Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive209

I would highly appreciate monitoring the neutrality of this article as well as the article of its rival organization:

It really doesn't look like a full page protection was necessary. Not even convinced semi-protection would have been needed, and it seems like you are involved? I don't know the full background, so forgive me, but this seems like a questionable admin action.-Andrew c ^[talk] 01:41, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Ok. I will at least put it to as minimum protection as possible. I'm very sure though that a paragraph stating it being a cult will be inserted as [ soon as the protections is removed]possible. My only involvement is trying to maintain neutrality. --Jondel (talk) 06:04, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Protected from unregistered and new users for 1 month. I think this is appropriate.--Jondel (talk) 06:29, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

We have a bit of a backlog at

Just a short announcement to say that I have created an alternative account at User:Mjroots2 for use at public terminals and when I may be away from my own computer and not in need of the use of Admin tools. Mjroots (talk) 11:00, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Backlog at

What would the chance of deletion be for starting an article about 2010 New England town meetings, there seems to be some precedent for municipal elections, but in New Hampshire, and I assume other New England states, the town meeting doubles as a municipal election and a congress of the town's legislative body (local boards are legally only considered administrative caretakers for the direct democracy of the voters). Doc Quintana (talk) 23:13, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Ask the Help Desk or VP. Some admins hate it when this board is not used for issues like asking administrators to block others. See your talk page for advice. Suomi Finland 2009 (talk) 02:16, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

The common code of Template:Table cell templates was updated about a month ago (mostly to center cell text), and all of the unprotected cell templates were likewise changed for consistency. But the templates: {{yes}}, {{yes2}}, {{no}}, {{no2}} and {{rh}} all have permanent protection and cannot be changed by non-administrators. Could someone please update those templates, or in some way make all the table cells consistent? --Gyrobo (talk) 00:26, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to see the community extend some good faith to Peter Damian. I know he's done some socking since his ban, but all of it has been constructive and related to article work (even if some of it's been pointy). I don't see anything to be gained by punitive punishments or expectations of complete submission. As long as an editor is willing to contribute constructively, it seems to me that leniency and extensions of good faith are the best way to garner less animus and more good will. If someone is willing to abide by our rules upon their return, I don't see any reason to keep them in exile. If they make trouble it's easy enough to show them back out the door. Let's be magnanimous for once. Any takers? ChildofMidnight (talk) 21:41, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, support, give him a break.

Off2riorob (talk

) 21:44, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

He was banned for violating an arbitration ruling... So is he going to abide by it on his return? –xeno^talk 21:47, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

People often respond well to a little good will and trust.

Off2riorob (talk

) 21:55, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

He was given a fair amount of both, and still refused to abide by his restrictions. Allowing him back is (yet again) saying "This is your really really final chance, for realsies, we mean it this time." Enough is enough. → ROUX ₪ 21:59, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Has anyone got a link to those restrictions he broke?

Off2riorob (talk

) 22:01, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

[2] - next time, look at the block log. → ROUX ₪ 22:03, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia is much better off without him. Looie496 (talk) 22:41, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

• As he was banned by community discussion at ANI, I think that is the appropriate forum for this discussion. Given that he socked as recently as yesterday I wouldn't expect that to go very well. The argument that he had no choice and had to sock is contradicted by the many users who have been blocked or banned and were allowed back because they managed to demonstrate that they had the self control to refrain from socking for a while.
  talk
  ) 22:44, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

As recently as today:

talk · contribs) (account creation blocked, e-mail blocked, cannot edit own talk page) with an expiry time of indefinite ‎ (Block evasion: Peter Damian). Jarkeld (talk

) 22:48, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

He doesn't seem to be helping himself much, a six month block with good behavior is pretty much good enough to get most people back editing, he appears to have socked his way out of that.

Off2riorob (talk

) 22:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

The truth is he can edit as he pleases as long as he stays anonymous. It's a defacto reality of whispered truth that editors can return as long as they do so quitely and remain anonymous. If they identify themselves they have to blocked. It's Wikipedia's version of Kabuki theater.

