Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive157

Tory Mason

Perhaps there is a revision of this article that should be deleted, the porn actor's real name was at one point revealed and immediatelly removed (and using that name one could get google results even with details like his high school.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.242.48.18 (talk) *** 14:35, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

 Done. –xeno (talk) 14:42, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Quick request

Resolved

Could an administrator please delete For a New Liberty so that I can reverse the redirect? I tagged it for speedy two and a half hours ago and haven't got the time to wait around any longer. Spasibo, Skomorokh 15:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

 Done, though in the future I suggest you use the first parameter of {{db-move}} to make it easier to tell what you want done. Cheers. --lifebaka (talk - contribs) 15:58, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the swift attention, but I'm afraid Twinkle doesn't support the parameter you suggest. Sincerely, Skomorokh 16:04, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Then ::GASP:: do it without Twinkle. Beam 16:10, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Constructive as always, Beamathan. Skomorokh 17:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Beam, do you know User:Smith Jones? Corvus cornix_talk 23:46, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

User:Malcolm Schosha

Resolved

 – Individual has been asked by email to contact the original blocking admin

User:Malcolm Schosha/User:Kwork, who left six weeks ago through right to vanish, has emailed me asking "what would be involved in unblocking either" of those two accounts. Hence, I'm putting it up for review here. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can figure out, he was Kwork (talk · contribs · count · logs · block log · lu · rfa · rfb · arb · rfc · lta · socks), but then was indef'd for disruption, and came back as Malcolm Schosha (talk · contribs · count · logs · block log · lu · rfa · rfb · arb · rfc · lta · socks). So I gather if he can address the reasons for his original blocking to the satisfaction of the community or the original blocking admin, he might be able to be unblocked on the Kwork account. –xeno (talk) 17:41, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Who requested that? I thought he vanished... Beam 17:52, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

"The "right to vanish" is not a "right to a fresh start" under a new identity. Vanishing means that the individual, not the account, is vanishing. There is no coming back for that individual." from Wikipedia:Right to vanish#What vanishing is not. There is no right to vanish involved here at all, and mentioning it or suggesting there is is just raising confusion. Since jpgordon imposed the original indefinite block and scarian accurately blocked the new account for being a sockpuppet of an indefinitely blocked user, discussion should be with those admins. GRBerry 18:11, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Only brought up the RTV to give the whole context, to skirt confusion. I'll email the individual and tell him to take this up with User:jpgordon. Gwen Gale (talk) 18:15, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm on it; thanks. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 22:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Arabic Wikipedia

Resolved

Hello, i need to remove protection from this article, Rodull, the admin, did so, in order to find a consensus (Take a look to the talk page) but it was not reached, also, apparently, he's afraid from puppets, i told him to protect it again later, after my edits. Regards. --Stayfi (talk) 19:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• The fact that no consensus has been reached is a reason to leave it protected, not to unprotect it.
• Requests to unprotect pages should be directed to WP:RFPP.
• As for your suggestion that it should be unprotected to allow you to make an edit, and then re-protected, please see WP:WRONG. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 19:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Or Template:editprotect. It is not inherently bad to want to have edits made to a protected page (although you are probably right that WP:WRONG applies in this case anyway...) --Jaysweet (talk) 19:44, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

We are talking of only a few days protection so far, and I do not see a consensus developing for Stayfi's edits. If that happens, fine. I consider unprotecting at this time premature. --Rodhullandemu 19:52, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Also, this same user has requested this same thing either here or on ANI as recently as yesterday, and evidently won't take no for an answer. I'd suggest he stop asking, it's getting disruptive. --barneca (talk) 19:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. As per this, I am marking as resolved and warning the user about filing spurious reports. --Jaysweet (talk) 20:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• Woo, thanks, i'll try to post it, in the remove protection section.

Jaysweet, not all humans r the same, if u find one who understands u better, why not?

Barneca, move along, ignore me simply, regards --Stayfi (talk) 20:33, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Non-speedy delete

Resolved

 – article deleted.

Can someone kill this article, please? It doesn't belong in any CSD category, which is why I changed it to a PROD, but it shouldn't sit there for too much longer. Thanks. Wheelchair Epidemic (talk) 23:25, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I've deleted as a poorly sourced attack/negatively toned article. The source was just an interview/opinion piece, definitely not reliable enough for this article. Kevin (talk) 23:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Thankyou. Wheelchair Epidemic (talk) 23:41, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

"Anvil Media Inc" and its advertising tactics

Resolved

 – Checkusers conducted and blocks issued, see Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Anvil Media Inc. --Amalthea (talk) 12:07, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Just a heads up: Anvil Media Inc (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is a now-blocked role account of an advertising company. In their unblock request, they helpfully pointed me to this article describing how one should advertise one's company and boost site traffic, etc. by writing spam articles so that they resemble real Wikipedia articles as closely as possible. Several of their œuvres have already been speedied (not by me), and I think we should watch out for more articles of this type being posted in the next days by people following that article's advice.  Sandstein  21:25, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

It seems this is already being discussed at Wikipedia:ANI#User:Anvil Media Inc.  Sandstein  22:04, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

RE: Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/Mido z05

Resolved

 – Error corrected by ChrisTheDude. — Coren ^(talk) 12:32, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I wanted to see if I could get an admin to sort out a block I think was put on mistakenly on to the wrong user. With reference to the sockpuppetry report I opened above, Coren closed the report with this edit. I think given the wording they used, they put the wrong blocks on the wrong users.

The user I accused of being a puppeteer was indefblocked] for being either a sockpuppet or meatpuppet and the abusive account was only blocked for 24 hours. I checked the blcok logs and the blocks added matched the notices.

Given this arose from an AfD (which I've taken no part in just in case) and the creator has (I'm pretty sure) been mistakenly blocked, it's going to cause ill will that he cannot defend his article, regardless of how unlikely it is to survive the AfD.

I was wondering if a sysop could reverse the blocks so the puppet could be indefblocked and the puppeteer could have the original block now lifted since 24 hours have elapsed.

I did try contacting Coren (here) but given both the ANI going on and the tag on the top of his page he seems to have missed both mine and another user's message. BigHairRef | Talk 04:11, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I concur that a mistake was made, I have re-arranged the blocks accordingly -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 07:36, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

And so I have. My apologies. I agree that I had mistakenly reversed the puppet and master, and the fix was needed. — Coren ^(talk) 12:31, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Unauthorized bot needs blocking

Resolved

 – User has stopped automated posting of talk notices and the mainspace mess has been cleaned up. - Icewedge (talk) 05:28, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Can some one block User:Mr. Absurd, he seems to be running an unauthorized bot that is making a mess. - Icewedge (talk) 05:14, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

To clarify, the bot is posting notices having to do with wikiproject history on all the members talk pages. However it is messing up at random creating pages such as Merbabu:User talk:Merbabu. - Icewedge (talk) 05:18, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Wait, not sure if this needs any admin action now. The user has stopped the script and we are now discussing this on his talk page. - Icewedge (talk) 05:22, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Addressed, and discussion continues on the user's page. Thanks. Risker (talk) 05:49, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Topic ban

There has been a long dispute going on between two main accounts; Opiumjones 23 (talk · contribs) and BKLisenbee (talk · contribs). What I'll be doing now is to put an end to it and apply an indefinite topic ban. I am not suggesting since this has lasted more than 3 years with no resolution. That's enough. Please refer to User:FayssalF/JK for the full background.

Both users have been having the same dispute off-wiki. They both claim the originality of their respective sponsored bands; Master Musicians of Joujouka (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) and Master Musicians of Jajouka (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Note the similarities between the names. Other affected articles include:

• Paul Bowles (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Brian Jones (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Brion Gysin (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Jajouka (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) / (or Joujouka)
• Mohamed Hamri (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• William S Burroughs (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

and many other BLPs such as Cherie Nutting, Bachir Attar and Frank Rynne as well as articles about the bands' albums and CDs such as Brian Jones Presents the Pipes of Pan at Joujouka and Boujeloud.

All of these articles are related to the beat generation. Both Opiumjones 23 and BKLisenbee are strongly tied to many protagonists of the beat generation.

I don't believe putting those articles under probation would help because the COI part of the story is more than alarming. Opiumjones 23 edits his own article [no need to link to it] sharing the article editing history with BKLisenbee in a clear breach of COI and BLP policies. They had been reminded of everything, warned and even blocked once but nothing changed. Opiumjones 23 has more than enough used biased references (which attack other subjects) from non notable websites belonging to his friends. BKLisenbee has been removing them lately as well as spamish external links but edit warring in total breach of COI for years needs to stop. So I'd stick to a topic ban for both accounts unless someone would think otherwise and try to keep a permanent eye on those articles.

P.S. I've been receiving documents from both sides for more than a year claiming their story (copies of newspapers' articles, videos, links to articles, some respectful testemonies, music, festivals' announcements, etc...) My personal judgement is that they are not of the same weight in terms of credibility but since I have been acting as the admin in charge of this issue, I prefer to leave the content issue to someone else and therefore I welcome any admin or interested editor to verify them (by contacting me or one of the users) and give a third opinion while both users are topic banned. -- FayssalF - ^{Wiki me up®} 11:02, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Forgery of my signature

Resolved

 – Innocuous mistake. Now there's a word you don't get to use often enough. Innocuous._GB^T/C 07:10, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm reporting a user has been forging signatures on Talk pages. This is a very serious offense and I wasn't quite sure where to report it. TheWikiArtifact (Talk Contributions) forged my signature including links to my user and talk pages here. The user whose talk page he left the note on justifiably thought I had written it, and wrote to me complaining about the unjustified reversion and warning. Please take the appropriate action against the nefarious forger. Thanks  ‑ MANdARAX XAЯAbИAM  (talk)  02:31, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't quite think it was really a case of the user purposefully forging your signature in a malicious way. What I think happened here is that TheWikiArtifact, who appears to be a newer user, wanted to warn the user, didn't know how, so he copied a warning that he found (in this case, one you placed). Metros (talk) 02:42, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Likely just an accident. New users frequently copy and paste warnings and forget to re-sign them. --MZMcBride (talk) 02:43, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree that it looks like an accident. I understand your gut instinct on this Mandarax, but if you think about it a second time you'll see what Metros and MZM are thinking. Beam 02:56, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the responses. Yeah, that makes sense. When I got a note chastising me for doing something which I hadn't done, my first instinct was that someone was committing questionable acts and attempting to blame them on me. I'm glad to hear that instead it was probably an innocuous mistake.  ‑ MANdARAX XAЯAbИAM  (talk)  05:22, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Update. I may have been premature in declaring that the user's intentions were innocent. I left a very courteous note about the proper usage of signatures and warnings which TheWikiArtifact's other identity, WikiArtifact (Talk | Contributions), deleted with an extremely nasty edit summary and then proceeded to begin attacking me personally here and here.  ‑ MANdARAX XAЯAbИAM  (talk)  19:36, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Sigh, sorry for the frustration Mandarax. His behavior is unacceptable at this point, now that he's following you around and altering your posts. I've left a warning with a timestamp, and I'm watchlisting his talkpage. You've done nothing but assume good faith and show patience, and you've understandably had enough. If he makes one more post (he hasn't edited for over 3 hours that from this account), I'll block him to prevent the continued harassment. Please don't take it personally, some editors are just that spiteful. Continue adding/building our encyclopedia, and use my talkpage if this editor resurfaces to harass you and I miss it. Cheers, Keeper ǀ 76 19:47, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

He's already been blocked 24 or 31 hours (I forget) by Scarian (which I discovered when I went to go block him myself). --barneca (talk) 19:52, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, i got confused with which block log i was looking at. Scarian blocked indef for sockpuppetry; I don't know the details, but I can't argue with the result. --barneca (talk) 19:54, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Sorry again, but it's confusing. There's User:WikiArtefact, and User:TheWikiArtefact. One's blocked for 24 hours, one indef. if i tell you which is which, I'll screw it up again, so go look for yourselves. --barneca (talk) 19:56, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

^#%$^#@% Last time. User:WikiArtifact, and User:TheWikiArtifact. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Barneca (talk • contribs)

Heh. Yeah, I got confused to, but for completely different levels of incompetence than Barneca's. My offer still stands though, Mandarax. If this user shows up again, in any form, with any username, let me (or someone competent like Enigmaman or Scarian) know, so we can take care of the issue for you. Keeper ǀ 76 20:16, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks everybody. I really appreciate it.  ‑ MANdARAX XAЯAbИAM  (talk)  21:02, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Cleaned up warnings he left signing as somebody else. -- Alexf⁴² 21:46, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Strange activities on an Anon user talk page

The IP 207.194.108.93 has a history of vandalism, I became aware of it after it vandalized a page on my watchlist. After issuing a warning (to go with its many warnings), I had it on my watchlist. Recently the associated talk page seems to be in the middle of a confusing series of edits: a number involve people who were previously listed as suspected alternate accounts (both Fred Woofy and MisterAlbert) before I got to the page; others were by anon users blanking the page; its all very suspicious because they're following each other in close proximity. I'm not sure what's going on here. Anyone have any idea --especially what should be done? --Bobak (talk) 14:36, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

There is no reason for the page to be protected. The user may blank his talk page, deletion of messages is the wp equivalent of acknowledgment. Page should be unprotected and other issues investigated.--AdultSwim (talk) 14:48, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

For clarity, the blanking wasn't being done by the IP associated with the page. It may be likely that it's the same user with a new IP, but there is a difference. The warnings were months old, and I don't think it's a big deal if they remain or not...just wanted to point that out. --Onorem♠Dil 15:05, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I've unprotected the page. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:08, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I've removed the information added by MisterAlbert as it seemed inappropriate. --AdultSwim (talk) 15:13, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Confirmation Code Expired

I registered for a new account today and when I received the email I clicked on the link to confirm and that link brought me to a page saying error this code is invalid or expired... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.189.214.218 (talk) 18:17, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Try having the password sent to you? John Reaves 18:56, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

You can still log in, but you might have to retry confirming your e-mail address. The confirmation isn't required for any accounts, but is useful if you forget your password. Cheers. lifebaka (talk - contribs) 18:57, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Mass speedy deletion of Fellows of the Royal Society

Sean Whitton (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) has been mass deleting articles on scientists (and then removing links to them), unfortunately I am not considered trustworthy enough to actually see what he has deleted. I do note however that they appear to be articles on Fellows of the Royal Society, and that Fellowship of the Royal Society is probably the best indicator of a British or Commonwealth scientist's notability. Please could some admins have a look and reconsider these deletions? I shall inform Sean of this thread. Thank you. DuncanHill (talk) 11:47, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I recently started articles for all living female Fellows of the Royal Society who did not already have pages. I believe I added about 60 new pages. Which seem to have all been deleted.Domminico (talk) 11:56, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

See here for a list of all living female fellows if this is helpful for restoration.Domminico (talk) 12:02, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Given that all the articles that I checked are of the form, for example, '"Patricia Clarke, FRS, is/was a distinguished British scientist", they are not establishing their notability. WP is not a directory of every Fellow of the Royal Society. --Stephen 12:24, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the FRS bit does establish notability (or at least it would if Wikipedia had any pretence to serious coverage of the sciences). DuncanHill (talk) 12:25, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely, it's true that all the articles were stubs, but they are exactly stubs that would be interesting if they were expanded. Except for Hon. Fellows (e.g. Margaret Thatcher) every FRS is a distinguished scientist who will have performed notable work. Obviously Wikipedia is not a directory for every fellow that's why the articles were stubs - my hope was that people would expand them. Domminico (talk) 12:32, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Notability for people can be established by a notable award. From a quick review, Jean Thomas (scientist) is notable, and the stub should have been expanded rather than deleted. I've restored the page and added a BBC reference, as well as asking Sean reconsider other pages deleted. . . dave souza, talk 12:34, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Fellowship of the Royal Society is a notable award. It's about as distinguished as you can get for a British or Commonwealth scientist bar winning a Nobel Prize/Fields medal.Domminico (talk) 12:36, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

It would help to establish notablity if a reference is given to each page, establishing award of the FRS. . . dave souza, talk 12:40, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, for every page I added this page establishes FRS. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Domminico (talk • contribs) 12:42, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I have to agree that speedying the lot of them with no discussion was hasty. Shall we just undelete them all now? Consensus, folks? Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:17, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I'd undelete them and add a maintenance tag, then if they've not been touched in a month review them. It's false to say that every single FRS is inherently notable - there is no such thing as inherently notable, especially when you consider our policies on WP:V and WP:RS, if there are no non-trivial documents about them then it doesn't matter what level of academic distinction they may have gained, but it's unlikely that any modern FRS will be so obscure as to lack any non-trivial independent sources. Guy (Help!) 15:02, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

No one said they were "inherently notable" they are notable _because_ they are FRS. It is this that qualifies them since they must satisfy at the very least 2 3 and 6 of guidelines to be considered for election in the first place.82.69.91.165 (talk) 15:12, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

(ec) Er... what? FRS's being "inherently notable" means they're notable because of being FRS's. Please see "inherent" in Wictionary. And I agree that they shouldn't have been mass deleted. Please undelete right now, then we can discuss which if any of them should be deleted. It was hasty all right. Bishonen | talk 16:06, 20 July 2008 (UTC).

Being a fellow of the Royal Society does not mean there will be sources and independent analysis we can use. Notability in Wikipedia terms means that there are sufficient sources to work from. No sources, no article. Your statement makes no sense: you say they are not inherently notable, they are notable because they are FRS; that is, as I said, an assertion that an FRS is inherently notable. I dispute that. Guy (Help!) 15:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Greetings. I would concur with JzG here: I can accept that the scientists may well have been notable (I can't comment either way because I don't know much about this area), but without sources for each one of them their articles then they don't meet Wikipedia's version of notability, which is, as said, sufficient sources to write an article from. —Sean Whitton / 16:26, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

They are pretty poor articles but they make an assertion of importance (being an FRS) so should not be speedy deleted. Any which cannot meet the notability guidelines can then be deleted by AFD. Davewild (talk) 16:32, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

When articles do not meet Wikipedia's standards, there are two ways of fixing them. One is to fix their deficiencies; a second is to leave them for someone else to fix. Deletion should only be used when the subject is non-notable -- not when the article is poor. And if one does not know much about an area, one is not in a good position to decide whether a subject is non-notable, so option two should be used. These articles should be undeleted so that someone who actually knows about the subjects can decide whether they are notable or not according to WP's standards. -- Derek Ross | Talk 16:44, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Non-of my articles were good. They were close to as bad as it's possible for a WP article to be but nevertheless they were robust to AFD. They were stubs: all are good candidates for informative articles. I'm willing to bet no FRS will get through WP:AFD. If they come to AFD I'm quite sure they'll be improved and found robust. I disagree with Guy that FRS is not sufficient criterion for notability, read WP:Notability (academics).Domminico (talk) 16:53, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Of course they're inherently notable; they must satisfy at least one of the criteria in WP:PROF to be elected. Some will satisfy all six criteria. --Rodhullandemu 17:06, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Dave here. If you start discussing notability and sources it is most likely already not a speedy candidate. Speedy deletion is reserved for articles not asserting any importance and imo being a FRS does that. Whether individual admins think they are notable or not, they all deserve in doubt a discussion and all speedies need to be undone.--Tikiwont (talk) 17:10, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Seems to me that some people need to go back and read the WP:PROF guideline and the WP:N guideline a bit more carefully. Notability is about the existence of adequate sourcing, and Wikipedia not being a directory. Of anything, including FRSs. If something is encyclopaedically notable, then there will be multiple non-trivial independent sources. If there aren't, then it isn't. Falling into class X, Y or Z does not make the case even if it is a strong or even universal indicator. Sources, that's what matters. And of course for most of these there will be plenty, so no problem. Guy (Help!) 18:30, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Seems to me that some people need to go back and read the CSD policy. The point isn't about the notability guidelines but about the A7 criterion according to which the article has been deleted which is distinct from questions of verifiability and reliability of sources, and is a lower standard than notability. Besides, I'd proceed as you say above, i.e. undelete, tag, and review which for me just means in case of doubt send to AfD. --Tikiwont (talk) 19:54, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Quite familiar with it, thanks. Foo is a member of bar is context-free and does not assert notability. Foo is a member of bar notable for frob is an assertion of notability. Now, as it happens, I would accept FRS as some kind of assertion of notability despite having read of some FRSs form the 17th and 18th century who are really quite obscure, but I can see how others might dispute that. Guy (Help!) 22:07, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Whether or not these people are considered notable under our policies, the award certainly constitutes an assertion of notability, which is all an article needs to avoid being speedy deleted, as occurred here. -Chunky Rice (talk) 23:19, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, I'm not an admin, but it seems to me there is a consensus for reinstating the articles at the very least for a few weeks with AFD tags. Can an admin do that?Domminico (talk) 19:15, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

As a practical matter, if Domminico is the person who created those articles in the first place, it would be better for him to restore a small number of them and begin work on adding sources to them himself, before restoring all 60. Otherwise he is just dumping a big bunch of work on his fellow editors. There is no point of a mass AfD on 60 articles which are nothing more than directory entries to begin with. EdJohnston (talk) 19:24, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I just restored 30:

• Anne Dell
• Anne O'Garra
• Anne Warner (scientist)
• Athene Donald
• Brigid Hogan
• Brigitte Askonas
• Carol Robinson
• Caroline Dean
• Cheryll Tickle
• Daniela Rhodes
• Elizabeth Warrington
• Enid MacRobbie
• Fiona Watt
• Gillian Bates
• Helen Saibil
• Jan Anderson (scientist)
• Janet Rossant
• Jean Beggs
• Judith Howard
• Linda Partridge
• Mariann Bienz
• Naomi Datta
• Ottoline Leyser
• Patricia Clarke
• Patricia Simpson
• Ruth Lynden-Bell
• Susan Rees
• Trudy Mackay
• Ulrike Tillman
• Veronica Van Heyningen

Did I miss any?

