Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive11

Contents: March 11, 2005 - March 15, 2005

User:Martin2000

Blocked the user for 24 hours for a personal attack [1] against violet/riga. -- Chris 73 Talk 00:10, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

we are not authoriesd to block for personal attacksGeni 08:43, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

some stern words to the effect that he can shove off to usenet may be in order, though. dab (ᛏ) 09:13, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

re Lack of Authority: I think this applies to the ordinary "stupid" etc. What Martin did here is way beyond this and strays into the dangerous. He was essentially making threats of real life sexual harrassment. The fun stops here really. I might be biased and I acknowledge this hence i have not at any stage used admin powers, but I would have blocked him too. Refdoc 11:21, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

teh cabal! I admit that the block is "outside policy". And you know what? I'll do nothing about it. if one of the 400+ admins feels that this edit was unfairly slapped with a 24h block, let them unblock this user, I'll not complain. But, as Refdoc said, Martin2000 was so far out of line that I hope nobody will think it necessary to file an RfC against Chris 73 or ask for Jimbo's intervention... dab (ᛏ) 11:31, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think we are authorized to block for personal attacks: According to Wikipedia:No personal attacks, Users have been blocked or banned for [repeated personal attacks], and If you are personally attacked, [...] you can request the attacker be blocked. While the block did not fall 100% under this rule, I think common sense and standard practice allowed the block. This edit is also questionable. While he did not attack me personally, violet/riga seemed to be happy to have him blocked. Anyway, glad the majority here seems to agree with the block. -- Chris 73 Talk 11:53, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

The vote to give admins the power to block in case of personal attacks did not gain comunity consensus.Geni 12:24, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Gnnn... another vote which I missed and really would have liked to vote on. I did not/do not know about the vote. The only oneI know is at Wikipedia talk:No personal attacks, which accepted the guidelines on Wikipedia:No personal attacks. If it's not too much trouble, could you give me the link to the failed vote? Thanks -- Chris 73 Talk 12:31, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

Should we have a Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Links to votes sub-page here? Filiocht 12:42, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Blocking policy/Personal attacks (old), it got a majority (36(including JW):26), but no consensus. Obvious objections were/are objectivity/defineability/vagueness (everybody would suddenly become very touchy in an effort to have people blocked...). I do believe that the case of Martin2000 is so unambiguous that this very vote may be cited to support Chris' block. dab (ᛏ) 12:53, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Extreme cases make bad law. People can be blocked for personal attacks. The ArbComm can do it; Jimbo can do it. It cannot be done by a regular administrator. This is another example where it is a problem that the ArbComm acts only through a slow-moving, super-cumbersome judicial process. I can't really fault the admin for wanting to get rid of this guy, but it chips away again at the policies and consensus we have set up. There should be a relatively fast way to establish community consensus that someone is a troll or a serious behaviour problem and have him removed from the community quickly. At least temporarily while the more slow moving processes confirm the decision. Otherwise, admins will take it onto themselves to make up policy as they go along; so that they can get rid of people they think are "obviously" objectionable. Sometimes, as in this case, it will be obvious, and there will be no disagreement in the end, and in other cases it will only be obvious to the admin concerned. Sometimes it will just be impatience and hot temper, and sometimes the admin will be correctly predicting the consensus (or at least Jimbo's eventual opinion). But that isn't how it should be. --BM 12:57, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I disagree that this block was contrary to policy: it was a personal threat to Violetriga, for which the user can be blocked indefinitely under the blocking policy, since we have no way of knowing whether the threat was a joke or not. — Dan | Talk 13:04, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

you have a point. It had not occured to me to eamine the issue from the angle. I agree with your analysisGeni 13:27, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

the comment was obnoxious, no doubt. It would get anybody in an American workplace instantly fired for sexual harassment. Or if it didn't, some company would be getting sued. On my web site, where I am the God-King, I would just ban this person for this since it would be an obvious violation of the Terms of Use of my site. But it is really stretching the point to see this comment as physically "threatening". For one thing it is an exchange between two anonymous handles on an Internet site. Wikipedia's current structure is that this kind of case has to be dealt with by Jimbo or the ArbComm. If that is a problem, and I agree it is, we should fix that problem. Meanwhile, lets not just make shit up so that admins can whack people that they want to whack, popular as that might be in some cases. --BM 14:29, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Why don't we just rollback their changes or delete their personal attacks? But I don't disagree with blocking this idiot. Sheesh. What is it with these nasty people? - Ta bu shi da yu 13:48, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

agree with BM, not a threat, that's really stretching it. rather an illustration of why we do need a policy to block such jerks, along the lines "admins may issue short blocks for repeated, extremely unambiguous attacks or insults". Hey, there is no community consensus for not blocking these idiots, look at it this way. There is, rather, a decided majority in favour of it. In general, "no consensus" should default to "don't block", but I argue that there are cases where "no consensus" definitely defaults to "block"!. dab (ᛏ) 14:36, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

hey, and BM, we (WPians, including you) make up policy as we go along, that's the idea! And sometimes we do trade some justice for manageability. We're not here to assure that every troll gets treated with the exact same amount of patience. You will agree that your voice is heard, even though you're not an admin. Stick around and write a few articles, and you'll be admin before you know it, TINC. dab (ᛏ) 14:41, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

well, this is only because I'm just so overwhelmingly persuasive and reasonable at all times, that people have to listen to me, or else they'd feel rotten about themselves. Right? Cheers. --BM 16:41, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

While rules and policies are important to any community, especially one with as many disputes as Wikipedia. I don't think we should be hamstrung by them. If we know someone is a troll and is making extreme personal attacks, why should we not block the person for a short time? Because of some policy? I think Wikipedia:No personal attacks is deliberately ambiguous (may be blocked) to allow admins the descretion of blocking someone for personal attacks. Quoting rules and regulations as an excuse a reason not to block someone that we (from common sense) know should be blocked is one of the reasons why instruction creep is a bane. As long as the ban isn't long term (ie, greater than 24 hours), and is performed by a third party, I think it should be fine. --Deathphoenix 15:38, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If we do not follow policy then why should we expect others to?Geni 18:04, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

No, I'm saying (and when I read my comments above, I can see how things aren't clear at all) that there are some things that don't need policy. I agree that once a policy is set, we should follow it. But there are some things where following common sense or discretion is better than turning to a policy and following chapter 2.4, section 3a, paragraph 5. That a clever and smart troll can turn up and possibly inflict a lot of damage while we argue over which policy applies to the individual's actions is, quite frankly, a little frightening. I have pretty thick skin, but there are some good editors who may leave over the actions of such trolls. That's why I'm glad that Wikipedia:No personal attacks is deliberately vague to show that in some cases, users engaging in such activities may be banned. --Deathphoenix 18:32, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

A skilled troll can do a lot more damage when a system is based on subjective judgement and "common sense". Yes there are times to turn vigilantly but it is important to know when these times are. I my opinion this was not such a case since the problem was limited to a small area. Such cases can and should be dealt with through normal means (RFC mediation arbcom).Geni 20:06, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Which is why, IMO, some things are policy, and some things are not. Speaking hypothetically, if I were subject to a personal attack, and there were more to come, I'd prefer that the attacking user be blocked for 24 hours until the problem has been addressed. 24 hours seems to be a "tempban" anyway. I don't see how a skilled troll can do more damage in my example than if several admins had to go look up a policy and debate its merits and applicability while the user continutes to make personal attacks against me. --Deathphoenix 20:11, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The troll flits around the edge of the subjective rules resulting in them being extend for "clear cases" or them being removed altogher. In the first case a respected member finds themselves falling into a danger zone in the second the troll keeps pushing. Neither of these are goodGeni 21:24, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

So what's wrong with an admin using discretion to temp-block the personal attacker for 24 hours, especially because doing so doesn't violate any policies? Wikipedia:No personal attacks allows for admin's discretion in such cases, and if other admins disagree, they can unblock the user anyway (although there is a danger of getting into block-wars in this case). Most admin blocks for personal attacks that I've seen have been responsibly done because if the target is an admin, they'll post a request for some other admin to do the block. --Deathphoenix 21:31, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Block wars are not a risk since if a block is disputed then the person remains unblocked. Whats wrong is how do you define a personal attack? the comunity is not sure about what to do over this area as such we should use extream caution this area.Geni 22:02, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think good examples of personal attacks are provided in Wikipedia:No personal attacks, and asking another admin to look into the personal attacker is a good way to have a third party determine whether something is a personal attack. --Deathphoenix 22:20, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I give lots of my time to Wikipedia already and am not about to spend an extraordinary amount of time on "(RFC mediation arbcom)" against this person. You seem to be forgetting two very important aspects of this: 1) the user has made no significant edits and 2) there was no call for any dispute resolutions between him and myself because there is no dispute - I merely applied correct policy and he attacked me for it. violet/riga (t) 20:32, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

so then perhaps rather then telling those who break the 3RR trying to stop POV pushers and those getting into edits wars that they should try the disspute resolution process I should say; you can do this but unless you want to spend extraordinary amounts of time on it I would suggest learning to edit war better. If we don't repect policy and the wikipedia process why should we expect anyone else to? I know about this conflict I have been watching it and have been slightly involved for some time. It is an interesting case it constaly seems to be on the edge of a catastophy but never quite gets thereGeni 21:24, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You seem to have skipped over everything I said. Martin2000 has been blocked from editting for 24 hours (hardly a nasty punishment against someone with edits only really related to one article) and I can promise that if I see a similar case anywhere else I will block the user involved. I respect the policies but they can't cover everything. violet/riga (t) 22:41, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

that is not an answer to my pointsGeni 09:10, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I wasn't aware that you made any points that required a response. violet/riga (t) 17:41, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It saddens me greatly that some people believe that any user should be able to get away with making such strong personal attacks. We are a group of people trying to add content to an encyclopedia, not looking to have to defend ourselves against little kids with no sense of how to communicate with people. He should be banned, and even if it's not along with current policy then I think most people would agree that this troll isn't worthy of being let off. Virtually all the edits have been part of a revert war, and I think there can be little doubt that he also abused users and broke the 3RR under IP 64.6.186.242. Thanks to Chris 73 for blocking him, and I think that some people need to stop thinking that policy is a hard and fast set of rules that must be followed 100%. violet/riga (t) 18:26, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Perfectly good editors can argue back and forth about which policy applies to what situation. Meanwhile, the potentially abusive user (or smart troll) is free to carry out personal attacks which, while harmful, may not be against any written policies. --Deathphoenix 18:40, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I wouldn't be too sure about the IP there is anouther user in this conflict who I consider a posible candidate for those actionsGeni 21:24, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I also would like to thank violet/riga to get involved in the first place. Refdoc 18:54, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

User:Cumbey/User:68.61.150.80 versus User:SqueakBox

Three revert rule violation on Javier Solana (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views).

