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Excirial
   
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Edit-warring on The Amazing Kornyfone Record Label reported

Just alerting you to this 3RR report, since you had to deal with the editor a few days ago... MikeWazowski (talk) 20:33, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

User:DimitrisLoveIvi

related ANI posts - related unblock requests

Please fetch back my page :( Its very important i have very important information for my contest please :'( I'm crying so much :(( DimitrisLoveIvi (talk)

Seems that this has already been dealt with trough WP:ANI. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 07:42, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Public Wiki.

Wikipedia is a public wiki. I added my name to Daniel Da Silva and you remove it, what gives you the right to say whether someone's name can be on here or not? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.26.10.140 (talk) 21:40, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

If you would cast a glance at the page history you will notice that i never edited the page in question, and that i never reverted your edits, and that your edit was instead reverted by user:ClueBot NG. As for the edit being reverted - Wikipedia is not a public Wiki. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia that has sets of rules that dictate what can be, and what cannot be on a page. The person you added is a redlink, and based on the comment that was added after the name i doubt he would pass the notability requirement which would allow for a separate article.
Besides this, i notice that all edits from your IP today are vandalism. I equally notice that the comment you made here seems to refer to the block i issued on November the 23th. If i combine these two observations with your current editing session i assume that you are on a static IP, and that you are not here to edit constructively, and as of such i reblocked your IP for another two weeks. Once the block is over you are welcome to return, but i urge you to make constructive contributions, rather then the two steaks of vandalism we have seen now. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 22:33, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Wilson Arse

Hi Exciral, I noticed that you have deleted my recent contribution. I understand that it has caused some concern among the wikipedia community, but i would like to verify its truthfulness. I understand you need to be stringent when checking for vandalism. Unfortunately due to the relatively small area in which this term is in use i could not find any official citations for the article. Incidentally, would it help if we changed the name of the article to "Wilson Bottom"?

Many Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alialhakim (talk • contribs) 21:50, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Hello Alialhakim,
In order to be on Wikipedia an article needs to be notable, and this notability must be verifiable trough reliable sources. If a subject is not covered by reliable sources and no such sources exist, it cannot be created on Wikipedia. As you describe the topic, it seems to be a very local-scale neologism, which are generally taken never included.
Kind regards, Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 22:01, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Philips NLT

That's not even the person it claims to be, it's one of the "clients" who's been going around for a bit...--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:19, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Yep, the client (86.181.7.88) who apparently contacted a lawyer 15 minutes after his first comment, and managed to get him into action within that timespan as well. My edit should therefor be taken with a grain of salt. :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:27, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Why the nonstandard title?

Is there a particular reason you went with Daniel Ortiz (Paintball Player) rather than the more standard, per the MOS, Daniel Ortiz (paintball player)? —C.Fred (talk) 15:46, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

No specific reason. The two pages needed to be merged to keep their page history consistent, but i just followed the order in which they were tagged without considering the MOS. Can just be changed, if you wish. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 15:54, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Proposal to shut down WP Geographic Coordinates & ban coordinates on wikipedia articles

This means you. --Tagishsimon (talk) 12:03, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

You've got mail!

Hello, Excirial. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.

SarahStierch (talk) 20:45, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Barnstar

The Original Barnstar
This barnstar is awarded to everyone who - whatever their opinion - contributed to the discussion about Wikipedia and SOPA. Thank you for being a part of the discussion. Presented by the Wikimedia Foundation.

MSU Interview

Dear Excirial,


My name is Jonathan Obar user:Jaobar, I'm a professor in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences at Michigan State University and a Teaching Fellow with the Wikimedia Foundation's Education Program. This semester I've been running a little experiment at MSU, a class where we teach students about becoming Wikipedia administrators. Not a lot is known about your community, and our students (who are fascinated by wiki-culture by the way!) want to learn how you do what you do, and why you do it. A while back I proposed this idea (the class) to the community HERE, were it was met mainly with positive feedback. Anyhow, I'd like my students to speak with a few administrators to get a sense of admin experiences, training, motivations, likes, dislikes, etc. We were wondering if you'd be interested in speaking with one of our students.


So a few things about the interviews:

  • Interviews will last between 15 and 30 minutes.
  • Interviews can be conducted over skype (preferred), IRC or email. (You choose the form of communication based upon your comfort level, time, etc.)
  • All interviews will be completely anonymous, meaning that you (real name and/or pseudonym) will never be identified in any of our materials, unless you give the interviewer permission to do so.
  • All interviews will be completely voluntary. You are under no obligation to say yes to an interview, and can say no and stop or leave the interview at any time.
  • The entire interview process is being overseen by MSU's institutional review board (ethics review). This means that all questions have been approved by the university and all students have been trained how to conduct interviews ethically and properly.


Bottom line is that we really need your help, and would really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you. If interested, please send me an email at obar@msu.edu (to maintain anonymity) and I will add your name to my offline contact list. If you feel comfortable doing so, you can post your name HERE instead.

If you have questions or concerns at any time, feel free to email me at obar@msu.edu. I will be more than happy to speak with you.

Thanks in advance for your help. We have a lot to learn from you.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Obar --Jaobar (talk) 18:25, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

WikiProject Article Rescue Squadron Newsletter

Article Rescue Squadron Newsletter

Volume I, Issue III
February 2012

To contribute to the next newsletter, please visit the Newsletter draft page.
ARS Members automatically receive this newsletter. To opt out, please remove your name from the recipients list.


It is just short of three months since...

Hello Excirial,

It is just short of three months since we last had contact. How are you? Well, I hope.

You kindly said that I should ask if I needed your help. I promise not to be a pest, but in view of your considerable experience in coping with the vandals and the like, could you just tell me what happens next after my posting a report on the Administrators' noticeboard, regarding continuous vandalism and disruptive behaviour by a non-registered IP at an Open Proxy address. I don't understand the next stage of the process. Do I just wait... will I be contacted?

The poster never fills in an Edit summary and warnings posted on the IP Talk page never receive an acknowledgement. Kindest regards, Gareth Griffith-Jones (talk) 19:44, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

New Page Triage engagement strategy released

Hey guys!

I'm dropping you a note because you filled out the New Page Patrol survey, and indicated you'd be interested in being contacted about follow-up work. This is to notify you that we've finally released both the initial documentation about the project and also the engagement strategy, which sets out how we plan to work with the community on this. Please give both a read, and leave any comments or suggestions you have on the talkpage, on my talkpage, or in my inbox - okeyes@wikimedia.org.

It's awesome to finally get to start work on this! :). Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 02:52, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

WikiProject Immunology

I see you have edited some of the pages within the scope of immunology. Please have a look at the proposal for a WikiProject Immunology WP:WikiProject Council/Proposals/Immunology and give your opinion (support or oppose). Thank you for your attention. Kinkreet~♥moshi moshi♥~ 09:31, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

CAMP-of-the-WOODS

Hi Excirial,

I am new to creating and updating Wikipedia articles and I wanted to write an article on a non-profit organization by the name of CAMP-of-the-WOODS. For whatever reason, I cannot. For some reason it has been blocked or a previous article has been deleted. The link that I wanted to create is this: http://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=CAMP-of-the-WOODS&action=edit&redlink=1.

Would you be able to help me?

