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Ansariya ambush	2024-06-12 19:26	indefinite	edit,move	Contentious topic restriction: WP:PIA, WP:ECR	El C
Hunter Biden	2024-06-12 19:23	indefinite	edit,move	Arbitration enforcement: WP:AP2 flashpoint	El C
Draft:Naraz	2024-06-12 16:25	2024-09-12 16:25	move	preventing eager new user from moving this draft back to another namespace (again) without page review	BusterD
Steps (pop group)	2024-06-12 15:50	2024-06-26 15:50	edit,move	Persistent sock puppetry; clear socking, coordination among accounts, and louting; all gaming the system activities	BusterD
Steps discography	2024-06-12 15:49	2024-06-26 15:49	edit,move	Persistent sock puppetry; clear socking, coordination among accounts, and louting; all gaming the system activities	BusterD
Stun Siva	2024-06-11 21:27	indefinite	create	Repeatedly recreated: WP:UPE target - approved draft required	Ponyo
Keffiyeh	2024-06-11 19:38	2025-06-11 19:38	edit,move	Contentious topics enforcement for WP:CT/A-I; requested at WP:RfPP	Daniel Quinlan
Hari Singh Nalwa	2024-06-11 18:20	indefinite	edit,move	Continued disruptive despite semi-protection; WP:ARBIPA	Abecedare
Kuki war of independence	2024-06-11 17:38	indefinite	edit,move	Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Thakor_Sumant_Sinhji_Jhala	Abecedare
Koli war of independence	2024-06-11 17:37	indefinite	create	Repeatedly recreated; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Thakor_Sumant_Sinhji_Jhala	Abecedare
Naraz	2024-06-11 14:19	indefinite	create	Repeatedly recreated; no objection for this subject to be created view draft if properly reviewed at NPP ; requested at WP:RfPP	BusterD
Colombia	2024-06-11 05:19	indefinite	edit	Edit warring / content dispute	Daniel Case
Kelly A. Hyman	2024-06-11 04:34	indefinite	create	Repeatedly recreated	Daniel Case
White Mexicans	2024-06-11 04:06	2024-09-11 04:06	edit,move	Edit warring / content dispute: per RFPP	Daniel Case
Nano-ayurvedic medicine	2024-06-10 21:22	indefinite	create	Repeatedly recreated: per AfD discussion	Vanamonde93
Tribal revolts in India before Indian independence	2024-06-10 19:19	2024-09-10 19:19	edit,move	Sock puppetry; Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala + others	Abecedare
Rebellions	2024-06-10 19:16	2024-09-10 19:16	edit,move	Sock puppetry (LTA); see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala	Abecedare
Principality of Sealand	2024-06-10 18:03	indefinite	move	Edit warring / content dispute	DrKay
List of peace activists	2024-06-10 15:12	2025-06-10 15:12	edit	Arbitration enforcement	ScottishFinnishRadish
False or misleading statements by Donald Trump	2024-06-10 02:11	indefinite	edit,move	Arbitration enforcement Modern American politics. Will log at WP:AEL	Ad Orientem
Carly Rae Jepsen	2024-06-10 00:56	2025-06-10 00:56	edit,move	Persistent disruptive editing	Discospinster
Al-Sitt	2024-06-09 21:36	indefinite	create	Repeatedly recreated; requested at WP:RfPP	Elli
Hamis Kiggundu	2024-06-09 21:15	2025-06-09 21:15	edit,move	Persistent sockpuppetry: per RFPP	Daniel Case
Aditi Rao Hydari	2024-06-09 20:37	indefinite	edit	Violations of the biographies of living persons policy: per RFPP; will also log as CTOPS action	Daniel Case
Sukhoi Su-57	2024-06-09 20:33	2024-06-12 20:33	edit	Persistent vandalism - modification to originally intended level.	Amortias
Nir Oz	2024-06-09 03:41	indefinite	edit,move	Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA	Daniel Case
List of ongoing armed conflicts	2024-06-09 03:11	indefinite	edit,move	Arbitration enforcement: WP:PIA	Anarchyte
Nuseirat refugee camp massacre	2024-06-09 02:43	indefinite	edit,move	Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA	Daniel Case
Russian Air Force	2024-06-09 01:56	2024-06-16 01:56	edit,move	Persistent disruptive editing from (auto)confirmed accounts; follow up	Robertsky
IDF Caterpillar D9	2024-06-09 01:48	indefinite	edit,move	Arbitration enforcement	ScottishFinnishRadish
Front for the Liberation of the Golan	2024-06-08 21:41	indefinite	edit,move	Contentious topic restriction: WP:ARBPIA	Ymblanter
Lok Sabha	2024-06-08 21:22	indefinite	edit,move	Contentious topic restriction: wp:ARBIND	Ymblanter

UK newspaper sources and how to handle deprecated sources?

This has spilled over from WP:RSN, but clearly it has gone beyond WP:RSN's ability to find a solution.

UK newspapers are increasingly seen as unreliable and unfit to be used as sources (unlike, for instance, the seemingly unimpeachable Fox News or Russia Today). Every time I look at the noticeboard, another one has been added. This has gone from the infamous WP:DAILYMAIL "ban" to The Sun, The News Of The World and even The Daily Express.

These sources are now "deprecated". There is little agreement as to what "deprecated" means. WP:DEPS is pretty clear "that editors are discouraged from citing in articles, because they fail the reliable sources guideline in nearly all circumstances." and "Deprecating a source is a more moderate measure than "banning" it.". However some editors at WP:RSN have disagreed with this. Also note that DEPS does not list the NotW or Express as deprecated at all.

There is general agreement at RSN that:

These sources are deprecated, and rightly so (at least, let's say, for the Daily Mail). There is no question that they do not have considerable problems of either recurrent inaccuracy or editorial bias.
Deprecation should (per DEPS) discourage these sources being added to articles.
There are also issues, without great disagreement, that an article, a BLP statement, or a contentious statement generally, would have trouble passing WP:V if it relied upon such sources.

It should also be noted that:

There is no policy against the use of non-RS sources. There is no policy supporting the immediate removal of non-RS sources. We have guidelines, based on WP:V, which require the use of RS sources (and would not be met by non-RS sources) in several situations. But there is no policy against the further use of sources which do not meet RS, to go beyond this. Typically such sources have had issues re WP:SPS.

When it gets to the following however, there is great disagreement at RS:

What is to be done about existing articles, with existing use of deprecated sources?

Several approaches have been discussed:

Tagging such sources as {{better source needed}} or {{Deprecated inline}}.
Immediate blanket removal of all such sources, from all articles. Optionally with replacement by {{citation needed}}
Immediate blanket removal of all such sources, and the content which they support, from all articles.
Deletion of articles which rely on such sources.

Two editors have been carrying out 2 / 3 here. Despite prior agreements to not do this, and to limit themselves to 1. There is no consensus to support this, there is significant opposition to doing so (1 would be supported). There is no policy to support this, WP:DEPS does not support it, WP:DAILYMAIL does not support it, the RfCs etc. before WP:DAILYMAIL were pretty clear in not supporting it. Also, when other editors have done this, they have largely been reverted. However two powerful editors (admins) are able to push this through anyway.

These removals have also failed on WP:COMPETENCE and WP:EW. In many cases, one citation or reference to a deprecated source has been removed, leaving other citations hanging. In others they've removed blocks of citations and taken out obvious RS with them. There have been concerns about the speed of these edits, and their resultant poor accuracy, including breaching the usual level of "a sustained rate of under 5 seconds per edit" being seen as a problem, re WP:MEATBOT. Edit-warring is a given: even against CitationBot [1][2][3] on Skibidi and most recently [4][5] on block-setting crane. It might be noted that this citation came up specifically at the WP:DAILYMAIL RfC a year ago as an example of why automated bulk removal of these citations was so wrong Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 254#RfC: The Sun. And of course, whenever admins indulge in content disagreements, they back it up with threats of blocks: User talk:Andy Dingley#Addition of deprecated sources to Wikipedia articles.

WP:FAIT and a willingness to edit-war freely is also a good way to skew any argument in one party's favour, if they have the power and influence to do so. Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 270#Global ban on non-RS? is a good example of such, to strip out all use of an unquestioned (except by one) source which then turned out to have support as RS.

These disagreements (and for one of the admins here they're very long-running) have been characterised throughout by sheer bad-faith and abuse of other editors, and regular threats. Some of the abuse would be insta-blocks if anyone else had done it the other way, but evidently it's OK for them to call other editors "c*nts". In particular, two things: a persistent and unbending description of anyone disagreeing as "friends of The Sun" etc. Yet no-one here is supporting these sources or claiming that these newspapers are a problem for us (the first two points at the start here), rather than disagreeing solely on the third point, what is to be done about them? Secondly, repeatedly claiming that policy supports immediate blanket removals and citing WP:DEPS in support of that: and yet DEPS does not support any such, nor does WP:DAILYMAIL.

WP:RSN is not a safe space for a GF discussion on how to proceed here, when one side of the argument can (and is repeatedly) threatening to block the other. Accordingly I bring it here. We need some sort of agreement on the remedy for these sources, and can we please try and do it without accusing the bona fides of one side and pretending that they are instead advocates for the Sun. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:28, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I would also add briefly here that at least one editor currently purging Wikipedia against all the above is an admin and has utilised WP:ICANTHEARYOU several times, along with unfounded claims against users' motivations, strongly in contravention of WP:ADMINACCT. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 20:51, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Andy Dingley, Just to address a couple of specifics: UK newspapers are increasingly seen as unreliable and unfit to be used as sources (unlike, for instance, the seemingly unimpeachable Fox News or Russia Today). Every time I look at the noticeboard, another one has been added. This has gone from the infamous WP:DAILYMAIL "ban" to The Sun, The News Of The World and even The Daily Express.

No, not "UK newspapers" .A small number of UK red tops.
See WP:RSP: RT is generally unreliable for topics that are controversial or related to international politics. . I don't use it at all and replace it wherever I see it. It's not deprecated, if it came up, I would support deprecation for the same reason that I supported deprecation of Occupy Democrats. We need to stick to sources whose primary objective is reporting facts, not supporting an agenda.
Right now there is a thread on that exact same noticeboard where I am arguing against inclusion of Fox News, and have done so many times based largely on the analysis in the excellent Network Propaganda by Faris and Benkler, and I am eternally grateful to Mike Godwin for suggesting it.
The Mail was the first deprecated source. I proposed removing (not deprecating because there were only a couple of hundred uses) the News of the World because it was literally shut down for possibly the worst misconduct in UK journalistic history. One of its journalists has since been jailed for other misconduct.

The problem with taking an arbitrary view of whether this or that story is accurate is that it puts Wikipedians in the position of evaluating primary fact, and we're explicitly not allowed to do that. If I were to propose that a certain chapter in the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion is a reliable source for a specific fact, I would, rightly, be slapped down. A crap source is a crap source.

It seems to me that you have never accepted deprecation, which you argued against, and you want to ensure that no action is taken based on it. Demanding sanctions against the few who actually undertake active cleanup is the wrong way to go about that.

Instead, you should set up a central RfC at WP:CENT on whether deprecation of sources is legitimate, and whether removal of deprecated sources is appropriate, and if so how should it be done. You're challenging a course of action that has been discussed and refined through multiple debates at WP:RSN, and you're doing so here on the basis that... what? the two people you identify as primarily responsible both happen to be admins? No admin powers have been used here. David's not even using AWB. How is that a matter for the admin board? Guy (help!) 23:24, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It seems to me that you have never accepted deprecation

Please read some of what has been written, and stop just listening to yourself. Deprecation, or the need for it, are not questioned. What is questioned is the meaning of deprecation, and how to deal with those sources.

a course of action that has been discussed and refined through multiple debates at WP:RSN

A course of action that has been rejected at RSN, at WP:DEPS, at WP:DAILYMAIL et al. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:38, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I just looked at WP:DAILYMAIL and couldn't find the wording that rejected the removal of Daily Mail references. Precisely which words were you thinking of here? - David Gerard (talk) 14:41, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It closes, "Volunteers are encouraged to review them, and remove/replace them as appropriate. "

No-one is against this with review and treatment of them as appropriate. That is not the same thing as 'bot runs to remove them all regardless, or manually editing at the speeds of WP:MEATBOT. No-one is against a considered removal on inappropriate use of the Mail (which is likely to be asymptotically approaching zero), but the error rate and collateral damage of this blanket process (and I would concede, much less so from your edits than Guy's) has been excessive, way beyond what DAILYMAIL called for.

Also WP:DEPS is specific that, "Deprecating a source is a more moderate measure than "banning" it. " and neither of these support the performance of blanket removals (rather than replacements), whether conducted by 'bot or manually. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:23, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Removal is usually appropriate - the words you literally quoted there really don't reject the removal of deprecated sources. Your claim doesn't check out - David Gerard (talk) 18:41, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

No, what "doesn't check out" is your meatbot approach to ban these sources and in doing so, actually introducing errors into articles which were previously fine. You really need to ask yourself if what you're doing is to the benefit of the readers, replacing correctly sourced facts with incorrectly sourced fiction. Not to mention the other messes you've left all over the place. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 19:11, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

You claimed WP:DAILYMAIL rejected a given approach. You quoted text in support of this where it doesn't reject this approach. At this point, you don't appear to be reading the text you're putting in support of your own claims, or you're just failing to understand what it says - David Gerard (talk) 20:18, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I claimed what? Can you provide me with evidence of that, diffs, that sort of thing? Also, please answer the question now asked of you thrice, are you open to recall? The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 20:21, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The above mischaracterises what I wrote at User_talk:Andy_Dingley#Addition_of_deprecated_sources_to_Wikipedia_articles - it was in no regard a threat of a block. What I asked him to do, was to stop repeatedly adding deprecated sources to Wikipedia, without obtaining the high degree of consensus that would require.

Here's the text I added there:

---

You are continuing to add deprecated sources to Wikipedia articles, e.g.: [6] [7] [8] [9] - despite the deprecation of the Daily Mail as a source in two RFCs and The Sun as a source in one RFC.

From the 2017 WP:DAILYMAIL RFC: "its use as a reference is to be generally prohibited, especially when other more reliable sources exist. As a result, the Daily Mail should not be used for determining notability, nor should it be used as a source in articles."

From the 2019 Sun RFC: "References from the Sun shall be actively discouraged from being used in any article and they shall neither be used for determining the notability of any subject."

I appreciate that you personally disagree with the removal of deprecated sources. However, as WP:DEPRECATED describes it: "Deprecation is a formalization that arises from Wikipedia’s normal processes for evaluating sources. It primarily exists so that we can save time by not repeatedly discussing or explaining the same issues, and to increase awareness among editors of the status of the sources in question." Demanding repeated relitigation of the deprecation of a source such as the Daily Mail is a waste of other editors' time.

As you have noted in previous discussions, the deprecation does not forbid all use of the Daily Mail as a source in articles. However, the two RFCs show a strong general consensus that its use is "generally prohibited". This means that any use of it needs a strong consensus - and not just a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, as that cannot override a general consensus, per the Arbitration Committee's 2013 statement of principles on levels of consensus. A consensus would need to be a general consensus - in an appropriate venue, such as the Reliable sources noticeboard.

I also appreciate that you feel your edits were completely correct and appropriate. However, you still need to obtain consensus for such inherently controversial edits, per WP:ONUS - which is policy - "While information must be verifiable to be included in an article, all verifiable information need not be included in an article. Consensus may determine that certain information does not improve an article, and that it should be omitted or presented instead in a different article. The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is upon those seeking to include disputed content."

The Daily Mail has been ruled a generally prohibited source in two RFCs; as such, the onus is upon you to seek a general level of consensus to override the general consensus of those two RFCs, before adding deprecated sources to Wikipedia articles.

Nor can you claim that you do not understand that adding deprecated sources to a Wikipedia article is controversial - one administrator noted in a recent discussion at WT:RSN that he would have blocked you for one of the edits listed above had he not been in a direct conflict with you at the time. While I further appreciate that you would consider this an unjust block, you cannot reasonably claim that repeatedly adding deprecated sources to Wikipedia articles is an uncontroversial action.

I ask that you undertake to stop adding sources that have been deprecated to Wikipedia articles without first obtaining a sufficient level of general consensus for each edit to override the general prohibition, obtained in a suitable venue.

---

Andy's response comes across as an attempt to strike out pre-emptively against the onerous burden of ... checking that his controversial edits that add deprecated sources to articles - sources that consensus holds we literally cannot trust - have consensus first. Per WP:ONUS, which is policy.