Cumbey (talk · contribs)/68.61.150.80 (talk · contribs):

• 1st revert: 03:10, 11 Mar 2005
• 2nd revert: 04:48, 11 Mar 2005
• 3rd revert: 05:33, 11 Mar 2005
• 4th revert: 06:21, 11 Mar 2005
• 5th revert: 10:37, 11 Mar 2005
• 6th revert: 10:50, 11 Mar 2005

SqueakBox (talk · contribs):

• 1st revert: 03:32, 11 Mar 2005
• 2nd revert: 11 Mar 2005
• 3rd revert: 10:47, 11 Mar 2005
• 4th revert: 10:56, 11 Mar 2005

I will let the administrators decide whether SqueakBox is reverting vandalism; he is certainly up against an overt POV pusher.

Reported by: Susvolans (pigs can fly) 11:13, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Blocked user:68.61.150.80 for 24 hours. Cumbey did not violate the 3RR, unless she is also the anon IP adress, which is likely since she did the same reverts. SqueakBox also had 4 reverts, which do not look like simple vandalism to me, but then I am not familiar with the topic. I would support a block of both Cumbey and SqueakBox, but would like to hear a second opinion first, or alternatively have another admin block them. -- Chris 73 Talk 11:25, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

Notified both users about the 3RR report. -- Chris 73 Talk 11:32, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

Looking at the comments below, I now oppose a block of SqueakBox. While technically violating the 3RR rule, the fault lies in my opinion with the other party. -- Chris 73 Talk 23:13, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

Cumbey reverted to a version riddled with inaccuracies. This is not a straightforward edit war. Cumbey is a multiple IP address user inserting a POV thesis on Solana being the Beast in deliberate violation of wiki policy. Her version is full of inaccuracies such as that a Ferdinand González was a Spanish President; it is Felipe González. She claims the EU have a vote on the UN security council. I wish, but it is not so. She also deliberately misplaced the section on the Barcelona Conference, making it appear Solana initiated this as EU foreign minister. All this had already been discussed on the talk page, where she only engages in insulting me. She vandalised my home page yesterday. See Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User:Cumbey. I was merely ensuring the article was not vandalsied, as was RickK. User:Cumbey is not acting in good faith, she is acting in bad faith, deliberately trashing wikipedia policy to prove he is the beast, with all it's anti-EU rants. The America contributors would not tolerate this being done to Condoleezza Rice. I would prefer to be formally told I was wrong, but I did act in good faith. If I did something wrong I apologize. It was the middle of the night (something here woke me), and I could not ask for help, I just wanted to go back to bed. This is her contribution to my home page.--SqueakBox 16:13, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

If you block me for 24 hours I can live with it (just go and work on Spanish wiki), and recognise I need a break from this. I am even dreaming about it. But I ask people not to impose a longer block on me, and not to block me while unblocking User:Cumbey. I am convinced when she is unblocked she will return to her everts. I don't feel I should be blocked for trying to stop her machinations, even if I went too far by reverting 4 times. As I say, I apologise for any wrong doing. I am unhappy at her insulting my good edits to this article, and then removing them without explanation, starting an edit war. --SqueakBox 20:50, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

• Comment: User:68.61.150.80 and Cumbey appear to be the same person - User:68.61.150.80 signed edit summaries "CEC" (=Constance E. Cumbey). In defense of SqueakBox, this appears to be a long-running dispute in which Cumbey is guilty of POV-pushing, Original Research and Personal attacks (e.g., [2]). It's hard to see just by comparing the diff's - the two versions are very different, but based on the (extensive) Talk pages, it would appear that Cumbey admits to trying to link Solana with the anti-christ and to the New Age movement by including his mother's links to Rajneesh. Cumbey appears to be protecting an earlier version of the page, and keeps reverting it to that (compare the Feb 20 and March 10 versions [3]). Cumbey's version appears to be trying to connect Solana with the rise of the anti-christ re-uniting the Roman empire, etc. SqueakBox was a little overzealous in fighting extremist POVs, but appears to be acting in good faith in defense of accuracy and NPOV, and I would argue against a block. Guettarda 18:45, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

User:SqueakBox, after reasearch, admits he was wrong. He should have posted something here or just left it in the hands of others. If he is blocked for 24 hours he will accept it gracefully. He will not in any case break the 3RR rule again. he recognises that is not the way to do things here, that technically Cumbey was not vandalising the Solana article (only his home page), and that he must follow wikipedia procedure if he is to prevent Cumbey's thesis from infecting the Solana article. --SqueakBox 18:53, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

Well, I can't speak for every admin, but I certain have no intention of blocking you, and I see a couple of other admins have been through and left comments without blocking you either. I think we understand what the situation is (alas, we see it all too often ourselves, in articles we care about). Noel (talk) 23:04, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Cumbey and SqueakBox are trying to resolve their differences through emails, where we are at least more civilised with each other than at wikipedia--SqueakBox 20:29, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC).

From my point of view, as a non-administrator but with 12 months editing experience at Wikipedia under my belt, that the Javier Solana article is being continually vandalised by User:Cumbey and maybe others. User:Squeakbox may have made a few mistakes but he has acted graciously and in good faith throughout this process. Please examine his detailed work in tracking and reporting this problem. Like many users who are subject to hostility by vandals, User:Squeakbox is getting very frustrated and may give up on Wikipedia if this problem is not solved. Like me, he cannot solve this problem and must rely upon the Wikipedia hierarchy to act. I implore anyone who has responsibility in this area to act to prevent this blatant vandalism. If someone does a detailed check of User:Cumbey's and User:Squeakbox's editing you will discover for yourselves the vandalism that is occurring and the efforts of User:Squeakbox in repairing this damage. --One Salient Oversight 21:26, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Sigh, the definition of Wikipedia:Vandalism is pretty restrictive; if Cumbey really believes this stuff they are adding, it doesn't (alas) qualify. I share your frustration about people like this, but if you head over to WP:AN/I, you'll see that admins are catching flack for blocking people unless there's very clear policy that covers it, and alas, this type of stuff isn't so clearly covered. I too am frustrated with editors like this, but I don't have any good quick answer. Noel (talk) 23:04, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The Wikipedia:Vandalism states: Vandalism is indisputable bad-faith addition, deletion, or change to content, made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of the encyclopedia. The largest quantity of vandalism consists of replacement of prominent articles with obscenities, namecalling, or other wholly irrelevant content. I think that is what is going on here. Cumbey may think she's doing the right thing, but she is refusing to compromise, refusing to listen to others and treating the Solana page as her own private article. If we can't ban them then at least restrict access to the page for a while. One Salient Oversight 01:39, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Javier Solana (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) is listed at Wikipedia:Most vandalized pages. For a time, "666" Number of the Beast content was being added to it, including a Bible quote at the very top of the page. Some of the anonymous IPs involved in editing the article may have a 666-related agenda. Some discussion is at Talk:Javier Solana/Solana vandalism and POV. It might be helpful if more admins or users in general add this page to their watchlists. -- Curps 21:51, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

SqueakBox will revert Cumbey if she puts her version back twice within any 24 hour period, but I will not revert it a third time, even if it means being stuck with the other version. I hope others might do the same. Unlike Cumbey I have a variety of interests. I hope no one is going to block me because I do not want a history of being blocked. I am not bothered about temporarily being unable to use English Wikipedia as I can just go to the Spanish one --SqueakBox 23:37, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

User:Cumbey has now engaged in an identical edit war at [4]. Any help would be much appreciated. --SqueakBox 17:10, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

Reply to User 'Squeakbox': Global Elite Wiki employs the Wiki process but is a separate board. In addition to being so extremely controlling and insulting to me on this board, he has gone over there with vandalism to the article. I am concerned about his apparently megalomanic view that he is entitled to globally control all information reaching the public on Javier Solana, including the right to eliminate the references Wikipedia instructs its authors to use 'so others may check the accuracy of their work.' He eliminted those footnotes and instead placed footnotes, EVEN ON THE GLOBAL ELITE BOARD to his various slanders. If this is Wikipedia's editorial preference, so be it, but it will eliminate credibility as a scholarly encyclopedia as to Wikipedia. Question for Squeakbox: Why don't you apply for a job at Google and Yahoo in their search engine department so you can really do a hatchet job on the available Javier Solana information?! Cumbey 20:20, 12 Mar 2005

SqueakBox has not attacked Cumbey at wikielite. he doesn't want her tagging her version there as being from wikipedia when it is her POV version. She on the other hand left this

BEWARE OF USER SQUEAKBOX'

The person making changes and reversions demanding that Wikipedia post only his own vandalized version of the Javier Solana information is a New Ager. He is complete with Alice Bailey, 'Core Process Therapy,' Rastafarianism, and astrology. He is a historical revisionist and an internet megalomaniac who resorts to threats and bullyings on the Wikipedia Board. He utterly ruined the article on Wikipedia and frankly I lack the stamina to keep up with him there, but he clearly does not belong on Wiki Elite board. He claimed he could get away with his vandalism there because of his claimed friendship with "Jimbo" and other board regulars. Knowing Europeans rebutted him and he also erased their work. I am going to seek his permanent banning from Wiki Elite! His agenda is to kill truthful information, not to foster it. You can read about his strange pursuits here: [1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:SqueakBox)

Respectfully, CONSTANCE E. CUMBEY cumbey@gmail.com

here.