If it's a sock of his, which seems likely, it seemed to be working constructively on article improvements. Differentiating between clean socks and dirty ones would be useful. Like so many acronyms we often throw around terminology without distinction or meaning.

I think it's unfortunate that we push talented academics into the shadows because they got frustrated and into trouble. The whole Assume Good Faith protocol seems hollow to me when we so consistently fail to extend it, even when it costs us nothing. It is almost effortless to reblock if problems reemerge, so it makes us out to be petty and vindictive in cases like this that we demand punishing terms, ritualistic humiliations, and exile before allowing a return. I'd much rather be part of a forgiving and welcoming community that leads by example. I don't think we should be a church in attempting to recruit supplicants. ChildofMidnight (talk) 22:58, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Good faith was extended, many times...

Tan | 39

23:00, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

So what's one more time? I think it's been a while since the last go round. And think of the gloating you can enjoy pointing out my mistake if I'm proved wrong. And if by chance Damian should return as a productive contributor, think of the new chapter of light and redemption we can open. A new dawn. A Wikipedia Renaissance of Enlightenment and reasoned consideration for our fellow hominids in which good faith and olive branches are extended and good favor bestowed upon us in return. ChildofMidnight (talk) 23:13, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Not much of a gloater, but I am confused - you said, "the whole Assume Good Faith protocol seems hollow when we so consistently fail to extend it", meaning that Peter Damian is getting the shaft because we fail to AGF. But now we need to do it over and over? Where is the line? Is there one?

Tan | 39

23:16, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Apart from the virulently offensive types of users, I would think we should always be willing to at least listen, sure. But is there a request for an unblock by Damian himself? I'd rather see something in his own words rather than some sort of request-by-proxy appeal. Tarc (talk) 23:29, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

I've lowered his block to allow him to send email. At this point that's as far as I'm willing to go.

talk

) 23:41, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

I was waiting a response to Tarc's question before allowing talk page access: are his words so

ungood we can't risk them being posted to his talk page? (If he is really seeking to be unblocked; if this is just an out-of-the blue suggestion by CoM then I suppose it can remain blocked) –xeno^talk

23:45, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

The problem with PD is that he is so clever -- he is perfectly capable of doing a long series of perfectly good edits just for the sake of setting up a drama, and when the drama plays out it goes on for ages and sucks in dozens of editors. Even Jimbo has been sucked repeatedly into PD's dramas. We've been through it often enough. If he were the usual bonehead the cost of giving him another chance would be limited, but he isn't. Looie496 (talk) 23:43, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

(ecxinfinity) I agree he is clever which is why it would be good to have him back contributing to articles. The service in exile meme seems a strange tradition and an arbitrary tribal ritual to me. Let's show some respect to the man and see if we can't get some in return. I've restored illuminationism (from being a redirect), and if that's the type of contribution he's interested in making, I think it would be good to have him back among us. If the test run fails and there is disruption, it won't be hard or costly to shut down the experiment. I disagree with the idea that it will be enormously drama filled to end it if it spins out of control. It's a one button operation and I'm more than willing to receive my share of I told you so's if I'm suffering from delusions of grandeur. But it seems wimpy that there are none among us willing to give good faith a try when it's such a commonly preached refrain. And I don't think it's really been tried before, not since the previous episodes which as I recall were quite a few months ago? I don't recall him being allowed to return to open editing as a respected member of the community any time in the recent pass. The first step would simply be to initiate a discussion: Hey there young man, how are things going? Are you interested in editing here? We've had some problems in the past, if you returned would it be fore the right reasons? ChildofMidnight (talk) 23:54, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Of course, we've essentially done this before, right? So if this doesn't work, what will stop you (or another editor) from saying we should do it again? No one cares about telling you "I told you so"; hopefully we're all out of sixth grade. We (read: I) care about wasting yet more time on a proven incorrigible editor.

