Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents: Difference between revisions

In the last few weeks, some on my posts have been reverted with comments using unwarranted language ("stop vandalism" and implicit accusations of deceit) on the part of a couple of IP editors, all of them based at RIPE Network Coordination Centre, RIPE, P.O. Box 10096, Amsterdam. Two of these IPs are 84.139.199.8 and 84.139.198.95. There may be more; this is difficult for me to track. The coincidence seems to great to me; it is probably one editor hiding behind distinct but related IPs so as to make his edits more difficult to track (while he tracks mine; he seems to have some sort of German agenda, but the articles are unrelated).

When will a line be crossed? Can the user be convinced to adopt a consistent username? May I request that a search be done so that it can be ascertained whether this is somebody with a username who does not want his edits tracked even to his Wikipedia identity? Feketekave (talk) 20:32, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here is another one: 84.139.235.50. Enjoy. Feketekave (talk) 20:35, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please provide diffs of the behaviour. If you truly believe that the IP is the sockpuppet of an established user, you can visit WP:RFCU and follow the directions there. Else, provide warnings for uncivil behaviour and report to WP:AIV as necessary. Cheers. // roux   20:37, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

These IPs all have between one and three edits each, all related to the topic; diffs seem unnecessary. Here are two more IPs that are presumably the same: 84.139.243.190, 84.139.241.103. The first IP posted on the topic, the second one answered to me; neither intervention seemed wrong to me at the time (though the edits were arguably slanted), but they may be relevant.

The user seems knowledgeable of some Wikipedia-related language, though possibly not of Wikipedia's actual rules. It seems clear to me that he has spent some time here, but I cannot myself tell which established user he is likely to be. How should I proceed?

Also - if his IP keeps shifting, how can I leave him a warning? Feketekave (talk) 20:49, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Some other IPs that are almost certainly the same: 84.139.245.108, 84.139.205.82, 84.139.199.195. The ones that I mentioned first were the ones I felt had made uncivil remarks (to say the least). These just make this individual's agenda clearer. Feketekave (talk) 21:07, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The IP will only shift when it is asked to. Try whichever IP you think they last edited from. — neuro^(talk) 21:09, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Will do. Should I make a search request for a sockpuppet, then, or can I do that only when I have a (justifiable) suspicion of which established user he or she is? Feketekave (talk) 21:14, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

PS. I just left a warning at User:84.139.199.8. Is this fine? How can I tell whether it has been received? Feketekave (talk) 21:25, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please note: These IP addresses are not "based at RIPE". RIPE is the Regional Internet Registry that assigned the 84.136.0.0 - 84.191.255.255 IP address range to Deutsche Telekom. -- The Anome (talk) 00:46, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Throwing stones in the glashouse. Feketekave called it "racialist" to add a category "French people of German descent" [[1]] for someone, who was born in Berlin as a German citizen and reverted even sourced content [[2]] by calling it a "Nazi fake"[[3]]. His last addition to Ilya Ehrenburg was a "translation" from German WP, but instead of naming the head of the soviet Secret Police (Viktor Semyonovich Abakumov), he described him as "frontline soldier", which is an euphemism, to say the least.

P.S. I don't use shifting IP's in bad faith, it works like that, I don't know why. I don't contribute a lot to the English WP, that's why I use IP's. I can't see any "aggressive comments" yet, it wasn't my intention. 84.139.209.53 (talk) 11:30, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

About every single remark made by the anonymous user above is inexact. (On the issue of Ehrenburg, they are outright lies against me.) Mind you, his overall line is quite outside of the mainstream in the German wikipedia. Would he care to state the username he uses in de.wikipedia.org, if he is indeed a regular contributor there? Feketekave (talk) 19:34, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

PS. From wikipedia.de: "Im letzten Kriegsjahr erhielt Ehrenburg kritische Briefe von Frontsoldaten, die ihm vorhielten, er habe sich gewandelt und trete nun plötzlich für Mildtätigkeit gegenüber den Deutschen ein." - This means "In the last year of the war, Ehrenburg received critical letters from front soldiers, stating, that he had changed and now suddently stood for softness towards Germans." Grothendieck, as the son of a Russian father (later killed at Auschwitz) is unlikely to have been granted German citizenship automatically at birth; German citizenship is based on descent, not place of birth (jus sanguinis). And so on, and so on. Feketekave (talk) 19:45, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also: as you can see from his diff above, both of the citations I removed were unsourced at the time, and had already been labelled as such. As for one of them: "Die Forschung ist sich seit langem einig, dass es sich um ein Gerücht der deutschen Propaganda handelt.[78] Und Lew Kopelew hat als Zeitzeuge mittlerweile vielfach bestätigt, dass ein solches Flugblatt Ehrenburgs nie existiert hat und weder sprachlich noch inhaltlich in Ehrenburgs Produktion passe. „Es scheint nur bei den deutschen Truppen bekannt gewesen zu sein und war wohl ein Versuch der Goebbels-Kader, auf diese Art den Widerstandswillen der Wehrmacht zu stärken.“[79]" - "Researchers have long agreed that this is a rumour [put around] by German propaganda. And Lev Kopoelev, as a contemporary witness, has stated numerous times that such a pamphlet of Ehrenburg's never existed and would not fit either in language or contact in Ehrenburg's work. "It seems to be known only by German troops and was most likely an attempt of the Goebbels cadres to strengthen the will to resistance on the part of the German army."[79]".