All SqueakBox wants is a balanced a political article. he is still trying to get some collaborative effort via email with Cumbey, but she keeps attacking. --SqueakBox 20:50, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

User:Cumbey has made another personal attack against me at Talk:Javier Solana--SqueakBox 04:28, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

PERSONAL ATTACKS ARE NOT WELCOME AT WIKIPEDIA. WILL SOME ADMINISTRATOR PLEASE BAN CUMBEY AND THE ASSOCIATED SOCKPUPPETS? --One Salient Oversight 04:33, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

---

OK everyone, STOP already! This is not the place to be battling out whatever you are all battling out. File an RFC please. - Ta bu shi da yu 04:45, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There is an Rfc at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User:Cumbey --SqueakBox 23:38, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

Then please leave further comments there. - Ta bu shi da yu 23:48, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

rec.sport.pro-wrestling

We seem to have imported a serious case of usenet drama at rec.sport.pro-wrestling. Impersonation, vandalism, and trolling ahoy! All within one day. silsor 13:38, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

I think you should look whether there's a case to ban either one (or both of them) to stop this. If that's not possible, I'm afraid the only thing that will cool it down is a block on a version that precedes both their edits. Mgm|^(talk) 14:00, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

They could probably just be ignored. Any action against them will likely be more harmful to Wikipedia than just not being too bothered, coming back in a couple of weeks and fixing the article then. Dr Zen 03:01, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You ought to know better than to speak against punitive logic, Zen! They'll get you for that! Everyking 06:35, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

New vandal MO

Probable sockpuppets of Willy on Wheels have been trying a new method of vandalism, since we've made it harder to perform page-move vandalism without using up old accounts. The MO is to create redirects to (for example) [[de:en:Image:Autofellatio.jpg]]. Using the multiple language prefixes causes redirection to occur in a way that makes using the normal user interface to undo the damage impossible. The changes can be backed off using URL-mangling to create appropriate editing commands, but this assumes a high level of admin skill, and is slower than just using the normal Web user interface -- which is surely WoW's intent. This probably requires developer involvement to make this kind of to-and-fro redirection impossible. -- The Anome

Interwiki redirection is used on the images on the main page, for example. This kind of vandalism can be dealt with by clicking the history links in the user contributions, not the article links. From there you can perform page operations as usual. silsor 14:21, Mar 12, 2005 (UTC)

I have made this one 1656 on bugzilla. This kind of redirect IMHO should not work - they are too difficult to edit (only via the user edit history), nor do they show in any "what links here" list. Who knows how many of redirects to the Autofellatio image are still hidden in the database now, not found after cleaning up the vandalism runs? It's impossible to tell without searching in a database dump, or by SQL commands. Do we really use this kind of redirects on the main page? andy 17:01, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Open proxys

I am an open proxy, found care of an open proxy search engine - [5]

This proxy search engine lists new IPs every time it is refreshed, so its list will never be able to be blocked. Choosedreams 14:46, 12 Mar 2005

User ID blocked permanently as sock-puppet. Noel (talk) 14:58, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I suggest we keep an eye on articles that CheeseDreams frequents. - Ta bu shi da yu 02:22, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Impersonation and other harassment directed at User:Tabib and others

As a result of the ongoing arbitration case brought by User:Tabib, there are likely to be impersonations and other disruptive edits on his pages and those of anyone associated with the case or fighting the vandalism involved.

A recent case was User:-Tabib which made some reasonably plausible impersonations of Tabib today. I have blocked the user indefinitely. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 21:07, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This link may be of some use in spotting such cases. It's a related-changes for the evidence page in that case. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 21:12, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

User:Nulla

Three revert rule violation on Oliver North (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Nulla (talk · contribs):

• 1st revert: [6]
• 2nd revert: [7]
• 3rd revert: [8]
• 4th revert: [9]
• 5th revert: [10]
• 6th revert: [11]

Reported by: 68.108.243.20 05:32, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• Blocked for 3RR violation as well as removing the notice from this page. Rhobite 05:48, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

I'd have given them 48 - consecutive 24's for each of the two. Noel (talk) 12:55, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Autofellatio

User:198 is deleting the LINE DRAWING as "offensive", and indicates that he/she will continue to do so indefinitely to "protect the children". The page has been protected twice now in the last three days because of his edit warring and indications that he will not give up, including violating the 3RR. RickK 10:36, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

I think this is marginal. It's a bit like a copycat of DrZen's behavior. He is being annoying and pointless and insisting that only his version (without the picture) is right. Let him knock his head against group consensus for a bit. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 11:11, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Why do people keep protecting this page? 198 is obviously aware of the three revert rule. To my knowledge he's the only one who wants the drawing gone, and he has demonstrated that he is not willing to discuss the matter. Let him get blocked. Rhobite 21:28, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

I agree that no purpose is served by protection. The community is perfectly capable of asserting its wishes over this whenever the single user goes against its wishes. I'll unprotect. Anyone who disagrees, feel free to reprotect and I won't argue with it. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 21:50, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

From 198's user page:

Autofellatio--I will revert on sight if I see that porn picture, I don't care about the 3-revert rule in this case--198 03:17, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Seems like the outcome is inevitable, to me. --Calton | Talk 23:57, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I have blocked 198 for 24 hours for repeated vandalism of the page. RickK 05:34, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

It's not vandalism, it's a content dispute...has he or she broken the 3RR? Everyking 05:44, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It isn't a content dispute, it's deliberate disruption. 198 has demonstrated full knowlege of all applicable policies (3RR, not censored for minors, etc), and reverted exactly three times before explicitly calling it a night. --Carnildo 06:58, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

That doesn't make it vandalism or deliberate disruption. It could be deliberate disruption, but how are we supposed to know that? Maybe 198 just has a personal opposition to the display of sexual imagery. Everyking 07:05, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Did you miss the part above where he says I will revert on sight if I see that porn picture, I don't care about the 3-revert rule in this case? RickK 07:07, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

But we can't block for that, we can only block for actually violating the rule. Everyking 07:09, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Rick, I really wish you didn't take such a ham-handed approach to blocking people. 198 and I were discussing the situation on the talk page. A dialogue was taking place and I feel that we were moving towards an understanding about the drawing. 198 agreed not to violate the three revert rule in his last edit before you blocked him. You chose to ignore that remark and instead base your block on an earlier statement on his talk page. Your block is not supported by policy. We have enough of a problem with crazy POV warriors accusing people of vandalism. You of all people should know better. You know that his edit wasn't vandalism, and you know that you chose to ignore the ongoing discussion on the talk page. I have unblocked 198. Rhobite 07:19, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

And since someone will undoubtedly point out my remark above (I said "let him get blocked"), I do think that 198 should be blocked if he actually breaks a rule. I made that remark before he agreed to adhere to the three revert rule. I try to keep an open mind. Rhobite 07:23, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

So you have no problem with him reverting the page three times a day indefinitely? RickK 07:29, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

And I'm afraid I don't see any dialogue between you and 198, nor any indication that he will stop doing it. He is disrupting Wikipedia, and that is a blocking offense. RickK 07:34, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

I have a problem with administrators overstepping their bounds, especially when there is an ongoing dialogue. I don't believe 198 will revert the article three times every day, but if he chooses to do that we can get an arbcom case and a temporary injunction within a few days. No need to invent policy. As for our dialogue, see the bottom of Talk:Autofellatio and both of our user talk pages. It's not my fault if you refuse to do basic research before blocking a user. A simple look through 198's contributions would show you his attempts to compromise. Rhobite 07:41, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

Well Rick shown me the writing on the wall; I'm quitting wikipedia--198 07:43, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Rick, I also think you are going too far here. Saying "I don't care about the 3RR" in anger is not disruption. actually breaking the 3RR will get you blocked for a day of course, but only after you do it. This is an unresolved content dispute, with both sides reverting (you can't do a revert-war all on your own), and taking sides is not appropriate. In the view of 198, adding sexually explicit iamges is disruptive, and removing them is cleanup work. We need to find a compromise in this issue, but getting tough on 198 is out of line: toughness is alright when used on trolls, vandals or nazis, but clearly 198 is neither, but an editor sincerely concerned about what he regards as inappropriate content. The way to go in cases of edit wars is protection, not blocking of those in the minority (who will be more likely to break the 3RR. It is also no marvel that the 'prudish' side is in the minority in this case. What mindset do you think is typical for people with Autofellatio on their watchlist??). dab (ᛏ) 07:51, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I DID protect the page, and it was immediately unprotected because it was felt that blocking 198 was the way to go. See above on this same page. You can't have it both ways, people, we either protect the page or we block people who are vandalizing it repeatedly. RickK 08:13, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry, are you saying this is all a misunderstanding? I was under the impression that you thought it necessary to block 198. His very opponents seem to think that he should not have been blocked before actually breaking the 3RR. In my understanding, in the case of an edit war (not vandalism), you first block people for 3RR violations a couple of times. If the edit war persists, i.e. if you repeatedly have to block the same people for 3RR, or if people just settle for reverting every 6 hours, you (blindly) protect the page at some point. I'm sorry if I'm basing this on false assumptions, I thought you had blocked 198 for threatening to break the 3RR. dab (ᛏ) 16:09, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I blocked 198 because he 3RRs every day. This is repeated disruption of Wikipedia. I was perfectly happy with protecting the page and letting the entire discussion play out on the Talk page, but that was apparenlty unaceptable. You DID read the section above where I protected the page and it was immediately unprotected, right? If the page can't be protected and the vandal continues to insist on playing out the letter of the rule and not the spirit by 3 RRs a day, then what else would you suggest? RickK 20:25, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

Someone aggrieved by his 3RR's per day should apply to the arbcomm for relief, perhaps first going through mediation. Administrators are authorized to block people for violating the 3RR, meaning 4RR's in a 24 hour period. But there is no policy against "3RR every day" and if the community had wanted a rule like that they could have created one, and still can. One can still be guilty of edit-warring without overstepping the 3RR, and persistent edit-warring is certainly a behavioural problem. But it is one for the ArbComm to deal with, with collection of evidence, etc, etc. They have dealt with it in the past, such as in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Charles Darwin-Lincoln dispute. Stretching the blocking policy to define "3RR every day" as disruption is stretching that policy too far. That policy isn't intended to allow administrators to assume the duties of the ArbComm by allowing them to define any behaviour they find objectionable as "disruption" and block the offending editor. What is the point of even having an ArbComm, with elected arbitrators, etc -- if any administrator can impose a one month block on any other member merely by declaring his behaviour to be "disruption"? --BM 22:53, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

But there is no policy against "3RR every day" Funny, ArbCom doesn't seem to see things your way:

The three revert rule is an electric fence, not an entitlement.
The 3RR is intended as a means to stop sterile edit wars. It does
not grant users an inalienable right to three reverts every
twenty-four hours or endorse reverts as an editing technique. 
Persistent reversion remains strongly discouraged and is unlikely
to constitute working properly with others.
   Passed 6 to 0 at 14:35, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

3RR_is_not_an_entitlement --Calton | Talk 23:53, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I am on record as refusing to have anything to do with the arbcom, since their policies and past rulings have been worse than ineffective. RickK 23:27, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

I am not arguing that "3RR every day" is acceptable behaviour. However, it is not a violation of the 3RR policy. Administrators have the right to block under the 3RR policy. There is edit-warring that can occur that is still not a violation of the 3RR policy. There is no policy that gives administrators the authority to deal with that edit-warring by blocking. They have some other means, such as page protection, but not blocking. Edit-warring, other that 3RR violations, must be be dealt with by the ArbComm, as it has been in other cases. The quote from Calton is precisely from an edit-warring case decided by the ArbComm. The ArbComm decision did not create new authority for adminstrators to block people; it was the rationale for a decision by the ArbComm. If RickK is "having nothing to do with the ArbCom" (a position I don't agree with but for which I can imagine the reasons), it still does not grant him authority to block people according to his ideas of what is right. As an administrator he has authority to block people in very particular cases, such as 3RR violations, vandalism, disruption, etc. RickK knows this, of course, which is why he is trying to define the behaviour he targetted as "disruption". But that simply doesn't wash, since this is not a case of disruption. This issue is important because more and more we see administrators inventing policy and authority to bring about a result that they consider "common sense". Jimbo actually made this situation worse by recently blessing as "common sense", retroactively, another blocking action by an administrator outside of policy, and implicitly criticizing the people (including me) who objected to the violation of policy. But we can't have 400 administrators all substituting their own views as to what is common sense for the policies and procedures that have been established, hoping that their decisions will somehow be blessed retroactively by consensus (or Jimbo). If there are super-administrators who are not constrained by policy and have authority from Jimbo to impose sanctions on other members based on their own "common sense", I would like to know about it, and I would like to see a list of these administrators. --BM 00:25, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