I ask that administrators give consideration to requiring that Andy not add deprecated sources to any Wikipedia article in future, without first obtaining a general consensus for the edit in question - in an appropriate venue, such as the Reliable sources noticeboard - David Gerard (talk) 21:03, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, walls of text. What has been happening here is as Andy described, a current admin going through anything (and literally anything) related to The Sun and removing it wholesale. Sometimes he finds other sources (introducing raw URLs), sometimes he partly edits articles so leaving them half-referenced, sometimes he removes completely benign references to The Sun. In many cases Gerrard has made false claims in his edit summaries and seems to be under the impression that DEPS is policy or (as he has said at least once, a "guideline"). We should be discouraging admins from doing such things. Also, Gerrard has made some claims about the motivations of a few editors, without any justification. When asked for evidence of this, he has remained silent, directly in contravention of WP:ADMINACCT. I have a complete shedload of evidence I could bring to this, it's mostly trivial to find from Gerrard's recent contributions, but at no point has he made claims of his edits to resolve "controversial" or "disputed" claims, he's just implementing a de facto ban on The Sun and other such sources. This, of course, is in complete contradiction to WP:DEPS which he himself has claimed he is following and which he is also incorrectly asserting. Something needs to be done about this mishandled purge that an admin is pursuing. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 21:14, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I would ask that The Rambling Man be restrained similarly - deliberate additions of deprecated sources to articles, [10][11] including two of adding controversial claims to a WP:BLP sourced only to The Sun [12] [13]. He also had to have it explained to him recently on WP:RSN that WP:ONUS is actually policy - David Gerard (talk) 21:17, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Please note, these (and those claimed above by Gerrard) are not "additions", they are simply reversions to the previous status quo. Gerrard's deletion policy contravenes the discussion above, and the complete mess he is making is unwarranted. We also don't need him to edit war over the fact that The Sun awarded a best album accolade. This is now well into the realms of disruptive editing. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 21:20, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Adding a deprecated source to an article - including re-adding one, or edit-warring to keep one in - is prima facie an edit against the general consensus that the source is deprecated. It's not actually just fine, and you're attempting to re-litigate the concept of deprecation of sources here - David Gerard (talk) 21:22, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Stop making things up please Gerrard. Restoring the status quo is not "adding a deprecated source" per your earlier claims. And as you have been advised probably a dozen times now, your dicdef of "deprecation" isn't what is given in the DEPS "information" page. And your accusations about my motivation need explanation per WP:ADMINACCT. Provide evidence that I'm here to support The Sun, and do it quickly. Ironically Gerrard has only just (in the previous few hours) starting quoting ONUS although in most cases it doesn't apply anyway. The examples he has given for the John Wark article have existing consensus through the WP:FAC process which ensures high quality content throughout Wikipedia. At no point did Gerrard seek to discuss any controversial or disputed content (and he has yet to provide any evidence that his edits do constitute the highlighting of such), nor did the esteemed reviewers at FAC raise any concerns. The normal course of action would, of course, be to highlight areas of concern and allow editors to do their best to address them. The Gerrard method was to simply purge the content with a false edit summary. Enough said. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 21:35, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Having said "enough said", it should now be clear that Gerrard needs to stop the meatbot "ban" purge on the WP:DEPS sources using false scare edit summaries until this has been resolved. I would hope he has the integrity to do that at least while we understand where it's all gone so wrong and messy. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 21:44, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The Rambling Man, have you ever considered stating your case neutrally, as a lifestyle choice? It might work better here. Guy (help!) 01:45, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

David Gerard and I both remove deprecated sources from biographies and other articles. The clue here is: deprecated. We do not deprecate a source unless it is untrustworthy. That doesn't mean that everything it publishes is a lie, but it does mean that enough of it is false or misleading that we cannot trust it. That is the starting point.

A small number of people, notably the OP, have resisted deprecation from the outset and have complained whenever any effort to remove deprecated sources is undertaken. There is little doubt in my mind that a subset of editors do not believe we should deprecate these sources at all. That is an opinion they are allowed to have, but consensus as established at WP:RSN is clear. If they want to demonstrate that consensus is in fact against deprecation, disputing the actions of individual editors is not the way to do it. Some people appear to view source removal as tantamount to deletionism. I do not subscribe to that view.

I have been through several iterations of my process, receiving feedback at RSN along the way. Based on these discussions here is what I currently do:

If a deprecated source is redundant to other sources for a specific fact, I remove it. The text remains, and remains sourced. I don't think anyone has ever complained about that though I could be wrong.
If a deprecated source is in External Links I will usually remove it. Example: blogs and personal websites not of the subject. A few people have complained about this in respect of specific sources. I can remember two. In both cases, it was asserted that they were reliable and widely cited by reputable authorites, in both cases the people opposing removal promised to provide evidence of this, in neither cases was the evidence forthcoming, but in both cases I removed them from my list anyway. So I only remove these links when they are of a type that is, by consensus, not reliable sources but are subject to good faith challenge.
So now we come to what is, I guess, about 2/3 of cases: the deprecated source is the only source for a specific fact. I have by now been told with equal force that (a) I must remove the txt along with the source; (b) I must leave the txt and tag it {{citation needed}}; (c) I must not remove the source unless I, personally, find a replacement, putting the burden on me to fix someone's sourcing error. So based on multiple discussions, what I do is:
1. If the source supports a potentially contentious fact (e.g. about family or marital issues in a WP:BLP) I manually check for a better source and replace it if one is readily available, otherwise I delete the text.
2. If the source is for something trivial (e.g. date of joining a football team) I tag as needing improvement, for example with {{deprecated inline}}.
3. If the source is for a sky-is-blue statement or is one of several sources that support the content (e.g. Bob did X[1], after which Y happened[2], and [2] covers both events) I remove it.

I use AWB, largely because the regex makes it vastly easier but also because I have C7 radiculopathy and it maximises the ability to work by keyboard rather than mouse.

The classes of sources I remove are:

Predatory open access journals;
Books published via vanity press (Lulu, XLibris, iUniverse, Author House, Trafford Publishing at this point), other than by the subject of the article;
Deprecated sources per WP:RSP, e.g. Breitbart, the Daily Mail, WorldNetDaily, InfoWars, Mintpress, Life Site News);

The good news is that mostly we're dealing with a legacy problem. Edit filters have been created that warn against addition of most of these sources, and these have substantially reduced the levels of addition. But we still have thousands of articles, including biographies, referenced to sources we have agreed as a community are not appropriate.

It's a bit like being the sysadmin for the company mail server. Nobody ever comes by and says thanks when it's working well. In this case most of the complaints often feel as if they come from people who think we should be using fax instead. But there you are. Guy (help!) 22:16, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

"David Gerard and I both remove deprecated sources from biographies and other articles."

Yes, and you do it in bulk, carelessly, without per-item editorial judgement, over-riding the views of any editor who disagrees, and most of all against the decisions made for WP:DAILYMAIL et al., which have been against doing just that.

Then, you continually lie (you make untrue statements of fact against other editors) to describe those opposing you as either "opposing deprecation" or "supporting The Sun". No-one is against this deprecation, they are against your excessive and unconsidered response to it. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:21, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Mr Gerard, your comments here continue the persistent disparaging untruths which have characterised your comments throughout this RSN argument.

Let's just take a look at the "additions" of which you complain – except they're not additions, they're simply trying to maintain an existing and long-stable status quo against these hasty, unsupported and poorly executed removals:

Skibidi - you chop a self-evident, almost trite, description of the song's video in half, merely to remove a Sun citation. What you leave behind no longer makes sense.
Block-setting crane – this very cite was discussed a year ago, at the WP:DAILYMAIL RfC discussion, and was cited there as a very example of what was wrong with this sort of simplistic blanket removal. You requested WP:ONUS on keeping it, yet that was already done a year before you removed it (twice). You clearly have no respect for any sort of consensus decision arrived at, merely your own opinion has to win.
Hijab & Hijab Firstly, after some examination, it seems that even The Daily Mail can't be wrong all the time. They've taken two sets of independent photographs from years ago and reproduced them, for once without bias or blaming Jeremy Corbyn. So I restored this, not so much as WP:V but as EL, linking to a resource of value that we can't host for ourselves. In the second case, after you'd removed it again, I switched these sources to the non- deprecated non-DM sources, from which the DM had obtained them. But those were removed forthwith too as "You can't be serious.". Andy Dingley (talk) 22:17, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

JzG I don't know why you felt a need to restart the thread, but we'll go from here. Patronising people by telling them "deprecated" is the "clue" is pathetic. You're not dealing with newbies here. And the claims being made are nonsense. I'm even seeing citations for awards been given by The Sun cited by the newspaper being removed as unreliable. You must be kidding? The good news here is that some of us are standing up to the nonsensical purging which is arbitrary and leaving behind a complete mess with its half-arsed implementation. Regurgitating what you think is the essence of DEPS is a waste of time. The meatbot approach to essentially attempting to BAN The Sun and others is actually directly contradictory to the advice we have codified. So stop doing it. And for those of you who keep making false assertions about it in edit summaries, STOP DOING THAT TOO! The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 22:25, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The Rambling Man, Oh FFS, don't be a snowflake. Do you know how many sources are deprecated, rather than just not recommended? It's a very short list. The list is comprised almost exclusively of sources that have a documented history of fabrication. WP:RS would seem to be at odds with that, and has been canon since before I joined. Please try to acknowledge at least the possibility that we're trying to improve the encyclopaedia, eh? Guy (help!) 23:00, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

don't be a snowflake? Perfect admin response. Well done you. I think you've said enough already, but feel free to further opine. Of course I'm fully aware of which sources are deemed deprecated, and indeed, and importantly, what that actually means per the definition given in Wikipedia. Feel free to attempt to patronise me once more, but I would recommend you focus more on the substance of the matter than continuing to make personal attacks. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 23:04, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The Rambling Man, I wasn't aware that replying to a personal comment on a topic that does not involve use of admin powers was an "admin response". YLSED. Guy (help!) 23:37, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think you probably already know that we hold admins to a higher standard, and saying "oh for fuck's sake, don't be a snowflake" falls very short of that standard. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 08:45, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The argument stems from disagreement over how to “enforce“ deprecation. What makes it actionable is if someone is going on a “crusade” to enforce our “rules”. “Crusading” is always disruptive, even when enforcing the “rules”. Blueboar (talk) 23:18, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Blueboar, not even enforce really - we do that through edit filters, and that seems to work rather well. Anyone who tries to add a deprecated source is warned, they can then click through if they want, and then the edit gets reviewed off the back of the logs. This is almost entirely about (a) disputing the entire deprecation business altogether and (b) disputing retrospective enactment of deprecation. Guy (help!) 01:24, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Uninvolved comment. I saw this come up at RSN and chimed in there to remind editors WP:ONUS is indeed policy, and those wanting to add the sources (or readd) need to gain consensus for that since the use is obviously disputed. The Rambling Man's responses here and here did not impress me at all and indicates some pretty strong battleground behavior on their part as well especially with this response to me: Hey? Suddenly you're looking for a consensus to include a source rather than exclude a source? You have it completely arse-about-face. We have never looked for a consensus to include any specific source.. . In addition to that hot-headeness, that really looks like thumbing one's nose at ONUS policy to the point my brief interactions have me thinking removing TRM from this topic might decrease disruption significantly due to the inflammatory comments leading to walls of text.

I see TRM had a lot of troubles at AE, though aside from my brief RSN interaction, I don't know any history about sanctions there or which of those warnings are considered "current", but edit summaries like this seem to be continuing those problems. I don't have to the time to assess further whether their behavior here is a one-off or instead at the end of WP:ROPE.

Otherwise, I'm not sure what other administrative actions can be done here. If someone is trying to game WP:ONUS by reinserting the sources without gaining consensus, that is edit warring and blockable. In some examples above (hard to find in the wall of text) Andy Digley provides examples of themselves ignoring onus policy.[14][15] (i.e., finding errors in an edit isn't an excuse to blanket revert). I can't find comments from TRM or Digley trying to get consensus to reinclude the sources on the either of those talk pages either. I'm not finding anything actionable on David Gerard's part though since they are following onus policy, and any perceived mistake on their part doesn't justify what TRM and Digley had been doing. Kingofaces43 (talk) 23:12, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

For a much needed tl;dr though, everyone needs to follow WP:ONUS, which should cut through all this extra drama I'm seeing above gumming up the works. If you get consensus on a given page to use the source, then do so. If you don't have consensus, it stays out per that policy. If that can't be followed, then it's clear some preventative measures are needed to stop the edit warring and the battleground behavior I've been seeing from TRM and Digley above. Kingofaces43 (talk) 23:12, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

"Uninvolved"? Grudge much?

As to the block-setting crane ref and ONUS, that was literally the poster child at the Daily Mail RfC for an example of a justified DM ref. Over a year ago. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:45, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That "grudge" comment doubling down on battleground behavior is concerning. I was uninvolved when I commented at that most recent RSN where you hadn't even commented. I was also uninvolved when I came into that ANI you link, especially in regards to you, and noticed battleground behavior problems there when I made my only comments there. That your behavior is an issue again doesn't make those who noticed it before WP:INVOLVED even for non-admins who comment at behavior boards. WP:BOOMERANG definitely applies here if those problems continue. Kingofaces43 (talk) 00:07, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/The_Rambling_Man#The_Rambling_Man_prohibited indeed - David Gerard (talk) 23:40, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure of the relevance of that well-publicised situation to this case where your purging edits equivalent to trying to ban The Sun result in the direct introduction of errors. You replaced a source which you claimed can't be trusted with one that you (I assume) believe to be reliable, yet the former was reliable and the latter was incorrect. And it appears your understanding of football transfers is not commensurate with the reality of the situation, particularly in regard to loan players. And this, sadly, exemplifies one major aspect of the problem. You are making sweeping edits, leaving either a mess or simply introducing false information into Wikipedia, despite what you have been reminded of numerous times, that the source you are purging is considered reliable by some editors for sports reporting. This sadly is just one example demonstrating that we now have to check each and every one of your edits while you continue to introduce errors and incorrect sources into Wikipedia. I really think you need to consider your position. Are you open to recall? The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 17:09, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

You have now just removed perfectly citable material (ironically cited in the next reference) which was easily found (in the very next reference). I would advise you to stop purging Wikipedia of valid information please. Checking these kinds of edits is highly time-consuming, and despite multiple requests for you to desist, you continue to do so against even basic editing norms, let alone in your position as an admin. Please desist. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 17:28, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I have a simple question for @Andy Dingley:: You state above in your initial explanation of the dispute in question, that "Two editors have been carrying out 2 / 3 here" where 2/3 refer to "blanket removal" of sources and content from articles. You've asserted this as having happened several times, both in this discussion and in prior discussions. Can you present some evidence of it? That is, can you show a series of diffs or patch of editing history that show that the editors in question are engaging in that behavior? It would go a long way towards help others understand the nature of the problem, and be able to comment on the behavior itself. If there is widespread behavior, we need to see evidence of such. Both of the editors (who are unnamed in your initial complaint, but we probably have a sense of who they are) have said that isn't the way they operate, here and in other discussions, but so far you've repeatedly asserted that they do. Can you provide some diffs showing that they are, in fact, doing as you describe? --Jayron 32 17:36, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I don't really know or care about the history of this problem, but just a quick glimpse at the contributions of David Gerard will show you the blanket removals that are happening right now, despite multiple requests to stop from multiple editors. Often (and this is the best case) the text is preserved but a bare URL is introduced. Sometimes (and this is happening more frequently), information is just removed, along with the purge on The Sun as a source. Sadly, and what is happening lately, is the removal of text despite other references in the article verifying it, or even worse, the introduction of false information based on inaccurate sources. All the name of the blanket purge on The Sun. Which isn't codified in any consensus that I'm aware of. The end result is that some of us are having to check each and every edit from this admin to ensure that false information is not being added, nor is valid information being removed. In a meatbot sense. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 17:44, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I've checked about 4-5 and I don't see any major issues. The Sun was deprecated as a source; and in the cases I just looked at, either a) he removed it when there was already a better source alongside it b) he removed it and replaced it with a non-deprecated source, sometimes altering the text to better match what the non-deprecated source said or c) he removed it and also removed some text, but usually the removed text was of spurious utility to begin with (WP:TRIVIA and the like). I haven't seen any unambiguous problems, indeed, most of them seem like uncontroversial clean up. I mean, if you want to spend your time checking up on him, I don't see why you have to. I don't see any evidence of problems in his recent edits you just directed me to. I notice above you raise issue with one of his recent edits, but I wouldn't say the removal is unambiguously bad. --Jayron 32 17:56, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
You checked four or five? Brilliant work. Gerrard is doing about four or five every five or ten minutes. You didn't see a problem with his introduction of factually incorrect material using in inaccurate source? Wow, just wow. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:24, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yep. The thing I keep finding over and over is when about half the Wikipedia wording is supported in multiple sources - but some really interesting quirk of wording in the article is only supported by the Sun. Sports, celebrity, TV shows, all manner of subjects. In such cases, I assume the Sun is doing what the Sun does - jazzing stuff up, i.e. making stuff up, to make it more interesting. This is why it's deprecated, and this is why editors who insist on putting deprecated sources in on Wikipedia articles - as our logorrheic Sun/DM crusaders here do - are behaving in a problematic manner. When you only have the Sun as a reference for a given fact - you don't have a reference. Never trust the Sun - David Gerard (talk) 18:47, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
"crusaders"? Are you open to recall? I'd say "never trust David Gerrard" ahead of "never trust the Sun". You proved the point perfectly earlier today when you actively removed The Sun as a correct source and replaced it with an inaccurate source and completely false information. It may be that you lack the expertise to edit in certain areas of Wikipedia, which is fine because none of us can be brilliant at everything, but the suggestion that you believe your own "crusade" against The Sun is justified when you are introducing errors into Wikipedia as an admin is beyond belief. You have no reasonable defence for removing facts and replacing them with errors. This is a symptom of someone doing something they should not be doing. So, please, STOP. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:34, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Jayron - to stick with what's already here, take a look at Skibidi vs. Skibidi, where it has been cut to half of its size. These [16] [17] were what literally triggered posting here. One is a pretty obvious statement, sourceable by anywhere covering pop culture (if we cover pop culture at all, we are inevitably going to be using sources that aren't as solid as the London Gazette). The second of these also sliced a description of the video in half, making it nonsensical. You could source that much per BLUESKY even from LittleBig's own YouTube. Again, if you want a pop culture source, take your pick. But when pressed to choose between Hello magazine and The Sun, there's never going to be much in it. Then when this thread opened, Mr Gerard went for it and sliced the whole article in half. [18] Now you might say, "Skibidi is a trivial topic unworthy of an encyclopedia" and you'd have a point, for encyclopedias which hadn't written WP:N the way we chose to. Also, 135 pageviews/day, a year after the song came out, isn't bad going. This is not editing to improve the encyclopedia. This is blinkered editing, to remove a particular source at any cost, and also the content which it had been supporting.

