User talk:Thatcher/Archive19

This is an archive of past discussions. Its contents should be preserved in their current form. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Appeal of ban to arbcom

I am seeking to appeal a ban, but have never filed an on-Wiki arbitration case before. It was suggested that I might talk to you for assistance. I started a thread on my talk here. The ban notice is here, this follows a discussion on WP:AN which you have previously been made aware of. —Whig (talk) 18:04, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Editing war with a Wik Editor called Fainites barley

Dear Clerk,

I find myself in an editing war with a Wik Editor called Fainites barley. I am afraid as a contributor I am not really familiar with making complaints so I have put it on an html page at;-

http://eventoddlers.atspace.com/WikCOMPLAINT1.html

I should like to lodge a formal complaint and would like to know whether this format is acceptable?

Many thanks,

kipKingsleyMiller (talk) 21:00, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

moved from your user page -- lucasbfr ^talk 21:02, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

• Kip, at this point what I see in article content is that you and Mrvain68 (talk · contribs) are going back and forth over the issue of the Strange Situation Protocol and both of you appear to be driven by an agenda; Fainites (talk · contribs) appears to be trying to work your material into the article with appropriate changes to style, tone, references, excessive block quoting, and so forth. You should probably review the neutral point of view guidelines for article content presenting alternative viewpoints fairly but without bias. I can't find anything in your complaint that is inappropriate at this time. I would like to respond to some specific issues you raise.
  • There is no difference between "contributors" and "editors." You and Fainites have the same authority and ability to edit articles. He probably is more familiar with procedures, style, content guidelines and such, which may give him more de facto input, but he does not have more authority de jure.
  • Youtube is complicated, you should review the guidelines for external links. In general, Youtube links are not allowed because the contents almost always violate someone's copyright. Videos that do not violate copyright (uploaded by the creator, for example) still have to be measured against the rest of the external link policy. For example, they would normally be linked in an External Link section rather than embedded in the text, unless they also met the criteria for a reliable source citation. You should not add links to your own videos as that is a conflict of interest; you can propose them on the talk page and let other editors decide. External links should contain information of encyclopedia quality that for practical reasons can not go in the text itself. External links should not promote a biased or non-neutral view of the subject if at all possible; biased links should be used sparingly and be balanced by opposing viewpoints.
• If you can not work out your differences on the article or user talk pages your next step would be Mediation, either informal (MEDCAB) or formal (MEDCOM). Mediation is voluntary and non-binding but a good mediator will learn about your issues and try to help the parties find common ground. Also, you may wish to try your hand at editing some other types of articles that you may be interested (have any hobbies?) to get more of a feel for the give and take of editing on an article where you have less of a personal stake. Thatcher 23:20, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Dear Thatcher

Thank you for this quick response.

Do you feel as though I should get help from a more experienced Editor to help me through?

I contacted you in the first place as I had not come across the page on Editor help.

Please note the substantive issues in this complaint lie at;-

http://eventoddlers.atspace.com/WikCOMPLAINT1.html

Thanks again.

kipKingsleyMiller (talk) 09:49, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

• Unfortunately I do not have the time to become involved in sorting out this dispute. You certainly could benefit from the help of a more experienced editor who could take the time to study the situation, look at what you are trying to do, and find the best way to help you do it. You might want to try Wikipedia:Adopt-a-User. Thatcher 10:48, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Removing arbitration requests

Hi Thatcher. I agree with what you did here, but wanted to check that removing requests like this is within the remit of the arbitration clerks. Could you confirm either way, or maybe ask an arbitrator to confirm that the request should be removed? I also see that you blocked the editor following a checkuser. Again, I'm sure it is all fine, but was wondering if you could leave a little bit more of a paper trail? Something like a block notice on the account, and something indicating what the other accounts were that the checkuser revealed? Otherwise it all looks a bit cryptic to those looking in from the outside. Carcharoth (talk) 17:09, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

It's not cryptic. A sockpuppet was trolling. Thatcher executed revert, block, ignore. The ignore part is further explained here. Discussing this incident publicly only encourages more. I suggest you email Thatcher if you have further questions. Jehochman ^Talk 17:20, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

The incident is already public. Anyone who looks can see this and this. I admit, I might overestimate the way people follow what happens on Wikipedia, but I personally look through page histories and logs. Those tell far more than what you see on the "front pages". I saw something in the page history that looked strange (the arbitration request), I noticed Thatcher reverted it. I looked further and found a block with a checkusered sockpuppet indefinite block log, and I then ran into a brick wall. Most times I can then look further and find out what the other accounts are, say, for example, to help clear up whatever mess has been uncovered. But here the paper trail runs cold. Revert, block, ignore, doesn't remove the need for an informative block log that helps people understand what happened here.

I know Thatcher (and others) routinely run checkusers in cases like this (without any of the associated paperwork) and block on the basis of the results, but I disagree with that. I think that all checkuser actions should be logged somewhere like RFCU for purposes of transparency and external review. When I see a checkusered sockpuppet block, I like to be able to follow a link to an RFCU and see what the extent of the problem is, but it seems that there are different sorts of checkuser actions - the openly logged ones at RFCU and the ones that are done without any equivalent paperwork (for want of a better word). My other concern is that those (in the media say) who are not used to how Wikipedia works might see this in a different light.

Finally, my initial question remains: "[is] removing requests like this within the remit of the arbitration clerks"? For that question alone, all that's needed is for an arbitrator to turn up and politely endorse the action, and I will say "thank you" and drop the matter. Carcharoth (talk) 18:13, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

There were 2 accounts blocked at the same time, there is a third account consistent with the other two which was independently blocked for trolling in Feb. No readily identifiable master account (it is easier to compare two suspects than to try to find other accounts associated with a single user, especially when the user has taken pains to isolate the trolling account). There are any number of reasons that the request was not a matter for arbitration; if it had appeared to be a good faith request I would still have removed it but with a polite note to the requester. Essentially, a) no prior attempt at dispute resolution, b) arbcom does not normally deal with off-wiki activities, c) the only allegations related to article content are stale and involve alleged influence through third parties, and d) whether Jimbo should still play a prominent role in Wikipedia business is a matter for the Foundation, not the local Arbcom--the appropriate place to raise these issues is one of the mailing lists (wiki-en-L or foundation-L probably).

You are welcome to email or talk-page any arbitrator regarding the propriety of the removal. Thatcher 18:20, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply, Thatcher. Much appreciated. Carcharoth (talk) 18:29, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Response on Jamiechef2

Responded to your request - I know of at least two blocked but untagged socks, and one probable sleeper account that wasn't detected (either a meatpuppet or the user bouncing subnets/ISPs). Left the listings and diff entries on the probably sleeper for you here. Thanks for keeping up with this, it's been rough. M1rth (talk) 17:15, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

• One more just because it wierded me out to see today - showed up on Gwen Gale's talk page, CindifromNJ (talk · contribs). I may be wrong but it just has that vibe to it. M1rth (talk) 20:18, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
  •  Confirmed. Thatcher 20:51, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

ArbCom enforcement log

Hi Thatcher. FYI, Sarah reverted your logging of her block at The Troubles ArbCom, see User talk:Rockpocket#Urgent. She is understandably keen not to get sucked in to that maelstrom. Since she was not a party to that ArbCom and, as far as I am aware, she has never been subject to its remedies, I can see her point. Rockpocket 18:04, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

FMA

Hiya, on the FMA case, one of the remedies is still at only 6 votes, FYI. --Elonka 21:09, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

• Dang. Thatcher 21:12, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, the close looks good, and I see you've notified everyone that needs to be notified. Is it okay with you if I also post the message on a couple article talkpages (such as Franco-Mongol alliance, Indo-Greek Kingdom) or at least link to the decision? Or would you rather do that? Also, we'll be having some other loose ends to be tied up, as we work through the list of affected articles. Specifically, we may need a couple redirects deleted to make room for moves, and a few templates need to go away. Shall we contact you for any of these, or would it be best if we work through the TfD/MfD/RM processes? Either way's fine, just let me know what you recommend. --Elonka 01:41, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

You can add a note and link to any relevant projects. The case does not offer any remedies about past edits by PHG so I would say that those other changes should go through the normal processes, although under the circumstances they could probably be speedied. Thatcher 01:49, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

FYI - Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Wakedream

Hi, thanks Thatcher. As requested, Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Wakedream. Lawrence § t/e 15:28, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Test

Quick brown fox. Thatcher 16:52, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Feedback on draft requested - User:Lawrence Cohen/Arbitration RFC draft

Hi, if you have a moment, would you mind reviewing User:Lawrence Cohen/Arbitration RFC draft? I'm just beginning to draft this, but given the recent situations I think this could be valuable to see what community mandates if any exist for changes the Arbitration Committee could be required to accept. My intention was to keep the RFC format exceptionally simple, with a very limited number of "top level" sections that were fairly precise. Please leave any feedback on User talk:Lawrence Cohen/Arbitration RFC draft. Thanks. Lawrence § t/e 17:19, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

This is probably the worst time to possibly raise this subject. Hard cases make bad law, as the saying goes. It would seem that a period of calm and reflection is in order, and this could be pursued in a few weeks if it still looks necessary. The middle of a thunderstorm is not the right time to reshingle the roof, even if you think it needs it. Thatcher 01:47, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Prostitution in South Korea & Gimbap

As per the archived WP:AN/I discussion here, I have initiated WP:DR in the respective talk pages as follows:

• Talk:Prostitution in South Korea#WP:NPOV violations / "Prostitution for tourists during the 1970s"
• Talk:Gimbap#The origin of Gimbap

If it's not too much trouble, please continue to monitor discussions there. Thank you.--Endroit (talk) 18:45, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

New user launches edit war

I would like to report a new user for disruptive behavior on page Irredentism. First, user:VartanM kept removing well-sourced information (I have three academic references). Later anon user, who now registered under name User:Azad chai keeps removing the same information. Further he is threatening with edit war and makes personal attacks [1] --Dacy69 (talk) 22:36, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

• Looks like Moreshi has already blocked him. You might want to file a request at WP:AE to bring Irredentism under the Armean-Azerbaijan probation. As long as editors are going to be disputing that as a sub-topic in the article, it should probably be included. Thatcher 22:51, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

• • Turns out its the same guy as Azerbaboon (talk · contribs). No main account identifiable, though. Thatcher 23:41, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

It seems that there is new sockpuppet of this user which is messing up page Irredentism. I left a message to Morischi but with no effect. This new user continues stalking me.--Dacy69 (talk) 13:43, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

• I've applied a small range block to prevent anon editing for a few days and we'll see what happens. He might be able to get a bigger range or he might give up. Thatcher 04:01, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

User:88Soldat88 ?