More rules are just about the last thing we need. Look at all the stupid, time-wasting arguments we have other whether something is a revert or not. More rules just mean more wiki-lawyering. We should simply have said "people can be blocked for edit-warring", and left it at that. Yes, we do need to come up with some way to prevent block warring; I liked your idea. Also, maybe we ought to create two classes of admins; normal "janitors" who just do stuff such as deletions, protection, etc, and small number of "policeman", who are carefully selected for their reasonable nature, and given the authority (by the Wikimedia board, or some group they appoint - i.e. not an election) to block people for behaviour (edit warring, abuse, etc); the actions of the latter group can only be undone by the policeman who took the action, or by appealing to the ArbComm. (If something like this happens, I cheerfully volunteer to be demoted to the former; I have no major desire in riding herd on people.) Noel (talk) 13:04, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Growing necessitates more and better rules. I never heard of a society yet, or an organization, that made the rules simpler as it got more complex. It doesn't work that way. Improving the nature and scope of the laws is a natural part of improving our functioning as a community. Clear and comprehensive rules are a protection for all editors against the petty tyranny of those who like to play politics or carry on a grudge. I'll take wiki-lawyering over petty tyranny anyday. A lack of basic fairness drives contributors off faster than the plague. Everyking 13:24, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Fine I'm out of this. I tried a protect and that got undone. I tried a block and that got undone. Consensus is apparently not to be enforced. The vandals and edit warriors win. RickK 05:30, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

Informal complaints over the behaviour of admins

User:Snowspinner

Snowspinner has committed stalking and harassment against me and thereby actively disturbed and made me upset by repeatedly reversing the following edits of mine: Natural health, Osteopathy, Metamorphic Technique, Orthomolecular medicine, Body work (alternative medicine), Rolfing and Magnet therapy. This is not a dispute over the content of an article but is about Snowspinner knowlingly engaging in stalking and harassing behavior by Snowspinner's abuse of administrative reversals. The only thing that I am trying to do is to update the old objectionable pre-existing project infoboxes with a new version of a single purpose infobox design. According to Snowspinner

Natural Health Medicine:CAM NCCAM:Biologically
Based Therapy Modality:Self-care Culture:Western

"I object because it is not an infobox, but rather an attempt to make your categories shinier and more special than everybody else's." Snowspinner 13:21, Feb 28, 2005 (UTC)[12]

I am not banned and I am currently an editor in good standing.

"John Gohde has made no secret of the fact that he is MNH. He had a ban from the arbcom. The ban ended, and he came back. So he is now a user in good standing." Snowspinner 14:45, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)[13]

In addition, Snowspinner has been stalking my edits since 16:14, 12 Feb 2005[14],[15] See additional evidence at [16].

Furthermore, I brought the subject up on Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Snowspinner and on Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Snowspinner. Snowspinner's reply in Talk indicates that Snowspinner thinks that the whole thing is very funny. It is about time that you Admins did something about your problem areas.

Therefore, Snowspinner 's repeated admin reversals are totally inappropriate. -- John Gohde 15:19, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Prior to today, I had not reverted any edits of the sort for several days, possibly upward of a week. Indeed, I didn't revert (Or even look at your contributions) over the weekend. Today, I did, removed the infoboxes once again, and then noticed that, after repeated accusations of stalking, you've mysteriously wandered off of your usual focus on alternative medicine and expressed an interest in beef and Internet pornography. I never knew such matters interested you. Perhaps you should bring up your objections to my edits on the talk page, and we can discuss them. I'm particularly surprised to find that you don't think a top 4000 website is notable - it's one of the most successful and important erotic websites on the Internet. But I look forward to seeing your responses on the talk page! In good faith, Snowspinner 15:41, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, but I am NOT a sex pervert. That article is NOT suitable for Wikipedia, period. -- John Gohde 16:33, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Do you similarly want Playboy, Oral sex, and BDSM removed? Snowspinner 17:12, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

Comments from above

When I look at that record, that is not what I see. Sure, he did some work on the steak articles, but before that we have long strings of rollbacking of User:John Gohde, removing stub tags and deleted templates, and some RC patrol. In fact, if you look at his 500 articles, you have to go all the way back to Sep 14th (at present). ... -- Netoholic @ 15:57, 2005 Mar 11 (UTC)

RickK, for anyone that has ever really been stalked, or even cyberstalked, your accusation is probably seen as insulting. I'd like to illustrate the double-standard being put forth here. If you take a look at what Snowspinner has been doing regarding User:John Gohde, you may get a hint of what true Wiki-stalking is. That poor guy, who may be misguided, is trying to edit in his area of speciality. Snowspinner is systematically using reversion, deletion, and good old fashion editing to remove tones of that guys work. The only way Snowspinner is doing that is by pulling that user's contribs and going over every single one, reverting most of them and removing anything that guy does. I would suspect if you count up, Snowspinner is a much bigger stalker than TRT, and more blatant. So please stop using the term "stalked", since it is nothing of the sort. -- Netoholic @ 00:53, 2005 Mar 10 (UTC)

Why was this moved here? What does this have to do with anything above it? RickK 21:07, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

John Gohde copied them down here at 16:07, 13 Mar 2005. Noel (talk) 20:34, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It was copied here, rather than moved. The reason is obviously self-explainatory. -- John Gohde 04:05, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

What does this have to do with any activities I have or will perform as an admin, and what does it have to do with any comments above it? RickK 06:34, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

User:David Gerard

David has committed stalking and harassment against me and thereby actively disturbed and made me upset by repeatedly reversing the following edits of mine:Natural health, Osteopathy, Metamorphic Technique, Orthomolecular medicine, Body work (alternative medicine), Rolfing and Magnet therapy. This is not a dispute over the content of an article but for knowlingly engaging in stalking and harassing behavior by abusing his use of admin of reversals. I am not banned and I am currently an editor in good standing.

"Compared to the behaviour of such recent arbitration subjects as Herschelkrustofsky or Robert the Bruce, John Gohde is just fine. He works very hard indeed at writing material he's a subject matter expert on to fill in Wikipedia's coverage nicely. ... In my non-arbitrating and strictly as any old Wikipedian opinion" - David Gerard 23:54, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)[17].

Therefore, David's repeated admin reversals are totally inappropriate. -- John Gohde 15:19, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Because David doesn't think you're as bad as some people, he shouldn't revert your edits when he thinks they're bad? I don't get this. Snowspinner 15:28, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

Stalking, harassment, actively disturbing and making me upset knowlingly by an Admin, with his repeated inappropriate use of admin reversals. -- John Gohde 15:48, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

nothing to see here... I can only see commented, straightforward edits by Snowspinner. [18], [19] would have been more informative diffs. If you are so upset simply by people disagreeing with you, maybe it's your turn for a wikibreak? Also, rollbacks are hardly an abuse of admin power. It's not like you have been inappropriately blocked or something. Any editor may revert you, if they don't like your edits. dab (ᛏ) 15:56, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• The fact they are roll back reversals doesn't change a thing. A revert is a revert no matter who makes it. You make it sound like making a rollback on non-vandalism is a bad thing. Mgm|^(talk) 16:29, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)
  • It is when used to facilitate an edit conflict. Roll-backing a non-vandalous edit expressly fails the "Always explain your reverts" policy. -- Netoholic @ 17:19, 2005 Mar 13 (UTC)
  • Rollbacks are a way of dealing with vandalism.They really shouldn't be used for non vandal reverts. I've done it myself from time to time, but I regret doing it as a non explained revert rarely helps the situation. Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 17:27, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • The reason for objection was made pretty clear by me on several occasions - it's an inappropriate use of series boxes. It seems assumable that David's reversions amounted to "Agree with Snowspinner." He may even have indicated that once in an edit summary - I don't recall, quite honestly. Snowspinner 17:32, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)
      • You have to ask yourself, "why doesn't every editor have access to rollback?" I think we all know it is because it would be abused to facilitate unproductive edit wars. Admins are supposed to be able to handle themselves better, and so are given this tool for vandal-fighting. It is not a "voting tool" in an edit conflict, so the "Agree with Snowspinner" assumption, though probably correct in David's mind, doesn't make it a proper action. -- Netoholic @ 17:46, 2005 Mar 13 (UTC)
        • Most were hand-reverts in the conventional manner, actually - David Gerard 18:55, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
          • I don't treat with respect anybody who treats me with disrespect. And, I am calling you a Liar Point-Blank because most if NOT all were admin reversals. Feel Free to prove me wrong. -- John Gohde 08:50, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
            • If you have access to a technical method of telling edits done one way from edits done the other way with the same summary text, then, since you're making the assertion, I'm eagerly awaiting your evidence - David Gerard 13:40, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
            • You are the person making an assertion that is contrary to common sense, therefore you have the burden of proof. If it looks like an Admin Reversal/Rollback, it is one unless David can prove otherwise. -- John Gohde 15:09, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
              • So this is an admin reversal/rollback? Snowspinner 15:52, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

Well then how about telling me the reason for David repeatedly reversing my edits. Are the project's infoboxes too shiny for David's taste? How about a reason that belongs on planet Earth? Inboboxes are a totally accepted part of Wikipedia by policy, guidelines, and style guides. Show me one thing wrong with replacing the old infobox design with a new single purpose design. These boxes were already there. They are not going through a list. They are intentionally harassing me for no good rational reason. And, I am talking about Admins, NOT an editor. Admins must be held to a higher standard of conduct. -- John Gohde 16:47, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• I've looked at the "infoboxes" and they aren't actually infoboxes they are navigation boxes. As such they are a duplication of the category links and are therefore redundant. Please stop adding them. Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 17:34, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • So, have I. They are positively NOT navigation boxes. The new design is positively a pure infobox. And, the blocking is actually keeping all the old navigation boxes from being updated to a pure infobox design. -- John Gohde 04:10, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