When we see a slab of red like this, [19], when is that ever a good thing?

Look at this one on Brian Cox, "replace deprecated source with RS" (Scottish Sun with Guardian). Lovely, who could possibly question that? Except that the Gruadian ref is from four years later and presents a significantly different viewpoint on Cox's politics in Scotland than what it's supposed to be supporting. This is tick-box editing, with no editorial aspect to it. We could have 'bots do it no worse than this.

Then we get the simple stuff like this "remove and replace deprecated source" (the Mail used for sport, which has already been put forward as an area where it's not so biased). But "replace" doesn't mean, "remove and tag as {{cn}} unsourced", as was done here. That's just a false edit summary.

This post was made in response to Gerard's edits, rather than Guy's. Most of them in the last few days are removing the Sun from articles where it' barely clear we ought to be having that article, which is less of an issue than those involving the Mail. But Guy's go back further and have deeper problems, particularly the RSN page claims, "I will just tag them (1)" and then doing the opposite of stripping them (2 & 3). Andy Dingley (talk) 15:47, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Genesis of the dispute

Reviewing past history it seems that this goes back to August 2011: Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 102 § Publisher" on a Weebly site and the comment beginning "The editor is carrying out a 'bot-like bulk edit removing any content that pattern-matches a URL indicating that a web site (of any content quality) has been hosted through Weebly. This claims justification through the no-blogs policy of WP:ELNO." It's somewhat surprising that after more than eight years of complaining about this exact issue - systematic removal of sources based on binary assessment of the site's reliability - the OP has yet to come up with a solution other than complaining every time it happens. I know he has friends here, can someone maybe help him to initiate some process whose conclusion we can all get behind? Guy (help!) 00:18, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I and many others have repeatedly asked Andy to make a case. If his opinions are supported in policy, it should be a slam-dunk by now. Many of us have suggested WP:ANI as a venue, for example. But here will do - Andy, can you or can you not make a coherent, policy-based case against JzG's actions? Your continued choice of extended personal attacks, and wasting other editors' time by repeatedly edit-warring in deprecated sources, is an inferior alternative for working with others, as surely you must understand - David Gerard (talk) 23:23, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Mr Gerard, there is a large section at the top of this which both of you have studiously ignored, and have persisted instead in making false descriptions of other editors as "Supporting the Sun", "Opposing deprecation" etc, none of which has any truth to it - but IDHT, yet again. This is about your edits, and Guy's edits, which although not identical are both making massive runs of unconsidered removals of refs (cases 2 & 3 in the comments at the start). Yet neither of these are supported by DEPS, DAILYMAIL or any consensus at RSN. Guy, in particular, has repeatedly claimed that he is only doing 1. (tagging), yet persists in these bulk removals.

You keep refusing to address the issue here: you are both acting way beyond the agreement of WP:DAILYMAIL, and you are using every tactic possible to deflect from this. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:12, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

In short: No, then. --Calton | Talk 04:10, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Other discussions

There's an ongoing discussion about the use of newspapers as sources at WP:V. This discussion should be folded into that one rather than being yet another fork. The main issue for AN should be the use of admin tools and, per WP:INVOLVED, it seems obvious that admins should not be using their tools to enforce their own personal opinions about this matter. Andrew D. (talk) 00:38, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The trouble with "they shouldn't" is that admins are a fleet in being: they still have the capability to block other editors for disagreeing with them, and in this case, both have already threatened to do that. Andy Dingley (talk) 01:55, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If you mean me, please show me the diff(s) and the words therein where I threatened to block you. I'm pretty sure this didn't happen. If you mean other admins, please show the board the diff(s) and the words therein where they threatened to block you - being specific will be the most useful contribution here. I even supplied one above for you - David Gerard (talk) 23:24, 25 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Still waiting on this one - please substantiate your claim - David Gerard (talk) 18:37, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Still waiting on if you are open to recall. Please, per WP:ADMINACCT, let the community know. Thanks. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:36, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Still waiting on if you are open to recall. Please, per WP:ADMINACCT, let the community know. Thanks. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 19:09, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Andy Dingley: Please produce evidence of how a "they" threatened to block you - diffs, that sort of thing - David Gerard (talk) 20:19, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

A Compromise?

A lot of the current conflict seems to stem from party A removing a source because they believe that is the proper course of action for handling deprecated sources, and then party B adds it back because the removal was done without providing a replacement source, or the removal included collateral damage. The strongest argument I have seen made by party B is that party A is exercising WP:FAIT, and the strongest argument I have seen party A make is that party B is adding unreliable sources to articles. It seems like we could at least cool down the situation by having party A agree to stop removing deprecated sources until such time as we can come to concensus as to what proper policy is, and party B would in turn agree to not add or restore any deprecated sources. While we debate the merits of purging non reliable sources, we can leave Wikipedia in its current state, with no new references to deprecated sources being added and no existing references to deprecated sources being removed. This will at least temporarily end the edit war and perhaps allow everyone to have some time to cool down and amicably discuss a long term strategy for how we should deal with deprecated sources.

I think part of the reason things are so heated in this discussion is because while the discussion is happening both parties are engaging in an edit war behind the scenes. This leads to both parties being frustrated with the other for recent actions, and this prevents either party from engaging calmly on the topic and (hopefully) working towards a long-term solution. For context, I believe the primary involved parties are (in order of me seeing names while scrolling up the page) User:David Gerard User: The Rambling Man User: Andy Dingley and User:JzG.

There also may be value in pausing this discussion for a couple days just to let everyone calm down a bit. Often just a break of a day or two in situations like this can greatly aid in resolution. Micah71381 (talk) 23:21, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thankyou. I would be happy with that and would see it as being aligned with WP:DEPS. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:34, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This looks like the right course of action, at least in dealing with the interpretation and implementation of DEPS. Other matters such as WP:ADMINACCT will still need to be addressed, but that can happen in parallel. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 07:36, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Micah71381, no edit warring here, I am singing Biber and Sances. But no, the “compromise” is capitulation so does not work for me: it basically gives those who opposed deprecation and lost, the right to retain deprecated sources - many of which are either redundant or objectively inappropriate.

They’ve had many months to start an rfc and have instead chosen to simply attack those who remove the crap. I have been removing predatory journals for ages, we have few left now, same with obvious no-hopers like Occupy Democrats and Breitbart. This has improved the encyclopaedia. That’s why we deprecate them. Guy (help!) 14:11, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The problem here seems to have been missed in translation. It's not the concept of a well thought out replacement of a deprecated source with a suitably non-deprecated one that is the issue here at alll; no-one would argue with that. But certainly for me it's the manner in which a unilateral ban is being enacted, directly contrary to the advice given in DEPS, and that the edits are being made so quickly that errors are actively being introduced, along with incorrect sources, while perfectly citable material is simply being expunged. None of that is necessary nor advocated anywhere that I'm aware of simply in the name of removing deprecated sources (some of which have actually been recognised as being acceptable for some verification in any case!). The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 14:17, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I have been removing predatory journals for ages Yes, there's already a 2009 ArbCom finding of fact that you misused the spam blacklist to remove links to bad sites. The point, in both cases, being that it's not about whether these sources are reliable or not, but how to deprecate them. Some things never change. --Pudeo (talk) 14:24, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Guy Do you believe that leaving the deprecated sources up until Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#On_the_use_of_deprecated_sources is resolved will cause undue harm to Wikipedia? Is there some urgency in removal that makes it so it must be delt with immediately, rather than taking some time to figure out a course forward? In this compromise proposal, I am not recommending that we stay in this state indefinitely, just call a truce (neither party messes with the sources in question) until such time as we come to concensus on a strategy for dealing with deprecated sources. Micah71381 (talk) 14:43, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

As mentioned, it will not harm Wikipedia because it is unenforceable; people will continue to remove or replace them as soon as it's determined they are unreliable in accordance with WP:RS, and people who persist in violating WP:RS by restoring sources that are definitely unreliable will eventually get blocked, regardless of the outcome of that RFC - that is to say that even if proposal 3 there passed with unanimous support, I could still immediately remove deprecated sources from twenty articles, and if someone persisted in restoring them, they would eventually get banned for editing against WP:RS, which overrides the WP:LOCALCONSENSUS on that RFC. However, in the event that WP:RS were somehow eliminated and unreliable sources were allowed to remain in place for months on end, then yes, of course it would hurt the encyclopedia. Poor sourcing damages the reliability and reputation of our encyclopedia, and it's important to fix it as quickly as possible. There is room to debate what sources are reliable (and we should fall back and focus on that aspect, if there's disagreement over this or if sources are being removed in places where many people think they pass WP:RS.) But we cannot write a blank check to simply ignore WP:RS, even temporarily - as in, we cannot, it is literally not something we are permitted to do. If someone is overly-aggressive in removing sources, in a way that goes beyond WP:RS, and they ignore objections to those specific removals to continue editing against consensus, that particular editor could also get in trouble, yes. But "this source has been deprecated, so I will start removing it from many articles where it is being used inappropriately" is protected by WP:RS, and this cannot be changed; and in fact, in many cases (especially WP:BLP ones) restoring the citations will itself be block-worthy, especially if there was an established consensus clearly indicating that the source was not reliable in those contexts and an editor continues to restore it despite that. --Aquillion (talk) 20:57, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We've had an RfC. It produced WP:DAILYMAIL. It did not support immediate blanket removal of everything. So why are you going against WP:DAILYMAIL? Andy Dingley (talk) 13:57, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Micah71381, What Aquillion said. Only, probably, being me, with more words and less precision. Guy (help!) 12:52, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This is is unworkable. WP:RS is a core policy, which means that removing unreliable sources is always a defensible edit - we cannot make a general policy against doing so, and cannot make a policy that would require that an unreliable source remain in place (especially, of course, in WP:BLP situations, where removal is required, but even to a lesser extent elsewhere.) We can disagree over when and where a particular source is reliable, but once it's established that it is unreliable, removing it immediately is always valid under WP:RS, and restoring it is a violation of WP:RS that could lead to editors getting blocked if they persist. --Aquillion (talk) 20:57, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

WP:RS is (perhaps surprisingly) only a guideline, not a policy. Also there is no WP:RSONLY policy.

WP:RS is a need for RS in order to meet WP:V. It says absolutely nothing about removing any sourcing beyond this. Guy tried that when he stripped sources from all the castle-related articles. See WP:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 270#Global ban on non-RS?. Despite the damage he caused there, no policy was ever found to support those removals.

The relevant statement here is WP:DEPS, not WP:RS. And particularly, what is to be done about large numbers of existing sources, and how to improve things without causing more damage than any benefit. That's the issue for this thread. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:55, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Any material lacking a reliable source directly supporting it may be removed and should not be restored without an inline citation to a reliable source. seems straightforward to me. Citations, themselves, are also "material"; an unreliable citation without an accompanying reliable secondary source discussing it is therefore "material lacking a reliable source" and should itself be removed. --Aquillion (talk) 18:16, 30 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Aquillion, true, though strictly RS is a guideline, but it's a guideline in the same way that evolution and gravity are only theories. It has been canon for so long that it has the same force as policy, and is a guideline only because it derives from policy (in this case an intersection of V and NPOV).

If something is carried only in an unreliable source then it may not be neutral, cannot be verified (because the only source is undependable) and almost always gives undue weight because no other source considered it worth publishing. Guy (help!) 12:55, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Following up on the OP:

On behalf of British journalists everywhere, I resent the use of "UK newspapers" rather than "some British tabloids". There are plenty of reliable British newspapers, and those aren't the subject this discussion.
I take no issue with removal of deprecated sources from articles. Deprecation of sources means they must not be used, regardless of time. Put differently: whether they're "about to be added", or "have already been added" to an article is insignificant - they shouldn't be there, with few exception.
If an editor repeatedly adds deprecated sources where other sources are warranted, then that's a potential violation of any number of policies, and the editor is liable to being sanctioned.
In dealing with existing use of deprecated sources, the choice between options #1, #2 and #3 in your list comes down to the nature of the content (its notability, verifiability, sensationality etc.) and is at editors' discretion.
1. I would usually avoid solutions #1 and #4 as too light and too severe, respectively. If you still opt for solution #1, then use {{deprecated inline}} rather than {{better source needed}}.
2. If you take issue with an editor opting for solution #3, then you can ask that they apply solution #2 instead. You suggest there's been previous agreement to apply solution #1 alone, but no diffs are presented so I can't comment on it.
Other problems that have been raised in this thread, such as incivility and alleged abuses of administerial powers, should be raised separately. It's impossible to deal with all of it in a single thread. François Robere (talk) 15:28, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thankyou for a rational reply

I resent the use of "UK newspapers" rather than "some British tabloids".

Note that here, Guy clarifies that as: "No, not "UK newspapers" .A small number of UK red tops." Except that the Daily Mail isn't a red top. Nor would it be seen as a red top within meta-commentary on UK journalism. It has problems, so does the red-topped Sun, but these are not the same problems.

I do prefer "some UK newspapers". It's not red tops alone. Nor is the size of the paper they're printed on any reliable guide, so I don't like "tabloid". The Daily Express is also being discussed in the same manner. Now that the scarlet-hued and diminutive i has been bought by the Mail, I anticipate that Guy will be turning his attention in that direction too.

Deprecation of sources means they must not be used

RFC:2119 is always a useful guide for such wording. The problem is that "must" is very strong and we find ourselves in a position where we already have many of them in use. So what is to be done? Does the simple blanket removal (as I contend) make things worse?

In the context you seem to be discussing it's more specific: the article is actually open for human editing at that point. I can certainly agree that this is a time when we have more control over what to do next than simply looking at a backlog with a 'bot script in hand.

If an editor repeatedly adds deprecated sources

Has this happened? I see no examples of it. I'm accused of it, I certainly haven't been (within our general standards for non-EW disagreement between editors).

4. I favour option #1 because we can do that with a 'bot script. It would be a reasonable and practicable thing to do, with broad agreement behind it. And most of all, we can still do #2 or #3 immediately afterwards, should we wish.

We should move to a situation where DEPS are replaced, rather than removed, and in nearly all cases it ought to be possible to do so without losing content. If that content can't be verified, then of course we might have to lose it (Although just {{cn}} is still an accepted option across WP, unless this is constrained by BLP or specific challenge). However it's considerably harder to replace a source than to remove one, so we can't make bulk runs for that overnight. If we try to, there's also the risk (as for the Brian Cox source noted on this page) they might end up with an impeccable RS source as a ref, which doesn't actually support the claim it's supposed to. Those are a problem, because they're not machine-detectable afterwards, as a tag or url regex would be.

4.2 That would be here: WP:RSN#News of the World. Where Guy posted a new thread, WP:RSN#News of the World, and stated, "I propose to tag and then remove the couple of hundred links we have to this site." When challenged, he then changed this to "I am not removing and leaving {{cn}}, I am tagging as needing a better source unless the source is redundant (i.e. one of two or more sources for the same text) in which case I am removing it altogether and leaving the other sources. " However that's not what he then did - he kept on with #2 and #3, even for non-redundant cites. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:19, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If an editor repeatedly adds deprecated sources Has this happened? I see no examples of it. This entire section literally exists because I asked you to stop doing precisely this thing, and cited my examples. TRM has also repeatedly added deprecated sources to articles. You both think you have excellent reasons, but you still actually did it. I realise there's a lot of words between the beginning of this section and the end, but you've generally been good with detail (as compared to TRM's response to a statement of the issue of Wow, walls of text - but then, following the discussion may not be for everyone) - I'd expect you to remember how this section started - David Gerard (talk) 18:45, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

stop doing precisely this thing Where? Block-setting crane? Where I restored a ref (you then 2RRed it), because it's a ref we specifically agreed at RSN and WP:DAILYMAIL a year ago showed that the DM wasn't always wrong? At iceberg house, where we did the same, because the DM had paid out its media budget to get far better photos of the London house collapse than we could get any other way? At Skibidi, where you kept removing sections such that the para no longer made any sense, then you simply deleted half the article and made it worthless? Or at hijab, where I checked the two historically valuable refs via the DM and saw they were free of bias or inaccuracy, per WP:DAILYMAIL? Then when you'd summarily removed them again, because discussion is something you consider beneath you, I replaced them with the sources that the Mail had got them from. At which point, Guy removed them again anyway.

