Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive363

Request for intervention concerning User:Aearthrise

Original request for assistance containing examples of insults/communication style and individual difflinks

Hello admins, I'm kindly asking you to intervene in a matter concerning Aearthrise (talk · contribs) and the article Pennsylvania Dutch which I believe is getting out of hand and is harming Wikipedia. In little under two years time, a single user (Aearthrise) has basically claimed sole editorship of the Pennsylvania Dutch-article. If statistics are to be believed, Aearthrise has since become the author of over 50% of the articles content and is responsible for 83% of all edits to the article within a two year timeframe. [1] Now there is of course nothing wrong with a single author being prominent or more involved in an article, but I'm afraid that in this particular case it has resulted in significant damage to Wikipedias reliability, neglect of its principles and a severe lack of respectful communication. In practice Aearthrise adds what he wants, deletes what he wants and does so in a manner which I can only describe as browbeating or just plain bullying. Any attempt to engage in a meaningful discussion concerning the articles content is impossible as all of these discussions follow a basic pattern: a question is asked by another user or Aearthrise himself; which is soon followed by a large amount of green quotes from various websites and Google Books. Any attempt to bring in professional literature with an alternative POV is ignored or waved away and the discussion quickly gets unnecessarily personal and unpleasant. Exploring or questioning the validity or reliability of the green quotes is equally not appreciated. Regardless of arguments made, sources provided or discussed: Aearthrise does what he wants. Currently there are 4 talk page discussions involving Aearthrise, which I've tried to describe and summarize below. I've added diff links and excerpts which (I hope) give a good idea of the problem at hand, but would advise anyone involved to read the talk page itself and check the recent article history to get the complete picture; especially concerning the first one as I feel it illustrates Aearthrises attitude and debating style as no other. In the first talk page discussion involving him, Aearthrise reverts an edit made by @47thPennVols: several times and then posts a comment on the talk page, asking for a source on how ″Dutchman″ can be considered a slur for some Pennsylvania Dutch. The entire discussion can be read here. At one point 47thPennVols, who remains friendly and professional throughout the entire conversation, curiously asks why Aearthrise (a user who claims to be a French Louisianian from New Orleans) has such an intense interest in Pennsylvania Dutch history. To which Aearthrise replies: My grandfather was Dutch, and unfortunately he passed away during the pandemic. I do miss speaking Dutch with him, and I wish I spent more time with him. Developing this article helps me connect with my German heritage. [2] Reacting to this and the issue at hand, 47thPennVols posts a comment which can really only be described as heartfelt, well-meaning and constructive. In this comment she gives her condolences, tries to make a personal connection and goes on to explain why he wants to address the issue raised and explicitly says he wants to reach a workable middle road.[3] It receives a single sentence reply: What is your citation that "Pennsylvania Dutchman" is a derogatory term for the PA Dutch people? [4] — despite the fact that 47thPennVols already gave her citation. To his credit, 47thPennVols stays on topic and expresses her concern with the 5 quotes that Aearthrise previously provided. 47thPennVols explains that the publisher of some of these sources (Stackpole Books) has come under scrutiny on Wikipedia over the years and is not considered to meet Wikipedia quality standards. He also goes on to cite an academic review of one of the sources provided by Aearthrise, which said the source contained ″numerous errors″, ″interpretive and rhetorical overstatements″ and ″needs to be handled with care″.[5] Instead of reflecting on the sources used, Aearthrise doubles down, writing: You are continually waffling and nitpicking, but you have not yet provided ONE source for your claim. I've already provided 5 sources both historic and recent that demonstrate the usage of Dutchman in regards to the Pennsylvania Dutch community. [6] and; You have not proved your claim that Dutchman is a slur in Pennsylvania Dutch community; it is therefore not appropriate to remove the term- this is based on your original research, and not based in reality. I suggest next time you make an unsubstantiated claim, you find the evidence to back it up. Your attempt to remove the term is completely unjustified. [7] 47thPennVols then writes: I'm asking you, respectfully, to stop now. Despite your repeated claims to the contrary, I have, in fact, presented you with a source that confirms that the terminology you used in the article has been considered a slur. I have presented that source to you twice. I have also documented that, of the five sources you have used to back up your claim that the term you used was not a slur, two were completely irrelevant because they were published before the period when the slur began to be used against Pennsylvania Germans and the Pennsylvania Dutch community, one of your other three sources contains known factual errors, according to at least one prominent historian, and the other two are considered potentially unreliable as sources by multiple, experienced Wikipedia editors because those sources are produced by companies known for publishing the works of self-published authors that are not considered suitable for scholarly research. It is clear from your insistence on pursuing this dialogue, despite the evidence I have presented, that you are unwilling to consider my sincere perspective. Therefore, we must agree to disagree. And because of that, I am, again, asking you to stop, reflect and then move on to another matter deserving of your attention. I will not be continuing this dialogue with you any longer, but do sincerely wish you all the best with your future research. Kind Regards. [8] Aearthrise responds twice to this, in a manner which speaks for itself: Your "perspective", i.e. original research, is invalid; the only citation you've provided is a weak Dictionary.com entry that is not at all related to the Pennsylvania Dutch. There is nothing to "agree to disagree"- you have not provided sufficient proof for your claim, and your attempts to remove "Pennsylvania Dutchman" from this article are completely unjustified. I shall roll back your last edit. [9] and; You undid my reversion of your post claiming "Ther term "Dutchman" is considered to be a slur by many in the Pennsylvania Dutch community"; either produce reasonable evidence of your claim now, or I shall revert it again. [10] Regrettably but understandably, 47thPennVols gave up his attempts to edit and improve the article. The second talk page discussion involving Aearthrise concerns a long bilingual quote that Aearthrise has added to the article. The quote is very wordy (in fact the quote has a higher word count than the section its in) but the main point of disagreement is that Aearthrise insists that the original Pennsylvania German quote (from a book published in 1903) should use the Fraktur font — which 𝔴𝔥𝔦𝔠𝔥 𝔩𝔬𝔬𝔨𝔰 𝔩𝔦𝔨𝔢 𝔱𝔥𝔦𝔰 and is something highly uncommon if not nonexistent on Wikipedia and in professional literature. When @Theodore Christopher: addressed this, a very unpleasant discussion again unfolds, which can be read here in full but contains remarks directed at Theodore Christopher such as: Although I already answered this question in an edit, which you choose to ignore now, I shall entertain the question with this response. [11] You speak on that the usage of Hebrew and Greek are irrelevant to Palatine German- this is another statement without a thought. [12] Your inability to comprehend that is telling of your mindset; you ignore sound arguments and prefer to just waffle and blather. [13] Your words are based in ignorance, coming and from an outsider to Pennsylvania Dutch culture, you who don't even speak the language nor know our cultural traits. [14] As I said in my previous post: "your thoughts are not worth very much. [15] Lastly, your (...) quote is completely incorrect, and it shows you lack knowledge of Pennsylvania Dutch culture or basic understanding of the message. [16] Your arguments and words are all vapid nonsense (...) [17] Theodore Christophers edit were repeatedly reverted by Aearthrise and he (once again, regrettably but understandably) stopped engaging with the article. When I joined this discussion some time later and wrote I fully supported Theodore Christophers changes and argumentation, this too was ignored or waved away and edits reverted multiple times. The third talk page discussion involves a NPOV-dispute concerning the etymology of ″Dutch″ in ″Pennsylvania Dutch″. There seem to be two main trains of thought: one is that Dutch was used in an older broader meaning, the other that is an anglicization of the Pennsylvania Dutch word for themselves ″deitsch″. Both views have reputable academic publications behind them and are widespread among scholars. Per WP:NPOV, both views should be represented in the article, as they were in the past and are represented on other Wikipedias. Aearthrise opposes this, considering one view to be ″the truth″ [18] and the other nonsense and again and again [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] removed the second view from the article. The pattern described at the beginning again appears: large amounts of quotes are spammed on the talk page. Most are from travel blogs, personal websites or books that are well over a hundred years (1900, 1870) old, followed by insulting or suggestive remarks: This is your problem- you want to operate on ignorance and your emotions rather than from evidence and knowledge, and you've shown that time and time again. Even now, you're showing how your feelings were hurt and trying to use that to win the argument. You have a bruised ego. [24] Your commentary makes you seem like the type who doesn't like learning, nor wants to learn [25] You deleted my responsse here earlier for making a discussion here, but yet, as a hypocrite, you started a discussion here yourself! [26] You are hypocrite and are playing a game to get your way.[27] I came to the same conclusion as 47thPennVols before me in realizing that a discussion with Aearthrise wasn't going to go anywhere, so I made a Request for Comment-request to try and persuade others to voice their opinions on the matter. As I'm writing this, I don't think that RfC is going to be very successful as it immediately got spammed with large amount of green texts and personal remarks which have nothing to do with the purpose or subject of the RfC. At one point, he started adding large amounts of text to comments that had already been replied to [28] and despite explicit requests and warnings not to do this, he continued anyway [29]. In the fourth discussion involving Aearthrise an anonymous IP asked the perfectly normal question if there was a source for the claim that Elon Musk is of Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry, to which Aearthrises replied: It takes a "special" person to ignore the citation that's already present on the article, and a lazy person to not take it upon himself to make quick a google search. [30] and again added a lot of green text from questionable websites. He has my sympathies for losing his Pennsylvania Dutch grandfather, but this has clearly resulted in a case of WP:OWN with regards to this article. Aearthrises behavior has resulted in many unreliable and/or outdated material finding its way into the article, it's been tailored to his personal preference to the point of the fonts used and the talk page and article history clearly show that he is unwilling to accept additional or alternative points of views, even when valid and reliable sources are clearly provided. In addition to the harm being done to the reliability and neutrality of the article, his aggressive, insulting and bullying style of communicating is driving other committed users away from an article which is not very well known or has many involved editors to begin with and is preventing improvements or changes to the article being made. This needs to stop before it gets out of hand even more than it already has. Wikipedias principles on personal attacks, proper use of sources and NPOV need to come out on top and I would therefore kindly ask you to intervene in this matter. Vlaemink (talk) 21:37, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

Original response indicating Vlaemink's attempt to avoid direct argumentation

Vlaemink has continually made poor arguments not based on hard evidence; every single point i've made in our discussion includes evidence. Vlaemink added false information to the article, and also attempted to make an anecdotal argument equal to one that is filled with a plethora of hard evidence. Vlaemink has showed he doesn't want to argue and has deleted my arguments several times on the discussion page; he would rather play a game of ego rather than prove that his information is correct through well-reasoned arguments. All of my edits are based on citations and evidence that are reasonable and well-sourced. Vlaemink here has cherrypicked four arguments, one from 47thPennVols that was completely based on his personal opinion, and which he could not provide evidence for. He tried to talk around the issue instead of providing evidence. The second, from Theodore Christopher whose whole argument was based on treating a specific Fraktur variety of Pennsylvania Dutch language, that was made to be rendered in Fraktur for historic reasons, the same as German language, which I argued was incorrect and should be treated differently, due to the circumstances around this form of language, and that Pennsylvania Dutch language is completely separate to German language. He kept returning to the same point about how we treat standard German without addressing any of the points of contention I gave. The third is Vlaemink's own argument about adding content that, partially was misleading, and another part completely false; I talked to him about how parts of his added content were misleading, but he didn't want to address the argument. The fourth is an anonymous IP who said "The section talking about famous folks of PA Dutch decent says family of Elon Musk. Is this correct? Can this be substantiated with any evidence?", with a source of evidence right next to the word Elon Musk. I produced 4 more quotes in addition to that one, and wrote my response in a way to show the hubris of taking the time to write a whole section on the talk page, but not taking easy steps to view the evidence already provided, which is why I called it lazy. Vlaemink wants to say that I claimed ownership of the article, but that's not true at all. I improved the article's quality and content with cited material. He claims "signficant damage" to Wikipedia, but includes no evidence for this claim other than points of his bruised ego from himself having not made good arguments for his addition of content. He wants to make you believe that this whole article is questionable now on nothing more than his word.

Hello admins, I ask you to intervene in a matter concerning Aearthrise and the article Pennsylvania Dutch, which I believe is harming Wikipedia. I made a previous request which was too long and detailed; it can be found in the above collapsable for specific insults and more difflinks and here is article's talk page.

In under two years, Aearthrise has dominated the Pennsylvania Dutch article, contributing over 50% of its content and making 83% of all edits.[31][32] While single authorship isn't inherently problematic, in this case, it has led to significant damage to Wikipedia's reliability, neglect of its principles, and a lack of respectful communication. Aearthrise adds and deletes content as he pleases, often in a bullying manner. Meaningful discussions about the article’s content are impossible. Attempts to introduce alternative perspectives are ignored, and discussions quickly become personal and unpleasant. Regardless of the arguments or sources provided, Aearthrise does what he wants. Four talk page discussions illustrate these issues.

In the first discussion, Aearthrise reverted edits by @47thPennVols:: and demanded a source on how "Dutchman" can be considered a slur. 47thPennVols provided a citation and raised concerns about Aearthrise’s sources, which were aggressively and unilaterally dismissed. 47thPennVols eventually gave up on editing the article.[33][34][35] [36][37][38][39][40] The second discussion involves a long bilingual quote added by Aearthrise in Fraktur font, highly uncommon on Wikipedia. When @Theodore Christopher:: addressed this, a very unpleasant discussion ensued. Aearthrise made derogatory remarks and repeatedly reverted Christopher’s edits. My support for Christopher’s changes was also ignored.[41][42][43][44][45][46][47] The third discussion is a NPOV-dispute about the etymology of "Dutch" in "Pennsylvania Dutch." Both views should be represented, but Aearthrise opposes one view and repeatedly removes it, despite valid sources. He spams the talk page with quotes from unreliable sources and insults, questioning others’ motives. An RfC was similarly spammed, deterring other participants.[48][49][50] [51][52][53] In the fourth discussion, an anonymous IP asked for a source on Elon Musk’s Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry. Aearthrise responded insultingly and added text from questionable websites.[54]

Aearthrise’s behavior has led to unreliable and outdated materials in the article. His aggressive, insulting, and bullying style drives committed users away, preventing improvements. This must stop before it worsens. Wikipedia's principles on personal attacks, proper use of sources, and NPOV must prevail. I kindly ask you to intervene in this matter and hope my description of the problem is now brief enough to be workable. Vlaemink (talk) 06:57, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

I'm condensing this section because Vlaemink has edited his original post to make it smaller, and is making different claims now.

He claims that 1.my challenging 47thPennVols insulted him, so it scared him away; this is untrue, as I asked for evidence for the opinion he was presenting, but he did not produce anything beyond a weak quote unrelated to the topic.

2. Vlaemink claims I made derogatory remarks and reverted Theodore Christopher comments; none of those links he added shows "derogatory remarks", it's just long-winded debate, and for the reversion, it's because Theodore Christopher completely removed content, which I challenged the removal, and we subsequently discussed it.

3.Vlaemink's problem is not the addition of content (beyond the false content he added), but rather the misleading nature of equating a consensus based on an abundance of hard evidence with an anecdotal folk etymology debunked by experts on the topic.