Brandonstone7 (talk) 16:00, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Seeing the time difference between today, this post and the last user edits, i am assuming that there is little reason to respond as it is likely not to be read. Please give me a nudge in case this assessment is incorrect and i will get back to you as soon as possible. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:20, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Tablighi Jamaat - Okie Dokie Lokie!

Hey there,

Shame our introductions are not in better circumstances but I wanted to thank you for your quick review of the request on Tablighi Jamaat.

I'll keep an eye out for any further vandalism by the IP and if any pops up I'll forward it on to WP:AIAV as advised.

Thanks again and have a good day and good luck with that backlog!

Regards, Terk Terkaal -- <Warning! Self-Confessed Newbie!> (talk) 08:29, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh! Almost forgot!
Is it alright to copy paste your response on to the section I put in the article's talk page on the request, so that other editors who may not know the policy fully (Such as how I was, until your response) can be aware that further blanking by the IP can be reported to WP:AIAV?
Sorry for being such a bother, still rather new at this whole Wikipedia thing ;P
Thanks again,
Terk
Terkaal -- <Warning! Self-Confessed Newbie!> (talk) 08:33, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
Hiyas there Terk,
Your more then welcome, and the report itself was quite valid actually (Only the technicality regarding the vandalism after final warning got in the way to be honest). I'm actually quite impressed that you managed to find the protection page after only about 100 edits (Much less place that you managed to place a correctly formatted request there), as it takes most editors much, much longer to find the "Inner Working" pages from Wikipedia at all (there are quite a few!)
Personally i wouldn't bother with copying the response, since most new editors hardly have a look at a talk page all together. In most cases some vandalism patrol using WP:HUGGLE or another tool will spot the edit anyway, and they can drop the user a note on the issue itself if needed. As for being a bother - your absolutely not. Hence, if you have questions, don't hesitate to ask them (Either on my talk page or at the Helpdesk - just note that i am a tad busy and might a be slow to respond at times). I vastly prefer spending time helping new editors who are in turn trying to help Wikipedia forward, over having to spend time using banhammer or similar means on editors who are just here to make a mess :). Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 08:44, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
Thinking that may have been the case, I just put a summary of the finidng into the talk page instead with a link leading to the specific section on the Request for Protection board for those who may wish to see it themselves.
Thanks for the compliment on finding those mechanics after x<100 edits but I can't accept it hehe, I'm one of those editors who's strengths lie in catching vandalism or trying to enter disputes as a neutral pov rather than the ideal role of a contributor, so those x amount of edits are mostly vandalism reversals or opinions on RfDs etc... rather than actual constructive content on wikipedia.
Vandalism client you say? Suddenly I feel like a caveman chipping into a mountain slowly by using the vanilla web interface haha xD
Either way, thanks again, I appreciate the personal feedback, adds a nice warm feeling to the community :P
Anyway, I best let you get back to work, I can see you're busy round here as it is without my dialogue adding to it hehe.
Au Revior Mon Capitain!,
Terk
Terkaal -- <Warning! Self-Confessed Newbie!> (talk) 08:54, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Thinking About It Now, There Is One Question

<it> Itches the back of my head nevously </it>

I promise this will be the last you hear from me before I end up becoming annoying, or perhaps even more so.

However, after just fixing up the editing on my talk page, I noticed you said If I had a question I could ask you here. Thinking about it, there is one thing.

This isn't so much an issue for myself anymore, I withdrew from the dispute by what I felt was just a case of trying to discuss something with a brick wall and if it was not for the scale on which this spread I wouldn't ask.

However, a while back I stumbled across what looked like a few editors, I believe to be the original creators or patrollers of the article and its related portal in question, the America's next top model portal, while doing a burst of recent changes observation.

It looked as if a group of editors were reversing any changes to a page from significant edits all they way down to the use of a word and formatting of a table (Such as was the dispute I saw that I jumped into).

In the interest of inegrity, I'll be honest with you. I could have engaged in that discussion with a greater set of values. I'm not saying I jumped in with expletives left right and centre, but after getting irritated with what felt like a conversation with a wall, my british sarcasm did rear it's head along with the fact I was still a newborn in terms of community participation.

In this case, I attempted to put in place a comprimise which offered information, while incorperating the original setup in place from the group of editors I referred to.

The response was a barrage of Wikipolicy links, deep analysis of and extrapolation of intent and a total revert of any edit, no matter how small to the the favoured idea of the cooperating editors.

This type of response was not just limited to myself and as a result it effectively locked out any other editor's attempt at contributing to the article or other articles in the portal. In the end, I can see why this isn't so bad, they were after all main contributors and participants in the portal in question, so this isn't really the point I was wanting to ask about.

What was however, is that during the affair, I did look over the talk pages of the users involved in the 'discussion', and noticed a bit of a trend.

It was when looking at the experience other editors were having with the user Mtking (edits) that I began to wonder if rather than a well intentioned editor may have been a case of a very articulate and intelligent malicious user. I understand that is probably not the case but after engaging in dialoge on the user's talk page it ended up being on my watchlist, it was through this that I ended up seeing the issues this editor does seem to be causing to the UFC Wikipedian community and their articles with what on the surface looks like, at best, a well intentioned but overly-beurocratic application of wikipolicy to the detriment of wikipedia's coverage on the category and at worst, a malicious attempt at using wikipolicy to significantly destablise the work of a portal maintained by an editor or editors which may have in some form provoked him.

It was of interest that with every deletion attempt I saw throughout the MMA portal, it was the same editor and what looks at first glance to be a group of friends which were coming down on it's articles in what at worst, looked like harrasment.

Once again, I see editors having the same experience I have, with every attempt at discussion being met with the same repeated response on notability, regardless of evidence provided or attempts at discussion being totally ignored. I even see editors finding this experience spreading into their talk pages into they too explicitly state they withdraw all interest, just to make it stop.

Of course, this is only my perception, likely being influenced by my own experience with the user and as such probably quite biased so this is in no way intended as a "Wahh wahh, that user did this" as I admit it may appear

Just, now that I have a chance to ask, I'm genuinely hoping you might be able to shed some light on what an editor should do when they find themselves involved in such a scenario?


For a history of the I had experience with the editor and associates to better explain the context of the query rather than my own interpretation, see links below with synopsis.