this is bogus. On the risk of sounding "territorial" again, there is no need to come here just to ask David what he thought was wrong with the boxes, and could he please comment on his reverts. He has a Talk Page for that. After he refuses to give his reasons, the option to complain, formally or informally, will still be open. As it is, this is just abusing this board to get a wider audience for your whining, or for exposing the buddying-up of admins. Let me tell you, if any sizeable subset of this motley crew of admins buddies-up against you, you must have a really weak case. dab (ᛏ) 20:12, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• They are in fact enhanced navigation boxes, i.e. templates, except you've constructed them as the HTML rather than as templates. They are redundant with the categories and so don't belong on articles. They serve only as vanity decorations and statements of article ownership - David Gerard 18:55, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • First of all, a pure navigation box was just voted on in the recent TvD vote on Buddhism.[20] Even though template:buddhism is a prohibited use of an article series box, both of you Admins voted to keep it.[21] That pure navigation box survived squeaky clean. So, there is absolutely nothing wrong with using a pure prohibited navigation box in Wikipedia in any subject area. Second, the new design is clearly an infobox rather than a navigation box. I researched the topic, and I removed all imperfections from it. The new design is a pure infobox by all policy, guidelines, and style guides on Wikipedia. Infoboxes by policy, guidelines, and style guides are not redundant with categories becuase they have nothing in common with categories. Third, Lists are allowed by Wikipedia guidelines to be redundant with categories. Thus, being redunduant with a category is not a crime on Wikipedia. Fourth, the ONLY reason you insist on disrepecting me with your openly bigoted comments about the new AM infobox design is that you clearly are a bigot by your own above words. Feel Free to prove me wrong. -- John Gohde 08:50, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • What does WP:POINT say about consistency? - David Gerard 13:40, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • That comment does not speak to the issues that, I have raised. Namely your unjustified use of Admin Reversals. -- John Gohde 15:09, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Actually, I have already discussed same in the respective talk pages of both users under the topic of WP:POINT. And, these dudes made some of their dumbest comments ever, IMHO. -- John Gohde 05:07, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The only thing bogus here, is your comments. Time has past for being polite. I want David punished for stalking, harassment, actively disturbing and making me upset knowlingly by an Admin, with his repeated inappropriate use of admin reversals. Nothing than less than punishment for David will be accepted by me. -- John Gohde 04:15, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

that's great, but you're equally mistaken to bring it up here, then. ta-ta, happy arbcomming. dab (ᛏ) 09:27, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

User:RickK

• Deliberately abused his sysop privileges for blocking me for 24 hours under false pretenses.[22]
  1. Attempted to blocked me for 24 hours only after I filed a proper complaint against him.
  2. Falsely claimed that I violated the 3 RR in an edit war which he himself started.
     1. The facts show that I did two reverts. [23]
     2. Nick falsely claimed that I broke the 3RR rule.[24]
     3. When informed of the error of his ways, by the person who re-added my complaint, NickK failed to unblock me.
  3. I did not write the introduction to this page. And, this page clearly states that I have a right to file complaints against admins here.
• Deliberately deleting my complaints against admins on this page, twice. Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents: "If you want to make an open informal complaint over the behaviour of an admin, you can do so here."
• For a recent bogus enforcement of a 3RR violation after Snowspinner made the offer on his talk page.
  • "I thought you might particularly want the honor of blocking User:John Gohde (AKA Mr. Natural Health) for violating the 3RR on Alternative Medicine. Snowspinner 21:29, Feb 13, 2005 (UTC)" [25]
• Violating WP:POINT because I made a big stink about his abuse of sysop privileges last year. Time to get over it, Rick!
  • This year the stink is going to be a lot bigger.
• Rick is obviously a cronie of the above two other admins. Probably the worst offense of the lot. -- John Gohde 06:14, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

What a load of crap. I won't respond to this garbage. Get this guy banned permanently. He is a cancer on the project. RickK 06:36, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

User:Neutrality/workshop III

Netoholic is editing and reverting me at User:Neutrality/workshop III, a personal subpage in my userspace where I and others am collecting evidence against him to use in an Arbitration case. This is my userspace, and he has no right to edit it for any reason (especially because it deals with evidence against him). As such, I've blocked him for 24 hours ours. Comments? --Neutrality^talk 21:41, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

(cross-posted to WP:RFAr)
Granted, User:Neutrality/workshop III is his subpage, and he is using it to gather a quite one-sided view of my actions. Certainly, making the other guy look as bad as possible is probably how most Arbitrations get started. I made two fairly innocent updates - one to correct a gross exaggeration and another to provide context for a comment I made. Neutrality then used my edits against me by claiming this was evidence tampering. I clarified that comment saying "it's misleading to present multiple edits in one link". This was rollback reverted by Neutrality. I tried adding it as a signed comment. This was rollback reverted. In total, Neutrality has rollback reverted four times today, violating the [[WP:3RR]. I bring this up here, not to report that violation, but to show the misdirected animosity from this person. Sure, it is his subpage, but it is not official evidence in any open case. -- Netoholic @ 21:50, 2005 Mar 13 (UTC)

Why don't you just let it be, since, as you said, it isn't official evidence? You can make a note of things that you think should be corrected and provide a list of corrections if it does become official evidence. Use the fact that he is doing this in a public space to your own advantage by preparing your defense as the evidence is collected. ;) -Aranel ("Sarah") 22:02, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I completely agree with Aranel here. What exactly is wrong with waiting until he's got his evidence collected and filed the RFAr? You'll have an entire section in which you can respond to this thing without getting reverted once the evidence does become official. Mgm|^(talk) 22:07, Mar 13, 2005 (UTC)

To be honest, I wouldn't have expected this kind of response from him. It's quite venomous. If this was my own page, and the "opposition" made these corrections, then I would have thought it was fair and balanced. There are certainly other responses I would make if this goes anywhere, but I don't see the point of leaving in such a gross (and maybe unintentional) mistake. As it is, I myself don't want to violate 3RR, so I'll not edit anymore. My reply above makes the case just the same. -- Netoholic @ 22:09, 2005 Mar 13 (UTC)

I have a comment: you should not be blocking a person with whom you are in dispute. You should be asking a different admin to block. -- Jmabel | Talk 00:35, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

3RR violations by User:Neutrality

Three revert rule violation by Neutrality (talk · contribs) on User:Neutrality/workshop III (edit | [[Talk:User:Neutrality/workshop III|talk]] | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) and User talk:Neutrality/workshop III (edit | [[Talk:User talk:Neutrality/workshop III|talk]] | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views).

User:Neutrality/workshop III (edit | [[Talk:User:Neutrality/workshop III|talk]] | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views):

• 1st revert: 21:25, 2005 Mar 13 (rollback)
• 2nd revert: 21:29, 2005 Mar 13 (rollback)
• 3rd revert: 21:32, 2005 Mar 13 (rollback)
• 4th revert: 21:35, 2005 Mar 13 (rollback)

User talk:Neutrality/workshop III (edit | [[Talk:User talk:Neutrality/workshop III|talk]] | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views):

• 1st revert: 21:28, 2005 Mar 13
• 2nd revert: 22:38, 2005 Mar 13 (rollback)
• 3rd revert: 23:11, 2005 Mar 13 (rollback)
• 4th revert: 00:16, 2005 Mar 13 (rollback)

Reported by: Netoholic 00:56, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)

Comments:

• Of course I doubt whether this report will result in anything (I have reported 3RR violations by him before), but these are clear reverts/removals of signed comments and good faith edits. Worse yet, it was done using the rollback anti-vandalism tool. This may be his subpage, but he doesn't "own" it enough to warrant this. -- Netoholic @ 00:56, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)

• This is in his User space. He has the perfect right to do whatever he wants to do in his own space. 3RR rules do not apply to your own User space. Leave it alone, editing other people's User space is in and of itself a blockable offense. RickK 01:00, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • Since when? Vandalising another users user space is blockable, but editing isn't. Having said that, I'd advise Netaholic to leave Neutrality's evidence alone and instead counter that evidence on the RFAr page or by creating an evidence page yourself in your own space. Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 06:20, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• User:Neutrality/workshop III is part of my userspace and I can revert whoever the hell I want in it, unless my page violates the userpage policy (which it obviously doesn't). Go peddle your nonsense somewhere else, Netoholic. Neutrality^talk 07:51, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)
  • Funny you should bring up Wikipedia:User page. When I read it, I saw "Community policies, including Wikipedia:No personal attacks, apply to your user space just as they do elsewhere." I am sure that if ever the situation was reversed, I'd be sitting out a block right now. 3RR violations are bad, but removing comments from a talk page makes this so much worse. -- Netoholic @ 08:59, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)
    • Adding evidence to a page isn't a personal attack. People remove comments from their own talkpages all the time. Like I said before, there is nothing to stop you from creating your own subpage defending yourself against Neutrality's accusations and linking to it on the RFAr page. Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 15:39, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
      • I didn't mean to imply his page was a personal attack. I probably should ahve quoted it as "Community policies... apply to your user space just as they do elsewhere." I am specifically meaning that 3RR certainly applies to user space, since 3RR is a community policy. -- Netoholic @ 16:17, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)
        • I have no problem with applying the three-revert rule to user space, but in general I would see removing unwanted edits from a subpage in my user space as the equivalent of reverting vandalism to an article. That to me is the sensible consequence of the latitude we allow people in deciding what goes in their user space. So I feel that this particular situation falls under the exemption to the rule. If you and I were in a revert war over Neutrality's user space, it would be a different story. --Michael Snow 00:38, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

With the exception of a few specific circumstances such as posting personal attacks, I find the idea that someone could be blocked for what they do with their own userspace outrageous. Gamaliel 16:31, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

this is not the place to report 3RR violationsGeni 17:11, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Everyking again

Everyking has reverted Autobiography (Ashlee Simpson album) again, in violation of the arbitration ruling against him. As is typical, this is not a simple revert that can be shown using a single diff:

• On Feb 27, Snowspinner converted four paragraphs of reviews into a single paragraph, and I reduced the number of reviews quoted from six to three. Alkivar made some unrelated changes (I shrank the # of reviews in the table to make it fit on 1 page Alkivar 05:25, 14 Mar 2005). [26]
• On March 4, Everyking made some unrelated edits to the article
• On March 13, Everyking reverted the "reviews" part of the article back to the pre-Feb 27 version, with the removal of a single sentence and movement of a second sentence. [27]

The overall changes can be seen in this diff: the parts labeled "line 86" and "line 92" in the first column cover the net changes in the "reviews" column: one sentence removed, one moved. --Carnildo 02:20, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Apparently any edit I make is a revert now. Give me a break. Everyking 02:59, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Did you look at the diffs? That was a revert. --Carnildo 03:09, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I know what the edits were; there was no revert. Everyking 03:12, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hilariously, Carnildo has now gone and reverted back. What were you arguing, exactly? Everyking 04:15, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

That you, according to the arbcom case, are not permitted to make this edit, and thus should be blocked for 24 hours. I, on the other hand, have no such limit, and am perfectly free to revert said edit. --Carnildo 04:41, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You reverted (twice now), while I haven't reverted at all. Doesn't that make your argument a bit silly? Everyking 04:48, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Not at all. I'm allowed to revert, you aren't. --Carnildo 05:57, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Please don't hide behind the ruling to justify everything you do. Everyking 06:15, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

And he's done it again, this time one of his special "partial restore" reverts: [28]. Note that he left out the fourth paragraph this time. --Carnildo 04:45, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

And another "partial restore": one paragraph: [29] --Carnildo 04:53, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

As Everyking declared that he had made 100 reverts by the definition at Wikipedia:Revert and told me to block him for 100 days on IRC, I have done so. Snowspinner 05:14, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

Transcript for the interested (trimmed):

00:10 <everyking> if that's the case, i've reverted about a hundred times in the last few hours
00:10 <Snowspinner> EK: On Ashlee articles?
00:10 <Snowspinner> Because I can ban for 100 days if you want.
00:10 <everyking> go ahead
00:10 <Snowspinner> Well, I mean, if they were all on Ashlee articles.
00:11 <everyking> sure they were, add on those 99 days already
00:11 <Snowspinner> OK. If you say so.
00:12 <Snowspinner> Done.