I'm curious just who this character was a puppeteer of, as I didn't see it on the posting. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 04:41, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm not clear on whether these kinds of things are always or sometimes tagged or whether we are still trying to WPDENY them recognition. Since Flash94 admits to be formerly JScott06 at Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/JScott06‎, I guess you'd say JScott06 is the main puppeteer and all the other accounts are the socks. Thatcher 06:39, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Personally I prefer to see a few of the socks - the checkuser-proven ones anyway. When they start creating socks just to create them, I stop tagging or move older tagged ones into a deleted page somewhere (User:Wknight94/Ron liebman for example). I've seen decent results from that approach but it is just my approach, not one agreed to anywhere. Conversely, I've caught flack for removing sections from WP:LTA... —Wknight94 (talk) 13:20, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Certainly anyone is free to convert the tags to something else if they want to. In my contribs, all the user talk pages between Rhysseus‎ and JScott06 are the same person. Thatcher 13:28, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Troubles Arbcom

I'am very disappointed that this report has been archived without as much as a comment from the arbcom adminstrators. This is giving this editor the green light to continue his disruptive behaviour on wikipedia.--Padraig (talk) 12:07, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

your comment on checkuser

Hi, I am writing with regard your comment on checkuser of Azeribaboon, Azad chai and new anon user. From editing patterns it is obvious that it is the same person. So, should we accept tricks that this person continue under anon. And he continues visiting other pages after me and making inappropriate comments comments.--Dacy69 (talk) 15:41, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

• I've applied a range block, is there anything since that? Obvious vandal and racist comments may be reported to WP:AIV and link to the Azerbaboon checkuser request so the admins who watch AIV will know to skip the early warning stages. Or you can let me know but AIV will probably be faster. Thatcher 16:42, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
  • I thought that since you are aware of the case and your input helped previously to resolve such issues, your intervention can help.--Dacy69 (talk) 18:54, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

TharkunColl and Friends

Hey there, uh we were all exonerated, except someone forgot to unblock the user Trynaa ShieldDane (talk) 03:44, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Here's the links...Trynaa and the proof she is a real person, Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/TharkunColl. Next time can we wait for the checkuser before the bans please? Thanks! ShieldDane (talk) 03:46, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I have my doubts about an editor whose first edit is to say "My purpose is to fight and serve the glorious Editor TharkunColl." Even if the editor is in a different country than you that does not mean the editor is here for purposes that benefit the encyclopedia. Whether to block an obvious single-purpose account is a judgement decision based on more factors than whether or not one has the same IP as another user. She may be a different person but that does not mean she is automatically welcome here if her purpose is to be a disruptive "meat puppet" of another editor. Your own statements in this regard have raised concerns as well that you do not seem to have addressed satisfactorily. Trynaa herself can ask for an unblock by posting to her talk page or following the other instructions visible to blocked editors. Thatcher 03:51, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

So she has to ask for you guys to undo, that which was wrongly done? I'm pretty certain she never even got a chance to make an edit anywhere other then on her user page, and TharkunColl's. While she's done nothing to prove she isn't a meat-puppet, in actual actions on the wikipedia itself, she's done no actions to prove she is one either. Is she guilty until proven innocent? Or Innocent until proven guilty? ShieldDane (talk) 10:08, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Generally, yes she needs to ask for herself. If you feel the need to intervene, ask the blocking admin. Thatcher 11:32, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Freehand

Hi Thatcher. Elonka and friends are using the Arbcom restrictions against me to have a freehand in deleting large amounts of proper content from Wikipedia. For example all references to the relations between Edward I of England and the Mongols have been deleted by User:Ealdgyth: [2]. User:Elonka has reinstated obvious untruths in Viam agnoscere veritatis (discussed in [3], bottom of thread). Could you kindly warn these users that managing to block another user is not a license to do anything on Wikipedia and just delete referenced and true information that they dislike, or reinstate false or unreferenced information? Thank you. PHG (talk) 09:17, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

So let's take a look at PHG's behavior since the ArbCom ruling. His restrictions are to avoid editing articles related to medieval/ancient history, though he is allowed to participate at talk, as long as he does so in a civil manner. He has also been strongly encouraged and reminded to take the comments of other editors into account, and to avoid endlessly repeating the same argument. Since the case has closed, he has:

• Created the article David Morgan (historian) which is about a medieval historian;
• Been protesting the deletion of archived information from his userspace[4]
• Been reinserting large chunks of his preferred content onto the talkpages of history articles (see Talk:Edward I of England#Deletion of information on the Mongols[5] and Talk:Louis IX of France#Deletion of referenced material[6])
• Has been uncivil at Talk:Viam agnoscere veritatis, accusing me of inserting "blatant untruths" into the encyclopedia.[7]

Though no single one of these actions, taken individually, is a huge blatant violation of his restrictions, it is my opinion that they show a pattern of borderline activity. I am willing to give PHG some leeway here, but some closer supervision of PHG's edits would be appreciated, otherwise he is just going to keep wasting the time of other editors, and the only thing that will have changed from the ArbCom case, is that PHG will no longer be actively edit-warring, but he'll still be doing everything else. Thatcher, what do you recommend? Should we formally caution PHG at his usertalk, or file a report at the enforcement page, or do you recommend some other action? --Elonka 09:43, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I cannot use the words "blatant untruth" (I corrected to "Obvious untruth" since then), but Elonka can use the words "blatant violation" against me? I believe all of the above edits are perfectly in compliance with my editing restrictions, inspite of Elonka's attempts to misrepresent them. I am a proper user of longstanding, I am willing to respect the ruling even if I think it is unfair and based on numerous untrue accusations. Creating an article on a modern historian is a great edit, and in compliance of restrictions. Intervening on Talk Pages to make sure some users just do not delete proper content is fully legitimate and in compliance of restrictions. By the way, is there a procedure to appeal a ruling which is believed to be based on false accusations and misrepresentations? PHG (talk) 10:01, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

• PHG may contribute to the talk pages; there is no requirement to adopt his suggestions. A simple "We have considered your input and decline to act on your suggestion" may be sufficient for most cases; how much you wish to engage him on substantive issues is up to you. The usual content dispute mechanisms are still open to PHG (3rd opinion, RFC, mediation) as long as he does not carry the torch for his pet issues too far once a decision has been made. Disruption on talk pages would be actionable by page banning but it would be best to be as tolerant as possible for as long as possible. And, again, it may not always be necessary to engage in a lengthy debate over every point--how much you engage with him is largely up to you at this point. Thatcher 22:49, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Thanks. Looks like FT2 has blocked for 48 hours anyway. We'll see if PHG is able to modify his behavior when he returns (though considering his current comments on his talkpage, I am not optimistic). --Elonka 23:11, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Question at RFCU

I left a question for you at this RFCU. - Neparis (talk) 03:50, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

And another if you could have a look, please? - Neparis (talk) 05:48, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Range block 86.29.240.0/20

I'm currently editing on a friend's laptop, and they found a minor error in an article. I logged out, to give them the opportunity to edit it - they've never used Wikipedia before. It turns out their IP address, 86.29.248.192, is blocked because of the range block you placed on 86.29.240.0/20. So an innocent user's first introduction to Wikipedia is the message "stop playing silly buggers". Not good. Could you review this please. Thanks.  —  Tivedshambo  _(t/c) 19:36, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately you share that range with a persistent troublemaker, I was hoping he/she would find a new hobby. Can you create an account for your friend? The range is only blocked anon-only and account creation blocked. Thatcher 23:03, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

No doubt I could have done, and in the end I demonstrated the minor change by doing it myself on my log in, but the point is that no first time user of Wikipedia should be greeted with the words "stop playing silly buggers". If a range block is essential, could I ask you to pick a more neutral phrase in future, such as "This range of IP addresses has been temporarily blocked due to vandalism." Thanks. —  Tivedshambo  _(t/c) 11:28, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Good point. I changed the wording. Thatcher 01:13, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

article ban

Hi, I'm writing with regard to your one month ban of myself from the Bosnian mujahideen and Mujahideen articles. You "encourage... to discuss the article on the talk page and engage formal mediation". I therefore assume that you are banning me for not doing either of these. However, I believe that I have done both of these.

1. When I first created the Bosnian mujahideen article it was repeatedly deleted/blanked/moved by User:The Dragon of Bosnia and User:Grandy Grandy ([8][9][10][11][12][13][14]). Both of them claimed that the article name was a neologism and based on "Serb propaganda".
2. Precisely to avoid endless edit wars I requested mediation (Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2007-12-04 Bosnian Mujahideen, though much of the discussion was on the article's talk page). There was also an Afd discussion.
3. Following the end of the mediation process I have made long explanations of any edits/reverts on the article's talk page (recently most notable here, here and here).
4. Recently User:Grandy Grandy has made a number of what I believe to be blatantly POV edits (please compare our versions here and here, if you have the time). Again, I sought outside involvement/mediation. However, becuase of the lack of response I contined to revert the POV edits of User:Grandy Grandy.
5. I really believe that I have followed all of Wikipedia's rules of conduct - explain all edits, seek discussion, involve outside parties and finally, to seek mediation. I have reverted what I believe to be blatant POV edits. I cannot see what else you could expect from a Wikipedia editor in nationalist charged articles such as these.

Therefore, I would like to ask you to either revoke my ban. RegardsOsli73 (talk) 01:37, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Thatcher, I will comment that Osli has tried to engage in talk page discussion. However, I support your actions as the correct thing to do to prevent disruptive edit warring. I will be checking on the Bosnian mujahideen talk page periodically and attempt to assist them in reaching some agreeable middle-ground on that article. I will add mujahideen to my watchlist and look over the history in that "parent" article, and assist as I can there as well. If you come across problematic editing or behavior by anyone involved over the next month, please let me know and I will try to assuage the situation as appropriate. Thanks! Vassyana (talk) 18:05, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Thatcher, following you ban of User:Grandy Grandy's his coeditor, User:The Dragon of Bosnia, has now picked up where GG left off:

• Bosnian mujahideen:[15]
• Bosnian war:[16]
• Alija Izetbegovic: [17]

You may want to widen your scope here. CheersOsli73 (talk) 23:19, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

• I'll do one better and block Dragon and Geographer X as checkuser-proven sockpuppets. Report at WP:AE. Thatcher 01:34, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Thatcher, no disrespect meant here. However, I'm still not quite sure why you banned me? As I stated (and User:Vassyana noted after I asked him for a reference) I believe that I have explained and been willing to discuss all my edits as well as initiate mediation when that did not seem to work. However, these last edits have been in the face of what I believe to be sustained and gross POV edits. What else should I have done? I need to know if I am to continue to edit controversial articles on Balkan issues. CheersOsli73 (talk) 07:37, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

note

My AE post was around 850 words, not 10,200.

Thank you for all the help on diffusing the situation when I requested your audience and input a couple weeks ago.

Anyways have a great weekend, Jaakobou^{Chalk Talk} 00:41, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi

Hi Thatcher

Thank you very much for your determination to solve the problem about edit wars in Balkan topics.

I always suspected Osli73 (talk · contribs) is sockpuppet of Jonathanmills (talk · contribs) (Can you review history of Srebrenica massacre article).

Or these edits:

Osli73 and Johnatanmills.

They were both interested in Konjic which is hard to believe, because Konjic is a small town in Herzegovina, and someone who is not from Konjic, and who is a stranger couldn't be so informed to know for Konjic.

Thank you in advance, --HarisM (talk) 00:54, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

• • Please file a request with some evidence. Thatcher 23:32, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Your request for more information on checkuser

Forgive me if this is an inappropriate place to discuss this. I saw in the edit history of Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/WalterGR (I'm WalterGR) that you requested more information, regarding who was blocked in the edit war that Kilz mentioned. To answer your question, Kilz and the other editor he was warring with were blocked. 3RR case report. Block log for Kilz. Block log for the other editor.

I notice you marked my checkuser "Inconclusive." I couldn't find information on what that means, but I clicked the WHOIS links in Kilz's report. I'm guessing you marked it that way because I use the same ISP and am in the same US state as 70.231.224.36? Just FYI, I'm separated from San Francisco by about 90 miles and a toll gate. A round trip drive would be about $30.  :)

I'm not too concerned, given that Kilz is just seeking retribution and given that I don't drive to the San Francisco Bay Area to argue with him on talk pages, but I felt compelled to say something. Thanks (and again sorry if this is the wrong place for discussion,) WalterGR (talk | contributions) 17:50, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Broadly speaking, your conclusion is correct. The geographic locations reported by whois are sometimes wrong, and you might just have a terrible commute. It would be a different answer if you were on the same local IP range, or yet a different answer if you were editing from British Telecom. All in all, inconclusive means can't be ruled in or out by technical means. Thatcher 22:39, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. WalterGR (talk | contributions) 22:45, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Layla27

I started to file as a regular RFCU, but then I actually moved the request to RFCU/IP, and Alison found 30 socks, all now blocked. The edited RFCU addendum is probably of use as a matter of history, but we can call it closed until the next time, I think. Acroterion _(talk) 23:49, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Question at RFCU

I left a question for you at this RFCU. - Neparis (talk) 02:37, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand the question, or perhaps I do not understand the assumptions that underly the question. Even if checkuser revealed the home address and phone number of the web site owner, there is nothing we can do to stop him from finding new IPs from which to post his spam, and no way to prevent him changing domain names as fast as the DNS can propagate. Even if he used a totally unique user agent, I can not start monitoring all 4 billion IP addresses waiting for it to show up. This is simply a case of watching the articles in question, reverting the spam, and reporting the IP address to WP:AIV. Thatcher 11:02, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, and sorry if I was unclear. I'll try to give a better explanation. I understand what action needs to be taken by me. I don't want to ask about that. My questioning is aimed at something else more personal. I hope to learn something about the process that occurred because I am very interested, as a prospective admin, in the application of policy issues, and RFCU policy, like all policies, has ambiguity because no policy can legislate for all possibilities. The best way to learn is by analyzing examples of how the policy was applied in previous cases. That's why I'd like to ask you the following two questions about this RFCU:

1) Am I correct to think that you checkuser'd a couple of the IPs in order to determine that the user-agent was, as you put it, "too generic to be of much use"? It's pretty clear to me that you did, but I want to be sure.