Tan | 39

23:57, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

I guess nothing. Nothing will ever stop good faith editors from suggesting that someone with a history of very solid article contributions, but other issues that got them banned, be extended some respect and good faith in the form of an opportunity to at least discuss a return to community membership. What is there to lose? I'm not going to be writing any aritcles on Medieval philosophy, but I think it's a subject that's worth including if we can find someone who's willing to work on that subject. They may have some good ideas about other aspects of Wikipedia that can be improved on as well. Who knows? The stongest argument against trying to be gracious and welcoming is Looie496's well articulated position that we'll just get burned again. If we follow through, he may be right. But I still think it's worth the endeavor of trying. ChildofMidnight (talk) 01:31, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

One thing that I could see working is an unblock, with a restriction in place to only allow Peter Damian to edit article or talk pages. His previous misdemeanors stemmed from Wikipedia/User talk space contributions and I think he could edit constructively in article space. Anyway - that's just my opinion. Ryan Postlethwaite^{See the mess I've created or let's have banter} 01:36, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

That makes sense at first glance to me; what do you think of that, CoM?

Tan | 39

01:39, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Unless that is a programmatic restriction (as in he is technically incapable of editing anything other than mainspace and article talk), we all know he will simply not abide by it. Why are we doing this? It's a waste of time. → ROUX ₪ 01:41, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I told myself I wouldn't get into the "one final chance" argument, but I actually think this would work. If he edits another namespace - well, he gets a swift block without further discussion. His terms would be that he's only allowed to edit article and article talk pages - if he breaks them, it would be obvious so no drama would be caused by a swift reblock. Ryan Postlethwaite^{See the mess I've created or let's have banter} 01:50, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

You have far more faith than I, Gunga Din. It is a virtual certainty--one I would wager on, and I am not a gambling man--that wehn (not if) PD breaks the restriction and is blocked, someone will stir drama on ANI saying "Oh it was just a minor infraction." We all know he will push the envelope specifically to make that happen; an innocuous projectspace edit here, a template edit there. It will be the death of a restriction by a thousand cuts, and once he has inured people to his minor infractions, he'll go right back to the usual drama-mongering. As has been pointed out above, PD plays the long game and thinks nothing of taking time to start his shenanigans.

While I understand where you're coming from, you are unusually misguided in this case. (And yes, I am unavoidably reminded of my own support of Betacommand in his "no really, this is final for real" days before someone put a serious leash on him.) Which, yes, one could argue is precedent for this sort of last chance. Unfortunately, the situations are different. Betacommand took a "my way or the highway, and damn the torpedoes" approach; Peter Damian is explicitly out to disrupt things around here. As such, he requires different handling. More to the point, given all the disruption, I do not feel--even if Satan skates to work and he abides by his restrictions--that he can be trusted in articlespace. → ROUX ₪ 02:14, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Sounds okay to me. Can someone reach out to him or unlock his talk page so we can see what he has to say? Maybe he's not interested. Who knows. But I wanted to read about immediacy (philosophy) and it's a redlink :( ChildofMidnight (talk) 03:32, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Eh, I have no horse in this race, so I initiated a topic over there to see if the party in question is interested. Only a slight bit of Tarc Snark(tm) was used in the process. Tarc (talk) 04:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I don't know if you're aware of the history, but I think one of the problems in the past was his making edits here to promote discussion and controversy there. So putting it up for discussion in that forum doesn't seem desirable to me as far as encouraging good faith on Wikipedia involvement that is free from ulterior motives. But never mind. What's done is done.

I've expressed my opinions as far as blocks go, and they apply to this situation as well as others. Maybe I'm just being dim. Cheers all. Thanks for listening and I'll try to leave it up to others going forward so I don't become overly involved are start to sound too much like a skipping record. For what it's worth Peter and I were in disagreement as far as our previous onwiki editing interactions go. But he's clearly capable of contributing good content. Whether he's interested in doing that or prefer to try and shake things up going forward I have no idea. I haven't had an opportunity to ask him, and I try to do as little e-mailing as possible about on-wiki stuff, apart from occasional chit-chat, for transparency sake. ChildofMidnight (talk) 05:51, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I support unblocking him. He has always made excellent contributions—he just got into some feud way back when. The encyclopedia should come first. Everyking (talk) 05:21, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Recent PD socks I am aware of:

• User:John Watkins LLD
  : edited 17 December 2009 - 9 February 2010
• User:Short lived account
  : edited 7 February 2010 - 8 February 2010
• User:The Rationalist
  : edited 16 February 2008 - 28 January 2010
• IP 86.184.211.76: edited 7 February 2010
• User:A history of the modern world
  : edited 20 November 2009 - 30 January 2010

So at least three different accounts at the same time, and probably a whole host of sleepers and active socks besides (perhaps someone should run a checkuser to get as many of those as possible, so that we get a complete view of his recent editing here, and not just the image he wants to show us?). He could have quietly edited for six months with one account, showing that he was perfectly capable of being a long-term contributor without running into trouble. Instead, he chose to avoid his ban by mass-socking. Keep banned, and let him use the ArbCom unban requests if he wants to be unbanned.

Was there any problematic activity from these accounts, or were they blocked for ban-evasion only? Tarc (talk) 17:36, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Tarc, please don't even think about suggesting ban evasion isn't a good reason the block the accounts - I support an unblock, but please don't go down that route. Ryan Postlethwaite^{See the mess I've created or let's have banter} 17:37, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Yeesh, calm down...of course I think it is a good reason. What I was getting at is if the same behavior that led to the main account's block has been seen again in the socks. Tarc (talk) 18:07, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

• A general observation: the definition of 'insanity' is doing the same thing over and over, and expecting a different result. → ROUX ₪ 17:50, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Well, it's really not, look it up.

Tan | 39

17:56, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Your smartassery has trumped mine. I doff my cap to you, sir. → ROUX ₪ 17:58, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Do you think it's a good idea making a comment like that when you've just come off a block for incivility? Ryan Postlethwaite^{See the mess I've created or let's have banter} 18:32, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Do you think it's a good idea to fail to see the intent of the comment? It was a compliment. AGF, FFS. → ROUX ₪ 18:34, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Roux and I's current spat aside, Ryan, we generally see eye-to-eye. I took no offense at his comment; on the contrary, it was well-played.

Tan | 39

18:37, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

• I would like to see Peter unblocked. He does good work, and the current situation is that it's being deleted because he's banned. There's a philosophy article he wrote recently, Illuminationism, which was deleted by Fram, who also redirected the title to a different topic. I asked Fram to consider undeleting, but she said I'd have to take responsibility for the contents. [3] That's an awkward thing to ask, because the sources aren't online so it would involve quite a lot of work to check them, though I see it has now been reproduced by Child of Midnight. [4] I'd support an unblock for him to work only on articles and article talk, plus no interaction with editors he's had problems with in the past. If things work out—after, say, a year of editing with no problems—he can ask to be allowed to post in other areas too. SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 18:12, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
  • And how can we have any confidence at all that he would abide by those restrictions? He is banned and restricted from socking, yet he's doing that. He was banned for failing to abide by restrictions. How many times must he be caught with his hand in the cookie jar before we grow a collective brain and move the cookie jar out of reach? → ROUX ₪ 18:15, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
    • I agree with ChildofMidnight, Slimvirgin et al that it would be a good idea to unblock Peter Damian: when sets his mind to it, he can be an excellent editor. Just my two centimes worth :) Mathsci (talk) 18:45, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
  • I did not redirect it to a different topic, I reverted it back to the situation it was before PD came in: someone else had created the redirect to that topic, not me. As for the "awkward thing to ask", namely that you take responsability for the edits, this is not awkward at all, but comes straight from our
    Fram (talk
    ) 09:34, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Reinserting thread archived by MiszaBot. —Soap— 23:53, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Ease of editing break

I had not realised Peter Damian had been rebanned. I think he should be unblocked and personally do not think it necessary to impose any restrictions on his editing. If his contributions are disruptive, that can be addressed then by neutral parties. The more I reflect on his contribution to the project, the more I think he was treated unfairly and has cause to feel aggrieved. If he's still interested in contributing, I think we should welcome him. WJBscribe (talk) 18:58, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I've no reason to trust a Sock Master. GoodDay (talk) 19:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Several people have said they'd like to see Peter Damian unblocked. So would many of us, myself included. The problem in the larger picture is that we ask people to refrain from socking. How can we expect banned users to take that message seriously if socking can prompt a discussion that ends their ban the next day? Peter has plenty of talents that he's welcome to put to use right now at other WMF sites. If he does so for three months without socking here, I'll initiate an unban discussion for him myself (see