Times are EST. -Fennec (はさばくのきつね) 05:16, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One more case of Snowspinner's abuse of admin powers. Blocking another user, a fellow admin, for 100 days for not responding to his IRC threats with meek submission. Everyking 05:54, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There is an open Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Snowspinner, which is focused on his use of the blocking function. -- Netoholic @ 06:32, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)

Note that Everyking still hasn't been blocked for this violation. --Carnildo 07:01, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

And another one of his special "partial restores": [30] --Carnildo 08:44, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This is ridiculous. You have reverted twice. I have not even reverted once; instead I've been trying to find acceptable compromises. Would you stop the complaining? Everyking 08:48, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You have not been trying to find acceptable compromises; if you had, you would have noticed the discussion on the Talk page about this part of the article. --Carnildo 09:43, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I'm sure we could work out something mutually agreeable. There's no need for the reverting. I created the scratchpad version of the article so we wouldn't need to go through all this stuff again. Everyking 10:21, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If James wishes to add useful info to Ashlee articles let him - he has a revert ban, not a ban on them. Please don't goad him either - if they are good edits, let them stay. However, James knows (although does not accept) what fellow Wikipedians think about his Ashlee obsession - he should not allow himself to be wound up by those who seek to do so, jguk 12:52, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think referring to me as having an "obsession" is rather uncivil. The only think I'm obsessed about is improving Wikipedia. Everyking 12:54, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Excuse me if I'm a little cynical here, but the last time you used words like "compromise" and "mutually agreeable", the result was having to run a poll every time someone wanted to change or remove a sentence, interspersed with the occasional complete revert of the article. Since you're still using your old tactics of uncommented reverts, reverting a section and claiming it wasn't a revert, calling a revert "restore a bit", and avoiding the talk page, I find it hard to believe you're sincere about wanting to compromise. --Carnildo 18:08, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Comment: Could you provide an additional diff to show exactly what content that Everyking is alleged to have reverted? ie, "This is what John Doe added (diff)" and "This is what I think Everyking reverted (diff)". Maybe this is laziness on my part, although I prefer to think of it as benefiting anyone else who will read this. :-) --Deathphoenix 15:54, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

See the first three bullet points. It's a little hard to see, since there were a number of edits to other sections of the article, but the net result of Snowspinner's edit, my edit, and Everyking's edit was to change the position of one sentence and remove a second, despite the fact that each edit affected the entire "reviews" part of the article. --Carnildo 18:08, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Unblocked

Everyking gave his word to me online, so I unblocked him at 20:27, after just over three hours blocked. If he makes another Ashlee-related revert, he knows I'll be very disappointed and will not unblock him again. Let's give him the chance to prove me right or wrong. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 21:31, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This is getting a little melodramatic. I'm not going to comment on who is in the right and who is in the wrong here; in some ways, it does not matter, because blocking wars like this make all administrators look bad. What moral authority will administrators have to inspire other editors to work harmoniously when there are blocking/unblocking wars going on like this between administrators? I agree with silsor's comment in the following blocking log: [31] . --BM 23:00, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This isn't a blocking war. The administrators are not working against each other here. None of them are in the wrong IMO. Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 06:11, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

What about Snowspinner blocking me for 100 days? I think that's pretty wrong. Everyking 06:23, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I don't know, Theresa. If you look at 14 March in the blocking log, you see: block - extend to 100 days - unblock - block - unblock. One admin blocking, two different admin's unblocking. How many times do they have to go back and forth before you would call it a blocking war? --BM 12:45, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You have to look at the comments as well. Silsor unblocked the 100 day block, although he didn't reblock, he said it would be ok to block for 1 day. Tony unblocked because new information (namely a promise) came to light. Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 13:30, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It's pretty normal for an administrator to unblock someone who is displaying genuine contrition. It's how we build trust. If someone had gone against this and blocked again I would not have fought it. If people want to play block wars I'm not interested. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 08:19, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Tony, in this case, the contrition was expressed to only one of 400 admins (you), using the IRC channel. There is something wrong with a process where in order for a block to stick, all 400+ admins must agree. If someone violates the 3RR and is blocked for it, the other admins should let that stand, UNLESS it was actually an error. (e.g. there weren't really 4 reverts.) The process is broken if any of 400 admins can undo a block because he thinks the person is "contrite" or that a block within policy was "too harsh". Presuming that the block was according to policy, why would you ever substitute your opinion for that of the person who imposed the block? A person violating the 3RR (or in this case Everyking violating his parole) should expect to be blocked for 24 hours, not counting on being able to appeal to one soft-hearted person in the admin cadre. --BM 16:48, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The parole is a tool to change Everyking's behavior - not a punishment. Snowspinner 17:03, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

And it does seem to be working -- instead of reverting the whole article in one go, he's reverting it one paragraph or one section at a time, spread out over several weeks. --Carnildo 18:58, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think I was wrong to block because of a promise on #wikipedia. I won't do that again. If Everyking says something equivalent on the wiki, that's a different matter. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 23:10, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Although I'm no fan of making decisions on IRC, I didn't mind this particularly (also keep in mind that if Everyking is blocked, he can't say anything on the wiki). It's one thing for you to unblock when Everyking tells you, "I won't revert anymore", which he can do on the mailing list, IRC, or by private email. Quite a few people have been unblocked based on similar communications. It's different if you start a conversation on IRC that amounts to asking people, "Everyking promised to stop reverting so should I unblock him now, what do you think?" That discussion is more helpful with greater transparency. --Michael Snow 03:26, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I dunno, I've unblocked because of a discussion on IRC ... the first time only. If a second 3RR occurs I am distinctly uninclined to unblock, obviously - David Gerard 11:51, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

John Gohde

I have blocked John Gohde for 24 hours for a 3RR violation on this page. RickK 06:23, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

Inappropriate. You were involved in this lame "edit war". Please provide diffs to substantiate this. I have in teh meantime readded his section, which is appropriate per the page introduction. -- Netoholic @ 06:28, 2005 Mar 14 (UTC)

Rick I've counted the reverts today. John reverted 3 times not 4. So he hasn't actually broken the 3RR. Please provide the diffs if you think I'm wrong, but in the meantime i have to unblock him. Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 15:46, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I only count 2 reverts rather than your 3, and certainly NOT 4! NickK deleted my valid complaint twice. Therefore, I re-added it 2 times. The 3rd re-add was done by somebody else since I was blocked. -- John Gohde 16:04, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

RickK, the rougue admin - to whom do we complain?

From the talk page - Ta bu shi da yu 00:54, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

RickK has been doing some wholesale reverts, blocking with false block reasons and a host of other abusive behavior. Why is he allowed to get away with all of this? To whom, if anyone, does he report to? 209.51.136.26 09:30, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

As I understand it, if you have a problem with a particular admin you bring it up on their talk page. If that doesn't lead to the dispute being resoved, then file a Request for comment. Thryduulf 10:30, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Lying on edit summaries, posting racist comments, using unacceptable user names like User:Earl Turner, yep those are sure false block reasons. RickK 09:43, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

Complain? I say we give him a medal for kicking Nazi filth like you off Wikipedia. Neutrality^talk 16:51, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

Fe

RickK, you are hereby awarded the Iron Dross for using the iron fist on Nazis :oP dab (ᛏ) 18:39, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

RickK, the rougue admin - to whom do we complain?

RickK has been doing some wholesale reverts, indefinite blocking with false block reasons and a host of other abusive behavior. Why is he allowed to get away with all of this? To whom, if anyone, does he report to? rick 209.51.136.26 09:39, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

RickK tried to block me for 24 hours when I filed a complaint against him[32] right on this very page. Rick made a bold face lie about me breaking the 3RR rule, when I wasn't close to breaking it. On Wikipedia, Admins are allowed to do anything that they feel like doing. I agree with you that the cancer, called RickK, should not be allowed to get away with it. Rick called me a cancer on my complaint against him. And, I just returned the favor. -- John Gohde 00:56, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Lying on edit summaries, posting racist comments, using unacceptable user names like User:Earl Turner, yep those are sure false block reasons. RickK 09:42, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

User:Everyking

Everyking has reverted Autobiography (Ashlee Simpson album) again, in violation of the arbitration ruling against him.

• →About the album - restore a little bit. He even blatantly uses the synonym for revert, but claims he's not really reverting. He's made other, more complex, reverts, but this one blatant violation should be sufficient evidence. --Calton | Talk 12:57, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There are signifcant differences between that version and the previous one by everking. Plase point out which version of the article he has reveted toGeni 13:16, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Bobthe8th/165.29.54.126

I'm not sure what to do about this User; he's been attacking the Jethro Tull (agriculturalist) article, vandalising first just with coloured tables, then with childish abuse, now with racist abuse (aimed at me, as I've been trying to defend it). He's alternating between his User account and the anon IP address. Could a friendly admin step in and help? Thanks. Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 19:09, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I warned him. I think you can just put these on WP:VIP. dab (ᛏ) 19:18, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Ah, thanks — I knew that there must be a page for just this, but I couldn't think what it was. Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 19:21, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Cumbey threatens SqueakBox

The main threat User:Cumbey is makingis via email against User:SqueakBox is to tell the police here in La Ceiba, Honduras that I have a stash of marijuana; this based on my interest on Rastafarianism. I think it is an empty threat as she doesn't know where I live, only in La Ceiba in Honduras. Things are not like in the UK/US here. No-one wants the negative attentions of the police. She has absolutely no justification for thinking I am in possession of marijuana, i.e. just attacking. But to unjustly and without cause bring the police here would, in my opinion, be a threat to me and my family. I have no idea whether making false claims to the police is an offence here, I would guess so, but getting the police involved in one's life by making false claims can do a lot of damage to the other party.

The other email charge she is making is that I hacked into the wiki data base; she wants to see me go down for a long time for this one. I I know the Honduran authorities would not investigate this without hard evidence.

On wikipedia she also accuses User:hierarchypedia of being my sockpuppet. These last 2 spurious allegations make me question her mental health, which is partly why I am concerned.

She knows my name (from my talk page) and is threatening to smear it all over the net. She writes my name all over her talk page, and I removed all the references.

The basic problem as she sees it, I think, is that I am working for Javier Solana in order to remove the evidences she placed in the article proving that he is the antichrist, and thus not letting the public no the truth about him.