  • Sighs. Talk about tedious reasoning in the first link. We seem to have a source that there are 14 contestants, and we got a source that someone is voted out first. I think we can then safely assume that the last person out of a group of 14 has the 14th place.
What counts here, is the spirit behind the rule, and not the absolute letter. The OR policy was put it place to prevent people from drawing own conclusions based on the sources, rather then using the content of the source itself. If i were to say "She got last place, so she was the worst singer" it would be a clear opinion which is debatable. On the other hand the conclusion that someone last is a group of 14 has 14th place is simply a matter of fact, as you cannot argue that she got a different spot in the ranking. Ergo: "Last Place" and "Place 14" are, when both "first voted away" and "contestant count" are sourced, simply synonymous as far as i am concerned.
As for what to do i think three policies sound nice - WP:BRD, WP:DR and WP:BOLD come in mind. Shortly said - before anything else, try to talk with the editor in question and try to reach consensus. If you cannot, involve some other people trough the dispute process, and see what they think. And last, regardless of the ourcome, both editors should eventually drop the stick and walk away from the carcass since a discussion is dead when its dead. :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:13, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for the advice Excirial, the issue itself I long left behind, like you said, discussion is dead :P. However, now I know what to do the next time I encounter such a scenario. Thanks for the pointers :D
Terkaal -- <Warning! Self-Confessed Newbie!> (talk) 06:37, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Good to know you are back

Hello Excirial, Good to know you are back. Hope all is well with you. Kind regards, Gareth Griffith-Jones (talk) 15:39, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Good afternoon Mr. Gareth Griffith-Jones,
All is entirely fine, just another one of those enjoyable busy periods which leave very little time to do any wiki-work at all. They happen at times and cause me to edit very sporadically or even to disappear for some time. It is very pleasant to see that you are still around, and based on the contribution history i can see quite a bit of good work being done. Always a pleasure to see another editor who not only decides to edit for a while, but decides to stay around longer as well. :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:18, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
Good evening Excirial,
An enthusiastic, well-intentioned, young user has taken it upon himself to set in place the automatic archiving of my talk page. I know you have it here, run by a bot. He set it for 10 days (!) ... all without asking me, would you believe? (But he did inform me after the event.) Fortunately, I got to the formatting before bot, and altered it to 91 days. Then, in spite of advising him of this, he sneaked back to alter it again to ... "activate the bot" ... so now I have copy in an archive which I would prefer to be restored. Is there a way of doing this automatically? Best wishes, Gareth Griffith-Jones (talk) 18:03, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
Good afternoon Mr. Griffith-Jones
I must admit i had a good laugh over that Bold action by the other editor as it is clearly well intended but not the most convenient thing to do without some form notice. Thankfully our good friend Cluebot works just like a regular editor, so i reverted its edits which restored the sections it removed. Afterwards i deleted the User talk:Gareth Griffith-Jones/Archive 2012 page it created to store the content, to prevent any form of duplicates.
it might be wise to set up some (Manual or otherwise) form of archival though. Right now the talk page is 300Kb in size, which makes loading it slowed. If my own talk page remained in one piece it would result in a 2Mb download every time it is opened, which is of course rather heavy (Especially if an editor works trough a mobile device, or is in a part of the world without broadband access). Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:18, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
Good evening Excirial,
Thank you for seeing to that so promptly ... hadn't realised a simple "undo" would have served ... but then I would have missed the part about deleting the archive. My young friend was only being helpful, I know, and as he watches my talk page noticed your actions and immediately removed the archive set-up formatting. I hope he is not too offended, because he is a most obliging person, and has been keen to help in many ways.
Your comments on its size (and his, tonight) are duly noted, and will be acted on. I think a manual archiving method would be more to my requirements, but in the meantime I am ruthlessly "shredding" several sections and other content to reduce the number of bytes – was 323,009 when you looked at it, will soon have it well under 300,000.
  • Since we started conversing last November, I have followed your pattern of keeping the conversation all together. With a few exceptions, when we both stick to the user page that has the first posting and 'watch' each other – I find most users only post/reply on the other user's page. I have therefore adopted your preferred method, but by using the copy 'n' paste procedure.
  • My question is regarding the Sinc system that you employ: is it special software? or is it available when I click on [Tools→Sync now] up on the menu toolbar? I am afraid to try. -- Gareth Griffith-Jones (talk) 17:51, 19 April 2012 (UTC)
  • Good afternoon Griffith-Jones,
The copy and paste system is indeed the most convenient system (for me), since it keeps the flow of conversation quite visible and understandable, while also giving archiving a talk page an actual purpose (After all, what use is there to reading 10 answers posted a month ago without knowing what the question was?).
The "Sync" system i use is all manual work though. i tend to write the reply on my own talk page and then copy that entire section over to the other users talk page, replacing any old copyover (Provided that won't overwrite anything i don't have in my copy). The consistent use of "Sync" is mostly born out of laziness on my side (Similar to using the summary "> R" when i reply to a section). Before the text i wrote would be "Synchronizing section with other user user talk page", but over time that simply got shortened to "Sync", as it is much faster to write. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:25, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Getting others to monitor the Labor Ready article

Collapsed WP:PROT request

Semi-protection: For at least a year, please, or preferably indefinitely. Recurring unexplained removal of sourced criticism by IPs and by new users.

The most recent case:

Earlier cases:

Even earlier cases, from 2009 or earlier:

I've mentioned all major cases of criticism-removal dating back to August 2008, but not earlier. There are more that happened earlier.

I don't have time to monitor the article. Since the most recent criticism removal was left there for six months until I posted this protection request, you can see that nobody else was watching it either.

Pending-changes level 1 protection would have been a suitable alternative here. Oh well.

Thank you for your time.

Unforgettableid (talk) 04:27, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Declined – Pages are not protected preemptively. Last edit was several months ago, there is no reason to protect this entry. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 07:44, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
Fine. Thank you for considering the request. One question: Is there any way I can convince others to monitor the page, since I don't have time to monitor it myself? One favor: If you could please move this conversation to my talk instead of copying it, it would be much appreciated. I plan to move it back again if I reply, or to WP:RPP's "Declined" section otherwise. Cheers, Unforgettableid (talk) 16:45, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
Hiyas Unforgettableid,
Most editors on Wikipedia are already monitored trough tools such as WP:Huggle as well as some automated processes (Bots) that check edits for vandalism. The vast majority of the problematic edits are caught that way, yet some may or may not slip trough the net at times. There is no real way to counter this with 100% accuracy, though many people choose to WP:Watchlist an article (There is an RSS feed for the watchlist as well for easy checking) if they intend to check it once in a while.
Protection of a page is not the solution in this case. Suppose you stumbled on this article as a non-user and saw a flaw; in that case you couldn't correct it if it were semi-protected. Also, protections are kept to a minimum since Wikipedia is supposed to be open and editable, so long term protections such as a year are only handed out in very rare cases.
As for the discussion - i always keep a copy of it on my talk page for future reference, and i keep them in sync between talk pages if replies occur. So if you have a reply you can simply overwrite the discussion with the copy and the reply. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:27, 17 April 2012 (UTC) Note that i always keep a full copy on my own talk - the hatnote is mostly if people wish for me to use talkback templates or reply on my own talk only.
OK. Thank you for your reply, and for all the work you've done for Wikipedia. Unforgettableid (talk) 00:55, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Jerry Sandusky

Please check this page again, you shortened my protection, while telling the log you were extending it. Did you miss I set the expiry in April of 2013 by chance? Courcelles 05:02, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Nice catch, and entirely correct. I was already wondering why there was a 1-day semi protection as it seemed so incredibly short in this case - The 2013 kind of explains that though. I reset the protection back to its old 2013 expiry as well. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 06:45, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
Thanks, and no worries, I really didn't care how long the page was protected for, but just the incongruence in the lgo entry made me ask. Sadly, I doubt the candalism on this page will die down anytime soon... Courcelles 06:49, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Ambassador program - Mechanical Aptitude

Copyover from another talk page - posted in this revision

Hiyas there Smallman12q,

Yesterday i came across the article Mechanical Aptitude, which is currently being worked on as part of the Industrial Psychology course for which you are listed as one of the ambassadors. The article needed a histmerge (which is now fixed), but afterwards i noticed that the " Wiesen Test of Mechanical Aptitude" section is almost entirely a literal word-for-word copy of the source. I didn't have the time to do a complete check, but a few Google searches on the rest of the content makes me suspect it is mostly minor rewording from other sources.