In other words: we are dealing with an anonymous user whose Teutonic agenda would be well outside the mainstream in the German wikipedia, and who attempts to change the English-language wikipedia to suit his bias. Feketekave (talk) 20:16, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You should learn something more about German law of citizenship, your statement is simply wrong. Somebody who calls a long established category "racialist nonsense" [4] shouldn't expect to be treated with kid-gloves. The Ehrenburg problem should be discussed at the proper talk page, you're mixing up the leaflet with truly existing and sourced articles in different newspapers and you reverted the whole part instead if clarifying. 84.139.211.23 (talk) 08:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

 – There are plenty of reasons why the user could have their name styled as such, but unless they tell you themself we are merely speculating. Already rejected at UAA. — neuro^(talk) 13:27, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Administrative eyes would be welcome at "Emotional Freedom Technique". (See its history page first.) My own eyes are bleary as it's my bedtime. -- Hoary (talk) 15:06, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Removed the OR section again, and left the editor a note. Black Kite 15:12, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See this related thread at EAR: Wikipedia:Editor assistance/Requests#Edits rejected as "opinion". – ukexpat (talk) 16:11, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Paging SA. He'll solve this one. the new editor is clearly a biased proponent, and not any particular scientist, all her edits are to remove qualifiers which erode the positivity of the idea, and to spew caveats against negative results. SPA, topic ban her and be done.ThuranX (talk) 16:23, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sarcasm always helps, eh? In any case, this editor is proposing text which is, while written as personal opinion, a solidly mainstream personal opinion: the EFT is blatantly unscientific and credibly identified as pseudoscience. Guy (Help!) 16:58, 27 December 2008 (UTC) My bad, read it upside-down, as noted below. Guy (Help!) 17:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I might've read this wrongly, but isn't the editor trying to add a section claiming not that EFT is unscientific, but the opposite - that a piece of research critical of EFT is unscientific? Black Kite 17:29, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe you're right, maybe I am cross-eyed due to spending most of the day hanging upside down under my railway layout pinning up wiring. Guy (Help!) 19:29, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You've read it correctly, Black Kite, which makes Guy a bit off in his little outburst at me. Like I said, the editor adds text discrediting scientific reports discrediting the EFT ideas. Apologies can be sent to me care of my talk page. ThuranX (talk) 22:25, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Meh, that wasn't an outburst. But your comment was sarcastic, and I don't think that helps when that editor is actively being discussed on WP:RFAR. But you're free to ignore me, I am a bit sensitive about users who are pushed to the edge and beyond by relentless civil POV-pushing. Guy (Help!) 17:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Bottom line: more eyes would be great. Please watchlist, all of you. I've been on the case at this article for awhile, and this is hardly the first proponent of Emotional Freedom Techniques to make an appearance. While you're at it, take a look at the associated article on Thought Field Therapy. MastCell ^Talk 06:09, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A challenge to this whole series of articles on 'alternative' psychological treatments and similer follderoll, is that most of the editors are spa's on one side of the topic or another (except for a few fringe studies folks such as MastCell) and they really don't understand how wikipedia works very well. Some will become full fringe nutters that are impossible to work with, most will not if we educate them about how wikipedia works. The talk page of EFT is instructive, a couple of long time users have patiently tried to work with a number of spa's over the last year with moderate success in getting them to either edit to our guidelines and policies or move on and waste time somewhere else (the long soapboxing at the top of the page, goes away by the end). It does not need to be confrontational (though that is sometimes where it ends up). --Rocksanddirt (talk) 08:11, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Skomorokh (talk · contribs) These are false accusations here and here. I consider this editors activities to be disruptive, lacking in good faith, and borderline racially based. This editor's support of whitewashing the Stormfront (website) article is not acceptable. I ask that this editor be blocked or permanently banned from the project. We don't need his type around here. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 16:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Whatever the other merits, he certainly appears to be well beyond 3rr [[5]] and certainly doesn't seem interested in the fact that his POV is being soundly rejected by the other participants on talk.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:08, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here are difs from today when he undoes others work on the article. [[6]] [[7]] [[8]] [[9]]Bali ultimate (talk) 17:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A pattern he apparently carried on from previus days as per [[10]] and [[11]] I don't think he can argue that he was unaware that there was, at best no-consensus on his edits and in fact an overwhelming majority opposed to them.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:20, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Among the diffs only [39] is a clear revert. In [40] Skomorokh moved a statement to a different place. In [41] (s)he removed a citation from the lead, because it is not necessary there. And in [42] (s)he simply merged 3 successive refs. I do not see evidence of a violation. Ruslik (talk) 17:30, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just noting my agreement with Ruslik. 3RR appears to be intact. — neuro^(talk) 18:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Skomorokh added a "maintainer" template for himself at the top of the talk page of Stormfront (website) [12]. He seems to be behaving aggressively to other editors (warnings to Orangemarlin [13] and Verbal [14] on their talk pages about using the category "Neo-Nazi website", wikilawyering on the talk page pf the article) and adding racially sensitive material, out of context, to the mainspace article, based on newspaper reports of postings on the forums of Stormfront. He has written that on google "my method is simply to search for the word "Stormfront" and take information from the sentences in which the word appears". In view of the problem of WP:OWN shown by the maintenance template and his failure to understand the controversial nature of this article (as well as a likely COI), he should probably receive a topic ban of some sort: he does appear to be disrupting the editing of the article and causing needless offense on talk pages. Mathsci (talk) 13:24, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It might be beneficial if some administrators would help watch this article's page and talk page as things are getting pretty heated already (see for example, [15] and [16] for some of the incivility and edit warring (not to mention discussing the event as if it were a web forum rather than a page for discussing how to edit the article) associated with this article. Thanks! Sincerely, --A Nobody^{My talk} 20:01, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