Cumbey has told me she is going to write to Jimbo Wales demanding to see the hard discs (to get evidence that I have been hacking in and contaminating them, doctoring the evidence, etc, and also to demand that he reinstate her version of the Solana article. And I thought I was here to write encyclopedia articles. She thinks I have befriended the new editors on the Solana article, because they are not telling the truth the way she sees it either. If she goes ahead with pursuing Jimbo she may then start to blame him for manipulating evidence, etc, as well. I think she thinks I am a personal friend of his (don't know him). I hope she will just go away, but am concerned she won't. --SqueakBox 23:30, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

Do you know how to killfile her? If not what program do you use for email? (someone's bound to be able to help). Has she made any threats on Wikipedia itself or are they all by email? Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 06:17, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It would be a good idea to write to wikien-l or to Jimmy Wales about this, or to supply more information. The admins reading this page won't do anything without evidence of legal or personal threats. silsor 06:53, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

SqueakBox, I suggest you write to board@wikimedia.org and sent evidence of the mails you are talking about. Since you did not make mails public, I suppose that means you would prefer to keep some details private. If so, avoid wikien-l. Anthere 07:15, 15 Mar 2005

Sending it to the arbitration committee might be a better option. Angela. 05:10, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

The emails are actually quoted at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#religious persecution. Sorry, I'm the person who directed SqueakBox to that page. I must confess to having not known of this page's existence (having never had a need for it before). GeorgeStepanek\^talk 10:16, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

after seeing these mails, I am not so sure this is a serious case. Sure, Cumbey indulged in personal attacks, but these were on email, and thereby outside wikimedia's jurisdiction. the 'threat' seems to consist of "perhaps the local authorities need to investigate your increasingly clearly existing stash." which to me sounds rather like a polemic turn of phrase than a serious threat of taking action. Just my impression, though, I'll happily stay uninvolved in this ;) the "hacking charge" is of course cranky, though dab (ᛏ) 11:24, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

One's perception is determined by one's situation and cultural background. Perhaps because of my unusual background, I find that I can understand both your perspective and SqueakBox's. Part of my family—including myself—fled Czechoslovakia in 1968, but part of my family was unable to escape. I know that my Czech relatives would have found a threat like this to be a devastating event, and one that could not be taken lightly. I don't know what the situation is like in Honduras, but SqueakBox is obviously very upset and concerned by the threat. Nor do I know Cumby's background and motivation: she may just be joking, or she may be quite serious. Personally, I would prefer us to err on the side of caution, rather than on the side of complacency. GeorgeStepanek\^talk 08:48, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Threats in personal email over Wikipedia editing are entirely matters for consideration on Wikipedia, since their effect and intended effect is to affect editing here - David Gerard 13:59, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

threats, yes. insults, no. we'd never see the end of it. Also, evidence gathering is much more difficult. if it was wiki-email, the content could be sniffed (but I don't know if it is). Off wiki-email, you have no basis to prove the mail is genuine. Even for wiki-email, admins are out of the picture. Developers might assess it if it is worth their time, but that should be reserved for extreme cases. dab (ᛏ) 14:14, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Having read all this I am a bit taken aback by Squeakbox's whinging. I have not seen any actual threats in any of the emails, nor serious accusations/threads or personal attacks on the talk pages. It appears rather that Squeakbox talks a lot of the time to himself and pursues just as much as Cumbey his personal POV pushing, it is just that his POV is slightly more socially acceptable than hers. I personally would like them to get on with it and just come down heavily onto them if they go beyond 3RR etc. Refdoc 10:34, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Drug policy in Honduras is draconian in nature. 2 Students I know from NYU were in Honduras back in 1995 with the Peace Corps. They got caught with 1oz of weed/smoking weed and spent 3 months in jail. I definately think people need to realize that this is not a weak threat.  ALKIVAR™ 11:08, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

However if someone doesn't even know where you live?? Theresa Knott (ask the rotten) 12:31, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

But what if the other other party is advertising Squeakbox's real name? (Deathphoenix 14:17, 17 Mar 2005)

it seems like Cumbey said something that got to SB. It's not like SB didn't try to say things that would get to Cumbey. Anyway, we won't be able to do anything about it. It's up to the arbcom and/or board to decide whether they want to take action. dab (ᛏ) 14:25, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think the email address should be considered genuine. See User talk:SqueakBox#Private conversation. The reality is I did and do feel intimidated by what she said; and that she said it because she does not like my religious beliefs. I certainly do not agree that I threatened her. When she earlier at wikipedia on the Solana talk page told me to read the new age books when I was not in an altered state I made it clear (as if I should have to) that I do not take drugs, and that if she kept libelling me like that she'd end up in a Honduran jail. Libel is a criminal offence here; I did not mean I would try to put her in a jail, but obviously if she libels my reputation as a law abiding character I do have the right to sue her for libel, and would probably feel it necessary to do so (not necessaarily in Honduras) in order to salvage my reputation, not in order to look for trouble. She has absolutely know right to even threaten to persecute me for my religious beliefs. This is not an atmosphere in which I find it easy to edit the Solana article, and I would argue that her attempt to intimidate because of my religious beliefs is nothing more or less than an attempt to intimidate me into stopping being a contributor to the Solana article (which is why it could be a blockable offence). I think here as User:68.61.150.80 she let me know she had a Spanish speaking contact, but it is pretty unlikely that they are Honduran, and therefore, as Guettarda assured me, pretty unlikely they would be able to persuade the local police to go out and look for me, only with my name and 2 other bits of info that Cumbey has; that I was hospitalised by a machete attackin October, and that my partner lost a leg; in the UK the police could probably find me with such info (though they would not do so for mere possession of a class c drug) whereas it is unlikely a foreigner could persuade the Honduran police to act. Yet I still feel threatened, which I believe was the point of the exercise from her point of view. She has neither proof nor reason to think I have a stash. Assuming I don't, the mere fact of having the police here could still bring me a lot of trouble, andd cost me money (though unlike many wiki contributors I do have the resources to contract a (my) lawyer, pay an instant fine, etc). I am clear that I do not deserve to be even threatened with having the police called on me by Cumbey solely for expressing to her a belief in the divinity of Haile Selassie, and to prevent me from editing the Solana article. That strikes me as religious bigotry. I am waiting for mediation, and if she doesn't meet my demands there, including a retraction of this email statement on a wiki page and a promise not to persecute me for my religious beliefs, I will pursue this to arbitration with the aim of trying to get her banned from the Solana and Barcelona Conference articles. I am not sure if people here are able to read from my email links (the fact that my computer reads them does not mean anyone else can, but if any admin wants a copy they should contact me on my user page or at the scuiqui address. I am aware she is a member of the state bar of Michigan, and I doubt whther they condone threats of religious persecution; right now I am not looking for trouble, but I am very concerned to protect my reputation. I will think about some of the other suggestions; I didn't realise the issue had been moved here. I will also leave a note at Cumbey's talk page directing her here.--SqueakBox 21:30, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

I don't feel Cumbey and I have treated each other equally. She vandalised my home page [33] made insults that were removed by User:Curps at Talk:Javier Solana here, spread my name all over her talk page here. She also claimed I had read new age books in an altered state, a slur that undoubtedly rose the stakes. I did call her a Nazi apologist for comparing Solana to Hitler, but I believe I got to her because I wanted to remove her original and POV thesis from what she was claiming was her article. her desperation showed in the edit war she started last friday night, and for which she was givena 24 hour block. --SqueakBox 23:32, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

religious persecution

I posted this message and received this response from a fellow user today at Wikipedia:Village pump (news)#Cumbey threats:

These threats were received by email. User:Cumbey claims SqueakBox is hacking into the wiki database. She is going to demand the hard discs from Jimbo Wales so she can get me put down for a long time because of my alleged hacking. She accuses me of having a stash of janja (sic) she means ganja, in my possession, and that she is going to tell the Honduran police about it. She is going to write to Jimbo demanding he reinstate her version of this article. She is very unhappy with the new contributors. She thinks they work for me and I work for Solana.--SqueakBox 14:43, Mar 14, 2005 (UTC)

Have you requested mediation or arbitration? That would probaly be more help than just posting here. --Marnen Laibow-Koser (talk) 18:09, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This issue is more serious than that. The policy is that: "Threats or actions which expose other Wikipedia editors to political, religious or other persecution by government, their employer or any others ... may result in a block for an extended period of time which may be applied immediately by any sysop upon discovery. Sysops applying such sanctions should confidentially notify the members of the Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee and Jimbo Wales of what they have done and why." I strongly suggest that you mention this issue on the Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard. If you provide the appropriate evidence, I am confident that you will see a swift and decisive response. GeorgeStepanek\^talk 04:25, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The issue he refers to is my dispute with User:Cumbey which started at javier Solana. I do feel and felt before George wrote to me that I felt she is persecuting me for expressing religious beliefs. Obviously I have kept the emails, and am happy to send them to someone. i have never admitted, either in emails to her or in my work at wikipedia that I am using marijuana. I do, though, jealously guard my reputation as a law abiding citizen. I have had to put in both English and Spanish on my home page that I don't smoke marijuana, because I feel threatened. i live in Honduras, not the UK, though even if I lived there her entirely spurious allegation only based on my expressing religious beliefs about Haile Selassie. I have expressed at User talk:Cumbey that I assert the right to express my religious beliefs concerning this well known religious symbol. --SqueakBox 05:47, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

Here is the interaction we had.

I wrote this: On Mon, 14 Mar 2005 04:43:42 +0000, Richard Weiss <scuiqui@hotmail.com> wrote: I have made clear you are not, in my opinion, using sockpuppets at wikipedia. it appears you did at wikielite, but as you say, that is something different. I hope you accused me of hacking to Jimbo too? Please leave me alone, you are blocked from this account so I will not receive your letters. Goodbye! BTW I know my biblical prophecy, and it shows very clearly that His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie I is God incarnate. I shall live forever in this body with him in Holy Mount Zion. I put my trust in H.I.M.. Whom shall I fear? Jah Rastafari!

She replied:

From : Constance Cumbey <cumbey@gmail.com> Reply-To : Constance Cumbey <cumbey@gmail.com> Sent : 14 March 2005 12:05:05 To : Richard Weiss <scuiqui@hotmail.com> Subject : Re:

Dear Richard,

In my humble opinion, you are using too much Rastafarian 'wisdom weed' a/k/a 'janja' and perhaps the local authorities need to investigate your increasingly clearly existing stash.

Constance cumbey@gmail.com.