I'm afraid i lack sufficient editing time lately, so if i were to action this with a comment to the users or similar i'd be very likely to miss the response for some time. Any chance you could have a look? Thanks in advance! Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 12:48, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I've notified the professor at User_talk:Mjtagler#Mechanical_aptitude_text. Good catch, and thanks for the heads up!Smallman12q (talk) 23:39, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
Thank you very much. I have notified the students about this issue via the talk page for the article. I trust they will address the problem promptly. Much appreciated. Mjtagler (talk) 00:12, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Blocking

If you arbitrarily block a multi-use IP adress again, then the full range of WP sanctions may be deployed against you. You should always try to resolve disputes using the Talk page first. 212.121.210.45 (talk) 15:00, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Please see recent contributions which involve similar accusatory comments.
Best Wishes Ankh.Morpork 15:19, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Thankfully, you are unable to operate in the world outside WP.212.121.210.45 (talk) 12:12, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

  • Hiyas 212.121.210.45. As the article history and your own contributions display you were in overstepping the bounds of WP:3RR. A warning was issued, but even so the reverts continued without any attempts on your side to discuss on the talk page and as of such a block was issued. I see that your recent contributions include edits to a talk page, so i am glad you are now actively editing them. In case you believe the block is "arbitrarily" do feel free to report this to WP:ANI Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 17:26, 19 April 2012 (UTC)
Thank you for your advice. I will of course endeavour to comply with WP good practice, as you do. Good examples such as yours will hopefully help me to raise the bar on my own work. 212.121.210.45 (talk) 10:27, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dmitry Borshch

Hello Excirial,

I have never misused my Wikipedia account. On Tuesday I mentioned to a friend that my article is being judged unfairly but did not ask her to edit or contribute. In accordance with Wikipedia guidelines I assume good faith, and did not accuse Sionk of meatpuppetry or collusion because she voted a few hours apart on the same day with Carrite.

I also assume that none of the voters except me have read any of the "Further reading" sources or Borshch's biography in Who's Who in American Art, and yet they rush to delete.

Sincerely, Khidekel (talk) 17:20, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there Khidekel,
I'll believe you on your word that you did not intend for this entire sock puppetry situation to happen, which is also the reason why only the three new accounts are blocked. The accusation itself should not be to odd though, as you were the only editor arguing to keep the article, while all of a sudden three new accounts pop up out of nowhere and head straight to the article in question. As you might imagine this is very strange behavior for new editors and thus suggest that something fishy is going on here. In this case a checkuser indeed confirmed that all three accounts were related, hence the blocks that were issued.
All article's marked for deletion are publically listed on WP:AFD, so its not that odd that two longer-term editors involve themselves sometime after each other. If it puts your mind at ease: i intersected Carrite and Sionk contributions, and besides being having quite high edit counts they have little to no on-wiki dealings with one another.
As for the article itself i fear i have to agree with the others involved in the deletion discussion. While there are a lot of sources they are mostly trivial mentions, images or pages that otherwise don't pass the reliable source criteria. In fact it is not the amount of mentions that cover notability, it is the quality of those sources. One or two good quality article's from - for example - renowned newspapers or scientific publications are worth more then 30 trivial mentions. In fact it only takes one or two sources to pass WP:42, and that is all that is needed. Yet if it cannot pass this criteria an article is removed, as it wouldn't pass the inclusion criteria. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:09, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Edit war at Czechoslovakian Wolfdog

Originally posted here

We have not entered into any edit wars simply every day we have logged in to find someone has changed our links and sources and removed our text we have simply added back our details and links. The links to this site are in our forum and we guide people here. they then come back to us and state the links and information have been removed and another body named vlcak.co.uk have removed our details and placed theirs in there is no war however the people who keep making changes are in relation to vlcak.co.uk and have nothing to do with our GB club we understand this is a free site but it is unfair that representatives of the vlcak.co.uk feel the need to do this every day we find our links gone and changes made! we simple add ours back to the list and then the next day its gone! or within the hour ? we may have to remove our links directing members to this page as the actions of representatives of vlcak.co.uk are behaving in this manner. can we protect this page? or should we just state to our members that the page can not be accredited and remove our links to your site?

You many not repeatedly make the same changes over and over again. Please use the article's talk page (here) to discuss your dispute with the other editors. Kuru (talk) 11:54, 19 April 2012 (UTC)
we only re added our link that was removed by the other group. Are we just to leave the removal of our source and links if this is a site where everyone is equal why can someone else remove our links everyday? and yet if we re add them this is wrong ? It is not making the same changes it is re adding our links that representatives of vlcak.co.uk keep deleting everyday. THE PAGE IS BEING DESTROYED BY THESE PEOPLE AND YOU HAVE THEIR IP ADDRESSES WHY DO YOU NOT STOP THIS? We only re add our link and source each time we are told it has been removed!
And in turn you are removing the link of the other party as well - Somehow a Kettle comes to mind for me. Having said that, i see that currently both sites are in the external sources section of the article, so that should be entirely fine. However, constant reverting or executing the same edits falls under edit warring, which is a definite no-go (This goes for both parties involved).
As for how to deal with this: In case this keeps repeating itself, drop the other editor a note on their talk page asking why they are removing the link and see what and if they respond - With some luck that will be sufficient to handle the issue. If the other party keeps removing the link after a message or two and refuses to discuss it further drop me a note and i will look into it. However, this is a two way street, so no replacing their link either. Ergo: Both links seems to be fine for the article, so it should be fine to leave both in the article. :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:58, 19 April 2012 (UTC)
Hello Excirial
I dont know where to contact you as you state on my talk to contact you if they make changes again and bingo today the lady from bulgaria has changed our link to hers it is rediculous that she persists and although we agree we have each time she makes the changes changed it back this time we have waited for you to take action. If she has had the warning then since her warning she has done this twice and still no ban please can we keep our link on czechoslovakian wolfdog page we find it so time consuming coming back every day to see her undo is there anything you can do? again I am so sorry to write here I didnt know what else to do to ask for help and we have refrained from doing the undo ourself because its becoming cat and mouse games (User talk:csvgb talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Csvgb (talk • contribs) 15:39, 20 April 2012 (UTC)
Thankyou very much Csvgb your so quick! —Preceding undated comment added 15:56, 20 April 2012 (UTC).
(edit conflict) Hiyas there Csvgb,
Don't worry, you did find the right place to leave a message. Before anything else, thanks for not reverting the edit straight back when you saw it, as this is what causes edit wars to keep going on and on. For the moment i re-added the link to the article which means that both http://www.vlcak.co.uk/ and http://www.czechoslovakianvlcak.co.uk/ are in the article. In turn this means that there should be no reason to remove either link anymore, as both are already in the article.
For now i am going to assume that the other editor simply wanted the vlcak link in, and simply replaced the other link while doing so. I will keep an eye on the article for a while (IE: watchlist it), and see if this status quo remains in place. If the other editor simply removes the link again i'll have a word with them and see why they keep removing it. If this keeps going on regardless it will simply be an edit war / vandalism and ill deal with that as required. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 15:59, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
For your tireless vandal fighting today. Keep going! WikiPuppies! (bark) 17:40, 20 April 2012 (UTC)
Tireless might be a bit of an overstatement as i am quite tired, but i just have a decent build-in autopilot ;). Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:17, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Alphonso (mango)