4. Vlaemink says I insulted the anonymous IP by calling him lazy for asking for evidence, when evidence was already present on the article, attached directly to the information he read; the anonymous IP didn't at all make the post about reliability. Now, on this thread, Valemink is now claiming these are questionable websites. Forbes is a questionable website? I don't think so, and if it is this isn't the place to discuss that, it should be done the article's talk page. Aearthrise (talk) 22:02, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

@Vlaemink and @Aearthrise these are both quite extensive walls of text. It is far more than I and many other editors or indeed administrators (all of whom, remember, are volunteers contributing in their spare time) will have time to read. I'm sure you both carefully crafted your comments and were aiming for completeness but I'd urge you both to condense your concerns down to the most salient points. Adam Black ^{talk • contribs} 22:10, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

I can condense this whole argument: Vlaemink is mad that because he can't argue with hard evidence, he would rather make an ego-filled post here to administrators about how my words could hurt people's feelings, instead of actually providing well-sourced proof for his arguments. Vlaemink wants an administrator to step in and save him, rather than address the points of discussion. Aearthrise (talk) 22:17, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

This type of combative WP:BATTLEGROUND response doesn't exactly defend yourself well from the complaints above. The Kip ^(contribs) 23:19, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

That's your opinion, but it doesn't change the fact that this whole post is about how Vlaemink says my words may hurt other people's feelings, and that he made it here because he wasn't willing to wait for comment on the article's talk page (he already put in a request for comment); his arguments weren't convincing through discussion and evidence, which is why he is taking the route of notifying administrators- his actions show that he's not confident that he can win with his own arguments. Aearthrise (talk) 09:28, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not about ″winning arguments″, it's about finding sources and finding consensus. The fact that I asked for a third opinion, RfC and now have taken to the Administrators Noticeboard is anything but a sign that I do not believe in the validly of my sources and the need for their inclusion.Vlaemink (talk) 13:25, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia is about showing what is verifiable and true, and that is "winning arguments"; Wikipedia is all based on evidence. There is no evidence that Dutch is just a corruption beyond that people have said it. The consensus on the origin of Dutch has an abudance of evidence to show why it's correct, and that's the view scholarship accepts. Aearthrise (talk) 15:16, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Any Wikipedian familiar with Wikipedia's principles can tell (and show you) why that is completely false: Wikipedia does not show what is ″true″, it repeats and summarizes what has been written about a particular issue by reliable and valid authors. And if there are multiple views, then multiple views are to be mentioned to provide the reader with the full scope of an article. This an encyclopedia, not a bundle of personal essays. Vlaemink (talk) 18:44, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

That is 2000 words. You'll need to cut that down by like 75 percent at least. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 22:07, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

While this is far too long, I'll just say that from inspection, Vlaemink raises some good points, and Aearthrise needs to adjust their behavior even if they're right (which I don't think is a given). In #4, an IP address asked a harmless question, and Aearthrise was pointlessly rude and insulting, and even made their case seem worse by linking some truly awful sources like random websites with "A brief biography of Elon Musk for young kids" (looks obviously AI generated! Terrible formatting, alien wording! [55]). See WP:BITE, there's no need to be hostile to a standard question, just politely link your source and move on, or ignore it. (And frankly, given Musk's reality distortion field, it wouldn't shock me if it was at least possible that someone just made it up in the past, so there is an interesting question here.) For #2, We absolutely don't do fancy Fraktur fonts because it was contemporary, and I don't think the Miller quote is worth including at all, let alone 4 full paragraphs of it that is extremely partial (I'm sorry, but Eastern Pennsylvania was not the "model of the world" for agriculture, the good professor was deluded, why are we quoting this guy). Aearthrise claims that German nationalism only existed in the "late 19th century" (diff), which is 1000% false to anyone who knows anything about the German question. For #1, I'd argue that one Aearthrise has a point on the merits, but he was still needlessly hostile on the talk page, seeming to invoke ownership rather than finding some compromise, like a footnote discussing the issue from both sides. Similarly, for #3, even if we grant for a moment that Aearthrise is correct (we'd need someone uninvolved to examine the literature), then there's probably an interesting missing section about the "folk etymology", its supporters, and reliable sources on why it's wrong. Instead of just deleting it outright. SnowFire (talk) 23:35, 20 June 2024 (UTC)

• Well, I read all of the comments here and Aearthrise, if you can honestly read all of this evidence and blame it all on a "hurt ego", it shows to me that you are taking this too personally and refusing to address the merits of the complaint. Of course no one likes to be criticized but there is some unreasonable and uncivil behavior on your part that you can't wave off with a "hurt ego" comment. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 03:39, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

  I addressed the merits of the complaint, but my point of contention was that Vlaemink was misleading people by equating anecdotal evidence with the consensus explanation of "Dutch" by linguists and experts, proven by an abundance of hard evidence. Vlaemink refused to revise the content he wrote, and included false content at the same time. Aearthrise (talk) 09:19, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

You can repeat this time and again, that etymology A consists of ″anecdotal evidence″ and etymology B does not — but it doesn't make it so. It's a debate tactic, it's not based on the sources provided. The talk page contains numerous publications by reputable authors which subscribe to etymology A, and this alone shows that a ″consensus explanation proven by an abundance of hard evidence″ does not exist. One of the authors supporting etymology B even explicitly mentions the fact that etymology A is mainstream among nonscholars and scholars alike. A Wikipedia editor is supposed to report on relevant view from reliable publications, we are not here to create our own preferred version of reality. This is the core issue here. Vlaemink (talk) 13:21, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

You show you don't want to cooperate on this article, because you ignore the points of contention and want to make the claim based on anecdote equal to the one based on heavy evidence, and is the consensus view on the origin of Dutch.

You don't want to acknowledge how equating these arguments is misleading, and that's the whole problem, not whether we include the information at all. Aearthrise (talk) 15:11, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

• @SnowFire: I didn't claim German nationalism only existed in the "late 19th century" as you're claiming from that revert link, but if it is a point of contention, it can be easily discussed and proven or disproven with proper evidence. I didn't revert Vlaemink's revision because of when German nationalism started, it was because he deleted a lot of content, and for his inclusion of false information, that High Dutch was a calque of "Hochdeutsch", false and not substantiated by the sources added, and misleading content which was saying there was confusion by linguists about an anecdotal folk etymology while there is consensus of the historic of use of "Dutch" backed by an abundance of hard evidence. There is no problem with adding a footnote, but Vlaemink did not want to change his position on the way of writing the content, because he wanted to present them as equal arguments.

  You talk about the quotes for Elon Musk, which as I said were all easily found on a quick Google, and you only mention one, being the last quote. The others are Forbes.com, Industrytap.com, etc.

  As for the Fraktur, which you're trying to dismiss in the same way as Theodore (who called it ridiculous), and Vlaemink who called it (ludicrous), i've spoken at length on the discussion page why it should presented in that form, as it is a classical literary variety of Pennsylvania Dutch written specifically in Fraktur as a way to fight against the complete loss of German education in Pennsylvania. The Fraktur wasn't only a circumstance of being written at that time as you want to claim, it was consciously written like that to be an opposition to fight against the "Englisha rule" Pennsylvania Dutch, which was simply the spoken language of the time written in an English way, and part of the reason it was ridiculed.

  For the quote by Daniel Miller itself, it painted very well the feeling of the prejudice faced against the Pennsylvania Dutch community, and that was the point of the paragraph. Your nitpick is on how Dr.Miller showed that emotion towards the prejudice, and are making an argument about his words aimed at uplifting a marginalized people.

  As for invoking ownership, there is no proof for that claim, unless you're basing it on the passion i've shown to make this a quality article. I always want people to challenge content on Wikipedia, but the content should well-sourced, and if there is confusion about content, it can be discussed until a resolution is made, based on the best argument and best evidence. Aearthrise (talk) 09:17, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Leaving aside a literal declaration of ownership, there is plenty of clear evidence that you are behaving as if you own this article:

• Over half of the current article content was added by you in less than two years and your edits make up 83% of the total during that period. [56] — and these edits did not come about in a collaborative and constructive way: you are unnecessarily aggressive and insulting.
• Prior to 2022 you did not edit this article. You described yourself as a Louisiana Cajun living in New Orleans, and a professional translator proficient in English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Latin, Greek, Italian and Romanian.[57].
• After 2022, you stated that your grandfather was Pennsylvania Dutch and claimed to speak Pennsylvania German.[58] You started to edit the article intensely and at one point even claimed that you yourself were in fact Pennsylvania Dutch, as evidenced by a remark in which you accused a fellow editor of ″not even speaking the language nor knowing our cultural traits″ [59] and explicitly stated that you edit the article because it ″helps you to connect with my German heritage″ [60].

And therein lies the problem, because that's only half the story. It's clear to me (and I hope also to others) that it's not just your desire to connect or explore your heritage but also a clear desire to shape your claimed heritage to your own personal liking. If you were truly interested and invested in this article, you would welcome every possible view, nuance and sourced addition to the article. Instead, you seem to exclusively want to see your own personal views and preferences in the article page and get abusive as soon as anyone dares to challenge or even as much as doubt it. That's a clear example of WP:OWN-behavior and I really do not see how you can objectively deny this given all the evidence and examples provided. Vlaemink (talk) 10:02, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Vlaemink, as someone who agrees with you, Aearthrise's cultural background is irrelevant, and I'd recommend dropping the topic. Judge by actions here, not possible motives. The sole thing that matters is refusing to work with others to improve the article and instead insisting on "their" view. SnowFire (talk) 10:10, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

@SnowFire: You are right, I should have stuck to the refusal to cooperate and ignoring of alternative POVs.Vlaemink (talk) 13:28, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

The refusal to cooperate is on your side. You don't want to listen to opposition and work towards a solution; it's not about ignoring alternative points of view, it's about making points of view that are weak equal to ones that are very strong, based on hard evidence. Aearthrise (talk) 15:27, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

The problem being identified in the discussion of personal background is the rather blatant inconsistency of the claims, suggesting strongly a history of dishonesty. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 11:19, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

You want to purport that sharing self-identity on the talk page this platform is supposed be an "inconsistency of the claims", and say the writing self-identity on the talk pages "strongly suggests a history of dishonesty". This is an incorrect statement, and users should be able identify however they want on their talk pages, without being harassed about it. Aearthrise (talk) 14:59, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Vlaemink, you are doing everything to try to save face. You claim WP:OWN, but your only evidence is that I added more than over 50% of the current content on the article, that my talk page identifies me in a certain way, and finally a cherry picked quote from the discussion about treatment of Pennsylania Dutch language in the Fraktur discussion with Theodore Christopher, which his whole argument was based around how we treat standard German.

You're using personal information now to try to prove that I claim ownership on the article, but all you're doing is making a discussion of who I am as person. Aearthrise (talk) 10:11, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

• (de-indent, reply to Aearthrise above, but it seems Vlaemink decided to reply there instead): I'm going to try to keep this brief. A), Yes you did make such a claim on German nationalism, it's right in the linked diff above (and the incorrect statement wasn't in the version of the article in 2022 before your revisions), but if you're saying it was a good edit of Vlaemink's accidentally swept up in the undo, fine, glad we agree. B) Okay, so your sources are right and Vlaemink's are wrong on etymologies. Put a pin in this. C) You clearly aren't understanding The Problems in what I wrote on the IP's Musk question. C1) How would you react if someone on a talk page asks what is in your view a simple and easily answered question in the future? The same way or different? Why? C2) I agree that the Forbes article is the real source. I was saying you only should have linked that before. Instead you linked obvious chatbot splurge as "proof" as well. This suggests you thought it was real proof. This does not speak well for your discerning judgment in figuring out which sources are reliable and which aren't - do you understand that? Everybody makes mistakes, it's no big deal, I've personally trusted some awful sources in retrospect. But an editor who makes mistakes, refuses to acknowledge them after they're pointed out, and then basically invokes their own judgment on which other sources are reliable (say in case B on etymologies) as unquestionable is treading on thin ice. (SnowFire, interjection by Vlaemink)

@SnowFire: I hope you don't mind me placing this small comment in between your comment, but the sources I've provided on etymology A are valid, reliable, and cited in full on the talk page. Also, Aearthrise is trying his utmost to frame this as ″my theory″, but I've provided sources on both etymologies and have no personal preference; my POV is that both should be mentioned as they both appear in the scholarly field.Vlaemink (talk) 13:15, 21 June 2024 (UTC) (SnowFire again:)

That was meant only as a summary of Aearthrise's argument that I'd loop back to (hence the "put a pin in it"). I'm not saying he's actually right about everything and you're wrong about everything. SnowFire (talk) 13:21, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying that, I misunderstood. English is not my native language and I think I got my idioms mixed up.Vlaemink (talk) 13:33, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

You claim i'm trying to frame this as your theory, but show no proof of it. The point of contention, and we've repeated this several times, is the consensus around the origin of the word "Dutch" in English. The other theory has been debunked by experts of the topic, and the debunking is based on a plethora of hard evidence.

You haven't tried to revise your work as of yet, and you still want to present them as equal arguments. Wikipedia is based on what you can prove, and you can prove that some people mention it as the etymology of Dutch in English, but it has no evidence behind it beyond anecdote.

Oxford for example lays the term out perfectly "from Middle Dutch dutsch ‘Dutch, Netherlandish, German’: the English word originally denoted speakers of both High and Low German, but became more specific after the United Provinces adopted the Low German of Holland as the national language on independence in 1579.". Oxford on the same page explicitly mentions the Pennsylvania Dutch as an example that falls under the historic use: The German language, in any of its forms. Obsolete except in High Dutch n. A.1a; Low Dutch — Pennsylvania Dutch, a degraded form of High German (originally from the Rhine Palatinate and Switzerland) spoken by the descendants of the original German settlers in Pennsylvania. Aearthrise (talk) 15:08, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

At this point I think there can only be two options: either you never understood what is being discussed to begin with or you did but are now purposely creating a smoke screen: nobody is contesting that the word ″Dutch″ at one point had an older, broader meaning in English which, in today's terms, could also include Germans. I wouldn't be able to name a single professional etymological or historical linguistic publication that has ever disputed that. That's not what being discussed here: the issue is not whether ″Dutch″ had additional meanings in the past, but why the ″Pennsylvania Dutch″ are called ″Dutch″ — and that question has at least two possible answers. Yoder in his 1980 article assumes ″Dutch″ is a relic of an earlier meaning surviving in American English, another explanation found in reliable sources is that its an Anglicization of ″deitsch″ or ″deutsch″. That's two theories, both of which should be mentioned in the article. The fact that (etymological) dictionaries prove that ″Dutch″ had a more diverse meaning the past does not mean they validate or prove Yoders hypothesis, it merely means Yoder used a historical dictionary as part of his explanation. Your quote from an 1897 Oxford Etymological dictionary entry (which also defines Pennsylvania Dutch as ″degraded German″) is in the same ballpark: it supports Yoder, but this has no relevance on the fact that other scholars hold a different view and that this view should be included per WP:NPOV. Louder already explicitly mentioned the popularity of the alternative among scholars, proving its relevance and further casting doubt on your continually repeated claim that a ″total consensus″ exists on the matter. Vlaemink (talk) 18:26, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

First, this Oxford post is from the online dictionary, which they've updated with all of the information they've collected, so you're claim that it's just an 1897 quote is unsubstantiated here. You say "Louder already explicitly mentioned the popularity of the alternative among scholars, proving its relevance". Dr. Louden like Dr.Yoder explicitly states that this idea is incorrect, and he provides reasoning why, the same that I have presented to you over the past few days.

Dr.Louden says: "Contrary to a widespread belief among both nonscholars and scholars, though, the Dutch in Pennsylvania Dutch is not a historical mistranslation of the native word Deitsch...", and Dr. Yoder was quoted: Dr. Don Yoder, father of American Folklife Studies, and co-founder of the Kutztown Folk Festival, tackled this question in 1950 for previous generations: “When they stepped off the boat at Philadelphia, they were called by the English-speaking people ‘Dutch’ and ‘Dutchmen.’ This term was not, as you often erroneously hear, invented in America as a mispronunciation of the German word ‘Deutsch’ which means ‘German.’ No, ‘Dutch’ was in 1750 already an ancient and well-established term. It has been traced by the Oxford English Dictionary as far back as the late Middle Ages.”