Durvova, this did not happen to Muntuwandi (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), who had multiple socks, so why should Peter Damian be subjected to this kind of probation? That seems quite arbitrary. Mathsci (talk) 06:58, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Slightly more than one year ago Peter Damian was granted an unban on the heels of a socking episode; the result did not turn out well. Wikipedia:Standard offer usually works; am not aware of that Mutawandi example and would have made the same offer there. Durova⁴⁰⁹ 19:37, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

I have to say that I see it rather differently. I am not very concerned by people evading bans to produce good quality content. If someone shows that they have evaded a ban and that their contributions have been overwhelmingly positive, I think this is in itself a good reason to consider unbanning them. It rather suggests that either (a) there was something wrong with the ban in the first place or (b) that the user has changed. I concede that this approach incentivises evading bans but, provided the contributions to the project made are good, it doesn't seem so bad... WJBscribe (talk) 21:01, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Call it a difference of wikiphilosophy, then. This website does not have a good track record at dealing with editors who contribute worthwhile content in article space while being disruptive elsewhere. The question is whether an individual willing to abide by the same standards the rest of us observe. Does content work amount to an exemption from behavioral policies? We've allowed case-by-case discussions on that point to consume inordinate amounts of volunteer energy. Refraining from socking is a minimal demonstration of respect for policy. Those who wait for several months are more likely to make a successful return. Durova⁴⁰⁹ 00:22, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Is anyone in contact with Damian? It seems like it would be helpful to hear from the man himself as to whether he'd like to return and, if he does, what his editing interests would be. ChildofMidnight (talk) 18:25, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• I've just gotten an email from Peter asking for talk page access. Seeing as consensus is not close to unanimous one way or another, I'm thinking it might be a good idea to let him speak directly via his talk page while this discussion is ongoing, any relevant comments should be copied over here.
  talk
  ) 23:30, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I've only just caught this thread, but would support Peter being unblocked. His overall content contributions outweigh other issues. --Snowded ^TALK 08:03, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Another 8 accounts have already been found at

One of his socks tried twice to whitewash the Think of the children fallacious argument[5][6], and then used that same argument on Jimbo. That was 10 days ago.

I once argued for PD's unbanning, and shortly after unbanning he decided to retake his long-time argument with FT2, and got re-blocked for it. PD needs to show that he is really interested in improving the encyclopedia, and that he won't go out of his way in trying to destroy his perceived enemies inside wikipedia. He contributes good content not for the sake of improving the encyclopedia, but for the sake of getting himself blocked after he reveals his identity. He does this to support his point about good editors being blocked for political reasons. As far as I know he will just do the same thing again: 1) contribute an amount of good content, 2) make a POINTy argument that he knows that will get him blocked, 3) brag in Wikipedia Review about how his point was proven once again. PD has to show that he is willing to break this dynamic and limit himself to article work.

By the way, as far as I know, his pledge to do all in his power to destroy wikipedia is still standing..... --Enric Naval (talk) 13:06, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

• Here is Peter's reply, copied from his talk page:

Thank you for unblocking the talk page. I notice that a number of perfectly innocent accounts have been uncovered, and some content has been deleted. Damnatio memoriae. All I can say is how upset I am about this. I can't believe that the people who did this care anything about building a comprehensive and reliable reference source. Deleting these articles is worse than common vandalism.

The attacks on the

WP:AN

are just too horrible. I have nothing more to say. The cruelty of human nature is limitless.