--A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:16, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Spot-checking a few:

• Anne Dell Google News archive search: 26 hits
• Anne O'Garra Google News archive search: 6 hits
• Athene Donald Google News archive search: 4 hits
• Brigid Hogan Google News archive search: 90 hits
• Brigitte Askonas Google News archive search: 1 hit
• Cheryll Tickle Google News archive search: 16 hits
• Daniela Rhodes Google News archive search: 1 hit
• Elizabeth Warrington Google News archive search: 5 hits

Note that Google Scholar is probably a better measure; nevertheless, if Royal Society Fellowship does not make them notable you're going to find out they all became notable in the course of doing whatever they did to get selected. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:30, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

These deletions should never have occurred.

It took me about a minute to do each of those searches -- isn't the deleting admin supposed to do a 30-second check of notability before deleting? I know I do. Also, I saw no notifications to Domminico, the author. That's not just a courtesy but it also gives feedback to the author, documents for non-admins that this person has a problem with article creations, and, in the event of an admin mistake, shortens the loop in fixing an erroneous deletion. Something else I do is look at the author's contribution log and talk page -- if I see several hundred good, positive edits, then I assume there's a greater chance the author is not making a mistake and I investigate more thoroughly before deleting. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:44, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

There is nothing that requires the deleting admin to check the notability of the article. If the article does not assert notability then it can be deleted. If the article on bread just said "Bread is a food" (assuming the admin hadn't heard of bread and there wasn't an article history to revert to) it could be deleted under A7. The criteria does not specify whether or not the article is notable, only whether it asserts its subject's notability. Thus no google search is required although in cases I'm not sure of I tend to check anyway. James086^{Talk | Email} 10:13, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

An assertion of notability does not need to mean an explicit sentence of the form "Foo is notable for...": it can be a statement about foo that prima facie indicates that foo is likely to be notable. "Fellow of the Royal Society" is a very clear assertion of notability of this type. If the deleting admin is too ignorant to know the implications of being a fellow, and too lazy to find out by doing a brief search, he shouldn't be deleting these kinds of articles. "Speedy" doesn't mean that the deleting admin should take as few seconds as possible to make the decision, it merely means we're avoiding a week-long decision. And by the way, your example betrays another fundamental misunderstanding of A7 deletion: bread is not a person, organization, or web content, and is therefore ineligible. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:14, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Indeed bread is an incorrect example, I should have chosen something like Einstein or Google. I happen to know of the Royal Society so I wouldn't have deleted them without investigating further but to call someone who doesn't know of the RS "ignorant" is a bit of a stretch; I would not expect everyone to be familiar with the various honours within academia. Wikipedia:Notability (academics) criteria 6 says that if they have received a notable honour (Fellowship would fall under this) then they are definitely notable. Also these articles are not covered by CSD G4 so they can be freely recreated without discussion. However I stand by my point that it is not the responsibility of the admin to do a 30 second check for notability, only to check for an assertion. James086^{Talk | Email} 12:25, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

• Is it just my impression that we have people just blundering about deleting things they don't fully understand these days? When I was on WP:NPW long ago I'd at least Google if I was unsure. Have we really become that lazy these days? And what happened to WP:SOFIXIT? That I learned from working the Wikification project. --Rodhullandemu 23:56, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

The chance that the Royal Society would grant fellowship to someone who was not notable in the Wikipedia sense is approximately zero. (Granted, finding multiple reliable sources on a fellow whose main activity was before the Internet might require a visit to a *gasp* research library.) Also, as mentioned above, all those articles contained a claim to notability (fellow in the Royal Society) and had at least one reliable source (the list of fellows of the Royal Society) just a few mouse clicks away. As far as I know, "kill it before it grows" is not a Wikipedia policy. So I suggest restoring all those articles, and waiting for someone to flesh them out.. Cardamon (talk) 00:37, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Great Cheers I'll try and do some fleshing between writing up my thesis... Domminico (talk) 13:25, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can read here, it seems there is a strong consensus to undelete all ~60 articles, tag em, and AFD them if sources can't be found after a reasonable time to verify the asserted notability. Have all 60 been undeleted Domminico? I also very much agree with Guy here, we definitely need sources, going forward for these 60, perhaps numerous others, for the articles to remain for any length of time. I'm inclined towards a mild troutslap for the deleting admin for at the very least, not attempting to talk to the article's creator (would have been very easy seeing as they were all created by the same person, not 60 separate talkpage posts). AN could've and should've been avoided. Keeper ǀ 76 22:46, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

• Good deletions, giving people the possibility to feel good about starting an article from scratch by filling a redlink, which is more satisfying than expanding a mostly-worthless substub. Kusma (talk) 08:03, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
• These should not have been deleted; they didn't meet the speedy criteria, because they had an assertion of notability. A mass AfD would have been more appropriate if the articles were thought to be useless. -- SCZenz (talk) 08:11, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
  • It was a good faith deletion of stub articles which lacked sources and were close to being content free, equally stubs aren't discouraged as such. Notifying the author and a mass AfD would have been better, in retrospect, but time constraints make that sort of clearing out difficult enough already. Domminico had a source asserting the notability of the list of names, and if that had been cited in each stub at the outset the stubs would have been referenced, rather than just asserting membeship of a society. From glancing at a couple of examples, that's still to be done. . . dave souza, talk 10:04, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

• • I do assume good faith in this deletion. I however consider it a remarkable example of recklessness. At the very least anyone placing speedy tags should know the basic speedy deletion criteria, including that non-notable A7 means no indication of notability, not lack of references to prove notability, and that stubs are acceptable at Wikipedia. Furthermore, anyone even nominating for deletion should be aware of the applicable notability criteria, and this includes that for academics a very notable awards is sufficient evidence of notability. It is, I suppose possible, that the deletor was not aware of the meaning of FRS--but that's why we have an encyclopedia. The reason I consider this worthy of serious attention, is the actions of the admin above -- who actually removed the backlinks from the articles to Royal Society, and other notable awards. This is a clear indication that it was not just an oversight but either carelessness or lack of understanding. I am aware that he is a very experienced admin, and someone with a technical background, so i totally do not understand. Further, he choose to delete in a single motion of his own accord without anyone previously having placed a speedy tag in at least many of the cases--I have not checked all. This once more provides reason why, except for BLP and copyvio and outright vandalism, no admin should be permitted to have that power. I see two responses of his, the first to Domenico, to the effect that "I've ... speedily deleted all of your articles on scientists ... because there was no assertion as to why the scientists are sufficiently notable to warrant articles. I'm no expert in the field, but the articles really were too short to justify their notability so I decided to remove them from the encyclopedia" To delete -- let alone delete single handed, instead of just placing tags-- in an area one admits one does not understand, because the articles were "too short", and in the presence of the indications of notability provided by the backlinks, seems more than careless. It shows the failure to understand SCD A7, that there merely has to be an indication of importance, not a "sufficient" proof that the articles justify inclusion. I see his comment above that "without sources for each one of them their articles then they don't meet Wikipedia's version of notability, which is, as said, sufficient sources to write an article from" This shows the failure to understand deletion policy, that importance does not have to be proven to prevent speedy. At the very least it would seem appropriate to expect a full apology to the editor involved and a clearly stated recognition of what the speedy deletion criteria actually are. And in any case, it's time to remove the power for admins to delete single-handed except in the cases I mentioned above--it's too dangerous to the encyclopedia. DGG (talk) 02:18, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

I can't believe I didn't see topic this before...deleting these articles was a bad move. Membership in the Royal Society is quite prestigious. An "elected member of the RS" is a de facto assertion of notability on par or greater than just about anything here. DGG is spot on that this is complete misuse, and misunderstanding, of WP:CSD#A7 which only requires a reasonable assertion of notability. {{stub}} tags, maintenance tags, and AfD nominations (if necessary) were the correct course of action. — Scientizzle 02:49, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm lost. Don't all of these meet WP:PROF #6 and therefor are notable? Why is there even a debate? Are we arguing that WP:PROF doesn't play a role here or are we arguing the membership doesn't meet number 6 or something else? It looks like an argument that WP:N trumps WP:PROF even though WP:PROF says otherwise. That seems a bit odd.... Hobit (talk) 03:45, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

There's been a lot of hand waving here to prove that membership in the Royal Society means notability. Does membership in the comparable national sciientific society of every country prove notability, or is the UK "special?" What would be the comparable U.S society affording automatic notability with membership. How about the Romanian Academy of Science when it was headed by Elena Ceauşescu [1], wife of the dictator? Should there be some forum for deciding which scientific societies afford automatic notability for their members, beyond indignant foot stomping when some members of one are speedily deleted (should have been AFD)? How about other politicized Soviet bloc scientific honorary organizatins? How about Third World national scientific bodies? Edison (talk) 22:38, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

For the States, the United States National Academy of Sciences, and yes, elected members would be notable. Defunct soviet academies? Dunno - none of them have ever had the position or prestige of the Royal Society. Third World academies? Likewise. It's not a matter of the nationality of the academy, rather a matter of the academy's standing in the scientific world, and the requirements for membership. DuncanHill (talk) 22:44, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

The aforesaid Mrs. Ceauşescu was elected an honorary member of the Royal Society of Chemistry (UK) and, according to the Wikipedia article Elena Ceauşescu, "She allegedly obtained these awards with money, instead of merit." Maggie Thatcher was also elected a member of the Royal Society (not an "honorary member") as were Churchill, Disraeli, and Attlee. These politicians may be notable in that sphere, but their scientific prowess is doubtful. How many menmberships went to the merely wealthy? Are we to take these politicians and others as automatically notable scientists because they could put FRS after their names? The article on the Royal Society that before the 1820's the members were "gentlemen and amateurs." Would these have automatic notability enough for unquestioned stub Wikipedia articles? If there is any automatic presumption of being a notable scientist or mathematician due to RS membership, it would have to be restricted to very recent years. Edison (talk) 22:52, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Royal Society of Chemistry is not the Royal Society. Were Dizzy, Churchill or Attlee ever referred to as FRS? Of course, although not notable for their scientific achievements, they were elected as a result of their highly notable endeavours in other areas - so I do think that the fact of fellowship does indicate notability. Prior to the 1820s, science was largely an activity for gentleman amateurs - one can make a good case for Tom Huxley being the first "professional scientist". DuncanHill (talk) 23:02, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

I also think you will find that Dizzy, Churchill, Attlee, and Thatcher were all elected as Fellows - (check on the Society's website) - Honorary Fellowship not having been invented then. DuncanHill (talk) 23:06, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Have just checked - they are all listed as "Fellows" (not honorary members) and their election is listed as being under the former Rule 12. DuncanHill (talk) 23:17, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Duncan. the Royal Society is among the most selective and recognizable academies, as is the US NAS. Other societes don't necessarily have the cache or international impact of these two. Those selected have gained substantial recognition within his/her respective field, therefore, in general, it is an argument of encyclopedic notability to meet WP:BIO/WP:PROF; it's certainly beyond CSD#A7 material. That said, if one of these bios is brought to AfD and there is no substantial sourced information available beyond election to the RS, I would view deletion as a potentially reasonable course of action. — Scientizzle 23:16, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Since my last post, I have created an article about a random name in the U.S. NAS membership list, Albert C. Smith. It is better referenced than the mass-created stubs of RS members, such as Cheryll Tickle, but I could find no clear proof the man would really be considered "notable" under WP:PROF. Not much in Google Books [2], and no biography at NAS. Is he automatically a "distinguished botanist" as Ms. Tickle is automatically "distinguished" by virtue of the membership?Edison (talk) 23:25, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Given that there is a journal Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society specifically devoted to providing exactly the sort of sources we need for our articles, it seems unlikely that any non-newly-elected now-dead FRS would lack sources. (I previously wrote non-newly-elected but I see from our own article on the journal that it actually publishes obituaries.) Regarding Albert C. Smith, I see no less than five claims of notability in a three-line stub (museum director, society chair, NAS, distinguished for a research specialty, and the "standard author abbreviation" about which I've seen arguments in other AfDs that it confers automatic notability). —David Eppstein (talk) 00:39, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The article Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society says that the obituaries are often written by students of the dead scientist, and that they often exaggerate his accomplishments. Thus they are of questionable independence and reliability, and are hardly objective. Edison (talk) 14:00, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

as there is for NAS. (in both cases, only for deceased members). [3] The one for A C Smith seems not available yet--but I'm going to check further. However, a list of 36 published works is available Worldcat at [4]. There may be more, as it does not include most journal articles. That's enough to indicate notability, as well as to write content about the subject field in which he did he did his research. And that's even without visiting a library. It is inconceivable that anyone would be a member of either society and not be notable. How far this extends to other academies is debatable, but w do tend to avoid national bias. (For the main Soviet academy the relevant group is the full members (academicians), not the candidate members, and I would be prepared to argue that those in the physical sciences and mathematics at least were all notable.) Further, for almost all national academies, the foreign members (however called) are even more noted than the regular members, for such an election is an exceptional honor. DGG (talk) 01:05, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Some of the refs are for a different Albert C. Smith (maybe a son or unrelated person who got a PhD in 1951?)[5]Edison (talk) 02:35, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

This sort of quibbling about whether there may be a few exceptional non-notable FRS's is appropriate for an AfD. It is not appropriate for a speedy deletion decision. If a statement in an article probably indicates notability, but may have some exceptions (and I am not convinced that the examples above really are exceptions to FRS indicating notability, as they are all notable people anyway) then the appropriate step is to take it to an AfD, not to speedy delete it. If you're not sure about some area, don't do speedy deletions in that area. For instance, I rarely handle a7 speedy deletion requests for bands, because I'm not sure I understand the distinction between major and minor label releases; similarly, it is no shame for the deleting admin to be ignorant of the implications of an FRS, but he should have used that ignorance as a reason to let someone else handle the decisions for these articles. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:21, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

It seems clear that many who have been members of the Royal Society do not qualify as "distinguished scientists," including the politicians and the pre-1821 amateurs. Thus each article should cite references to show the person is notable as a scientist, rather than being a mirroring of the membership list. If the article creator does not have a few minutes to do a minimal search for references, such as DGG did above, he should not create the article, and an A7 speedy deletion of unreferenced articles seems appropriate. Edison (talk) 02:31, 24 July 2008 (UTC)(in full pedant mode)

If you were really in full pedant mode, you might have noticed that A7 speedy criteria explicitly state that references are not needed, only an assertion of notability. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, David, of course, but Edison is right to the extent that those people who write bio articles without at least giving some indication to non specialists of where the importance lies are doing a sub-optimal job. This is particularly troublesome in copying over sparse entries from biographical dictionaries. I and you and the other people here who can do it try of course to fix at least to some extent every one of them we can catch, but I'm sure many are not spotted and get deleted, which is unfortunate both with respect to the work of the contributor and the coverage of the encyclopedia. I'll do the work as much as I can, but I wish I could concentrate on other things. When I do save such an article, I try to explain to the contributor how that should do it, but there are some who have actually told me they intend to contribute the barest possible article as a placeholder and leave others to fix them. I don't think that's fair, as the original contributor is usually in a good position to add at least something. What is an related problem is those who delete articles within a few minutes of making them, when the original contributor may have written just the name and dates, and intends in the next edit to do more. This can happen in any subject, and although an intrinsically reasonable method of editing, it does make it harder to screen.

Incidentally, Edison, I am quite prepared to argue that any of the early gentlemen-amateurs were notable in their own time as scientists/physicians/naturalists/whatever, and hey are generally included in biographical directories or histories giving enough information. Historians of science have worked rather intensively with this group of people who, in the absence of a formal educational system in science, contributed to the earliest stages of its formation. And I strongly doubt that anyone gets an honorary membership who isnt highly notable in some other field, such as --even--politics. DGG (talk) 17:42, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not so convinced that in the 1700s all who were elected had made any significant scientific contributions, regardless of the unavailability of a university program or degree in science. As mentioned above, some non-scientists Prime Ministers were elected in the 20th century. It seems like hand-waving to assert that they must have been notable for something. The claim was made that membership proves the member is a distinguished scientist. That is what was written in the stub bios. That non-specific inherited assumption of notability is claimed to be proof against A7, but it would not be accepted if someone merely wrote "Joe Smoe is a distinguished artist" without noting awards, exhibitions, mention in books, etc." Are there reliable independent sources to verify that all members of the Royal Society were distinguished scientists or mathematicians, as opposed to proving that a selected subset of them were? That none got in via influence like some member of a royal family or other powerful persons who did not happen to have any demonstrated scientific accomplishments? (They might be notable for being powerful, but that would not support a claim of scientific notability contra speedy deletion). The Society's history[6] says that before 1730 the membership criteria were "vague" and that even after they started written records of why someone was proposed for membership, there was a mixture of working scientists and "wealthy amateurs" whose membership was sought apparently because of the money they brought (rather than their scientific accomplishments.) A "wealthy patron" of a scientist is not necessarily a distinguished scientist, any more than a wealth patron of the arts or music is an artist or musician. I dread the inevitable assertions of automatic notability for drones who somehow gained membership in such a society.Edison (talk) 19:07, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Edison, I'm sorry to have to say it, but you seem to be picking a fight for a fight's sake. Now either make a mass AfD for all FRSes, or put up with the idea that being elected a fellow of the Royal Society is a very very good indicator of notability. I no longer see the point of this thread. You have come up with exactly no examples of non-notable fellows, and just four examples of non-scientists who were fellows, but whose fellowship was a result of their quite extraordinarily notable other activities. DuncanHill (talk) 22:16, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The fellowships of the Prime Ministers and of 18th century wealthy contributors argue against any assumption that membership=distinguished scientist, and the fellowships for prime ministers are as dubious as the scientific honors awarded Mrs. Ceauşescu, who was both wealthy and powerful. Perhaps the unsourced stubs could say "Mr. X, FRS, was either a distinguished scientist, or wealthy, or powerful, or came from family with connections." Edison (talk) 00:31, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Have all 60 been restored? These should never have been deleted, but I suppose not everybody realizes that saying somebody is a FRS is a statement of notability. Tim Vickers (talk) 23:45, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Sorry if it seems I am "picking a fight." Please assume good faith. It is incumbent on those who claim "FRS=distinguished scientist" to provide reliable independent sources to verify that ALL members of the Royal Society, throughout its history, were distinguished scientists or mathematicians. So far no one has offered any such sources, just accusations of fight picking and unsourced assertions of how renowned the Society is. I have seen too many instances of an entitlement viewpoint whereby people create a series of unsourced stubs and then claim inherent notability for some class of articles, whether they are highways, high schools, or baronets. It is not required for me to prove that some of the members were non-notable. WP:N works quite the opposite way. Edison (talk) 00:14, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Until reading this discussion, I would never doubted an FRS member's notability. But now after considering all these views here I've become agnostic. Perhaps the FRS really does invite members based on different criteria. Perhaps it's as simple as a powerful individual with a sincere interest in science. Powerful could be as a star scientist but perhaps it also includes powerful politician or powerful aristrocrat or powerful personality. Perhaps there have been affirmative action programs where women were invited with the main purpose being to boost numbers. How can any of us be sure? I've read enough history to know that there are at least a few skeleton's in the FRS's closet (e.g., refusing to publish some members work as was done to Oliver Heaviside after 1894...definitely a bonehead move, since his work was actually good as well as sound). --Firefly322 (talk) 04:47, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

There is consensus that recently elected members of the Royal Society have been notable in their scientific or mathematical work, and not so much a consensus that that has always been the case, or that that is the case for every other British Royal Society, or for the main national science academy in every other country at every period, such as Rumania during the Ceauşescu regime. For recent members of the Royal Society and for a random deceased member of the U.S. National Academy, editors could quickly come up with some references indicating notability, so speedy deletion of recent members of these groups seems inappropriate. So far as I am concerned, mark this one resolved, with the proviso that the article creator should provide a link to prove that the person in the article is indeed a member of the Royal Society. I have seen hoax articles asserting that the subject was the "Irish National Dancing Champion" when he wasn't, and unsubstantiated assertions of membership in honored societies could at least be PROD'ed.Edison (talk) 12:01, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Stalking