I had added a mango uncle link on alphonso mangoes page not because I wish to market their website but these fruits are in a great demand all over and people actually search for it on google on how to procure it. I completed that page with one link that i knew — Preceding unsigned comment added by 111.91.95.51 (talk) 21:43, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

There are two clear problems with this link. First and foremost it is not compliant with the external link policy as it is little more then a webshop for selling products - those type of links are never, ever to be included in an article. Second concern is that a link such as Many mango lovers crave for Ratnagiri Alphonso mangoes worldwide and search for them all over, luckily their search ends here.. above link gives the procurement procedure in detail is clearly promotional. It could have just as well stated "Click here and get your credit card to buy the most delicious fruit on the planet" as it would be more or less the same. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 21:48, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Hello, Sorry for the trouble

Hello Excirial, I would like to request my User and Talk pages to be deleted, beacuse I wish to leave Wikipedia permanently. I heard that I can't delete my account but I can request the deletion of my user and talk pages, as written in the 'Right To Vanish'. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Urduarabicpunjabiengish (talk • contribs) 21:14, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there Urduarabicpunjabiengish,
You might want to read this link in that case, but i do honestly doubt if its worth the effort to request it. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 21:53, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Sorry (from User:Davidoko99)

I am not trying to vandalise Wikipedia. I thought that I was editing the wiki called RationalWiki. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Davidoko99 (talk • contribs) 20:25, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I was already wondering about that edit - blanking a random page and replacing it with a level 2 header mentioning RationalWiki would have been a rether unique modus operandi for vandalism. Good to hear it was just a mistake, and no worries about that edit - no harm done after all. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:35, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

How to Report Another User

Hello; you recently blocked me and my block has expired and I would like to know if I am within my rights to report Ackees for making a personal attack against me in his edit summary on the Benin City article. Particularly, he has called me "neo-nazi", not to mention he removed accurate material which I have since restored and provided a reliable source for. Please let me know how I can bring this matter to the attention of the administrators- I am new to Wikipedia and I do not know how to report another user or where to report him/her. Thank you. (Also, here is the link to the place where I was reported by Ackees: WP:ANEW#User:ElliotJoyce reported by User:Ackees (Result: )ElliotJoyce (talk) 21:12, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I see you managed to find the place where to report this, and i also see that you managed to get blocked again right after the release of the previous one for exactly the same reasons as the last. Elliot, a block might have a limited duration in most times, but once it expires it does not mean that the edits that caused it to be put in place are suddenly all OK. As explained before edit warring, Threatening to report (multiple) users for administrative action unless they cease doing something and Attacking and hounding editors is simply not done.
Besides, I would especially point out that an edit war is still an edit war even if you limit yourself to two reverts a day. What counts is the spirit of the rule that consensus is reached trough discussion. Slow-reverting, moving across multiple article's or doing two reverts on an article in an attempt to stay under the 3RR limit is simply gaming the system. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 19:36, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Template:Did you know nominations/Kelihos botnet

Hi Excirial, I've reviewed your DYK nomination and there are a couple of issues. Could you reply at the nomination page? Thanks. Crisco 1492 (talk) 05:24, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Also Replied at the nomination page, TPM message below
Hello there Crisco,
First of a hearty thanks for checking my DYK submissionKelihos botnet - and especially for taking the time to do such a thorough check and copyedit. I've been working on the issues raised, and i believe the current version should take care of them. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 11:47, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Hi. When you recently edited Kelihos botnet, you added links pointing to the disambiguation pages PCWorld and The Verge (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 10:38, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

(Note: This is now fixed) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 11:23, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

User:Seeker4264

Hiyas there BWilkins,

I Hope you don't mind, but i upped the block for User:Seeker4264 to one week, and disabled his talk page access for repeated personal attacks. As far as i can see it is nigh impossible to have any form of civil conversation with him right now. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 12:16, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

No issues. Can't say I didn't try to assist. Signed, Adolf (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 12:18, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Aquaponics spamming

Hi Excirial, now that your protection has expired, our spammer at Aquaponics is at it again. Could you enable protection and / or escalate this through appropriate channels? Thanks! Martijn Meijering (talk) 10:51, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Whew, talk about persistent spammers and sockpuppeteers. Thanks for the note - i replaced the protection and set it to 1 month this time. Hopefully thats enough to cause them to lose interest. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 10:54, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
Thanks! Martijn Meijering (talk) 10:56, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

PROD removed at Louis Cole

Hi Excirial. Just letting you know I removed the PROD tag on this article - Cole has been in the news for quite some time, although I had only added recent references stemming from his fish-eating incident, so I can see why you'd cite WP:BLP1E and WP:NOTNEWS. I've now added a couple of sources from last year to show that he's notable for more than just one event. Yunshui 雲‍水 14:05, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Indeed, it really looked like another one of the "This was just in the news" article's, especially since it seemed to attract vandals like honey attracts flies. With the extra sources dating last year i guess it passes both policies. Though i kind of hope that there are no copycats thinking "Hey, eating live animals gets me on the news and Wikipedia". :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 14:20, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

block on 64.251.53.213

I increased the 31 hour block on 64.251.53.213 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) to three months as this is a long term vandalism-only school IP. That should last until school is out of session. Judging by the history, they will probably be earning a year-long block when school resumes in the fall. I hope you don't mind my change. If you do, please adjust settings according with no need to notify me. Regards, —EncMstr (talk) 18:12, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

To be honest I can only applaud the change to the block. Plenty of vandalism and no good edits. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:14, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Rejection of FlameCCR article