2) I notice the case was closed as "declined", and yet it seems that you did, in fact, checkuser a couple of the IPs, and were even able to tell me the user-agents were generic. Thus, it seems the RFCU was accepted and processed to a significant extent, rather than declined with no investigation undertaken. I'd like to understand what "declined" means in the context of RFCU policy.

I do also have a small though probably justified concern here in having any "declined" RFCUs on my record, because I have seen RfAs fail where opposers judged the ratio of accepted vs declined requests for admin action. I am usually very accurate in my requests for admin action, which are usually accepted, so the RFCU decline here is a mild disappointment. I filed the RFCU because Rlevse and Rudget both advised me to do that. I don't think it was a mistake to follow that advice, but I want to make sure I learn enough from this case to be confident that my future reports will get closed as "accepted".

I would be most grateful if you could advise me on both of these questions. I hope it is not too much trouble for you. Again, thanks for your time. - Neparis (talk) 20:49, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

• Actually, the case is not marked in any particular way,  Unnecessary or even  CheckUser is not a crystal ball might have been appropriate labels. Yes, I did look up a couple of the IPs out of curiosity, and there was certainly nothing useful there, although in the present circumstances I don't know that there could be any useful information. If the user agent was more rare, I might be able to say that a new spamming IP was the same as the old one, but you would know that from the Russian IP and the name of the added link anyway. There shouldn't be any stigma attached to filing a rejected check, lots of people (including apparently Rlevse and Jehochman) either misunderstand or have exaggerated expectations of checkuser. Thatcher 22:52, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, thanks for the clarification on how it was closed, and your encouraging remarks re stigma. I had assumed it was declined when the case was moved to the Declined requests section with the edit summary "decl". Apologies for not being clearer in my earlier questions to you on the RFCU subpage. Although the case is now archived, would it be useful to copy this thread onto the tail end of the discussion on the subpage? - Neparis (talk) 23:41, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

If you are concerned then go ahead, I suppose it can do no harm. Thatcher 14:59, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Trynaa

Hello Thatcher. I'm just curious, why is User:Trynaa indefinitley blocked? GoodDay (talk) 18:58, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Answered above at User_talk:Thatcher#TharkunColl_and_Friends. Thatcher 19:11, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Okie Dokie. GoodDay (talk) 23:03, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Ongoing vandalism in response to an AfD incident -- advice?

My page -- both for my account and my IP address -- have been ongoing vandalism at the hands of User:Kung Fu Man. I suspect this has something to do with what I believe is a bad faith AfD nomination here. I endorsed a speedy deletion, and later pointed out what appeared to be suspicious IP activity both in favor of keeping and deleting the article. (it was later reported by you that the nominee appeared to be using an open proxy) I've kept an eye on one of the suspected sockpuppeteers, (using keep votes) who I believe to be User:Kung Fu Man. After filing AN/I and SOCK complaints, he jumped on the opportunity to put in a check user request on my IP and began bombarding my talk pages with spurious SOCK tags. Reverting them per vandalism has not helped, so I put in several AIV claims. Eventually, the check-user request was infact closed as stale. (by you) The SOCK claim against this user is still ongoing, however, and could really use administrative attention. Since I assume you've looked into this situation already, I would appreciate if you could check into this and possibly find a more long-term resolution. Please see the relative claim here. Some of the suspicious IPs endorsing keep votes have no edits outside of the AfD discussion, and others have contributions histories that would suggest close ties to the user -- possibly meatpuppets or alternative accounts. One appears to be a single-purpose account for AfD nominations, as that encompasses its entire history. All relevant evidence is there in the SOCK claim. I would appreciate if someone could finally get around to addressing this, both to end the vandalism and prevent the issue in the future. Thank you. 68.209.235.149 (talk) 23:44, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

A question

I have dealt with this editor since his early edit to WP, on a number of occassions he's said he edits from both school and home, are there any IP addr where LT is the sole editor and are these frequently used IP addr? Have you checked User:Auroranorth in relation to this? Gnangarra 14:43, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Auroranorth is too old to check. All of Littleteddy's edits come from a series of IP addresses from the same ISP, but in two different dynamic ranges. If indeed he has the same ISP at home as at school and the two /16 ranges represent that, then he is definitely up to no good, because the vandals are on both ranges. However it is also possible that the ISP used by the school dynamically assigns IPs from different ranges and all these edits are from school. I would have to give some further thought to the idea of work/home. The Day/Time js graph thingy on the contribs page shows he generally edits in a narrow window between 0800 and 1400 UTC, although I need to wrap my head around his time zone to figure that out. I'm at work and my detailed files are at home so it will be a while before I can get a better answer. Thatcher 15:06, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

FYI he's currently at UTC+9 due to daylight saving since 1 Dec. Gnangarra 15:32, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

So he edits from 5pm to 11pm local time? Is this a residential (live-in) school? Thatcher 15:35, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes it is, also school term started 5 Feb after 7 weeks holidays so would expect a clear break on ip around the end of January Gnangarra 15:42, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, it's a boarding school. Littleteddy... keep me in a good mood 08:23, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

In that case he has the same ISP at home and school, and access to the same ranges of IP addresses. It seems that the vandal accounts and other funny business did not appear until recently. At the very least he and some friends are playing silly buggers, with the friends acting as vandals--talking to each other, blanking each other's articles, creating hoax articles--while he maintains the good hand persona. The technical evidence can not rule out that they are all one person, nor can it rule out absolutely that they are more than one person. Thatcher 16:00, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks from your comment I gather that LT early edits during the holiday period were from the same ip range as the current problem ones. Can you resolve the IP's to a school? Gnangarra 16:21, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

• This is probably the last comment I will make as far as technical analysis is concerned. I attempted to analyze Littleteddy's IP use with whois and traceroute. The IP he gives, 203.189.4.98, is true, and is registered to Crox Development, and there are shenanigans on it, and it is certainly plausible that it is a shared IP at his school. Littleteddy has used over a dozen other IP addresses registered to a different ISP that I will call "Kangaroo." Some of these IPs only have Littleteddy's edits but some of them also have shenanigans. There are also a large number of vandal-only accounts that also use "Kangaroo" IPs and traceroute puts them on the same network branch with the same first-upstream-server as IPs used by Littleteddy. I can not be positive that Littleteddy's school does not have internet service from two different providers, but it seems unlikely. I can not be positive that the "Kangaroo" IPs are not shared, but it seems unlikely. It seems more likely that "Kangaroo" ISP edits come from Littleteddy's home. Thatcher 16:16, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

the checkuser template

Hi. I saw this and will be sure and use that template in the future. I had notified several people of this with the vandal template and copied it to the RFCU page wo/adjusting it. I'm unsure if your {{IPblock}} means that some sort of range block is now in effect to shut this down. If not, I expect more of same tomorrow. Also; if you know, and if it's appropriate to say anything, I would like a hint as to what happen re Alison. Cheers, Jack Merridew 16:12, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Alison's situation is Alison's business. I'm new to Grawp; it would be awkward to issue a range block in this particular situation until I know about his pattern so I can narrow it down. For example, a large corporation might be listed in the whois directory with a very large range but with a much smaller range assigned to a particular building where a vandal had access. New accounts can also be listed in the IP check subsection of the page without being added to the transcluded report, for this particular person, since it is less important to demonstrate that B is a sock of A than to just block the IPs. Thatcher 16:19, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

AIV has been pretty good at getting this sort of throw-away account blocked. I am not really sure if it's Grawp, but it seem quite likely. He has flat-out stated several times that he will simply revert my edits. As I see it, there are three players that have serious issues with me; Grawp (and there seem to be subdivisions within the just archived RFCU case), the group at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/R:128.40.76.3 and User:White Cat. I don't know the earlier history with Grawp, but I see him as originating as a D&D fan; if he is really more of a full-on troll, he may not really care about any group of articles. Take another look at User:Samneric? Cheers, Jack Merridew 16:48, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Samneric and the other editors listed at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/R:128.40.76.3 are in a different country from the most accounts listed at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Grawp. White Cat is in yet a third country. Thatcher 18:18, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I didn't mean to suggest that the groups were the same person - although it seems they take some note of each other. I wouldn't be surprised if the accounts tagged as 'Grawp' in the earlier checkuser case (cases?) are, in fact, several editors. I've seen that Grawp uses IPs from all over, but home seems to be LA; you may know more (and I'm not asking). My comment re Samineric was that your comment at that checkuser seemed to indicate that that account (and another that hasn't actually edited) was, ah, related. Samneric went right after the Martin Banwell article as had one (or two) of the others. And he went to ground when I started cleaning-up that article. Anyway, I was hinting at a block for him. Anyone who hasn't figured out what White cat is just hasn't been paying attention. Cheers, Jack Merridew 09:13, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

What? (If Samneric is not blocked yet, you can ask at WP:ANI). Thatcher 02:43, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Nope, Samneric (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) was never blocked. Neither was Vickiemc (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) — whom I know nothing about other than your comment at the checkuser case. I'll post a note at ani referring to this discussion and the case and see what happens. Cheers, Jack Merridew 09:17, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

They're blocked now, by Jéské. See WP:ANI#a kiwi sock returns. Cheers, Jack Merridew 09:47, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Grawp attack

• Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Grawp

has had a lot of new stuff just added.

Cheers, Jack Merridew 13:38, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Digwuren update

This motion failed to get an approval. Could your update indicate that? As posted this lacks complete clarity. Thx, --Irpen 21:55, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

• OK, done. Thatcher 02:23, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Wordbuilder

Where does this go next? You stated that you can find no connection. The editor who filed it admits that I have no connection to the IP editor and other editors have come to my defense. Does it just stay open indefinitely? Andyvphil is using it to fish for information and I would like it to be closed. →Wordbuilder (talk) 00:34, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Template:Armenia-Azerbaijan enforcement

Template:Armenia-Azerbaijan enforcement, which you created, says, "Under the terms of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2, any editor who edits articles which relate to the region of Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Iran and the ethnic and historical issues related to that area in an aggressive point of view manner marked by incivility may be placed under several editing restrictions, by notice on that editor's talk page." This is not the case, as highlighted here. ArbCom made two rulings in AA2: one for editors from AA1 and another for all other editors. The latter applies only to "Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts". Therefore, the template should be changed, accordingly. Nishkid64 _{(Make articles, not love)} 04:18, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

• The last time this issue was brought before the arbitrators they indicated that it was their intention that the same remedies and scope apply to all editors, see Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan_2#Clarification_request_October_2007. Therefore the probation will be enforced according to the template wording unless you can persuade the Arbitrators otherwise. Thatcher 06:24, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Question

I guess the only thing that changed on the RFAr MONGO was that the committee made it clear that they do not have the power to regulate content?--MONGO 05:17, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

I guess. There was significant opposition to the other proposals. Thatcher 06:25, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Happy easter!

Open your card >> >> >>

Happy easter you guys! Sorry if the picture looked crappy, but it's the best I could do on such short notice. Sincerely, BoL (Talk) 04:45, 23 March 2008 (UTC) Credits: This card was inspired by BoL, an administrator/bureaucrat and head designer of Codesnippets. Join the community today!

Accusations

Blanchardb (talk · contribs) broke 3RR and accused me that I am sockpuppet of AhmadinV (talk · contribs), can you please check it? I am really insulted by his actions. Thank you. --HarisM (talk) 15:27, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

• AhmadinV is editing from open proxies, so I can make no statement either way. Thatcher 02:40, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of Template:Caution3

A tag has been placed on Template:Caution3 requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section T3 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a deprecated or orphaned template. After seven days, if it is still unused and the speedy deletion tag has not been removed, the template will be deleted.

If the template is intended to be substituted, please feel free to remove the speedy deletion tag and please consider putting a note on the template's page indicating that it is substituted so as to avoid any future mistakes (<noinclude>{{transclusionless}}</noinclude>).