Online beyond Oxford, the University of Wisconsin-Madison clearly shows Although scholars and some language advocates prefer the term “Pennsylvania German,” the use of “Dutch” here does not reflect a (mis)translation of “Deutsch” or “Deitsch.” The English word “Dutch” was used in earlier times to describe people of both German and Netherlandic origins.... I can produce so many more quotes and evidence, so many already being on the article's talk page.

You're still trying to push the definition not based on any hard evidence to be equal to one that does. Your thought process is like using a paper tiger. You can't prove it isn't a tiger by looking at it, but it doesn't hold the weight of a true tiger.

This is the whole point of contention, which your unwillingness to compromise has lead you to create several RFC requests, and being impatient, skipped over them to make this call to administrators because you're not getting your way. Aearthrise (talk) 20:14, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Louden does not provide any reasoning why the alternative is incorrect, he defers to Yoder as anyone looking up the source can see for her or himself. If you take a close look at the online Oxford Etymological Dictionary (which is an active project, not a finished dictionary) you'll find (in the top left corner a disclaimer stating whether an entry has been revised since 1897 or (as in this case) not. Vlaemink (talk) 20:41, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Louden does provide reasoning why the alternative is incorrect. The expanded quote, from his book "Pennsylvania Dutch: The Story of an American Language" reads "Contrary to a widespread belief among both nonscholars and scholars, though, the Dutch in Pennsylvania Dutch is not a historical mistranslation of the native word Deitsch, as earlier pointed out by Don Yoder. Although the words Deitsch and Dutch do share a common Germanic etymology, both German and Dutch were used in earlier American English to mean 'German.' The two synonyms differed in terms of formality. The word German, which was borrowed from Latin, traditionally had a neutral or formal connotation, while Dutch was used in more familiar and informal ("folksier") contexts." Aearthrise (talk) 20:57, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

No he doesn't, as can be clearly accessed from both the quote above and the source itself. He expands on why he thinks Yoder is correct, he doesn't address why the Anglicization hypothesis is wrong, unlikely and/or impossible anywhere in his book. Vlaemink (talk) 21:00, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

• On Fraktur, I'm sorry, but unless the passage is specifically on fonts or art, it isn't how things are done on Wikipedia, and the other editors were correct. We don't have Kulturkampf in Fraktur despite it being the contemporary font in 1870s Germany. Maybe we need an explicit passage in Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Text formatting forbidding this but I think this just has never come up before. On the very long Miller quote, it's very, very common chest-thumping that thanks to its language only gets seen by its intended community. You could find near-identical statements in Norwegian in 1903 Minnesota, or in Yiddish in 1903 New York, or in Guarani in 1903 Paraguay, talking about how wonderful a local group is and how people look down on them but they're totally wrong and we're actually awesome. It's all standard cheerleading written a million times before, not just the wild claim on agriculture. But this is more a vanilla content dispute. Suffice to say you haven't made the case that this is really a worthy quote to include both the translation AND the original text.
• Your final comment on demanding "proof" ownership is occurring is very strange. What do you think the purpose of this AN thread is? SnowFire (talk) 10:10, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

  I agree that German nationalism was a just swept comment, and if it needs to be corrected, it should be. The focus of the reversion wasn't about when German nationalism took place.

  As for the quotes I added, I simply added four extra web pages (in total 5 with the Forbes quote already present on the article, and the next four web pages after it) to demonstrate that it was easy to make a Google Search to find the information.

  On the Fraktur point, the literary Fraktur Pennsylvania Dutch should be given consideration due to its history and unique circumstances, and should be treated in the same way other languages are uniquely written for their circumstances (I mentioned Yiddish and Coptic Greek for example). Nevertheless, the whole paragraph on prejudice against the Pennsylvania Dutch is unnecessary on the article and can be removed; the removal of content so far has been about how the language information was presented.

  As for the final point, I asked for proof of ownership, because the only points Vlaemink provided are my passion for the quality of the article, how much of the article i've contributed, and who I am as a person. Aearthrise (talk) 10:22, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

  For your Musk quotes: AN is a little tense for a "learning experience", but you still don't seem to be engaging with the problem here. It doesn't have to be a big deal, exactly, but you seem to think that more quotes is better and the other person was very lazy (your words, not mine) for asking the question. Did you read what I wrote above that "you made your case seem worse by linking some truly awful sources like random websites"? If someone asks what the capital of Illinois is and you link a terrible AI-generated source, it makes it look like you don't know what you're talking about, even if the source is accurate. If you couldn't be bothered to critically examine the websites at all and were literally just pasting Google links, maybe don't do that? To back up a little here, your enthusiasm in researching the Pennsylvania Dutch article is a good thing. But learning what sources are reliable and what aren't is a key Wikipedia skill - one that frankly most of the world is bad at (most people believe memes shared on Facebook uncritically). Please click on your own links. Discarding sites like that are the basics of learning how to source. If you agree that those non-Forbes sites weren't useful, then great, we can move on to tougher questions like when to trust old sources from 1878 or whatever. But if you still don't see the problem, then nobody is going to believe on your judgment anywhere else.

  On that note, you didn't answer my C1 question above. If someone asks an in-your-view "easy" question in the future, how would you respond?

  It's moot, but for future reference, you will want to distinguish fonts and language scripts. Yiddish and Coptic are written in non-Latin scripts. Pennsylvania Dutch, like German and English, is written in the Latin script, of which Fraktur is one font. Varying up the script to match a language is fine; varying up fonts within a script is very unusual and not done just because it would have been contemporary without a very good reason.

  On ownership: I think Vlaemink has made his case. I think you have two ways you can defend yourself: A) Actually, everyone else IS really wrong, and you were just performing good stewardship by stopping these wrong editors. But given some of errors so far in your preferred versions, you're not making this approach the easy one. B) You commit to accepting feedback and not reverting and working with others. If you commit to B, and then actually follow through, that'll actually be the happy case - but you have to understand that you will sometimes "lose" and other editors will put in the "wrong" stuff and you'll need to develop a consensus on the talk page otherwise, politely, and without bludgeoning. Are one of these doable? SnowFire (talk) 11:37, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Adding: Since the first post on the Administrators noticeboard, it has come to light that a very large amount of the references and sources added to Pennsylvania Dutch, almost exclusively by Aearthrise and within the past two years, have very serious issues. It appears many of these references are in fact personal, family or travel websites, self-published (family history/genealogical) books and a very large number of hopelessly outdated publications all over a 100 or even 150, years old, some of them containing false dates of publication which made them appear much more recent than they really were. Some references were simply copy-pasted from other Wikipedias without even changing the language in the citation. This is only based on the first 50 references given out of a total of 130, and it is very probable that the other 80 references will yield similar results. The Pennsylvania Dutch article seems to be in a truly terrible state and will need much improvement. Vlaemink (talk) 21:08, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Vlaemink, you claim that there are very serious issues, but show very little to make the claim about severity; your whole argument is about time period and a nitpick of a six sources, but don't point out any flaws of the information they corroborate.

Dealing with the topic of Pennsylvania Dutch, Pennnsylvania Germans, the height of information about this culture was written between before the American Revolution and World War 2, with the period between World War 1 and World War 2 being heavily obscured and marginalized.

I've spent a lot of time researching this topic to bring light to facets of this culture, corroborated by many different sources, because prior to my additions, there was almost no history mentioned, only information on the Amish.

If you see something that you find questionable, then bring it up, and it can be discussed, but without better evidence you're just inventing claims about "very serious issues" based around only 6/130 sources you claim are questionable and fifteen sources from dates before World War 2. I have made a response to your claim on the discussion page.

This addition is still part of your tactic of character assassination to win your argument on the discussion page, this whole post being because I reverted your deletion of my arguments, which you deleted three times; trying to silence me, you threatened to complain to administration only because I restored my arguments. Aearthrise (talk) 15:09, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Aearthrise, please try to keep consecutive edits down to two or three, by using the "show preview" button. It's hard enough to read all of these walls of text without watchlists being flooded too. Phil Bridger (talk) 18:25, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

It's time for you (Aearthrise) to stop doubling down, to stop pretending to be a victim, to stop twisting words and to stop defending what cannot be defended and to get back to reality.

At no point, did I ever threaten you. I asked you to stop making significant changes to your comments well after they'd been responded to and after asking multiple times I told you I would seek assistance from the admins if you continued [61], which you did without any hesitation — so I did what I explicitly told you before.

You also cannot bluff your way out of the serious sourcing issues described above: I've very clearly stated that of the 130 sources in the article, I've only been able to take a look at the first 50. Discounting sources used multiple times, effectively half of these references were unacceptable by Wikipedia's standards with regard to valid and reliable sources. You're now actively trying to misrepresent the facts by speaking of ″fifteen sources published before World War II″ — which is absurd and extremely misleading, given the fact that these invalid sources include material published over a decade before the start of the American Civil War and leaves out untrustworthy (personal) websites, self-published books, falsified publication dates and copy-pasted references from other Wikipedias!

This is not the first time your sources have been questioned and found to be totally unsuitable for a serious and reliable encyclopedic article. Take for example your 240 word by Daniel Miller from 1903 — for which you still, despite unanimous pushback from all users involved so far, refused to accept that the Fraktur font is unwanted — which was shown to be both outdated and incredibly biased; or in the words of @SnowFire: ″the good professor was deluded″.

You need to take a critical introspective look at both your attitude towards sources and other editors. You constantly talk about ″winning″ arguments, unilaterally declare that others ″have failed to convince you″ and are downright rude towards others. The sources you spam every time you are questioned look AI-generated and often have little or nothing to do with the issues being discussed. You say that prior to your additions, there was almost no history mentioned? I'm here to tell you that barely any history is to be preferred over an extensive history section with flawed, biased and hopelessly outdated information.

There are a great many recent and reliable academic sources on just about every aspect of Pennsylvania Dutch culture, past and present, and these can be found and used by just about any editor. The proposition that you had to use thoroughly antiquated material because nothing of note has been published since 1945 is simply not true and frankly ridiculous. Vlaemink (talk) 20:39, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

You're bouncing around between discussions on this page and the article's page, and this is just another character attack. You're copying this argument from the article's talk page under Talk:Pennsylvania Dutch#Very serious problems with the reliability and validity of the sources used. There, I pointed out a lot of the problems with the routes you're taking to get your way; you don't use evidence, and make statements based on nothing but your word. Aearthrise (talk) 09:27, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reliable Sources is extremely clear on what constitutes a reliable source and with whom the burden of proof rests and I'm not going to debate these community standards with you. You are not in any position to make any demands: you've added a huge amount of unreliable, questionable and/or outdated sources, in several cases even falsifying their dates of publication or misquoting the source material, and it is highly likely that most if not all will be removed from this article within the next couple of weeks because of this. The quality standards apply to all and to all equally. Vlaemink (talk) 10:55, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

You made a claim on that page of what is "unreliable", and you didn't back up your claims. I addressed your claims, but you ignore them and show that you would rather make a character attack than directly argue with evidence and well-reasoned arguments. Aearthrise (talk) 16:03, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

• Holy wall of text, Batman! Gents. Please endeavor to be more concise. @Vlaemink:, please point out 2-3 sentences and the associated sources you believe to be incorrect, incomplete, misleading, or inappropriate. @Aearthrise: I understand your frustration and find comments here to be less-than-collegial. Let him present his evidence and then we can address them. Buffs (talk) 14:34, 24 June 2024 (UTC)
  • Comment. Wouldn't normally try to backseat a report, but since Vlaemink isn't very experienced with AN and also said English is not their first language, I'll just note that Vlaemink's original post did include lots of diffs showing uncollegial behavior from Aearthrise, since collapsed after told it was way too long. (Then they spent a bunch of time holding their content dispute here anyway...). While since then there's been uncollegial behavior on both sides, the accusation is OWN, and an even casual inspection of the talk page & page history shows that Aearthrise has indeed been defending their "turf", at least in the past (although did say a few good things above on easing off some matters). However they seem to have backed off the article at the moment and are letting Vlaemink make some changes, so maybe the problem is moot? SnowFire (talk) 15:59, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

    You're saying "defending their turf" and "backed off on the article", like that was the point of the arguments I had with Vlaemink. This is a complete mischaraterization on your side.

    This whole discussion was about Vlaemink adding content that was untrue (writing High Dutch was a calque invented by Americans of Hochdeutsch, which is false and didn't have any sources), and making an argument had a little weight beyond anecdote equal to one that there is consensus and is backed by an abundance of hard evidence.

    I reverted his edits because he refused to revise them after being addressed why his addition was misleading. Now Vlaemink is trying many different ways to make his earlier work seem legitimate, but it's not true. His newer edits having nothing to do with that argument, so bringing them up here and stating how I'm allowing them is not needed to be said, because it's completely irrelevant. Aearthrise (talk) 16:18, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

    This is why I asked him for clearer evidence. I'm not suggesting anyone here is as pure as the driven snow...I mean MAYBE fire ON snow might be ok...I'll have to see the diffs. :-) Buffs (talk) 20:53, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

• Outside observer's summary of the WoT and best steps forward. Since I suffered through reading some of the above already, might as well chip in as someone who's never edited the Pennsylvania Dutch article. There's two issues here: a content dispute (that ideally isn't resolved at AN, but it's here, so I guess it might as well be acknowledged) and behavior woes.
  • On content: While I can't be sure that Vlaemink's "version" is better, I do think that they are correct that Aearthrise's old version was very... credulous... of old and dated sources, or stuff like genealogy websites. Old sources have their place, but in moderation, and maybe more for a "History of the Pennsylvania Dutch" article when desiring a contemporary report's details. This would normally be No Big Deal, Normal Editing, but Aearthrise initially responded hostiley to attempts to bring in alternate perspectives rather than saying "great, let's expand the sourcing." (And per above, I do not really have confidence in Aearthrise's current ability to pick out what is a good source and what isn't on their own, which is not meant as an insult - this is a fixable problem, just please accept advice with good grace rather than defensiveness). For the record, someone like Aearthrise being willing to dig up old sources like Aearthrise can be a tremendous asset to research on the article, just as long as you work with others to figure out which sources are usable and which aren't, and apply them in WP:DUEWEIGHT. I hope that you two can actually work together in the future.
  • On behavior: Vlaemink's depiction of Aearthrise's behavior as being uncollegial and OWN-y are correct per the diffs in his original report. Simply peruse Talk:Pennsylvania_Dutch, or Talk:Pennsylvania_Dutch#Family_of_Elon_Musk? for one obvious example to an IP address - Aearthrise tends to paste some text that supports his position and assumes that denying the printed word is obviously perverse, as if there was one established truth and people don't disagree. Before, he also "defended" his version of the article with salty reverts rather than working collegially toward a better article or as a compromise. (Which would be one thing if Aearthrise was clearly "right" and Vlaemink was a passing crank, but see above on content, I don't believe that was accurate.).
  • Suggestion: If Aearthrise is satisfied that they can do better and is willing to commit to working collegially forward, and understands that not every random old source they find is necessarily that usable for Wikipedia, there's nothing that needs to be done other than perhaps a warning. If Aearthrise plans on just restarting the edit war, and plans on snidely replying to newbie questions while being wrong himself, then a page ban from Pennsylvania Dutch & Pennsylvania Dutch language may be in order. But I'm hoping that isn't necessary. SnowFire (talk) 15:59, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

I couldn't agree more with the SnowFire's assessment and also support his suggestions (a warning now, a page ban if the previous MO is continued) concerning the use of sources and incivility displayed.Vlaemink (talk) 16:32, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

SnowFire, you've said your piece four times already and repeating it doesn't make a more compelling argument. You first tried to make a "gotcha" with my sources by making a whole argument around Elon Musk (I simply added the first five sources that corroborated the same point, to show how easy and quickly the evidence could have been found through a Google search) and you nitpicked one while ignoring the others, and presenting it here like the whole post was wrong saying "given Musk's reality distortion field, it wouldn't shock me if it was at least possible that someone just made it up in the past, so there is an interesting question here". I pointed out the other sources, and you back pedaled.

