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The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for Bot Approvals Group membership that did not succeed. Please do not modify it.
Closing notes: Following the discussion below a community consensus to continue BAG membership for Magioladitis has not emerged. This closure has no impact on prior BRFA's that Magioladitis has approved or denied, or Magioladitis' status as a bot operator. Like all editors, Magioladitis is welcome to participate in all future BRFA's by asking questions, offering opinions, etc. Magioladitis may seek BAG membership again in the future through the normal means. Magioladitis, thank you for standing for reconfirmation when asked to by the community. — xaosflux Talk 16:46, 29 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

BAG reconfirmation: Magioladitis

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After comments in my talk page, I hereby ask for reconfirmation as BAG member. I 've been a BAG member for 2.5 years. After I assigned as member:

So, here I am. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:22, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

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Two questions:

  1. Why are you running an unapproved bot from your account to make edits like this?
  2. Why is this not grounds for yet another block?

Ramaksoud2000 (Talk to me) 02:35, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The questions are unrelated to my BAG nomination. BAG checks mainly the technical part of the story. The question asked here is if have the technical skills and related knowledge to be part of BAG. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:02, 29 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

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Hchc2009's comments

Thanks for agreeing to see reconfirmation Magioladitis. At the moment, I would oppose reconfirmation. The standard for Bot Approval Group members is that we trust them to "approve or deny the various bot tasks submitted by both new and old bot operators" and "to understand Wikipedia's bot policy, and to offer sound bot-related advice to bot operators, admins, and editors alike". The former activity is particularly sensitive, as the BAG do not operate as a committee, and there are no checks and balances around individual approvals: once a BAG member has approved a task it can be immediately implemented and is not subject to review by other BAG members. While I think that Magioladitis has considerable technical talent - which is clearly valued by the community - and is certainly operating in what he perceives as the best interest of Wikipedia, I have concerns in the following areas:

  • Magioladitis has difficulties in judging consensus when approving and carrying out bot activity. Recent examples include a Dexbot approval which has been criticised by multiple editors for lacking wider consensus; User:Xaosflux another member of the BAG and an admin/bureaucrat, has noted that there was insufficient evidence of discussion or community consensus (NB: the box was in fact left blank), noting that "I never would have approved that task without it". Magioladitis refuses to agree that there are any problems with his judgement, arguing that "all the tasks have consensus". I do not have confidence in their ability to distinguish between bot-related tasks that have community consensus, and those which do not.
  • The relationship between Magioladitis and User:Ladsgroup in the context of the BAG appears problematic. (NB: I would caveat my comments here by noting that some editors do not appear to be working in their first language, and I would welcome correction if I have misunderstood their messages/intent). It appears that Magioladitis has been asking Ladsgroup to submit requests for bot tasks, which Magioladitis has then been personally approving as a BAG member. In the case of Dexbot 9, for example, a task that Magioladitis recently both asked Ladsgroup to carry out and then personally approved, the result were widespread edits that went against wiki guidelines. When questioned about some of his bot editing, Ladsgroup has noted that "I was asked to do this so I thought there is a bigger plan and I can help out. I'm not aware of the details... I remember vaguely that a discussion like that happened but can't remember the details. Anyway, Marios asked me to do it." A similar tone comes through in other conversations in which Ladsgroup has noted, when challenged about the details of his edits that "I do whatever BAG members say". It would appear that the BAG approvals process is being routinely circumvented resulting in edits which lack community consensus.
  • There are long running questions over how Magioladitis's own bots are run. SarahSV has carried out a review of this, and reports that "there are dozens of threads going back to 2009 about violations of the bot policy, 22 blocks of Yobot and Magioladitis, and hundreds of hours of volunteer time spent trying to resolve it." My own due diligence checks, carried out on recent activity only, suggest that there have been widespread problems which have caused wide-spread aggravation. I have seen nothing that encourages me to believe that Magioladitis has taken this on board as a problem, leading me to question if he is well-positioned to offer sound advice to others.
  • Most recently, the recent block of Magioladitis for what the blocking admin, User:Spinningspark, described as "appalling behaviour...especially as he has been blocked for the exact same thing in the past", calls into question whether it remains appropriate for Magioladitis to remain a member of the BAG. I would recommend that a period off the Group would allow him to demonstrate behaviours which would increase the level of trust by the community and pave the way for his return to the BAG. Hchc2009 (talk) 12:50, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Hchc2009 Here are some replies