So go on then, show this "repeatedly adding", to anything like, for instance, WP:3RR? And don't say "these should have been discussed", because whenver I try to discuss this problem it's dismissed as "whinging" or "disruption". Andy Dingley (talk) 20:27, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Andy Dingley: I've looked at some of the diffs David is referring to; the "status quo" argument (other than not being Policy on the English Wikipedia) doesn't hold in the case of deprecated sources, the usage of which has been found by definition to be violating Policy. In other word, restoring a deprecated source is not a simple restoration of content, but a restoration of a Policy violation. What's more, since both WP:BURDEN and WP:ONUS place the responsibility of justifying the inclusion on you, you end up breaking several policies at once. François Robere (talk) 20:42, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

So which ones? Because for the first two, WP:ONUS was met, back last year when we wrote DAILYMAIL. If anyone wants to discuss or analyse further, then fine, because I'm all for discussions. For Skibidi? Yes, that's mostly annoyance at Mr Gerard making such POINTy edits at all. And at hijab? Again, the point of DAILYMAIL is that we need to check these edits, and I'd checked them. Why remove the refs to a non-DM site? That's really being POINTy!

I've always been fine about discussing any of these, I cheerfully accept that I might even be wrong on them, if that's how consensus falls. But there is zero discussion from either Guy or Mr Gerard, just a continual claim that they're admins and so they're right on all content issues, even against RfC decisions. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:53, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Not last year, now. If you want to add something in November, you've got to have consensus and verifiability in November, and AFAICT you've had neither (verifiability, in particular, is incompatible by definition with DEPS).
the point of DAILYMAIL is that we need to check these edits, and I'd checked them Actually the point was that the Daily Mail should not be used for determining notability, nor should it be used as a source in articles. Drawing from as appropriate that we should retain a source is not in keeping with the spirit of the RfC; in the case of Hijab, for example, alternate sources should've been searched for. François Robere (talk) 21:11, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

So sources now "expire"? A decision made a year ago no longer holds? Now that's creative.

For hijab, alternate sources were not only searched for, they were added. Guy then removed them and the content too. Perhaps you'd like to ask him why? Andy Dingley (talk) 21:37, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It's not about expiry, it's about specificity. You have to justify source use on a case-by-case basis, especially when the consensus is that a source is WP:GUNREL.
On Hijab - if other sources were found, then there was no need for the DM. Diffs? François Robere (talk) 22:24, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hijab replaced removed Andy Dingley (talk) 22:32, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

For specificity, look at the RfC for WP:DAILYMAIL. The "crane case" was already current at that time (Nikkimaria had replaced it by another of those wrong refs to the wrong type of crane). It became one of the discussion topics as to why not all DM refs were implicitly biased. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:32, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Guy here. Two of the three sources don't look reliable, and the third one doesn't support parts of the text to which it's attached.
I can't find any reference to "crane" at the RfC discussion, and the only comment by Nikkimaria doesn't contain any links. François Robere (talk) 12:35, 30 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Found it at the Sun RfC.

The edits in question introduced the DM almost two years after it was deprecated. Nikkimaria was right to remove it, even if the replacement was wrong. Simply put, that ref had no place in the article in the first place.
Recall you denied ever adding a deprecated source afresh, but here you did just that.
On another point, in the opening message of this thread you brought this edit as an example of the damage of automated removal, but I see no evidence that NM used an automated tool to do that. François Robere (talk) 21:30, 30 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Are you aware that The Sun isn't the same paper, or related to, The Daily Mail? That's the Sun RfC, not the DM. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:17, 30 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The crane example appears at The Sun RfC (November 2018), not The Daily Mail RfC (January 2017). The example itself cites the DM (October 2018). François Robere (talk) 04:59, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It's not red tops alone. Nor is the size of the paper they're printed on any reliable guide We're not discussing paper sizes and masthead colors, we're discussing tabloid journalism. You may not like it, but it's an accepted and widely used term.
The problem is that "must" is very strong So are our RfC results on said sources.

Does the simple blanket removal (as I contend) make things worse? Not if done correctly.
In the context you seem to be discussing it's more specific: the article is actually open for human editing at that point What context are you discussing it in?

I favour option #1 because we can do that with a 'bot script If we run a bot across the entire article namespace and Guy then proceeds with solutions #2 or #3 as he sees fit, will that resolve the dispute?
We should move to a situation where DEPS are replaced, rather than removed, and in nearly all cases it ought to be possible to do so without losing content Ideally yes, but that assumes DEPs are reliable in practice, otherwise we couldn't replace them with equivalent GRELs. In cases where they have proved reliable, however, I'd rather let editors decide how to handle them, with some guidance.
@JzG: Comments on method (Re: this)? François Robere (talk) 19:17, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

A few more notes:

The statement there is no policy against the use of non-RS sources is disturbing.
The statement these removals have also failed on WP:COMPETENCE and WP:EW is not supported by diffs AFAICT.
On the one hand I see the OP supporting source replacement over removal (We should move to a situation where DEPS are replaced, rather than removed), on the other hand I see a complaint against an editor making an erroneous replacement (Nikkimaria had replaced it by another of those wrong refs to the wrong type of crane). Replacement errors are unavoidable - they're bound to happen the moment we decide to deprecate a source. The assumption in all cases is that allowing and keeping the source is more problematic than deprecating and replacing it. We should certainly strive for accuracy when replacing sources; one way to minimize errors would be not to introduce sources that would likely be removed later.
There are two core misunderstandings at the basis of this case: a finding of "generally unreliable" means, and what a successful deprecation RfC results in. My reading of Policy is that a "generally unreliable" source is one that you should not employ for general content (including images, unless you have a specific RfC that allows it) and/or in general practice (ie habitually); and that a deprecation RfC results in an effective ban on a source. It seems the OP reads it differently: that WP:GUNREL sources can still be used liberally; and that RfC results are voluntary. If that is the case, there may be room for a more assertive clarification by the community. François Robere (talk) 21:30, 30 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The statement "there is no policy against the use of non-RS sources" is disturbing.

Then cite the "WP:RSONLY" policy. There is none.

This is a long post and to keep it as short as possible I have tried to avoid repetition. The diffs for the competence issues have mostly been listed in the previous threads, linked from the top of this one. A few were repeated here (The Trump ones), but the worst examples would be the Castles set.

I'm also tired of posting diffs etc. only for the next comment to be "I don't believe this without diffs". Yet allegations like "I am repeatedly adding references to the Sun" are all false, unsourced and yet unchallenged.

one way to minimize errors would be not to introduce sources that would likely be removed later.

Whilst true, that is an irrelevance here. The point is, we already have these sources. Their number will increase as more UK newspapers are deprecated. The Express will probably be the next, followed by the Mail on Sunday and the i.

My reading of Policy is that a "generally unreliable" source is one that you should not employ

Which policy was that?

a deprecation RfC results in an effective ban on a source.

And yet WP:DEPS specifically says the opposite.

It seems the OP reads it differently: that WP:GUNREL sources can still be used liberally; and that RfC results are voluntary.

Yet more fabricated mud-slinging. I will ask you to cut that out. In fact, I'm the one arguing that the RfC should be followed, not cited to support something which it has been clear that it does not. If there is a policy for WP:RSONLY, please cite it. If there is an RfC supported blanket removal of sources in bulk, please cite it. WP:DEPS, WP:RS, WP:DAILYMAIL do no such things. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:12, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Well, WP:RS is a guideline, but WP:V is a policy, and I'm not sure what verifying an unreliable source is meant to buy us in 2019, except calumny and grief. Mackensen (talk) 01:39, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This has nothing to do with WP:V. No-one has ever claimed that it has.

WP:V is clear: if content is contentious, it needs to be sourced to WP:RS. There is no contest to that. However we have a large grey area beyond this, as we looked at extensively for the Castle case. Can sources not meeting RS be used in addition? In particular, we had an issue with a good quality but a SPS source. There is no WP:RSONLY policy (and yet Guy removed the lot, against consensus). Andy Dingley (talk) 09:42, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Andy Dingley: You've now clashed on this with multiple unrelated editors (including in the "Castle" case, which I just took a look at), and Guy's request below was answered overwhelmingly with a call for a one-way I-ban. Any chance you're wrong in your reading of Policy and RfC results? François Robere (talk) 05:55, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Any chance you're wrong Then you'll easily be able to cite the opposing policies.

Nor are these "unrelated" editors! Take a look at the editor interaction reports, or just look to see what particular chip each of them has on their shoulders (there are very few names I don't recognise here, let alone the off-wiki rabble rousing). Andy Dingley (talk) 09:42, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Andy, there are now 18 editors who support a one-way I-ban between you and Guy, and only four who oppose it. I again encourage you to consider whether it is at all possible you're in the wrong on this. François Robere (talk) 10:27, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

A further point outside of what's been argued is that a broad goal in general on WP is to minimize any type of disruption - whether for editors or for readers. Implementing a "we must immediately remove a long-used source that has suddenly become deprecated, and material that is only sourced to that", even if that meets the intent of WP:V, still is disruptive. The entire situation here reminds me of what mess there was over updating non-free images back in 2009 with BetaCommand/Delta, as the automated handling of removal of non-frees that didn't met the letter of the law but could be fixed was a problem.

Mass removal of deprecated sources is fine as long as that is not disrupting articles just to be "free" of a bad source. We need to give editors reasonable time to see if they can find replacement sources, or to edit the article to remove the bad source, or other type of action. I've suggested before that we have a six month moratorium on any "semi-automated" removal of deprecated sources but make sure editors are well aware of this and pointers to the necessary RFCs that outline that. After that 6 month period, then editors that want to go at the semi-automated removal should be free to do so. That's how we've done this types of changes in the past, some type of sunset/grandfathering period. --Masem (t) 06:17, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Masem, right, hence my approach. Remove where redundant, tag where it's not supporting anything especially controversial, manually re-source when it's controversial (especially a BLP) and remove if it's controversial with no other source. That seems to me to be minimally disruptive. Guy (help!) 13:39, 2 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I should mention I agree that Guy's approach is right in lieu of any grandfathering period (discussed over at RS/N, IIRC). A human-monitored semi-automated process to handle these deprecated sources are find. If we want something less human-monitored that includes removal of deprecated sources, however, I beleive we need to have a grandfathering period to give editors time before bots are let loose. --Masem (t) 17:37, 2 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Masem, no disagreement here. Guy (help!) 18:45, 2 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I've tried to read this section, but I've found two areas of disagreement that I'm having trouble parsing.
1. Guy and David Gerard claim that all their removals of deprecated sources (The Daily Mail and The Sun) are being reverted by Andy Dingley and TRM (sometimes saying that AD/TRM are doing so because they are "fans of The Sun," but surely that is hyperbole), while AD and TRM claim that they are only reverting very specific removals of deprecated sources that have been done incorrectly. Which is true? Or have I mischaracterized one of the two options?
2. Guy and David Gerard (and others) claim that WP:DAILYMAIL indicates that all instances of deprecated sources must be removed, while AD and TRM disagree and say that is not what WP:DAILYMAIL says and that that page specifically says that the deprecated sources may be used/kept in some very specific circumstances and that Guy/DG are not considering those circumstances. Which of these is correct or have I mischaracterized?
Thanks 174.91.115.9 (talk) 14:28, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I have never claimed that all my removals are being reverted (they aren't). I have never said that either of those two editors, specifically, are fans of The Sun (I am pretty sure neither is). I am not claiming that WP:DAILYMAIL says that all deprecated sources must be removed. What WP:DAILYMAIL says is that the Daily Mail, and by extension other deprecated sources as the DM is an archetype, are not reliable sources. The policy on reliable sources is WP:V/WP:NPOV and the quasi-policy WP:RS which synthesises the two. If a source is not reliable for new citations, it's not reliable for old ones either, and the only substantive question is how to manage the transition to the point where it is used only in the appropriate way for an unreliable source (e.g. WP:ABOUTSELF).

Now please log back into your usual account and comment so we know who we're dealing with. Guy (help!) 15:34, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

No, neither of these is quite true at all - David Gerard (talk) 17:10, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for mischaracterizing your positions. I do maintain that what I've said above is what Andy and TRM have claimed above they are arguing against. Do you also disagree with me that what I've written is their presentation of your positions?

Clearly my point 1 is just wrong - apologies. I guess my question boils down to do you disagree with all instances where AD or TRM have reverted your removals of a tabloid? Or do you agree with some of their reversions? Like, do they have a point at all with any of their reversions or are all of their reversions disruptive and incorrect according to WP:DAILYMAIL?

I don't have an account. 174.91.115.9 (talk) 17:59, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Never trust tabloids

This isn't the place for a general discussion about tabloid sources. That would be VPP or RSN. Let's try to keep this focused on the behavioral issues, please. Vanamonde (Talk) 04:49, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Above anything else, never use tabloids for a source. GoodDay (talk) 14:53, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

GoodDay, Ideally, I would agree. In practice it is not quite that simple. Sometimes tabloids are acceptable (e.g. for sports results). But mostly they are, as you say, to be avoided. Guy (help!) 15:35, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Even then, they are to be avoided. I'm replacing Sun links, and I keep finding details they've enhanced, that are not found or are directly contradicted, by other coverage of the same event, e.g. [20] Increasingly, I don't even trust The Sun for sports coverage, and I think that slight carveout for using it should probably be removed. We deprecated The Sun because they're liars, and it turns out they lie in this area a lot like they lie in other areas - David Gerard (talk) 17:13, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I checked the example given here – a red card for Willie Gibson. It's not clear what the Scottish Sun said about the matter as the links to it are dead now. The other source remaining now is a report of the match by one of the teams playing and so that's partisan rather than independent. Looking elsewhere for a source, I find that The Herald on Sunday reported the incident, "Willie Gibson was shown a straight red card for an alleged stamp on Stephen McKenna after 73 minutes, a decision both he and the midfielder protested." So, that's independent confirmation that the decision was indeed controversial. The example indicates that neither the original editor nor the Scottish Sun was at fault. The effect of Gerard's change was to make this BLP more derogatory and left the fact in question supported by a weaker source. Tsk. Andrew🐉(talk) 15:28, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Players protesting a red card on the field is 0% remarkable, even if the Sun tries to beat it up. Most sources didn't mention a protest at it at all - a telling sign the Sun is doing some enhancement - and I was thinking particularly of this coverage from the Scotsman - in which there's little evidence of this Sun-alleged noteworthy controversy, and the most we see is Dunfermline's manager telling the Scotsman "I didn't think it was a red card, it was harsh, but the referee decided to give it and he's the man that counts" and "I don't want to talk about the ref, I want to talk about the game."

I wouldn't think that was worth quoting either. We really don't have enough evidence to say in Wikpedia voice - as the article previously did, and which you seem to be advocating in your claim that important information has been lost - "His sending off was controversial, leaving Dunfermline player's stunned and many Queens players wanting the official to change his mind" as if this is something remarkable to note. The only reason someone would be looking for evidence for this was a Sun-based attempt to make out there's interesting, colourful, eye-catching controversy - that is, the Sun's stock in trade, and an excellent reason not to trust them and stick strictly to the verifiable facts. I think the claim "more derogatory" is quite a stretch here - David Gerard (talk) 19:53, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Guy mentioned "sport results" not sports coverage. Scores and other hard-numbered data cannot be spun or sensationalised the same way controversial or pseudo-controversial actions during a sports event can. If said deprecated sources can be trusted with regards to sports results and in cases where there are no other, less deprecated sources at hand, exceptions might be allowed. ---Sluzzelin talk 20:48, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yep. The serious problem is that I keep seeing "oh sports from Sun/DM is OK" being used to justify this sort of subjective evaluation of sports-related matters - and that's the precise thing that Sun/DM can't be trusted in. I remove it because lying about that sort of thing is why we deprecated these sources - they're sources that literally can't be trusted. Maybe they can be trusted for mere numbers! Though then there's the ones where the Sun got the year of a match wrong, because neither they nor their readers care ... - David Gerard (talk) 00:02, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think GoodDay is right, and it's highly, highly unlikely that there would ever be any fact that we would need to source that could only be sourced to a tabloid like The Sun. If a fact is sourced to a tabloid, either (1) it can be sourced to something better, (2) it's not true, or (3) it's not important. I'd go as far as to openly challenge anyone to provide an example of an important, true fact that can only be sourced to The Sun or some other tabloid. – Levivich 21:00, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ask yourselves, how many tabloid stories have you seen over the years, that reported Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom was - A] going to abdicate (she hasn't), B] She's going to name William as her heir-apparent (which she can't do) & C] She's dying (but she isn't). GoodDay (talk) 21:10, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Saw C] on the front page of an American tabloid today (sorry, don't remember which one). Apparently, she's hoping Kate will have twins before she dies. - Donald Albury 17:12, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Why no ban?