Please help me, I was sent here as a respond to my request via {{help me}} template. User:VartanM has been stalking me around since long ago but I have always tried to stay calm and hoped that would stop. I don't want to tell more about how he or she has been doing that but just want to show you one example 1. This particular behavoir against other established member of the community is unacceptable. Note also that he is currently on civility parole and being descussed here. Thank you. 00:53, 25 July 2008 (UTC). "Refactored". Gülməmməd ^Talk 01:17, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

What does "tauching" mean? --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 01:04, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I assume he means "taunting". --Barberio (talk) 01:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Should I cross post about how Gulmammad is intimidating new and IP users? Or how about soapboxing? How about writing frivolous reports with misleading diffs? VartanM (talk) 01:41, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

And what do you mean "stalking me around since long ago" I just came back from a 2 month wikibreak and before that I had almost 0 contact with you. I got to here because I have the article he edited on my watchlist, and seeing your rude and unwelcoming comment I had to respond. VartanM (talk) 01:46, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

• To Gulmammad: Although he found it anyway, in the future, please notify someone when starting a thread on AN or AN/I about them. Thanks, Enigma ^message 01:50, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

This page is also in my watchlist :). I have the add the pages that I edit to my watchlist configuration on. VartanM (talk) 02:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I am asking administrators' opinion not someone who tries to hide the problem by making non-related comments over here. Apearantly I am being stalking even here! Please, is there anyone who seriously cares about my problem? Thank you. Gülməmməd ^Talk 20:23, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I've only briefly looked at how this conflict has unfolded so I have no comment on prior edits, but I must say I have trouble understanding how VartanM's most recent edit here could objectively be considered stalking. --Jeremyb (talk) 20:36, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I see no stalking activity here. In addition, notifying the user regarding a case about him is not making "non-related" comments. In fact, it's necessary for an even and involved dialogue. seicer | talk | contribs 20:39, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Please note that I came here via {{help me}} template and there is no steps as in AfD to indicated how to report such incidents. Thank you. Gülməmməd ^Talk 20:44, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Are you saying he shouldn't be allowed to come here to defend himself or make general comments? I'm confused. Enigma ^message 20:47, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

May I ask you to comment on the original problem? Gülməmməd ^Talk 22:54, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Please delete Chip Berlet

I am Chip Berlet. The entry under Chip Berlet has, since it was created in 2004, been off and on a collection of biased, defamatory, and false information. It is currently biased and POV and fails the NPOV standard, much less BLP. It is currently under attack from conspiracy theorists and supporters of neofascist antisemite Lyndon LaRouche. Now being attacked are some entries where my work published in reputable journalistic and scholarly sources is being called unreliable and problematic. I have been trying to work within the Wiki guidelines on the entry Chip Berlet since December 2004. It is obvious that there is no interest in dealing with this ongoing problem and that Wikipedia's leadership ahs no solution to wikistalking and attacks by fanatics, which in my case has extended to a battle at Wiki quotes. Enough. Please delete the entry Chip Berlet. If it is appropriate for Dan Brandt, it is appropriate for me. Wikipedia has shown that it is unwilling or unable to enforce its own policies, and I have no faith that this will change in the near future. I have been through RFC's, Mediations, and Arbcom. It has been an utter waste of time. Please delete the entry Chip Berlet, and when that is accomplished. Please delete my user account. I have no interest in discussing this.--Cberlet (talk) 21:29, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Deleting your user page, sure. As far as deleting Chip Berlet in article space, that should be taken to AfD. Jonathunder (talk) 21:41, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chip Berlet (2nd nomination), courtesy of Will Beback (talk · contribs).. - auburnpilot talk 21:55, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Someone should probably SNOW-close it. It's going down the same path as the one from 2005. Enigma ^message 22:44, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

 Done PeterSymonds (talk) 22:47, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I see what happened, but I do believe it doesn't have a Snowball's chance in hell. Keeping in mind the first AfD/VfD (unanimous among 14 editors) and past AfDs involving such things as "Subject of article doesn't like article", it doesn't have a prayer. 11 Keeps at the current one, with a sole delete that doesn't provide a good rationale. We have never removed articles because of a simple request from the subject. Sometimes we have ended up removing articles that the subject wanted removed, but it wasn't solely due to that. Enigma ^message 23:21, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

request for edits on protected talk pages

Resolved

 – Requested actions performed by User:AuburnPilot. - Icewedge (talk) 01:12, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Per a recent WP:UCFD could an admin please make the following change on the following pages:

1. User talk:Browse4you
2. User talk:Onkaci
3. User talk:Street family Entertainment

Change:

[[Category:Wikipedia users blocked for spam]] → [[Category:Wikipedians who are indefinitely blocked for spamming]]

When the changes have been made, please notify me either here, or on my talk page. Thank you.--Rockfang (talk) 00:48, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Done. - auburnpilot talk 01:04, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Blocked user is editing... how?

Hi, fellow admins. Can anyone explain this?

I thought that I indefinitely blocked User:As1960 here: [7]. He was then able to remove the template from his user page here: [8]. How did he do that? My intention is to block the username.

Incidentally, I believe that the blocked individual has returned as one of the editors of the article Andrew Shulman. - Richard Cavell (talk) 05:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Users can edit their own talk pages when blocked. --Golbez (talk) 05:59, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Golbez has protected the talk page.[9] I think As1960 is a vandalism-only account. Masterpiece2000 (talk) 05:20, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Did someone delete the main page again?

Is there something hinky going on this morning, or is site performance just generally bad today? I'm seeing the database locked repeatedly. Maybe we're just busy? UltraExactZZ ^Claims ~ Evidence 14:00, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

It's been slow for a couple days now. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 14:13, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Jimbo spilled Coke on his keyboard and hasn't gotten around to cleaning it yet. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 14:20, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, the Main Page is un-deletable. Juliancolton ^{Tropical Cyclone} 14:32, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Quite true, as Ryan told somebody recently "Go ahead and try" (Please note, this is NOT an instruction to go ahead and try). Tim Vickers (talk) 15:05, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I think a few days ago it was Sandstein deleting Pokémon types with over 2700 revisions (warning, long page load time), but I dunno' what's up with it now. Are there other long pages at AfD a lot recently? lifebaka (talk - contribs) 15:25, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh it's possible to delete the Main Page... they installed some protection after I deleted it, but there's a workaround, and I've certainly learned my lesson and not telling others how to do it. Maxim_(talk) 16:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah now it forwards you to MS clippy. "It looks like you are trying to delete the main page." --AdultSwim (talk) 16:12, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Let me guess - you have to move it first, then delete it ;) --Duk 21:30, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Only one way to find out... James086^{Talk | Email} 05:12, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Dare ya. --Duk 05:32, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

"Campaigner" vandal

What we have here is a monkey with a keyboard. His previous accounts all have the names "Campaignerxxxxx" with the X's replaced by a seemingly random five-digit number. Any way to block the creation of an account with this naming convention? Getting off-subject, yesterday was a particularly difficult day with the Grawp vandals; it's clear that "Grawp" is more than one person. What, if anything, is being done about this on a legal or technical level? I loathe cleaning up after this guy. He takes up administrative time best spent elsewhere and he/they are clearly abusing their terms of service agreements. It's time Wikia stopped looking the other way or lots of good editors are going to burn out and never return. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 21:58, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Multi-user-Grawp was clear on EnycDrama months ago. --AdultSwim (talk) 22:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

True, but what if anything is being done by the company which runs this site? As I said, I'm tired of cleaning up after these fools. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 22:11, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

How do you suggest we implement your request? —Kurykh 22:19, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I've added "campaigner" to the Username Blacklist. And Wikia is not affiliated with Wikipedia. Grandmasterka 22:20, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

(ec with above)I salted the "clinton" deleted article, since it had been created 3 times. It appears that the vandal abandons each account after only a few edits, so I see little point of urgency in blocking them upon appearance. Anything that is used over a couple of days, report to AIV. All the others, give me a list at the end of the month and I will indef block them en masse. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:23, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Or make a list and request a CU for an IP block. KnightLago (talk) 22:24, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I have run a CU. I have blocked 64.53.2.215 for a month as the underlying IP. This is a good-hand bad-hand situation -- I have contacted the user in question before taking any further action. Sam Korn ^(smoddy) 22:49, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

So this user is all the "Campaigner" socks. He is also User:AppleMacReporter and all his sockpuppets. His good-hand is AMRDeuce (talk · contribs), whom I have blocked indefinitely following an email conversation. Thanks for bringing this up. Sam Korn ^(smoddy) 06:21, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

To answer Kurykh's question, there should be a formal request for a TOS violation investigation against the original account as well as any and all of his little playmates, especially the little SOB who issued me the death threat via a Comcast IP. I doubt any good will come out of discussing the matter with the people who run ED; they don't seem to care what goes on over at that playpen. The persons who are responsible for the operatio of this site have a responsibility to make sure that it's a favorable experience for all involved. This can be stopped. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 22:34, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Gwernol created CV page for self, PR Spam for product and company, deleted COI tages

Resolved

 – No need for intervention. Sceptre ^(talk) 23:44, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
IP left after being warned. Will block upon return to mischief. Grandmasterka 02:49, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Gwernol has created pages for self, product and company.

• Dan_Crow_(computers)
• BookSmart
• Blurb.com

He's a huge enemy of COI, and SPAM, and has seen fit to derogate 100% from his own religion - and it's been like that for over two years. Currently he's involved in a COI Mediation case addressing this very issue (COI), accusing a well-meaning user of ill comportment. This needs to be looked at. None of the articles are notable. He's removing COI tags. This is not good stuff. COI case here All three articles have been duly AFD'd. As well they should be. Seriously folks. Be serious. 208.54.94.66

Proof? —Kurykh 23:31, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh my god, he edited an article about himself! Lets call in Jimbo, Elonka, Jehochman, Cberlet and William M Connelly! Sceptre ^(talk) 23:33, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

call in Essjay as defense atty. --AdultSwim (talk) 23:43, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

That biography is a year old and it was created by another user. - Caribbean~H.Q. 23:42, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

If you think the sources are weak, send the articles to AfD. Oops, sorry, IPs can't create AfD pages. Gwen Gale (talk) 23:43, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I marked this as unresolved, there may not be any need for admin intervention in the supposed COI matters, but what about this IP that seems to be on a crusade here? Is Gwernol's RL identity common knowledge? It doesn't seem to be on his userpage at least. Mr.Z-man 23:57, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

The IP as of now has offered absolutely no proof that Gwernol is the person mentioned. —Kurykh 00:14, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I would block for the attempted outing, attacks on other editors, and revert warring. But at this point I consider myself involved (as I've made some of the reverts). Mr.Z-man 00:19, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I've warned the IP, am very close to blocking for personal attacks and harassment. Gwen Gale (talk) 00:24, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

A quick word of thanks from me for all the help with this rather unfortunate incident. It appears that someone objected to my removal of inappropriate external links from the IPTV article. For the record I have chosen not to reveal my identity on Wikipedia, though several admins, including Jimbo as it happens, are aware of it. So, again thanks to Kurykh, Sceptre, AdultSwim, Caribbean H.Q., Grandmasterka, Gwen Gale and Mr.Z-man. Best, Gwernol 02:38, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I do not see this as resolved. Jimmy knows me too, so what does that get me? Flowanda | Talk 05:37, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

{{PD-PubMed}}

This template is empty but linked in Wikipedia:Image copyright tags/Public domain. It should be created or deleted the link.--Sdrtirs (talk) 05:39, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

The PubMed page says the information present is public domain, but only from the National Library of Medicine. Everywhere else, it might be under copyright. I suggest on removing the link for right now, so we can figure out this template. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire)} 05:50, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Backlog at...well...everywhere

Hey y'all
Is it just me or are the backlogs right now far worse than usual? There's 151 AfDs needing closing, 34 requested moves in the backlog area, 53 Suspected Sock Puppets, including 35 from over a week ago and 4 from June, a couple dozen Templates for Deletion over a week old, and 92 possible copyright violations. Where is everybody? And more specifically, can at least the stuff from June at WP:SSP be cleaned up? I'd do it myself but, of course, I'm not so equipped...
Thanks much everyone!--CastAStone/^{/₵₳$↑₳₴₮ʘ№€} 02:52, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/CastAStone 2 ? ;> (I'll see what I can do about dem backloggen)... –xeno (talk) 02:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

If you wait for 8-12 months, I'll help with this backlog. Beam 03:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to try to do a few RM's each night to help out; my time has been a bit restricted. CastAStone does have a good point the backlogs which require an experienced eye have been overlooked. Old timers' need to help out, and new admins need to get their feet wet. Keegan^talk 04:14, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I performed a RM but then I realized that all the links needed to be fixed so, I had to get my bot approved for that and then...well, now it's time for bed =) I'll attack some more moves tommorow. –xeno (talk) 04:17, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

A bot approval for What links here fixes? Good grief :) Keegan^talk 06:03, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

WP:SSP has been cut from 4 from june to 2 from june, so I guess that's progress. ;) --CastAStone/^{/₵₳$↑₳₴₮ʘ№€} 03:01, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Some of the ongoing backlogs do exist for various reasons. SSP can be backlogged because many cases requires much research and scrutiny, as false accusations can have ramifications in regards to contributions. RM backlogged discussions often need further input to determine consensus if the discussion has stalled, or in some cases discussions last over a month. Just a thought. Keegan^talk 07:57, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Delete User talk:Bob the biro

Hey. Can someone please delete User talk:Bob the biro under CSD-R1. I would tag it but it is protected :) Thanks in advance.. --·Add§hore· ^Talk/_Cont 16:46, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

 Done Thanks, PeterSymonds (talk) 16:50, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Reprotected as well. Cheers. lifebaka (talk - contribs) 16:51, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks PeterSymonds and Lifebaka :P ·Add§hore· ^Talk/_Cont 16:52, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Template:Citation

Can

http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Template:Citation

be created as a redirect to:

http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Template:Citation

when I go to the top link:

Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. Please search for Http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Template:Citation in Wikipedia to check for alternative titles or spellings.

and try to:

Start the Http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Template:Citation article or add a request for it.

it says

Unauthorized

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search

The page title that you have attempted to create has been included on the local title blacklist, which prevents it from being used due to abuse. If you have a good reason for creating a page with this title, or if you receive this message when attempting to edit an existing page, please let us know at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard. Be sure to specify the exact title of the page you are trying to create or edit, as well as a brief explanation of what you were trying to do. Thank you.

I have been trying to link to : http://wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Template:Citation in my comment history to show which template I am using, but it has been coming out wrong and as a red link (as above)

Thanks.

JohnRussell (talk) 17:08, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Template:Citation... if you tried to do wiki.alquds.edu/?query=Template:Citation, that's because you're confusing external with internal links. Calvin 1998 ^(t-c) 17:14, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

What you're technically doing there is trying to search for a URL within Wikipedia. It's like if you were to type "http://www.yahoo.com" into Wikipedia's search box - you'd get nothing, because Wikipedia has no articles (or redirects, as far as I know) with URLs as the name. —kaoskastle (Talk) 18:17, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Act of Abjuratoin

On the main page, can someone add that today is the anniversery of the signing of the Act of Abjuration? Thanks.Red4tribe (talk) 20:52, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Bit late, by the time stamp my computer shows for your comment there is just 3 hours of today left - and less than two at the time of my posting this (although I am 1 hour ahead of that; BST). The content for each days main page is decided before hand and vary rarely changes over the course of the "day". Learn about how to contribute to it, and next year the anniversary may be marked (if there is consensus). LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:07, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

User:Chunkiermunky

I don't know if this is a Grawp wannabe or just a garden-variety troll who's been watching what's been going on, but I noticed this user on an AN discussion on the subject; this person's lone comment (and a somewhat snide one) is the only edit. Please don't think I'm biting newbies or not assuming good faith, but anything like this having to do with Grawp-style vandalism is worth paying a bit of extra attention to. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 21:07, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Since you bring the subject up, this and this are awfully bitey, considering neither has any contributions. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 21:17, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

And this isn't very constructive at all. Have you read WP:DENY? Your user page says you are on a wikibreak. Maybe a real wikibreak is a good idea if you're letting run-of-the-mill vandalism get you so worked up. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 21:24, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

If the account is making no other edits, there is no point in blocking it. There may be reason to CU, but I don't see the usefulness at this time. --AdultSwim (talk) 21:18, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I thought it was worth bringing up. As far as those "bites" were concerned, the first was a mistake. I thought it spelled out "asswipe" and I apologized when I realized it did not. I believe I was justified for the second one. The user had created a sockpuppet account with a similar username even before I issued my statement. He did in fact vandalize an article as well. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 21:26, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with any of the above bites. But complaining(notifying) about other users on AN while having unclean hands is a little dickish. --AdultSwim (talk) 21:29, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

If, for the first case, you had reported the username and said nothing to the user, or told the user that their name may be unacceptable, you would have had nothing to apologise for. In the second and third cases, taunting vandals is not likely to induce them to stop being vandals. Is your userpage vandalised a lot, by any chance? Delicious carbuncle (talk) 21:41, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

• I would also say that this Grawp idiocy is more than run-of-the-mill vandalism. It's a coordinated, ongoing attack that has been going on for nearly a year, it's taking up way too much volunteer time and the powers-that-be don't seem to care. I do contribute constructively to this site and yes, I need a break because trying to stay ahead of this nonsense has burned me out. Sorry I brought it up. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 21:30, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
  • If people would stop talking about it so much, it wouldn't take up so much time. The "powers-that-be" have been using bots and scripts to clean it up in seconds for some time now. Its all these discussions and proposals and people freaking out over this that is what takes up so much time. Mr.Z-man 21:50, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
    • Its kind of like that one time when you drank too much at the Office Christmas party and everyone freaked out when you started dialing phone numbers with your penis. Like that, everyone just needs to calm down and move on. Its time we realize that these things will happen from time to time. --AdultSwim (talk) 22:03, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Can't recall ever having gotten quite that drunk...moving on...definitely takong some time out, though. Thanks for the laugh. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 22:09, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

• • To answer your above question, yes it was. I was reporting the Grawp vandalism en masse to AIV as it came in. I am no longer an administrator by my own choosing, but I still do lots of administrative tasks unless I happen to think of a subject to write about. Those vandals focus on those who thwart them, especially the admins who block them. Persian Poet Gal, NawlinWiki and Luna Santin are their favorite targets since they're among the most active admins in blocking them. As for me, I was the victim of a coordinated IP attack which included a death threat from a Comcast IP, so my pages have been protected. I know that my lashing out isn't going to stop them. All I have is a rollback button and the ability to report abuse. Since I'm a whistleblower, I'm a target. PMDrive1061 (talk) 21:50, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Usernameblacklist disabled

Per this message on Wikitech-l the Usernameblacklist extension has been disabled. Until it is enabled again, names on MediaWiki:Usernameblacklist are technically possible to create. FunPika 18:04, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

*BEANS alert*... Anthøny 18:14, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Just gotta' watch WP:UAA like a hawk. User:HBC NameWatcherBot should still catch them. lifebaka (talk - contribs) 18:54, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

It's back running again. --MCB (talk) 06:28, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

IRC related notification

Just drawing everyone's attention (sorry if it was done earlier) to a planned meeting at m:User:Ryan Postlethwaite/IRC, related to Wikimedia Foundation IRC group contacts. I have requested on the page linked that the meeting's contents be publically logged (I made that request a few minutes ago so I haven't gotten a response at time of writing). —Giggy 05:37, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Usernameblacklist disabled

Per this message on Wikitech-l the Usernameblacklist extension has been disabled. Until it is enabled again, names on MediaWiki:Usernameblacklist are technically possible to create. FunPika 18:04, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

*BEANS alert*... Anthøny 18:14, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Just gotta' watch WP:UAA like a hawk. User:HBC NameWatcherBot should still catch them. lifebaka (talk - contribs) 18:54, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

It's back running again. --MCB (talk) 06:28, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

IRC related notification

Just drawing everyone's attention (sorry if it was done earlier) to a planned meeting at m:User:Ryan Postlethwaite/IRC, related to Wikimedia Foundation IRC group contacts. I have requested on the page linked that the meeting's contents be publically logged (I made that request a few minutes ago so I haven't gotten a response at time of writing). —Giggy 05:37, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh Hai, can I has backlog?

Resolved

Good morning. It looks like we've been busy with CSD tagging - There are currently 368 pages in Category:Candidates for speedy deletion. The majority seem to be articles, though I'm seeing quite a few templates as well. Some eyes from my fellow admins would be of value, I think.

The current live count, or close to it (since PAGESINCAT isn't exactly accurate), is thus: All CSDs = -6. Thanks again for your help! UltraExactZZ ^Claims ~ Evidence 13:18, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Working. It's still at 128 right now. Raygun time. lifebaka (talk - contribs) 16:10, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks to all for their help - we're hovering around 100 now. UltraExactZZ ^Claims ~ Evidence 20:47, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Down to 4, I'm marking this resolved. Hut 8.5 18:57, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Autoconfirm admin proposal

There is a proposal to autoconfirm admins. Best, NonvocalScream (talk) 21:23, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

"Autoconfirm admins" is a bit disingenuous. The proposal is (or was) to grant adminship by simple request if someone passed arbitrary account age and edit count criteria. It has been SNOW-rejected. Stifle (talk) 12:51, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

CmdrObot is working for Amazon!

