME. --Dweller 14:46, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Brown wikilinks

Whats up with this? Is this vandalism by a compromised admin account? -- Cat ^chi? 15:28, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

And why only some wikilinks? -FisherQueen (Talk) 15:36, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Ther is a discussion on the technical section of the pump. It seems to ahve to do with links labeled with "class=stub" and the css settings for that class. DES ^(talk) 15:38, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Whatever it is, it's ****ing irritating. Changing the stub threshold doesn't seem to make any difference — iridescenti (talk to me!) 16:01, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Has been fixed, I believe. Carcharoth 17:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes. That was my fault. Sorry. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 18:47, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Personal Attacks after Final Warning

Dedman-88 (talk · contribs) - Posts personal attacks on his talk page (diff [60]) after being politely asked (and given final warning) to stop vandalizing Wikipedia. Suggest short block. Yankees76 17:47, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

He seems to have stopped. I'll decline to block, but others may differ. howcheng {chat} 18:09, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

His last two edits. [61] and [62] - one a random date change, the other a personal attack. Both today. Yankees76 18:22, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

48 hour block. If he keeps it up (or he changes my comment), I'll bump it up to a week or indefinite (depending on my mood). We've got better things to do than deal with people who have no interest in building an encyclopedia. EVula // talk // ☯ // 18:29, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh what good times were had by yours truly. User has had their block bumped up to indefinite, their talk page is now locked down, and I got a couple of new additions to my list. Wheeeeeeeeeee! EVula // talk // ☯ // 22:18, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Wow - it's amazing how some people teter on the brink of being uncivil and then just lose it. Sorry to drag you into this, but thanks for the help! Yankees76 22:39, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalising my User page

User: Suplex66 keeps vandalising my talk and user page. I would really appreciate some help. You can see the vandalisms in the page history. Thanks, Kris 19:12, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Have warned about personal attacks. If they do it again, take to WP:AIV. —dgies^t_c 19:19, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, thanks! Kris 19:21, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I've blocked him for 48 hours. Didn't realize that Dgies was simultaneously trying to resolve the issue.--Jersey Devil 19:29, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Repeated posting of junk information by 69.140.218.130

Normally I would have requested a block outright, but I was not certain if this qualfies as outright vandalism. The user of this IP has a long history of posting unsourced information of a malicious nature, in particular to Elliot in the Morning and WWDC-FM. This person has ignored all warnings and indeed all communication, seemly focused on their goal regardless of editors attempts at negotiation. The IP address appears to belong to a single person as well. Ideally I think they should be blocked.Legitimus 19:48, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] DVD key in signature

Maurauth is using the DVD key in his signature; see User:Maurauth/09/ and following pages. They were marked for speedy deletion, and I have deleted them. Now he re-created them, and complained about their deletion on my talk page. What do you think is the proper course of action? Should the pages be deleted again? - Mike Rosoft 20:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Yup, and if he recreates them after that, block him. This has little to do with the key itself and everything to do with violations of WP:USER and being purposefully disruptive. --Cyde Weys 20:49, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I noticed this also on my new user page patrol. I concur with the sentiment to delete these pages, which are in existence as I write. 129.98.212.73 20:59, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

It would be nice if you actually informed people that you were talking about them an their actions when you say things, and not have multiple people saying different things. In no way is it disruptive, and why are they being deleted, the foundation says they have no views on removing the key from wikipedia. ≈ Maurauth ^(09F9) 21:54, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

At best, it'd be like a fair use image: you can possibly justify using it on the article in question and only the article in question. But there's no legitimate use for it in userspace, and putting it in userspace is nothing but intentional disruption. --Cyde Weys 22:02, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Um, I just want to tell you that other admins have disagreed with removal of key from user pages... I fear linking the specific times i pointed it out for because I fear of war wheeling. But yea, I personally know userpages that have the key. So... this isn't really a settled issue. MrMacMan ^Talk 00:49, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Again, how is it disruptive in any way? ≈ Maurauth ^(09F9) 22:06, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

• You're violating WP:POINT by being purposely disruptive. After all, if it wasn't that number (cue loud organ music), you wouldn't be using it, would you? It's like Cyde said. Using it on the article in question could possibly constitute fair use. Using it in your signature is just being being a bit dickish about it. As much as we are a bastion of free information and so on, Wikipedia is not the place to stick it to the Copyright Man. Do that on your own server. ♠PMC♠ 23:38, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bobby Sands