To arms, lads!--Patton123 20:42, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That would not be bad if some of us would take a look at the contributions of User:LOTRrules. He made the uncivil comments here above and performed many "poved move" in the last days. I reverted some but it seems there is much to do... Ceedjee (talk) 22:05, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

 – User has apologised for his behaviour. Let's move on, shall we?

// roux   01:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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• Marshall Williams2 (talk · contribs · checkuser · block user · block log · edit count)

Someone please explain to this novice editor how exceedingly unlikely it is for Rambot to have created an article as false as this person claims it to be. Compare the article as it stands now with the initial Rambot version to see how drastically this article has been stripped of verifiable information. I'm a little busy with some article rescues to spend a lot of time patiently explaining things. (And according to the boilerplate vandalism warning that I was given for contesting the proposed deletion of a city covered by the U.S. census, I'm supposed to be reading the welcome message right now, anyway. ☺) Uncle G (talk) 21:06, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I notified him of this thread. Very silly conduct. Rambot generates article from census data and the like, which we may well assume to be as correct as can be.  Sandstein  22:46, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I reverted back to the earlier version, and notified the user that the data was correct based on the census data provided. The only change from his insistence that I moved forward on was to note that the city is entirely within Cobb County as opposed to being partially in Douglas County (which someone erroneously posted). He is being a bit on the belligerent side, but I've been trying to assume good faith and move accordingly. --Mhking (talk) 22:55, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, everyone. --Marshall T. Williams (talk) 01:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User: Nilzy continues to add unsourced and controversial rumors about a living person to Talk:Ctrl+Alt+Del. He is accusing someone related to the article of pedophilia and criminal acts. There are no sources to support this accusation, and yet he insists that a discussion about it be started. Myself and several other editors have asked him to stop, removed his edits, and attempted to advise him on the WP:BLP policy [17] [18]. We have also sought help from the BLP Noticeboard [19]. Not only are his accusations unsourced, and highly controversial/libelous, but the article in question is about a webcomic and not a biography on the author, about whom he continues to make the accusations. This evening I have reverted his re-addition of the unsourced rumor several times (as per WP:BLP policy to remove unsourced controversial material immediately), and he continues to re-add it. A total of four editors have removed his edits, but he continues to re-add them, despite multiple warnings.--Thrindel ^Talk 00:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This matter has been resolved.--Thrindel ^Talk 01:11, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just a quick reminder not to edit war like you've been doing - I've spent the last 20 minutes trying to figure out the basis for this complaint, wading through all the various reverts you and Nilzy have undertaken. If you need help in future, could you provide a diff showing the actual content we should be looking for. Thanks anyway. Nick (talk) 01:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I thought 3RR & Edit war rules did not apply to BLP violations - anyone is allowed to revert them with extreme prejudice as often as required. Exxolon (talk) 03:02, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Common sense dictates after one or two reverts, administrator assistance is requested (preferably here). The reason reverting BLPs is exempted from 3RR is not to give users immunity to revert each other continually, it's to stop users being blocked, on a technicality, for preventing problematic material being inserted into any article whilst they await administrator assistance, be it in the form of an administrator discussing the issue with the parties involved, page protection being instated, or a user being blocked. The policy is not intended to give users carte blanche to revert each other over a period of several hours or days; edit warring over problematic material is a course of action that does nothing to ensure problematic material is removed and remains removed from any article. The correct course of action when you see problematic material is "revert, discuss/warn" - if the material is added again without proper discussion and agreement, then it's "revert, summon administrator assistance". The other point to remember, if you were to continually revert additions to a BLP without requesting help, what happens when you go offline - if nobody else knows a problem exists, then you'll likely find the edits restored by the time you return and that's doing nothing to help the project. There's really no reason to be reverting more than a couple of times before requesting assistance from an administrator or experienced editor, if we don't know about a problematic editor or article, there's nothing we can do about it. Nick (talk) 13:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I realized too late that it had gone too far, too fast. In the future I will take care to clarify diffs. Thank you.--Thrindel ^Talk 01:33, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As a coda to the evening's events, I'm assuming a copycat of Thrindel has popped up at the page trying to get the user's attention. [20] Dayewalker (talk) 01:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

 – False alarm

Can someone delete this edit [21] and report to WP:OVERSIGHT please, thanks. Exxolon (talk) 02:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why? "I attended this school" doesn't mean "I am a child" – she might have been there in 1952 – and in any case there's no personal information given other than her name. – iridescent 02:57, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies - I misread the sentence as "I attend this school." Exxolon (talk) 02:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Last month, STBotI (a bot belonging to ST47) posted a warning on my talk page regarding a non-free image that I'd uploaded without supplying a fair use rationale. The image in question was a Wikimedia project logo (which obviously didn't require a fair use rationale), so I rolled back the bot's edit and thought nothing more of it.