Resolved

 – notifying user has been awarded a barnstar for his dillegence, The 'non Amazon' bot will continue editing --AdultSwim (talk) 19:00, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

While making some commendable edits, this bot is adding commercials for Amazon.com . Lots and lots of them!

1. 02:01, 23 September 2006 Pseudomonas (Talk | contribs) (Replacing Amazon Book URLs with ISBNs - using AWB) (undo)

1. (cur) (last) 03:00, 19 March 2006 CmdrObot (Talk | contribs) m (Compact Amazon URL; unicodify) (undo)

This bot should be prevented from adding linkspam.Fconaway (talk) 07:22, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Those are from 2006. ? Enigma ^message 07:29, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I notified User:Cmdrjameson of this thread. Enigma ^message 07:33, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

And the bot is fixing the urls not adding any. Look at all the recent edits the bot has made Fconaway, and look at reverts you made of the bot. The bot is compacting the url that was already there! Not adding any. Also "Replacing Amazon Book URLs with ISBNs" he is adding ISBNs, that's good! Please stop reverting the bot. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) @ 07:33, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Agree with this assessment. SQL^{Query me!} 07:35, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I have rolled back all Fconaway's reversions of the bot's earlier edits. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) @ 07:39, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Okay. The bot does a good job as far as it goes, but the spam's still there.Fconaway (talk) 09:18, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Yup, the project is full of Amazon spam, feel free to nuke as much of it as you can handle. Guy (Help!) 09:28, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

With the exception, of course, of ASIN where ISBN, OCLC and ISSN are found wanting. Skomorokh 10:36, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know about this discussion. As was pointed out earlier in this thread, I don't work for Amazon, and all I'm doing is removing cruft (and identifying information) from overlong Amazon URLs. Someone suggested to me recently that it might be replacing Amazon links that are just ISBN-10s (and not ASINs) with the appropriate ISBN magic word. On the face of it, this sounds like a good idea to me. Would people be in favour of this? Cheers, CmdrObot (talk) 14:17, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Replacing Amazon links with isbns when it is obvious how to do so sounds like a good project for a bot to me. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:28, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Excellent! There are so many (which have crept in by good faith editing) that they can't be handled one by one. I suspect there may be links to other retailers, as well. We shouldn't favor any of them over the hardworking guy down the street. ISBNs, etc., go far enough.Fconaway (talk) 19:30, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Cold fusion

See also WP:COIN. The long and the short of it is, Pcarbonn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has written an article in a fringe journal, New Energy Times, openly admitting that he has been pursuing a years-long agenda to skew the article Cold fusion (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) to be more favourable to the fringe views proomoted by that journal, [10] and especially [11]. Example:

"I'm pleased to report that the revised page, resulting from the mediation process, presents the topic as a continuing controversy, not as an example of pathological science. This is a major step forward in the recognition of the new field of condensed matter nuclear science and low-energy nuclear reaction research ... I now have a lot of respect for all paradigm-shifting scientists, like Copernicus, Galileo, Fleischmann and Pons, and the other courageous cold fusion pioneers".

Note:

Few media outlets are paying attention to the subject, and many of the prominent individuals known to New Energy Times who are observing the field are keeping mum though a few observers such as Ron Marshall and Pierre Carbonnelle have tried their best to participate.

Per WP:NPOV, if "few media outlets are paying attention to the subject, and many of the prominent individuals known to New Energy Times who are observing the field are keeping mum" then Wikipedia should be right there with them. Not working to fix that problem, as Pierre Carbonelle and Ron Marshall have tried. And try they most assuredly have.

This is a wholly inappropriate use of Wikipedia. We are not here to resurrect the reputations of pariah fields, we are here to document them. Pcarbonn and other members of this fringe group have been the major editors of that article for a very long time, and caused it to be demoted from FA status due to POV-pushing.

I have reverted, again, to the FA version. This is reasonably free of the subtle and destructive bias of this group. A friend of mine who was a grad student in one of the labs in which the original Fleischmann-Pons experiments were conducted, and who is still active in academia as a full professor in bio and electrochemistry at an English university, read through the FA version and said he considers it a fair representation of the field. I trust his judgment in a way I don't trust that of Pcarbonn.

This incident is a perfect example of a problem I have pointed out many times: those who seek to promote a fringe view are attracted to Wikipedia by its profile. It is massively more important to them to get their POV reflected on Wikipedia, tan it is to almost any Wikipedian to stop them. Long-term polite POV-pushing, driving off all those who seek to maintain neutrality, has in this case resulted in an article with which the POV-pushers are very happy, reflecting as it does their fringe view.

As I say, I reverted to the FA version which has the benefit of not having been subject to years of insidious POV-pushing. I also suggest an indefinitet topic ban for Pcarbonn. I do not recall his ever having declared his conflict of interest during the protracted mediation in which he was the main, almost sole at times, participant. He has abused the project, abused the good faith of Seicer and others, and committed a gross violation of WP:NPOV in the service of an off-wiki agenda, using Wikipedia to change reality rather than document it. Enough. Guy (Help!) 07:03, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Before I consider your suggestion further, could you provide the link between the author of that piece and the account in question? Sarcasticidealist (talk) 07:09, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Oops, confusion - the link you provided above goes to the wrong article. The user links to the right one from his user page. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 07:12, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'd also note that his statement "I have won the battle for cold fusion) (note where "the battle" links to" is completely inappropriate and is about the mostl explicit, if not the most severe, violation of WP:NOTBATTLEGROUND I've ever seen. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 07:23, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

To be clear here, I do not care at all - not even slightly - if they are right or wrong about the field itself, the problem here is the egregious use of Wikipedia to try to shape rather than reflect public opinion. Public opinion, as reflected in journals such as Physics Today, is that cold fusion is essentially a joke, and where it is not a joke, the Pons-Fleishmann debacle is sufficiently powerful in the memory that people are very wary indeed of going anywhere near it. Again, Wikipedia is not here to fix problems in the real world, and that is what these guys have been trying to do.

More to the point, he "won" by virtue of persistence, because (as usual in such cases) it really matters to him to win, whereas most of the rest have other "battles" to fight and other articles to police. This is a perennial and growing problem. The ones with the itme, energy and determination are the ones with an agenda to promote. Guy (Help!) 07:31, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Where the hell are you getting this from? I read both articles he wrote, and I see no issue here. Someone believes something different from you, so you want to ban them from editing? -- Ned Scott 07:54, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

JzG, why are you bring up a content dispute on AN? This editor believes that they are acting in good faith, and that they are upholding NPOV and are using reliable sources. They might be right or wrong in that belief, but they haven't broken any rule or behavioral guideline. -- Ned Scott 07:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Because (if you read it) I am suggesting a sanction. Guy (Help!) 10:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

OMG this editor believes that X is accurate, has nothing to personally gain by X being true, but honestly believes it is backed by reliable sources. Now that son of a bitch has the balls to write about it in a journal of like-minded peers. How dare he! -- Ned Scott 08:10, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, we do have a classic case of a single purpose account here. I can't find more than 10 edits by Pcarbonn to any article other than cold fusion, and in the most recent version, I don't see the word pseudoscience at all (last I heard about cold fusion it was in a class dedicated to the identification and investigation of pseudoscientific theories [although Category:Fringe physics is in Category:Pseudophysics which is in Category:Pseudoscience]). And Pcarbonn's writings at New Energy Times, the second of which contains the statement "I hope that the revised Wikipedia article will help put a stop to the epidemic of pathological disbelief and that it will help raise the interest of scientists so that prominent scientific journals won't be able to reject articles on the topic "because it does not interest our readers." Certainly, Pcarbonn has been involved in this revision process, which he holds his own views on.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 08:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

If you have not found more than 10 edits by me to any article other than cold fusion, you have not looked. No editors have been able to find a post-2000 sources saying that cold fusion is pseudoscience, and a recent RfC on the subject concluded that cold fusion is not pseudoscience. This is a content dispute, nothing else. I have no financial interest, in one form or another, related to cold fusion. I have followed all wikipedia rules, and even have written for the enemy. Pcarbonn (talk) 09:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

My goal of "presents the topic as a continuing controversy, not as an example of pathological science" is fully supported by the most notable, reliable review of the field: the 2004 DOE panel. Anybody who wants to present cold fusion as pseudoscience has a hidden agenda (one editor presented himself as the representative of the "average scientific lab" and defended their view, at least as he saw it). The only thing is, this agenda is not supported by reliable secondary sources of the same level as the 2004 DOE (see parity of sources). All this is explained in the paper I wrote for NET, if anybody would care to read it. Pcarbonn (talk) 09:24, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

This is because fringe topics are not published, generally, in main stream scientific journals. This is something I also learned from the course that I took. And I went back through about 2000 of your contributions, and out of the articles, most were related to cold fusion, if not cold fusion itself. A simple Google search shows the differing ideas. A search of the last 20 years of articles in the Journal of Physics gives 24 papers (I did not read them, but they were few). And, also, you mention "the enemy." There shouldn't be talk of enemy and ally on Wikipedia unless it's an article about a war, and the RFC. I'm not saying someone's right and someone is wrong here, but a bulk of your contributions (and by bulk I mean well over 90%) are dedicated to cold fusion and related pages.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 09:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

And there's nothing wrong with that.. -- Ned Scott 09:49, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

However, it is wrong that this article went from featured to just "good" because of its current content.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 09:52, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

It was promoted in 2004 and demoted in 2006, and there were multiple issues cited at its delisting. It's unfortunate that the article lost it's FA status, but that's a content dispute. Pcarbonn doesn't have a COI here, he just believes there's some truth to cold fusion. It doesn't appear that he's ever tried to hide that fact. Suddenly Guy finds out he wrote an article about the situation and proposes that Pcarbonn be banned from the article. WTF? -- Ned Scott 10:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Ryulong, you say "fringe topics are not published, generally, in main stream scientific journals". This statement applies to pseudoscience, not to fringe science topics. They have been several papers on cold fusion in peer-reviewed scientific journals, another proof that it is not pseudoscience. If I'm not mistaken, the google search you propose only provides self-published, unreliable sources, and certainly not at the level of reliability and notability as the 2004 DOE review.

Here is what the ArbComm unanimously said about significant alternative to scientific orthodoxies : "Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, a fundamental policy, requires fair representation of significant alternatives to scientific orthodoxy. Significant alternatives, in this case, refers to legitimate scientific disagreement, as opposed to pseudoscience." That is what I have defended, only that, and I'll continue to do it. Pcarbonn (talk) 10:26, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Cold fusion appeared well and fairly documented last time I read it, probably thanks largely to Pcarbonn.[12] Now when I glance at it I see a lead with zero citations and zero footnotes.[13] Jzg has blanked the page. See blanking on the types of vandalism. Blanking pages wholesale is not the way Wikipedia works. Point out citations that you find questionable, discuss, proceed with dispute resolution if necessary. Don't come here. Don't edit war. Don't blank verifiable research including evidence from the Osaka University, Dep't of Navy, Indian gov't, DOE review, and others.

Some of the concerns raised by Ryulong are difficult to understand "Pcarbonn has been involved in this revision process, which he holds his own views on" -- we all hold our own views on subjects. The people with the strongest views are generally attracted to editing the articles. I fail to see the relevance, and I think there's a major conflation of vested interest with conflict of interest here. Also, the POV pusher thing goes both ways. All of the evidence in favor of cold fusion clearly should be documented: If you can point to specific areas where Pcarbonn has pushed highly questionable references and content, you should be addressing those on the article page, or going to dispute resolution. This sounds like a whole lotta noise and rhetoric. JzG's blanking the page should be reverted as vandalism, if he continues he should be blocked. Since this isn't the place to be discussing the article content, I propose we close this, and it can be continued on the article itself, as it should be -- although perhaps it should be continued, since there's some highly questionable behavior from JzG here.

The FA article is categorized as pseudoscience. There was recently a RfC which overwhelmingly concluded that although cold fusion is fringe science, it is not pseudoscience. So there's no consensus for these actions.

If JzG wishes to proceed with blanking the page, he should try a RfC first. A lot of people have done a lot of work on the page that existed, and most seemed to think it was pretty good. II | (t - c) 10:53, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Is it accurate to say that transitioning Wikipedia's article from describing cold fusion in terms of 'fringe pseudo-science' to a 'scientific controversy' was a laborious and sometimes heated process? If so, then I can see no 'rule violation' in saying so. Wikipedia is not SUPPOSED to be a battlefield. But, can anyone really say that Cold Fusion wasn't? In 1989 (first DOE review) it would have been perfectly reasonable for Wikipedia to describe cold fusion as fringe pseudo-science, but that became less and less true over time and by 2004 about a third of the second DOE review members were saying that they found the evidence for cold fusion convincing or compelling. In 1989 US government funding into cold fusion research was barred because the DOE thought there was nothing to it, but since 2004 it has been allowed... because the DOE now isn't sure whether there is anything to it. Kudos to Pcarbonn (and doubtless others) on successfully updating the encyclopedia to be in line with the current status of the issue. Five years from now we may be rewriting the article again to explain what was really behind the anomalies which caused researchers to think that cold fusion was happening... or the details of how cold fusion was confirmed. Surprise, NPOV isn't a static unchanging animal... and sometimes getting people to accept that things have changed IS a 'battle'. --CBD 11:14, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Well the policy of NPOV is a very static sexy animal. However an actual neutral point of view can change day by day (MINUTE BY MINUTE!) on specific topics. And everyone who saw the Saint stop the evil Russians knows Cold Fusion is real. Beam 11:22, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The July 2008 version (with 64k of material -- JzG cut it down to a 2004 version with 24k material) doesn't even describe it as a scientific controversy per se. It's pretty neutral; the phenomenon is described more like a strange anomalous curiosity which mainstream physics mainly ignores and can't explain. It's sort of an example of incommensurability between research programmes a la Lakatos – not that "new physics" is really scientific in my mind, but as a layman I have no way of knowing. There seems to be more interest it in abroad, but since we're English, we can't really discuss that as well, only mention it. Of course where there is interest should be mentioned, as it is in the well-referenced version, which is rather careful. In some cases it language could be shifted; for example, in the criticism section on lack of reproducibility, it might be best to start with the 2004 DOE panel's claim that the effects are not replicable rather than the the researchers' claim that there is replicability "at will". Then again, considering the 2 recent positive reviews and reports in peer-reviewed journals, maybe not. What is surprising is that there are very few recent negative reviews in the article. This might be because many of the anti-fringe POV pushers prefer to blank than to do research. If JzG gave the thing a careful read and attempted some research of his own, he could fix these problems; instead he seems intent upon pushing a futile edit-war with no talk page support to make some kind of emotional point. His actions are amazingly irrational and starkly in violation of Wikipedia policies for dispute resolution; surely he realizes that 40k of content worked up over 4 years are not going to disappear on his personal whim. II | (t - c) 11:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The July 2008 version is perfect if you are a True Believer, less so if you subscribe to the majority POV. When you say anti-fringe POV pushers, do you mean WP:NPOV-pushers like me and SA, or do you mean those who oppose Pcarbonn and the other fringe POV-pushers? I don't do WP:OR, myself, but thanks for the suggestion.Guy (Help!) 12:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• CBD, what the 2004 DoE review said, and what those who supported cold fusion in some respect said, was that there is some unknown effect but that without getting the basic science right it is pointless to keep repeating the same sometimes-reproducible experiments. The cold fusion mob like to interpret this as "DoE supports cold fusion research", but actually it's "DoE says go away and do the basic science". They have had 18 years to do it, and have not yet come up with a credible mechanism. The scientific community is still waiting, and the general reaction to cold fusion in the scientific community is highly sceptical, which is one reason the cold fusion mob did a Windscale and changed the name to LENR. But the problem remains: those who have the enrgy and determination, are those with a vested interest in the fringe view. That was the problem during dispute resolution, it is the problem now. The New Energy Times mob have successfully rewritten Wikipedia to reflect the world as they wish it to e, but the world is not as they wish it to be. Guy (Help!) 12:23, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Guy has related this to a genuine problem, of persistent and polite pov pushing producing misleading articles. This version (not Guy's preferred older version) includes references which are difficult to substantiate, but appear to indicate something which is clearly fringe science. Whether it's pseudoscience is more debatable, and to that extent the older lead appears doubtful to me, but at present the lead section bends over backwards to give credibility to what seems to be a minor unexplained anomaly which is only just detectable. Its proponents still seem to be making wild claims about the potential of this unexplained process for future energy generation. The request for mediation resulted in a draft being introduced for further discussion, and evidently the recent version was considerably watered down from that draft to give more credence to "cold fusion". Not easy to overcome such persistence, unless editors show equal persistence in giving due weight to mainstream views. . . dave souza, talk 12:51, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• Yes, exactly. For example, the lead describes two literature searches by interested parties in minor journals, thus placing them on a par with Fleischmann and Pons' paper in Nature, one of the highest impact journals in the world, and leading to one of the largest scientific controversies of my lifetime. Sure, Pcarbonn sincerely believes that the tiny group of pro-CF researchers are onto something. Problem is, most of the mainstream not only doesn't believe this, they don't even know they exist. Guy (Help!) 13:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not involved with the editing of this article. It seems to me that whether the material inserted by the POV pusher is correct (or rather, plausible) is beside the point. Rather, we have a startling admission of bad faith in editing and unclean hands. It seems to me that in the face of that, the proper steps are:

• 1. Revert the article to the pre-bad-faith version (the FAC version seems like a good starting point.)
• 2. Begin dispute resolution at whatever level is appropriate (RFC, RFArb), and optionally...
• 3. Discuss in this space whether a community (or topic) ban is appropriate

Dithering over the details of the edits is appropriate for a content dispute. This is not a content dispute. This is an editor who has figured out how to game our system, who has done so to great effect, and who is now encouraging others to do so. This is an extraordinary situation, and in my opinion, calls for extraordinary remedies. Nandesuka (talk) 14:32, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• I agree with Nandesuka. This is not about the topic being fringe science or not, this is about violations of our conflict of interest standards and about treating Wikipedia as a battleground. I could well imagine that a topic ban might be an appropriate remedy.  Sandstein  14:46, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
• A revert to the accepted mediation version, which includes most of the content from the Featured Article, is what I suggested on Guy's talk page. seicer | talk | contribs 14:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• Problem: "accepted mediation version" here equates to Pcarbonn's preferred version, since he was responsible for about 90% of the lobbying in the mediation - I was rather busy burying my father at the time, and Pcarbonn somehow forgot to mention that he was setting out to use Wikipedia to blaze the trail in rehabilitating the reputation of this fringe field. I'm sure it just slipped his mind. You'll find if you look at that mediation that virtually everybody supporting the more sympathetic view which prevailed, is a single-purpose or agenda account, and they are the ones with all the determination because it is vitally important to them to get their way. Guy (Help!) 15:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Further comments should be made cold fusion talk page. This is a bad faith, biased rant by JzG, who apparently hasn't even read the article, nor paid any attention to the thorough discussions ongoing on the article. The article has been constructed collaboratively with several editors, including skeptics. ScienceApologist and several others are heavily involved there balancing things; JzG would be welcome, I'm sure. Pcarbonn has a vested interest -- this is not the same thing as a conflict of interest, which implies financial incentives. Sure, Pcarbonn has an opinion, and feels that the article on cold fusion is now balanced. That doesn't necessarily mean it is balanced, but that is something that JzG should try to fix as an editor, and should be. If one reads BATTLEGROUND, one can see that he is working directly against its principles. Battle ground says this:

Wikipedia is not a place to hold grudges, import personal conflicts, or nurture hatred or fear. Making personal battles out of Wikipedia discussions goes directly against our policies and goals. Every user is expected to interact with others civilly, calmly, and in a spirit of cooperation. Do not insult, harass, or intimidate those with whom you have a disagreement. Rather, approach the matter intelligently and engage in polite discussion.