Spinningspark's comments

I don't know what other useful work Magio does for BAG, but he certainly should be prevented from approving other bots. If the only way of stopping him doing this is to keep him off BAG, then oppose. He seems completely incapable of discerning what amounts to consensus, and I'm not sure that he cares much about it anyway. Besides the dubious approval of Dexbot mentioned above and the problems with Yobot, he shows this with his own statements even on this page. In § General fixes and cosmetic edits in this edit Magio says "[m]ost of AWB's general fixes are based on Guidelines and Documentation" and cites the page WP:GENFIXES as evidence. However, most of the items on that list do not cite a guideline or community decision at all. Of the ones that do, the immediate issue that led to Yobot's current block, template redirects, is cited to Wikipedia:Redirect § Template redirects but the guideline does not proscribe template redirects, it merely notes that "[w]hile template shortcut/alias redirects are common, they may infrequently cause confusion and make updating template calls more complicated". If the guideline had said something like "thou shalt not transclude redirects" then Magio would have a case, but it doesn't. In short, there is no audit trail back to a consensus, not by the route Magio thinks there is in any event. In this very thread, Magio defends himself over Persondata by pointing out that Persondata has now been taken over by Wikidata. It seems to have completely passed him by that who was right about the ultimate fate of Persondata is beside the point. The issue is that he did not have consensus to wipe it out at the time he requested to do so and seems still to fail to understand that. SpinningSpark 14:40, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

So, as I get it, you disagree with a single approval of single bot and this is the reason you oppose me. This is the only action relevant to BAG that you describe in your comments. The AWB documentation is not my job and it is unrelated to BAG anyway. Same holds for Prsondata. I requested a task via the normal procedure. I did not run anything unapproved. -- Magioladitis (talk) 20:59, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Please read Template_talk:Official_website/Archive_2#Wikidata that results to Dexbot's bot task. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:16, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
No, I don't oppose because of a single mistake, I oppose because you have not demonstrated an understanding of the meaning of consensus, why it is important to Wikipedia, or how it relates to the bot policy. SpinningSpark 00:08, 21 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
After you read the inks I gave you still think there was no consensus for Dexbot to run for example? I think it's not nice that we try to resolve this under this discussion but anyway. -- Magioladitis (talk) 00:10, 21 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I was referring to the issue with Dexbot 9 raised by Hchc2009 above where you approved a bot request that cited no discussions to show consensus. You seem to be talking about Dexbot 6, but as it happens, that one has exactly the same problem as well. But now that you have asked my opinion on the discussion you linked, I think it is dubious at best to claim a community consensus on the back of it. It was on a template talk page, only likely to be watched by people interested in editing that template, and even there the proposal found some opposition. Now I'm not here arguing either for or against either of those tasks. The point is that the basis tasks are being done on needs to be clear both at the time of approval and for anyone subsequently reviewing who might want to challenge it. SpinningSpark 01:16, 21 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
SarahSV's comments

Oppose reconfirmation. WP:BAG says that BAG members are "trusted to understand Wikipedia's bot policy, and to offer sound bot-related advice to bot operators, admins, and editors alike". Magioladitis's bot has regularly operated in violation of the bot policy since 2009, particularly COSMETICBOT. He either brushes off complaints, blaming the edits on a bug that is being fixed, or he ignores them. He seems not to understand the need for consensus or that repeated complaints mean he must stop the task. Communicating with him is not easy. There are dozens of talk-page complaints about his or Yobot's edits, many showing a failure to take the point. If an editor complains about X and mentions Y in passing, Magioladitis will focus on Y and ignore X. This wastes a lot of time.

As for approving bot tasks, Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Dexbot 6 is a concern. According to the bot operator, Magioladitis asked him to change all links to official websites in External links to the template {{official website}}. This would mean the site would be retrieved from Wikidata. It ignores the guideline WP:ELOFFICIAL, which says: "Use of the template {{official website}} is optional." The section of the BRFA that requests links to discussions was left empty. The BRFA instructions for BAG members say:

Before granting a trial, consider whether the task could be controversial (e.g. most bots making non-maintenance edits to articles and most bots posting messages on user talk pages). If so, and the request does not already link to a discussion showing consensus in an appropriate forum (or silence after a reasonable waiting period), use {{BOTREQ|advertise}} to request that that be done.

Magioladitis didn't do that. A subsequent discussion at Wikipedia talk:External links#Official website template shows no consensus to add this template everywhere, and certain problems with it are being discussed. These apparently include that Wikidata could include a blacklisted site without editors here noticing, but when they next try to save the article, the spam-blacklist filter would be triggered. This illustrates why discussion is needed before mass edits are approved. SarahSV (talk) 20:58, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

SarahSV I think it's best that you ait for the discussion in ELOFFICIAL to conclude. Till now the arguments in favour of the migration are ovehelming and Fram's reaction contained f* words. -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:02, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Any argument raised in the ELOF page is about the template in general and not about the conversion. -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:54, 20 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Oh no, my reaction contained fuck, that makes it obviously invalid. "Till now the arguments in favour of the migration are ovehelming", even though they aren't convincing anyone. Fram (talk) 09:00, 21 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Bgwhite's comments