Earlier today (my time), an anonymous editor posted a message on my user page (and that of several other Wikipedians) informing me that my name had been listed on the page User:STBotI/BADUSER and that this was visible via search engines. Curious as to why I'd apparently been publicly labeled a "bad user," I read through STBotI's documentation to no avail.

So I headed over to ST47's talk page, where I found a couple of existing threads on the subject (including someone else's inquiry as to the page's nature). I joined the discussion, and then I noticed that DragonflySixtyseven had moved the page to User:STBotI/LEFT-NOTE-FOR-USER with the summary "as per OTRS". But because the bot's code still directed it to the old page title, the next data dump automatically restored all of the content to that location. DragonflySixtyseven rolled back the edit, and I perceived this as the beginning of a tug of war between human and script (until the latter could be updated with the new title). For this reason (and because the redirect's existence ensured that the page would remain indexed by search engines), I deleted the redirect and protected the page against re-creation. (I noted this on ST47's talk page, indicating that "if anyone feels that these actions were inappropriate for any reason, please feel free to undo them or request that they be undone.") At the time, I didn't realize that DragonflySixtyseven already had blocked the bot (so my steps made no difference).

A short time later, ST47 restored the single deleted data dump (labeling my deletion "vandalism") and merged it into the main history at the original name. He/she then updated the bot and moved the page to User:STBotI/WARNEDUSERS (edit summary: "Happy?"), leaving behind the redirect at User:STBotI/BADUSER (which he/she later explained must be temporarily retained for technical reasons).

In the discussion that followed, Gwen Gale complained about an addendum, referred to by ST47 as "a nice notice on top of the new page in case someone decides to take offense." This "nice notice" was worded as follows:

This page is updated regularly by the bot. It's purpose is really none of your business, but some people are exceedingly nosy and seem to have this innate desire to waste my time. One of them in particular even blocked the bot over this page. Divas.

This page contains a list of every user the bot has warned as part of it's live IMGBot2.pl task, along with the number of times they have been warned, since the last time the page was cleared. Probably a long time ago. When I first wrote the bot I used the terse name BADUSERS for this page, as it was the dump page for the BADUSERS sub, which reported users who had uploaded over 10 bad images to an IRC channel. Unfortunately, due to meddling by the aforementioned exceedingly nosy users, it was moved to this name, which sort of screws up anyone who is trying to actually review the bot's code, since it's got a nice logfile for NFCC10C issues called NFCC10C, a logfile for notag issues called notag, etc, and now the wikipage WARNEDUSERS for the BADUSERS sub. This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption, is in no way guaranteed to be accurate, and is really best ignored - it needs to be on wiki so it is shared between STBotI's various host servers.

ST47 partially reworded the message, but not in a manner that eliminated the incivility. When Gwen noted this and I expressed agreement, ST47 ignored our posts (while replying to someone else's unrelated post) and reverted to the earlier (more uncivil) text.

I don't know how to address this situation. Editing the message would be futile (because it would be reverted during the next data dump), and ST47 has withdrawn from the discussion and evidently restored the worse version out of spite. I honestly don't know why he/she has responded in this manner, and I find it quite disheartening. —David Levy 04:06, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note that I've directed ST47, DragonflySixtyseven and Gwen Gale to this thread via their talk pages. —David Levy 04:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's also this on the bot's user page:

Admins: Getting to block a bot is not a trophy you get. If you block this bot, you had better have a good reason.

Ed Fitzgerald _{t / c} 04:27, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I know the editor hasn't been particularly responsive to queries about the page, but it seems like getting him to add {{noindex}} to the page would help? Then his bot could still keep its list and you and the other editors who've angered the bot won't have to worry about a page called 'Bad Users' (or whatever it ends up being called) turning up in web searches for their user names. -- Vary Talk 04:31, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that would help. It was suggested to ST47, whose reply was rather unhelpful. —David Levy 04:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's also a threat of violence on the bot's talk page (User_talk:STBotI) - "Oh, and if you say rational instead of rationale, I am going to hit you over the head with a large fish." Exxolon (talk) 04:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm inclined to interpret that as facetiousness. —David Levy 04:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. Enigma ^message 05:34, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Quite possibly, but there seems to a problem with WP:CIVIL here too. "small-minded fool", "some people are exceedingly nosy and seem to have this innate desire to waste my time.", "Divas.", "aforementioned exceedingly nosy users," are hardly the sort of phrases an admin should be throwing around. I'm also somewhat unhappy with this statement - "Do not revert the bot's edits to your userpages or templates, because the bot will just do it again." - does this mean the bot will revert removal of a warning template from a user's talk? Exxolon (talk) 04:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So, out of curiosity, are ST47 and Betacommand the same people? It sure seems like it... - ✰ALLST☆R✰ ^echo 05:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No. Enigma ^message 05:34, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