You tried making a completely different tangent about the page by starting an argument about German nationalism, and I pointed out that it had nothing to do with the reversion of Vlaemink's edit.

You say I tend "to paste some text that supports my position"; that's called providing evidence, which is how you prove arguments. Again, those weren't "salty reverts," they were made to stop misleading information from being added. The lack of cooperation is not from my side; if Vlaemink wanted, he could have made well-reasoned arguments and discussed the evidence. Instead, he is going this route of character attack and avoiding addressing points that I made against his argument rather than directly supporting his position. Aearthrise (talk) 16:38, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

I've been trying to avoid the wall of text, but for the record: this was never a "gotcha", Aearthrise. It was a sign of a problem and a genuine attempt to get you to understand that A) Your petty reply to that IP address isn't how we do things on Wikipedia, and B) How to improve in the future. You can choose to take that advice or not. SnowFire (talk) 02:37, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

I understand your sentiments, but I felt I needed to defend against mischaracterization. The crux of this argument, is that it's important to maintain civility, and I agree. I got frustrated with the situation with Vlaemink, and I took it out on the IP address, and that was wrong.

Wikipedia should be a place of civility, and one without character attacks. If we can maintain peace, then the experience on the site is more congenial, especially for cooperation. Aearthrise (talk) 06:24, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

I support SnowFire's assessment of the situation and this response only serves to show Aearthrise's WP:BATTLEGROUND behaviour. It is quickly getting to being beyond the point that a warning would be sufficient. Adam Black ^{talk • contribs} 04:36, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

The response was just a defense of some the claims that SnowFire made in his assessment. But beyond that, I agree with the background sentiment. This whole muddy post is the result of bringing an ego into the editing process, and clearly chaos is the result. I don't want chaos, I want peace and harmony, and I want the best articles available, like any good Wikipedian.

On a side note, Vlaemink has made the revision that I asked for initially, so that point is out the way; this the fruit of cooperation. Aearthrise (talk) 06:37, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

It seems I spoke too soon I spoke too soon about Vlaemink's revision. Aearthrise (talk) 07:40, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Both Vlaemink and Aearthrise have posted far too much here, and Aearthrise seems to have ignored my previous post. Please stop posting and let independent editors decide things. Phil Bridger (talk) 22:34, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

I see your post Phil Bridger; I understand your point of keeping consecutive edits down to two or three, and I understand that it's to help editors read the history of this thread.

I have made a habit of continuously editing my words for small phrases and grammar mistakes, and I forgot it when writing my response to Vlaemink's most recent charge. I thank you for reminding me, and I ensure it won't happen again. Aearthrise (talk) 23:02, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

• I am making one more short comment here so that this thread isn't archived without action. Vlaemink was not very concise in raising the problem, but that doesn't mean it isn't a real problem, IMO. I've posted my own tl;dr analysis above and would encourage at least some admin to wade through the mud to provide some semblance of a way forward for these feuding editors, even the "bad" kind of a-curse-on-both-your-houses. SnowFire (talk) 02:37, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

  Thank you SnowFire; I don't want to be cursed, and I don't want Vlaemink to be cursed either: we've had a discussion with very heavy emotions, and lot of mudslinging- the only result of that kind of behavior being a big mess.

  A good Wikipedian should be able to edit without bringing in such strong emotion; in my final words, this whole experience has been a lesson on why it's important to manage frustration and anger. Aearthrise (talk) 07:04, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Potential Canvassing on Talk Page for San Bernardino County, California

A Twitter user has posted [62] about Talk:San Bernardino County, California#Election results gone. and seems to have a lot of people saying they are going to participate in the discussion. Just wanted to give a heads up. LakesideMiners^{Come Talk To Me!} 19:01, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Discussion was held, piling on was ocuring. Nothing more to be gained by the debate so I've collapsed it. Lets all move on as any other issues that need discussing should be done separately to that debate. Amortias (T)(C) 20:06, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Block review User:Jamiesonandy

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

---

Jamiesonandy (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Blocking admin: Orangemike (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

The blocked user is clearly an elderly person who misunderstands what Wikipedia is. It was explained to him at the help desk, and he stopped editing. Ten hours later, Mike indef blocked him. I feel like this is far from the first time I have seen Mike come late to a situation and substitute his own judgement for that of others who already adressed the situation. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 21:36, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

Egregiously bad block What the hell? Not a single warning on the user's talk page, not a note from the admin prior to jumping to a block, and an indef block at that? For a newbie who seems confused and needs some direction? Have we forgotten WP:BITE and WP:BLOCKP? I daresay I hope Orangemike is able to defend their actions, because I'm not seeing any reason they should be blocked indefinitely for a few questions on the Teahouse and Help Desk (two places designed for people to ask for..wait for it...help!). Not to mention, Orangemike mentions the editor being "belligerent" in the block reason, which I see absolutely zero evidence of, and the rest of their block reason of WP:NOTHERE seems to be a very unsubstantiated position to take. EggRoll97 ^(talk) 22:39, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

The belligerency was when he demanded, I asked a question; where is your answer? The guy was just not getting it, was using both the Teahouse and Help Desk as general information sources for UK banking questions, and clearly was not going to accept that this was not the place to seek help on this question. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Orangemike (talk • contribs)

It wasn't just one out of place question. It was several on both the Teahouse and the Help Desk, and it didn't seem like the user was ready to give up asking. RudolfRed (talk) 23:27, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

Definitely not a good block. I've taken a look at a number of Orangemike's NOTHERE blocks (I didn't look at others), and there were a number of very bad blocks:

• Special:Contributions/Studio_Atinati, one-edit no warning block
• Special:Contributions/Caroline.j.ashleyy, another one-edit no warning block
• Special:Contributions/Mrpoopbenji, user who stopped editing after warning, blocked more than a day later
• Special:Contributions/Wilburthewigga, no warnings whatsoever; this is not a good deletion either

Nearly half of the blocks I looked at were like this. Orangemike really needs to stop doing these no-to-little-warning blocks. —Ingenuity (t • c) 23:52, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

If my colleagues really feel that I'm being quick on the trigger, I will accept your collective judgement and take my trouting like a mensch; but I genuinely doubt that any one of these accounts had any intention of contributing to our project in the way that somebody like Sideways [nee Beeble] does every day. Two spamming accounts with spammy usernames, one poop joke, one racial epithet username, and our confused British gentleman who thinks we can put him in contact with a bank account dead for over half a century...... --Orange Mike | Talk 00:37, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

I haven't looked into any of your blocks and so have no opinion whether or not you have acted appropriately, but I would say that the fact that you genuinely doubt that any one of these accounts had any intention of contributing to our project does not override Wikipedia policy, specifically the policy on blocking. The intention behind Wikipedia was to create an encyclopaedia that anyone can edit. Policies which temporarily (even indefinite blocks shouldn't be considered permanent) remove an individual's ability to contribute to the project exist only to limit damage and disruption to the project and should generally be considered a last resort, not the first tool you pull out. I am not and have never been an administrator on this or any other Wikimedia project, but I have been an administrator or bureaucrat on multiple MediaWiki installations through my work and can tell you from experience that biting the newcomers in such a way may temporarily put a stop to vandalism or disruption but long-term only harms the project. Adam Black ^{talk • contribs} 02:08, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

None of these 4 blocks make any sense, and while I think Mike's explanations are genuine, this is a base breach of the blocking policy, and at least a couple of those user's blocks are concerning. The first, for User:Studio Atinati, based on the contributions looks like they need to be redirected to a different language content project (Google tells me it's Georgian?). The second user, User:Caroline.j.ashleyy, just needs an extra dose of the introduction to Wikipedia, not a block for heaven's sake. The third user, User:Mrpoopbenji, based on their contributions just seems like they need some help getting started, something the Growth Tools like mentorship are supposed to help with. Finally, the fourth user, User:Wilburthewigga, is the only one I'll say should probably be blocked, but not for WP:NOTHERE. If anything they should have been blocked for a UPOL violation, but not for their contributions or whether they are HERE or not. To be quite honest though, their edits are just to their user page then a question to their mentor. Of those edits to their userpage, they didn't seem to have any malicious intent either. In addition, they appear to have responded to the block notice, stating they would learn from it, which isn't typically a trait associated with blocks for WP:NOTHERE. On just a closing note as well, the deletion, unless something else had been added that was horridly obscene other than the page creation with "Woo!", I would say that's a violation of WP:DELTALK and the deletion policy in general. Based on the API result here, there doesn't appear to be any other edits to the page, though. Just out of curiosity, Ingenuity, would you (or of course any other administrator) be able to confirm if there's still a deleted revision on User talk:Wilburthewigga? If there is, I wonder if it would be possible to restore that revision, as it doesn't appear to be a proper use of the deletion tool. EggRoll97 ^(talk) 01:12, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

I remember encountering Mrpoopbenji (talk · contribs) through WP:UAA, and discovered that all of their edits were created by a large language model. Ther sandbox was deleted for this reason. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 17:55, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Someone with a username that's slang for "white nigger" needs only a swift kick in the ass out the door. I'd have blocked on sight as well. As to the others: one is an obvious username violation, with another the text being in Georgian is the least of the problems given it was an obvious attempt to hijack an article with blatant spam about an entirely unrelated subject, and the last was as flagrant a case of noble cause syndrome as it gets. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 06:10, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

• Just wanted to point out that the blocked editor did not stop editing once it was pointed out (not only on May 14th, which they may have not seen, but also on Jun 14th at 18:34, again at 18:34, at 18:35, and at at 18:44) that wikipedia, including the Help desk and Teahouse, was not an appropriate place for their query. Rather, 20 minutes after that last response, the editor reposted the question asking for legal/financial advice on the userpage. Secondly, while the editor said that they had "contributed to Wikipedia for a number of years" at least this account seemed to be dedicated to a single purpose that was not that of building an encyclopedia. Finally, as Girth Summit eloquently explained on this page a short while back, albeit in a different context, one motivation for applying an indef block is to get assurance from the blocked editor that the problematic behavior will not be repeated.

Hence, while I understand that the Jamiesonandy block was still a judgement call, and that it is natural to feel sympathy for a senior citizen in distress, I can also see Orangemike's thinking in applying the NOTHERE block. Cheers. Abecedare (talk) 01:39, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

• Comment I've noticed for years that Orangemike is quick to block, often without any talk page warnings but I generally have trusted their judgment. I'd ask them to ease up on the trigger finger and try communicating with an editor before laying down the ban hammer first. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 03:34, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Generally speaking, in my view, a NOTHERE indef block is admissible (although not necessary) if none of the user's edits indicate an ability or intent to improve our articles. This seems to be the case here. It's then up to the user to convince us, in an unblock request, that they are indeed able and willing to edit constructively. Sandstein 08:27, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

A quick show of hands: y'all do realize that the "reason" you fill in at Special:Block isn't just for the entry in the block log, but is shown to the user every time they try to edit, yes? Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:22, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

• The thing here for me is that the Teahouse and the Help Desk are exactly where we want users to go when they are lost or confused as to the purpose of Wikipedia. I don't think anyone is defending this users actual edits, but he hadn't posted anything in many hours and the situation seemed to have settled itself when Mike just indef blocked out of nowhere. Mike, like myself, has contributed for many years at WP:UAA Personally, I don't even think most of the thousands of accounts I've blocked at UAA were here in bad faith, they, like this person, just didn't get it and tried to use Wikipedia in ways it isn't intended to be used. So, they use an WP:ORGNAME and write upa draft article on said organization, and the usual response is that we delete the draft and soft block the user, explicitly allowing them to just start a new account and try to edit within the rules. Looking at some of Mike's blocks, he treats "being lost and confused on help forums" the same way most admins treat "actively disrupting article space." I just don't think being clueless in WP space is what NOTHERE hard indef blocks are for, it is for people who come here to push the content to suit their own needs, not for people who ask deeply misguided questions. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 18:31, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

  I'd add that if you look at the language at WP:NOTHERE there's a lot of wording like "long-term history...Extreme lack of interest in working constructively...Major conflicts of attitude, concerning Wikipedia-related activity..." and so on. It doesn't say anything aboout "asks clueless questions at help forums, because help forums are there, at least in part, to help clueless users get some clue. Just Step Sideways ^{from this world ..... today} 20:57, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

  I get that in general, but this particular account was going well beyond that. I count 4 separate instances of being told, in various ways, that Wikipedia is not a forum for handling personal bank squabbles that date back to something from 1950s British probate court (!); to respond to said warnings with this tells me that, in a very literal sense, this user was not here to build an encyclopedia. I'm American and even I could point out that a solicitor, not an online community devoted to building an encyclopedia, would be who to ask these questions. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 06:35, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

• I've brought this back from the archive because this is still relevant. EggRoll97 ^(talk) 03:33, 23 June 2024 (UTC)
  • Should've let it stay archived. I get the sense of injustice, but I don't see anything useful this user can contribute to the encyclopedia. And that's the benchmark - the project is what's important. I'm not going to undo the block, myself, and I'm not sure any other admin would, either. This isn't an endorsement of the block, I probably wouldn't have made it myself, but I can't see how unblocking makes the project better.--v/r - TP 14:44, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

  I think we all agree here that although Orangemike is too quick to block users, all of the blocks in question except Wilburthewigga were sound. It is evident that all of the users except Mrpoopbenji and Wilburthewigga were WP:NOTHERE, and Mrpoopbenji was a good block because they misused a large language model.