Compromised reached on the article's talk page gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 22:26, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi all! I've recently been engaged in a dispute with two editors, One Night In Hackney and Mr. Blacketer over their disruption of Wikipedia, specifically the Bobby Sands article, because they are upset about the way the category functions and the edits made by a banned user. I understand their desire to undo a banned users edits, but they are now edit warring with me on the subject of Bobby Sands' inclusion in the Irish Catholics category. This category has no stringent requirements and includes people like Colin Farrell, Pierce Brosnan, Bertie Ahern, and Oscar Wilde. In addition Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#By_gender.2C_religion.2C_race_or_ethnicity.2C_and_sexuality states that the Wikipedia also supports categorizing People by religion and People by race or ethnicity. The parent category, simply entitled "Roman Catholics" suggests guidance, which asks before adding an article to this category or subcategory, please consider whether the person's religious beliefs or participation in the Roman Catholic Church are significant to the reasons why that person is notable. For those unaware of who Bobby Sands is, he is a Catholic IRA Volunteer that was elected to parliament while on a hunger strike during the period colloquially known as "the Troubles" in Ireland. He died on the hunger strike and has had an enormous impact on the Republican movement. Given the immense sectarian division that permeated the social and political climate of the time, it's obvious that his being a Catholic is significant to the reasons he's notable. I provided a source from Gerry Adams that stated that the whole reason why Sands got involved in the civil rights and republican movement was due to the Catholic oppression he, his family, and his mates endured while growing up in the north. I've pointed all of this out to both fellows on the talk page and they keep insisting that the category should be excluded. I actually violated the 3RR rule trying to keep their "pointed" edits from infecting the article (I reverted myself after realising this), and am asking for some help and/or advice in dealing with this situation. Thanks in advance! gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 21:00, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

As I've said, the edits by a banned user are not relevant to this article, the category was not added by the editor. As myself and Sam (an administrator) have repeatedly pointed out, the criteria for inclusion in the "Roman Catholics" category and sub-categories are narrowly defined. For further information see here, here and the article's talk page. I've repeatedly asked for a source that shows Sands was notable for his religion, and none has been forthcoming, just blind reverts. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 21:04, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, as he's done in the past, ONIH is giving a skewed interpretation of the events. I've tried repeatedly to engage in discussion with this fellow (just look at the talk page to see all the green signatures, hehe), and he's been unwilling to adhere to our community guidelines and precedences. As mentioned several times now, I've provided proper sourcing for this in the form of Gerry Adams' The Life and Times of Bobby Sands. gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 21:14, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

This is just another baseless attack by me from this administrator. For further evidence of this, see the debacle on the Gerry Adams talk page due to the whitewashing of the article, and removal of reliably sourced content. This is nothing more than a content dispute, and the re-insertion of the disputed category is equally as pointy if your standard is to be applied. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 21:17, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, the Gerry Adams silliness is another example of your unwillingness to adhere to our community guidelines, policies, and precedences. Cheers for bringing that up. gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 21:19, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That would be why every editor (including uninvolved neutral ones) disagrees with your whitewashing, and breaching of WP:NPOV? One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 21:21, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Mate, that hasn't happened, hehe. You can't just make these outlandish claims... in any case, setting that snarkiness aside for a moment, can we get back to the issue at hand, which is that Bobby Sands warrants inclusion in this category per the proper sources, the community precedents, and the suggestion on the category page? gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 21:26, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Before a disputed category is re-added there should be a clear, sourced statement in the article that the subject belongs in the category. I don't see where in the article it states that the subject was a Roman Catholic. -Will Beback · † · 21:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

As you can see, I've provided a source outlining that the whole reason why he became involved in the civil rights and republican movement is because of the Catholic prejudice he and his family felt by the RUC when he was growing up in the north. gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 21:35, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Looks like a content dispute, other than your 3rr violation. It would be nice if you would avoid calling other people disruptive just because they disagree with you. Also avoid reverting their edits with summaries that say "rv silliness," especially if you are violating 3rr with it. It's not the other guy that looks silly in that case. Frise 21:37, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I went there and offered a suggestion. I'll look in on it. ThuranX 22:08, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your input ThuranX. It should also be said that while this is still under discussion, making another revert just an hour after the 24 hour limit isn't particularly helpful.Gah One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 22:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Erm... if you'll look closely, that edit and the accompanying talk page post was an attempt at a compromise. gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 22:14, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