By that, ST47 means that the bot will drop the warning on the user talkpage again if the user just reverts the warning and doesn't fix the image. Which is of course correct. Black Kite 10:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

[outdent] I don't pretend to understand a thing about what the bot does or for that matter why, but it seems to me that the behavior displayed by the bot owner has been somewhere between stubbornly unhelpful and outrightly uncivil. WP:OWN applies to all pages on Wikipedia- even if (s)he owns the bot (s)he doesn't own the pages and this sort of snide remarkery shouldn't remain hosted on our servers. I say remove anything borderline from the bot pages, block the bot if necessary to prevent it overwriting until we can get this sorted out, and surely ST47 has something to say for him/herself? l'aquatique |✡| talk 07:19, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I concur with L'Aquatique.  Sandstein  09:29, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, STBotI is an important bot that tags uploaded media with no copyright information for deletion, and also non-free images that have no valid fair-use rationale. It also informs the uploaders what is happening. Black Kite 10:18, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do important bots follow different policies than unimportant bots? rspεεr (talk) 10:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

By "important", I was pointing out that blocking the bot would be a bad idea when the problem isn't directly related to the bot's main tasks, which it appears to be performing mostly correctly. Black Kite 10:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Blocking bots is no big deal. They can catch up later and they don't have feelings to hurt, and the temporary absence of one bot will not harm Wikipedia. Blocking a bot is just something you do when it's making undesirable edits. The problem is that ST47 seems to be taking these blocks of his bot personally, and getting angry instead of addressing the problems people bring up. rspεεr (talk) 10:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, my point being that the bot's actual main task is not being affected at the moment. I think this is a bit of a storm in a teacup to be honest, but yes it would be useful for ST47 to address the issues raised. Black Kite 11:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On top of the incivility, ST47 should disabuse himself of the notion that he can intentionally edit-war using his bot by acting as if it's out of his hands. It is within ST47's power, and his responsibility, to change the bot's code if it is making undesirable edits. rspεεr (talk) 09:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• The notice needs to include {{NOINDEX}} - OTRS tickets 2008122610019734 / 2008122710016502 / 2008122710016682 for reasons why. I suspect in the end that some people will never be happy with anything other than uncritical acceptance of any unfree image however tenuous the justification, but the tone of the message on the WARNEDUSERS page hardly helps. I would put money on the anon being the self-same user who created the three OTRS tickets listed above, all of which must be very important and serious complaints because they HAVE LOTS OF CAPITALS and inform us that the BADUSERS page is ILLEGAL. Guy (Help!) 11:21, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You see, there were at least two or three points in there that I was actually interested in replying to. Unfortunately, it's just a jumble of text now. Good job.

1. The page was moved. The new page has a brief explanation as to what its purpose is. Far more explanation than a simple logfile should need, but heh. It was called baduser because it was the dump file for a subroutine meant to locate potential bad users. Aptly named "sub checkbaduser". Here is the current text:

   $badusertext="This page is updated regularly by the bot. There used to be an explanation here of why it was moved, but some overly sensitive users have requested that it be taken down.\n\nThis page contains a list of every user the bot has warned as part of it's live IMGBot2.pl task, along with the number of times they have been warned, since the last time the page was cleared. Probably a long time ago. When I first wrote the bot I used the terse name BADUSERS for this page, as it was the dump page for the BADUSERS sub, which reported users who had uploaded over 10 bad images to an IRC channel. Unfortunately, due to meddling by several users, it was moved to this name, which sort of screws up anyone who is trying to actually review the bot's code, since it's got a nice logfile for NFCC10C issues called NFCC10C, a logfile for notag issues called notag, etc, and now the wikipage WARNEDUSERS for the BADUSERS sub. This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption, is in no way guaranteed to be accurate, and is really best ignored - it needs to be on wiki so it is shared between STBotI's various host servers.\n\n";