Why isn't Wikimedia Foundation handing out bans Wikipedia:Long-term abuse/Bidhan Singh. If they're not able to do so, for some technical reason? Please clarify. I think there's enough evidence, to possibly track down the source of those disruptive edits. GoodDay (talk) 15:24, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure why you're asking about why the WMF isn't doing something here. Surely it's far better to approach a relevant staff member directly. But anyway, the obvious first question is, do they even know? I see some suggestion on the LTA talk page of contacting the WMF, but no indication it actually happened. Also this was back in August. So even if it happened soon after, it would be August at the earliest. WMF bans often take time, 4 months is a resonable stretch but not that long and that's assuming the WMF were notified soon after you suggested it. Nil Einne (talk) 15:44, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, remember that there's often no benefit for WMF ban's of LTAs. If the WMF plan to make reports to ISPs, perhaps a wMF ban would be useful for them, but otherwise often not because there's no doubt to anyone on wikipedia that the editor cannot edit and has little chance of being allowed to in the future. Nil Einne (talk) 15:57, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It's just that these types of vandalism from the same individual, has been occurring for seven years. I assumed an administrator or arbitrator (anybody with the tools or know how) would've reported it by now. GoodDay (talk) 16:19, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

LTA that clearly violates Terms of Use may be reported to T&S.--GZWDer (talk) 16:57, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It may. But we also can enforce the Terms of Service ourselves; when we can, we should. . The only ones that need to be reported are those that involve other WP projects also, because then a global ban may be necessary. DGG ( talk ) 11:42, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Generation X

At the moment this is just a content dispute. Primefac (talk) 11:17, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Despite repeated attempts to get Kolya Butternut to bend, I am making no headway. Nor is any other contributor.

A quick view of the (unfortunately heated) talk page will reveal that I have met a man who is proud of his work, but not necessarily open to reason. The Oxford/Cambridge header in the talk page says it all.

The issue is self-explanatory, and the article is wrong. Everyone agrees. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hanoi Road (talk • contribs) 18:36, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

(non-admin comment) - I think this would likely get closed/moved, but as I'm not an admin, I'll just comment. This isn't the place for this type of topic, see either the incidents board for bad faith edits, or WP:AN/3 for three revert-rule violations. It should be noted that there are only two editors on the thread, and I didn't see any 3RR violations from the editor on a very quick scan.

Oh, and it's usually best practice to {{Ping}} an editor when talking about them. Hanoi Road. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 18:55, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Not commenting on the content dispute, but the talk archives are messed up; one bot created archive 6 but the current bot is archiving to archive 3. Makes it hard to figure out all of the red-linked and IP accounts. I can't believe I wasted 30 minutes figuring it out. Can an experienced user correct the bot issue? Rgrds. --Bison X (talk) 20:22, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

User:Hanoi Road has (unsurprisingly) not presented our discussion accurately. This six-section talk page discussion begins here. I have attempted to build off of User:Cullen328's edits to improve the lead.[21] Kolya Butternut (talk) 21:58, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

As I said on ANI, this is a content dispute. The admin boards deal with conduct issues and urgent or serious problems, not content issues. OP is well advised to read the dispute resolution guidelines and seek help through the traditional channels . Captain Eek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 04:05, 2 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Appeal of restrictions

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

I'd like to appeal my editing restrictions at Wikipedia:Editing restrictions#BrandonXLF. I haven't engaged in an edit war or performed any disruptive editing (as fa as I'm aware) since the restrictions were implemented. I have used edit summaries a lot more lately and I have decreased the number of edits I made per page. I have found Special:TemplateSandbox to be really helpful to reduce my number of edits per page when preview decides to now work. I haven't broken the restrictions and it's been over 6 months. I plan to make minor changes to templates (revert vandalism, add listings, fix minor errors) and to expand documentation (and to fix vandalism in documentation). I may create templates with the approval of other editors, but I do not intend on doing this immediately and I will only do it when the template/module is definitely useful for the encyclopedia. Pinging User:Primefac as they imposed the restrictions. – BrandonXLF (talk) 00:35, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Primefac: You negotiated the restrictions here and may want to comment. As I recall, a lot of disruption was due to BrandonXLF trying things out by reworking established templates. I hope there would never be more of that. I doubt there is much need for another person to revert vandalism in templates or their documentation and a more concrete proposal would be desirable. For example, what template would you be thinking of editing, and why? Johnuniq (talk) 09:59, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

My main concern was (and slightly still is) Brandon overhauling (poorly), usurping, or otherwise disrupting well-established template groups with little or no explanation. The lack of edit summaries and not previewing was also problematic, but that seems to have been resolved. Unfortunately this is one of those restrictions that you can't really say is "resolved" until you remove the restriction and see what happens. I'm on the fence, but would not be opposed to the restrictions being lifted. Primefac (talk) 11:30, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I don't intend on touching well established templates, and if I do, I would use the talk page first. Maybe at some point I would request to update Template:Infobox chemical and to stop using Template:Chembox, but this seems unlikely as I would first need to find a reason why the infobox is better and I would have to discuss the changes, which will likely result in nothing happening as it has done before. I think most of the disruption was due to me not using sandboxes, which I now do and will continue to. I was mostly thinking of just the minor edits I have to do when the I see the odd piece of vandalism here or there or I need to update the navbox. I also wanted to work mostly in doc for now because there are a lot of templates to little to no documentation. I was also thinking about making Template:historical affliation with the code at User:BrandonXLF/A as requested by another user (User_talk:WikiWarrior9919#Template:Historical_affiliations), but one still needs a lot of work. When done, it would be used on something like 290 pages, so a lot more work is needed for it to work on all the pages. I thought a module like Module:Sandbox/BrandonXLF/1 would be useful, but I would first need to find a few situations were it would be useful. Same with Module:Sandbox/BrandonXLF/2, but I seems very unlikely that I will create a module because there are other modules that have similar functionality and there's Module:List already. A page where I would expand the documentation would be Template:Infobox order maybe because it currently doesn't have any templateData.– BrandonXLF (talk) 13:32, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

BrandonXLF, I think the best solution would be for you to propose the changes on Talk first for review, and let someone else make them. Then, when you've (re-)established a reputation for carefulness, this will probably go through on the nod. Guy (help!) 15:38, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@JzG: That is what I've been doing and my changes have been done by other people already.– BrandonXLF (talk) 16:28, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

BrandonXLF, perhaps some links then? Guy (help!) 16:43, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@JzG: Kind of hard to find considering I've been doing it for over 6 months. But here are some: [22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30]. As you can see the fact I can technically edit the templates make it hard for me to make edit request.– BrandonXLF (talk) 17:13, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Closure notice

This is not appropriate. There are always many discussions that require closure on ANRFC. Please do not use AN to expedite yours. El_C 17:24, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

There is an inactive discussion concerning merge of ITS launch vehicle and BFR (rocket). It was active on October 2019. N2e requested a closure, but no uninvolved editor came forward. Please look at the discussion to determine the consensus. Thank you. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 12:40, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

SQL appointed full clerk

The Arbitration Committee is pleased to announce that SQL (talk · contribs) has been appointed a full clerk, effective immediately.

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 e-mail to clerks-llists.wikimedia.org.

For the Arbitration Committee, Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 18:33, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#SQL appointed full clerk

Assistance needed at WP:RPP

Handled. -- MelanieN (talk) 04:00, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Could a kindly administrator please protect the BLPs of the professors who are currently testifying before the U.S. Congress? Pamela S. Karlan, Michael Gerhardt, Noah Feldman, and Jonathan Turley. They have been subjected to an onslaught of BLP violations. Thank you. - Mr X 🖋 22:32, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Thanks for the alert. -- MelanieN (talk) 22:37, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks MelanieN, you're the greatest. - Mr X 🖋 03:07, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Disruptive edits on The Voice (American season 17)

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

An anonymous editor has repeatedly reverted material I added to the above article which was verified by a reliable source, removing it with no explanation or rationale. User in question has repeatedly been instructed to discuss this issue on the talk page before reverting it again, and has failed to do so. The nature of the unexplained edits constitute what I believe is a violation of this rule, and the nature of the edits and my attempts to deal with them have proven disruptive to both the information on the page and my efforts to move on to other articles on my watchlist. If I could have an admin look over the page history and verify this user's conduct as disruptive, I'd appreciate it. --Jgstokes (talk) 02:52, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I have blocked the IP 48 hours for a 3RR violation on The Voice (American season 17). EdJohnston (talk) 03:27, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Request for review

Me learnèd colleagues - I have recently been involved in a case of UPE at Texas A&M School of Public Health. I'm posting here to ask for a review of my actions, in case things turn legal.

I first noticed a new account, Tamusphcomm, editing the article - their username seemed an obvious breach of ORGNAME, and smelled of UPE, so I blocked.
I went to the article to look at what they'd been doing in more detail, and saw a number of issues with promotional content, inappropriate external links and the like, so I had a quick tidy up.
Shortly afterwards I was reverted by Sarnold75 without an explanation.
Rather than edit warring, I asked on the talk page why they reverted me.
Sarnold admitted to being an employee of the subject of the article, and they and Kjcomm19 then performed a number of other edits to expand on the article.
I then responded to Sarnold on the talk page, gave them links to COI and PAID, and in fairness to them they haven't edited since.
In the morning, I reviewed their edits, which looked blatantly promotional to me - unsourced sections about research, lists of external links, glossy images which don't actually objectively illustrate the campus, puffy language etc. I made a number of edits to cut the promo, update the tags, etc.
Since then, an IP editor, describing themselves as their Executive Director of Communications and Alumni Affairs, has posted on the talk page demanding to speak to my supervisor. I replied here.
As a part of the aforementioned post, the IP editor mentioned another school (Texas A&M University College of Dentistry) which is also apparently being maintained by UPE editors. I had a quick look, removed some obvious MOS violations and added a COI tag, but to be honest from a look at the history it doesn't look like there's been any problematic editing there for years, so I thought it was probably too stale for a COIN report.

I'm pretty confident that I'm on the right lines here, but since my admin T-shirt is still in its plastic wrapping, I'd welcome a review. Have I overstepped the mark? Is there anything I've missed? Also, I suspect that, having edited the article a few times now, I am INVOLVED, and I do not intend to use the tools further in this matter, but I would welcome others' views on that question. Thanks in advance... GirthSummit _(blether) 19:50, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

(Non-administrator comment) I see nothing particularly wrong with your commentary, however I'm going to get the popcorn out as jusifications of WP:NOTTHEM/WP:WAX only end in more pages being clobbered. Hasteur (talk) 20:37, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Hasteur, hi there - sorry if I'm being dense, but would you like to expand on what you mean by 'being clobbered'? I hope that I haven't removed any useful content from any page, and I'm not looking for anything to be removed if it's good, neutral content - I just want users with an obvious COI to go through to proper channels. I hope the popcorn is tasty - I'm more of a nachos man myself (which is, no doubt, a contributing factor). GirthSummit _(blether) 20:52, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Girth Summit: There is still work to be done; those not yet blocked for spamming against the ToU should themselves also be blocked. ——SN 54129 21:13, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Serial Number 54129, on principle I agree with you: however, each individual account has stopped editing since I provided links to the relevant guidelines; the disruption seems for now to have stopped, so I'm not sure what grounds I would have to block them. Part of why I came here is for some 'what next' advice - as an experienced (!) user, I'd be very grateful for your input. GirthSummit _(blether) 21:41, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Girth Summit: wikt:clobber (more the meaning 1 than 2), because one article 's defender called out deficiencies elsewhere.Hasteur (talk) 21:26, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Hasteur, thanks - sorry if I came across as over defensive there, nobody has ever asked to speak to my supervisor before, thought I'd better make sure! GirthSummit _(blether) 21:32, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Also not an admin, but your actions look entirely appropriate to me and your responses have been reasonable and level-headed. I also think that your INVOLVED concern is a good first instinct, I'll watchlist the page when I'm back on my main account in case more sneaky COI/UPE shows up. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 21:13, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think all of the colleges in the Health Science Center (except for Pharamacy) have major SPAM qualities to them and need substantial revision. Given what we see here I would be unsurprised if these were all heavily influenced by University employees. I see no indication that Girth has acted outside of policy. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 01:06, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Edgar181 desysopped

Conclusive CheckUser evidence was obtained through the scrutinizing process of the 2019 Arbitration Committee election that Edgar181 (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) has been engaging in extensive sockpuppetry. Edgar181, using his sockpuppets, attempted to vote in the election at least seven times.

Edgar181 has admitted to this abuse of his editing privileges in an email to the Committee. Accordingly, Edgar 181 is desysopped under level II procedures.

These accounts have been indefinitely blocked as sockpuppets of Edgar181:

ChemNerd (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Deli nk (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Dwndlnd (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Dwonderl (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Edgeweyes (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Gnome de plume (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
MetrosMan (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Mylucideyes (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Mwg24 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
PCock (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Slideshow Bob (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Tcg2019 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
TimBuck2 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

Support: Joe Roe, KrakatoaKatie, Mkdw, Opabinia regalis, Premeditated Chaos, Worm That Turned

Oppose: None

Not voting: AGK, GorillaWarfare

In addition,

the committee has resolved by motion that Edgar181 should be indefinitely blocked.

Support: Joe Roe, KrakatoaKatie, Mkdw, Premeditated Chaos

Oppose: None

Abstain: Opabinia regalis, Worm That Turned

Not voting: AGK, GorillaWarfare

For the Arbitration Committee,

Katie^talk 21:26, 5 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Edgar181 desysopped

Proxy/VPN IP adress used for POV pushing

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

This IP address seems to be a Proxy/VPN IP address. It is/was used to spread a map of South Asian ethnicities that is politically made to include Afghan-Turkic ethnic groups in South Asian ethnic groups. This was done as the only purpose plus he pushed these maps in many non-english wikipedia pages too.

VPN used to hide identity for the POV push.

Casperti (talk) 02:26, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

All of the IP addresses in the 36.71.224.0/20 range show as VPN/proxy but the address you have there has not edited since Oct. 27. I didn't find any accounts when I checked yesterday. He was only on it for three days and it is kind of stale. He does not appear to have used any other IP addresses in that range since. That is a Indonesian phone company and blocking does not make sense for the level of disruption that he presented.
— Berean Hunter (talk) 03:42, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Please delete incorrectly created archive Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive1

Someone misconfigured WP:RSN and summoned ClueBot to create a new archive which is out of sequence, see [31]. I've reverted ClueBot [32] and removed the offending configuration [33], but need an admin to delete the incorrectly created archive Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive1. -Zanhe (talk) 07:37, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Done. El_C 07:39, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@El C: Update: ClueBot just archived almost the entire RSN again, so removing the config apparently did not fix the problem. (the page is normally archived by Lowercase sigmabot) -Zanhe (talk) 07:43, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I see. Is there anything I can still do to help? El_C 07:46, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I found and deleted another misconfiguration for ClueBot [34], hopefully it'll fix the problem. Just need admins to keep an eye on the page in case it goes wrong again. Thanks! -Zanhe (talk) 07:55, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Template:Toyota road cars timeline, 1985–date

On 22 October 2019, {{Toyota road cars timeline, 1985–date}} was renamed as {{Toyota road cars timeline, Japan Market, 1985–date (Model Years)}}. This has a number of problems:

There was no discussion.
It originally covered international markets, now there is no template for international markets.
Japan uses calendar years, not model years for cars.

I attempted to move it back but the redirect on the original name blocks me. Can an administrator restore the original name? I can then restore the original content myself. Thank you. Stepho talk 07:42, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I don't understand. I moved it back to the original, but no administrative action was needed for that. El_C 07:48, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The move step asked me to come here, probably I missed a step somewhere. Thank you for your prompt action. Stepho talk 08:06, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Weird. Anyway, you're welcome — glad it worked out. El_C 08:12, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Stepho-wrs: Any chance you both selected "Template" from the lefthand drop-down menu and wrote "Template:Toyota road cars timeline, 1985-date" in the right hand field? That would have resulted in moving the template to Template:Template:Toyota road cars timeline, 1985-date title and, I think, gives that message. AddWittyNameHere 16:26, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think you are right. Stepho talk 22:42, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Opinions on INVOLVED

A disclaimer, at the start:- I am not asking for any sort of remote sanction against anybody.

I find myself to be embroiled in a dispute with another admin (User:Sir_Nicholas_de_Mimsy-Porpington), as to whether one of his protections at Ranjan Gogoi was a violation of WP:INVOLVED or not.

My opinion is that, Porpington was long-term involved in a content dispute, as to whether certain content belonged to the page. Evidence may be seen over Talk:Ranjan_Gogoi#Allegations_of_sexual_harassment and Talk:Ranjan_Gogoi#Allegation_of_sexual_harassment, two t/p threads where he is the main participant in favor of a part. way-out and multiple reversion of edits on the same theme, which did not qualify as removal of vandalism.

About two months back, he rollbacked an editor who went contrary to his stated stand over the t/p threads and pending that, went on to impose a Pending Changes Protection, under WP:BLP.