Hi ya. Thanks for reviewing my article so quickly. I'm not surprised it wasn't accepted as it was my first attempt. However, I have two general questions for you (you don't need to see my article for these I am sure): (1) your comment says I broke the golden rule that article is unsourced. Well, I listed the reference of www.flameradio.com and I 'sourced' this article from interviews with Norman Polden, Station Manager and creator of Flame Christian and Community Radio, and from the Flame website which I was given permission to do. How do I list him as a source? He pointed me to the website where the information is listed about the station and which, again, I put as a reference on my page at the bottom where I was told to put it. Second question: if I am not allowed to 'copy' directly from a website, thus insuring facts are correct and referencing that is where I got the material, with permission from the author himself, Mr Polden, is it better if I just leave it all out and just put in what I wrote and leave all their stuff out (making my article incomplete)? Or if I paraphase absolutely everything from the website, is that considered acceptable, because I can do that. But, my education dictated that quoting from the source (ie, the website) and stating you were quoting from the source and adding a footnote (reference) stating your source insured you were not breaking any copyright laws and verified your FACTS as accurate. And the FlameCCR website isn't copyrighted anyway; there is no copyright notice on the pages anywhere (I checked and I asked). I just want to get this right and as I see articles on Wikipedia using corporate logos, those people could not possibly have permission to use them, they just 'steal' them off the company sites (I asked someone who wrote a Wikipedia article where he got the logo for his page and he told me he just used the one on the companies site). There are parts of my article that are from the website, for accuracy, yes. But the whole article is not. If there is no copyright on the website and the owner of the website gave me permission to use the information from his website as verification of the facts in my article, so it was verified by the man who owns/operates FlameCCr and the website, why can't I use it? Or, again, should I just leave it all out and only submit the part I wrote based on my interviews with Mr Polden? Thanks ever so much for your help. Teresa — Preceding unsigned comment added by Teresa McDonnell (talk • contribs) 19:01, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there Teresa,
I think i should explain a thing or two about references. As an encyclopedia, wikipedia does little more then collecting information from other sources and compiling those into a readable article. These "Sources" (Also called references) are intended for the readers of the article to verify where one got his or her information, and to see if it is correct. Because there sources more or less form the basis of wikipedia there are several criteria in regards to sources as to what makes them reliable.
For example, one cannot quote a person stating something or a self-owned webpage (Primary sources), or sources that are closely related to the subject. Were i for example to say "Excirial is an accomplished sport fisher who won many trophies in deep sea fishing" with the reference being myself or my own website you would have no means of knowing if it is correct (It isn't), as i might be lying, boasting or withholding part of a story. Thats why all sources need to be secondary sources such as (major) newspapers, new websites, scientific literature and so on.
Moving on to the copyright. Under U.S law (Which Wikipedia fall under) all written content is automatically copyrighted, whether or not the writer of the content explicitly displays it on a page. For something to be copyright-free or under a specific permissive copyright this has to be explicitly noted on the content itself. In most cases it is therefor safer to paraphrase content. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:44, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
One of the fastest Anti-Vandalism enforcers! Riley Huntley (talk) 19:23, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
Hiyas there Riley,
Thanks for the star - i will make sure it gets a nice place in my galaxy. I also had a look at your contributions and i must say - the Evans Repeating Rifle article is very well written for a first (wikipedia) article. I see that you administer several Wikia sites so i am not surprised it looks above average, but with all the rules and guidelines regarding article content over here it is still quite a fear for a first article.
Having said that (And perhaps you already know) - if you ever plan to write a high quality new article such as that one again, you might want to nominate it at WP:DYK. WP:DYK allows editors to nominate a good new page for placement in the "Did you Know" section on the front page, which generally boosts its views quite a bit. And since i see you are into vandalism patrol as well: If you plan to do it more often (And gotten a little more hands-on experience which is required for rollback to be granted) you may be interested in requesting rollback and moving to one of the more "Advanced" vandalism patrol tools such as Huggle or STiki.
Either way, always good to see another vandalism patrol and of course - happy editing :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:58, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
I was going to give you an Anti-vandalism barnstar because you beat me to reverts many times today. But then I saw all that you do for Wikipedia and I decided you needed a better one. So, this is my gift to you.

Keep up the great work! Clarince63 (talk) 19:40, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

DYK for Kelihos botnet

PanydThe muffin is not subtle 00:05, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

5/1/12 How can I block a certain user?

Howdy, I'm glad you fixed that false editors vulgar on the Warren G. Harding article, and he's done it more than once, do you know how to block him, so he won't keep messing up the article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.190.230.254 (talk) 02:22, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there 71.190.230.254, If you see vandalism you can warn a user. If the user persists after sufficient warnings you can leave a report at WP:AIAV to request a block for this user. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 19:52, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

thaaaaaank you

yepp Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 18:35, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

You are very welcome. Hopefully that is sufficient to stop the worst of it... Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 19:54, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
Yes, thanks! I didn't really feel I could semiprotect the AFD right after protecting the main article. Reaper Eternal (talk) 01:58, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

New article "Frank Buytendijk"

Hi Excirial,

Thanks for looking at the article submission. Can you help me out a little bit why the article was rejected? I have carefully read all guidelines, and have focused on "real-world" press coverage, all verifiable and all reliable. I must be missing something.

Would absolutely love your guidance..

CasperJB — Preceding unsigned comment added by CasperJB (talk • contribs) 19:46, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there CasperJB,
The article itself looks mostly fine, but it is lacking citations that state what reliable sources are used for the article. The only reference cited is "Worldcat author record" which appears to attribute the books written. That is fine, but the rest of the article is entirely unsourced. For example - If i were to change the article to state that "Frank Buytendijk is currently the manager of the worlds largest botanic garden", how could anyone see that this is plain nonsense? The lack of underlying sources would mean that no-one would be able to verify the content of the article for its truthfulness.
There are two more issues. The first one is that this a biography of a living person (Also shortened to BLP). Rules on sourcing BLP's are exceptionally strict, since having incorrect content in these can have repercussions for the subject of the article. Additionally the article lacks a clear indication of Notability (See also a specific guideline for author notability). The best way to "prove" someone is notable, is by adding reliable sources regarding the subject. This is also called the golden rule for inclusion.
I hope this helps! Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
Hi Excirial, THANK YOU FOR YOUR FEEDBACK. I really appreciate it. I originally modeled the article after another Dutch author I like very much, Andre De Waal, it seems the rules have tightened considerably. Hope it is better now... CasperJB — Preceding unsigned comment added by CasperJB (talk • contribs) 10:25, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Blue Shark Optics

You removed PokerPlayer1973's removal of content here, I believe the user was removing unnecessary information from the article. As you can see, the article seems to be advertising and contains unnecessary information such as "history of sunglasses" and "safety". SwisterTwister talk 18:51, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Nicely spotted - on first glance it looked as if the editor was removing a whole bunch of useful content, but it seems that all of it was unrelated to the article. I've deleted the page itself as (very clear) copyright violation of multiple sources. Of the 4 segments i Googled all 4 proved to be a straight copy-and-paste from various other sites. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 18:58, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

FYI

Hello Excirial. Thank you for protecting the UNCF article against the POV IP. FYI they filed a long winded and malformed RFPP here [1]. They also went on a spree of reverting edits made by you and GreatOrangePumpkin. I know that you are busy so I thought I would make aware of these things just in case. MarnetteD | Talk 21:10, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there Marnette,
I happened to notice them placing request when busy with Huggle, right before Wikimedia tech did something that killed cluster23 for a minute. I do have to mention that the request for semi protection was rather amusing - i certainly agree with the IP that it is needed, but it would prevent the IP from adding more POV material. I doubt that was the intended outcome of the request... Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 21:14, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
The term "Hoist with his own petard" always springs to mind when this kind of thing happens. I know a bit too esoteric but it just sounds so good. Thanks for your vigilance. MarnetteD | Talk 21:20, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
Lo and behold a sock ExposingYourLies (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) appears. MarnetteD | Talk 21:22, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
Nice catch there - thanks. Completely not suspicious that a new account is created, and that this account suddenly finds its way to a virtually unknown page a minute after its creation. Somehow this entire thing makes me think of Crayons, Boxes and the wordt bright - i wonder why! Either way our friend the IP is blocked 48 hours for edit warring, and the sockpuppet is out cold on indefinite basis. Hopefully thats sufficient to prevent more accounts and nonsense for at least the next 48 hours. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 21:29, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for the follow through and up. Looks like the IP has been an SPA since its first edit on Apr 21 2012 so it'll bear some watching after the block expires but it will be nice to get back to normal editing (whatever that is) until then. MarnetteD | Talk 21:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Your recent edit of Tom Short