2. I didn't 'revert' my change when I went from the older message to the newer one, I just hadn't let that change propagate. Now it has, and the bot has been restarted, and the notice will stay.
3. Guy: You must be behind on sleep if you think you can justify deleting this page on legal grounds, especially in its new state. I see no reason to add templates or notices or documentation or pretty colored boxes or flying ponies to what should be a simple log file.
4. If you try to move one of these pages and the bot ignores you, DO NOT block the bot. Let me know, and if you're clever enough to justify moving it, then I will shut down the bot, edit its config, force propagate the changes, and restart the bot.
5. The redirect needs to stay for now. Do not delete the redirect. The IRC portion of the bot running on some faraway server will not function without the redirect. Once everything has been updated, I will delete the redirect. If I have not done so in a week, you may remind me then. It shouldn't take any longer than that.
6. Vary: The page called Bad Users is no longer in use. It is now called Warned Users. This has the benefit of being factually correct, and therefore noindex is really unnecessary.
7. Ed Fitzgerald: What, is asking admins to think before they block such a horrible crime? What is so wrong with sanity?
8. Exxolon: Right. It's a threat because I'm actually going to find every user who misspells rationale and go to their house, break in, bring a tuna, and attack them. It's far more plausible that I didn't actually mean that.
9. Exxolon again: "Do not revert the bot's edits to your userpages or templates, because the bot will just do it again" means that if you revert the bot's removal of fair use images from your userpage, from a template, from a portal, from anywhere else, then the bot will just remove the image again on it's second pass.
10. Rspeer: At the time that I made the note saying that the bot would ignore any change to it's log file, noone had actually made a coherent case as to why. As a matter of fact, the same is true if we substitute 'now' and 'why there's still a problem now that it's at /WARNEDUSERS'. ST47 (talk) 12:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Cut that message short because I was looking for an iridium flare, unfortunately it's a bit too cloudy. I first became aware that someone was complaining when that user vandalized my talk page, the bot's userpage, and the bot's logfile, all in CAPS, while logged out. Obviously a user with an account who had to log out to vandalize. He was blocked for 24 hours, the damage was reverted. When I got there, I believe I reverted one more edit to the logfile from a while ago and then I semied it. I also left a message on the IP's talk page, which I really think was rather nice of myself after he came and acted like such an ass. Anyway, I think I then received an email, let me check. No, maybe not. I heard from someone that there was a rather incoherent OTRS request up from a user who was, their words, not mine, 'mentally unstable'. Around this time the first message on my talk page was left. The user didn't justify their request, didn't ask me to add the template, didn't give any reasons, just pretty much asked what would happen if he added it to the page. The answer to that is "The bot would ignore it, and on the next update it would be removed". Then lots of stuff happened. He msged me at 5PM yesterday, my time, and told me the page would be a problem. I was at a calculus study group, away from my computer, and could not respond. Despite the fact that the page had been up for over a year, Dragonfly6-7 couldn't wait 15 minutes and moved the page at 5:10. Sometime in this period the bot probably reuploaded the log, because it's nowhere near clever enough to see what DF67 did. Less than a half hour later, he blocked the bot. He could have protected the page: the bot is not an admin, and could not have edited through protection, and would have been able to continue to run. People have this innate desire to rack up trophies or something like that by blocking the bot rather than taking the more effective, more sane, less exciting approach. When I got back, I probably shouted at people a bit, had the bot unblocked, then I histmerged the page and moved it to /WARNEDUSERS. This is a perfectly fine title. It is truthful. It is a list of users who the bot warned. The message at the top is more truthful than incivil, for sure. 'Meddling' is entirely accurate: rather than wait for me to reconfigure the bot, people had to try to do it themselves, wound up failing, then blocked the bot. ST47 (talk) 12:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Finally, Guy. The second half of your comment appears to be sarcasm, but you also seem to be using it to support the use of that template. Are you being sarcastic about that as well, or are you actually suggesting that since the user has used enough capital letters, we should add some random template? Also, if you do have some request to make of me, then you really need to support it with the actual tickets that explain your supposed "reasons why", rather than some arbitrary timestamps. Being that I don't have OTRS access, I can't evaluate an argument that is hidden behind a timestamp. ST47 (talk) 12:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"...This has the benefit of being factually correct, and therefore noindex is really unnecessary" - would it hurt to add noindex, though? There's no need for the log of a bot to be publically searchable - as you yourself state, "This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption..." _TalkIslander 12:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No need for it not to be. ST47 (talk) 12:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, but in a way you're contradicting yourself there. You can't state one minute that the page isn't for the general populus, but then the next refuse a request to hide it from search engines. Apart from all else, it's a tad stubborn. Adding it would not be at all detrimental to you or your bot, yet you refuse. Why? _TalkIslander 12:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

@ST47: I'm afraid your comments to me above don't actually address what I said. I did not say the page should be deleted, I said we should add {{NOINDEX}}, I think we should do that with any page where bots make records of usernames - in this case the username is the user's real name, so the fact that one of the first page of Google hits is a page about BADUSERS is a bit of an issue for him, for all of his (IMO) rather hysterical over-reaction to it. I am sure he'd have got the result he was after much more quickly and with less drama if he had left the caps lock off and just asked nicely, since I don't believe that anyone is setting out to e actively evil. But the tone of the message on the WARNEDUSERS page is pretty inflammatory, and I don't think it would hurt to tone it down a bit - do you? Guy (Help!) 13:33, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's no longer called BADUSER, it's called WARNEDUSERS, therefore the title is factual (list of users who have been warned) therefore it's no reason to exempt it from the whole searchable openness of knowledge thing. The message has been changed once again. Still waiting on a good reason for noindexing. ST47 (talk) 13:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just to set things straight here, I appreciate the change to use the editable header text (I assume it uses it direct, but whether it does or whther you copy-paste it periodically probably isn't relevant at this point). You've been given what several users think is a good reason to use NOINDEX, which I see you currently do. Do we still need to have any further debate about that or not? Guy (Help!) 17:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We seem to have consensus here that User:STBotI/WARNEDUSERS should not include the objectionable commentary directed at other users, and should include {{NOINDEX}}. I have made these changes and, according to ST47's suggestion above, protected the page to stop the bot from overwriting it. I ask all administrators to only lift that protection once the bot has been reconfigured so as not to undo these changes. Thank you.  Sandstein  13:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I also suggested that you first come up with a good reason why. I've made the changes to the bot to use noindex, and if you have a good reason to, I'll keep it that way. ST47 (talk) 13:31, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would suggest that the commentary should be neutral, and perhaps transcluded from a protected page that can be tweaked without having to get specific users to make code changes. By neutral I mean something like: "this is a list of all users warned by the bot, being listed here does not imply that there is an issue with the user, this is purely for maintenance purposes." Or something. Some of those usernames are real names. Guy (Help!) 13:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The reason why, apart from the fact that you do not own that page and appear to be the only user here not to want it noindexed, are our policies regarding civility, personal attacks and, as Guy points out, the biography of living persons. I strongly recommend that you follow Guy's advice with respect to transcluding the commentary.  Sandstein  13:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Guy: It's just a header for a logfile. It seems neutral to me. Once I finish this post, I'll even get rid of everything except the explanation. And since there will be a nice, neutral, explanation, I don't think we'll need noindex, do you agree? ST47 (talk) 13:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I certainly don't agree. You still haven't explicitly stated why you refuse to add 'noindex' - it seems to me that you're the only one here against including it, so unfortunatly consensus is against you. I'll just add that I think the transclusion idea is a good one - as you're well aware, you don't own the page, so you shouldn't be the only one able to edit its contents (which, by having the bot overwrite it, you effectively are). _TalkIslander 13:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