This seems to be a textbook violation of WP:INVOLVED. Porpington apparently disagrees and I will appreciate third-party opinions on the locus. ∯WBG^converse 10:56, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Removing BLP-violating content and then protecting a page to prevent it being readded is very much something an administrator can and should be doing. I may have missed something as I've only read the talk page just now and scanned the article history, but is that not what Sir Nicholas has done here? Fish+Karate 11:03, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We are talking about the Chief Justice of India, not some low-grade BLP. See WP:WELLKNOWN. Now, these particular allegations had wide ramifications to the extent of recently retired fellow Supreme Court Justices penning down op-eds and several mainstream newspapers, mentioning that this case will haunt the Supreme Court of India, for years. The roll-backed edit had all these content, duly sourced.
Is the BLP violation, so clear-cut? If it is, what does not prevent an admin from removing any negative info under the purview of BLP and going about protecting pages/blocking editors? ∯WBG^converse 11:10, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Definitely looks like he's involved. He's removed sourced items from the list under undue and BLP , where it looks like BLP doesn't apply (except on the "opinion piece", it's labeled as such, and consensus looks to be against him, he's the sole individual that wants the incident removed, three others argue for it's inclusion, and at least two versions are soured. Necromonger...We keep what we kill 12:53, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Quote WP:UNINVOLVED: Involvement is generally construed very broadly by the community....Although there are exceptions to the prohibition on involved editors taking administrative action, it is still the best practice, in cases where an administrator may be seen to be involved, to pass the matter to another administrator via the relevant noticeboards. The excepton of course is where ny reasonable administrator would have probably come to the same conclusion; I'm not sure this "BLPVIO" is so egregious as to qualify for that exception. ——SN 54129 12:57, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
In some cases, it was unsourced, so I have no problem. But this for instance, is sourced to Al-Jazeera, among others. At that point, I don't think you can invoke a clear BLP violation exception to act as both admin and editor, no. Of course, once these things start, it can be hard to keep clear. WilyD 13:26, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW. that version also has sources in The Indian Express and The Hindu, arguably two of the most-reputed national dailies. ∯WBG^converse 13:40, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for providing more details. I would say that the content does not clearly violate BLP as it is well-sourced and neutrally-written, and Sir Nicholas therefore needs to take a step back from carrying out any administrative actions on the page, as he is making content decisions, so ought not to be making administrative ones. Fish+Karate 13:50, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I wasn't meaning to slight them. The Al Jazeera was just the first one I noticed, and is sufficient to make the point, I think. WilyD 13:53, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Indefinite community site-ban for Edgar181

For long-term abuse of multiple accounts and manipulation of the consensus process, Edgar181 is indefinitely banned from the English Wikipedia and should not be unblocked unless substantial community consensus is established to permit a return to editing. Concurrently, Edgar181 is subject to an {{ArbCom block}} and should not be unblocked without prior committee approval. –xeno^talk 13:18, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Per my interpretation of the discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Edgar181_desysopped, the announcement at Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Edgar181_desysopped, the justification at Special:Diff/929448788, and my expectation of an unblock request happening one day, the community may want to ban Edgar181 in a way that can only be reversed by community consensus.

Proposal (WP:CBAN): By the community, Edgar181 (talk · contribs) is indefinitely site-banned from the English Wikipedia for repeatedly disruptively abusing multiple accounts. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:58, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

ToBeFree, it was already proposed at ANI (and is not getting support). Schazjmd (talk) 16:02, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I spent too much thinking and research time between making the decision and implementing it. ~~I retract this duplicate proposal.~~ ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:06, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but ban discussions should usually be held here. (reverted my archiving and the header name change). –xeno^talk 18:39, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Wherever it is going to be held, it should only be in one place - so whoever is coordinating this pick one, merge the discussion and point everything to the one place. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:45, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Centralize here. See also comments made in archived ANI thread: Special:PermanentLink/929574107#Proposal: Site ban for Edgar181. –xeno^talk 18:50, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Xeno: Can you please sign your ANI closure?--Bbb23 (talk) 18:56, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Done. –xeno^talk 19:03, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support WP:CBAN per ToBeFree's reasoning as well as Risker's comments on other threads. Schazjmd (talk) 18:52, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose for now: Block and ban are preventive measure, not punishment. The criterion of a ban is not how much damage the user have done in the past, but the likeliness of the abusive pattern to be recurrent. If the user is evading block it may be governed by WP:3X.--GZWDer (talk) 18:54, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support – The community, not Arbcom, should be the one to decide whether, when, and on what terms, Edgar can return to editing. I don't like the idea of a future Arbcom potentially acting on an unblock request privately, without community input. Could a future Arbcom agree to give him a clean start, and we wouldn't even know about it? I can think of Arbcom unblock decisions I disagree with; I bet other editors can, too. I can't be the only editor who'd want to have a say in this. Also, it has to be mentioned, part of the abusive conduct was voting multiple times in the Arbcom election. We'll never know for sure if all the socks were caught, we'll never know who he voted for. Even if the votes didn't swing anyone's candidacy, it's the principle of the thing... leaving it up solely to Arbcom seems unwise. Frankly, if this behavior doesn't merit a CBAN, I don't know what would. Also, big thanks to all the admin who straightened out the logistics of re-opening this thread and moving it to the right place. – Levivich 18:57, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It's worth noting that afaik, they'd be subject to both (I don't know if there's an order process) an ARBCOM appeal and an community appeal, along with whatever paired set of terms (assuming they didn't pass one and fail the other, which is more than possible). There is an interesting question of whether the incoming ARBCOM could be said to be involved (in either way) - we'd have our own necessity setup. Nosebagbear (talk) 19:02, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Nosebagbear: See here for what a successful appeal of community-banned user to ArbCom will look like.--GZWDer (talk) 19:26, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Levivich: I realise it was probably a rhetorical question, but just on the technicality: ArbCom can't "grant" people clean starts. All it does is (optionally) record the former account in case the new one gets checkusered. Blocked editors aren't eligible for a clean start, so Edgar would at the least have to successfully appeal before trying one. Even then, I suspect any attempt to by him to edit under a new account would be seen as evading scrutiny and therefore not a valid clean start. – Joe (talk) 20:16, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

For clarification: I do still support my proposal. I will strikethrough my now-obsolete retraction comment.
I personally see a need for a CBAN, just to completely rule out the possibility of ArbCom unilaterally reversing the block after a private discussion, which they (to my understanding) are currently allowed to do. There is very likely community consensus that such an unblock should not happen, but this consensus has not been formally established. An existing block, whether by ArbCom or not, should not prevent the community from formally clarifying that ArbCom alone does not have the authority to unblock the user. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:04, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose I am only familiar with his edits to chemistry pages which will be missed. Can't you just prevent him from voting or something? Pelirojopajaro (talk) 19:08, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

He can't vote as all of his accounts are indefinitely blocked. RickinBaltimore (talk) 19:10, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah I get that. I guess I care more about his good edits than some election.Pelirojopajaro (talk) 19:19, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Pelirojopajaro: see the discussion at Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Edgar181_desysopped for background. The actions were grievous enough to warrant an ArbCom indefinite block. The discussion now is formalizing his means of appeal through the community and ArbCom. Jip Orlando (talk) 19:13, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support per Levivich. "The community, not Arbcom, should be the one to decide"

That said, I'd welcome him (singular, non-admin) back. He was a valued contributor. He was two or three valued contributors at once. But I expect that's a minority view, and I'd certainly respect a CBAN. It wasn't just ArbCom's trust he was stamping on here. Andy Dingley (talk) 19:14, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'm inclined to lean towards your position actually. This is a strange and unsettling case - I didn't interact with many of the socks, but I had a lot of respect for the three separate people I imagined Deli nk, Gnome de Plume and Edgar181 to be. I'm a believer in second, third and more chances for productive folk who also exhibit behavioural issues; I simply can't imagine what would motivate someone to do something like this, but a user who has made hundreds of thousands of positive contributions (I don't think there's any suggestion that they were vandalising anywhere, unless I've missed something) is potentially someone we might one day want to welcome back if they can get over whatever was going on in their head and make an honest commitment not to repeat it. I'm neutral on the CBAN question; I can totally understand the proposer's perspective on this, and it clearly has merit, but if an unblock request included personal information of the sort that couldn't be made public, Arbcom might be better placed than the general community to make a judgement. GirthSummit _(blether) 19:34, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Per the precedent of Crouch, Swale, even if a user is banned by community, the ban is still able to be removed by ArbCom (and should be appealed to ArbCom in this case), though ArbCom will usually consult the community first (instead of remove the ban unilaterally).--GZWDer (talk) 19:40, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support - I was the one who opened this discussion on AN/I, and was disappointed in the initial response and extremely early closure(s) so to see this moved here is heartening. Levivich, just above, sums up much of my own thinking regarding Edgar. I also believe a global ban and/or cross-wiki ban is called for as a preventative measure. I believe the community needs to make it completely impossible for Edgar to operate openly in any way, shape or form on any Wikimedia project in perpetuity. Edgar’s is an extraordinary violation of community trust that requires, as I see it, extraordinary measures. Jusdafax (talk) 19:16, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Anyone who engages on a campaign of deception for 14 years should be banned because we just cannot trust them. --Rs chen 7754 19:22, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support CBAN, sadly. The amount of trust Edgar undermined by abusing his admin privileges is, frankly, awful. Enough has been said about this both here and at WT:ACN. In my view, he should both need to convince ArbCom to unblock him and the community to restore editing privileges. Jip Orlando (talk) 19:23, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support. This may feel a bit excessive to some people, but then again we've rarely had such a level of abuse by accounts that, on the surface, looked perfectly legitimate. As a former arbitrator myself, and a longtime arbcom watcher, I know that the collective memory of the committee is not always as long as that of the community, and that opinions voiced by the current committee and its members is not guaranteed to be consistent with the opinions and actions of future arbcoms. It is important that the community be *guaranteed* the right of response should a request for unblock come in the future. This will also give more flexibility in addressing any further socks that may be found; the "paperwork" involved in arbitration enforcement can be a pain, and the overlapping community ban will reduce the likelihood that a block of additional accounts will come into question. Risker (talk) 19:29, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I think it may be useful to expand a bit here. Based on the evidence that's currently available, there is a very good chance that these are *not* the only accounts operated by this user. It's a lot easier to manage socks of community-banned accounts - block, point to ban, move on - than to have to deal with an Arbcom enforcement of an Arbcom ban, which requires finding the "case" (which is a motion in this situation), and adding it on as an enforcement action. Tacking on the community ban simply makes future management much easier. I suspect that he'll return to familiar editing haunts (for that matter, he may well have other accounts that are still operating there). Risker (talk) 02:04, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support – if Edgar181 is found socking on two more occasions, this site ban will be automatic per WP:THREESTRIKES. I don't think we should wait around for that to happen. There may be a path for Edgar181 to return, but it will require review by the entire community, not just Arbcom. We're all going to want an apology. – bradv🍁 19:41, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support A vote-stacking admin who has been socking for 13 years... I might be content to leave this as an Arbcom action if it were not for Edgar181's claim that it was just for fun, with no nefarious purpose [35]. That degree of self deception suggests that an eventual appeal is a possibility, in which case the community needs to have a say. Meters (talk) 19:47, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support - The sheer scale (perhaps "depth" is a better description) is one of the most dramatic of any single person socking efforts we've ever seen. Messing with ARBCOM votes is a particularly damming offence. I do feel that it's best we get a say in any future unblock considerations (which if he can resist re-socking (big if) I do actually feel is possible, though his "for fun" reasoning discourages me immensely, and I know many reckon "never", perfectly legitimately). I actually feel the community can get more offended about "and I trusted you" cases like these, then broader basic account socking. Nosebagbear (talk) 19:49, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That's just perfectly normal catastrophe theory. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:47, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Nosebagbear, fwiw, I do think that Edgar tampered with ACEvoting, only because he wished to go out with a bang. As a long-term and technically clueful sysop, he ought to have known the technical details of SecurePoll... ∯WBG^converse 09:01, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Edgar has undoubtedly contributed a great deal to the project, but his use of sockpuppets was a stupendous abuse of trust. We're not talking about some minor breach of WP:VALIDALT: over a sustained period of time, he created at least 13 accounts deliberately designed to deceive others into thinking they were different people (e.g. with userboxes claiming different genders and backgrounds), and used them to try and get his way in content discussions ([36][37][38][39]), project-governance discussions ([40][41][42][43]), and community elections (WP:ACE2019). That shows a complete lack of respect for the consensus-building process and the opinions of his fellow editors. No reasonable excuse for it has been forthcoming.

On the procedural question, speaking as one arb (not for the committee): this came to ArbCom because it was admin misconduct warranting an immediate desysop, and we're the only ones that can handle that. The block/ban didn't have to be an ArbCom action—any individual CheckUser or admin could and probably would block in response to such an egregious misuse of multiple accounts—it just so happened that a majority of us supported it and so it made sense to do it at the same time. A formal community ban on top of that isn't redundant, it serves two purposes: 1) to establish that there is community consensus for the block itself; 2) to ensure that any future unblock also has consensus. ArbCom's role in any appeal should be limited to checking that there hasn't been any further sockpuppetry. It's not for ArbCom alone to decide whether we trust Edgar enough to return to editing. I think any future committee with its collective head screwed on would open it up for discussion anyway, but having this discussion on the record will make sure of it. – Joe (talk) 19:52, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support I suspect that 90+% of Edgar181's edits (and probably over 95%) are helpful, useful and without any controversy. But those handful of bad edits are enough to counter all of the good they've done here, and this post on their talk page is just spitting on the community. Enough. Ravensfire (talk) 19:55, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Ravensfire, I'm not sure we should be too damning about that post. Yes, it is completely inadequate to explain their behaviour, but very few people perform optimally in stressful situations. Whatever we think of Edgar's behaviour, this is someone who has spent a large proportion of their time over many years contributing to this project - it's been a significant part of their life, and this moment of denouement must be stressful. Spitting on the community? Perhaps, but there have been times in my life when I've been in the wrong, and been called out on it, but acted inappropriately in the heat of the moment - human nature is what it is. I'm still neutral on this proposal, and I respect your opinion on the right way to proceed, but I'd be grateful if we could all just take a breath, dampen down our righteous indignation a notch, and do whatever business we have to do without any unnecessary invective directed towards someone who isn't in a good place to speak for themselves just now. GirthSummit _(blether) 20:36, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Girth Summit, That's the part that's really odd for me - that they have contributed in such an incredible manner, for so long, and yet in a handful of cases (and mostly fairly small ways), they've played games. This has been going on so long, and the activity of the socks so impressive, it feels like they were pushing the envelope to see if they were caught, how far could they go. I hear what you're saying and I hope in a month or two they have something different to say. Just not sure there will be. Ravensfire (talk) 05:06, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support -- Shocking breach of community trust. Community should formalise the guarantee that the editor can not return back without direct consensus from the broader community. Usedtobecool ^TALK ✨ 20:23, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Entirely unacceptable conduct. Sandstein 20:24, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support The level of dishonesty from a position of trust is so high in this case that a community review is necessary even in the unlikely event of a future Arbcom granting an appeal.-- P-K3 (talk) 20:28, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support It should absolutely require community review for any unblocking due to the severity and extent of the abuse, prolonged (apparently) over the whole course of their Wiki-career. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 20:32, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose this is process for the sake of process and is highly unnecessary in this case. There also seems to be a hint of wanting to give Edgar his comeuppance, and that's not the purpose of this page. I'm not particularly thrilled with how a somewhat lengthy ANI discussion was shut down and a separate discussion started here without any notification to those who participated in the nullified discussion. Lepricavark (talk) 20:38, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
This discussion was closed with a note pointing here, the discussion largely centered around whether the discussion should actually be had, and that meta discussion was distracting from the ban proposal (see also user talk:Primefac#Please reconsider). Also, this wasn’t an incident, it was a serious ongoing disruption. –xeno^talk 20:54, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I understand that this is technically the proper venue, but I don't think this thread will ultimately make any sort of meaningful difference. Edgar abused trust and he's been blocked for good. Sure, a lot of people are angry, but an angry ANI mob banning him post-departure is about as meaningful as a posthumous execution. Lepricavark (talk) 21:12, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Lepricavark, in fairness to the OP, I believe that the two threads were started independently, this was accidental rather than forum-shopping. However, since you've raised the point, pinging Jusdafax, Bbb23, Creffpublic, Serial Number 54129, Jayron32, Cryptic, Pawnkingthree, Barkeep49, DESiegel and Levivich - apologies to those who are already aware of this and want no further part in it, and to anyone I've missed out. GirthSummit _(blether) 20:59, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
It's almost staggeringly impressive he was able to carry on such a complex network of deception, and for this lengthy a time. I don't think our policy has any sort of answer to such magnificent disruption on this level. It's for that reason that I support a site-ban, regardless of what the "correct" process is.--WaltCip (talk) 20:57, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
oppose. Given he was a former moderator, it's enough he lost access to the tools. I'm sure he regrets what he did. 108.30.105.141 (talk) 21:26, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Are you daft? He literally said he doesn't regret it at all on his talk page. 2001:4898:80E8:3:49FC:F839:FC54:30E (talk) 23:01, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There's also no such thing as a moderator on wikipedia, at least as a formal position. They were an admin. Nil Einne (talk) 03:37, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Well if this editor was already banned by the arbcom, what point is there to ban him a second time? 108.30.105.141 (talk) 10:54, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The editor is blocked by arbcom, not banned. The difference between an arbcom ban and an arbcom block in this case is IMO perhaps not much, except that most arbcom bans have a minimum period before review. But in any case, as explained by the opener and many participants, what's being asked here is a community ban. It's generally accepted that community bans cannot currently be appealed to anyone but the community. As I said in my !vote, I find it very unlikely arbcom will unblock without asking the community, but as long as it's only an arbcom block, this remains more likely, and some feel it's likely enough that it's worth establishing this is a community ban to try and protect against this eventuality. Nil Einne (talk) 14:54, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