While I don't agree with everything being said and the neutrality of Spingingspark and SV would be like a hot war between the US and USSR, I do think Magioladitis should not be reconfirmed as a BAG. There's too much of a cloud. BAGs should be neutral. The cloud brings doubt to the neutrality. In a year or so, if things on the Yobot front remain calm, then it might be a good time to run for BAG again. Bgwhite (talk) 02:54, 21 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ramaksoud2000's comments

Oppose because user appears to be running a WP:COSMETICBOT for template redirects under his main account right now, during this re-confirmation. I'm astonished because this is what caused Yobot's block. Strong case of WP:IDHT. Ramaksoud2000 (Talk to me) 02:15, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ramaksoud2000 You opposed before I have the time to reply the two questions you posed to me above. -- Magioladitis (talk) 13:05, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
You may certainly answer the questions, as you partially did on my talk page. I'm very sorry to say, though, that the answer you gave, and any other answer you could give, is unlikely to be sufficient. Ramaksoud2000 (Talk to me) 20:17, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The questions were rhetorical, right? Let's be honest. They do not even address to me. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:05, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
They are addressed specifically to you and concern edits that you made. Ramaksoud2000 (Talk to me) 03:52, 28 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
BU Rob13's comments

Oppose due to ongoing issues. This has been going on for years, and a bot operator that doesn't comply with the bot policy should obviously not be a BAG member. (Why are we using headers for this?) ~ Rob13Talk 06:39, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. Bot operators are expected to have exemplary diligence and communication due to the mass of edits performed, especially for cosmetic-like tasks. Meanwhile, the user is performing continuous bot-like editing on their main account even after all the issues that have been brought up. Edits like this even use the bot summary (e.g.). I don't believe an editor who is unable to follow the policy and reasonably resolve disputes should be reviewing others for the same criteria. While I don't have as strong of an opinion as others, I don't believe the issues should ever have come even close to where they are. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 12:34, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Hellknowz just to clarify. Do you disagree with the removal of the break tag or my edit summary? Thanks, Magioladitis (talk) 12:44, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree with the way the edit was performed. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 12:55, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
These kinds of edits should not be done by someone upholding bot policy and leading by example as a BAG member. They definitely should not be done during ongoing disputes/issues and during a BAG reconfirmation where one would demonstrate technical diligence, ability to follow consensus and communication beyond everyday editing. As I said, the issues should never have gone as far as they have, regardless if you believe you are right. I don't have any major issues with the actual edit, checkwiki, or summary. If you could have acknowledged there is an issue with your editing, stopped and reexamined the bot tasks, then sought proper consensus to adjust them to unambiguous policy/guideline/community standards, I would have supported your stay with BAG. But your continuous edits and responses lead me to believe that if you cannot uphold these standards even during a reconfirmation, then you won't uphold it afterwards either. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 14:12, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose with much chagrin. I wrote at the beginning of this year:

"Bluntly put, we're at a crossroad here. You can commit to follow WP:COSMETICBOT / not ignore skip conditions / not using a brute force approach / do semi-automated testing of things where you personally review a substantial amount of edits before letting a fully-automated process take over / whatever other voodoo magic is necessary. Expecting < X/1000 trivial edits is not something I'm willing to put forth as a criteria of success, but their frequency has to be drastically reduced.
Or do we have to revoke your AWB access?"

From the rest of this year's WP:COSMETICBOT related drama surrounding Magioladitis, their bots, and approval of similar cosmetic (or cosmetic-like) bots, it's clear to me that this commitment was not, is not, and likely won't ever be taken seriously. The community's patience has run out. Bot ops are expected to abide with all of WP:BOTPOL, and all WP:BAG members should be intimately familiar with them since we are trusted to approve/deny/advise/comment on bots and bot-related things. With this strong a case of WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT, I don't see that we have a choice but to rescind Magioladitis' BAG membership.Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 18:37, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Questions: Per this comment "the group is just the technical side of the review". From this perspective, what did I do wrong as BAG member? - Magioladitis (talk) 14:00, 29 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Well, one thing you did wrong is seizing on an inaccurate comment to try to defend yourself. The issues people have with you are not in the technical area but in compliance with community standards. To quote WP:BOTPOL with emphasis added, "Once the request has demonstrated its conformance with the community standards and correct technical implementation, the BAG may approve the task. The BAG may also decline a request which fails to demonstrate community consensus to perform the task." It also states "The decision to approve or decline a request should take into account the requirements above", which includes "performs only tasks for which there is consensus". Anomie⚔ 16:27, 29 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above BAG membership discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
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