• As you can see, it does not contain a request to be unbanned, so I suppose that means we're done here. He also posted a list of articles that he feels were unfairly targeted for deletion, but I didn't see any reason to re-post that here.
  talk
  ) 19:14, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

• I'm concerned that we're deleting articles that Peter is creating when there's nothing wrong with them, and in fact they look quite good. These three have apparently now been deleted: The_Pheasantry, Jenny_Kee and Linda_Jackson_(designer). Is it policy that articles created by socks be deleted? SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 19:31, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

• The usual "...created by a banned user..." would seem not to apply in the case where a user in longtime good standing, with extensive good content contribution, is judged to have later gone astray in a non-article related manner. No matter what policy and precedent say here, I think that IAR should override and the articles should be reinstated across the board, unless a particular article has a specifically identifyable problem. I haven't had time to more than briefly scan them, but I haven't found any problems so far. Please stop deleting and put 'em back. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:41, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

• The relevant policy, to answer SlimVirgin, is
  WP:BAN#Enforcement by reverting edits. Edits made by banned editors, including articles created, don't need to be deleted, and the policy specifically states that "obviously helpful edits" are an exception. So I agree with GHW, except I don't think we need to IAR because the rules specifically allow for this. -- Atama頭
  22:27, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

I am very familiar with some of the bio ones and am checking and adding references. Casliber (talk · contribs) 19:57, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

• I have tried to just be a sort of mediator so far in this because I didn't have any previous involvement with this user, but my patience for his games is now rapidly wearing thin. I have gotten some more emails in which he asks me to restore articles that he created with sock accounts, while at the same time stating that he has no desire to return to editing Wikipedia. Does anyone else see a rather large contradiction inherent in that statement? If he really had no interest he wouldn't be creating sock accounts left and right and asking for all this stuff to be restored. In any event, since he has stated that he does not want to be let back in the unbanning discussion is moot. In the interest of moving forward, I propose that those users already evaluating his recent contribs proceed, but that any future socks be dealt with in the usual manner and have all contribs reverted or deleted on sight in order to discourage further socking.
  talk
  ) 20:24, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

• I've this to offer, which I placed on my own talk-page following a brief but productive interaction with Peter about his linking of the term
  Latin West
  . Our discussion was ended by the subsequent abrupt disappearance of his alternative talk-page (or "sock", if that's preferred).

I responded with suggestions for disambiguation or de-linking - if the context of the term wasn't clear, it should at least not confuse the reader. An admin closed the user-page soon after; it had been opened to evade a permanent block. I was surprised to find all this editor's contributions and others' responses on his talk-page erased, as if in damnatio memoriae; I thought we evaluated contributions on their own merits. Haploidavey (talk) 14:00, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Nothing I've read here has changed my mind. It's reasonable to delete worthless articles, which these aren't. I think Peter's claim to not want editing rights disingenuous, but not underhand; the guy probably wants to edit, desperately. If there have been problems in the past, I hope he acknowledges them and negotiates a return but that'll only happen if he's allowed a voice. Haploidavey (talk) 21:29, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

It's called gaming the system. PD is banned for good reasons, he is following a route taken by other banned users of socking to create some uncontentious content which can then be exploited to divide the community based on the quality of that content, in an attempt to obscure or distract from the documented fact that the user is banned for good reasons. It's

disrupting Wikipedia to make a point and we don't need it. Guy (Help!

) 09:14, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

(ec) Per Guy. There isn't a good answer to this problem, but it is worth remembering that Peter Damien has previously expressed a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" approach with these: he argued that he would deliberately create articles as a sock of a banned user, and, if the content remained, he claimed a win, arguing that WP permits him to edit in spite of his banning. If the content was removed, and/or if the sock was blocked, he argued that he had won, because it showed that WP is more concerned with punishing editors than building an encyclopedia, and he could take this evidence to donors. It's an odd game, that I could never see as carrying much weight, but it's probably worth keeping in mind in relation to current actions. Alternatively, maybe he does just really want to create articles. - Bilby (talk) 09:21, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Thank you both for the links. Per Bilby's – an odd game indeed, but admins who oblige with a block when PD blows his cover are playing into it. Anyone here can edit under any number of names. Abusers are reasonably banned, as far as I can see, for what they do on particular pages or a whole series of pages – less reasonably, I believe, for who they are, who they later claim to be, or even their admission of ulterior motive in offering positive contributions. A review of banning and blocking policies might be in order. Haploidavey (talk) 16:01, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I think it is silly to say that by blocking sockpuppets of banned users we are in some way playing into their hands. It's just a housekeeping job. We don't have the concept of a little bit banned, if someone is banned it's because they are a net drain on the project, and this thread is a perfect example of a drain on the project which costs PD virtually nothing. If he wants to appeal the ban he can do it in the orthodox way by contacting the ban appeal subcommittee. If he is so very confident of his case this should be a straightforward process. Guy (Help!) 23:01, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I also fail to see how we are playing into his hands when he is wasting hours of his time, and we could be done with it in only a few minutes. Just make it obvious to him that none of his contributions, no matter if they are good or bad, are welcome here, since he is a banned user who is during his bans creating and using good hand - bad hand accounts to avoid scrutiny of all his edits. I don't understand the people who feel that content is more important than anything else, and believe that they are the sole people playing into his hand and making his socking and siruption worthwhile to him. I'll continue to block his socks and delete his contributions, and ignore him otherwise.