Thanks. --MZMcBride (talk) 21:20, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

• Thanks. I created the template because I did not like the standard warning templates with the big red stop signs, and I prefer to write a customized warning message. I use it rarely these days, but I do use it, and it is always substituted. Thatcher 00:10, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/NorthernThunder

I have closed this per WP:SNOW at (6/12/4). I am alerting you to this because you previously re-opened this candidacy at (1/3/1). As I am sure is obvious, this user has no chance of passing at this time, and a non-bureaucrat closure per WP:SNOW is both reasonable and, in my opinion, warranted, at this time. Cheers, -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:06, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

• Perhaps. However I do not believe it was reasonable at 1/3/1. Thatcher 11:19, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

User:AhmadinV

I suspect that this is a newly created sockpuppet of user:The Dragon of Bosnia see first edit to Bosnian mujahideen‎ with the comment "again" and compare it with the last edit of user:The Dragon of Bosnia to the same page. As I had just made some minor edits to that page, it would probably be better if you were to look into it. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 00:07, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Checkuser evidence is inconclusive. The IP is in a different country but probably a proxy. You can post an enforcement request at WP:AE. Thatcher 02:48, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry to be a pain but user:HarisM has been sucked into the debate Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/AhmadinV, and usually I would not question a user of such long standing, but I noticed that the users edit history includes a Wikibreak in the month of January at the same time as user:The Dragon of Bosnia/user:Grandy Grandy were also absent from editing Wikipeida, so please could you run a checkuser to put the accusation to bed. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 14:11, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

AhmadinV is definitely using proxies so no statement can be made one way or the other based on technical comparison. Thatcher 00:41, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Personal threats / stalking

Thatcher, since you have involved yourself in Balkan related conflicts before I will turn to you for this. I have previously received some nasty emails on personal email account which I strongly believe were related to my edits on wikipedia. I now feel that someone (though I suspect that it is related to the recent edit conflicts on the Bosnian mujahideen article) is stalking me [18]. Due to my past bad experience with this I'm uncomfortable with it and, also, not sure how to handle it. I would appreciate your assistance/input/suggestions/help. RegardsOsli73 (talk) 02:18, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

• Looks like an open proxy. Thatcher 02:32, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I checked the IP myself, and it seems to be from Bosnia. What does "open proxy" mean in this case?Osli73 (talk) 02:35, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Do a google search for your own IP and for 195.222.48.2. A normal IP has few to zero hits, an open proxy often has many. Also, https://www.ippages.com/?ip=195.222.48.2&get=nmap shows that it has open http port 80. An open proxy is an address that anyone can connect to and edit from, and checkuser will show the proxy IP rather than their own. Open proxies are blocked when discovered, see WP:OPP. If it is a true open proxy, or being used by a paid proxying service, the person could be anywhere. I did perform a range check on the range that IP is part of and did not find any registered users. If its not a proxy then the person could be in Bosnia but I don't know who it is. Thatcher 02:48, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for looking into it. It just feels a bit creepy to hear that people are investigating you (and, for some reason, letting me know that they have done so).Osli73 (talk) 22:40, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

User:Draconiandeastroyer

Hi Thatcher. I redacted part of your c/u comment over there due to privacy issues. An editor here is being targetted for outting & this has happened more than once. I'll followup and have the account moved, if possible. It's been blocked now. Sorry about the mess! - Alison ^❤ 01:37, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

okies. Thatcher 01:59, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

WP:AE

Hi, just offering my $0.02. I've been watching WP:AE lately, and trying to get a feel for it so that I can help out more (you may have noticed that I closed the J Greb thread). Regarding the Giano complaint, I have to say that I disagree with your close. Based on the diffs that I saw, Giano was clearly in breach of his ArbCom restrictions on civility, and a block would have been appropriate. I'm not going to revert you or anything, but I did want to indicate my surprise with your action. --Elonka 03:39, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Giano was not incivil to an article contributor in a content dispute, nor did he come to AN/I and post inflammatory things about Arbcom. He said them privately on his own talk page, where they did no one any harm and could easily be ignored. I think John was misguided in bringing them to AE. I would willingly take action against Giano for slagging off on an article contributor in a content dispute, or if he introduced his opinions into an unrelated dispute or an unrelated enforcement matter to try and stir up trouble, but this was just his own talk page, and said to someone who was trying to stir up trouble by poking him. Thatcher 02:26, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I hear what you're saying about giving someone leeway, for what's going on in their own userspace. But what about this, said on the Village Pump?[19] Or this, in these edit summaries on active articles?[20][21]

Please understand, I don't actually have much interaction with Giano, and haven't been following the recent cases involving him. But then, that's why I consider myself pretty uninvolved. In my opinion though, once ArbCom passes a civility restriction on an editor, then the restriction should actually be enforced, otherwise the sanction becomes meaningless. The wording seems pretty clear: "Should Giano make any edits which are judged by an administrator to be uncivil, personal attacks, or assumptions of bad faith, Giano may be blocked." But he evidently did say things that were uncivil, he did make assumptions of bad faith, and he wasn't blocked.

I think it bothers me most, because I've been spending a lot of time lately trying to (informally) mediate some disputes with other editors, trying to get them to stop yelling at each other and shake hands and get back to work. Overall I've been pretty successful, but then when someone as high profile as Giano comes along, is clearly uncivil, and then suffers no consequences even though he's theoretically under ArbCom sanctions, I feel like it undermines the other work that I'm doing. I would rather that we actually enforced civility sanctions once in awhile.  :/ --Elonka 03:09, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

At AE, well said. :) --Elonka 02:54, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Concerning User: Phil McCavity

This user requested help, and I responded. The user stated that they are not able to edit, and when they attempt to edit they receive the following message:

• You are currently unable to edit pages on Wikipedia. You can still read pages, but cannot edit, change, or create them. Editing from Phil McCavity (your account, IP address, or IP address range) has been disabled by Thatcher for the following reason(s):This user is a sock puppet of Fredrick Day, and has been blocked indefinitely. Please refer to Checkuser for evidence. See block log and current autoblocks.Your IP address is 87.113.0.101, and the block has been set to expire: indefinite

I looked at checkuser case history, and there was nothing there concerning Phil McCavity. I looked at the Frederick Day case, which was submitted by an old "friend", and Phil McCavity did not show up under suspected sockpuppets. There were also no warnings left at the user's talk page. I might be missing something. I'm not sure how much I trust this user, as they left me a message on their talk page saying they were "Off to the pub". I'm guessing I'm missing something, but please leave me and the user in question a message saying what happened. Thanks, Southern Illinois SKYWARN (talk) 13:35, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

• I ran the check after seeing the current discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Fredrick_day. There is absolutely no question that McCavity was created on the same IP and PC as User:Fredrick Day, in between registered edits by Day and logged out edits that he signs "Section 31". Thatcher 14:30, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Thatcher, I can't find that referenced incident. Has that incident report been deleted? --Abd (talk) 13:40, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

It was archived, see Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive389#Fredrick_day. Thatcher 13:43, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I don't know why I couldn't find it.... just dizzy, I guess.--Abd (talk) 13:54, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Alright, thanks, but please leave Phil McCavity a message on his talk page. Southern Illinois SKYWARN (talk) 14:41, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Arbitration enforcement

You should be aware of a further continuation of the conflict involving the Bosnian articles. Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Admin help requested on Bosnian war article requested; article history. Vassyana (talk) 02:19, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

FYI

Just wanted to leave you an FYI. -- Gogo Dodo (talk) 06:10, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

user:JWPurvis13

Do you happen to remember whose sockpuppet this was? -FisherQueen (talk · contribs) 17:10, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

• He's part of the "WikiMafia", there is a current noticeboard thread. Probably User:Littleteddy or one of his school chums. Thatcher 17:20, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Actually it seems to be a total screw-up on my part. He is not related at all to them and I'm not sure how his name got in front of me in the first place. I have unblocked and released two autoblocks. Thatcher 17:26, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Randomized (talk · contribs)

Hi Thatcher,

I thought you might be the person to speak to about this as you dealt with the checkuser request earlier today, and blocked the account BavarianWolf (talk · contribs) earlier today for similar reasons. Randomized is constantly disrupting the Electrical sensitivity talk page, and claims anyone that disagrees with him is the same person. He has also restored the changes made by BavarianWolf that you undid earlier today, and added me to a sockpuppet/checkuser request that has almost expired/already been dealt with (by you). I see you must be a very busy admin, so if you have time could you please give me any advice on how to deal with this and take any action you deem appropriate. Also, could you remove the sockpuppet warning added today by Randomized (exactly the same as the one posted by BavarianWolf...) from my page? It says 'do not remove', but the sockpuppet page is over 9 days old, and you have already dealt with the checkuser. Thanks in advance! >>Partyoffive (talk) 19:57, 27 March 2008 (UTC)<<

Littleteddy

Just to let you know, I've left a message on Newyorkbrad's talk page, and asked him to weigh in on the situation. Nwwaew (Talk Page) (Contribs) (E-mail me) 20:23, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Scope of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2

Hi, I was wondering the scope of the remedies in question. I am not an involved party in either case and I hardly ever touch the articles in question.

Does the remedies cover every topic that has to do with Armenians and some other group of people (Azerbaijani, Turkish, Iranian, etc)?

A while back ago I was editing this article and several people removed present Turkish governmental sources citing it was illegal to use Turkish governmental sources or something. I left the matter alone hoping it would die, but that seems unlikely after so many months.

The article in question was unrelated to Armenia-Azerbaijan issues and there were no content issues. Parties merely refused to allow the use of governmental sources.

-- Cat ^chi? 12:01, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Khampalak

This is very confusing. On February 12, Alison said, "Confirmed with respect to the named user(s)". The named users were NisarKand and RomainSnd. Luna Santin then blocked the account indefinitely and tagged Romain as a sock of NisarKand. In that CheckUser case, Alison also said the IP belonged to Khampalak. I don't see where she said Romain was Khampalak, not NisarKand. When I went to user:Khampalak, I saw it was tagged as a sock of NisarKand by Rlevse back in December. It appeared as if CheckUser had confirmed that NisarKand was Khampalak. With your confirmation of Romain=Khampalak and Alison's supposed confirmation of Romain=NisarKand on Feb. 12, I did away with the Khampalak sock category and recategorized them as NisarKand socks. And now I see that you have clarified that some other accounts, previously confirmed to be Khampalak socks on Feb. 24 by Alison, do not belong to Khampalak. I don't understand why she got a different CU result than you. Could you go over this with her? Nishkid64 _{(Make articles, not love)} 16:09, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

• There is a single template that makes the

 Confirmed with respect to the named user(s).  No comment with respect to IP address(es).

logo so it is hard to use it in nuanced situations. Here Alison was saying confirmed that RomainSnd is a sock of Khampalak, no comment with respect to the IP. The evidence is quite clear and is still in the checkuser logs; RomainSnd uses a business IP that is characteristic of all of Khampala's sock accounts, and I know who the IP is and it is not RomainSnd. From this misunderstanding flowed a number of mis-taggings, I gather. Regarding the second group of Khampala socks I mentioned, I am puzzled as to how Alison made that conclusion; they are quite distinct geographically and by ISP. Khampala uses a characteristic business IP and a residential ISP in the same area, and Shikab & co. are somewhere entirely different. Again, it may be a case of confirming the existence of socks but failing to make clear that the puppetmaster is not who was first alleged. I have asked her to comment as well. Thatcher 16:19, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Argh, what a confusing template. I've restored the sock category and reverted my userpage changes. I'll see what Alison has to say regarding Giribabuy, Shikab, ProudAfghan4life, Selvans, and Afghania before changing around their userpage. Should these users have been blocked in the first place? Are they sockpuppets of another user? Nishkid64 _{(Make articles, not love)} 16:29, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Certainly they are all socks so all but one should be blocked; whether the master should be blocked indefinitely or short term is a matter for admin judgement. There appears to be some kind of long-running feud going on involving NisarKand, Beh-nam, Khambalak and Tajik, and if someone jumps into that I would certainly be suspicious even if it is not provable that it is one of those four. Thatcher 16:57, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Did Alison ever comment regarding the discrepancy in her findings? I have also retagged four of the non-Khampalak socks as socks of Shikab (talk · contribs). Logs show that Shikab's account was created nearly two years ago. Nishkid64 _{(Make articles, not love)} 21:32, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement#DreamGuy

Hi Thatcher, would you mind taking a look at my closure of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement#DreamGuy? Because of comments made in that thread by some users with whom I'm been involved in a different dispute, my "uninvolvedness" (is that a word?) has been questioned. Since you're very experienced at WP:AE, I'd appreciate your input. --Akhilleus (talk) 21:25, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Akhilleus, in my view, correctly closed that AE discussion. Offenses by DG arguably existed, but were minor or not in excess, compared to what DG was facing, and apparently continues to face, from some other users. There is this odd phenomenon appearing, I think it's been arising for a long time. A user is uncivil, whether or not provoked by someone else in the first place. The user is sanctioned, put on civility parole. This user is then harassed by other users, his actions are subject to minute inspection, and comments which would normally be shrugged off become reasons for AE enforcement. He reacts with new incivility. And then, of course, some of the same users are demanding that the Arbitration be enforced, or the sky will fall.