  As for Wilburthewigga, they were unambiguously asking for help because they were new to the project, and the deletions of the userpage and user talk were clearly wrong, but they should have been soft-blocked for an offensive username (the word wigga). –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 20:19, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

  The closest analog I could think of is a racist username [partial redaction] from 2012, who received the soft usernameblock notice because despite the offensive username, none of their edits were obviously unconstructive (though they were preemptively reverted by The Mark of the Beast (talk · contribs)). –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 20:28, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

  Or you could have just held that thought in your head and not reposted racist hate speech here. That would be fine, too. Indignant Flamingo (talk) 03:11, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

  WP:NOTCENSORED, you might not like it but Wikipedia is not censored and sometimes we have to discuss unpleasant speech in order to effectively maintain the project. Adam Black ^{talk • contribs} 11:19, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

  This sort of abstract defense is incredibly stupid: if you think the inclusion here can be defended on its own merits (I am skeptical but it seems like a minor point) then do so, otherwise why are you wasting the time of everyone who reads your comment? 100.36.106.199 (talk) 16:04, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

  When we have to put up with people making unpleasant, unhelpful comments like yours (incredibly stupid and wasting the time of everyone who reads your comment specifically were unnecessary) in all corners of the encyclopedia, I think it's perfectly acceptable to use a blocked username as an example of how an editor thinks blocks of problematic usernames could or should be done. Adam Black ^{talk • contribs} 16:11, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

  Yes, the example is a fine example; and anyone who thought about it for 2 seconds would come up with ways that use it effectively as an example without needing to include the actual offensive username here. What is unpleasant and unhelpful is dropping of WP:NOTCENSORED without any evidence of having thought about how it applies to the situation under consideration. (Both the policy and the guideline WP:Offensive material recommended by it are thoughtful and are very clear about the context-dependent nature of their application.) 100.36.106.199 (talk) 21:10, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

• @Orangemike:, you say you'll "take the trout like a mensch" if the community disagrees, so while I don't think there's agreement among commenters on all 5 of the blocks discussed here, there does seem to be an agreement that your blocks, in general, are a little too quick. So if you could dial it back, like, 10-15%, I think some of us will be satisfied, and others will at least be happier. In this particular case, I think the block was good if we're confident this is a troll of some kind, and too aggressive if we think it really is a semi-confused person. It seems too quick to just assume the former. Do you mind if I unblock, as a gesture more than anything else (there's a 90% chance it's too late anyway), and as a way to shut down this zombie thread? I'll keep an eye on their talk page and edits. It would make me feel better. --Floquenbeam (talk) 12:49, 24 June 2024 (UTC)
  • User:Jamiesonandy was totally astray, like an angry ratespayer demanding a VAT refund from a Beefeater at the Tower; but I certainly wouldn't object to an unblock, especially if you attempt to get clear to the guy that he's not just in the wrong pew or the wrong queue, but in the wrong universe. --Orange Mike | Talk 20:20, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

    Great, thanks, I've done so. We'll see what happens. By commenting and then unblocking here, I probably shouldn't close this thread myself, but IMHO it's ripe for closure. Floquenbeam (talk) 21:12, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

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

Help creating a redirect

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

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Hello, I hit a title blacklist trying to create Muñoa’s Pampas cat as "REDIRECT [[Pampas cat#Taxonomy]] {{R to section}}". I can't figure out why it is blacklisted, there is nothing in the deletion log. If there is no significant issue, perhaps the redirect could be created, or the blacklist could be removed to allow for a WP:REDLINK page creation prompt? (Seems a viable topic.) Best, CMD (talk) 04:54, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

It's because because the title has ’ instead of '. The contents of MediaWiki:Titleblacklist-custom-curly-quote should have been shown to you, explaining this, when you tried to create it; did it not? —Cryptic 05:14, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

It does not. Here is the text I see when I click that red link:

Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. Please search for Muñoa’s Pampas cat in Wikipedia to check for alternative titles or spellings.
This page is on the title blacklist, so only administrators, template editors, and page movers can create it.
Search for "Muñoa’s Pampas cat" in existing articles.
Look for pages within Wikipedia that link to this title.
Other reasons this message may be displayed:
If a page was recently created here, it may not be visible yet because of a delay in updating the database; wait a few minutes or try the purge function.
Titles on Wikipedia are case sensitive except for the first character; please check alternative capitalizations and consider adding a redirect here to the correct title.
If the page has been deleted, check the deletion log, and see Why was the page I created deleted?

I was also getting the same message with Muñoa's Pampas cat, but I refreshed that a couple of times and managed to get it to work. CMD (talk) 05:24, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Are you perchance editing on mobile? It works properly for me while logged out (at Draft:Muñoa’s Pampas cat, because as an IP I can't create in mainspace anyway) on desktop, but mobile view seems to throw away the blacklist custom message. —Cryptic 05:52, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Afraid not, windows 11. Checking both the original redlink and that draft redlink in an incognito window on Chrome, as well as unlogged-in instances of Firefox and Edge yield the same text I'm afraid. CMD (talk) 06:05, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I click on that red link and get this message in pink:

• "Warning: This page can only be created and/or edited by administrators, template editors, and page movers because it matches an entry on the local or global title blacklist:

.*’.* <errmsg=titleblacklist-custom-curly-quote> # right single quotation mark with custom error message"

So, does that mean that an admin or page mover can create this page? As an admin, I've never been allowed to override a blacklisted title or weblink (which can happen when fixing old archive talk pages) so I was suprised to see this message implying that we could. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 18:34, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:User access levels#tboverride says that the right to override the title blacklist is granted to admins and bureaucrats and additionally to template editors, page movers and interface editors. Looking at your last edit filter log, you do indeed have that right. Per this old AN comment you get that warning because you have the override right.

Perhaps one of you user scripts changes the default behaviour? – 2804:F1...35:42BC (talk) 20:44, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

I've opened this at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Not getting the curly apostrophe message at page creation as it is apparently more technical than administrative. Thanks all, CMD (talk) 11:29, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

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

SilverLocust appointed trainee clerk

The arbitration clerks are pleased to welcome SilverLocust (talk · contribs) to the clerk team as a trainee!

The arbitration clerk team is often in need of new members, and any editor who would like to join the clerk team is welcome to apply by email to clerks-llists.wikimedia.org.

For the Arbitration Committee, Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 18:13, 28 June 2024 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard § SilverLocust appointed trainee clerk

Birdienest81

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

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I don't know if this is the good place to notice this and if I'm allowed to do it, but I just want to notice something. I was involved in an edit war with Birdienest81 about keeping and removing WP:red links. The red links were at the 96th Academy Awards page untill Birdienest81 reomved them from 07:30, 26 June 2024. We received a justified warning by Cinemaniac86 on 21:33, 26 June 2024 and an ongoing discussion started at Talk:96th Academy Awards. The warning included 1) Edit warring is disruptive regardless of how many reverts you have made; 2) Do not edit war even if you believe you are right. However after the warning, and taking part in the discussion the user continued removing the red links here for example and within his edit also here. While it seems like an experienced editor, I think it doesn't allow the user to own the control of the page. 46.44.158.42 (talk) 11:32, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

This is a content dispute that is being discussed on the article Talk page. Nor has Birdienest81 violated WP:3RR.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:12, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

The user ingnores the warning at the users talk page and continued with the edit war. Apart from that I think the user violated the WP:3RR.

26 June (7:30) - The user reverted for the first time a previous edit where the red links were added, as part of this edit

26 June (17:03) User reverted the edit

26 June (17:04) User reverted the edit

(The user was warned on 26 June (21:33) including “Do not edit war even if you believe you are right…. …If you engage in an edit war, you may be blocked from editing.”)

26 June (23:12) user reverted the edit

26 June 23:16 - user reverted the edit. 46.44.158.42 (talk) 09:18, 28 June 2024 (UTC)

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

Unexplained decline of CSD on several TimedText pages

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

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I nominated several TimedText pages for speedy deletion per G8 because they were associated with deleted files, but all but one were declined by the same user without any explanation. The admin who declined, Liz (talk · contribs · logs), didn't respond when I asked on their talk page.

• TimedText:Heaven circa 2016.ogg.en.srt
• TimedText:Pe-al nostru steag e scris Unire.ogg.ro.srt
• TimedText:Pambansang Martsa ng PDP–Laban.ogg.tl.srt
• TimedText:My Favourite Mistake (Sheryl Crow song - sample).ogg.en.srt
• TimedText:Avicii - Wake Me Up.ogg.en.srt
• TimedText:Avicii - Wake Me Up.ogg.vi.srt
• TimedText:Test.mp3.en.srt (also per G2)
• TimedText:Cass Elliot - Dream a Little Dream of Me.ogg.en.srt
• TimedText:Pambansang Martsa ng PDP-Laban.ogg.tl.srt

They also declined an attempted CSD on TimedText:File:Title_(Meghan_Trainor_song_-_sample).ogg.en.srt per R3 and G6, after I moved that TimedText page to the correct location. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 00:45, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

These aren't the typical pages we see tagged for CSD G8 which are orphaned talk pages. I haven't encountered many "Timed Text" pages except for some vandals who create Timed Text talk pages which are deleted as CSD G8. I'm sorry that I haven't been prompt in responding to User talk page messages lately but for the past two months I've been taking care of a relative on hospice care who died over the weekend and honestly, sometimes the last thing I want to do when I come to Wikipedia is respond to talk page complaints. That's my failing, I'll admit, I need to improve. I'm sorry that you felt the need to come to a noticeboard about this, if I had responded in a timely manner, I probably would have suggested that you retag them and I'd let another admin who is more familiar with Timed Text pages deal with them. They are not a namespace we encounter much patrolling CSD categories so I probably should have just left them for someone else to deal with instead of untagging them. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 06:36, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Deleted all of them. Take care of yourself, Liz. Floquenbeam (talk) 12:28, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

All the best, Liz. Sorry to hear that. El_C 09:15, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

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

Remove pv-magazine from spam-blacklist

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

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This source has been blacklisted since 2011 MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist/archives/June 2024#pv-magazine.com. Several requests have been made to allow it but no action has been taken. Could an admin please review the request? Thanks! {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 18:18, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

It seems you restored the request from the archive... back into the archive - I don't think that's what you meant to do. – 2804:F1...35:42BC (talk) 21:07, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Let's try this... one... more... time... can someone please fix this? MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#pv-magazine.com {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 15:46, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

It was added by Hu12 on 31 March 2011 as a result of this complaint. The reasoning was that editors -- possibly socks or someone with COI -- were adding cites. That is, it wasn't about whether the publication was spam, it was whether spammers publicized it in Wikipedia. I've seen (and made) fruitless complaints about similar situations to the blacklist/whitelist folks and believe the proper solution would be to allow only confirmed users to add such cites, though I don't know if that's technically possible. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 16:48, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

It was a long way back. So I think it is safe at this point to remove it and if the problem resumes the spam list is just one click away. The site is a legitimate and reliable source. I guess at the time someone from pv-magazine thought they had a "great idea to grow the site quickly" {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 18:30, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Also: why was the source/website blacklisted and not simply the individual spammers blocked? I think the wrong tool was used here to fix this (old) issue and we are now stuck with it 20 years later. Time to fix this especially since multiple editors have raised this issue several times already. {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 11:53, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

When sock account after sock account is registered to evade attention while spamming links, the right thing to do is to address the root of the problem (the spamming) rather than playing whack-a-mole with socks. PV Magazine's staff shows up from time to time to complain about the blacklisting, so it is reasonable to assume that they are paying attention and would resume linking if they could. MrOllie (talk) 12:59, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

Should probably continue this at MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#pv-magazine.com. –Novem Linguae (talk) 16:13, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

Agree, thanks. Several editors have raised this issue on that page multiple times (definitely unaffiliated with PV magazine) so if @MrOllie could provide links in that discussion it would be helpful. Thanks! {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 18:12, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

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

Continuous disruption

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

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User:Malik256 spamming everywhere "Kashmir" with an edit summary "Added links". Nxcrypto Message 03:01, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

They’ve also created categories with spelling errors, such as Category:Kashmiri Philosphers 173.22.12.194 (talk) 03:32, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

This seems to be an exuberant and misdirected new editor. Have you tried explaining WP:REDNOT (with respect to adding categories that don't exist) to them? Chetsford (talk) 03:46, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

I left them a note [63]. Hopefully that helps remedy any misunderstanding on their part. Chetsford (talk) 04:06, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

Seems to be remedied. Simple typos are an easy fix. Buffs (talk) 21:08, 29 June 2024 (UTC)

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

Spam blocking warning templates

I've just discovered that {{Spamblock}} and {{Uw-spamblock}} are redirects to different templates: the first to {{Uw-soablock}}, for an indefinite block of a spam-only account, and the second to {{Uw-sblock}}, for a temporary block. I'd like to file an RFD, asking that they both be targeted to the same place, but I don't want to mess up everyone who uses one or the other, and as a substitution of a redirect, I can't figure out how to track usage of the redirects. Can anyone help me know if both are used significantly, or if one is used more widely than the other? Nyttend (talk) 11:07, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

There is no mechanism for tracking substitution, but {{spamblock}} is linked to from Wikipedia:Administrators' guide/Blocking, which suggests to me that it may be widely used. Retargeting {{uw-spamblock}} might result in confusion, since, as you point out, it is short for {{uw-sblock}}. Jake Wartenberg (talk) 18:15, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

Someone at WT:UW might be familiar with this sort of issue, since it should apply to non-administrator user warnings as well. jlwoodwa (talk) 03:12, 28 June 2024 (UTC)

 Courtesy link: Wikipedia talk:Template index/User talk namespace § Spamblock redirects jlwoodwa (talk) 23:04, 29 June 2024 (UTC)

Correction on list

My daughter's age is listed wrong on the following list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miss_Teen_USA_2024 (says 19) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miss_New_Jersey_Teen_USA (on this one it's just listed as TBA) Julia Livolsi Miss New Jersey Teen USA 2024 It should be 18, not 19. Her birthday is February 21, 2006. Thank you. Glnrcker (talk) 12:24, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

There needs to be a reliable source that states her birthday. If it doesn't exist then her birthday and age shouldn't be included in the article. Nemov (talk) 12:54, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Fwiw, at the time of your comment, the source in the article was a profile of last year's Miss Teen New Jersey, who is a different person. I have removed that source and added a CN tag, but the article needs further attention from editors who are familiar with the subject matter. I've been trying not to be my usual ornery self, but it's not great that this report sat here for 16 hours before anyone actually looked into it. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 05:05, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

@Glnrcker: What that means is that you need to provide a citation from a reliable published source which mentions her date of birth. Read WP:RS for the Wikipedia definition of what kind of sources are considered reliable. Once a reliable source confirms the information, the articles can be corrected. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:08, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

I have no idea what constitutes an RS in this space, but through a few quick searches I found 2 instances reporting 19[64][65] and haven't found one saying otherwise (or any with a specific birthday). CMD (talk) 05:24, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

• Her birthday is February 21, 2006, according to her birth announcement in the Glen Rock Gazette, April 7, 2006 Page A7, and apparently she is from Glen Rock. Including her birth announcement, there were five mentions/photos of her in that newspaper. Isaidnoway (talk) 18:08, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

new page

i want to create new page for minecolonies but it say you cant Denizprof (talk) 05:48, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi Denizprof. Brand new users are limited in their ability to directly create articles. But you can work on a WP:DRAFT and submit it for review. Please see the template I left on your talk page. If you have any additional questions, I suggest dropping a note at the WP:HELPDESK. It's extremely late where I live, and I am about to go to bed. But you you can also drop me a line on my talk page. Just be aware I may not get to it right away. Happy editing. -Ad Orientem (talk) 05:57, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

Hey @Denizprof, you'll want to check out Wikipedia's general notability guideline and guideline for video game notability and make sure Minecolonies warrants an article before putting effort into creating one. ꧁Zanahary꧂ 01:09, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

A minecraft mod is unlikely to meet our notability guidelines, sorry. Secretlondon (talk) 18:29, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Problems on a family article's tp

There is a discussion with an IP on the talk page of the page Du Quesnoy which would need some clarifications by an administrator, as I'm personnaly not sure I'm fully aware of how to interpret certain rules on the english wikipedia, although it seems clear to me that there are several problems on that talk page.
Mostly, it's suggested that I'm libeling living people.
Kontributor 2K (talk) 01:14, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Undo a move on a page with a title blacklist

I moved Taumatawhakatangi­hangakoauauotamatea­turipukakapikimaunga­horonukupokaiwhen­uakitanatahu to Taumata Hill to be more concise. I didn't believe a reasonable person would oppose the shortening of such a lengthy title to a common name, but it is clear from the talk page (which I should looked at first) that this is controversial.