Rather than attempting to go to the talk page and gather consensus, JzG suddenly reverts an article 4 years back. That's battleground behavior, pure and simple. Find problem areas, bring them up, discuss, use dispute resolution if necessary. II | (t - c) 15:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

From the perspective of article content, the only question that needs to be asked when someone has reverted a page to a prior version is, "Is the restored version better than the more recent version?" The act of reverting, particularly if a revert is back to a FA version, is not necessarily "battleground behavior." I haven't looked into this particular debate. Antelan 15:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The only question is not whether one person (in this case, JzG) thinks it is better, but whether the editors think it is better. JzG went straight in and took it back to 2004, with not a word to the talk page seeing what all the actual article contributors have to say. He reverted again after an anon IP contributor to the article (who I believe is a skeptic of cold fusion) reverted him. That behavior is undeniably shocking, really, and you should really look into things before you comment. The page has seen heavy attention lately. A 2004 FA wouldn't even be a GA today, in many cases, and I think this is one of them. 24k vs. 64k; the "FA" doesn't even have footnotes or parenthetical references. JzG is not our knight of science. This is not a battleground where he fights demons of fringe. He needs to learn to play within the rules and discuss like normal editors. II | (t - c) 15:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Reverting to 2004, FA or not, seems retarded. Since 2004 the way mainstream scientists and the US Govt (among others) look at Cold Fusion has changed. The whole idea of Cold Fusion has evolved in 4 years. To revert to 2004 instead of working together in 2008 is lazy, and imAWESOMEo irresponsible. Beam 15:46, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

(ec)Actually, if anything the 'featured article' version seems markedly more friendly to a 'cold fusion is real' viewpoint than the version before the revert. In several places the version from four years ago seems to state cold fusion as an outright fact, barely pausing to note that some dispute it. Also note that I call it a 'featured article' version because it is nowhere remotely close to current FA standards... featured articles were a very different thing four years ago. --CBD 15:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Some of what has happened since 2004: the American Chemical Society hosted a 2007 conference on cold fusion,[14] and plans to (or already has) published a book in 2008[15], and the American Physical Society hosted a conference. The Indian gov't announced that the science appears promising and wants to look into it, an Indian version of Nature ran an article; and a couple people at Osaka University claimed that they have working cold fusion reactor.[16]. I've never edited the article and only read it first a couple weeks ago, so there may be other things, but these are all reliably published. I'm guessing that JzG just didn't know about these things; if he did, then it seems even more ridiculous. That's why it is best to research and think before acting... II | (t - c) 16:00, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to leave the content issue aside for now, though I have an opinion about it. The basic issue is simple: we have an editor whose self-admitted purpose is to use Wikipedia to raise the profile and credibility of a fringe/disputed idea. That editor has used mediation as a "battle" in which he successfully wore down opposition, and has gone so far as to brag about it in a niche publication devoted to cold fusion.

This editor should not be editing Wikipedia articles on cold fusion. That this is even controversial is disheartening. We have here a very basic and well-documented abuse of Wikipedia to promote an off-wiki agenda. I am in full agreement with Sandstein: Pcarbonn should be restricted from editing cold fusion and related articles indefinitely, though at this point I would suggest allowing him to continue contributing to the talk pages. If his proposed changes actually improve the article, they will find support from others. Is there significant opposition to a topic ban from articlespace on cold fusion - based not on which version is "better" but on an abuse of Wikipedia to promote an agenda? MastCell ^Talk 16:53, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

While I agree that dragging an on-Wiki dispute off-Wiki is never a good idea, I think we should primarily consider PCarbonn's on-Wiki contributions to the page and behavior before we start boiling up the tar. PCarbonn has worked diligently and in good faith. I see no reason based on his record to support a topic ban. Ronnotel (talk) 17:03, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Off-wiki agenda? One's agendas cannot be separated into on-wiki and off-wiki categories. You have an agenda to write good medical articles reflecting mainstream science. Pierre has an agenda to make sure that the recent scientific literature on cold fusion is presented. If you look at the purported evidence, he states he believed that his work was necessary and neutral, and that he was aided by the publishing of articles in prestigious peer-reviewed journals. No evidence has been presented that he wore down the opposition into accepting information that doesn't belong on the page. The cold fusion article right now looks fine, with plenty of strong references and a neutral tone. Some less strong references are probably in there, but they can be removed, and they constitute the minority from what I've seen. II | (t - c) 17:13, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Come on - one of those "agendas" is in keeping with Wikipedia's goals, mission, and policies, and one isn't. The cold fusion page doesn't look fine - it was just protected due to edit-warring over a particularly iffy conclusion to the lead. If someone goes off-wiki to say, "Hey, I won the battle to use Wikipedia to raise the profile of our pet theory!" and then comes on-wiki to edit-war in furtherance of that agenda, then I don't see the point of an artificial distinction - the bottom line is amply clear. I feel strongly that either 1RR or restriction to the talk page are appropriate here. MastCell ^Talk 17:20, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Note that Pierre didn't add that bit to the lead, and is fine with removing it. From what I've seen he appears to be quite cooperative. He comes with a bit of a bias, yes, but so does everyone. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for JzG, who appears less inclined towards discussion and consensus and much more inflammatory. II | (t - c) 17:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Yup, because Pierre is here for the long haul to get his POV reflected in Wikipedia as part of changing the way the world views the subject, whereas I'm here to keep the project neutral and have many, many articles on my watchlist - plus I'm travelling right now (in the Swiss business lounge in Zurich airport, to be exact). Guy (Help!) 17:54, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I too am not bothered by this report. Previous efforts to influence Wikipedia have resorted to sockpuppetry, concerted meat-puppet campaigns, canvassing, and the like. This effort instead used reasoned arguments in a mediation. The mediation by a good and fair editor here, resulted in some changes to the article, and they regard the changes as having the article "present[ing] the topic as a continuing controversy, not as an example of pathological science." This is a reasonable goal, and in keeping with Wikipedia policy. They consider the main way they did it was by adding additional references. Ditto. I wish all people with an agenda did as reasonably. (FWIW,my personal opinion is that the initial reports were in fact an example of pathological science, and that subsequent work now leaves open the possibility that something might be real. It is a somewhat more plausible sort of thing than ufos.) DGG (talk) 17:26, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm explicitly not endorsing Guy's, or anyone's, preferred version. The new one may well be better, and anyway that's not an AN/I question. I'm not even arguing with the quote snippet you've selected, about describing it as a "controversy" rather than "pathologic science" - I think that's appropriate. I'm concerned by the other quote snippets above, indicating that a group of people from this relatively small community are using Wikipedia to raise the profile of their pet idea, and that they view their participation as a "battle" to gain "recognition" for "paradigm-shifting scientists like Pons and Fleischmann." I'm not especially convinced by the argument that OTHERCOORDINATEDAGENDAPUSHINGEXISTS; sure, they're not "as bad" as some of the chronic Lyme disease groups, or the AIDS denialists, or the unaccredited-correspondence-school brigade, but that doesn't mean it's not an issue. And I don't see the problem with 1RR - if these changes have support from editors without an axe to grind, then they'll be incorporated. If it's only the cold-fusion community that want to see them incorporated, then it won't happen. That seems right to me. MastCell ^Talk 17:49, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Mast, please, point to something Pierre has done on-wiki that deserves censure. If we handed out topic bans to every editor who brings an agenda there'd be no one left to enforce them. Ronnotel (talk) 17:55, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

That's an oversimplification. If we topic-banned everyone who came here solely to leverage this site's visibility and promote a topic "unjustly ignored" by mainstream academia, we'd be just fine. In fact, this place might get closer to its stated goal of being a serious, respected reference work.

Again, I see the on-wiki distinction as artificial in this case. This editor has written that his participation here is driven by the desire to promote acceptance of cold fusion, and thus favorably influence journalistic and academic coverage of it. In light of that expressed agenda, his on-wiki actions, summarized in his own words as "I have won the battle for cold fusion", seem problematic. I have a really hard time seeing what we lose by 1RR here. MastCell ^Talk 18:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I have a really hard time seeing where 1RR is justified here. Given, for instance, that Pcarbonn reverted JzG exactly... once. It was everyone else, including a cold fusion skeptic, that was reverting JzG's 'blast from the past' restoration of the page to 2004. --CBD 19:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Really? Would it change your opinion to look at the page history in a little more depth? Because Pcarbonn (talk · contribs) has reverted at least 4 times in the past 20 hours ([17], [18], [19], [20]). That's edit-warring, and it would be blockworthy were the page not already protected. To be fair, I think he later self-reverted one of these when he read the source he was citing and found that it did not support his claims. Nonetheless, it seems through-the-looking-glass bizarre to argue that he's only reverted once, or that edit-warring is not an issue, or that 1RR is somehow out of left field here. MastCell ^Talk 21:17, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Topic bans are used to prevent disruptive behavior that is seriously debilitating. Many alternate forms of behavior modification are before this extreme step. Are you proposing that we blow through all of these (warnings, escalating blocks, mentoring, RfCs) and opt for a topic ban as first response? Ronnotel (talk) 21:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

No. I'm proposing 1RR, which is good practice for everyone, and particularly useful in forcing an advocate to convince others that his edits are beneficial rather than edit-warring to directly advance his agenda. I find it's much more useful than escalating blocks and mentorship, and I'm not aware of a mandate that these other approaches fail before we institute 1RR. MastCell ^Talk 21:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

WP:AN is not a step in dispute resolution

off topic Discussion
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
JzG, you should know better than this. WP:AN is no one's personal tool to get their own way in a content dispute, if there's a problem you take it through regular dispute resolution. This is exactly the kind of behaviour you said you'd moderate, but you're back to old tricks again it seems. Please do not cause this kind of disruption again. --Barberio (talk) 21:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC) This was an appropriate question to bring to WP:AN to solicit administrative opinions. Please don't engage in baiting. MastCell Talk 21:41, 24 July 2008 (UTC) With all due respect MastCell, it is explicitly not. I suggest you scroll to the top of this page, and read the part where it says "What these pages are not". --Barberio (talk) 22:29, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Please accept that I am familiar with the workings of this page. I'm hardly the only uninvolved admin to feel this is a reasonable issue to address here; see above. We'll have to agree to disagree about that. MastCell Talk 22:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC) While you may well be familiar with the workings of this page, you are contradicting the clear statement at the top of this page about what should not be posted here. This is a content dispute that should have gone through dispute resolution. It should not have been posted here. End of discussion. As an admin, you should not be undermining the dispute resolution process. --Barberio (talk) 22:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Give it a rest, Barberio. We don't have to adhere to the letter of the law 100% of the time. Yes, you can comment that maybe next time they should take it somewhere else, but being rigid, bossy and bureaucratic isn't going to help anyone. Tan ǀ 39 22:51, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Content dispute resolution is not something to be dictated by what ever group of administrators are reading WP:AN or WP:ANI at the time.--Barberio (talk) 23:00, 24 July 2008 (UTC) You have to admit, MastCell, he's beat you here. He said the same thing three times in a row, and everyone knows if you say something three times in a row it becomes true. Plus, he was the first one clever enough to say "end of discussion". Much like saying "shotgun!", or "Mornington Crescent", the first one to say it wins. --barneca (talk) 22:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC) (ec)Been meaning to ask you, Barneca, how's that Jimboship thing working out for you, anyway? Ronnotel (talk) 23:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Does anyone have a "special say" in dispute resolution? All we have are third opinions, uninvolved opinions. Yes, we have WP:3O and WP:DR, but who is there? Just a different group of... uninvolved opinions. Is the dispute being addressed in a manner that furthers Wikipedia? Are you helping that along? Geez. Grumpy old man in every crowd - "get off my lawn!" Tan ǀ 39 23:06, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I'd like to state that I am very disappointed in the amount of administrators who seem to express the opinion that the Dispute Resolution Process should only be followed when they want it to be, and can be short cut whenever they want. It can't, being a Wikipedia administrator didn't grant you the power to skip over Dispute Resolution. Wikipedia does not need disruptive administrators undermining the Dispute Resolution Process. If you think "Dispute Resolution" is a bunch of bureaucratic rules you can ignore at whim, maybe you need to reconsider why you're here? --Barberio (talk) 23:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Whatever. If I am having a dispute, I am not required to go to Dispute Resolution. I have many, many options at my disposal here for resolution of my problem. And now you say I need to reconsider why I am here? What the fuck does that have to do with this? Tan ǀ 39 23:11, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Different editors & admins work out the issues that arise in different ways. Some are painstaking in one approach, others in others. There are no hard and fast rules, nor should there be. We should all look at any situation, assess it, and then decide the appropriate course of action. Unless I'm missing the diktat somewhere that says "Go directly to DR". We should all be flexible, as each problem or issue is unlike any other. And, while I'm on, saying "maybe you need to reconsider why you're here?" is frankly appalling and unnecessary. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 23:24, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I've made no secret of my opinion that administrators who undermine Dispute Resolution, and administrators who reject civility, should not be administrators on this project. I'm not going to change that opinion because it might hurt the feelings of the administrators who reject civility or undermine Dispute Resolution. --Barberio (talk) 23:33, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I suggest reading Wikipedia:Dispute resolution which is after all policy. WP:AN is only for urgent cases of disruption, not content issues that can be resolved by any of the other methods outlined. Again, every editor including administrators is expected to follow Dispute Resolution. While you may have 'many options', only some options are considered acceptable and advisable methods to resolve the issue on Wikipedia. And all of them are listed in Dispute Resolution, so if you're taking an option outside of Dispute Resolution you're doing something that might not be in the best interests of the wiki. Additionally, both editors and administrators are also expected to use civil language. --Barberio (talk) 23:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Bullshit. Tan ǀ 39 23:32, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I agree wholeheartedly with Barberio on his/her very last point. Yes, we should be civil. As it is profoundly offensive and uncivil to say "maybe you need to reconsider why you're here?", so we can assume that your last remark is an apology for the one above. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 23:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I'm afraid the best I can do is a non-apology apology, in that I'm very sorry if I offended anyone by expecting administrators to abide by the Dispute Resolution process. --Barberio (talk) 23:40, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Once you asked me to "reconsider why I was here", you lost all respect. Not that you care, I would guess. Give me a break - like this bloated entity needs yet more instruction creep, more rules and regulations, more bureaucracy. I have no tolerance for this, or for its proponents. Why am I here? Why are you here, to bring the hammer down on people who take disputes to WP:AN rather than WP:DR. Pfft. Do something constructive. Tan ǀ 39 23:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Are you seriously saying that Wikipedia:Dispute Resolution is instruction creep and bureaucracy, and you will not tolerate it? --Barberio (talk) 23:53, 24 July 2008 (UTC) No, did you read that somewhere? I'm saying that you storming in here and bitching about using AN as a forum for discussing a dispute is a symptom of instruction creep and bureaucracy. Your attitude isn't "solve the problem", it's "you're solving the problem, but not in the right place, therefore you're doing it wrong!" You should be a director at my company, you'd fit right in. Tan ǀ 39 23:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Your argument might have merit if... Dropping it on AN did actually resolve the problem, which, oh, it hasn't. And really it's just opened up more drama. There wasn't a better place to discuss it. Heck, why bother with things like Wikipedia:Articles for deletion or Wikipedia:Requests for comment, when everything could be put on WP:AN!--Barberio (talk) 00:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC) (outdent) Barberio, bridges burnt are seldom easy to repair. That's the first point. Pissing people off is rarely a good strategy if you intend to hang around here awhile. The next point is to repeat what I've said above. You don't need to always go to DR. Why? If I drop in on an admin's talkpage to draw their attention to some idiot that is edit warring to say that the sun rises in the west, should that admin and I be forced to go off hand in hand to DR given that this is a mere content dispute? No, I think not. So, we can see that we thrive here on many things, including our flexibility, a hangover from when this site was much more anarchic than it is now. Get used to it. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 23:58, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Do you really want everyone to be bringing their content disputes to WP:AN from now on? --Barberio (talk) 00:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC) p.s., the date stamp on my first registered account edit here is 11:34, 2 July 2005. And I've felt free to argue and dispute things James Wales has said, and tell the ArbCom off for overstepping their bounds. So let's not lecture me on 'burning bridges'? I'm not here to be liked or popular, I'm here to help build an encyclopaedia. --Barberio (talk) 00:11, 25 July 2008 (UTC) To your first point, no, I think I have made myself abundantly clear. Each case should be viewed on its merits, and then an appropriate course of action determined. And importantly, given your question, what part of what I posted above was unclear, by the way, just for my future reference? To your second, well, remember that Wikipedia is a community a bit like a village or (these days) a small town. Your remark that you're "not here to be liked or popular, I'm here to help build an encyclopaedia" equates to and demonstrates enjoyment of or at least contentment with a bit of antagonism, ruffling feathers, pissing people off, whatever phrase you feel fits. Well, you can go down that road, but if you annoy people, especially pretty high profile ones, good luck next time you need some assistance. Oh, and by the way, there is always the option of putting your point firmly, forcefully, determinedly, straightforwardly, but without the antagonism in which you have indulged yourself this evening. Just a thought :-) AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 00:23, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I was perfectly polite, I just said things that some administrators do not appear to want to hear. (ie, that they're supposed to go through Dispute Resolution like the rest of us) I feel no compulsion to soft soap people who use language and tone like Tanthalas39 has. --Barberio (talk) 00:32, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I note that JzG was asking for a sanction of an editor, which people have (so far) declined to do. Such a request is not a content dispute. —Kurykh 00:13, 25 July 2008 (UTC) Exactly, and it should have started and ended with that. But as demonstrated, a lot of people seem to think content disputes are okay for discussion on WP:AN now. And strangely, get abusive and resort to obscenity when asked to take it to WP:DR like any other editor.--Barberio (talk) 00:22, 25 July 2008 (UTC) Well, your statement is only half correct. The discussion about the appropriate sanction, if one is to be applied, is ongoing. —Kurykh 00:29, 25 July 2008 (UTC) Did anyone say that, either? Do you just make shit up or what? We don't have a problem with "too much stuff at AN". I mentioned in one of my first posts in this thread that you could have mildly mentioned to them that maybe next time, take to DR, or the article talk page, or one of the involved editor's talk pages. However, you opted to be stiff, inflexible and stubborn over a solution to a problem. Ultimately, who cares where the problem is solved? We're not getting paid for this. Absolutely nothing says "Thou must go to Dispute Resolution". DR exists as a possibility, an option for people who want to use it. The fact that this - this - is what you are worried about here, instead of saying, "hey, here's a couple editors hashing out a problem", is ridiculous. And your new "PS" there just serves to illustrate your bitterness and "I've been here longer, listen to me!!" attitude. People like you don't help problems, you create them. As, ironically, I feel I am starting to do here, so I bow out. I'll read your response, tho, so feel free to have the last word... Tan ǀ 39 00:15, 25 July 2008 (UTC) My p.s. was solely in response to the "if you intend to hang around here awhile", which was an attempt to pull the "as I've been here longer than you have" argument. --Barberio (talk) 00:22, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I agree fully with JzG on this matter. Wikipedia is not here to provide a soapbox for every kook with a theory to push. Jtrainor (talk) 00:20, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I think you will find that Wikipedia is not here to provided a soapbox for anybody, whether they may be considered kooks, or not, by people with different agendas. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:46, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I know we're having fun, but...

I'd like to return the discussion to the actual administrative issue here, which is whether any sort of editing restriction is warranted. As per my last post a section above, I propose 1RR for Pcarbonn (talk · contribs) on cold-fusion-related pages, on the basis that he is edit-warring explicitly to disproportionately promote an agenda. A couple of uninvolved admins (Sandstein and Nandesuka) expressed general support for some sort of action, while Ronnotel and CBD objected. I objected to the factual basis for their objections, and then... well, you see.

There's no consensus for a restriction at this point. I'd like to invite anyone considering contributing to this thread to ignore the immediately preceding section as a distraction and comment on the initial thread and 1RR proposal. If there is no further substantive discussion and support for 1RR by uninvolved editors and admins, I'll drop it. MastCell ^Talk 16:28, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

The only "agenda" he seems to be trying to promote is a personal belief in the truth, which he feels is backed by reliable sources. -- Ned Scott 04:36, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes. The essence of the Neutral Point of View is that it should be possible for our readers to understand what the pro-cold-fusioneers and what the anti-cold-fusioneers believe once they have read the article on cold fusion. If such a controversial subject does not pass this test then it does not satify NPOV no matter how well referenced it may be. That is the main reason why pro-cold-fusioneers should not be excluded from the article without very good reason. Remember that for controversial subjects Wikipedia's aim is not so much to describe the subject (except for those parts where there is agreement from both sides) as it is to describe the controversy. -- Derek Ross | Talk 05:05, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

You're talking about apples and I'm talking about carbeurators. He's edit-warring and fighting a battle to make Wikipedia reflect The Truth, not WP:NPOV. That's a very good reason to limit someone to 1RR. We don't "need" devoted cold-fusion promoters to write a good article on cold fusion - in fact, they are demonstrably counterproductive. MastCell ^Talk 20:31, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

One side of the content dispute is asserting that he is breaking NPOV, but that has not been established. Did I mention this is a content dispute? And Guy seems to be edit warring more than anyone on that page. -- Ned Scott 08:06, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe I'm missing something, Ned, but I disagree. We all have a personal believe in sharing the truth, or we wouldn't be here. What the editor in question seems to have is a very strong POV, a focus bordering on SPA, a previously hidden COI, and a declaration of victory in using Wikipedia as a battleground. If he is really here for the sake of Wikipedia, rather than for pushing his POV, then he shouldn't have a problem taking six months or so off from the cold fusion articles and working on something else. On the evidence I've seen so far, I'd support any reasonable topic restriction, including the one proposed by MastCell above. William Pietri (talk) 21:20, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

What COI? There is no COI. Being an SPA isn't something that's disruptive at all. People can choose to focus on one topic, or even article, if they please. And the comment about winning a battle.. get over it and stop being so over dramatic. You guys take offense to the stupidest things... This is a massive assumption of bad faith, and you people should find a trout to slap yourselves with. -- Ned Scott 08:03, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

The COI I'm referring to is being a partisan. I'll use myself as an example. I'm an expert on and strong advocate of a particular set of software development methods. I've spoken and written extensively on them. However, on Wikipedia, I don't really edit those articles. Why? Because my abiding interest in promoting an agenda is in direct conflict with my interest in helping with a great NPOV encyclopedia. I'm making no accusation of bad faith here; conflicts of interest are fiendishly hard to manage. I don't think being an SPA is a priori disruptive, but it correlates with being here to push an agenda, which I think is subtly corrosive. William Pietri (talk) 05:54, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

User hit by Scibaby rangeblock

Resolved

 – On advice of Thatcher, IPblockexempt not granted. –xeno (talk) 01:51, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Please see the unblock request at User talk:Bacasper. It seems he's been hindered by a hardblock of a range used by Scibaby. Should the IPblockexempt flag be granted? –xeno (talk) 20:22, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Related concerns at User talk:72.58.90.54 / User talk:68.27.99.212. Offer to create account and IPblockexempt, or...? –xeno (talk) 20:25, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

See also WP:AN/I#Large amount of Rangeblocks by Raul654. - auburnpilot talk 21:58, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

• Ah, just checked the IPs aren't hardblocked, so I'll offer to create an account for them. Should the user get IPblockexempt? –xeno (talk) 21:59, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

BAG membership nomination

Per the bot policy, I am making this post to inform the community of a request for BAG membership. Please feel free to ask any questions/comment there. SQL^{Query me!} 03:14, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Someone take a look at this mass deletion of Nobel Prize pictures

Please here. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:32, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I've left a note on his talk page--as long as he's willing to discuss it, there's nothing that needs to be done. --jonny-mt 05:59, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Cold fusion

See also WP:COIN. The long and the short of it is, Pcarbonn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has written an article in a fringe journal, New Energy Times, openly admitting that he has been pursuing a years-long agenda to skew the article Cold fusion (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) to be more favourable to the fringe views proomoted by that journal, [21] and especially [22]. Example:

"I'm pleased to report that the revised page, resulting from the mediation process, presents the topic as a continuing controversy, not as an example of pathological science. This is a major step forward in the recognition of the new field of condensed matter nuclear science and low-energy nuclear reaction research ... I now have a lot of respect for all paradigm-shifting scientists, like Copernicus, Galileo, Fleischmann and Pons, and the other courageous cold fusion pioneers".