(EC)I looked at that, and I have to say, I like his source more than the previous, but ONLY because the other is so poorly formatted. If there's a revert on his edit, and i'm not saying there SHOULD be, it ought to be accompanied by the 'ref name' editing of the source so as to eliminate text saying 'ibid', which is really a sort of dangling participle or hanging chad of a cite, done like that. That said, is there anyone in the project who can access both sources and compare the citations for accuracy and sugestions? And yes, starting an edit war is bad. I'm not sure he's doing that, but I can see how it might look that way. ThuranX 22:15, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Personal attacks

(See also This ThuranX 21:55, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I've had enough: Last week user Gon4Z told me on my talk page:

• "its all crap you stright out deleted everything just because you are an anti Albanian dont mean you ahve to go around spreading propaganda you so called contribution of deeting articles are not wealcomed" Gon4z 19:54, 2 May 2007 (UTC) * "ok I suggest that unless you have a real contribution you should not edit the article.... tahnk you" (unsigned)
• "you are delusional" Gon4z 15:46, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Today he added:

• "it is you who is posting propaganda here for some reason, many you might be a Serb or Greek and have some sort of hatred towards Albanians so your claim of $10 billion is if I may frankly say God dam retarded, you’re not a very good propagandist all other sources state Albania’s economy at least $20 billion" here
• and on my talk page: "Naclardo it is clear that you have no knowledge when it come to the military of Albania ... you have something against the Albanian people so you like to vandalize the articles ... you’re a newbie so I can see you are not very familiar so here is something you can read to help you get familiarized with wikipedia ... No one seemed to have welcomed you. Only picking fights with you you are a newbie, hence be patient and don’t give up eventually you will learn everything you need to be a good editor Gon4z 17:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)"

First: I've over a thousand edits on the English Wikipedia, the same on the German Wikipedia and more on the Italian, French and Dutch Wikipedia. Only today I contributed all this:

• 1 Alpini Regiment
• 2 Alpini Regiment
• 3 Alpini Regiment
• 4 Alpini Regiment
• 5 Alpini Regiment

(plus: I began another 13 articles in my new projects: Articles about all the Alpini units]]

Second, why is Gon4z insulting me? Because I pointed out that his figure of Albanian GDP of "$35-50 billion" is way out with the World Bank $9.033 Billion and the IMF's number: [[63]] This user has a long history of vandalism, insulting other users and posting greatly inflated numbers when t comes to Albania. All the articles I worked on have also been reverted by him. This matter needs an administrator’s attention now! noclador 21:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I've blocked the user for 48 hours for WP:NPA violations.--Jersey Devil 22:41, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mass blankings of a series of articles

• Ned Scott (talk · contribs)
• Juhachi (talk · contribs)

User:Ned Scott and User:Juhachi have been mass blanking articles relevant to Air (visual novel) citing WP:FICT and WP:EPISODE. All episode and character (including the main characters) articles have been blanked and converted into redirects allegedly "merged" into two lists. A lot of the article content is not available in these lists. When reverted by another user they reblanked the pages requiring a discussion even though there had been no discussion to delete/blank fictional-character-article or episode-article in the first place.

This disruption is creating orphaned fair-use images as well as removing article content.

I feel such mass blanking borderlines vandalism if not crosses it.

-- Cat ^chi? 22:26, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I would assume good faith on their parts, but if its true they're doing this without discussion, they should at least allow some input from other Wikipedians before they unilaterally make a decision, regardless of what the guidelines say. —Dark•Shikari^[T] 22:28, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, okay, look, many of these articles have very little content on them and were stubs since their creation last June. Is it Wikipedia policy to create stub articles and then just leave them there to reflect an effort that died off soon after it was started by Cool Cat himself?--十八 22:37, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Most of our articles are stubs. Consider provinces of Tibet or Iran. Some articles on "countries" have very little info. I withdraw the "vandalism review" warning since the users are trying to talk. I would however welcome anyone to get involved in this discussion. -- Cat ^chi? 22:42, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, now for another issue. Cool Cat just called WP:EPISODE an essay instead of a guideline dispite the conclusion reached here.--十八 22:43, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I do not see any "conclusion" to promote it to a guideline. There seems to be an ongoing discussion. Perhaps it should be called a proposed guideline. -- Cat ^chi? 22:53, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