With this edit, you reverted an edit I requested on the article's talk page, which was carried out by another editor, and which was fully explained in the edit summary. Yet your edit summary says the reversion was due to "unexplained removal of content". Something seems amiss. Would you please reconsider whether the content you restored actually belongs in the article? It is a copy of a section of the Great Commission church movement article; the information in that section is not specifically about Tom Short. Thanks, SoCalDonF (talk) 07:41, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there SoCalDonF,
I think i managed to make a mistake on this page. I remember that i reverted that particular edit on the page yesterday since it removed a large section of content (And references) without a reason in the edit summary. Looking at the pages history i see that there actually is an edit summary that entirely explains that edit, so the only explanation i have is that i must have stared straight past it.
I reverted the faulty revert, so the article should now be in its correct state again. And of course - apologies for the mistake :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 08:17, 4 May 2012 (UTC)
Thanks again! SoCalDonF (talk) 14:32, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Review of "Coalition of Hope" Article

Hello Excirial, thanks for reveiwing the article [2]. I do see where the tone of the article is not encyclopedic, we'll be working on that over the next few days. This is what happens when you enlist the aid of volunteers from the advertising world. Aside from tone, are there any other issues you detected with the article that would prevent its publication? Please advise, thanks ... GHS G H Smith (talk) 14:26, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

To be honest this article is rather unusual for AFC standards. Most article's which are submitted trough AFC are a few paragraphs long at most, and lack even the most basic form of sourcing. Once this happens an editor is notified about this issue, and they slowly start rebuilding and reshaping the article till it meets the basic criteria. This article on the other hand is - length wise - the equivalent of a fully developed article and quite decent in some regards. Yet it still contains some flaws most starting article's have, and which tend to be iron out after a first review. The unfortunate truth is that there is currently a whole lot of content that i need to comment on.
  • The first thing i notice in this regard is the use of peacock terms. Take for example "highly trained first responders", "extensive air-lift capability" and so one.
  • A second and more prevent issue throughout the entire text is the promotional tone: "COH will be able to respond to unforeseen catastrophic events faster and better equipped than any other military or civilian element in existence" is an example of this, as it is purely a case of (Apologies for the bluntness of the following statement) "Look at how great we are!".
  • A third issue boils down to the basic structure of the article being promotional. The article starts with a first-level heading with the title "Mission Statement" followed by a one line stating the mission. After that there is a second section named "Foundation Imperatives" which lists the organizations goals, and after that there is a third section named "Coalition of Hope Relief Operations", containing the organizations past successes.
  • The article itself seems to have another issue regarding its content, and that is that it tries to cover to many details that are not encyclopedic. It is very unusual to state such a thing, as ofttimes more details are quite welcome to an article, so it is probably best to explain this trough an example. The best example for this issue would be the "Project "EXCELSIOR" section and its underlying sections. This section details the entire plan - from conception to expected results and from retrofitting to the daily operations that will be part of this project. These sections are so incredibly detailed they they often trail into entirely different topics, such as the history of hospital ships, the requirements to use a vessel under DoD and USN regulations, and a quotes and expectations of the future benefits of this ship.
While these sections may sound interesting they don't matter to the article's subject which is the "Coalition of Hope". To emphasize - if i were to ask for a short description of the coalition of hope, would you response include engine statistics for a ship, its commissioning requirements and a list of members for the organization? I doubt it would. Instead it would likely detail the goal, history and accomplishments of the organization. The article should be reviewed in this light as well - a lot of the content is either not required (The entire list of senior staff, the quotes from Mr. Keegan and other persons and the expectations a project has are examples) or better fit for other article's (The "The Vessel" section would work wonders in the Operating history of the USS Nassau (LHA-4) article).
  • A final point would be that the referencing could be stronger. A lot of the references used are self-published, which are par definition not reliable sources. The same goes for Wikipedia article's, since Wikipedia itself is a tertiary source - though it is fine to use the references that are present in those article's.
Now i know that i have been raising a whole lot of issues here, and i know that implementing them all will likely require a lot of work and cutting down written text in the article. For what it is worth i am not exactly enjoying raising all these issues as the article is not nearly as promotional as some (Nor do i believe the promotional sections were intentional promotion), and i can clearly see that quite some effort went into creating the article. The best piece of advice i can give is that it may be more convenient to follow the structure of an already high-quality article when building your own. As an example i would point to the Seacology article, an article which currently has featured article status, which means that it is without doubt the best possible quality around as of current. I would advice following its basic structure - Short introduction on the charity, some historical information and then detailing on current projects and other encyclopedic content. I hope that will help you to restructure the article in a way that addresses the above issues because i am quite certain the charity is notable and something we should have an article on. So for now i wish you the best of luck! Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 19:13, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Application to use Huggle

Good evening Excirial,

I have made a request to have permission to use Huggle. If, in your opinion it should be granted, I wondered if you would be kind enough to take a look at my application here, and, if you agree, make an appropriate comment.

I should be much obliged.

Kind regards,

-- Gareth Griffith-Jones (talk) 20:36, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

  • Good afternoon Mr. Griffith-Jones,
First of, congratulations! I have spend the weekend away so i haven't been able to reply (Which might have been for the better though, as some might have raised the canvassing red flag over it). As fr using Huggle and Rollback, they are fairly simple to use. Rollback works similar to twinkle´s version of rollback, be it that it is faster since twinkle needs to emulate the functionality. Other then that there is not much to say about rollback as it is mostly a 1 link feature in the article history.
As for huggle there is more to say. The first advice i would have is being careful - Huggle is capable of being extremely fast - so fast that it can more or less outmatch an editors checking speed. There has been more then one editor who tried to go as fast as Huggle could and ended up against a roadblock because they started to make to many mistakes during their attempt to counter vandalism (I can point to myself three years ago for an example). Personally i keep in mind that it is better to miss one instance of vandalism then to scare a new editor away with a barrage of unfriendly talk page warnings.
Ok, cautionings aside - using Huggle. One of the major advantages of huggle, besides from its speed, is that it can be controlled almost completely by the keyboard. Using the keyboard is not only faster (No need to follow the mouse cursor), but its also easier on the eyes since one doesn't have to look around all the time. I can therefor highly advice reading the shortcuts as they are very convenient. Personally i tend to control Q (Revert and warn), R (Revert) and Space (Next edit) with the left hand, and the brackets ([] - previous edit / next edit) with the right hand. About 95%+ of the activity resolves around these keys. Vandal reporting generates a click-able popup, but can be set to entirely automatic if so desired. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 17:41, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Higashi Yoshizumi page review

Hello, I am user Okiamok89, and you recently reviewed my article "Higashi Yoshizumi." You said that at this time the article cannot be published because it has inadequate sources. In any other scholarly work, I'd agree with you. However, this page is unique in that it is about a Japanese artist who purposefully hides from the public. Therefore, virtually nothing has been written about him. In attempts to increase his visibility, a professor at University of California, Berkeley has conducted an interview with him. All of the content I wrote is based on this unpublished interview, which will be included in an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York sometime in the next two years. Considering this unique circumstance, I hope that you will reconsider your review. Thank you, Kiya — Preceding unsigned comment added by Okiamok89 (talk • contribs) 04:59, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Hiyas there Okiamok89,
I'm affraid that any article on Wikipedia must have reliable sources in order to verify its content and in order to establish notability. An encyclopedia is nothing more then a collection of what has been written in other sources, so if nothing has been written then there is little to include. This article even falls under the BLP category (Biography's of living persons) - which means it is about a still living human being. These pages must conform to the highest possible standards of sourcing, as faulty information can have a rather major impact.
If there are no reliable sources regarding Higashi Yoshizumi, then i am afraid there is little that can be done; If nothing is written then nothing can be used as a basis for an encyclopedic article. Even so, i would point out that there are artists who are themselves unknown, while their art been included on Wikipedia. Take for example the artist known as Banksy. His real name is unknown, yet his art and pseudonym has received sufficient coverage for a stand-alone article. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 17:26, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