It is at [34] I then wrote On Mon, 14 Mar 2005 15:05:10 +0000, Richard Weiss <scuiqui@hotmail.com> wrote: Cumbey, That is exactly what your personal attacks against me online are-trolling. Curps has removed 2 of them. I did not and could not hack into any data base. I have no idea why wiki elite have gone offline, but it was definitely Maisie who changed the database, as she has the ability to do. BTW, I do not use cannabis, you don't have to use cannabis to be a Rastafarian, you to have know who God is. Christ returned and you missed the event. Have a look at Rev 5.5 and 19.8. In the old testament it clearly states the messiah will return as a great king, and he was the greatest. Anyone who knows me knows I don't use drugs and am incapable of hacking (limited technical skills). So your threats are empty. Instead of attacking me, debate any changes you want on the Solana talk page. The new contributors are like me; Europeans interested in Solana the politician, not Solana the Beast. At least one of them claims to have contributed to the article before, so be careful before you start claiming any version of it belongs to you, SqueakBox to which she replied

Your writing is so fascinating. And you had the nerve to ridicule Judeo-Christian beliefs! Want to talk about silly religious beliefs? Let's discuss yours!

That article was a stub and a 3 line one at that when I wrote the Solana article as it existed before Solana probably paid you to do the hatchet job (surely you don't expect me to believe that Ra Sta Fari came back from the dead to inspire you, do you? Who knows what personality you assume in what communication to any person? Three faces of Eve? Twelve Faces of Sybil? Heck, you've probably got fifty faces -- all plastic. Your dogs have more integrity than you.

If you told the truth about anything other than your confessions to me that you knew Alice Bailey's works, it was probably about the Rastafarianism and I still have your old communications where you denied even that before you so strongly professed it this morning, although it has occurred to me as a lawyer that you could be setting up an insanity plea -- ditto about your machete bump on the head. Don't know what to believe about you anymore, so I believe nothing other than you are a dangerous lying fool -- trolling the boards and then accusing others of precisely your own acts -- sock puppets, faking personalities, using false identities, vandalising/vandalizing the board.

But, in the event you really are a Rastafarian, I would hardly believe you didfn't participate in the best known sacrament of your religion -- the 'wisdom weed', ganja, marijuana, you name it! This is at [35] --SqueakBox 05:37, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

I don't know what killfile means (unlikely hacker material)? --SqueakBox 21:34, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

I also resent strongly the insinuation that I am POVing at Solana. Or is tring to make the article into a political article POV? I don't really have a point of view about him. Cumbey thinks he is the antichrist, and is determined to prove it in the article. I want an article about a politician with many contributors. to turn a fringe belief about an EU politician into just one of various POV's about this article, is, in my opinion, jus´plain not true. I may believe Queen Elizabeth II is the Whore of Babylon but I don't obsessively try to insert that POV into Elizabeth II of England, because that is also a political article, and neither article, I assert, should allow itself to be dominated by religious POV. I have taken a different path with Haile Selassie, but he is (a) dead, asnd (b) I have done it ina very non POV view. --SqueakBox 21:51, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

User:Jayjg

Three revert rule violation on Nazarene (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Jayjg (talk · contribs):

• 1st revert: [17:30, 14 Mar 2005]
• 2nd revert: [18:26, 14 Mar 2005]
• 3rd revert: [22:40, 14 Mar 2005]
• 4th revert: [15:06, 15 Mar 2005]
• 5th revert: [17:24, 15 Mar 2005]

Reported by: 193.63.146.184 17:08, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Comments:

• What is done to control revert possies? Jayjg also enlisted the support of Josh Cherry and Jfdwolff to try and get around the rule but obviously didn't watch his clocck closely enough. Is there no control against this sort of thing?

He's self reveted before I could get to it. to the issue of "possies" it is felt that if you can get mulitple people to support your position you are probably on the way to e3stablishing a consensusGeni 21:25, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

User:Blair P. Houghton

Three revert rule violation on Weight training (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Blair P. Houghton (talk · contribs):

• 1st revert: 18:22, 15 Mar 2005 (NZ time, not UTC)
• 2nd revert: 19:07, 15 Mar 2005 (NZ time, not UTC)
• 3rd revert: 04:13, 16 Mar 2005 (NZ time, not UTC)
• 4th revert: 06:43, 16 Mar 2005 (NZ time, not UTC)
• 5th revert: 13:06, 16 Mar 2005 (NZ time, not UTC)

(Sorry, I don't know how to get UTC times for edits and diffs.)

Reported by: GeorgeStepanek\^talk 21:03, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Comments:

The 3rd, 4th and 5th reverts slightly paraphrase the 1st and 2nd reverts in an attempt to subvert the 3RR. Also, the individual's edit comments and other comments, while not necessarily personal attacks, fall far outside accepted standards of civility:

• please learn to write before editing articles; the weasel-words alone are making my quads hurt and the POV is ludicrous
• all edits are "unilateral" and the ones I made are better than the ones being inserted by this small cabal of poor-writing-by-consensus
• George, it's not a consensus when the consenters decide to publish bad information. It's a conspiracy. Please don't edit this article any more until you understand the difference.
• I am working with others, apparently in the way that a teacher works with a class of juvenile delinquents. Take your sophistry elsewhere and let the truth be.

I have been attempting to forge a consensus between User:Sfahey and User:Taxman on the one hand, and User:Blair P. Houghton on the other. (For example: "I think George's most recent effort is a well-intentioned but overly detailed compromise that was not necessary."—Sfahey.) But User:Blair P. Houghton has simply not been willing to work with the other editors. I am sorry that I have not had more success in my efforts, and that this now means more work for you guys. GeorgeStepanek\^talk 21:03, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Rebuttal:

I was blocked unnecessarily over this because the admin doing the blocking (CryptoDerk) apparently did not actually read the pages being referenced.

Very little of the foregoing is valid. Not least the mischaracterization of my directness as a lack of ettiquette.

GeorgeStepanek obviates his credibility by changing his story on whether he thought my comments are personal attacks. His addition of Wikipedia:No personal attacks to my user talk page shows he did, and now he claims otherwise. They were not in any case, nor were they uncivil. I even pointed out in the talk page for that article that they weren't to be taken as such. But those opposing me weren't interested in the facts. I could by their logic take their opposition to my rational edits as a personal attack. But I'm not the irrational one, I'm defending my edits rationally against an alternately specious and blind appeal to consensus.

His claim of attempting to forge a consensus is further proof of prevarication. He persistently reverted to a known-bad version of the article rather than questioning my edit and amending it as consensus determines, nor even editing it to add those facts he thought unnecessarily deleted. Since I was blocked, he has in fact accepted almost all of my edits, showing that he did not disagree with them, and that he was merely trying to control their inclusion as though the page were his personal publication.

His claim that I am not willing to work with other editors is likewise false. I was perfectly willing to work with them; but he was not willing to work with me, as indicated by his flat reversions and denials of facts that he accepted only after achieving his goal of constructing a false case against me for a 3RR violation.

Most importantly, I did not revert the article to the same text three times. I made substantive, good-faith changes incorporating the gist of Sfahey's suggestions from the talk page in the 08:13, 15 Mar 2005 edit.

GeorgeStepanek, User:Taxman, and CryptoDerk owe me an apology. The pleasure of watching them defy that request will be even more satisfying than if they just did it.

Blair P. Houghton 06:50, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think these comments speak for themselves, in tenor if nothing else. Anyone interested in this debacle should see Talk:Weight_training#Article_summary for the attempts I have made to discuss and reach a compromise on these issues. GeorgeStepanek\^talk 09:19, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I don't see this as a 3RR issue so much as a content dispute issue which is not really amenable to resolution by 3RR enforcements or not. All the editors appear to be editing the article in good faith, even if they strongly disagree. I'm hoping that everyone can put aside the proceedings to this point and hash this out. One suggestion is to propose wording changes in talk, to see if all accurate information can be properly represented. There are other measures we can take if need be that can deal with the material instead of the personalities. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 09:41, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Without getting into the 3RR issue, in my opinion those edit summaries were extremely uncivil, and Blair's behavior since then seems to suggest that we have a serious editor attitude problem. I hope nobody takes Blair's demand for an apology seriously. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 10:10, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Now the reverts

Looking now at the article history, let us dispel once and for all the claim that Blair P. Houghton did not exceed three reverts in twenty-four hours:

• 05:22, 15 Mar 2005 reverting to the version of 08:42, 13 Mar 2005.
• 06:07, 15 Mar 2005 reverting to the version of 05:22, 15 Mar 2005.
• 17:43, 15 Mar 2005 reverting to the version of 15:13, 15 Mar 2005.
• 00:06, 16 Mar 2005 reverting to the version of 17:43, 15 Mar 2005.

Whatever has caused this fuss, it certainly has not been a false 3RR report. My comments on Blair's conduct also stand. Orbiting planet Luser without a cluestick can be hazardous. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 12:51, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I never claimed I didn't revert more than 3 times in 24 hours; I claimed I didn't violate the 3RR. Those are not the same claim. The 3RR has since been amended (by Tony, three hours before posting this "evidence" here) to change it from the "Ko-rule" version I interpreted as allowing me to make the fourth revert after making a substantive and cooperative change to the page. As for that cluestick, Tony, just make sure you remember which end was which, and don't forget to apologize. Blair P. Houghton 05:31, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I have removed the Ko Rule allusion because it misled you into believing that you could revert-war indefinitely as long as you made minor changes every two or three edits. Nobody owes you an apology. Get a clue. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 14:08, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I have a clue, and it's that you're unwilling to admit that you're being insulting by claiming I have an "attitude problem." Blair P. Houghton 02:34, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

User:Slrubenstein

Three revert rule violation on Capitalism (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Slrubenstein (talk · contribs):

• 1st revert: 23:09, 14 Mar 2005 "(Reverted edits by 203.20.71.2 to last version by Slrubenstein)
• 2nd revert: 17:22, 15 Mar 2005 "(Reverted edits by RJII to last version by Slrubenstein)"
• 3rd revert: 17:48, 15 Mar 2005 "(Reverted edits by RJII to last version by Slrubenstein)"
• 4th revert: 17:56, 15 Mar 2005 "(Reverted edits by Ultramarine to last version by Slrubenstein)"

Reported by: RJII 22:00, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Comments:

• This guy seems to guard 24/7 standing ready to to keep the introduction to the article just how he wants it without little or no flexibility. I've been trying to chip away at it to get some changes in but to no avail. He's reverted more than this but these are the obvious technical reverts where he actually announced it. As you can see, it's not just me he's reverting. RJII 22:00, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Umm...the first revert is reverting vandalism - doesn't count towards 3RR. Guettarda 22:35, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You're right, sorry. Here's another to put in it's place then: 17:59, 14 Mar 2005 "(Reverted edits by RJII to last version by Ultramarine)" RJII 23:01, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Please link to diffs not old versions. BrokenSegue 02:04, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

so going through the history I can confirm that he broke the 3RR by 3 minutes.Geni 11:58, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

blocked for 3 hours Geni 12:04, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Talk:Online poker

We've been hit with a slashdot effect as a consequence of being googlebombed. Check the Talk page for online poker for details. The article is currently protected, and I'm inclined to leave it that way, at the bare minimum for another 24 hours. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 23:05, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)