What this community is doing, all too often, is identifying a "problem user." There is an ancient belief that if we can get rid of the bad guys, everything will be just fine. So someone acts up, they are put on parole. But acting up frequently does not happen in isolation. If we don't deal with the context, the causes for the original offense, they will continue to provoke the user, who, having once been sanctioned for incivility, is now expected to be exemplary, to respond to even severe criticism and personal attack with a calm and patient turning of the cheek. As might very well be expected, he doesn't. He responds as most human beings will. And so the blocks escalate, until the user is effectively banned. Sometimes this works, sometimes a ban was really the best solution. However, sometimes the pack now looks for its next victim.

It is an old and failed model. The method this community is using to deal with disruption foments disruption. Nobody likes to be told to shut up. However, when the police arrive and say, "Everybody quiet down!", it is expected that everyone quiets down, and those who don't will be "arrested." Those arrests do not judge guilt. The police generally will not consider prior offense in terms of whom they will arrest (exceptions are actually some level of corruption). They do not determine fault, and they do not punish. They protect all, and act to promote order and to allow due process to resolve disputes, preventing them from escalating. My opinion is that by putting a single user on civility parole, and then not acting to specially protect that user from incivility, we are setting up further disruption.

I'm not at all sure of the solution. Disruptive users must be prevented from damaging the project. But neither should we allow paroled users to be harassed. I do have ideas about how to do this. Whatever remedy we find, it should help disruptive users to find legitimate ways to deal with the problems they encounter. Current standard process is not working, and it is steadily creating legions of resentful users and burned-out Wikipedians. A certain amount of this may be inevitable, but, from what I see, most of it could be avoided, at least with the situations visible enough to come to my attention.

One phenomenon might be noticed. There are individual users who follow around sanctioned users, and from they say, they do so to prevent damage to the project. However, these are adverse users, users who clearly are holding some kind of expectation of bad conduct. If someone is going to track a sanctioned user, it should not be a person who has been involved in prior disputes. Ideally, it would be a respected user, not involved in original content disputes, and who is accepted by the sanctioned user, who would then be more likely to accept restraints. (Something like this happens with mentoring.) At the same time this "shadow" would notice harassment, and warn others regarding it, and promptly, before it reaches a disruptive level. The shadow, even if an administrator, would not block others, except in emergencies, but would, as needed, call the attention of uninvolved admins to the situation. Call this person an "escort."--Abd (talk) 12:56, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

The 'Let's-Change-How-Wikipedia-Works' is thattaway. Akhilleus closed the complaint far too early, and Abd's assertions are wrong on just about every single point he makes. Apparently, Abd would have us reinterpret or simply do away with the ArbCom behavioral restrictions placed upon DreamGuy. I suggest he run for ArbCom then, so as to "enlighten" their "old an failed" thinking. DG was told in no uncertain terms to be civil. He wasn't, and while contributors in the same page were wary of him, they were in NO WAY uncivil. It is because of this that Akhilleus erred in closing the complaint before it was properly viewed and acted upon, and Akhilleus himself has since agreed that DG should have been blocked. - Arcayne (^{cast a spell}) 19:23, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Thatcher, I agree with you that where a user is baited and poked, and then responds with incivility, that the user should be given some allowances, and that the "poking" users should be cautioned just as quickly as the user under sanctions. However, in DreamGuy's case, I think that multiple examples can be shown of where he was uncivil to users without any provocation. I would also point to the bolded banner at the top of User talk:DreamGuy. I think that this kind of banner is a violation of "civility and good faith" sanctions all by itself.[22] If you're saying though that because one user is rude to him, that he is then allowed to be rude to everyone else, I'm afraid that I have to strongly disagree with that philosophy. --Elonka 20:40, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

re user: Khampalak and also user: Beh-nam

You're right here that Khampalak and NisarKand are two different people. Thanks for correcting that mistake.

Another mistake that has been made by checkuser admins is that user: Balkh77 and user: Balkh77 were tagged and blocked as Beh-nam. But I am Beh-nam and I confess to all those socks but Balkh77 was not me. I don't want someone getting banned for being confused for me.

Please look at his edits they are not like mine and also please check his IP and please let the other admins know of their mistake.

Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.68.54.169 (talk) 06:23, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

• I agree, someone seems to have mis-read the results at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Beh-nam. Thatcher 03:56, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the correction. Also user: Balkh777 (with three 7s), he made that account after he saw his account got banned.

Indefinate block of User:Littleteddy

(Copied from Littletedd's talk page)

Whilst the whole issue of the vandalism of Littleteddy and/or his school friends is a major issue, I dont agree with the indefinate block. He has been on wikipedia for more than 18-months, and over that period he has not shown any propensity for vandalism. He may have been pretty lame and had a crufty userspace, but he has done some good work on wikipedia; the one that sticks in the mind is Percy Henn. Im not saying unblock him and let him run free, he deserves a block, no doubt about it, but not an indefinate block. Wikipedia relies on volunteers, like you and me, and indefinately blocking him will see another one leave. Its time we started to think long-term around here, and not just look bluntly at whats been done of late. Twenty Years 16:01, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Possible?

Your good I'll give you that, but is it possible to leave my trolling (not vandalism) in the past and just start over with a brand new account? I'm really trying to help this site, Payne2thamax was early in my career, back in 2006 when I didnt know any of the guidelines. The accounts I created were never intended to be sock puppets, just alternate accounts, which I think is allowed (Same As It Ever Was=Hip-Hop, TheNextOne=Sports, Wicked Wayz=R&B, ComixFlix=Comics & Film and XMarxThaSpot=Wrestling) Not one of these accounts was used for Trolling or vandalism, all that remains is Live & Die 4 Hip Hop. (And my alternate accounts ComixFlix and XMarxThaSpot which I use when editing comic or wrestling related articles) So you can let Payne2thamax die as I am doing or you can let me make up for the wrong doings I did back as Payne2thamax (If Not for User:Kemor's threats to me back in 2007 I would have never made those comments). Just give me one more life, I promise I wont do anything wrong. Can't you see I'm trying to leave the past behind by making the consructive edits I've been making? (As for the three IP's, those are not mine, I've only used one IP which I'm sure you know). Live and Die 4 Hip Hop (talk) 04:05, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, you must have done something as Hip-Hop to attract attention to yourself. No one knows how many blocked users sneak back and change their ways so effectively that they never get caught; we only know the ones that get caught because they can't or don't change their behavior. According to policy the thing you should do is post the {{unblock}}to your first account (or post an email to the unblock-L mailing list according to the instructions you see when logging in to the blocked account), tell your story, ask for forgiveness, point out that even Tasc0 in the RFCU said the new accounts were not disruptive just evanding the ban; and ask that the account be unblocked so you can reincarnate as a new user without someone being able to claim "block evasion" as a reason to reblock the new account. If the unblock is granted do your best not to act in the same way as before so that you call attention to yourself. Since I have access to the technical information I usually prefer to let other admins make decisions that are based on judgement and contributions so I don't find myself using secret evidence to be judge and jury at the same time. Good luck. Thatcher 04:18, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Good Answer, Good Answer. Live and Die 4 Hip Hop (talk) 04:29, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

trying to report

I am trying to report and get properly tagged two users who are obviously sockpuppets, specifically Jd2718 who is obviously the socker for Michael-mike1 as reported here and here but I cannot get the page to show up on the requests for checkuser page as the jamiechef2 report page asks me to add it. I tried to get it reported in by placing it this way but it doesn't show, I'm asking you for help since you show as the guy editing there right before me in the history and you are a checkuser person. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.30.205.23 (talk) 00:18, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Question about a checkuser case

In Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Same As It Ever Was, does your confirmed mean that the I.P.s too are associated with the named user? I ask because User:Live and Die 4 Hip Hop, who I blocked pursuant to the checkuser findings, has contact me off-wiki with a request that I take his case to WP:AN. In that e-mail, he denies that User:166.109.97.168 was him. My suspicion is that he's lying because he doesn't realize that checkuser has tied him to the account, but I want to make sure that checkuser actually has tied him to the account. Besides that, I assume that the connection is something stronger than "same geographical area"? Sorry for the questions - I don't hang around checkuser cases much. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 08:05, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

• He has never used that exact IP but he appears on other IPs in the 166.109.0.0/16 range along with "Same as"; he is also on the same residential IP as all the accounts listed at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Payne2thamaxx. Thatcher 11:00, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Oh, and see the thread on my talk page right here by "Live and Die 4 Hip Hop". I get a distinctively suspicious vibe from it. Thatcher 11:04, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Confirmation of sockpuppeteering

You recently confirmed the sockpuppeteering of Reallysmartgrammarwiz (talk · contribs) at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Reallysmartgrammarwiz. Could you please take appropriate action against ithere), if any is needed? I'm not completely sure on what action is needed, as I've been away for a long time and am not so familiar with Wikipedia rules anymore! I believe this is a violation of Wikipedia:Sock_puppetry#.22Good_hand.2C_bad_hand.22_accounts. Thanks, Jack?! 23:59, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

• Usually I do not take direct action myself; it is often better for another admin to look at the contributions and the user's history and make a decision for banning or long blocks (or rarely, forgiveness). You would normally ask for help at WP:ANI, although in this case the accounts have now all been blocked. Thatcher 11:06, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Good work. Jack?! 15:44, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Dereks1x/Archtransit check

Since you were the checkuser that was most active in quashing Dereks1x's Archtransit sock farm, could you check Thegoodlocust (talk · contribs). The user just appeared on Barack Obama's talk page and he's showing several of the hallmarks of Dereks1x. I'd create an RFCU, but don't have time at the moment and the guy's spamming the snot out the talk page and I figured if I went directly to you, I could cut out the whole "This is why I think it's a sock of Dereks1x". If you want me to make a formal RFCU, I can. Thanks! --Bobblehead ^(rants) 21:23, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

• Well, its the same ISP but the reported location is one state over. Hard to know what that means. Thatcher 22:41, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
  • It means my ISP, Qwest is a very large telecom company which serves 14 states in the US. Maybe they can actually address the issues I brought up rather than trying some backroom method of getting me banned. As it states in WP:SOCKS, "Keep in mind there can be multiple users who are driven to start participating in Wikipedia for the same reason, particularly in controversial areas such as articles about politics, religion, or articles for deletion." Thegoodlocust (talk) 01:17, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
    • You seem awfully familiar with policy details for a new user. Have you had other accounts before?Jehochman ^Talk 01:45, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
      • No previous accounts, just a few minor anonymous edits in the past. I've been coming to wikipedia for years though and usually on a daily basis. The sockpuppet article was linked in a discussion earlier, and so I read it - I'm also a fast learner. Thegoodlocust (talk) 02:20, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Spring break. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:45, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Heh. Well, depending on the ISP, it could mean nothing. :) Guess we'll just have to keep an eye on him. Thanks! --Bobblehead ^(rants) 00:48, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Bulldog123

Hello! I posted some additional evidence. Please reconsider. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 01:14, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

J Merkey

So where do I report evidence that a banned user is editing again? Captain Nemo III (talk) 16:05, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:ANI is fastest. Lawrence § t/e 16:16, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

BKWSU

I just wanted to point out to you how wonderfully full of peace and harmony the BKWSU article has become since the BKWSU IT team has, seemingly, withdrawn from it.

Do I need to ask you if we remove that ugly arbcom banner from the top now?