Note:

Few media outlets are paying attention to the subject, and many of the prominent individuals known to New Energy Times who are observing the field are keeping mum though a few observers such as Ron Marshall and Pierre Carbonnelle have tried their best to participate.

Per WP:NPOV, if "few media outlets are paying attention to the subject, and many of the prominent individuals known to New Energy Times who are observing the field are keeping mum" then Wikipedia should be right there with them. Not working to fix that problem, as Pierre Carbonelle and Ron Marshall have tried. And try they most assuredly have.

This is a wholly inappropriate use of Wikipedia. We are not here to resurrect the reputations of pariah fields, we are here to document them. Pcarbonn and other members of this fringe group have been the major editors of that article for a very long time, and caused it to be demoted from FA status due to POV-pushing.

I have reverted, again, to the FA version. This is reasonably free of the subtle and destructive bias of this group. A friend of mine who was a grad student in one of the labs in which the original Fleischmann-Pons experiments were conducted, and who is still active in academia as a full professor in bio and electrochemistry at an English university, read through the FA version and said he considers it a fair representation of the field. I trust his judgment in a way I don't trust that of Pcarbonn.

This incident is a perfect example of a problem I have pointed out many times: those who seek to promote a fringe view are attracted to Wikipedia by its profile. It is massively more important to them to get their POV reflected on Wikipedia, tan it is to almost any Wikipedian to stop them. Long-term polite POV-pushing, driving off all those who seek to maintain neutrality, has in this case resulted in an article with which the POV-pushers are very happy, reflecting as it does their fringe view.

As I say, I reverted to the FA version which has the benefit of not having been subject to years of insidious POV-pushing. I also suggest an indefinitet topic ban for Pcarbonn. I do not recall his ever having declared his conflict of interest during the protracted mediation in which he was the main, almost sole at times, participant. He has abused the project, abused the good faith of Seicer and others, and committed a gross violation of WP:NPOV in the service of an off-wiki agenda, using Wikipedia to change reality rather than document it. Enough. Guy (Help!) 07:03, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Before I consider your suggestion further, could you provide the link between the author of that piece and the account in question? Sarcasticidealist (talk) 07:09, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Oops, confusion - the link you provided above goes to the wrong article. The user links to the right one from his user page. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 07:12, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'd also note that his statement "I have won the battle for cold fusion) (note where "the battle" links to" is completely inappropriate and is about the mostl explicit, if not the most severe, violation of WP:NOTBATTLEGROUND I've ever seen. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 07:23, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

To be clear here, I do not care at all - not even slightly - if they are right or wrong about the field itself, the problem here is the egregious use of Wikipedia to try to shape rather than reflect public opinion. Public opinion, as reflected in journals such as Physics Today, is that cold fusion is essentially a joke, and where it is not a joke, the Pons-Fleishmann debacle is sufficiently powerful in the memory that people are very wary indeed of going anywhere near it. Again, Wikipedia is not here to fix problems in the real world, and that is what these guys have been trying to do.

More to the point, he "won" by virtue of persistence, because (as usual in such cases) it really matters to him to win, whereas most of the rest have other "battles" to fight and other articles to police. This is a perennial and growing problem. The ones with the itme, energy and determination are the ones with an agenda to promote. Guy (Help!) 07:31, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Where the hell are you getting this from? I read both articles he wrote, and I see no issue here. Someone believes something different from you, so you want to ban them from editing? -- Ned Scott 07:54, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

JzG, why are you bring up a content dispute on AN? This editor believes that they are acting in good faith, and that they are upholding NPOV and are using reliable sources. They might be right or wrong in that belief, but they haven't broken any rule or behavioral guideline. -- Ned Scott 07:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Because (if you read it) I am suggesting a sanction. Guy (Help!) 10:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

OMG this editor believes that X is accurate, has nothing to personally gain by X being true, but honestly believes it is backed by reliable sources. Now that son of a bitch has the balls to write about it in a journal of like-minded peers. How dare he! -- Ned Scott 08:10, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, we do have a classic case of a single purpose account here. I can't find more than 10 edits by Pcarbonn to any article other than cold fusion, and in the most recent version, I don't see the word pseudoscience at all (last I heard about cold fusion it was in a class dedicated to the identification and investigation of pseudoscientific theories [although Category:Fringe physics is in Category:Pseudophysics which is in Category:Pseudoscience]). And Pcarbonn's writings at New Energy Times, the second of which contains the statement "I hope that the revised Wikipedia article will help put a stop to the epidemic of pathological disbelief and that it will help raise the interest of scientists so that prominent scientific journals won't be able to reject articles on the topic "because it does not interest our readers." Certainly, Pcarbonn has been involved in this revision process, which he holds his own views on.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 08:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

If you have not found more than 10 edits by me to any article other than cold fusion, you have not looked. No editors have been able to find a post-2000 sources saying that cold fusion is pseudoscience, and a recent RfC on the subject concluded that cold fusion is not pseudoscience. This is a content dispute, nothing else. I have no financial interest, in one form or another, related to cold fusion. I have followed all wikipedia rules, and even have written for the enemy. Pcarbonn (talk) 09:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

My goal of "presents the topic as a continuing controversy, not as an example of pathological science" is fully supported by the most notable, reliable review of the field: the 2004 DOE panel. Anybody who wants to present cold fusion as pseudoscience has a hidden agenda (one editor presented himself as the representative of the "average scientific lab" and defended their view, at least as he saw it). The only thing is, this agenda is not supported by reliable secondary sources of the same level as the 2004 DOE (see parity of sources). All this is explained in the paper I wrote for NET, if anybody would care to read it. Pcarbonn (talk) 09:24, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

This is because fringe topics are not published, generally, in main stream scientific journals. This is something I also learned from the course that I took. And I went back through about 2000 of your contributions, and out of the articles, most were related to cold fusion, if not cold fusion itself. A simple Google search shows the differing ideas. A search of the last 20 years of articles in the Journal of Physics gives 24 papers (I did not read them, but they were few). And, also, you mention "the enemy." There shouldn't be talk of enemy and ally on Wikipedia unless it's an article about a war, and the RFC. I'm not saying someone's right and someone is wrong here, but a bulk of your contributions (and by bulk I mean well over 90%) are dedicated to cold fusion and related pages.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 09:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

And there's nothing wrong with that.. -- Ned Scott 09:49, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

However, it is wrong that this article went from featured to just "good" because of its current content.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 09:52, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

It was promoted in 2004 and demoted in 2006, and there were multiple issues cited at its delisting. It's unfortunate that the article lost it's FA status, but that's a content dispute. Pcarbonn doesn't have a COI here, he just believes there's some truth to cold fusion. It doesn't appear that he's ever tried to hide that fact. Suddenly Guy finds out he wrote an article about the situation and proposes that Pcarbonn be banned from the article. WTF? -- Ned Scott 10:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Ryulong, you say "fringe topics are not published, generally, in main stream scientific journals". This statement applies to pseudoscience, not to fringe science topics. They have been several papers on cold fusion in peer-reviewed scientific journals, another proof that it is not pseudoscience. If I'm not mistaken, the google search you propose only provides self-published, unreliable sources, and certainly not at the level of reliability and notability as the 2004 DOE review.

Here is what the ArbComm unanimously said about significant alternative to scientific orthodoxies : "Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, a fundamental policy, requires fair representation of significant alternatives to scientific orthodoxy. Significant alternatives, in this case, refers to legitimate scientific disagreement, as opposed to pseudoscience." That is what I have defended, only that, and I'll continue to do it. Pcarbonn (talk) 10:26, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Cold fusion appeared well and fairly documented last time I read it, probably thanks largely to Pcarbonn.[23] Now when I glance at it I see a lead with zero citations and zero footnotes.[24] Jzg has blanked the page. See blanking on the types of vandalism. Blanking pages wholesale is not the way Wikipedia works. Point out citations that you find questionable, discuss, proceed with dispute resolution if necessary. Don't come here. Don't edit war. Don't blank verifiable research including evidence from the Osaka University, Dep't of Navy, Indian gov't, DOE review, and others.

Some of the concerns raised by Ryulong are difficult to understand "Pcarbonn has been involved in this revision process, which he holds his own views on" -- we all hold our own views on subjects. The people with the strongest views are generally attracted to editing the articles. I fail to see the relevance, and I think there's a major conflation of vested interest with conflict of interest here. Also, the POV pusher thing goes both ways. All of the evidence in favor of cold fusion clearly should be documented: If you can point to specific areas where Pcarbonn has pushed highly questionable references and content, you should be addressing those on the article page, or going to dispute resolution. This sounds like a whole lotta noise and rhetoric. JzG's blanking the page should be reverted as vandalism, if he continues he should be blocked. Since this isn't the place to be discussing the article content, I propose we close this, and it can be continued on the article itself, as it should be -- although perhaps it should be continued, since there's some highly questionable behavior from JzG here.

The FA article is categorized as pseudoscience. There was recently a RfC which overwhelmingly concluded that although cold fusion is fringe science, it is not pseudoscience. So there's no consensus for these actions.

If JzG wishes to proceed with blanking the page, he should try a RfC first. A lot of people have done a lot of work on the page that existed, and most seemed to think it was pretty good. II | (t - c) 10:53, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Is it accurate to say that transitioning Wikipedia's article from describing cold fusion in terms of 'fringe pseudo-science' to a 'scientific controversy' was a laborious and sometimes heated process? If so, then I can see no 'rule violation' in saying so. Wikipedia is not SUPPOSED to be a battlefield. But, can anyone really say that Cold Fusion wasn't? In 1989 (first DOE review) it would have been perfectly reasonable for Wikipedia to describe cold fusion as fringe pseudo-science, but that became less and less true over time and by 2004 about a third of the second DOE review members were saying that they found the evidence for cold fusion convincing or compelling. In 1989 US government funding into cold fusion research was barred because the DOE thought there was nothing to it, but since 2004 it has been allowed... because the DOE now isn't sure whether there is anything to it. Kudos to Pcarbonn (and doubtless others) on successfully updating the encyclopedia to be in line with the current status of the issue. Five years from now we may be rewriting the article again to explain what was really behind the anomalies which caused researchers to think that cold fusion was happening... or the details of how cold fusion was confirmed. Surprise, NPOV isn't a static unchanging animal... and sometimes getting people to accept that things have changed IS a 'battle'. --CBD 11:14, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Well the policy of NPOV is a very static sexy animal. However an actual neutral point of view can change day by day (MINUTE BY MINUTE!) on specific topics. And everyone who saw the Saint stop the evil Russians knows Cold Fusion is real. Beam 11:22, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The July 2008 version (with 64k of material -- JzG cut it down to a 2004 version with 24k material) doesn't even describe it as a scientific controversy per se. It's pretty neutral; the phenomenon is described more like a strange anomalous curiosity which mainstream physics mainly ignores and can't explain. It's sort of an example of incommensurability between research programmes a la Lakatos – not that "new physics" is really scientific in my mind, but as a layman I have no way of knowing. There seems to be more interest it in abroad, but since we're English, we can't really discuss that as well, only mention it. Of course where there is interest should be mentioned, as it is in the well-referenced version, which is rather careful. In some cases it language could be shifted; for example, in the criticism section on lack of reproducibility, it might be best to start with the 2004 DOE panel's claim that the effects are not replicable rather than the the researchers' claim that there is replicability "at will". Then again, considering the 2 recent positive reviews and reports in peer-reviewed journals, maybe not. What is surprising is that there are very few recent negative reviews in the article. This might be because many of the anti-fringe POV pushers prefer to blank than to do research. If JzG gave the thing a careful read and attempted some research of his own, he could fix these problems; instead he seems intent upon pushing a futile edit-war with no talk page support to make some kind of emotional point. His actions are amazingly irrational and starkly in violation of Wikipedia policies for dispute resolution; surely he realizes that 40k of content worked up over 4 years are not going to disappear on his personal whim. II | (t - c) 11:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The July 2008 version is perfect if you are a True Believer, less so if you subscribe to the majority POV. When you say anti-fringe POV pushers, do you mean WP:NPOV-pushers like me and SA, or do you mean those who oppose Pcarbonn and the other fringe POV-pushers? I don't do WP:OR, myself, but thanks for the suggestion.Guy (Help!) 12:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• CBD, what the 2004 DoE review said, and what those who supported cold fusion in some respect said, was that there is some unknown effect but that without getting the basic science right it is pointless to keep repeating the same sometimes-reproducible experiments. The cold fusion mob like to interpret this as "DoE supports cold fusion research", but actually it's "DoE says go away and do the basic science". They have had 18 years to do it, and have not yet come up with a credible mechanism. The scientific community is still waiting, and the general reaction to cold fusion in the scientific community is highly sceptical, which is one reason the cold fusion mob did a Windscale and changed the name to LENR. But the problem remains: those who have the enrgy and determination, are those with a vested interest in the fringe view. That was the problem during dispute resolution, it is the problem now. The New Energy Times mob have successfully rewritten Wikipedia to reflect the world as they wish it to e, but the world is not as they wish it to be. Guy (Help!) 12:23, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Guy has related this to a genuine problem, of persistent and polite pov pushing producing misleading articles. This version (not Guy's preferred older version) includes references which are difficult to substantiate, but appear to indicate something which is clearly fringe science. Whether it's pseudoscience is more debatable, and to that extent the older lead appears doubtful to me, but at present the lead section bends over backwards to give credibility to what seems to be a minor unexplained anomaly which is only just detectable. Its proponents still seem to be making wild claims about the potential of this unexplained process for future energy generation. The request for mediation resulted in a draft being introduced for further discussion, and evidently the recent version was considerably watered down from that draft to give more credence to "cold fusion". Not easy to overcome such persistence, unless editors show equal persistence in giving due weight to mainstream views. . . dave souza, talk 12:51, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• Yes, exactly. For example, the lead describes two literature searches by interested parties in minor journals, thus placing them on a par with Fleischmann and Pons' paper in Nature, one of the highest impact journals in the world, and leading to one of the largest scientific controversies of my lifetime. Sure, Pcarbonn sincerely believes that the tiny group of pro-CF researchers are onto something. Problem is, most of the mainstream not only doesn't believe this, they don't even know they exist. Guy (Help!) 13:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not involved with the editing of this article. It seems to me that whether the material inserted by the POV pusher is correct (or rather, plausible) is beside the point. Rather, we have a startling admission of bad faith in editing and unclean hands. It seems to me that in the face of that, the proper steps are:

• 1. Revert the article to the pre-bad-faith version (the FAC version seems like a good starting point.)
• 2. Begin dispute resolution at whatever level is appropriate (RFC, RFArb), and optionally...
• 3. Discuss in this space whether a community (or topic) ban is appropriate

Dithering over the details of the edits is appropriate for a content dispute. This is not a content dispute. This is an editor who has figured out how to game our system, who has done so to great effect, and who is now encouraging others to do so. This is an extraordinary situation, and in my opinion, calls for extraordinary remedies. Nandesuka (talk) 14:32, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• I agree with Nandesuka. This is not about the topic being fringe science or not, this is about violations of our conflict of interest standards and about treating Wikipedia as a battleground. I could well imagine that a topic ban might be an appropriate remedy.  Sandstein  14:46, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
• A revert to the accepted mediation version, which includes most of the content from the Featured Article, is what I suggested on Guy's talk page. seicer | talk | contribs 14:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

• Problem: "accepted mediation version" here equates to Pcarbonn's preferred version, since he was responsible for about 90% of the lobbying in the mediation - I was rather busy burying my father at the time, and Pcarbonn somehow forgot to mention that he was setting out to use Wikipedia to blaze the trail in rehabilitating the reputation of this fringe field. I'm sure it just slipped his mind. You'll find if you look at that mediation that virtually everybody supporting the more sympathetic view which prevailed, is a single-purpose or agenda account, and they are the ones with all the determination because it is vitally important to them to get their way. Guy (Help!) 15:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Further comments should be made cold fusion talk page. This is a bad faith, biased rant by JzG, who apparently hasn't even read the article, nor paid any attention to the thorough discussions ongoing on the article. The article has been constructed collaboratively with several editors, including skeptics. ScienceApologist and several others are heavily involved there balancing things; JzG would be welcome, I'm sure. Pcarbonn has a vested interest -- this is not the same thing as a conflict of interest, which implies financial incentives. Sure, Pcarbonn has an opinion, and feels that the article on cold fusion is now balanced. That doesn't necessarily mean it is balanced, but that is something that JzG should try to fix as an editor, and should be. If one reads BATTLEGROUND, one can see that he is working directly against its principles. Battle ground says this:

Wikipedia is not a place to hold grudges, import personal conflicts, or nurture hatred or fear. Making personal battles out of Wikipedia discussions goes directly against our policies and goals. Every user is expected to interact with others civilly, calmly, and in a spirit of cooperation. Do not insult, harass, or intimidate those with whom you have a disagreement. Rather, approach the matter intelligently and engage in polite discussion.

Rather than attempting to go to the talk page and gather consensus, JzG suddenly reverts an article 4 years back. That's battleground behavior, pure and simple. Find problem areas, bring them up, discuss, use dispute resolution if necessary. II | (t - c) 15:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

From the perspective of article content, the only question that needs to be asked when someone has reverted a page to a prior version is, "Is the restored version better than the more recent version?" The act of reverting, particularly if a revert is back to a FA version, is not necessarily "battleground behavior." I haven't looked into this particular debate. Antelan 15:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The only question is not whether one person (in this case, JzG) thinks it is better, but whether the editors think it is better. JzG went straight in and took it back to 2004, with not a word to the talk page seeing what all the actual article contributors have to say. He reverted again after an anon IP contributor to the article (who I believe is a skeptic of cold fusion) reverted him. That behavior is undeniably shocking, really, and you should really look into things before you comment. The page has seen heavy attention lately. A 2004 FA wouldn't even be a GA today, in many cases, and I think this is one of them. 24k vs. 64k; the "FA" doesn't even have footnotes or parenthetical references. JzG is not our knight of science. This is not a battleground where he fights demons of fringe. He needs to learn to play within the rules and discuss like normal editors. II | (t - c) 15:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Reverting to 2004, FA or not, seems retarded. Since 2004 the way mainstream scientists and the US Govt (among others) look at Cold Fusion has changed. The whole idea of Cold Fusion has evolved in 4 years. To revert to 2004 instead of working together in 2008 is lazy, and imAWESOMEo irresponsible. Beam 15:46, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

(ec)Actually, if anything the 'featured article' version seems markedly more friendly to a 'cold fusion is real' viewpoint than the version before the revert. In several places the version from four years ago seems to state cold fusion as an outright fact, barely pausing to note that some dispute it. Also note that I call it a 'featured article' version because it is nowhere remotely close to current FA standards... featured articles were a very different thing four years ago. --CBD 15:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Some of what has happened since 2004: the American Chemical Society hosted a 2007 conference on cold fusion,[25] and plans to (or already has) published a book in 2008[26], and the American Physical Society hosted a conference. The Indian gov't announced that the science appears promising and wants to look into it, an Indian version of Nature ran an article; and a couple people at Osaka University claimed that they have working cold fusion reactor.[27]. I've never edited the article and only read it first a couple weeks ago, so there may be other things, but these are all reliably published. I'm guessing that JzG just didn't know about these things; if he did, then it seems even more ridiculous. That's why it is best to research and think before acting... II | (t - c) 16:00, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to leave the content issue aside for now, though I have an opinion about it. The basic issue is simple: we have an editor whose self-admitted purpose is to use Wikipedia to raise the profile and credibility of a fringe/disputed idea. That editor has used mediation as a "battle" in which he successfully wore down opposition, and has gone so far as to brag about it in a niche publication devoted to cold fusion.