I cannot move it on my own due to a title blacklist, apologies. Traumnovelle (talk) 06:55, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

I tried but failed thanks to weirdness involving long names. Thanks Gadfium for the help. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 07:06, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Well now I think I screwed it up. I had reverted my own move because of the soft hyphens in the title, so now it's at Taumata Hill again. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 07:10, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Requesting removal of perm

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Hi, can my pending changes reviewer permission be removed? I requested it with the intention that I was going to use it, but I hardly ever did and is essentially useless for me at this point. Thank you! ‍Relativity ⚡️ 11:08, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

 Done by Jo-Jo Eumerus —Ingenuity (t • c) 13:50, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

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

why isnt this page move closed? it was opned a month ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Allegations_of_genocide_in_the_2023_Israeli_attack_on_Gaza Gsgdd (talk) 08:12, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

I suspect that the reason it hasn't been closed is that very few uninvolved editors have the time, ability and inclination to read and understand what people have said in that discussion. Phil Bridger (talk) 08:27, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Yah - its too big. I think we need another page move with only the top titles from that discussion and ask people only to vote for one of them. what do you think? Gsgdd (talk) 08:36, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Anyway we need to close it asap Gsgdd (talk) 08:37, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

looks like these are the titles suggested

1. Allegations of genocide in the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip

2. Genocide accusations in the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip

3. Gaza genocide question

4. Gaza genocide

5. Gaza genocide accusations

6. Accusations of genocide in Gaza by Israel

7. Accusations of genocide in Gaza

8. Gaza genocide accusation

9. Allegations of 2023–2024 genocide in Gaza

10. Allegations of genocide in Gaza (2023–2024)

11. Allegations of Israeli genocide in Gaza

12. Allegations of genocide perpetrated by Israel in the Israel–Hamas war

13. Allegations of genocide in Gaza in the Israel–Hamas war

14. Accusations of genocide by Israel in Gaza

15. Accusations of genocide by Israel against Palestinians

16. Allegations of genocide by Israel against Palestinians Gsgdd (talk) 08:45, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

I'll take a look. It will take some time to read and close. – Joe (talk) 08:57, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

thanks for closing it Gsgdd (talk) 22:54, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Subject

The page Casablanca derby is every time vandalized by one person who deletes the table information absolutely need protection Ji Soôo97 (talk) 15:37, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Have you tried requesting it here? (non-administrator comment) ABG (Talk/Report any mistakes here) 00:29, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

You're both edit warring, and now it's locked. Please use the Talk page to establish consensus. Star Mississippi 01:56, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

edit on Gaza genocide

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A user with 225 edit is making edits on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaza_genocide How is this possible. since its extended protection. User in question is User:Kinsio Gsgdd (talk) 02:18, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Please notify users on their talk page when you discuss them at this noticeboard. Kinsio (talk · contribs) is a declared (and permitted) alternate account of Gawaxay (talk · contribs), so they were manually granted extended-confirmed status. DanCherek (talk) 02:29, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

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

Suspected sockpuppet?

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

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I’ve just come across a user, User:Coop443535454, whom I suspect is a sockpuppet. I don’t know if what I suspect is true, however I am saying this could be true because of two very similar sounding users, User:Coop40493 & User:Coop2017. The edit patterns of these users appear to be very similar. Dipper Dalmatian (talk) 04:28, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

This is what WP:SPI is for. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 14:00, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Drmies, I know it's a long time ago, but the Coops belong to you. Beside the Coops, is there a master?--Bbb23 (talk) 15:04, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

No, I didn't see anything, but I don't doubt it's them. No point in writing up at SPI. Drmies (talk) 15:11, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

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

Sockpuppet page moves

I just blocked Leithiani as a sock of LTA Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/SheryOfficial. They performed a bunch of page moves prior to the block, if anyone is looking for a 4th of July /election day project.-- Ponyo^{bons mots} 17:33, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

There's also Normanhunter2, a confirmed sock who participated in a bunch of AfDs; their votes should be struck.-- Ponyo^{bons mots} 22:33, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Resigning rollbacker/PCR

Won't have a use for them anymore. See ya later, space cowboys. DarmaniLink (talk) 01:37, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

 Done I've removed those two permissions from your account as requested. DanCherek (talk) 01:39, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. DarmaniLink (talk) 01:40, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Archiving AN

It seems like AN is archiving awfully fast so I looked at this page and found instructions for two different bots to archive this noticeboard. One states that discussions are archived after three days but they are obviously being archived sooner than that and they are not being archived manually. Could someone who is knowledgeable about archiving make sure that the instructions are clear and not confusing and only one bot is archiving this page? Thank you. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 08:04, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

One of the instructions is commented out; I changed the other to seven days. BilledMammal (talk) 08:09, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, BilledMammal. I appreciate you checking on this. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 07:15, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Admin Misconduct

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I am a new user so apologies if this is not the correct way to go about it, but it is an issue that undoubtedly needs attention and with the structure of Wikipedia on mobile it has taken me forever to at least find somewhere suitable enough for this.

Prior to creating an account, I had received a year long IP block by Graham87. This has since been lifted, I do not know how, who did it, or whether how up-in-arms I was about it helped bring that along. But it has given me the ability to do something about it and I will take that ability.

I have been very active on the Queensland Fire Department Wikipedia article recently, undoubtedly providing the most information and putting in the most work to ensure that the article reflected the recent rebranding and complete overhaul/transition from Queensland Fire and Emergency Services to QFD.

Recently, however, I was IP banned by Graham87 for alleged “vandalism”. However I can happily provide sources for my information, they are just information I have found presented in a format that cannot be cited (such as ArcGIS maps). Following this, an unknown IP editor came in and completely destroyed a lot of my hard work, making the article extremely difficult to read and removing the neutrality. They even chucked promotional content in it. This user has not been warned or blocked at all, but I was blocked by a guy half way across the country who has numerous complaints online (search ‘graham87 block’ or ‘graham87 ban’ on google and you will find that half of the USA would be able to back me up at the very least).

I feel that action needs to be taken against this user as he fails to follow the etiquette and guidelines of the website he is an administrator for and silences people editing in good faith while letting people while letting the true “miscreants” as he calls them slip by undetected. It’s not something anyone should stand for and is against the very thing Wikipedia seeks to provide and protect. VollyFiremedic (talk) 08:20, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

We can't look into the details without knowing what the IP is (but you aren't obligated to say, and please be aware that doing so may expose personal information such as your location). However, in general, it is very possible that the IP block you experienced was not targeted at you. IP ranges are usually shared between different people who have the same internet service provider, mobile provider, institution, etc. When we have persistent and long-term vandals (and I know Graham87 deals with a lot of these), we sometimes have to block the entire range knowing that there will be 'collateral damage' to others who share that range with the vandal, but haven't done anything wrong themselves. It's unfortunate but necessary. The way around it is to create an account of your own, as you have done – and not take it personally. – Joe (talk) 08:30, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Unfortunately, if you add material to an article without sourcing it - as you appear to have been doing - it is likely to be removed again. Editors are regularly blocked for persisting to add unsourced text. If your sources are "in a format that cannot be cited", then you need to find alternative sources. Black Kite (talk) 08:38, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Indeed. Yeah I've never edited that article and you may well have been affected by one of my rangeblocks. Graham87 (talk) 09:22, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

This is probably 2001:8003:EC74:DD00::/64, who made this edit. Graham87 (talk) 09:51, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Correct that is the IP (and another one as well which for some reason was given to me when I added over 1000 additional words). An IP block itself would not have been as worrying to me if it was not then followed by another guy completely messing up the article and adding a whole bunch of stuff that sounds like an advertisement and also removing a lot of my work which resulted in the article not making any sense at some points. I would love for someone to review that as well while we are here if possible.

As for the citing, I am still very new to Wikipedia and the format leaves a lot to be desired for me so citing does not make sense. I was hopeful that other editors could come along and take part in some teamwork to get citations for what I wrote but perhaps I should not have been so helpful. Regardless, I do not see how lack of citations constitutes vandalism. I’m getting a lot of my information from QFD resources and brigade training and adding it in. I understand the need to cite, but my priority remains giving people access to information on topics I am passionate about. And I feel a warning prior to a year long IP ban would have been much more warranted and stand by what I have said previously. VollyFiremedic (talk) 11:36, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

We try to warn users before blocking them but sometimes it's just not practical, especially for wide rangeblocks that affect hundreds or thousands of innocent users as collateral damage, as this one probably is. I can't find any evidence that the IP you're using has ever been blocked. As for citing, it should be a very high priority, given how often Wikipedia content is copied; it can turn up in rather unexpected places. Please see Help:Referencing for beginners. Graham87 (talk) 12:13, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

WP:TUTORIAL may be of help to you. If you want to make WP edits that can "stick", learning how to add refs correctly is essential, I can't stress this enough. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:29, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

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

More admin misconduct

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

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Please see Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2024 July 5: it seems User:OwenX thinks that I am not an administrator "in good standing", and says that my status compares to that of someone with a compromised account. I don't know, maybe the racist and sexist trolls have found dates and jobs, and my talk page can be unprotected. Still, if OwenX had looked they could have seen that there was plenty of interaction between me and that editor in other places. But who knows, maybe OwenX can start a procedure to get me desysopped, and we'll see how that goes. Drmies (talk) 14:56, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

The title is appropriate. Failure to communicate is indeed admin misconduct per WP:ADMINACCT. By XC-protecting his Talk page, Drmies knowingly and willingly shuts down the primary means of communicating with him for an entire class of editors. This isn't an isolated out-of-process deletion or something we can wash over with IAR and get back to our daily business. It is a effectively a declaration that any editor with fewer than 500 edits under their belt doesn't deserve to have a voice. DRV is an editorial venue, not a disciplinary one, but the kind of dismissive tone expressed by him above is one I'm sure ARBCOM would have something to say about. Owen× ☎ 15:08, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

There are ways to communicate that don't involve going on a user's talk page. You have no right to the time, attention, or talk page space of anyone else, even an admin. Yes, failure to communicate can be an issue, but if you refer to WP:ADMINACCT you'll see that "protecting a talk page" is not among the examples of infractions. That said, Happy Friday to one and all. Dumuzid (talk) 15:14, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

And your use of such an argument at deletion review is inappropriate; the protection level of an admin's talkpage has nothing at all to do with deletion review. However, I gather you're fortunate enough to have never seen the threats and harassment aimed at Drmies and his family from LTAs. If you have a complaint about it, take it up with the arbitration committee, not as a specious argument in a tangential forum. Acroterion (talk) 15:15, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

OwenX, you are so wrong on so many different levels. It is because of Drmies commitment to the project as an admin that their talk page is EC protected. Calling for Drmies admin actions to be vacated and positing that they should be desysoped by ARBCOM for protecting their own talk page from persistent trolling and death threats against themselves and their family, that they receive as a result of the volunteer work they do here for you and other editors, is beyond the pale.-- Ponyo^{bons mots} 15:44, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Acroterion, over the years, I have received many threats and much harassment on my Talk page and my User page, including a recent death threat against me and my family. I reported the recent death threat on AN/I, and it was handled by an uninvolved admin. I don't remember if it was revdel'd or oversighted, you may be able to still see it. It never even crossed my mind to block access to my Talk page. I did eventually, many years ago, semi-protect my User page after 160+ vandalism edits, but that doesn't prevent anyone from contacting me, and it's still open to non-XC registered accounts. Our deletion review policy highlights communication with the deleting admin as a key requirement. A deletion by an admin who prevents communication with him is very much relevant to a DRV appeal. If the only way an admin can deal with harassment is to shut down commincation, then he should hang up the mop until the situation allows him to reopen the main communication channel. Drmies has my sympathy for all the harassment and threats, but that does not exempt him from accountability for his actions. Owen× ☎ 15:53, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Talk page protection is not equivalent to 'preventing communication.' This is nothing more than a petulant complaint that you cannot not everyone can communicate in the way you they desire. With all due respect, grow up. Dumuzid (talk) 15:59, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

OwenX is an admin and extended confirmed. Acroterion (talk) 16:02, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps you need to review both WP:ADMINACCT and WP:DRV then. I too have received threats, but nothing approaching the volume, virulence and specificity that Drmies has: do you think that should be grounds for desysopping? DRV is not a forum for arguing about technicalities or complaints about other editors in order to gain the upper hand. Take it up with Arbcom if you have a policy-based argument. Acroterion (talk) 16:01, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

I think Drmies should step away from any activity that requires him to be available for contact by non-XC editors until such time as he is ready to reopen his Talk page to all. That includes blocking, deleting, protecting, and most admin functions, with the possible exception of checkuser. Deleting from behind a protected Talk page is an abuse of admin rights, and grounds for automatic vacating when contested in good faith at DRV. Owen× ☎ 16:16, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

This is so asinine, I'm beginning to wonder if your account is compromised. Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 16:18, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I don't agree with your proposal at all as I don't think Drmies has done anything wrong. I'm honestly more concerned you're calling for that AfD to be vacated for this than about anything Drmies has done. SportingFlyer T·C 16:19, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Are you seriously suggesting that an admin should refrain from acting as as an admin on the project while their talk page is protected due to abuse? Do you have any idea how easy that would be to game from a trolling standpoint? It's a ludicrous suggestion. And your comment "Deleting from behind a protected Talk page is an abuse of admin rights" is equally absurd. I can't take anything you say from this point forward seriously.-- Ponyo^{bons mots} 16:28, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

One can argue that you, an admin of many years' standing, should have a better understanding of policy before making such accusations. Acroterion (talk) 16:21, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

I take your views, Acroterion, very seriously. I'm not one of those who dismisses accusations with a, "Haha good luck trying to get me desysopped". Yet I still don't see how we can simply waive a policy requirement of accountability simply because an admin found no better way to handle harassment than to shut down the main communication channel to anyone with fewer than 500 edits. We used to deny promotion at RfA to candidates who didn't enable email contact. Remember those days? If the situation doesn't allow you to fulfil your admin duties in an accountable way, hang up the mop until you can do the job as required by policy. There is no other way to ensure accountability. Owen× ☎ 16:33, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Reading the trail on Rocky's page, Drmies has email enabled and that's how he contacted him. Drmies was accountable and accessible, just not in one specific channel so not sure your analogy fits there, @OwenX (and I don't think email is required at RfA anymore, although I may be wrong) Star Mississippi 16:50, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, Star Mississippi, for addressing the actual issue at hand. Having reviewed Rockycape's exchange with Drmies following Rockycape's email to Drmies, I struck out my comment at the DRV. Drmies, please accept my apologies for the inappropriate comment. I still wish you would reduce the protection level on your Talk page to just semi, and handle harassers who have a registered account by banning, which would benefit the rest of us too. Owen× ☎ 17:22, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

We already do that. How many prolific abusive sockpuppeteers do you thing we see every day? There are some who've been harassing individual edits, posting threats, and wasting everybody's time, for decades, with hundreds of accounts. Admins who take action against them become targets. Acroterion (talk) 18:37, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