See this. He actually does regret what he did. 108.30.105.141 (talk) 10:58, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose, no need cast more stones. Formal community ban no help in detecting future socking if any. bishzilla _ROARR!! pocket 21:30, 6 December 2019 (UTC). (edit conflict) Oh, seriously, Bishzilla! Striking out. Sorry, everybody. Bishonen | talk 21:35, 6 December 2019 (UTC).[reply]
(edit conflict) Oppose as pointless. Edgar181 is arbcom blocked and will not be unblocked without very good reason and lots of scrutiny. A formal ban will not change this. A formal ban will not help in detecting future socking, nor authorize any tools or procedures not already authorized by the arbcom finding. The only non-symbolic effect would be that if a future arbcom ever decided, with good reason, to unblock (unlikely but in theory possible) an additional hoop of removing the ban would be required. Does it seem likely that a future arbcom would unblock here under such circumstances that a separate community review here at ANI or some simialr forum would be needed to confirm that such an unblock would be OK? DES ^(talk)_{DESiegel Contribs} 21:32, 6 December 2019 (UTC) This repeats my comment on the ANI thread. All ther ANI comments should really have been copied to this thread when that one was closed and redirected to this one, in my view. Having a split discussion serves no one, and effectively discarding comments because the OP to that thread used the (arguably) wrong forum is unfair and undesirable. I have not changed my earlier view. DES ^(talk)_{DESiegel Contribs} 21:32, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

DESiegel, there is a note at the top for the closer to refer to the ANI thread for additional commentary. I don’t see that all the meta discussion needs to be reproduced here, and someone else has pinged all the participants if they want to re-iterate on the merits. Re-starting here seemed cleanest. –xeno^talk 22:11, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support I think that a community ban is justified in addition to the ArbCom block due to the dishonesty here. Given that their conduct was a gross violation of community norms, I think that it's appropriate for this person to gain the support of the community if they wish to return to Wikipedia in the future, and not just satisfy ArbCom's unblock criteria. Nick-D (talk) 21:44, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Suppose Oppose because i don't see the real difference, but support becauase a good number of people seem to want to do this and I have no problem putting extra hurdles in the way of someone who engaged in thsi level of bad-faith behavior. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:06, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. It is unnecessary to have two bans. ArbCom has indefinitely blocked him and removed his tools. Nothing for us to do. No need to intrude on ArbCom who have taken the correct course of action here.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 22:31, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Clearly, this has been one of the worst betrayals in the history of the project, and it is appropriate for the community to go on the record to say so. Although ArbCom is already positioned to stand as the gatekeeper to any request for a return, it's a net positive to require community consultation before ArbCom grants anything. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:13, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Grudging support per Beeblebrox due to the severity of this whole incident, even though I was predisposed to oppose (as a cban here isn't strictly necessary, nor would it be really useful). But I had considered Deli nk as potential admin material, and am truly shocked to see this. GAB^gab 23:19, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Similar to another event happening in the US, this might not technically change anything, but it's about saying "this shit is not okay and we won't tolerate it". – Frood (talk) 23:47, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support This sends a message, and can be pointed to in the future. 2001:4898:80E8:3:49FC:F839:FC54:30E (talk) 23:52, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Any future decision to allow this de-frocked user to edit again should be in the hands of the en-wikipedia community to decide. Loopy30 (talk) 00:00, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support - While this isn’t that big of an offense, it should be under community oversight, Ed’s eventual return should be under community oversight, not Arbcom’s. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 00:33, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Why? Indefintiely blocked, banned for a year, what are we fixing here? It seems like grave dancing. Guy (help!) 00:39, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Before creating this proposal, I slept a night over the decision instead of making it late-evening, and let this go through my head during the day. I then created it after re-reading the banning policy and apologized to the discussed user, especially clarifying that I do not want to "grave dance". One may argue that it still is gravedancing, but if it is ever acceptable, then in this proportion to over a decade of betrayal followed by, well, the grave dancing on us. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:52, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Guy, where does it say he is banned for a year? I see "indefinitely blocked" and "desysopped", but no actual statement by anyone that he is actually banned. Am I missing something? Risker (talk) 02:07, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Even with good content creation, a 14-year charade with such dishonesty and deception goes against nearly everything the project stands for. The nature of this incident goes beyond the procedural and technical aspects of an ArbCom block. I agree that should this user ever repent, they must regain the trust of the community they betrayed (which for some will certainly not be easy if at all possible) in addition to appealing to ArbCom. ComplexRational (talk) 00:47, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Just read about this. I am shocked that he has managed to get away with this for over a decade. funplussmart (talk) 02:05, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support regretfully. I understand the concerns about grave dancing and prevention vs punishment, but I do not feel those apply in this instance. Edgar has very seriously violated the trust the community has placed in them. In order for any return to be successful (socially speaking), the community needs to be convinced that our trust will not be misplaced again. The way to do that is for the restrictions to be appealed to the community rather than ArbCom. I see this, essentially, as the community taking over the block of Edgar from ArbCom rather than as adding insult to injury. I would be equally satisfied with ArbCom passing a motion stating something like "Any appeals of this block must be made to the community at a noticeboard or village pump rather than to the arbitration committee itself." which would have a similar effect. Wug·a·po·des 02:13, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support banning of a mega-sockmaster. GoodDay (talk) 02:16, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support banning, as this is an administrator that abused his privileges as well as sock-puppetry. Also support creation of a LTA page in case any of his socks come back, since that is a possibility - he did say he got amusement out of doing it on his talkpage. Kirbanzo ^{(userpage - talk - contribs)} 02:59, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support . Obviously, and essential, and per Risker. It may not be a 'big offense' Swarm, but it is hugely damaging to the collaborative spirit and morale of most of our regular and honest users. One wonders how many are getting away with this kind of thing - it's pretty monstrous considering the enormous global impact Wikipedia has achieved as possibly the word's biggest ever voluntary, collaborative project. The shame in his actions is that it casts distrust and suspicion on the entire corps of admins, and does little for Wikipedia's reputation when the international media gets hold of it. RfA is going to be an even harder hurdle to get over for future candidates. This is probably even worse than Pastor Theo, and at least two others who have very seriously compromised our confidence in bureaucrats and admins and whom those with shorter institutional memory will have forgotten already. I cannot believe that this is the character this individual claims to be on their user page. Having made some good contributions as a medicinal chemist with a PhD in organic chemistry (if that's what he really is) is no argument for clemency, @Pelirojopajaro and Girth Summit: (although it sadly happens all the time). Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:19, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the mention, Kudpung. Something that we need to always keep in mind is that the underlying philosophy that has brought Wikipedia so much success is that "everyone" can edit. We've proven over almost 19 years that this is a recipe for success. We know that, at times, some potentially bad players will take advantage of our openness. While it is inevitable that we, as individuals, will be disappointed when this happens, it is incredibly important that we never lose sight of our reason for success. Thus, there is no reason to make RFA "harder" - in fact, I'd argue that it should be easier. There's no reason to constantly invade the privacy of our users who are carrying out normal activities; first, we don't have enough personnel to do it, and second...does anyone want 40-odd people to know that much about them? We shouldn't allow this event to change *us*. We should hope that this event changes *him*. We did nothing wrong, and we need to stop behaving as though we did. Risker (talk) 05:42, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, Risker, I am certainly not advocating making adminship harder to obtain. Quite the contrary, my criteria while detailed, often reffered to by adminship detractors as a 'laundty list', are actually one of the most permissive sets of RfA criteria out there. It's going to be the regular opposers who will claim that even more due diligence be exercised when electing candidates. No, as you say: 'we' haven't done anything wrong. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 05:10, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Kudpung - I'm not sure that I'm advocating for clemency exactly, just the possibility of reconciliation at some point in the future - I'd be happy to leave it to Arbcom to assess of any explanation for these actions, and to judge the sincerity of any promise not to repeat them, but if the community wants a say in that process I'm not going to argue against that. GirthSummit _(blether) 11:16, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Weak support what Edgar181 did is terrible, and there's no way in hell they should be allowed back anytime soon. But I don't think we need a ban for that. In the event they ask for an unblock, there seems to be no chance it will be granted without arbcom asking the community. And no chance an arbcom will grant it if it goes to the community and there isn't clear consensus. If Edgar181 keeps socking, we don't need a ban to establish that their edits can be reverted on sight, and any socks instantly blocked. And I'm not really onboard with banning just to send a message. But refusing to ban them IMO sends a worst message, so ..... Nil Einne (talk) 03:37, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Meh per BBrox. ∯WBG^converse 05:54, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per the reasons I gave earlier (how many fucking times does this need rehashing—E181 aint coming back; all this wailing the "help help he might sock" mantras misunderstands what has actually been going on. Their talk page sums it up, for anyone more than 2-dimensionally minded.) ——SN54129 07:05, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- SN, to answer your question: one fucking time is how many times we need to hash whether to impose a CBAN. Just one fucking time. – Levivich 07:50, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  - Well, obviously counting can be difficult—metatheoretically—but for something that only needs hashing once, why then the fucking rehashing. ——SN54129 08:02, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    - Nah, counting is easy. This is the first and only hashing. The number of the hashings shall be one. – Levivich 14:06, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
      - I assume SN54129 is referring to the earlier discussion at ANI which they (and you) participated in. To be fair, this was opened not that long later and independently, and although that discussion was closed at various times, I believe it was eventually agreed it should stay open at least 24 hours. Also the note to closer suggests they should consider any opinions there if the editors never made it here as this was chosen as the centralised place for the discussion, but the comments there were not copied here because there was a lot of other stuff and I guess selective copying is likely to cause more problems. So it's more a case of continuing the "hashing" at a single place but without all hasing being in one place. Still it is a confusing situation and I can understand the frustrations of those who participated there. Nil Einne (talk) 16:02, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support - The message must be sent that socking is wikisuicide, particularly at this scale and particularly when you clearly know better. This individual must not be allowed back in this lifetime under any circumstances. If it's only symbolic, which is debatable, it's also very low cost, and there is something to be said for symbolism. ―Mandruss ☎ 07:17, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral. This is only the second admin to have been caught abusively socking this year. We also just had a different case where an established user had been absusively socking for five years before being caught. At least Edgar bothered to give us an honest explanation for his actions.
What he did was sorta pathetic, but step back and really think about it. He was votestacking his own AFDs, blocking himself for edit warring, blocking vandals he reported without a talk notice, doing this kinda thing, etc. He didn't seem to vandalize anything, though. Why? Simple; he thought it was fun to manipulate and exercise power over others while pushing his editorial views on the project.
If you ask me, plenty of editors do that with or without socking; they treat this place as their personal playground and bully others to get what they want. POV pushers do it. Unblockables do it. Some admins even do it. That's the result of valuing the end product over the people who make it.
I don't think a CBAN is going to do much here besides give people a false sense of security and feed into the narrative that these cases are anything special. I sincerely doubt that anyone will unblock Edgar without community input. It's more important that we think critically about why our community seems so attractive to these types of individuals who want nothing more than to fix outcomes in their favor. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 07:29, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support a Site Ban - I don't agree with the idea that blocks and bans are preventive and not punitive. I think that offenses warrant punitive action, and this is one of them. Robert McClenon (talk) 08:31, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- @Robert McClenon: Would you mind clarifying that what you call an "idea", is actually—err!—a Wikipedia policy? Many thanks! ——SN54129 08:47, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  - Policies reflect accepted practice, which can change. Since accepted practice could never change without opposition, it's illogical to say that policies must never be opposed in practice. (I also oppose "preventative not punitive", as punitive is preventative by virtue of its deterrent value, and this is something that the rest of the world figured out centuries ago. Why Wikipedia thinks it's smart enough to dismiss the wisdom of the ages baffles me, but then a lot about Wikipedia baffles me.) ―Mandruss ☎ 09:06, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It clearly does. ——SN 54129 10:58, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, what a clever comeback. ―Mandruss ☎ 11:13, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

H'mm. Well, notwithstanding that only children expect (or reply with) "comeback", you remain baffled. That seems usual. ——SN 54129 11:39, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

User:Serial Number 54129, User:Mandruss - I am aware that I am stating that Wikipedia policy is nobly misguided. The thinking behind the policy may be quasi-utopian, the idea that Wikipedia can be an experiment in better justice. In my opinion, it has worked better than some utopian experiments, in that it hasn't been a disaster. However, still in my opinion, it has had its limitations, including that it is too often gamed, and it is still a noble mistake, an honorable experiment that has failed. Robert McClenon (talk) 15:11, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Question- all those AfDs that Edgar181 votestacked... should we re-examine those? Sure, most of them will turn out to be hopeless anyway but we need to be seen to be doing things the right way. Reyk _YO! 11:04, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think that's a good idea, but we should focus mainly on those in which sock !votes ended up tipping the balance in favor of one outcome (as opposed to cases of SNOW or with only one !vote, for example) and reassess the result if necessary. Also, we should check for possible supervotes from the admin account, as those closures could quite possibly be biased. ComplexRational (talk) 02:25, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This is still unnecessary. The idea expressed above that it would prevent an unbanning is absurd - the arbitration committee can, and has before, reversed community bans without consulting the community first.
Also, for a betrayal of trust done for the lulz, you all seem awfully intent on providing him even more lulz. —Cryptic 11:09, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Cryptic: Do you have a recent example? My understanding was that, since the BASC was disbanded, ArbCom only handles appeals of checkuser and oversight blocks, arbitration enforcement blocks, and blocks based on nonpublic information. A standard community ban like this would be outside our remit. When people that are both ArbCom blocked and community banned have appealed in my term, we've only unblocked them so that they can make an appeal at AN. – Joe (talk) 11:19, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Recent? No. But neither WP:ARBPOL nor the motion you link say "only", in either sense - that arbcom can only hear an appeal if it's a CU/OS/AE/privacy block, or that it won't hear appeals unless those are the only kinds of bans the user is subject to. The words that do appear are "for the time being", which is hardly an assurance. —Cryptic 11:33, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'm pretty sure that's what the motion means. In any case it's the current practice. I believe the "for the time being" wording was there because the intention was to eventually phase out appeals to ArbCom for CU/OS/nonpublic blocks as well. – Joe (talk) 15:36, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support. I accept it's unlikely to make any practical difference either way and my initial response was pretty much "meh" or "per Beeblebrox". But after reading the arguments, I can see it's really just about who should get the final say in any possible future rehabilitation attempt, ArbCom or the wider Community. And I have to come down on the side of the community. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:06, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Was leaning Oppose citing process for process' sake but upon readin most of the support I agree some action should be taken, and given the fact that everyone is already here let's get some use from our time rather than writing it off as a waste. IS Ed wants back he can come appeal in 10 years minimum, which is far more lenient than what i think real life conmen should get. Madoff's got 139.5 years left. I do wonder though, which socks of his are present and what is their reasoning? ^Thanks,L3X1 ◊distænt write◊ 13:37, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Rather than have accountability explained in private emails to Arbcom which the community would never see, he owes the explanations and negotiation of unblocking to the community. The community should be part of that process and make its own terms. Further, it would be far more contentious if Arbcom were to unblock and its perennial detractors as well as others would consider it fuel for the fire and great drama would ensue. With a community consensus, blame would not be assessed on the few that are already blamed far too much and too often. His deception was to the community so he would need to explain to the community.
— Berean Hunter (talk) 13:57, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Amazed at this turn of events, but oppose the current proposal in line with Literaturegeek's thinking and that of Lepricavark and, especially, DESiegel. Happy days, Lindsay^Hello 14:28, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support for many reasons, but especially per the reasoning of Risker, Joe Roe, and Berean Hunter. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 20:47, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Having read the explanation by User:Edgar181 of his sockpuppetry that he was doing it for his own amusement, and to see if he could get away with it, I believe him. It was a breaching experiment. There are places and times for breaching experiments, within very strict limits, because they involve humans who may not want to be involved in experiments; and this was not a time or place when a breaching experiment was appropriate. The fact that Edgar181 was doing it for his own amusement does not change my above stated view that he should be banned. Intentional communities rely fundamentally on trust, and trust was broken in a fundamental way. It would not be very far from allowing sockpuppetry for amusement, to allowing the publication of stories about phantom places for amusement, or to allowing BLP violations for amusement. I believe his explanation, and it doesn't change anything. Robert McClenon (talk) 21:01, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. Harold and Erving would be immensely proud, I feel. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:18, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW, I don't believe him for a second. Votestacking RFAs and AFDs isn't just for fun, it's malicious. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 21:21, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Only fun when you win, I guess. But I tend to agree. I guess someone has already checked the margins of all of those votes to see if it made any "real" difference? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:27, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support As a current member of the Arbitration Committee, it would be hard to imagine an appeal process that would lead to Edgar181 being successfully unblocked without a community consultation process. The committee has used community consultation in assessing certain unblock appeals in the past and it is something I am in favour of the committee continuing to do when possible (where the material arguments of an appeal are not based upon private evidence). It should be worth pointing out that there are several instances of editors who have been ArbCom blocked and community banned simultaneously. I can only speak about this committee and cannot make any guarantees about a committee in the future, so a CBAN now would make it abundantly clear for Edgar181 (and ArbCom) that any appeal he puts forward will not only need to convince the then sitting members of the committee, but also the community. I know Wikipedia does not like additional bureaucracy and in most cases, this would be unnecessary and excessive, but this was an extraordinary situation that involved a fairly egregious breach of community trust. It is therefore, uniquely, a situation where the community is heavily invested in the outcome. Mkdw ^talk 21:50, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support because this was cross-wiki socking, you need evidence of community discussion like this before a global ban can be considered. He's either currently socking or will be back, probably on multiple projects, so documenting this for a few months down the line when the inevitable global ban discussion occurs helps tick the checkboxes for the meta rules. TonyBallioni (talk) 23:57, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
That's a very good point. I remember how hard it was to get a global ban through for INeverCry and how surprised I was at the lengths some people at Meta will go to support the bad guys. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:20, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Absolutely egregious in all ways. Per Levivich's well put reasoning. Captain Eek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 03:52, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Admission of actions and 13 confirmed socks. I could get a BINGO if this were terms from a deviance class. The claim of "breaching experiment" is just a justification or account (Scott and Lyman) for being caught for breaking rules. EvergreenFir (talk) 04:33, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Having clearly lost the community's trust this is the obviously correct next step for us to take. IntoThinAir (talk) 05:07, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose As I understand it, most of Edgar181's contributions have been valid and useful and so, overall, their total is a big net positive. A ban might encourage pointy reversion of all that good work and so would be a net negative. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:17, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Edits made by somebody before they were banned can't be reverted just because that person was banned later. Hut 8.5 11:57, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support this behaviour absolutely merits a ban - if it doesn't then there honestly isn't much which would. Admittedly someone who's been indefinitely blocked by ArbCom presumably can't be unblocked without ArbCom's approval, so he is kind of banned already, but I don't see any harm in making it official and it does prevent an unblock without community consultation. Hut 8.5 11:57, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Support Trust is essential for this project. The damage is to the community and if trust is to be rebuilt, the community will be needed to do it. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:24, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Range blocks

