User:Davidwr/AGF Challenge Exercise Answers

Note: I am no longer interested in adminship This page is kept for posterity and in the hopes it will be useful to others who might want the bit. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 10:09, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Responses to User:Filll/AGF Challenge Exercises

My wife is not a coauthor

A question relating to office actions, not editor or administrative actions.

As soon as he said "SUE" it became an office action. Let the lawyers handle it. If I were Wikimedia council, I would be tempted to call his bluff but I would ignore my personal preferences and ask myself how a court would rule on the issue. I would not "simply cave" to avoid the cost of a lawsuit. In any case, I would invite him to support his claim. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

My town's library

A question regarding a very poorly written, almost-but-not-quite nonsensical article about a place that is almost certainly not notable and may not even exist. The article contains no assertation of notability or references.

I ran across this all the time when I was handling the WP:AfC backlog in 2007. I summarily rejected or totally rewrote such articles and notified the talk page of the IP address of the reason why. If it was in an article and I found no evidence the library existed, I would put cleanup templates at the top and nominate it for speedy deletion, and notify the author. I wold also check the author's other contributions. Before flagging it, I would check to see if there was a suitable previous version.

How many hours of editor time should Wikipedia spend to deal with this?

Enough time to check for previous versions and about 10-20 minutes to check if the library could be considered notable under any stretch of the imagination. If it could be then spend enough time to determine if it is or not, and if it is, take the time write a a passable stub or better, with references of course. As a courtesy, notify the author that you rewrote the article. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I am the best

No, I am the best. OK, maybe not, but somebody is.

How would I write an article about a person whose claims to notability are built on fabrications.

I wouldn't. I would go on to something else. If there was an existing article about him, I would gut it of all unsupported false facts, tag all "supported" false facts with counter-citations and/or flag them as "dubious" and put a polite, minimally-harmful note on the talk page, something along the lines of "X is not true per Y, even though Z claims it is. Should it stay with a counter-claim or should it be deleted?" then delete it after a few days if there is no reply. By the time I was done, there would be no uncontested false-because-the-source-was-wrong information in the article, and preferably no false information at all. If the remaining article was worse for the project than not having any article about this person at all, I would PROD or AfD it. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

What if this person threatens legal action if Wikipedia does not do what he asks?

Refer it to WP:OFFICE. It's their job. At this point, the simple thing to do would be to delete or stub the article then fully protect or WP:SALT it. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Arrow of Time

On dealing with a persistent editor who doesn't respect consensus.

If everyone is being polite, I would take that as a sign that maybe they are okay with this. If they were, I might let him get away with this behavior.

However, that is probably not the case. Assuming it's not:

After the 3rd revert in a day or, by rough extension, any ongoing but slower revert war, short blocks are an appropriate response. I would also recommend the editor for mentoring. If the editor was making quality edits elsewhere, I would recommend he spend his time elsewhere. If I thought he was mentally stable, as soon as he says "sue" I would reply with something along the lines of "I understand your frustrations, but please don't threaten legal action. Taking or making a serious threat of legal action results in an automatic block by WP:OFFICE, a block no administrator will remove until the legal threat is withdrawn. If you are serious about suing Wikipedia, have your lawyer contact ..., however, once he does so, you will no longer be able to edit here until the issue is resolved" or something to that effect. If I thought he might be mentally unstable, i.e. would go ballistic at a perceived threat to be blocked for threatening to sue, I would probably ask other administrators to intervene and might even request an expedited ARBCOM hearing to have him temporarily banned from editing just the article(s) in question for a week or two.

I would also give barnstars of civility to everyone who showed extraordinary patience with this person, ask them to join mediation-related projects, and consider looking at their edit histories and asking if they wanted RfA nominations.

davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Ghost in the machine

Questions relating to a possible fringe article

In the specific example you state, WP:FRINGE applies. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Take me to your Leader Extraterrestrial Shape-shifting Reptile

On dealing with alleged membership in a non-existent secret society by public figures.

The best solution would be for Jimbo and the members of the foundation to invite this editor and his 50 best friends over for a fancy dinner. Problem solved.

Seriously, BLPs are sancrosanct. As for everyone else, the sources needed to add this to any article about a subject other than itself would have to be verifiable and reliable. If they were, at least one major news outlet would be controlled by a real human being and would blow this story out of the water, and we could add it to every affected person living or dead. Alternatively, all the major news outlets are controlled by the blood-suckers and we've got more serious issues to worry about than Wikipedia. By far the most likely outcome is that there are no reliable, verifiable sources available, therefore, no mention of these should be on the pages of those alleged to be lizards from outer space.

What if this editor is joined by 50 others with the same agenda so they can overwhelm any minor response by Wikipedia editors?

See Meatpuppets are delicious. If those 50 others are acting independently though, then you have a real issue. RfCs should attract at least 51 editors who are ignorant of the truth or who are lizards themselves so they can out-!vote the conspiracy theorists. With the aide of the reptiles with CHECKUSER and those at the major telecoms, it won't be hard to find these 50 people and talk to them one-on-one. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Related to a saint

Relating to using unpublished, dubious sources in preference to reliable, verifiable sources when an editor's feelings are at stake.

The editor should be encouraged to revisit his family tree and verify that his aunt wasn't using incorrect information. Send him some pointers to genealogy web sites. In the meantime, merge the versions of the articles so they contain only verifiable, reliable sources. Invite the editor to be part of that process if he wants to, with the caveat that information from his unpublished source is off-limits. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I make my own rules

One editor who was fond of WP:FRINGE theories...

There, fixed that for you. On an editor who writes his own version of policies then dupes new users into following them instead of the consensus-approved policies

Seriously:

You don't say if he edited the real policies or if he created copies and used those in his welcome template. I assume he's been asked then warned repeatedly to stop.

In the former case, it's as simple as reverting his edits to the consensus version and temporarily permanently-protecting the policy until he gives up. In the latter case, a bot that watches for such behavior and appends a "These are the real polices" list would be appropriate and should neutralize his efforts. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)