Quoting Nietzsche et al, it is hard to fight with monsters and not appear like one.

Thanks. --Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 03:15, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

• Generally you would post a request in the "Request for clarification" section of WP:RFAR, although you are really asking for an amendment to lift the article probation. Thatcher 05:14, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Protected

I have semi'd your user and talk pages temporarily owing to the move vandalism earlier and the name it was moved to being suggestive that it might be continuing. Black Kite 13:47, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

OK, thanks. I think he's getting a little frustrated, I blocked about 40 sleepers over the last couple of days. Thatcher 14:45, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Grawp socks

Congratulations on blocking all the Grawp sleeper accounts -- for future reference, how did you find them? Thanks, NawlinWiki (talk) 02:10, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

• Checkuser, of course. And I'm far from done, I'm afraid. Thatcher 02:11, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

• • Another one tonight -- User:Drivedrop. Would you mind running a checkuser on that one too? Thanks, NawlinWiki (talk) 03:58, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Dmcdevit got there first, but I also did some fishing and blocked some more sleepers. Thatcher 05:13, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
      •  CheckUser is not for fishing Chuckle. Jehochman ^Talk 17:08, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Hello again, make sure that you re-protect the deleted talk pages after you add a protection template - when you create the page, it loses the creation protection, allowing Grawp to edit the page again. He's picked up on this flaw rather quickly previously, so it may be best to just leave the pages salted. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 16:54, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Olahus

Hi Thatcher, you handled this Romanian sockpuppetry case the other day, checking (among others) this Marc KJH (talk · contribs) against a couple others. Did you by any chance also check him against User:Bonaparte? He fits his pattern. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:32, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

I've never checked Bonaparte and don't know what he looks like (his original account is obviously too old to check). You should ask one of the old-timers. :) Thatcher 15:48, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah, okay. I think Dmcdevit is the specialist. I'll see if I can get hold of him. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:50, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

A couple more names

Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Venki123. Two new socks have appeared. Jehochman ^Talk 21:08, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Jimbo's Talk

I just thought you should look at this. Steve Crossin (talk) (anon talk) 12:56, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Phil McCavity

How does checkuser help you distinguish which PC someone edited from on a particular IP? The reason I ask is that I think that User:Phil McCavity may have been caught in the crossfire due to his IP being hijacked by User:Fredrick day, who apparently uses an antenna in an urban area to get on many people's wireless connections. I suppose they should take more care to secure their connection if they want to prevent that from happening, but I was just curious. Sarah Lynne Nashif (talk) 21:55, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

No, Phil McCavity was pretty clearly created by Fredrick day on the same IP address, about 10 minutes after he posted an announcement that he was "retiring". Thatcher 16:36, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Archtransit

Thank god for this fancy new watchlist feature that lets us see log actions! Wouldn't it be better to unprotect User talk:Archtransit rather than the user page? Or is he going to post with an IP/new account? Ryan Postlethwaite 10:59, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

• Foiled by the redirect! Yes, he emailed me and wanted to be unblocked so he could post and prove he was still in his original location. He says he is not the Obama editor Tvoz has been complaining about, which I'm sure is at least half true as there appear to be two of them from different places. I don't know that posting from his old ISP will necessarily prove he is not Harry59b from Singapore, as it could be an arranged post or he could have been on a business trip, but it seemed civil to let him have a say. Thatcher 11:36, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

• Is that normal, to unprotect a page specifically to allow a banned editor to post? Particularly since the implication is that he is posting as another account or IP, but wants to prove he isn't a specific one? Avruch ^T 14:49, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

He asked to be unblocked. Instead, I unprotected his user talk page. In order to edit, he will have to log in as Archtransit and he will only be able to post to his own talk page. Thatcher 14:59, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Diligence

		The Barnstar of Diligence
		For blocking one editor's estimate of 500,000 ips. Thank you for your hard work. Kingturtle (talk) 16:49, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

That was one at a time, too! Thatcher 16:57, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Add a barnstarbarnstarbarnstarbarnstar of good humour for this effort. dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 10:54, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Check out

Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Iantresman. Thanks. ScienceApologist (talk) 15:56, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Potential sock

I see that you blocked User:Grandy Grandy and User:The Dragon of Bosnia as abusive socks. Could you please have a look at Texwiller071 (talk · contribs)? These edits seem to follow the previous edit war.[23][24] This edit seems very similar to the style of talk page approach used by the blocked user.[25] I do not believe they are related, but you may wish to take a look at Nirvana77 (talk · contribs) as well. Thanks!! Vassyana (talk) 08:20, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi, did you have a chance to take a look at User:Texwiller071? He's been making the same edits/reverts as previously blocked blocked User:Grandy Grandy and User:The Dragon of Bosnia.

Bosnian War:

• User:Texwiller071: [[26]] and [[27]]
• User:Grandy Grandy / User:The Lion of Bosnia: [[28]], [[29]], [[30]], [[31]] and [[32]]

Role of foreign fighters in the Bosnian War:

• User:Texwiller071:[[33]]
• User:Grandy Grandy / User:The Lion of Bosnia: [[34]], [[35]] and [[36]]

Thank you. Osli73 (talk) 16:44, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

• Answered on the RFCU page. Nirvana77 is unrelated. Thatcher 14:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Hello

Have a good day my fellow wikipedian! Bsrboy (talk) 18:47, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

CHECKUSER on CFW

This is regarding your comment on this [37] Req for Chk user. This request was filed in conjunction with the suspsock report [38] filed against this user. The main thing I am requesting is to check the IP of user Cult free world before March 2008 and after March 20, 2008, reason is we think Cult free world has given his/her account to Shashwat Pandey (a.k.a Rushmi) who is most likely based out of India to let him do things he has tried twice before at WP but unsuccessfully. We have strong evidence of this, outside of WP, all documented at the above sock report. There is a clear change in pattern/behavior of User Cult free world (inside Wikipedia) before and after the above mentioned time frame. If you also find a distinct change in IP during this periods, it will be of immense help for the this sock report. Thank you! Duty2love (talk) 05:07, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• Hard to say without a crystal ball. The majority of CFW's edits come from a single IP address. He also has many edits on a large dynamic range, just a few on each IP. Both are in the same city and probably the same provider, and this would be consistent with (for example) editing from work (with a stable address) and home (with a dynamic address). There are no unusual changes around March 20--the pattern goes back as far as I can check. Of course, he could live in the same city as Rushmi, or even be him, but I can't tell based on the technical evidence. Thatcher 14:18, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Question

Thanks for the quick response. I am still trying to figure out how all this CU and range block stuff works. So we now know that Heee and Dan are one in the same. Why didn't the range block on Heee stop Dan from editing with these new accounts? When range blocked are you still able to edit your talk page? I am just trying to wrap my mind around how all this works. Thanks. KnightLago (talk) 16:42, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Collateral check

Hi Thatcher. I'm considering hard-rangeblocking 64.191.0.0/16, which contains an enormous number of hosted open proxies. Is it possible to check the collateral and legitimate networks on this range? The main sub-ranges are:

• hostnoc.net 64.191.0.0/17 (64.191.0.0 - 64.191.127.255)
• qx.net 64.191.128.0/18 (64.191.128.0 - 64.191.191.255)
• equinix 64.191.192.0/18 (64.191.192.0 - 64.191.255.255)

I'm considering blocking them all. Thanks. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 16:44, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• If they are a hosting company you can probably safely block the range. Checkuser shows edits from 101 different IPs in that range, which is pretty low considering it is a /16. There are a couple of good editors with only a couple of edits each, maybe they were testing the proxies or something. I can give you the list if you want to apply targeted blocks. Otherwise it is probably safe to block the range. Thatcher 23:45, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Thanks. Two are hosting colos which appear regularly, but I'm not familiar with qx.net, so I'll apply the three range blocks individually just in case. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 00:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanx

Thanx for going out of your way to find all those ip adresses, i provided some evidence of the bigotry i suffered but became tired of having to defend myself against the indefencable act of racism. I thank you for collecting together those ip's and pointing out that he also harrased my articles, in all the madness, the article harrasment was forgotten on my list. Realist2 (talk) 23:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Blocking of IP

I don't know why you blocked my IP address from editing Wikipedia but your claim that I was a persistent disruption is blatantly wrong because if you look at my edit history, the last edit I made was CLEARLY explained and it wasn't reverted because other Wikipedia users AGREED with my edit. In addition, to block someone for anonymous editing is simply ludicrous and looks to me as if it is a violation of administrator powers. Just because an individual doesn't want to register for an account you have no justification to block him if he is not being disruptive as Wikipedia prides itself on being the encyclopedia that ANYONE can edit (not simply registered users).

99.238.137.107 (talk) 18:33, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• The block was targeted at a user who had created more than 100 sockpuppet accounts and was using them to vandalize and do other disruptive edits; because he was constantly resetting his modem, it was necessary to block the entire range of IP addresses he had access to. (99.238.0.0 through 99.238.255.255) You were unfortunately caught in the range. As the block was of anonymous editing only, you could have chosen to contribute from an account, or to ask for the block to be lifted or modified, or to just wait. These sorts of things are the unfortunate consequence of trying to balance the principle that everyone can edit with the need to have a reasonably calm and non-disruptive editing environment. Thatcher 19:03, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• I understand. I apologize if I came across as a bit harsh as I thought that my blocking was intentional. At the time however, I was unaware that you instituted a block against the entire IP range.

99.238.137.107 (talk) 22:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• • No problem. If anything like that is ever unclear, please ask the blocking admin or use the unblock-L mailing list, they can usually get to the bottom of it. Thatcher 00:03, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Page protection

Hi, an edit war is again in risk of breaking out in a number of Bosnia related articles:

• Bosnian war
• Bosnian mujahideen
• Mujahideen
• Role of foreign fighters in the Bosnian war

Basically User:HarisM has been reverting back to the versions of these articles previously proposed by now banned User:Grandy Grandy / User:The Dragon of Bosnia. After my calls for discussion on the talk page regarding these edits have been unanswered I have in turn reverted to 'my' version of the articles. I have now left a message on the talk page[39] of User:HarisM, however, since he has not been willing to discuss edits before (and appears to be canvassing support for his edits[40][41]) I would like to ask you to protect these pages. RegardsOsli73 (talk) 15:32, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

protect Alija Izetbegović article

Hi, could you please also protect the Alija Izetbegović article as it is descending into the same type of edit war (often with the same edits as old User:Grandy Grandy & co.) as in Bosnian war and Bosnian mujahideen. Thank you. RegardsOsli73 (talk) 22:48, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Fredrick day Check User

Hello. I wondered if you would be willing to contact User:David Gerard regarding the checkuser that you conducted on me and discuss your results with each other. I was also involved in a suspected sock puppet case where he also conducted a checkuser. From the way i interpreted his comment here it seemed like he felt there was no possible link but to me, 'Inconclusive,' seem to still leave an air of doubt over which i would rather not have and personally i feel that things being left as inconclusive would tarnish any respect from the community. Thank you for you time in this. Seddon69 (talk) 17:25, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, Thatcher, I'd be interested in seeing a cross-reference here, with regards to the checkuser outcomes. Whilst I can't speak confidently without data access, it does seem that David Gerard was erring to an unlikely. Would you mind getting in touch with him and cross-checking, or otherwise having another Checkuser double-check the findings? Regards, Anthøny 17:34, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

OK, I've asked. Thatcher 17:42, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