@DerHexer: A reader contacted Wikipedia ticket:2019120610006149 with the following statement:

Hi,
Quick question, someone has blocked one of the largest mobile phone operators Telefónica/Mobilcom-Debitel/freenet Funk for a year?
Quote:
Editing from your IP address range (46.114.0.0/21) has been blocked (disabled) on all Wikimedia wikis until 11:55, 10 October 2020 by DerHexer (meta.wikimedia.org) for the following reason: Long-term abuse
This block began on 16:21, 26 October 2019
Unquote
Are you serious? Maybe that is a bit over the top?
Needless to say, the blocking user, DerHexer, can only be reached via editing. Which is a bit of a catch 22 for blocked users, isn't it?
Maybe someone wants to look into this.

I am separately arranging to help them register a username. However, I responded that it was my impression that a year-long block for this wider range was unusual, but I don't get involved enough with range blocks to know whether my impression was valid, so I offered to bring it hereS Philbrick (Talk) 20:07, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Der Hexer locked this IP range for long term abuse, per his post on meta. Necromonger...We keep what we kill 20:20, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not an IP expert, but they must be dealing with a nasty LTA for it to go to Meta for a Steward to block. A whole range assigned to a mobile provider seems to be affected. There was a discussion here a few months back regarding a large rangeblock by TonyBallioni that affects all TMobile users in the US. Account registration is permitted but anon only is disallowed. I don't think this is unusual, especially with a nasty LTA (hence the reason for the TMobile block). Jip Orlando (talk) 20:27, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I just reblocked it after I had to lift it for a short time. @Ruslik0: set the original block. Best, —DerHexer (Talk) 21:21, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

NOTE: It should've been moved to stewards queue where we can directly respond to the customer. — regards, Revi 11:30, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Page creation request for CarryMinati

Can someone please redirect CarryMinati to Ajey Nagar? CarryMinati has been deleted multiple times previously and is protected from vandalism.— Vaibhavafro ^💬 20:31, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Seems reasonable,

Done. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:10, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Beeblebrox: Can you please do the same for Carry Minati?— Vaibhavafro ^💬 09:28, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Vaibhavafro:

Done –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 15:45, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Palestine-Israel articles 4: workshop reopened

Because of the nature of the Palestine-Israel articles 4 arbitration case and the importance of the exact wording of remedies, the Arbitration Committee would like to invite further public comment and workshopping on its preliminary proposed decision, which is now posted on the workshop. Accordingly, the workshop in this case is re-opened and will remain open until Friday, December 13. For the Arbitration Committee, Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 23:55, 6 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Palestine-Israel articles 4: workshop reopened

Help with move

The filer, User:Wugapodes has self-reverted their close so the move request is back in the queue. Due to the protection issue it might be simpler for an admin to handle it. Doesn't require more attention here. EdJohnston (talk) 03:48, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Already spent more time on this than I care to. Close reverted per Tavix. Help, or don't, I'll be doing other things. Wug·a·po·des 03:05, 7 December 2019 (UTC) I closed this move request but a number of the pages to be moved are full protected. Would an admin please carry out the moves as stated in the closing rationale (note that it differs from the proposal). If it's not clear what needs done or you have questions feel free to ping me. Wug·a·po·des 02:07, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Wugapodes:. It is a WP:BADNAC to close something that you do not have the capability to carry out. I suggest you revert your closure and let an admin close it. -- Tavix ^(talk) 02:10, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If an admin would like to take over or revert the close rather than acting on it, I'm fine with that, but per WP:NOTBURO I'm not going to let a move request languish in the backlog just because people made eclectic decisions to full protect rather than template protect some pages in a set. Wug·a·po·des 02:21, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If the issue is with the protection level, then perhaps you should talk to the admin who protected it or submit a request to WP:RFUP. Once that is taken care of, then you'll have the capability to make the close you're wanting to make. -- Tavix ^(talk) 02:26, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

While some have a bit excessive protection level there's no doubt that a 7 million transclusions template like {{main other}} with no substantial edits for a decade qualify for full protection. For the close itself I see no good reason to revert, the close it self is fine and closing it even though they can't carry it out was probably just a mistake. It's very rare for a template editor to find a template they can't edit and forgetting wouldn't be weird at all. If an admin just moved the pages it would be over in five minutes. ‑‑Trialpears (talk) 02:51, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

{{main other}} and I think two others are cascade protected, and per WP:CASC the whole set probably should be as well since they don't really see much development. Wug·a·po·des 03:18, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Cascade protecting the lot wouldn't be appropriate. Several of them don't have even a thousand transclusions and only a few have over a million where full protection would even be considered now a days. {{talk other}} with ~150 000 transclusions seems to be fully protected mostly because it wasn't reduced when template protection was introduced. ‑‑Trialpears (talk) 03:38, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Ending iban from 2016

Any opposition to rescinding this interaction ban from 2016? The admin in charge, Nyttend, suggested quite a while ago I raise the question here, but it seemed obsolete and not worth bothering with, since one party was blocked as a HughD sock (I was right all along, btw. They said I was mad but I was right; just saying. Just saying. No apologies necessary.) and two others went dark. Any reason to continue enforcing it? --Dennis Bratland (talk) 17:30, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

As a note, you weren't IBANNED just on the grounds of accusing someone to be a sock, but for a whole bunch of behaviour - that an account is a sock doesn't change our Civility requirements. All the phrasing in this just makes me distinctly reticent to support any change - you were IBanned from 4 parties - 1 sock, 2 you say are dark - what about the 4th? Nosebagbear (talk) 21:17, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, those are all valid points. Also, being banned from interacting with people who aren't editing isn't likely to cause you any real problems, although I understand the desire not to have it hanging over your head forever. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:28, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support - the I-bans should be lifted. Seeing as the 3 accounts-in-question are no longer active. GoodDay (talk) 22:32, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

PS - and there's no friction with the fourth (active) account. GoodDay (talk) 02:29, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

A few things:

There's not 3 accounts, there's 4, making a 5-way iban, counting me.
I assumed an account being inactive or blocked doesn't protect me from being sanctioned for so much as mentioning them or touching one of their edits. If so, then I have less reason to request ending the iban.
The fourth editor seems to have gone back to what he was doing and there's no reason to assume there will be any further battleground battling from either of us.
The two inactive accounts walk and talk and look like single-purpose accounts, either meat or sock puppets, who had no reason to continue editing as long as the battle they'd been brought in to fight was over. One quit editing immediately after the iban, the other hung around a couple more years, fighting with others then quit for no obvious reason. Not perfect proof I was right, but it's not nothing.
The blocked sockpuppet might not be an issue, but the sockmaster behind the sock, is as active as ever: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/HughD/Archive. They recently burned through four sock accounts on one of their obsessions, Kawasaki Ninja ZX-12R. They then posted a threat/taunt on my talk page that they are going to go on "amusing" themselves with their usual socking, battlegrounding, and harassment.
Next thing you know, one of the topics, Dodge Tomahawk, that was a bitter bone of contention between me and the sockpuppet &co is suddenly reactivated, re-igniting the a 3 year old battle that just happens to have immediately preceded the iban. By an account with a history of sockpuppetry dating to 2008 who went dark in May 2015 earlier in the same year one of the iban participants began, 22 September 2015, and awoke 26 September 2018, one month after the ibanned account made their last edit, 31 August 2018. The tone and word choice of their taunts is pretty consistent, and their editing on topics outside my interest is eerily similar.
I know, I know, I should be pinning string to a wall with cards. But talk to anybody who's spent the last 3 years playing whack-a-mole with HughD socks. It does this to a person. It's why I ended up interaction banned.
Point being I can't even openly discuss any this without risking violating the iban. If I'm going to still be the target of harassment whenever the sock master feels like activating a sleeper account or making a new one, I should at least be allowed to respond.

So if I'm right, then the iban should be lifted because I'm being harassed by them. If I'm wrong, then it should be lifted because it's long past being necessary. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 23:52, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The fourth account-in-question, is still active. Are you requesting to have your I-Ban between yourself & @Skyring:, lifted? GoodDay (talk) 02:06, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, in the sense that it's a pain in the ass to worry about. But on the other hand, I think it's highly unlikely I'll cross paths with him. We're interested in such different topics that if it wasn't lifted I don't think either of us would notice. It's really the iban with other three that is of concern now. I would think admins would prefer to have one less iban to keep track of, but that's not really my problem. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 02:24, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@GoodDay: what do you mean "no friction with the fourth (active) account". AFAICT, Skyring has not commented whether they support or oppose the iban. Do you simply mean that Dennis Bratland has obeyed the iban? The whole point of an iban is to end friction by ending interactions between editors, so if it's obeyed there should generally be little friction. (Albeit with the complexities of indirect interactions if the editors regularly edit similar articles.) Nil Einne (talk) 06:04, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I would support lifting the Iban on the sock, since we generally do that on request. For the inactive ones, I'll probably support as well. As for Skyring, I'll await their comment. I would note that I'm fairly sure that the "appealing the ban" exemption means you also have to perform compulsory notification when appealing the ban. And in any case, if you are unsure whether you're allowed to perform the notification, you should mention that you have not performed it when opening the discussion. Still I'll notify all the unblocked ones for you. Nil Einne (talk) 05:49, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I have given my reasons privately to Nil. I would prefer this iBan continue. --Pete (talk) 07:04, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

One factor to consider is the behavior of all editors involved after the iBan was put in place. For example Dennis Bratland has been blocked from editing for violating the iBan three times. Sennen Goroshi ! (talk) 08:02, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support removing IBANs except Pete's. Pete saying that they want to keep it in place is good enough justification for me. As for the other IBANs, those can be lift with the failsafe that any uninvolved admin can reimpose them if Dennis somehow gets into a dispute with them upon their return (with the exception of the sockpuppet master which should be converted into a one-way). –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 09:25, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose removing interaction ban, due to Dennis having three blocks for violating said interaction ban. Sennen Goroshi ! (talk) 10:49, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose lifting the iban with Pete. Since Pete want's to keep it in place, and Dennis Bratland doesn't seem to have outlined sufficient problems it's causing to warrant lifting it despite the opposition. Especially since, as others have pointed out, the original appeal seems to downplay the reasons for the iban. With 1 active editor, and 2 including one who was active until 2018, who have not been blocked, it's ahrd to claim it's just because of a sock. (As also mentioned, editors really should be able to mostly keep their cool even when dealing with socks anyway.) After further consideration, I also only support lifting for the 2 inactives as long as they remain inactive. If they become active again and they ask for it to be reinstated, this should happen. Dennis Bratland should be notified before it takes effect. For the sock, I support lifting. BTW, I wrote this after reading Pete's email, but I think I would have said more or less the same thing even if I had not read it. Nil Einne (talk) 13:04, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Suggestions for Sadhu Shetty?

We have a stub on Indian mobster Sadhu Shetty. We previously had a more extensive article about him, though. In 2016, it was nominated for deletion by User:PageImp, with a result of keep. Following the discussion, the same user removed much of the article content and later that year nominated it for speedy deletion. It was deleted by User:Anthony Bradbury under WP:CSD#A7. The article was restarted this year by User:Gpkp, and User:PageImp again nominated it for speedy deletion today. I declined the speedy, but where should we go from here? - Eureka Lott 18:52, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, I don't understand how that stub could have been mistaken by anyone for an A7 candidate given that it's referenced to multiple potentially-WP:SIGCOV-sources [44] [45]; it seems if anyone thinks it should be deleted, they should take it to AfD. – Levivich 20:20, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
While I have comment on whether or not the article should have been deleted under A7, neither of those sources were used in the article [46]. They aren't listed at the AFD either. There is mention of multiple sources with a Google search shown, but it's impossible to know, unless someone recorded it, what showed up in 2016. And it's impossible to know what showed up for any particularly editor unless they have a record. There were a bunch more sources before the removals by PageImp (and others?) but I don't see any sign of those 2 sources. [47] They are in the article now, and since they both predate 2016 it's reasonable to assume they existed in 2016, but they weren't in the article then and it's obviously impossible for an admin in 2016 to know what will be in an article in 2019. So at most it's a WP:BEFORE issue. And I believe it's generally accepted that WP:BEFORE rests with the tagger rather than the admin Wikipedia:Credible claim of significance. (Although they probably should notice if there has been recent mass deletions and consider how that affects things.) P.S. For us non admins, it may not have been possible to know what was in the article in 2016 before the history was undeleted below, but we should know that what the article was like in 2019 would not tell us what it was like in 2016.) Nil Einne (talk) 05:43, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks to Cryptic for restoring the history. Let's save everyone some diff-diving:
Here is what the article looked like in July 2016: 7,500k readable prose, 15 refs, including this 2002 Time of India profile. There are also Indian Express links that are dead now, but I think this might be one of them.

In August 2016 PageImp reduced it to a 3-source stub and nominated it for AfD. The Times of India story linked above was one of the sources that was removed.

The AfD resulted in keep.

Three months later, an IP removes the infobox and one of the three sources.

The next day, PageImp tags it A7.

It was deleted A7 by Anthony Bradbury.

Three years later it was recreated, including the 2002 Times of India reference, and this 1998 story in India Today.

A few months after that, PageImp tagged it A7 again.

Eureka Lott removed the tag and posted here.
An admin making a CSD mistake is no big deal, especially one three years old, but I don't think either of those A7 taggings are OK, especially the recent one. – Levivich 07:51, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Apologies, I foolishly assumed without checking that it was speedy tagged this time as a recreation of a deleted page rather than A7 so the above complaints were about the speedy tagging and deletion in 2016. In which case I felt it was important to emphasise what was in the article in 2019 had very limited connection to whether or not mistakes were made in 2016. I see now that it was nominated for A7 again so the complaint was for the recent speedy deletion tagging, not the 2016 tagging and deletion. So, sorry for the confusion. Nil Einne (talk) 12:23, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Definitely notable per Levivich with several SIGCOVS. A much larger article could exist here (and a very interesting one). Clearly something not right going on with User:PageImp that needs a closer inspection, and possible action to avoid the disruption to this article (or other articles this is happening on). Britishfinance (talk) 20:36, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I've restored the history. —Cryptic 23:45, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Link abuse, rerouting through commission websites

Flagging to fellow admins. There has been activity from within 31.28.162.0/26 where the edits have been changing urls in what looks legitimate to those that redirect through commission websites, eg. special:diff/929797241, some using redirect services like "href.li". Globally I have put in a few blacklists, and some other monitoring, though this defence is going to need many acute eyes as they are quite good imitation domains. I have also noted that they are changing urls at Wikidata, so have alerted the administrators there to this practice. The editing may be broader than this /26, it is just what I have noticed in the past couple of days. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:25, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I blocked Special:Contributions/31.28.160.0/19 as a colocation webhost. Probably won't make much difference, though. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 11:28, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This report is an interesting example of a variation, though from that colo m:User:COIBot/LinkReports/coop.theeroticreview.com and this one has been occuring for a while. I have added the domain to revertlist. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:34, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

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