AFC/CSD question

Hey Excirial, got a question for you. An AfC you declined was nominated for CSD spam. Is there any point to that? Or, do we nominate AfC submissions for db-spam in the first place? Thanks, Drmies (talk) 19:41, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Speaking purely for myself: I tend to be much more lenient with AFC submissions as they are not in the article space, and because AFC is similar to a sandbox or incubator where people can develop their article's. Because of that my deletions tend to be limited to copyright violations and personal attack pages - Copyright violations because of legal reasons, attack pages because any content that needs a revdel needs to go anyway as far as i'm concerned.
I'm not aware of any special rule regarding AFC pages, but since AFC pages tend to be more controlled then the article space i see little reason to remove them outright. If people don't choose to improve them they are not in the way anyhow. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 17:19, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
I agree absolutely. Thanks for your response. Drmies (talk) 17:21, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Canadian Army Veteran Motorcycle Units

I removed the iw in the article because it linked to articles in other languages ​​on motorcycles, not about the motorcycle club. Can I restore it?--109.232.72.49 (talk) 19:01, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

I was already wondering why someone would remove the categories from that page. The edit summary didn't really provide much of a clue (On first sight, now that i read it again it makes sense). I restored your edit, and fixes the nobots template (The double curly brackets were missing). Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 19:08, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
Saw you on HG, keep up the good work :) Dan653 (talk) 20:23, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

What should I do about this [3] I can't report it for edit warring because there aren't four reverts... Dan653 (talk) 20:38, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Best thing to do is to drop both editors a note stating that they are in an edit war, and that they should head to the talk page to discuss. It seems to have started today, so there doesn't seem to be a long-term case of edit warring at time page (yet). Warning might help, but if it persists or if the reverting continues tomorrow without discussion it can simply be reported to WP:RFPP. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:51, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
I've been thinking about applying for adminship in the distant future (end of this year?), could you give me a tip or some advice on how to work towards that goal, or things I could improve? Dan653 (talk) 21:17, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
The best advice i can probably give is not explicitly aiming for adminship, but rather waiting and seeing if someone offers to nominate you for it sometime. The RFA process is a bit of a poisonous process these days as editors tend to nitpick on minor issues, and might even use conflicting reasons to oppose (Editor 1 opposes because you have to many automated edits such as vandalism patrol, while editor 2 would oppose because you have to little experience in vandalism patrol). As a result an RFA can be quite disheartening, since (in my opinion) doesn't do justice to the good work an editor does. At the same time the criteria to become an admin seems to be increasing more and more - This year so far we had 8 promotions, all of whom were active for at least 3 years. (See this page)
Still not dis-hearted? Good - in that case i could give some general pointers. First and foremost, stay active in area's that require administrative attention such as vandalism patrol, requests for page protection, suspected sockpuppets, AFC discussions, CSD patrol and so on - and show good judgment in those as an editor. You may also wish to involve yourself in some basic content creation to get some experience with it, and show that you understand the rules and policies that apply to a new page. And above all - remain friendly and civil to other editors. Doesn't mean you have to simulate an angel, but basic friendliness is very much required.
And remember - don't specifically aim for adminship. Not only is explicitly aiming for it frowned at at times, but in all honestly, admins are little more then janitors. What you receive are a few extra buttons that you may only use when the policy allows it. And every single one of those buttons can also be pressed by editors trough reporting to the appropriate noticeboards. The only change is actually pushing the button itself. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 21:35, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
Thank you for all the info. I have read through the 3 newest rfa's and i agree that they are very poisonous. I actually just saw one where they nitpicked on having too many automated edits. Over the summer I will definetly create some content (it was actually on my summer things to do list), but I don't have the time to right now due to school. I agree on not aiming specifically for adminship, and honestly I think admins abilities should be unbundled. The main reason I would like adminship is for AIV blocking, because it irks me when I report there and there is backlog when I could deal with it myself. Again, thanks for all the info. Dan653 (talk) 21:46, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


Victor Lewis-Smith USER PAGE

Hi. I made an attempt to Archive the user page. You stepped in and now it's double the length it started at. Perhaps you will tidy it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.169.108.193 (talk) 20:33, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

I think i can see what you tried to do, and i guess the fact that unregisters editors cannot create new pages got in your way while archiving the page. The page is now correctly archived. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 20:48, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Your recent edit to Ray Repp

The bot you use detected a false positive, probably because the edit included the word "gay." 96.25.4.2 (talk) 04:10, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Actually, Huggle and STiki are both manually operated and not bots. But yes, edits that add the word "Gay" right in the lead with no source directly after it are a red flag for vandalism checks. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 17:52, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

reliable sources

Hello, Just wanted to check about reliable resources for the submission: Martin Anthony. We received a rejection regarding a post. The main 'resource' is a TV station that closed and has not left legacy 'resources' online. Unfortunately, quite often the TV and Cinematic sectors of Turkey seems to not want to highlight its accomplishments. (Sad but true). Of course, this lays claim to legitimate performers involved documentaries, films, and TV shows being left 'un-resourced'.

Are YouTube submissions regarded as reliable? The 6NEWS YouTube page and their website has been struck from their virtual existence. We have added a new resource to the submission. It is the xRdsTV YouTube site that has some of the shows broadcast on the channel. Will this work?

NOTE: The Crossroads with Martin Anthony (TV Show) is still under review.

One side note. Was there a purge of (dormant) users in the past year or so? We had an account and did a lot of editing over the years.

Thanks, xRdsTV — Preceding unsigned comment added by XRdsTV (talk • contribs) 11:55, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Hello xRdsTV,
Youtube is Possibly a reliable source, though often it is not. If one were to link a documentary or otherwise reliable work it could be counted as a source, but that really depends on the content of the video and is therefor a case-by-case basis. Other self-published sources or social media tend to be a definite no-go as far as reliability goes. Personally i always leave a second review of a page to another editor to avoid a (possible) string of declines from one and the same person, and to allow for a second editors fresh input.
As for the account purge, i am not aware there was one. As far as i know only accounts with no editors are ever removed, with the possible exception of usernames registered by banned users. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 17:59, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Response

Good evening, in response to your message, I have looked at the article in question. It appears to of been my 9 year old sister. I have had a word with her and she agrees not to repeat this instance. I thank you for bringing this to my attention. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.13.23.149 (talk) 23:53, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

RFPP

I don't know if you like to deal with them, but there seems to be a huge backlog at the moment. Dan653 (talk) 01:08, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Its been a while since this post, and it seems some other admins already cleared the backlog :) Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 17:55, 9 May 2012 (UTC)
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