This editor should not be editing Wikipedia articles on cold fusion. That this is even controversial is disheartening. We have here a very basic and well-documented abuse of Wikipedia to promote an off-wiki agenda. I am in full agreement with Sandstein: Pcarbonn should be restricted from editing cold fusion and related articles indefinitely, though at this point I would suggest allowing him to continue contributing to the talk pages. If his proposed changes actually improve the article, they will find support from others. Is there significant opposition to a topic ban from articlespace on cold fusion - based not on which version is "better" but on an abuse of Wikipedia to promote an agenda? MastCell ^Talk 16:53, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

While I agree that dragging an on-Wiki dispute off-Wiki is never a good idea, I think we should primarily consider PCarbonn's on-Wiki contributions to the page and behavior before we start boiling up the tar. PCarbonn has worked diligently and in good faith. I see no reason based on his record to support a topic ban. Ronnotel (talk) 17:03, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Off-wiki agenda? One's agendas cannot be separated into on-wiki and off-wiki categories. You have an agenda to write good medical articles reflecting mainstream science. Pierre has an agenda to make sure that the recent scientific literature on cold fusion is presented. If you look at the purported evidence, he states he believed that his work was necessary and neutral, and that he was aided by the publishing of articles in prestigious peer-reviewed journals. No evidence has been presented that he wore down the opposition into accepting information that doesn't belong on the page. The cold fusion article right now looks fine, with plenty of strong references and a neutral tone. Some less strong references are probably in there, but they can be removed, and they constitute the minority from what I've seen. II | (t - c) 17:13, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Come on - one of those "agendas" is in keeping with Wikipedia's goals, mission, and policies, and one isn't. The cold fusion page doesn't look fine - it was just protected due to edit-warring over a particularly iffy conclusion to the lead. If someone goes off-wiki to say, "Hey, I won the battle to use Wikipedia to raise the profile of our pet theory!" and then comes on-wiki to edit-war in furtherance of that agenda, then I don't see the point of an artificial distinction - the bottom line is amply clear. I feel strongly that either 1RR or restriction to the talk page are appropriate here. MastCell ^Talk 17:20, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Note that Pierre didn't add that bit to the lead, and is fine with removing it. From what I've seen he appears to be quite cooperative. He comes with a bit of a bias, yes, but so does everyone. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for JzG, who appears less inclined towards discussion and consensus and much more inflammatory. II | (t - c) 17:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Yup, because Pierre is here for the long haul to get his POV reflected in Wikipedia as part of changing the way the world views the subject, whereas I'm here to keep the project neutral and have many, many articles on my watchlist - plus I'm travelling right now (in the Swiss business lounge in Zurich airport, to be exact). Guy (Help!) 17:54, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I too am not bothered by this report. Previous efforts to influence Wikipedia have resorted to sockpuppetry, concerted meat-puppet campaigns, canvassing, and the like. This effort instead used reasoned arguments in a mediation. The mediation by a good and fair editor here, resulted in some changes to the article, and they regard the changes as having the article "present[ing] the topic as a continuing controversy, not as an example of pathological science." This is a reasonable goal, and in keeping with Wikipedia policy. They consider the main way they did it was by adding additional references. Ditto. I wish all people with an agenda did as reasonably. (FWIW,my personal opinion is that the initial reports were in fact an example of pathological science, and that subsequent work now leaves open the possibility that something might be real. It is a somewhat more plausible sort of thing than ufos.) DGG (talk) 17:26, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm explicitly not endorsing Guy's, or anyone's, preferred version. The new one may well be better, and anyway that's not an AN/I question. I'm not even arguing with the quote snippet you've selected, about describing it as a "controversy" rather than "pathologic science" - I think that's appropriate. I'm concerned by the other quote snippets above, indicating that a group of people from this relatively small community are using Wikipedia to raise the profile of their pet idea, and that they view their participation as a "battle" to gain "recognition" for "paradigm-shifting scientists like Pons and Fleischmann." I'm not especially convinced by the argument that OTHERCOORDINATEDAGENDAPUSHINGEXISTS; sure, they're not "as bad" as some of the chronic Lyme disease groups, or the AIDS denialists, or the unaccredited-correspondence-school brigade, but that doesn't mean it's not an issue. And I don't see the problem with 1RR - if these changes have support from editors without an axe to grind, then they'll be incorporated. If it's only the cold-fusion community that want to see them incorporated, then it won't happen. That seems right to me. MastCell ^Talk 17:49, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Mast, please, point to something Pierre has done on-wiki that deserves censure. If we handed out topic bans to every editor who brings an agenda there'd be no one left to enforce them. Ronnotel (talk) 17:55, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

That's an oversimplification. If we topic-banned everyone who came here solely to leverage this site's visibility and promote a topic "unjustly ignored" by mainstream academia, we'd be just fine. In fact, this place might get closer to its stated goal of being a serious, respected reference work.

Again, I see the on-wiki distinction as artificial in this case. This editor has written that his participation here is driven by the desire to promote acceptance of cold fusion, and thus favorably influence journalistic and academic coverage of it. In light of that expressed agenda, his on-wiki actions, summarized in his own words as "I have won the battle for cold fusion", seem problematic. I have a really hard time seeing what we lose by 1RR here. MastCell ^Talk 18:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I have a really hard time seeing where 1RR is justified here. Given, for instance, that Pcarbonn reverted JzG exactly... once. It was everyone else, including a cold fusion skeptic, that was reverting JzG's 'blast from the past' restoration of the page to 2004. --CBD 19:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Really? Would it change your opinion to look at the page history in a little more depth? Because Pcarbonn (talk · contribs) has reverted at least 4 times in the past 20 hours ([28], [29], [30], [31]). That's edit-warring, and it would be blockworthy were the page not already protected. To be fair, I think he later self-reverted one of these when he read the source he was citing and found that it did not support his claims. Nonetheless, it seems through-the-looking-glass bizarre to argue that he's only reverted once, or that edit-warring is not an issue, or that 1RR is somehow out of left field here. MastCell ^Talk 21:17, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Topic bans are used to prevent disruptive behavior that is seriously debilitating. Many alternate forms of behavior modification are before this extreme step. Are you proposing that we blow through all of these (warnings, escalating blocks, mentoring, RfCs) and opt for a topic ban as first response? Ronnotel (talk) 21:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

No. I'm proposing 1RR, which is good practice for everyone, and particularly useful in forcing an advocate to convince others that his edits are beneficial rather than edit-warring to directly advance his agenda. I find it's much more useful than escalating blocks and mentorship, and I'm not aware of a mandate that these other approaches fail before we institute 1RR. MastCell ^Talk 21:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

WP:AN is not a step in dispute resolution

off topic Discussion
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
JzG, you should know better than this. WP:AN is no one's personal tool to get their own way in a content dispute, if there's a problem you take it through regular dispute resolution. This is exactly the kind of behaviour you said you'd moderate, but you're back to old tricks again it seems. Please do not cause this kind of disruption again. --Barberio (talk) 21:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC) This was an appropriate question to bring to WP:AN to solicit administrative opinions. Please don't engage in baiting. MastCell Talk 21:41, 24 July 2008 (UTC) With all due respect MastCell, it is explicitly not. I suggest you scroll to the top of this page, and read the part where it says "What these pages are not". --Barberio (talk) 22:29, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Please accept that I am familiar with the workings of this page. I'm hardly the only uninvolved admin to feel this is a reasonable issue to address here; see above. We'll have to agree to disagree about that. MastCell Talk 22:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC) While you may well be familiar with the workings of this page, you are contradicting the clear statement at the top of this page about what should not be posted here. This is a content dispute that should have gone through dispute resolution. It should not have been posted here. End of discussion. As an admin, you should not be undermining the dispute resolution process. --Barberio (talk) 22:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Give it a rest, Barberio. We don't have to adhere to the letter of the law 100% of the time. Yes, you can comment that maybe next time they should take it somewhere else, but being rigid, bossy and bureaucratic isn't going to help anyone. Tan ǀ 39 22:51, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Content dispute resolution is not something to be dictated by what ever group of administrators are reading WP:AN or WP:ANI at the time.--Barberio (talk) 23:00, 24 July 2008 (UTC) You have to admit, MastCell, he's beat you here. He said the same thing three times in a row, and everyone knows if you say something three times in a row it becomes true. Plus, he was the first one clever enough to say "end of discussion". Much like saying "shotgun!", or "Mornington Crescent", the first one to say it wins. --barneca (talk) 22:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC) (ec)Been meaning to ask you, Barneca, how's that Jimboship thing working out for you, anyway? Ronnotel (talk) 23:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Does anyone have a "special say" in dispute resolution? All we have are third opinions, uninvolved opinions. Yes, we have WP:3O and WP:DR, but who is there? Just a different group of... uninvolved opinions. Is the dispute being addressed in a manner that furthers Wikipedia? Are you helping that along? Geez. Grumpy old man in every crowd - "get off my lawn!" Tan ǀ 39 23:06, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I'd like to state that I am very disappointed in the amount of administrators who seem to express the opinion that the Dispute Resolution Process should only be followed when they want it to be, and can be short cut whenever they want. It can't, being a Wikipedia administrator didn't grant you the power to skip over Dispute Resolution. Wikipedia does not need disruptive administrators undermining the Dispute Resolution Process. If you think "Dispute Resolution" is a bunch of bureaucratic rules you can ignore at whim, maybe you need to reconsider why you're here? --Barberio (talk) 23:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Whatever. If I am having a dispute, I am not required to go to Dispute Resolution. I have many, many options at my disposal here for resolution of my problem. And now you say I need to reconsider why I am here? What the fuck does that have to do with this? Tan ǀ 39 23:11, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Different editors & admins work out the issues that arise in different ways. Some are painstaking in one approach, others in others. There are no hard and fast rules, nor should there be. We should all look at any situation, assess it, and then decide the appropriate course of action. Unless I'm missing the diktat somewhere that says "Go directly to DR". We should all be flexible, as each problem or issue is unlike any other. And, while I'm on, saying "maybe you need to reconsider why you're here?" is frankly appalling and unnecessary. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 23:24, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I've made no secret of my opinion that administrators who undermine Dispute Resolution, and administrators who reject civility, should not be administrators on this project. I'm not going to change that opinion because it might hurt the feelings of the administrators who reject civility or undermine Dispute Resolution. --Barberio (talk) 23:33, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I suggest reading Wikipedia:Dispute resolution which is after all policy. WP:AN is only for urgent cases of disruption, not content issues that can be resolved by any of the other methods outlined. Again, every editor including administrators is expected to follow Dispute Resolution. While you may have 'many options', only some options are considered acceptable and advisable methods to resolve the issue on Wikipedia. And all of them are listed in Dispute Resolution, so if you're taking an option outside of Dispute Resolution you're doing something that might not be in the best interests of the wiki. Additionally, both editors and administrators are also expected to use civil language. --Barberio (talk) 23:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Bullshit. Tan ǀ 39 23:32, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I agree wholeheartedly with Barberio on his/her very last point. Yes, we should be civil. As it is profoundly offensive and uncivil to say "maybe you need to reconsider why you're here?", so we can assume that your last remark is an apology for the one above. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 23:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC) I'm afraid the best I can do is a non-apology apology, in that I'm very sorry if I offended anyone by expecting administrators to abide by the Dispute Resolution process. --Barberio (talk) 23:40, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Once you asked me to "reconsider why I was here", you lost all respect. Not that you care, I would guess. Give me a break - like this bloated entity needs yet more instruction creep, more rules and regulations, more bureaucracy. I have no tolerance for this, or for its proponents. Why am I here? Why are you here, to bring the hammer down on people who take disputes to WP:AN rather than WP:DR. Pfft. Do something constructive. Tan ǀ 39 23:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Are you seriously saying that Wikipedia:Dispute Resolution is instruction creep and bureaucracy, and you will not tolerate it? --Barberio (talk) 23:53, 24 July 2008 (UTC) No, did you read that somewhere? I'm saying that you storming in here and bitching about using AN as a forum for discussing a dispute is a symptom of instruction creep and bureaucracy. Your attitude isn't "solve the problem", it's "you're solving the problem, but not in the right place, therefore you're doing it wrong!" You should be a director at my company, you'd fit right in. Tan ǀ 39 23:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Your argument might have merit if... Dropping it on AN did actually resolve the problem, which, oh, it hasn't. And really it's just opened up more drama. There wasn't a better place to discuss it. Heck, why bother with things like Wikipedia:Articles for deletion or Wikipedia:Requests for comment, when everything could be put on WP:AN!--Barberio (talk) 00:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC) (outdent) Barberio, bridges burnt are seldom easy to repair. That's the first point. Pissing people off is rarely a good strategy if you intend to hang around here awhile. The next point is to repeat what I've said above. You don't need to always go to DR. Why? If I drop in on an admin's talkpage to draw their attention to some idiot that is edit warring to say that the sun rises in the west, should that admin and I be forced to go off hand in hand to DR given that this is a mere content dispute? No, I think not. So, we can see that we thrive here on many things, including our flexibility, a hangover from when this site was much more anarchic than it is now. Get used to it. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 23:58, 24 July 2008 (UTC) Do you really want everyone to be bringing their content disputes to WP:AN from now on? --Barberio (talk) 00:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC) p.s., the date stamp on my first registered account edit here is 11:34, 2 July 2005. And I've felt free to argue and dispute things James Wales has said, and tell the ArbCom off for overstepping their bounds. So let's not lecture me on 'burning bridges'? I'm not here to be liked or popular, I'm here to help build an encyclopaedia. --Barberio (talk) 00:11, 25 July 2008 (UTC) To your first point, no, I think I have made myself abundantly clear. Each case should be viewed on its merits, and then an appropriate course of action determined. And importantly, given your question, what part of what I posted above was unclear, by the way, just for my future reference? To your second, well, remember that Wikipedia is a community a bit like a village or (these days) a small town. Your remark that you're "not here to be liked or popular, I'm here to help build an encyclopaedia" equates to and demonstrates enjoyment of or at least contentment with a bit of antagonism, ruffling feathers, pissing people off, whatever phrase you feel fits. Well, you can go down that road, but if you annoy people, especially pretty high profile ones, good luck next time you need some assistance. Oh, and by the way, there is always the option of putting your point firmly, forcefully, determinedly, straightforwardly, but without the antagonism in which you have indulged yourself this evening. Just a thought :-) AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 00:23, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I was perfectly polite, I just said things that some administrators do not appear to want to hear. (ie, that they're supposed to go through Dispute Resolution like the rest of us) I feel no compulsion to soft soap people who use language and tone like Tanthalas39 has. --Barberio (talk) 00:32, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I note that JzG was asking for a sanction of an editor, which people have (so far) declined to do. Such a request is not a content dispute. —Kurykh 00:13, 25 July 2008 (UTC) Exactly, and it should have started and ended with that. But as demonstrated, a lot of people seem to think content disputes are okay for discussion on WP:AN now. And strangely, get abusive and resort to obscenity when asked to take it to WP:DR like any other editor.--Barberio (talk) 00:22, 25 July 2008 (UTC) Well, your statement is only half correct. The discussion about the appropriate sanction, if one is to be applied, is ongoing. —Kurykh 00:29, 25 July 2008 (UTC) Did anyone say that, either? Do you just make shit up or what? We don't have a problem with "too much stuff at AN". I mentioned in one of my first posts in this thread that you could have mildly mentioned to them that maybe next time, take to DR, or the article talk page, or one of the involved editor's talk pages. However, you opted to be stiff, inflexible and stubborn over a solution to a problem. Ultimately, who cares where the problem is solved? We're not getting paid for this. Absolutely nothing says "Thou must go to Dispute Resolution". DR exists as a possibility, an option for people who want to use it. The fact that this - this - is what you are worried about here, instead of saying, "hey, here's a couple editors hashing out a problem", is ridiculous. And your new "PS" there just serves to illustrate your bitterness and "I've been here longer, listen to me!!" attitude. People like you don't help problems, you create them. As, ironically, I feel I am starting to do here, so I bow out. I'll read your response, tho, so feel free to have the last word... Tan ǀ 39 00:15, 25 July 2008 (UTC) My p.s. was solely in response to the "if you intend to hang around here awhile", which was an attempt to pull the "as I've been here longer than you have" argument. --Barberio (talk) 00:22, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I agree fully with JzG on this matter. Wikipedia is not here to provide a soapbox for every kook with a theory to push. Jtrainor (talk) 00:20, 25 July 2008 (UTC) I think you will find that Wikipedia is not here to provided a soapbox for anybody, whether they may be considered kooks, or not, by people with different agendas. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:46, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I know we're having fun, but...

I'd like to return the discussion to the actual administrative issue here, which is whether any sort of editing restriction is warranted. As per my last post a section above, I propose 1RR for Pcarbonn (talk · contribs) on cold-fusion-related pages, on the basis that he is edit-warring explicitly to disproportionately promote an agenda. A couple of uninvolved admins (Sandstein and Nandesuka) expressed general support for some sort of action, while Ronnotel and CBD objected. I objected to the factual basis for their objections, and then... well, you see.

There's no consensus for a restriction at this point. I'd like to invite anyone considering contributing to this thread to ignore the immediately preceding section as a distraction and comment on the initial thread and 1RR proposal. If there is no further substantive discussion and support for 1RR by uninvolved editors and admins, I'll drop it. MastCell ^Talk 16:28, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

The only "agenda" he seems to be trying to promote is a personal belief in the truth, which he feels is backed by reliable sources. -- Ned Scott 04:36, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes. The essence of the Neutral Point of View is that it should be possible for our readers to understand what the pro-cold-fusioneers and what the anti-cold-fusioneers believe once they have read the article on cold fusion. If such a controversial subject does not pass this test then it does not satify NPOV no matter how well referenced it may be. That is the main reason why pro-cold-fusioneers should not be excluded from the article without very good reason. Remember that for controversial subjects Wikipedia's aim is not so much to describe the subject (except for those parts where there is agreement from both sides) as it is to describe the controversy. -- Derek Ross | Talk 05:05, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

You're talking about apples and I'm talking about carbeurators. He's edit-warring and fighting a battle to make Wikipedia reflect The Truth, not WP:NPOV. That's a very good reason to limit someone to 1RR. We don't "need" devoted cold-fusion promoters to write a good article on cold fusion - in fact, they are demonstrably counterproductive. MastCell ^Talk 20:31, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

One side of the content dispute is asserting that he is breaking NPOV, but that has not been established. Did I mention this is a content dispute? And Guy seems to be edit warring more than anyone on that page. -- Ned Scott 08:06, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe I'm missing something, Ned, but I disagree. We all have a personal believe in sharing the truth, or we wouldn't be here. What the editor in question seems to have is a very strong POV, a focus bordering on SPA, a previously hidden COI, and a declaration of victory in using Wikipedia as a battleground. If he is really here for the sake of Wikipedia, rather than for pushing his POV, then he shouldn't have a problem taking six months or so off from the cold fusion articles and working on something else. On the evidence I've seen so far, I'd support any reasonable topic restriction, including the one proposed by MastCell above. William Pietri (talk) 21:20, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

What COI? There is no COI. Being an SPA isn't something that's disruptive at all. People can choose to focus on one topic, or even article, if they please. And the comment about winning a battle.. get over it and stop being so over dramatic. You guys take offense to the stupidest things... This is a massive assumption of bad faith, and you people should find a trout to slap yourselves with. -- Ned Scott 08:03, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

The COI I'm referring to is being a partisan. I'll use myself as an example. I'm an expert on and strong advocate of a particular set of software development methods. I've spoken and written extensively on them. However, on Wikipedia, I don't really edit those articles. Why? Because my abiding interest in promoting an agenda is in direct conflict with my interest in helping with a great NPOV encyclopedia. I'm making no accusation of bad faith here; conflicts of interest are fiendishly hard to manage. I don't think being an SPA is a priori disruptive, but it correlates with being here to push an agenda, which I think is subtly corrosive. William Pietri (talk) 05:54, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

User hit by Scibaby rangeblock

Resolved

 – On advice of Thatcher, IPblockexempt not granted. –xeno (talk) 01:51, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Please see the unblock request at User talk:Bacasper. It seems he's been hindered by a hardblock of a range used by Scibaby. Should the IPblockexempt flag be granted? –xeno (talk) 20:22, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Related concerns at User talk:72.58.90.54 / User talk:68.27.99.212. Offer to create account and IPblockexempt, or...? –xeno (talk) 20:25, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