Fram (talk

) 08:06, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

I've reblocked the main account without talk page access, since he is not interested in unbanning, but just in soapboxing. He has enough other outlets where he can do this, he blew his chance here when he created problematic socks again.

Fram (talk

) 08:10, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

As an aside, PD emailed me about this, I am not sure how much of this thread is the result of email and other offsite comments by PD to other people. My advice to him was the same as I said above: we have a ban appeals subcommittee and an arbitration committee, that is the proper route for appealing this ban if he wants to continue editing Wikipedia. Otherwise he should simply find himself another hobby. The regularity with which his socks are discovered argues against his assertion that his editing is uncontroversial and indistinguishable form that of any other editor interested in collecting the sum of human knowledge. Guy (Help!) 16:44, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

I agree with ChildOfMidnight and Slim, and especially with WBJScribe: Peter Damian has been treated unfairly and has cause to feel aggrieved. There was indeed something wrong with the ban to begin with. The question is whether this editor has been treated so badly by Wikipedia that he now hates it too much to work in good faith here. Things like that happen, unfortunately. It seems unnecessarily cynical to keep PD blocked for such a reason, though. Can he do a lot of harm? No. Can he do good, by using his editing skills and knowledge? Yes. As for re-locking his talkpage when this discussion is over, I request that you don't do that, Fram. (The page is unprotected at this moment.) Allowing a blocked or banned user to use his talkpage is the normal option. The reason you give for locking it, "Page should only be used to ask for an unblock so this is misuse,"[7] is quite a new rule, as far as I know. If you don't want to see what he says, can't you just not go look? Admins (and, a fortiori, arbitrators) should think twice before throwing their power around. Bishonen | talk 17:26, 15 February 2010 (UTC).

• Hey? I inserted the "Ease of editing break" above because the Peter Damian thread was so frigging long. No sooner had I done that than the top half of the thread disappeared. WTF? Somebody find it and put it back, please? That thread was by no means ready for archiving. And as for archiving half of it... Come on, could somebody fix this? Bishonen | talk 23:34, 15 February 2010 (UTC).

I've just restored the parts that I believe you were speaking of. —Soap— 23:54, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Opinions on this ban appear to be rather mixed. I'm not sure in such circumstances that keeping the ban makes sense. Community bans are a product of community consensus. If that consensus no longer exists, I don't see how the ban can outlast it. Requiring PD to "plead his case" seems rather unnecessary. Surely we are capable of just admitting that we may have gotten it wrong (or at least being open to the possibility). I propose that we simply unblock Peter Damian (talk · contribs) and leave the next step up to him. Let him know that he is welcome to resume contributing, if he so wishes. If he chooses to do so (and per Bish, I can see why he might not want to), then lets deal with any problems that arise then. A lot has been made in this thread of the fact that PD is "evading his ban" but little to say that the ban was justified in the place. Without wanting to reopen old wounds, we (including I) could have handled this much better back in 2007/2008. There is no real risk to welcoming PD back as against keeping the status quo. WJBscribe (talk) 00:30, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I would disagree here. A strong consensus was established in the last ban discussion to ban Peter Damian, as people felt he was a net negative drain on the time of the Community. Keeping him banned is the status quo. There is most certainly no consensus to lift the ban, and I would strongly object to doing so based on the above discussion. If Peter Damian wants to be formally welcomed back into the Community, I would certainly want to see some restrictions placed on him to avoid the debacle of last time, probably along the lines of what Ryan mentioned above. NW (Talk) 19:17, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