It appears to be a difference in checkuser philosophy. I looked at it merely from a technical standpoint; it is possible that one individual could arrange internet access through both a broadband provider and a dial-up provider, and use them to segregate accounts. There is no technical evidence to say this is so but no technical evidence to rule it out (such as the editors being very far apart geographically). Hence inconclusive. David also looked at Seddon's contributions and decided on the basis of both the lack of a technical connection and the contents of his edits that he was not FD. Thatcher 18:02, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I expected checkuser evidence to be weak, unless some significant mistakes had been made. Fredrick day is using multiple ISPs, he has demonstrated that, not just one or two. He has, and it is believable, numerous wireless networks in his neighborhood that are available to him, plus mobile phone, plus at least one, I assume, broadband provider that's routine for him, plus, I expect, dial-up. My conclusion was based on time correlation of accounts: one user stops editing after a long series, then another starts up immediately. The evidence is presented in the Evidence subpage of the SSP report. No interspersal, usually. There is interspersal, sometimes, he clearly knows how to do that. But he couldn't -- or didn't -- do it all the time. Anyway, I'm preparing evidence that is much clearer, I'll be back with it. It's possible that in the process I will discover a serious mistake; if so, I'll be back to apologize deeply to Seddon69, who, if he isn't Fredrick day, should really have nothing to worry about.--Abd (talk) 22:16, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

what's most interesting about this is that Abd seems to be proposing the Ducking stool test - if there is overlap in the edits - "well it must be the same editor and he's quickly swooping accounts!", if there is not overlap in the edits "Well it must be the same editor and he's being careful to make sure they don't overlap!" Using this method, I could be pretty much any editor who fulfils two criteria - a) they edit from the UK and b) they have access to the orange mobile gateaway (which is where Seddon and I seem to crossover - a gateway accessible by orange's 12 million mobile customers - me being one of them and I guess Seddon being another). Anyway, seem abd seems to be suggesting he's discovered far more serious "socks" of mine than Seddon69, it will be interesting to see which UK based editor he accuses next. --87.112.75.234 (talk) 22:39, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Unblock Request

Can you review User talk:Jamesvera's unblock request? He seems to have been caught in a range block by Alison. I left her a note a day ago, but she may be busy in the real world. Thanks. KnightLago (talk) 00:05, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I've sorted this one now. Thanks, Thatcher - Alison ^❤ 07:12, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Willirennen

Hi Thatcher. I notice that User:Willirennen has been indefinitely blocked as a sockpuppet of User:Knock-Off Nigel. I'd be interested to see the evidence that supports this. In my experience, Willirennen has been nothing but a valauble contributor to the encyclopedia (I realise that the two aren't mutually exclusive). I note that there is also a User talk:WilliRennen (i.e. with a capital 'R'), which was created by User:Russ T who seems to be mostly involved in spamming about "Z cars": [42] Is this possibly a case of mistaken identity? DH85868993 (talk) 23:24, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

• See Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Boomgaylove. Knock-Off Nigel and Willirennen are definitely sharing IP addresses and computers with the other names listed there are confirmed. Whether the accounts should all be blocked, or whether one (main) account should be left unblocked with a warning, is up to the admin who did the blocking. You should ask AGK, or ask for a block review at WP:ANI. Thatcher 14:47, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

OK. Thanks. DH85868993 (talk) 15:01, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Chocolate dessert

You blocked him as a sockpuppet of Mr nibble (talk · contribs). What's the evidence? I can't see it in the contribs. Daniel Case (talk) 14:20, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Checkuser. Several accounts created at the same time on the same IP in order to avoid the anon/ac block at his school (where he is vandalizing from). Thatcher 14:22, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Ahh. I figured that's what it was. When you block for sockpuppetry based on checkuser, whether there was or wasn't a formal request for it, can you at least say that? It's useful to know in reviewing unblock requests. Daniel Case (talk) 14:37, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I usually try to do that. Thatcher 14:39, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

RFCU needs a second look

[43] - Jehochman ^Talk 02:51, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No good deed goes unpunished. I have attempted to match up the socks again at Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Giovanni33. Could you have a second look at that one too? Jehochman ^Talk 13:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Osli73

I made the following posting on the Administrators Noticeboard.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#Osli73_violating_parole.2C_repeat_violator

Fairview360 (talk) 05:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

User Osli73 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Osli73 has a history of willfully violating probations including the use of sockpuppets on articles related to the former Yugoslavia.

One can see at the bottom of this arbitration webpage that he has been blocked repeatedly for willfully violating sanctions placed against his edit warring and sockpuppetry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Kosovo#Involved_parties

For example:

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) 3 months per 1 month tthis AE post. Please note this is Osli's fourth block. --wL<speak·check> 07:40, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) for 2 weeks for breaking the revert limit on Srebrenica massacre; also banned from editing Srebrenica massacre for 3 months. Thatcher131 02:27, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) for two weeks for directly violating his probation and revert parole at Srebrenica massacre. --Jayjg (talk) 01:52, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) for one week for directly violating his probation and revert parole by using a sockpuppet to edit war at Srebrenica massacre. --Srikeit 10:06, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Blocked KarlXII (talk · contribs) indefinitely as a sockpuppet of Osli73 (talk · contribs) proven by checkuser. --Srikeit 10:06, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

On March 19, 2008, Osli73 received the following probation from administrator Thatcher explicitly forbidding Osli73 from more than one revert per week on the Bosnian Mujahideen and Mujahideen article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosnian_Mujahadin , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mujahideen

Your topic ban is lifted and replaced with a revert parole. You may edit Bosnian mujahideen and Mujahideen but for one month (from 17 March) you are limited to one revert per article per week. Obvious vandalism is excepted from the revert limit, but you should take care in distinguishing true vandalism from content disputes. You are permitted to revert the edits of banned users such as Grandy Grandy/The Dragon of Bosnia but you should be extremely careful in doing so, because if it turns out the editor you are reverting is not a sockpuppet of the banned user you will have violated the revert limit. It would be better to report suspected sockpuppets to WP:AE or WP:RFCU. Thatcher 14:05, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

see user Osli73 talk page for the above probation notice: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Osli73

Despite the explicit probation against more than one revert per week on the Bosnian Mujahideen and Mujahideen articles, user Osli73 has again engaged in edit warring, reverting the Bosnian mujahideen and Mujahideen articles repeatedly, for example Osli made the following 8 reverts to the Bosnian Mujahideen and Mujahideen articles from April 8 to April 14: diffs:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205563168

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205562519

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205439461

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205437228

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205144618

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=204899529

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=204888935

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=204184557

From his statements, Osli73 has shown that he fully understands the restrictions placed upon him. From his actions, he has shown that he is not willing to abide by those restrictions.

I am notifying the administrators that have sanctioned Osli73 in the past as well as notifying Osli73 of this posting. Especially with articles involving the former Yugoslavia, it is imperative that users respect the limits placed upon their editing. If the more vitriolic editors involved in former Yugoslavia articles see that Osli73 is not held accountable for his his transgressions, then there is greater likelihood of out-of-control edit warring as there has been in the past. Fairview360 (talk) 05:22, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

This information was moved from the Administrators notice board to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement#Osli73. As you placed the sanction on Osli73 (User talk:Osli73#Article ban) perhaps you would like to comment and/or close the debate. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 11:07, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

PHG

I copy and paste PHG's own explanation against the accusation to the RFCU page. Is the anon quacking PHG as the assumption of Jehochman and Kafka Liz, Elonka? Well, I don't think so.--Appletrees (talk) 15:01, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I am sorry but I do not give out my e-mail to strangers

Who are you and what is this about?Nrswanson (talk) 20:30, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah I see, I am divinediscourse. I took a look at your user history to see what the issue might be. I don't mix that account with this one. I only really use that one for AFD discussions. Is that not allowed? If so I will stop immidiately. I didn't think it was sock puppeting because I don't edit together. But I am happy to comply with what is correct.Nrswanson (talk) 20:41, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I sent you an e-mail and thank you for treating me with care. I really appriciate that. Not every editor would have you know.Nrswanson (talk) 21:05, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Mike Godwin

How do I contact Mike Godwin?--Urban Rose 12:47, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

His email address is on his user page. Thatcher 12:55, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Contacted Mike Godwin

I have contacted Mike Godwin with a brief summary of Grawp's vandalism and a request that he allow the release of Grawp's IP address.--Urban Rose 19:45, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Clerk Request

Hi there, was wondering if you could take me on as an appentice clark as i would love to help out with things and help keep wikipeida clean and tidy. Chris19910 (talk) 08:49, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Checkuser

you recently had inconclusive results on Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/SexyNupe2000. He's only been a user for 2 days and it's possible he was out of town on business or vacation. Can you run the checkuser again in a few days when perhaps he's back in his normal location? I agree with the user who posted the checkuser that this is unusual behavior for newbie to know how to navigate wikipedia of skillfully.--Ccson (talk) 13:05, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Lukeklein

Based on photographic evidence presented to the unblock-en-l mailing list, it is confirmed that these two accounts are not operated by the same person. I'm not modifying the checkuser page since I don't know the process for doing so, but I thought I'd let you know so you can update it accordingly.

Cheers. --Chris (talk) 13:29, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

The technical result is that they are using the same IP and the same computer. And even if they are two people, we often take a dim view of editors who recruit non-editing friends to help them out in disputes. You are free to add a note to the case that you accept their explanation that they are two people and have unblocked. Thatcher 14:57, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually they have two different laptops (minor detail, yeah) as verified by two pictures, one of each user holding their Wikipedia account name on an index card and the monitor displaying the MAC addresses of their respective computers' wireless network card. But of course, they are behind the same router. (Based on their real names I suspect they are brother and sister.) While I am aware that meatpuppetry is discouraged, an indef block is clearly unwarranted in this case. --Chris (talk) 20:50, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Since you have unblocked you should note that on the case page since a block is currently noted there. Thatcher 21:09, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Checkuser

So what should I do if a user here falsely claims that I am the same person as another user? [44] Thanks, Guido den Broeder (talk) 12:13, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Brandt RfD

The closing admin of the DRV, Prodego explicitly agreed that this should go to RfD. I strongly urge you to reverse your premature close. JoshuaZ (talk) 16:13, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

You can certainly cherry-pick his comments that way if you want to,

While I agree with the users below who bring up that this was not a simple CSD deletion, and likely should have gone through RfD

however he closes with,

I find the most compelling arguments, and the best reasoning, to be that those wishing to learn about Brandt will learn nothing about him at the PIR article, and therefore this redirect is quite worthless...it is quite clear that this is truly a valueless redirect."

Thatcher 16:17, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Wrong discussion. Look at User:Prodego/archive/61#Daniel_Brandt —Preceding unsigned comment added by JoshuaZ (talk • contribs)

I disagree with the concept that the way to appeal a deletion is to use a "lower-ranked" process. Fewer people watch RfD; there is a hierarchy of deletion discussions for a reason. Attempts to restore deleted content are routinely sent to DRV, no one would argue that I can restore an article deleted through AfD and demand that it go through Prod or AfD again. If the problem is that there is no way to appeal a "wrongly decided" DRV, then welcome to the ranks of other disgruntled editors whose articles are deleted and endorsed and find themselves at the top of the process ladder with no where else to go. Final processes are meant to be final. Consensus changes, and no discussion is ever final (for better or worse) but in my judgement as an admin, DRV is the appropriate venue. If you can find someone who thinks differently, they can use their discretion and judgement to reverse me. Thatcher 16:34, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

The comment from Prodego was: "My view is: I don't think it is necessary, and will not do it myself. But I have no problems if you do. Prodego talk 20:02, 2 April 2008 (UTC)" That is hardly an endorsement of the RFD. That is, "Sure, do it if you want, since you're entitled to try anything." That's different than, "My close was bunk." Please. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 16:26, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

It endorses another RfD as valid. And if you want I can get Prodego's permission to give you the emails also where Prodego and I discussed the matter in some detail. Lawrence you seem to persist in assuming that everyone else is twisting things. Please stop projecting. JoshuaZ (talk) 16:28, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Please stop harassing BLP subjects. Critical decisions like this are not made off-wiki. Mind yourself, since you're already on thin ice for socking. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 16:30, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

With all due respect to Prodego, DRV is meant to be a final review, and if he did not have the strength of conviction to say, "I've made my decision, sorry you disagree, try again in 6 months" then he shouldn't have done the close at all. Or, if he was persuaded by your argument, he should have reversed the close, made a "vote" and asked someone else to close it. Thatcher 16:47, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I meant to reopen the DRV, as you suggest, not start an RfD, I have no idea where that misconception came from. To clarify: I agree with JoshuaZ that the DRV does not necessarily support deleting the page because of a threat to Alison, which he believes is the reason for the deletion, but I completely believe that it supports deleting the page (for the reasons I explained). However, if JoshuaZ believes that it is not so, I said I would not be opposed to him reopening the DRV for someone else to close. But, a bit too much time has passed for that IMO. Prodego ^talk 21:04, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