You are simultaneously complaining about a perceived IAR and then making up a new policy that an admin who has been abused to a sufficient degree can be driven away, rather than dealing with it in a manner that doesn't conflict with policy. The net result is that trolls can target people and win, according to your interpretation. "There is no other way to ensure accountability" is hyperbolic." And I agree that no action is required, except to ask that you remember to confine your comments at DRV to matters pertaining to the request, not to your perception of the justification for the closer's level of talkpage protection. Acroterion (talk) 16:54, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) OwenX, I think you are wrong here. Mandating that all admins allow anyone to post sexist and racist attacks and death threats, and worse, on their talk pages is a non-starter. I know that's not explicitly your goal, but it is the natural consequence if admins must always leave their talk pages unprotected. Good-faith users can easily contact Drmies, such as by leaving a ping on their own talk page. Or by reaching out to a third party. Or, heck, taking it to one of the admin noticeboards. You say, "If the only way an admin can deal with harassment is to shut down commincation, then he should hang up the mop until the situation allows him to reopen the main communication channel." I'm not sure you are aware of the seriousness of some of our LTAs. I get multiple daily death threats, as do several other admins, and I consider myself lucky that I'm currently not targeted for far worse abuse, as I know Drmies has been. I think it's entirely reasonable to protect user talk pages to deal with such attacks. Disclaimer: my talk page is currently restricted to autoconfirmed and confirmed editors, protection applied by me. It was previously protected by Ponyo in a similar manner. I will note this helps but most certainly doesn't prevent the daily death threats I receive. I strongly believe your approach would, very quickly, result in many admins handing in their mop while LTAs would celebrate their substantial win. I think the balance is wrong. --Yamla (talk) 16:56, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Agree. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:01, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

I think that admins should receive the same protections afforded to all users. The rules do not and should not allow that admins have to take any abuse from troll accounts. I would expect that the community would want all editors respected and protected from threat and harassment. --ARoseWolf 17:06, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

• This is entirely overblown and absolutely no action needed. I've worked with and highly respect both Drmies and OwenX so I don't think I'm Involved in that sense. This is all because an SPA had their personal project deleted and has spent a week bludgeoning and badgering rather than looking for sources. (Disclosure, endorsed the close at DRV but did not !vote in the AfD). Rocky had two means of communicating with Drmies, which they made use of and Drmies responded, which is all that's required of an Admin. Drmies has always been more than responsive, and self protection is not a reason for de-sysop (self or ArbComm). We are not required to be at the beck and call of users or abuse of trolls.Star Mississippi 16:48, 5 July 2024 (UTC)
• If I'm reading this correctly, Drmies' Talk has been protected since October 2022. That makes it even more unlikely that this is an admin conduct/contact ability issue or it would have been raised sooner. Star Mississippi 17:02, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

  If it's been a year and a half, the protection should be lifted, as maybe the disruption won't continue. All editors, admins or not, should be equally eligible to have their user talk pages protected, eg with a request at RFPP. If anything, an admin's request for UTP protection should be held to a higher standard than non-admins because of adminacct (and because protecting an admin's page can cause problems like what happened at DRV where a non-XC editor was erroneously called out for not discussing with the admin first, which they couldn't do because of protection). Admins shouldn't protect their own pages because they're involved; another admin should review the request. In this case, if it's been a year and a half, the protection should be lifted and Drmies should make an RFPP request for re-protection if/when necessary. Levivich (talk) 17:15, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

  where a non-XC editor was erroneously called out for not discussing with the admin first that was me, and I apologised for it when I got online this morning. The discussion happened via email and on the requestor's Talk, which was just fine. Let's not conflate the two. Star Mississippi 17:18, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

  I also made the same mistake when replying to the editor's enquiry on my talk page, for what it's worth. Daniel (talk) 17:28, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

  If it was proven that Drmies was difficult to contact and unresponsive to editors concerns I would be the first to side with this position. But there are other avenues available to communicate with them and those avenues were used. Drmies was responsive to editors concerns and a discussion was had so I don't see a conduct issue. --ARoseWolf 17:23, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

• From a purely 'policy' perspective and without any context, I tend to agree with Levivich above. But I am also cognisant that Drmies is one of the most targetted administrators we have for abuse, for all the hard work they do with LTAs etc. Ultimately we are all people, human beings, and it is impossible to ignore the human element of this issue — which is that Drmies needs this protection to reduce the impact of their editing on themselves and their family. I think that requires sympathy and understanding, and insofar as I noted my agreement with Levivich as a general statement, I feel like it may be appropriate to ignore this view in this situation. Daniel (talk) 17:48, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

  If Drmies had requested protection at RFPP, it's likely it would have been granted, so we end up at the same place anyway. Conversely, anyone who thinks it shouldn't be protected can request reduction of protection at RFPP as with any other page. Levivich (talk) 17:54, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

  WP:INVOLVED does not apply when dealing with vandalism. ⇌ Jake Wartenberg 18:21, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

  Involvement is construed broadly by the community to include current or past conflicts with an editor and I think having your user talk page vandalized or receiving death threats counts as "conflicts with an editor." (I know some admins strongly disagree with this interpretation because they think it would allow editors to "conflict out" admins by picking fights with them.) Levivich (talk) 18:32, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Editors and admins who confront people who make graphic threats of violence against them, their families, and others are in no way "involved," as the policy makes amply clear. Acroterion (talk) 18:37, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

The policy also says that an administrator who has interacted with an editor or topic area purely in an administrative role [...] is not involved. Interpretation of "conflicts" as it is used here to encompass efforts to prevent long-term abuse of the platform strains credulity. ⇌ Jake Wartenberg 18:52, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

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

Administrators' newsletter – July 2024

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2024).

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Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:59, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

Advice needed re request to unprotect a draft

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

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Article Hera Pheri 3 has a long history of deletions, un-deletions and moves. I added protection to it on April 28, 2017. Not all editors/admins involved are still active. SafariScribe has requested on my talk page to un-protect Draft:Hera Pheri 3 created Feb 21, 2023. Guidance on this would be helpful. Thank you. — Maile (talk) 15:20, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Is there any reason they cant create in their sandbox and move it subject it to review there? Amortias (T)(C) 15:43, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Scratch that, just realised you mean to unprotect the article not the draft page. Its been submitted for review by AFC, if its approved then an admin could unprotect at that point if it has now managed to reach a suitable style/substance of article. Amortias (T)(C) 15:45, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. That was the guidance I was looking for. SafariScribe it looks like you will have to wait until that review process has been completed. — Maile (talk) 15:56, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

@Maile66, @Amortias, thank you for your words. However, I don't believe this situation will escalate to the notice board. The draft after reviewing it as part of AFC work meets WP:NFILM, and the principal photography has already started–WP:NFF. I was about to accept the draft when a pop-up message indicated that the target page is admin-protected, hence my request for unprotection of the target page so that the draft can be moved. I think there may have been a misunderstanding of my intentions. Safari Scribe^{Edits! Talk!} 19:36, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

I think things got muddled here. @SafariScribe is a longtime editor and AfC reviewer in good standing looking to complete that review that was asked for. I do not have the on wiki time today to process the AfC move but I've dropped protection to E/C so Safari or any other AfC reviewer can accept and move the article. If folks feel as if it's still not notable (haven't reviewed, taking no position), a new AfD to reflect current consensus would be more helpful than a 7 year old one. Star Mississippi 17:07, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you @Star Mississippi for the clear understanding. I have move the article as meeting WP:NF or any required policy. I doubt it won't survive AFD if it is taken there. Safari Scribe^{Edits! Talk!} 07:22, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

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

Self-requested block of my old account

I would like to request a block on my old account M14325 (talk · contribs), which I no longer have access to. The account has already been blocked in de- and metawiki and now I would like to request a block here as well. Regards, Wüstenspringmaus _talk 07:31, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Wüstenspringmaus, rather than do it piecemeal, you should probably request a global lock at meta:Steward_requests/Global#Requests_for_global_(un)lock_and_(un)hiding. Primefac (talk) 12:31, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

By the way, Primefac, they appear to have requested a lock at Meta here, though it was declined and they were re-directed to local admins. EggRoll97 ^(talk) 15:29, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Good to know, I did wonder if they might disallow self-locking. I don't really see much point in blocking an account that has zero edits and was created two years ago, but... meh.  Done. Primefac (talk) 15:51, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Vanished user returned

If a user vanishes and then returns, should pages about that user, eg RfC's that the vanished user deleted, be undeleted, or signatures that they altered after vanishing be restored? DuncanHill (talk) 09:02, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

So per WP:VANISH, If the user returns, the "vanishing" will likely be fully reversed, the old and new accounts will be linked, and any outstanding sanctions or restrictions will be resumed. Though as neither deleting pages (except for user pages) or altering signatures is part of the vanishing process in the first place, they shouldn't have happened and therefore shouldn't need to be reversed. – Joe (talk) 09:12, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Among the deleted pages are Arbcom candidate statements, an MfD, their own contributions on other users' talk pages, and their own talk page. They also renamed an RfC, altered their own sigs on various pages. Then they returned and now edit under the same name, but I can't see any linking of the old account (which has a generic vanished name) and its edits and logs to the new one. This was all done some years ago, but the editor is active now. DuncanHill (talk) 09:25, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

That sounds pretty exceptional, though the policy does allow for exceptions. Maybe you should email ArbCom about it? – Joe (talk) 09:54, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Sounds more like scorched earth than vanishing, but if you do have specific concerns about this issue and do not want to divulge here (which I totally understand) I agree that contacting an Arb (or even an Oversighter) is probably the best bet. I also agree, in general, that deleted pages should not be restored purely because they have returned; it's not like the U1 becomes invalid. Primefac (talk) 16:18, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Most of them wouldn't qualify for U1 in the first place. DuncanHill (talk) 17:12, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Removal of perms

Can an admin please remove the perms associated with this account? I tried to come back, but have decided to scramble my passwords and leave this account for good. All the best, Schminnte ^{[talk to me]} 18:43, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

I've removed you extra permissions. Let me know if you change your mind. Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia. PhilKnight (talk) 18:47, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

@PhilKnight you missed autoreviewer I think. The Night Watch (talk) 18:56, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Now done. PhilKnight (talk) 19:00, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Looking to fix a defaced wiki page.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Itzler I am a live streamer and is being harrased by multiple trolls, im looking to get this page reverted back to a previous state, and lock the page from further edits. I am the owner of this wiki.

you can see there is trolls by checking the name of the image they provided, and a brief reading Gasnobrakes10 (talk) 18:23, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

While there are grounds for protection on BLP grounds which I plan to enact and potential blocks, please read WP:OWN. You have no specific role when the content is compliant with guidelines here. Star Mississippi 18:42, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

I have reverted to a version on June 22, right before the recent wave of disruptive editing began. Cullen328 (talk) 18:51, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

and I think I got all of the offending content. If I missed any, @Cullen328 or any admin please feel free to continue. I'm about to hop offline. Star Mississippi 18:56, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

ETA, I have just semi'ed it. Found BLP violations going back to 2017. Have to hop offline but if someone else has time and can eyeball, that would be helpful. Star Mississippi 19:04, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

personal attack, spreading rumors

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

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User:Michalis1994 accuses me without any proof that I am the same person as a blocked user on Greek Wikipedia. These kinds of accusations, on matters unrelated to editing, besides insulting my person, spread insidious rumors that may cause other users to view me with suspicion.

Extra careful, because you got blocked - who knows what could happen next? Removing cited content is not a great idea, Στρουμπούκη. and You're obviously trolling. Your account has been blocked completely from Greek Wikipedia for abusing multiple accounts, whilst your name is... Dora? Yikes D.S. Lioness (talk) 18:42, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Talk:Voice_of_Reason_-_Afroditi_Latinopoulou&diff=prev&oldid=1233180463 — Preceding unsigned comment added by D.S. Lioness (talk • contribs) 18:48, 7 July 2024 (UTC)^<diff>

Once again, this is exasperating. D.S. Lioness has been blocked on Greek Wikipedia for being identified as the person behind the indefinitely banned account ΔώραΣτρουμπούκη. According to Meta, this individual has created over 50 sockpuppets in the past two years [66] [67] [68]. D.S. stands for Dora Stroumpouki, and she even refers to herself as Dora on her talk page. Despite being previously blocked, she has returned with no sign of self-reflection or a willingness to change her behaviour and adopt a more diplomatic approach. What is it that you hope to accomplish here?? Michalis1994 (talk) 18:48, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

what does this have to do with my contribution to english wikipedia? D.S. Lioness (talk) 18:50, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Just stop removing cited content. Also, your previous behavioural patterns have been moved to the English Wiki, which is not really a great idea. You have been warned. Michalis1994 (talk) 18:52, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

What are you talking about? what are you doing here? how can you talk like that to another user? D.S. Lioness (talk) 18:54, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

I am not the same person! D.S. Lioness (talk) 18:55, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm going to stop here. You are the same person and that's why you got blocked on Greek WP. Michalis1994 (talk) 18:59, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/D.S. Lioness/Archive— Preceding unsigned comment added by D.S. Lioness (talk • contribs) 19:02, 7 July 2024 (UTC)^<diff>

I would suggest not continuing this discussion. Michalis1994 can file a WP:SPI if they want. It isn't an actionable personal attack. PhilKnight (talk) 19:02, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

spreading rumors about a user's previous activity it is a serious personal attack and hurts my credibility. D.S. Lioness (talk) 19:05, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Let's be clear here. You clearly are the same person as is blocked on el.wikipedia, because your global contributions are here for anyone to see. So saying "I'm not the same person" is a lie, and doesn't do you any credit. However your misdeeds, whatever they were, on that Wikipedia do not affect your existence here, as long as the same edit practices do not re-occur. If they do, you can - and probably will - be blocked here as well. Black Kite (talk) 19:13, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

• My question is how the original poster thought it would be a good idea to open yet another noticeboard thread, when Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#No_cooperation,_no_good_faith (also started by them about the same editor) is still open? This is now the third thread started by the original poster about the same editor in a couple of weeks, if you included this miguided attempt that was eventually merged with the existing thread. I suspected there were some significant competence issues last week based on the ANI, and I am not being dissuaded in my view by subsequent developments. Daniel (talk) 19:15, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

  There is also an AN3 report too, which I just found. Daniel (talk) 19:20, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

It is clearly a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Michalis1994 stalking case here. 90 out of 100 edits from Michalis are related with my contributions. I wait for check user results to clear the case, but the offensives are in daily basis. I don't know what to do..D.S. Lioness (talk) 19:32, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

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

Conflict of interest VRT consultations, July 2024

The Arbitration Committee has received applications for conflict of interest VRT queue access and has reviewed them in consultation with the functionaries team. The Community is invited to evaluate the candidacies and comment here until the end of 17 July 2024 (UTC).

On behalf of the Committee, Sdrqaz (talk) 00:01, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard § Conflict of interest VRT consultations, July 2024

https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hant/蔡瑞月

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

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Hi Administrators,

Someone upload a wrong portrait of Madam Tsai Jui-yueh on the Traditional Chinese Wikipedia page. https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hant/蔡瑞月

Someone uploaded using the reference below, Madam was tagged in that News article photo album, but photo is someone else in a group photo https://ahonline.drnh.gov.tw/index.php?act=Display/image/4359360wg9foOB#d6C

The same news article and album you can see Madam Tsai Jui-yueh is in this photo https://ahonline.drnh.gov.tw/index.php?act=Display/image/4359360wg9foOB#0Osa

Can someone please check the reference and correct this page.