All I really want is a reason why we have to take the step of noindexing the page. Now that there's an explanation as to why the page exists and why it should not be used by anyone or anything like that, and that the title isn't inflammatory, anyone who finds it would see "oh look, a bot's log page, nothing interesting here" and move along. No reason to hide it from google. ST47 (talk) 14:02, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, put it this way. If I were warned by your bot, I would be added to that list (quite legitimately). Now, it could be that I was warned for uploading a fair-use image for which I forgot to write a rational - as soon as I got your bot's warning, I'd write one (not the best example, as I never upload fair-use images without rationales, but humour me :P). I wouldn't then want a result for a google of 'Islander' to bring up a page entitled 'WarnedUsers'. Yes, it's not really inflammatory, and yes, it's miles better than 'Badusers', but still, it's a blot in my copybook. You won't find anyone that wants to be labeled a 'bad user', but equally I think you'll find very few that are quite happy being labeled a 'warned user'. Being a 'warned user' implies that you've been a bad user, and warrented a warning. In short, though the new title is much better than 'badusers', it's still not great, however factually accurate it is. _TalkIslander 14:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User:ST47/WUHead. Feel free to add a comment to the header explaining that. You can also use User:ST47/WUTitle. If you do, then please also move the existing page to the new address so as to preserve history. ST47 (talk) 14:25, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you - much appreciated :). _TalkIslander 14:26, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sand: If we ignore the commentary, and assume that I make it nice and neutral. A list of users who have been warned is in no way uncivil, it's not a personal attack to say "STBotI warned you", and I don't even see where BLP comes into play. If we treat this as a mainspace article and apply that policy, then we really just need it be unbiased and sourced. If it would make you happy, I can add a link to each users' talk page history as a source? ST47 (talk) 13:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Updated with a neutral explanation. ST47 (talk) 13:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks so much for taking care of the worries editors had about how things were worded. I don't think anyone was being nosy or untowards, although from your outlook, in the thick of things trying to run the bot, I understand how the page name seemed utterly straightforward and harmless to you, a scripting artifact and nothing more. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I really would like to keep it not noindexed, and I've put the header and title into a template at User:ST47/WUHead and User:ST47/WUTitle. If you have any suggestions, feel free to update them. ST47 (talk) 14:27, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How about calling the dump something like TEMPLATEDUSERS or NOTIFIEDUSERS instead? I see nothing wrong with keeping the page open to SE bots if the pagename along with any header text are wholly neutral. On the Internet, it's so easy for folks to take things wrong at a quick glance. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:34, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Either one of those is fine with me. Perhaps we can not make it ALLCAPS? User:STBotI/Notified users? ST47 (talk) 14:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, for some reason I thought ALLCAPS was how you wanted it, to denote botness or whatever. I always like smallcase better. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why is it important that a bot's logfile be indexed by search engines? DoubleBlue (talk) 14:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm fine with the page as it now is, but I think the NOINDEX should stay, as the page is of no use to the general public and would needlessly clutter up search engine results.  Sandstein  14:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If it's not indexed I see no meaningful worries with the name and header as they are. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The reason for including NOINDEX is simple: some of those are real names, and some others look like blameless users who made trivial errors in NFC rationales. There is no reason why it would ever need to be indexed, so adding NOINDEX makes good sense - it removes an identified problem without apparently creating any further problems of its own. Anyway, all sorted now, thanks. Guy (Help!) 15:01, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Precisely. No matter what the page's title is, an incorrect inference can be drawn by someone who sees such a list (containing names added due to issues ranging from blatant image vandalism to "a bug in the bot's code," the latter of which resulted in my name's inclusion). The new explanatory message certainly helps to counter such misinterpretations, but I see no reason why a page of this nature should be publicly indexed.