But then why would it have been changed to a guideline from a proposal over a year ago? In the history, one user says that it was apart of WP:CENT, and though I tried to find the actual discussion, I could only find the sub page Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Television episodes, which is now a redirect, and has no history. Was the discussion on Wikipedia talk:Television episodes? Might I also add this really old discussion here.--十八 23:08, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Well I suppose you are right. I'll leave WP:EPISODE alone. -- Cat ^chi? 23:15, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The accusation of vandalism is absurd - the content being removed lacks reliably published secondary sources and the approach taken is recommended by WP:EPISODE, which is currently a guideline. This isn't the appropriate forum to discuss this. Addhoc 23:10, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Is there any reason to dispute the secondary source (the official website) or the primary source (episode itself)? I already withdrew my vandalism check thing since parties established on my talk page that they have the same objective as I - increasing article quality. -- Cat ^chi? 23:15, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The official website is obviously a primary source and if there isn't any concern about vandalism, then you should continue your discussion with Ned Scott and Juhachi. Addhoc 23:56, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I am doing just that... -- Cat ^chi? 01:08, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lahs08 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log)

(Moved from WP:AIV, this seems like a more complex situation than simple vandalism due to the nature of their edits.) Grandmasterka 22:33, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Repeatedly replacing the names of Fox's NLCS and ALCS announcers in 2002 and 2003 with the names of Simpsons characters, despite being warned not to. Also has been adding random ungallerizable screencaps to the WGBH article that have no clear theme beyond describing the station's logo history in a non-concise manner, and may have been taken without attribution from another site. Nate 22:14, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Racist User

• Beh-nam (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) vandalized Taliban article several times by placing false claims or POVs about the Taliban being a "Pashtun movement", there is no such report about this. Taliban was not forcing people to become Pashtuns. Also, the Arabic writings next to Taliban is written in Farsi (Persian), he/she is removing Persian and replacing it with Pashto, which is false. I already explained this and he/she wants to start revert war. It seems as if he has a personal vengence or grudge against other ethnics (Pashtuns).Execu-tiv 22:41, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The taliban's name and logo are written in Pashto originally, Persian (more accurately Dari, a persian dialect) was only added because its a major language in Afghanistan. "But it was Pashto that was the language of the Taliban, which during their five-year reign forced the language on much of Afghanistan, changing signs and textbooks throughout the country -- even in the capital Kabul, where Dari has traditionally dominated." [64] and "Kābul was besieged beginning in 1992, first by various mujahideen groups and then by the Pashtun-dominated Taliban, which sought to reestablish Pashtun dominance in the capital." from Encarta. anyway, this is a content dispute and not meant to be on AN/I. Take it up with the user and on the article talk page. -M^ask? 23:00, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like you need to be more educated, I'm surprised at how some people still don't know what Taliban were or are after learning about them for the last 6 years. They had nothing to do with ethnicity or language, they killed people from every ethnic, including their own. The current leader of Afghanistan (Hamid Karzai), along with his entire administration, is the same Pashtuns from the same southern areas where the Taliban are from, so why are the Taliban fighting against Karzai's Pashtun government? Pashto language has been the official language of Afghanistan since 1747, when the Pashtuns created their own empire (check Constitution of Afghanistan). Since 1747, Afghanistan has been ruled by Pashtuns until presently. Taliban were not forcing Pashtun culture on Afghanistan when it was already a Pashtun state. There is NOT A SINGLE REPORT OUT THERE OF taliban forcing language on people. That's like trying to believe some idiots who claim america is in Iraq and Afghanistan forcing English language and culture on people. Things like this should not be placed in encyclopedias, it's false and it makes no sense, actually it makes a good laugh. About the Farsi words used, so what if Pashto was there for a long time in the article, it's a God dam mistake and should be corrected. You gave a very lame answer, that is Persian words, not Pashto. Check the tag in the bottom of editing page on Taliban article. It says "fa:farsi",,,,, pashto is like this ------> ps:=pashto. The reason I reported this racist individual is because he has nothing else better to do in life but come everyday look for places to add negativity about Pashtun people, it makes him feel lower to know that Pashtuns are very above them and he cant stand to see that. I just pray that God cleans the hate built inside his heart. writing false information in this encyclopedia is sin, its not made for fun as he and others like him do with this editing stuff. I guess its useless to report anyone because you administrators support those who edit with false information, may be wikipedia is a conspiracy to mislead the world and this is the starting point. I am gonna start using Citizendium from now on.--Execu-tiv 01:54, 11 May 2007 (UTC)