該封禁的查封ID是#560409。--Tjyfoundation（留言） 2024年7月8日 (一) 11:27 (UTC) Tjyfoundation (talk) 12:05, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

zh.wikipedia.org is a different project. There's nothing that en.wikipedia.org can do for you, you need to raise your concern on that project. --Yamla (talk) 12:07, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

How to raise my concern on that project? Tjyfoundation (talk) 12:24, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

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

Multiple reverts

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

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A user has reverted my edits two times each in First Dutch Military Aggression and Second Dutch Military Aggression. Can someone please prevent him from reverting it. I'm trying to avoid violating WP:3RR. Desertasad (talk) 01:25, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

I've blocked the OP for 72 hours for their homophobic comments they posted at NFSreloaded's Talk page, whom they failed to notify of this complaint. Any administrator is free to block Desertasad for longer.--Bbb23 (talk) 01:42, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

I can tell you that if I were an admin, I'd indef. Saying that the legalisation of LGBTQIA+ is a bad thing is extremely disruptive. I've seen users indeffed for less. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 01:47, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

I agree and have made it an indef. – Joe (talk) 10:29, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Appreciate the tag. In response to this complaint: the manual reverts in question are here and there on Operation Product, and here and there on Operation Kraai. On the former article OP duplicated information already present in the lead section, on the latter article they moved the informal non-English terms for the military operation up to the first sentence. I considered both contributions redundant and undid them, ultimately resulting in the exchange on my talk page. That said, I don't feel I was pushing any kind of nationalist narrative in this situation or elsewhere. --NFSreloaded (talk) 02:24, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

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

Withdrawing deletion nomination

I have withdrawn the deletion nomination of a page, see this, an administrator must talk. Hamwal (talk) 10:49, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Given that two people have weighed in on the discussion with something other than a keep !vote, the nomination is no longer eligible for withdrawal. --Blablubbs (talk) 11:22, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Well you can add a keep vote with reason and state that you are withdrawing your delete nomination. But that will not trigger close in this case. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:29, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

Opinion sought

A small edit war occurred at LGB Alliance leading directly from the closure of The Telegraph reliability RFC. While no intervention is, at present, required, as parties appear to have stopped warring, two editors are under the impression that it is other editors who were edit warring, not them. There has been discussion of this, with diffs, at Talk:LGB Alliance#Dubious source and at User talk:Amanda A. Brant#Talk:LGB Alliance#Dubious source. As you can see from these pages, both I, BilledMammal and WhatamIdoing have offered our opinions and all of us have been rebuffed. Both Amanda and BilledMammal have thrown WP:EDITWAR at each other during the article talk page discussion. I'm including BilledMammal as among the participants of the edit war, as their edit was warring back to "status quo". Furthermore that "status quo" includes text sourced to The Telegraph, and therefore aligned with BilledMammal's position being very upset about the Telegraph RFC closure, and they had not previously edited this article or talk page.

I would appreciate an admin/admins who will be respected as neutral by all participants (i.e. not those whose position wrt trans/GCF topics is well known and can therefore be rebuffed as biased by one party) to briefly describe what occurred in terms of our Edit warring policy. No editor even remotely reached 3RR. This is simply about what edit warring is, what constitutes participation in that war, not whether their edit warring needed sanctions or whether the content or absence of content was correct. I'm hoping for enlightenment and better future behaviour as a result, rather than anyone to get into trouble. -- Colin°^Talk 13:43, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Whatever the result of the review above that's a misinterpretation of WP:MREL. Marginal or disputed reliability is not the same as WP:Generally unreliable.

This was edit warring, reverting reverts of other reverts, even multipole editors only each reverting once could still constitute edit warring. After WP:3RR editors may very well get blocked, but that's not a reasont to get right up to that point.

As with most issue more discussion on the talk page, and less in edit summaries, would likely solve the problem. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:45, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Small correction; I didn't say that Amanda was edit warring - while if they had reverted again I think they would have crossed the line, as it was I don't think that was one of the issues with their conduct there. BilledMammal (talk) 19:53, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

You're comment "I’m just here because people are misusing RSP. I’m not interested in joining the discussion beyond objecting to that." might as well have read "I'm only here to join the edit war". CNC (talk) 20:04, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

I disagreed with the specified reason for removal - you can't remove a source on the grounds of unreliability if you're not actually claiming that its reporting is incorrect. Editors later raised other reasons for removal, and I wasn't interested in getting more involved in the discussion.

This isn't an unreasonable position, per WP:SATISFY and WP:VOLUNTARY. Editors are allowed to address one issue without becoming permanently involved in a dispute. BilledMammal (talk) 20:10, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Your argument has helped to confirm my suggestion as now you are trying to justify your reason for edit warring, rather than any acknowledgement that is was the wrong action: you made no attempt to avoid edit warring and your revert wasn't necessary. On 9 July, you joined the edit war with Amanda A. Brant, reverting at 15:18 [69], making your first comment on the topic 5 minutes later.[70] This is a clear case of "revert first, ask questions later". Then at 16:50 after stating "I’m just here because people are misusing RSP. I’m not interested in joining the discussion beyond objecting to that.[71], failed to revert your edit. I say "failed" because once you no longer claimed to have an issue with the removed content based on the argument presented by YFNS, you let your revert stand. It seems you've ignored the concerns Colin has raised in this topic. CNC (talk) 11:43, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

Where's the problem? Someone removed an unreliable source from a page. Fairly reasonable thing to do. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 19:58, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

WP:MREL is not WP:GUNREL, I'm shocked you haven't understood this yet. Likewise regarding edit warring and WP:BRD. It's unfortunately got to the point where an admin needs to explain to you the basics. CNC (talk) 20:02, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Fair enough, MREL is not GUNREL. But if a source isn't appropriate (as in here), it shouldn't be used. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 20:14, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Even if the source isn't appropriate, editors shouldn't be edit warring over whether it should be used (in that place, in that way). The dispute involves the repeated removal and restoration of this sentence:

• "The organisation has said that lesbians are facing "extinction" because of the "disproportionate" focus on transgender identities in schools."

along with one out of the seven uses of this source in the LGB Alliance article:

• Tominey, Camilla (25 December 2020). "Lesbians facing 'extinction' as transgenderism becomes pervasive, campaigners warn". The Daily Telegraph. London. Retrieved 4 January 2021.

The first sentence of the source says:

• "Lesbian are facing “extinction” because of the “disproportionate” focus on transgenderism in schools, a controversial campaign group for gay rights has claimed."

which could perhaps be faulted on grounds of Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing, but I think it is inarguable that the cited source WP:Directly supports the statement which it was being cited for.

I think this ought to proceed as an ordinary content dispute over whether the organization in question actually did espouse this POV, and (if so) whether that fact is DUE for the lead or should only be placed lower in the article. I don't think this should be considered a dispute solely about whether a source that is still used six other times in the article is inappropriate for citing a seventh time.

Also, I don't think that we should be thinking about this in terms of "sides". An editor who seems to oppose everything this organization stands for has removed damaging information about that org from the lead. Their PR team is probably very happy with her right now. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:42, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

This is not just about the fact that The Daily Telegraph is no longer considered "generally reliable" on transgender issues and gender-critical views, and was listed as yellow on Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources. There is a nuanced discussion of whether it is appropriate in the specific context (which I addressed) and whether it is WP:DUE in the first paragraph (whether the source is good enough in the specific context is part of that discussion). As I explain on Talk:LGB Alliance, I have reverted exactly once, and only after offering a detailed rationale on the talk page that the other party did not respond to, after being given an opportunity to do so. That is not edit-warring. That is normal editing. Pretty much all the other participants in the discussion routinely do the same thing. I don't think the most recent edit by User:Barnards.tar.gz that basically reinstated my edit with some tweaks is edit-warring either. There now seems to be general agreement to remove the material in question. The only really unacceptable behavior in relation to this minor incident was the abuse of templates and personal attacks by one editor. --Amanda A. Brant (talk) 20:37, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Depending on where one chooses to start counting, you have reverted either once or twice. The question here isn't really "Did User:_____, personally and individually, do anything that should be punished?" The question is more like "Do we have one of those situations in which editors [note the plural] keep flipping back and forth between the same two versions of the article?"

If you click through the relevant diffs ([12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18]), then I'd say we have an edit war, even if no single individual has broken any bright-line rules. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:46, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

- Just to say that I did ask for neutral admin (or experienced user) to comment as a third opinion, not for existing participants to continue to argue whether they did or did not edit war, or for folk to offer their opinions about which warring edit was the right one. I think such a wise authoritative voice would still be very welcome, as editors are continuing to argue they were not edit warring because they were Right and everyone else was Wrong, on the article talk page. -- Colin°^Talk 21:46, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

It does look like an edit war, at least the early stages of one. Unofficially, I'd encourage all parties to stop reverting and discuss on the talk page. That's exactly what happened, so I don't think it needs to go any further at this point. The rest seems like a content dispute which isn't really suitable for WP:AN. The Wordsmith^{Talk to me} 21:55, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

• I would be more concerned about the reliability of anything written by Camilla Tominey (stick "Camilla Tominey trans" into Google and have a look at that - don't bother looking at the hagiography that is Camilla Tominey) rather than the fact she happened to write it in the Telegraph. And as far as I can see, regardless of its source, it certainly isn't WP:DUE in a lead paragraph. As a second point, articles such as LGB Alliance are covered by WP:GENSEX so I'd suggest that editors who are pushing their POV consistently across multiple noticeboards and articles have a think about where pushing too hard ad nauseam might lead. Black Kite (talk) 07:23, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

  Can we please not have comments on the content/sources. Go to the article talk page if you want to do that. The concern here is some editors are unaware (or unwilling to accept) what constitutes edit warring. The actual topic is irrelevant. -- Colin°^Talk 11:41, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

  No, the issue here is the material, that was dubious from the start (dubious in the sense that its use in the first paragraph unduly promoted a biased narrative), and that has in fact been removed from the article by various editors. This harping on a supposed "edit war" after a couple of editors "reverted" exactly once each – in my case with a detailed justification and rationale that the other party had been given an opportunity to respond to, and in Barnards.tar.gz's case to attempt some sort of compromise, that now seems to be widely accepted by everyone – is not productive use of our time. --Amanda A. Brant (talk) 16:03, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

  I appreciate the uninvolved parties offering opinions, so I don't want to rehash all this and I won't add any more than this, but as "the other party" I would like to offer context as I saw it.

  • The page in question is exceptionally hard to attain consensus on for any changes, due to the divisive nature of the subject
  • The content we're talking about has been in the lede unchanged for (I believe) couple of years
  • The change you wanted, you justified based on an updated note on The Telegraph on Perennial Sources that was barely 2 hours old at this point, after a lengthy and polarising RFC we were both involved in, on opposite sides
  • You used this very recent change not only to argue in talk for this removal, wrongly claiming that the Telegraph was WP:GUNREL and should not be used, but also elsewhere on that talk that it should not be usable WRT other disputed neutral wording in the lede
  • Your rationale, aside from being a misreading of the note, cast aspersions about essentially the entire UK media
  • When I pointed out you were overstating things, you replied with what was a restatement of the same claim. At this point, my impression was we were at loggerheads, so wait and see if someone else weighs in. I don't see the point in repeating myself ad nauseum.
  • When you then reverted my revert, it was 2:30am my time. I'm sorry but I don't keep tabs on this 24/7, nor do I see the desperate urgency to remove ancient content such that it cannot be discussed by more editors first.
  • When your change was reverted to restore the status quo ante, I was personally glad of an uninvolved intervention and considered it a call to actually discuss the change per BRD, which I felt your revert had not been in the spirit of. However, with the issue subsequently being raised here as an edit war, I now see things like WP:DONTREVERT say Wikipedia does not have a bias toward the status quo so I guess my understanding of norms about this sort of thing are not correct. Every day is a school day, and I'll certainly bear this in mind in future.
  • FWIW, I have since chucked my 2p in on talk after the fact and endorsed the actual change as subsequently performed by Barnards, for the rationale that emerged on talk which I agree with, but I do understand the concerns about the process.

  At this point I think, despite how it was arrived at, there is actual unanimity about the content, which on that page is a cause for either celebration or to check its not April 1st. Void if removed (talk) 21:50, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

98.115.164.53's Numerous Minor Edits

98.115.164.53 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)

This editor has made numerous minor edits to articles. Most of them seem innocuous, but others, particularly the ones that remove terms like "to date," seem problematic for contextual POV. There seem to be hundreds of account-less edits, despite the suggestion to create an account already being made, but what do I know.

This user made a personal attack [72] after I reverted their edit on a page I had watchlisted. And then they put their edit back [73].

So far, they seem to have stopped editing for now, after being warned. I've gone through some edits to see what edits can go or stay, but they're just too numerous. Anyone have thoughts on what to do next?⸺RandomStaplers 19:57, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

You could ignore the user and move on. If the edit is truly problematic, you could revert it anyway, and/or you could ask an administrator to protect the page. 98.115.164.53 (talk) 20:08, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

What of the middle line in the report, the one where they say that they did revert one of your edits and you personally attacked them back and restored your edit?

Also, are you saying that the way to stop you from making problematic edits is to protect the pages you're being problematic in? Are you unwilling to change or discuss your behaviour?

– 2804:F14:8081:3201:9827:3072:74BC:2770 (talk) 20:22, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

• 98.115.164.53, what account or accounts have you used here and are any of those accounts currently blocked? --Yamla (talk) 20:26, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

  @Yamla I've opened a checkuser request. [74] ⸺RandomStaplers 20:29, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

  98.115.164.53 is CU-blocked by Ponyo. --Yamla (talk) 20:39, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

  @Yamla IP 2804:F14:8081:3201:9827:3072:74BC:2770 has responded to the CU request.⸺RandomStaplers 20:40, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

• @Yamla I'm looking through the edit filter log... this person was tripping rate warnings left and right. It's amazing this person wasn't caught sooner.⸺RandomStaplers 21:12, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Arbitration motion regarding Durova

The Arbitration Committee has resolved by motion that:

Principle 2 of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Durova, Private correspondence, is changed from
2) In the absence of permission from the author (including of any included prior correspondence) or their lapse into public domain, the contents of private correspondence, including e-mails, should not be posted on-wiki. See Wikipedia:Copyrights.
to
2) In the absence of permission from the author (including of any included prior correspondence), the contents of private correspondence, including e-mails, should not be posted on-wiki.

For the Arbitration Committee, SilverLocust 💬 23:23, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Poggies. jp×g🗯️ 06:38, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard § Arbitration motion regarding Durova

Some Help with Bot-Like Editing

I ran into OpalYosutebito with this edit. They were trying to address a citation error by removing |agency= from {{Cite journal}}, but also removed all other |agency= parameters from the other citation templates (which are valid parameters in those templates). I reverted and left a message, but then looked at the user's edits and saw what appears to be an abuse of AWB with bot-like editing. Over a recent 40 minute period, they completed 499 edits making AWB changes to unsupported parameters (about 12 edits a minute). However, looking at these edits, they are either making mistakes (like the one I noted above or this one) or are removing valid reference material from the citation template that should be fixed, not outright deleted. As an example this edit, the template should be changed to {{Cite news}}, which would correct the issue while retaining the correct parameter. There appears to be hundreds, if not thousands of recent edits that could be introducing issues like this. My gut says they all just need to be outright reverted. I removed the user's AWB privileges for now and was close to blocking for running an unapproved bot, but just don't have the time to dive into this anymore today. Can another admin take a look and review my actions so far, and take additional ad warranted? Thank you! « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 15:25, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Checking OpalYosutebito's contribs, they appear to have begun self-reverting, which is certainly called for. Unsupported parameters in citation templates almost always contain valid bibliographic information, and are usually the result of bot action, template updates, or translations from a sister project. Just removing them rather than attempting to incorporate the information properly into the citations is incredibly destructive.

I'll keep looking, if I can remember, since an AWB run this ill-conceived and deleterious may require a mass rollback while the edits are still fresh. Folly Mox (talk) 23:29, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) I'm about halfway done with fixing the mistakes I made. They're my errors, my responsibility - OpalYosutebito (talk) 22:29, 13 July 2024 (UTC)