Thanks for calming down and addressing the problem, ST47. —David Levy 16:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On article Ashwin K, author is IP hopping to remove CSD tag on autobiographical vanity article. User name is User:Inkwash and involved IP's so far include: 117.196.160.97, 117.196.164.71, 117.196.163.234, and 117.196.164.22.--RandomHumanoid^(⇒) 06:26, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have not looked into the editors' conduct, but in my opinion the page doesn't meed the CSD A7 requirements since it does assert notability of subject. So I will be rmoving the CSD tag; please take it to WP:AFD if you disagree. Abecedare (talk) 06:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Incidentally, given that User:Inkwash has recreated the article twice and his user name is a anagram of Ashwin K, COI is perhaps likely. Anyway, any article related issues themselves can be discussed at leisure at AFD. Abecedare (talk) 06:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I did just WP:AFD it. Nonetheless, is there to be no temporary ban on this fellow for his behavior?--RandomHumanoid^(⇒) 06:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I should hope not. Seems he was doing the right thing, if in a slightly unorthodox fashion... l'aquatique |✡| talk 07:21, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User:AP1929 is a pro-Ustaše user that has been roaming on Ustaše-related articles ("AP 1929" is an abbreviation of "Ante Pavelić 1929", "1929" being the year the fascist "Ustaše" Croatian ultra-nationalist movement was founded). His IP is 99.250.48.35, which can easily be confirmed. While his constant fascist comments can be tolerated, his description of an established User like Thewanderer as a "communist piece of shit" [22] should not go unrewarded in my opinion. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 08:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User was topicbanned for six months from these articles by FutPerf. Perhaps it's time to do it again? // roux   08:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Seems like it... --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 19:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

 – Rangeblocked again Black Kite 13:24, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• First ANI report - 2 week block.
• Second ANI report - 1 month block.

The "truth" is once again being preached from the 168.187.176.xxx range. --Onorem♠Dil 13:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In addition to spouting nonsense the guy from this IP range is typing in all caps, which makes the nonsense even larger. However, he apparently lives in Kuwait. Isn't that punishment enough? Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 13:22, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nice xenophobia there. Act upon content not location, unless a desire to throw out such comments fills an empty void in your life. Minkythecat (talk) 18:42, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

3 months this time. Doesn't seem to be much (if anything) productive from that range, so rangeblock is better than semi-ing a number of articles, I think. Black Kite 13:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

 – by Algebraist (talk · contribs) Agathoclea (talk) 15:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

An anon editor has just nuked the page of WP:Assume good faith can someone revert it as I cant seem to find the revert button on my screen as it is covered over with hacked by china or something along those lines. Corruptcopper (talk) 15:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Allowing position:fixed is a bad idea. Algebraist 15:44, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I stumbled upon User:Pediapress when a template I was working with was linked to a subpage User:Pediapress/TemplateBlacklist and thought it a rather strange situation. The user is advertising pediapress.com so I thought is was a promotional user and reported it to UAA, and was instructed to report it here. After looking at it closer, the WMF does appear to have a collaboration with this website, but the userpage and its monobok instructions, and the afformentioned subpage, still seem unusual. Maybe some additional eyes can take a look and see if this user, userpage and subpage are all on the up and up, or if any action should be taken. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 16:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

User:Pediapress/collection.js was deleted as G11, maybe we should notify the foundation though, as they should probably be the ones to inform the company that they are not exempt from policy just because they have an affiliation. — neuro^(talk) 19:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Could some uninvolved admins please step in at WT:DYK? The constant sniping and hostile atmosphere between Ottava and other editors at DYK has driven contributors away and is a detriment to Wikipedia. Is Ottava still under mentorship? If so, could the mentors please advise him/her on disengaging? BuddingJournalist 16:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Diffs, please? Protonk (talk) 17:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Until any are given, here is a stack to look through. No opinion on subject matter. [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] — neuro^(talk) 18:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Two hours and not one notification that I am put at ANI? And this is some how supposed to quell my claims that people at DYK are not following community standards anymore? >.<!!! Ottava Rima (talk) 18:57, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  Here is a good diff to look at. I tell Politizer to get involved with other aspects of the community: Village Pump, GA/FA, MoS, etc, in order to get a greater sense of people's opinions and issues, because DYK has been making some proposals that seem to run counter to how people outside of the rarely viewed WP:DYK talk page feel about various issues. What is the response? "You can go fuck yourself, Ottava Rima". I have a lot of DYKs. I have half of the DYK 5+ hook awards. I know about making complicated DYK, and I defended DYK for a long time at ANI. Now I am being dragged through the mud because I defended Blockquotes as counting as prose, as even MoS and WP:SIZE states it is. Then I am criticized because I stated that translations and simply taking what another wiki says and copying and pasted it into wikipedia is not new. What is this world coming to? I stated before that Village Pump or RfC should be used to get wider consensus on an issue and certain members called for me to be banned from DYK because of it. Is this really fair? Is this right? Ottava Rima (talk) 19:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

 – Blocked indef Black Kite 18:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above user is continuing to cause disruption by adding unreliably sourced information to articles. Despite multiple warnings he/she will not listen or communicate. The editor was blocked previously, but this had no effect. Please help. — Realist² 17:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• No improvement and no communication = blocked indef. If they want to communicate via unblock and explain how they are going to improve their editing, then they can. Black Kite 18:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks. — Realist² 18:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why are admins editing over protection. What I see here is a protection, then a reversion. Should pages be protected in the condition they are found? page history. The protection policy does not call for full protection at user request, but only semi after vandalism. NonvocalScream (talk) 19:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]