What??? Please explain ... - Alison ^❤ 21:50, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Different Alison? Carcharoth (talk) 21:59, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Wait, I'm a little slow here.. (though I suspected it at the time) we can confirm that Brandt had given a new threat, which prompted the deletion of the redirect in the first place? -- Ned Scott 22:09, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Brandt has not threatened me, not in recent times. There are no deals going on here and, frankly, I've no idea why I've been mentioned here - Alison ^❤ 22:21, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

User:WJBscribe also did not object to the idea of an RfD when I asked him during the DRV. -- Ned Scott 21:59, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Ok this is what I heard: JoshuaZ told me there had been some threat to Alison, which he believed caused the page to be emergency deleted. I said that the DRV didn't support a delete for that reason, but did for my reason. If this never happened, I would like an explanation from JoshuaZ, and I would be absolutely against reopening this at all if that were so. Prodego ^talk 20:12, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Thatcher, Ned has reversed your close of the RFD. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 22:13, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

And it will stay open. If Thatcher continues to disagree with this then he is free to take it to one of the many discussions that have popped up about it. That goes for you as well, Lawrence. -- Ned Scott 22:25, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Like I said on my talk Ned, you know I'm one of the "lets all remember that admins just have more buttons" side of things, but the closing of debates is one of the things that belongs to admins--it just is what it is. Reversing an admin on a close is one thing, and happens, I guess, but myself and now Gwen Gale have also reversed your opening of Thatcher's close. I almost hate to say it but for process's sake under policy if you have a problem with Thatcher's DRV you need to DRV Thatcher's close, to see if this belongs on RFD. The DRV is the top of the deletion process food chain, the last door. Prodego (per his above comments) has basically endorsed his own close, so you need to either DRV Brandt again outright (which may be seen as tenditious), or you can DRV the RFD or you can DRV the DRV itself, I suppose... Lawrence Cohen § t/e 22:33, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Which is how they win their game. -- Ned Scott 22:39, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

So in other words, if one loses a consensus battle, there is never an end? If I were in agreement with yourself and Joshua, I could keep up the RFD, and then what happens if the RFD is closed not to my satisifaction? I DRV the RFD? What happens if I don't like the result of the DRV? DRV the DRV? There has to be an end. Do we just discard that overwhelming DRV5 consensus? By what right do we invalidate the 100+ people that weighed in there? Lawrence Cohen § t/e 22:44, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Except a consensus battle was never lost in this situation. There was never (and lets be absolutely clear about this) consensus to delete the redirect. WJB knew he couldn't get consensus to do it, so he violated the deletion policy and deleted it anyways. People who wanted to correct this wrong were labeled as disruptive if they brought it up to DRV. This comes down to a handful admins not getting their way and shutting the community out by gaming the system. Don't bullshit me with things like "overwhelming DRV5 consensus". -- Ned Scott 22:50, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

And this holds true regardless if I agree with the deletion or not. I can pull up past examples from other situations if you doubt me. -- Ned Scott 22:52, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Then there is a problem with the DRV close. I do not accept these venue arguments. The overwhelming majority of users on DRV #5 endorsed deletion. We follow consensus, not the name of the page the consensus was formed on. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 23:00, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes but WP:CCC. There was never even consensus to delete the biography in the first place. Obviously the attempted merge compromise has fallen through; the material that was to have been merged over is entirely missing from the target article, and the consensus to redirect no longer exists. So why hasn't the article been restored? -- Kendrick7^talk 23:11, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Because there were significantly more people on DRV 5 that said to delete Daniel Brandt than there those who said to keep it. CCC indeed, and CCC changed to get rid of it on DRV 5. It was an endorce of the deletion. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 23:22, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

The deletion of the redirect. I'm talking about the article. -- Kendrick7^talk 23:29, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

OMG numbers! Yeah, count all the assholes who didn't even care to address any concerns, whatsoever, and simply write off their fellow wikipedians as trolls. "omg, not again, keep deleted" bullshit has no weight on Wikipedia. -- Ned Scott 23:34, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

• Kendrick7, you can say "there was no consensus to delete" as many times as you want but that does not make it true. There was no consensus that you agreed with; I think the expression is "tough shit."
• Ned, you have committed a number of serious errors:

You do not reverse another admin's actions without prior discussion.

You do not reverse an admin closing when you are not an admin. The fact that none of the admins who have participated in any of these discussions reversed me should give you a clue.

You do not reopen a discussion just so you can vote.

No XfD is an appropriate forum to review a closed DRV. The only appropriate forum is DRV. If it happens that people say, "hey, the last DRV was only a month ago, close a premature", well, that should give you another clue.

That said, I don't give a fuck. I was trying to reduce the drama and direct the discussion to the appropriate venue. You obviously have other goals. Thatcher 23:33, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Thatcher, I have reverted admin closing in the past, and I will continue to do so when their rationale is crap. Joshua was not trying to get around the DRV, and it was perfectly understandable why he thought he was doing the right thing. If you want to go believing in some non-existence holy law, go ahead and delude yourself. -- Ned Scott 23:37, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm just saying -- if you, Thatcher, or anyone for that matter, can point me to the current upstanding AfD of the Brandt article, it would be helpful going forward. If not, that's fine too. I just want to make sure we're all on the same page here. -- Kendrick7^talk 00:38, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Sanchez lexis nexis search

Concerning this you might also substitute the word "escort" for "prostitute" or even "hustler", "rent boy" and "call boy" as those are common synonyms for male escorts. Banjeboi 02:38, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

• To the best of my ability to search a database containing every major english language news source (and many minor news sources) the chain of events is something like this:

Blogger Joe.My.God finds an ad for an escort he believes is Sanchez and blogs about it. He also claims to have had a phone interview with Sanchez.

The story is repeated on other blogs, including GayPatriot and Michelle Malkin.

On March 7, 2007 Salon.com;s gossip column "The Fix" reports the allegations but does not independently confirm them. It says, "Is Columbia University student, ex-Marine and Fox News right-wing darling Matt Sanchez also Peter the Tree, a former gay porn star and escort? Speculation grew all day Tuesday on gay blogs....

On March 8 Sanchez wrote a piece for Salon, in which he says, "Some of the sites were comparing me to Rich Merritt, a Marine Corps captain who appeared in gay films. Others were comparing me to Jeff Gannon and claiming that I too had advertised my services as a male escort. I won't deny it, or that I acted in several adult movies 15 years ago under names like Pierre LaBranche and Rod Majors." (He also says "Being in the adult entertainment industry was sort of like being in a cult, and like all followers of a cult, I have a difficult time figuring out when I stopped believing in the party line. I can tell you, though, that by the time I finished my brief tour of the major studios, I was pretty disgusted with myself.")

• I suppose the sticking point is whether a biography here should say "he was a male prostitute" or "he advertised his services as a male escort." Calling him a prostitute, hustler, call or or rent boy (in addition to being offensive and telling me something about your agenda) goes one step farther than he himself went in the March 8 article. He does not say in the March 8 article that he had sex for money. I think a fair biography can at most say, "he confirmed in Salon that he had acted in gay adult movies and advertised his services as an escort", while at the same time reporting his current denials that he ever actually had sex for money. Thatcher 03:57, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi. Perhaps I should have explained a bit better. Your search on LexisNexis would be more thorough if it searched for some of the other words that may have been used in place of "escort". You can put your assumptions about me and "my agenda" on hold; these are the same things I have brought up in AfD discussions about searching for information using variations on spellings, for instance, to allow for a name that was commonly mispelled. My track record on how I feel about the whole matter can be easily summed up, we go by verifiability not truth. Although I can see how you might piece together the above timeline it's not one I've ever seen. Instead most of the accounts I've read have been more along the lines that his former clients or at least those who claimed to be his former clients blew the whistle to the bloggers. Regardless of what the actual events were, unless someone writes in a reliable source about them we should simply dispassionately report what is verifiable. I was only suggesting that if you're willing you may want to redo the search using likely synonyms so that the research is more complete. Do what you will. Banjeboi 04:29, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

In fact, the results above are the result of a thorough search using the terms you suggest. You should not be surprised to discover that reliable news sources (as opposed to blogs) rarely use terms like "rent boy." The point here is that no reliable news source has reported that Sanchez was an escort, prostitute, rent boy, or anything else. Sanchez himself made the limited admission reprinted above. A number of blogs have claimed it, and at least one guest on an MSNBC talk show (a Democratic political operative) reported that the blogs had said this, but blogs are not reliable sources and you should also beware of Fact laundering; when a reliable source reports, "several unreliable sources have claimed..." that does not suddenly confer reliability on the claim. Thatcher 11:24, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, it might be helpful for future editors to simply add to the talkpage thread that several synonyms were also used in the search to clear up that the reserach was more thorough. Banjeboi 23:01, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Not fair enough. Benjiboi has been banned for being biased because he wants the biased unsourced information in the article regardless of reliability. Rushdittobot (talk) 03:41, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Interesting comment but simply not true. My contributions can be easily seen by anyone and I hardly advocated for inserting unsourced content period. If you feel something in that article is unsourced, biased or otherwise problematic then address it on that talk page where your concerns can be fully addressed by interested editors. Banjeboi 11:07, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Disruptive editing

See: [45]. I believe that this is a sock of Harvey Carter, WP:DUCK. FWiW Bzuk (talk) 12:16, 25 April 2008 (UTC).

• Who? Have you tried a user conduct Request for comment or mediation? If you think this is related to an alread banned or blocked user I need more info. Thatcher 22:31, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

DennisOliver

Thank you for restoring the article about Dennis Oliver for which I've work very hard to achieve Wikipedia standards. It is very pleasant to attain recognition, instead of having the article deleted without any consideration,you have been very fair. Thank you again!Ralicia (talk) 19:37, 25 April 2008 (UTC)Ralicia

• You're welcome. It still could be nominated for deletion, but this time there would be a discussion which would give you a chance to argue your point. And there is often a pro-US/UK bias where it is harder to show notability of figures in other countries. So good luck. (If you speak spanish you should try adding the article to the spanish language wikipedia as well.) Thatcher 22:29, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Link to compromised account list

I've e-mailed you with a link to the user talk page of an ED user Headstrust who claims to be the real Grawp. On the page the accounts are listed as compromised.--Urban Rose 19:49, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Nevermind, there's no need to follow the link. The accounts have already been blocked as compromised accounts. For information on this go back to the AN thread and compare the conrtibutions (and deleted contributions) of RepriseRubric (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), a Grawp sock and possibly compromised account, to those of said socks for evidence.--Urban Rose 20:46, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Dennis Oliver again

Oops, you are so right. My bad for Speedying it for the completely wrong reason. I indeed knew/know the proper circumstances for a G4 so I obviously just wasn't paying attention. Thank you for reversing it and apologies for the avoidable-if-I-was-alert trouble. Cheers, Pigman☿ 22:20, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

No biggie. Stuff happens. Thatcher 22:26, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

User talk:71.107.163.121

71.107.163.121 (talk · contribs) was recently blocked, again (you gave it a {{checkuserblock}} earlier this month), and is currently requesting unblocking. Your block does not appear to be in dispute, but I'm primarily letting you know since I imagine you'll have a much better idea of what's going on, here, than I currently do. – Luna Santin (talk) 01:35, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

• Do not unblock no matter what he says. Thatcher 02:21, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

• Good thing I poked you about it, then. :) – Luna Santin (talk) 02:58, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Problems with User:Giano II

Giano II was recently given a warnbing about being disruptive and uncivil in an Arbcomm ruling you were involved in (see here.) Recently he added a HTML request to a lot of articles requesting that an infobox be not added to them. This was questioned, and is subject to ongoing debate WT:CHES#Little Moreton Hall. A message thread started on his talk page here includes a response by Giano II that directly disparages users who are questioning the request to not include an infobox (The sentence "Those with the attention span of a gnat, and inability to read what is in the first four lines of the lead, and those who enjoy seeing high quality images reduced to the size of postage stamps may see the need for a box. Those of a higher intelligence may prefer to read, learn and enjoy reading a page.") I find it offensive and I think others would do so too. Their position about infoboxes may be te better one, but using such language seems to go against the principles of wikipedia. In fact, the discussion has led to a number of people who do not agree with adding infoboxes to use uncivil language to describe those who question it. Can you advise us on what to do? I think the arbcomm ruling applies in this case, but I'm unsure how to proceed. Many thanks.  DDStretch  (talk) 09:39, 26 April 2008 (UTC)