See also WP:AN/I#Large amount of Rangeblocks by Raul654. - auburnpilot talk 21:58, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

• Ah, just checked the IPs aren't hardblocked, so I'll offer to create an account for them. Should the user get IPblockexempt? –xeno (talk) 21:59, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

BAG membership nomination

Per the bot policy, I am making this post to inform the community of a request for BAG membership. Please feel free to ask any questions/comment there. SQL^{Query me!} 03:14, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Someone take a look at this mass deletion of Nobel Prize pictures

Please here. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:32, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I've left a note on his talk page--as long as he's willing to discuss it, there's nothing that needs to be done. --jonny-mt 05:59, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Admin coaching

One of the co-coordinators of Admin Coaching has semi-retired and removed himself from the position. I've said before I feel uncomfortable being the only coordinator. Would anyone else with some experience in the field be interested in helping out? MBisanz ^talk 16:24, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Geesh, when was the last time that page was updated? It's almost entirely false. Also, what is the specific role of the coordinator/s? Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 16:27, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Tag as {{historical}} and go back to the old way of letting people find coaches themself? –xeno (talk) 16:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Yep! --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 16:31, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Sorry MBis... I know this probably wasn't the feedback you were looking for, but I completely agree with Xeno. The page is not just outdated but otherwise problematic. I don't think we need a new coordinator, or any coordinator, frankly. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 16:34, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Ouch. (and I agree with xeno too). Keeper ǀ 76 16:40, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, just to clarify, this isn't a dig at you or BM (MB AND BM, how about that), I just don't think there's enough admins participating in ADCO for it to be a well-functioning entity at the moment (as evidenced by the large number of backlogged requests). Much like the LOCE, it's probably better not to get peoples hopes up and instead have them pound the streets looking for a coach themselves. Just mho. –xeno (talk) 16:41, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

What does a co-ordinater actually do? WilyD 16:48, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Matches coachees and coaches. –xeno (talk) 16:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

And to further clarify my stance, it looks like most of the effort is in the encouragement of systematic editing in certain areas to increase likelihood of passing an RfA, something that the community appears to be sniffing out regardless of its being done in admin coaching or by the editor themselves. It's resulting in more candidates getting blindsided by negative results in RfAs as coaching, no matter how much people don't want to admit, can't teach maturity or other intangibles, probably the single most impotant qualities of a good admin. Bringing this back to the topic at hand, I'd be quite happy if this program fizzled out and we don't try to keep it going. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 16:51, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Is the problem the fact that the programme appears to be aimed at getting people to and through an RFA? The mentoring concept behind it is a good one - it's basically an extension of the adoption programme - where it takes those people who have been around long enough to master the basics of editing and contributing, so wouldn't fall under the current adoption scheme, and then takes them "behind the scenes" and shows them how to contribution not just on a content-level, but on a project-level. That's a good thing, surely - the more people participate in XfDs, and the project and community side of things the better. Maybe, then, convert it into more of an adoption scheme for not-so-newbies...? _GB^T/C 17:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Heh, I'm glad someone is finally paying attention to this, I got the job by default when the last coord retired from WP, in Feb 2008 me and Balloonman tried cleaning it up as best as we could, recruiting new coaches, etc. I agree we may have failed and wouldn't object to retiring the coordinator part of the wikiproject. If we do tag it as historical, we will need to update the Esperanza close, the RFA instructions, and remind people not to send NOTNOW RFA candidates to coaching. All up to you guys :) MBisanz ^talk 17:22, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't say you failed; a coordinator can only help as much as he has people willing to be coordinated. –xeno (talk) 17:27, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, that's a pisser. I was hoping to get some coaching, not because of the maturity and "intangibles" (I am just immature enough to fancy myself equipped in that department ;D ) but because I am pretty sure an RfA for me would fail right now due to lack of relative lack of mainspace/article-building contribs and lack of experience with other people's RfA's and Wikiprojects. I was hoping for some pointers and coaching in how best to accumulate those types of contribs and experience, and for advice in when I had done enough of that type of work.

If the project has fallen apart, no sense in continuing it. But it's still a pisser.  :( --Jaysweet (talk) 18:32, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

No jay, admin coaching is not "gone" , but it's probably best if you find yourself a coach, rather than counting on the program. –xeno (talk) 20:36, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

"Enough of that type of work" for what? To pass an RfA? Just goes to emphasise the point that Gwynand made so eloquently above. Admin coaching is pants. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 20:42, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

You know any that are available? :) --Jaysweet (talk) 20:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I know that User:Revolving Bugbear recently lightened her load. –xeno (talk) 20:40, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Take a look at User:Giano/A fool's guide to writing a featured article. Go page through a few AfD's per day (just be aware that people will scrutinize every comment you make in XfD at your future RfA). Most WikiProjects are pretty desultory affairs - I wouldn't worry too much about that. Do it cause you want to, not cause you want to be an admin. The difference is usually pretty obvious at RfA. MastCell ^Talk 20:46, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice MastCell. Good to hear not to worry about WikiProjects; my opinion of them has so far been roughly consistent with "desultory affairs", and so the "do it caust you want to, not cause you want to be an admin" is just not going to happen there :D

I already participate in XfDs that catch my eye, and would have no problem just stepping that up a bit.

The main thing I really want help with is, yeah, getting some GA/FA stuff. I'd like to do it, but I'm not sure where to start. I glanced at Giano's guide once before, but not in-depth. I'll take another look now. --Jaysweet (talk) 20:51, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Just start by finding a subject that you're genuinely interested in, however obscure. In fact, the more obscure the better. For your own sanity, make sure it's not the subject of active controversy, unless you're a masochist. Collect some references, organize the article, and tidy it up with wikilinks and the like. Ask User:SandyGeorgia if she would be kind enough to review it for stylistic issues. List it at peer review and be polite, even if the feedback is that it sucks. While you're there, peer-review a few other articles. Then arrange with someone over IRC to pass it as a good article nominate it for GA or, if the peer review was favorable and the article is substantial enough, you can go straight to WP:FAC. While you're there, review a few other candidates. MastCell ^Talk 20:57, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and while you're at it, vandalize "radically rework" MastCell's userpage a few times. There will be a barnstar in it for you! Tim Vickers (talk) 23:54, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Admin coaching is usually total silliness; the question is whether the user has established a record of being civil, productive and trustworthy and has done enough work on articles to demonstrate a commitment to the purpose of Wiki and an understanding of policy and tricky editing situations. I'm pretty sure that a tour of my record at XfD would show dismal results, perhaps even a batting record in the wrong direction; point being, trustworthy editors know their own weaknesses, and if given the tools, would stay away from those areas, so demanding experience in certain areas strikes me as foolishness. Do a good job in whatever you do, do sufficient article work, show that you're trustworthy and committed, and RfA should be no problem. Don't do that, and no amount of coaching will help. Show up with ill-prepared FAC noms of articles that you've rarely edited and were passed by your friends at GAN so that you can comply with an admin-coaching checklist, or support a lot of FACs that eventually fail because other reviewers identify serious deficiencies, and be assured you may encounter an Oppose from me at RFA :-)) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:38, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

• eh, I passed with no FAs, FLs, DYKs, any of that. See User:Xenocidic/Archive 1#Contributions. –xeno (talk) 20:59, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I've been thinking a lot about this, partly in light of a lot of the responses that we've had to the RfA Review. On the one hand, there's the feeling that admin coaching can be little more than training someone to pass a test or RfA. On the other hand, there's the thought that training editors on how to use the various behind-the-scenes areas of Wikipedia can be a force for good when done correctly, as long as improving the editor's capabilities and not becoming an administrator is the goal of the coaching. Perhaps the programme needs to evolve slightly, picking up from the Adopt-a-user programme and extending editor training to some of the more advanced areas that they may find themselves in, helping to find them a niche in which they feel they can participate comfortably at a level they are happy with. I think you will need some form of coach-coachee matching, as different editors have their fields of work in different areas, and it would be prudent to match a potential coachee's areas of interest to those a coach is strong in. I also think that by evolving it from an Admin Coaching banner to an Advanced Editor coaching one, you may end up with more experienced editors and admins willing to support the programme. I think that there are possibly other fringe benefits from this change, partly perceptional, partly actual, that could become apparent the more this is examined. Gazimoff_{(mentor/review)} 20:59, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Is there an echo in here? _GB^T/C 21:05, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Not so much an echo as a convoluted way of agreeing with you :) Gazimoff_{(mentor/review)} 21:09, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

(multiple edit conflict; I have not read Xenocidic's, Gazimoff's, or Gb's latest contribs, so sorry if something they said is relevant to my comments below)

@Malleus Fatuorum: Perhaps if you agree with Gwynand, you would like to ask him what he thinks about me&adminship. ;)

The bottom line is this: To successfully pass an RfA requires that one demonstrate proficiency at a number of different tasks, and yet after the RfA most admins wind up performing only the subset of those tasks which they are good at and/or particularly enjoy.

This is not a criticism of the RfA process; I think there are very good reasons why we expect this. For example, achieving an FA will give a prospective admin a level of experience in vetting the reliability of sources that would be difficult to achieve otherwise. Even if that person goes on after their RfA to never work on a single FA ever again, the experience could be extremely valuable in other contexts, e.g. determining whether a sourced-but-critical addition to a BLP needs to be reverted posthaste because the source is not reliable; or explaining to a user why they were blocked for repeatedly adding an unreliable source.

I will never be good at doing the kind of legwork required to put together enough sources for an FA. The legwork aspect of it is just not something I particularly enjoy. However, if I don't get at least some experience doing that sort of legwork, not only would it be likely to torpedo any chance at passing an RfA, but the lack of said experience would also very likely make me an inferior admin even if I were to pass.

So when I say I want a coach to help prompt me as to when I've had "enough of that type of work", I do mean on one hand to pass an RfA, yes; but I mean on the other hand that I'd like an experienced admin to tell me if they think I've had enough experience in that realm to gain a true understanding of what really goes into that type of work.

I hope this clears things up! :) --Jaysweet (talk) 21:08, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Hey, now that I've got some admin attention, another question: I have seen some places that participation in other folks' RfAs is generally considered a prerequisite to one's own RfA. Now, I read other people's RfAs fairly often, but I've never felt particularly moved to !vote in one, or to add a question, etc. Two part question: Would that be considered a weakness at an RfA? And also, as per my explanation above as to why I want to work on article building some more before attempting on RfA, is there some indirect benefit to one's adminship qualifications of RfA participation that I am not seeing? --Jaysweet (talk) 21:27, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

My answer to the first question would be that I don't see the question of whether the candidate has !voted on other RFAs as being even remotely relevant in determining which way I'll !vote for them... _GB^T/C 21:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I just want to say Jaysweet, that you are doing an absolutely brilliant job of pre-canvassing for your future RfA :-). You will definitely get my vote, as admins are primarily politicians :-) (this is all said in jest BTW, I don't really think this) Keeper ǀ 76 21:49, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

To jump back in here, and use Jay as my guinea pig... you definitely don't need an admin coach, you are way too generally competent to gain a net positive from specifically listing one person as your "admin coach" who despite their best intentions will likely do wonders in terms of getting your numbers/ratios ready for a succesful RfA. It's quite contrary to the natural flow of things on Wikipedia, as in a large collaborative project, and frankly it would be transparently obvious that goal of someone like yourself getting coached is simply making sure you can get through the RfA, but not that you are helping the project in doing so. While I think there are some cases where minor article work can be overlooked for otherwise highly competent candidates, it is totally logical and in the right of the community to expect proof of effort and knowledge in writing articles on a project where writing is the goal. Jay, you can certainly figure that out on your own, and in the daunting effort of improving an article to GA/FA, I advise you in collaborating or asking questions to anyone you please on how to do so, but as for the formal admin coach who will keep an eye on counts and ratios and the like, I'd say avoid it. You might won't become the ultimate "RfA candidate", but I genuinely believe you'll be a better contributor if you do it on your own. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 21:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh dear, I've seen this Wikipedia dynamic before: an idea that's basically really good is seriously undermanned because the community fails to appreciate its importance, and because it lacks sufficient manpower and organization it doesn't function as well as it could, and rather than give it the support it deserves someone starts a motion to dismantle it entirely. Coaching and training is normal preparation for positions of responsibility; Wikipedia is not intrinsically different from the rest of the world in that regard. Yet because our training is so deficient, the few people who become administrators are mostly a rare breed who figure things out for themselves. Over time, because we've never remedied those shortcomings, we've collected an admin corps of highly motivated self-starters who collectively do not think training is useful. Because we've failed to develop a concept of best practices (which is really fundamental to organized coaching), a lot of coaching gets done badly. That's a reason to put more effort into the area, not to dismantle it. Please see User:Durova/RFA Review boycott. Durova^Charge! 22:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Learning through trial and error is really the only way to can really know how to use the tools properly though. We don't need more admin coaches, just more people who are willing to nominate users. Wizardman 23:28, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Learning through trial and error is really the only way to really know how to drive a car properly. Nobody construes that as a reason to abolish driver's education classes. Durova^Charge! 23:31, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Learning through trial and error is the only way to become a lawyer. Close the law schools. Learning through trial and error is the only way to become a heart surgeon. Close the medical schools.--Filll (talk | wpc) 23:36, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The best lawyers first go to school, THEN learn by trial and error. Every doctor I know of first went to school, then learned by trial and error (what do you think an intern does? a resident? Learns. He or she has a more experienced doctor supervising so that the errors don't kill people... but believe me, the first time a raw intern goes to put an IV needle in will be a trial for someone. Probably the patient... Close the schools? only if you want the error rate to go way way way up. But no trial and error? Nope. That doesn't strike me as a very intelligent way to design a training program. ++Lar: t/c 03:32, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I have three doctors in my family. Don't get sick in July. New interns start July 1 every year. The hospitals are always a mess at that time. I think admin coaching is most useful after to tools are granted. Jehochman ^Talk 03:57, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I guess John and I are outlyers, we see the coaching role as more focusing on the introspection and motivation part, and our role to weed out those who would not be happy as admins, rather than focusing on the blocking and tackling and mechanics and edit counts and suchlike. Not everyone who knows how to push particular buttons ought to actually be allowed to push them. But even our best laid plans seem to fail as our last coachee, regrettably, did not pass... we should have caught that and saved some effort for everyone, but we didn't. ++Lar: t/c 03:32, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

• Certainly the greatest weakness in the coaching program was that, while it was fairly successful in teaching people what to do, and how to do it, there didn't seem to be much ability to help people understand why something should (or should not) be done. I've noticed several editors lately who spend a great deal of time in project space apparently following the edict to "act like an admin", rather than observing how good admins act. Shadowing a couple of admins who appear to be respected and occasionally asking them a question about why they chose a certain course of action would be more beneficial to those who plan to request adminship, I think. Carrying out self-tests where one analyses a real situation and then develops and rationalises an action plan is also useful (for example, reviewing 10 articles up for PROD and detailing one's thinking on whether or not to delete, what steps were taken in coming to that decision, etc.). Just my two cents. Risker (talk) 04:03, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

As someone who's currently listed on this, and given that I'm unlikey to be got to any time soon, I'd have to say I think there's a great deal of merit to the project.

I will not dispute in any way any statements that AC tells people what to edit to some extent rather than why, but given the !votes I've read on hundreds of RfAs a great deal of peopl would rather see a candidate have edits in 'adminly areas' rather than concentrating on a specific area (usually WP:CSD, WP:AfD, WP:AIV etc).

I have seen a great deal of !votes on RfAs where candidates have made quite clear that they will be working in areas such as these which tend to be the most backlogged (or at least end up backlogged more often than other areas even if they don't always stay so for long), but the RfA fails as so many people feel that people have not made an artilce up to GA/FA or contributed to the WP namespace.

Perhaps this is a problem with the lack of criteria for adminship rather than the voters themselves but if a potential admin makes clear that they're going to be active in these areas, then telling them they've not been active in the WP namespace or to make up an FA/GA is self defeating?

I'd have thought that if you have a user that an admin coach (who will obviously usually be an active admin so you would hope they know ;)) thinks would be excellent in the areas they want to contribute in but they would fail due to lack of WP edits then would it not make sense to assist these users by giving them pointers as to what they would need to work on? I'm not advocating telling a person you need to propose a new naming convention or propose a new subguideline or something like that but if we get an admin in a backlogges area out of it would that not be preferable?

Not only this but most of the tasks that are set by the coaches (from what I've seen) tend to be 'real life' examples of what would come up. For example many have a "Would you delete this article test" or how would you close this AfD. It's a chance to make the big "cock ups" (apologies for the angloism) where it won't matter before a new admin goes charging in and deletes the main page! BigHairRef | Talk 04:39, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I've always regarded RFA as one of the least important elements of admin coaching. Certainly it's necessary to pass it, but if a candidate is well suited and prepared that takes care of four-fifths of RFA. The remainder is communicating with the voters. Coaching doesn't end with RFA either, any more than learning to drive a car ends with gaining a licence. Good instruction is neaver really about passing this or that exam; it's about conveying information and building skills. Durova^Charge! 04:51, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I would suggest tagging it as historical because most figures and stats are so outdated. The process is not successful, in my opinion. I am one of those admins that joined this program in the hopes of becoming an admin. Then first RfA failed due to my participation and interaction with the admin coach. I dropped out of the program and then became an admin without further help from any admin coach. Overall, the goal of the project sounds promising to potential admin candidates, but not really doing its purpose. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 05:25, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't disagree with the notion behind what Durova and others are saying, and for some reason almost assumed someone would bring up a comparison to law school or the like. Despite my fervent opposition to what admin coaching has become, I'm not so crazy as to suggest that any element of coaching or practice is bad, I myself tried to help get User:Pedro/Mentoring mentoring off the ground. To work with the law school comparison... to become a lawyer, one does not simply state one day, "hey, I want to be a lawyer, let me into law school!", rather, it comes after years of studying, a college degree, and a good score on the LSATs. Admittedly, of course becoming an admin is no where near what becoming a lawyer is, but at the same time adminship isn't becoming a hall monitor in high school either. It's an important position of some authority and power that is just difficult enough that not everyone can go willy nilly expecting to become one on a whim.

The proper coaching and practice I've personally envisioned consists of much more natural editing on your own, discussing issues with peers across various forums, asking questions early and often, etc. Even forums like User:Pedro/Mentoring were good, they totally ignored RfAs and were open to people who wanted to simply discuss difficult items. I hadn't clicked on the WP:ADCO link in a long time, and when I first did after MBisanz linked it here, I had a bit of a "Is that a joke/are you serious?" moment. Going back to the law school comparison... it basically looks like a page advertising how it can properly get someone through the Bar exam and what goes into that. What's worse were the horrible edit count minimums that it required potential coachees to have... essentially encouraging all the wrong things from the outset. The "Best Practices" notion is actually a very good one, but admin coaching and adoption programs have moved so far away from that that I am currently opposing continuing in ways that are even close to them. Opposing means, well, I'll be fairly vocal about just how bad I think most of these programs are and advise against them, but in the end, people can do whatever they want. I won't blanket oppose all forms of coaching, which I agree would be ridiculous, but just about anything based on the premises listed on the front of WP:ADCO I think are purely helpful to individuals for passing RfAs, not actually helping the community. Like teaching students how to get ready for and pass the bar, but ignoring what practicing law really means. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 12:39, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I am tired and my eyes are starting to swim reading this thread - whoever said oomphing up adopt a user to swallow up admin coaching hit it on the head...the KISS strategy...Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:58, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Getting back to the opening post

Mbisanz asked for a co-coordinator volunteer for the admin coaching program. I don't have time to step forward in that role, but I'd be glad to work on a team to develop a "best practices" program. Any other volunteers? Durova^Charge! 16:09, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

what coaching should be

The Coaching Pages were updated just a few months ago and when you consider how long it takes to get consensus to make changes here on WP, I'd say that was fairly recent. I would have no problem getting rid of the people looking for coaches page---I've found that page to be a waste of time myself. Most of the people on that page are not qualified and the 'consensus' a few months ago was that we shouldn't remove unqualified people. Most of my coachees have sought me out. I completely agree with Durova, coaching CAN be a crucial step to help people who aren't self starters get the experience/knowledge necessary to becoming a coach. I think the Coaching Pages can still be helpful---but I think the focus should be on "how to coach." IMO most of the people who do coaching, do not prepare their candidates adequately. And by that, I mean, they give them drive by assignments "Go do a single FAC review" now "Go welcome 25 people to the project" now "Go vote on 20 AfD's." These drive by's don't help and give coaching a bad name. Coaching is about developing the editor... it should be an extended editor review that challenges the user to try new things... to establish a footprint in places he/she might not have...---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloon 15:31, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

That might be ideal - and make the focus on people seeking out coaches themselves. If this is the decision, I can bot-spam the people still on that list and let them know they should pound the streets themselves. –xeno (talk) 12:47, 28 July 2008 (UTC)