And the first step has to be a formal request, rather than continual ban evasion. Ban evasion is self-fulfilling, since it is itself grounds for banning. I don't know whether I'm in favour of the original ban or not, but we have a process and if he wants to edit Wikipedia he needs to follow it. The assertion that his edits are unproblematic is, to my mind, countered by the obvious fact that he keeps being found out. Guy (Help!) 12:00, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

...and that two of his socks were blocked in December and January without the blocker even knowing that the account was a PD sock, but only on the basis of the actual edits.

Fram (talk

) 12:38, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

 Done. Not that I mind at all doing it, but in the future we do have a dedicated noticeboard for this at

talk

) 22:42, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, thanks - I didn't know that RFPP also dealt with salting. Noted for future reference. -- ChrisO (talk) 22:49, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

By way of explanation - salting is a form of page protection. Rd232 ^talk 12:51, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Salting is page protection; there's no technical difference. It's simply protecting a non-existent page so that it cannot be created.

Tan | 39

13:25, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I didn't mean to imply otherwise. Thanks for being precise. Rd232 ^talk 13:28, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not seeing much recent progress with white-list requests at MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist. Ultimately it's an admin only task so, err, on you go, please. --Tagishsimon (talk) 23:09, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Also at MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist. MER-C 07:07, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

This is indeed a serious problem. We could really use some more administrators active on both lists! --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 08:40, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

It's a great way to get trolled mercilessly :-) Guy (Help!) 11:54, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

 – No consensus for topic ban. Take it to RFC if necessary. Burpelson AFB (talk) 01:13, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

Hi there, is there any source information or permission documented in the local history of this image? --Flominator (talk) 18:47, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I wasn't exactly sure what you were asking, so I undeleted the image. Just tag it with {{

NowCommons}} when you are done. NW (Talk

) 19:04, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Done, thanks. I didn't realize that the uploader was somehow related to the photographer. --Flominator (talk) 19:19, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

No problem. I redeleted the image. NW (Talk) 19:26, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

If an article is currently under review at AfD, is it speediable? Doesn't that subvert the community process? I can see (and have seen) admins taking action *at* an AfD to delete an article that is obviously speediable, but can someone involved in the AfD debate simply slap a CSD tag on the article? Thoughts? -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 23:46, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

If it meets the speedy deletion criteria, it can be speedied. Obviously, if people disagree on whether or not it should be kept, then it should go through the whole process. However, there is no need to wait the entire week just because it was brought to AfD instead of

not a bureaucracy. NW (Talk

) 00:34, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Why not? If someone researching the article in order to comment in the AfD finds, for example, that the article is a cut-and-paste copyvio, tagging it for speedy deletion on that ground (and noting in the AfD that it's been so tagged) seems entirely appropriate. Deor (talk) 00:38, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

In cases where there is harm in keeping the article on wikipedia for even a short period (attack pages, copyvio etc.), certainly. In other cases, having to do with notability, context, advert. etc, it is usually better to let the AFD run through (esp. if there is any good faith opposition to the deletion) , although early

WP:SNOW closure may be justified in really obvious cases. Abecedare (talk

) 03:43, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

• Yes, it happens quite often where the comments on the AfD identify that the article is speediable - no point wasting time when the result is obvious. Guy (Help!) 10:50, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

 – deemed by -- /

Notify Me

\

I don't know if it's possible anymore but this move was done wrong back in 2006 [8]. Can someone merge the histories or is it too late? Burpelson AFB (talk) 02:49, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Done. Abecedare (talk) 03:36, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

12.149.30.66 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) resolves to "First Baptist Church of West" using the whois link on usertalk. There are lots of "First Baptist Church of West somewhere", and given the recent "jokes" from this IP about thousands being killed and the Holocaust, I think it might be helpful to know just which one this is. DuncanHill (talk) 14:42, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

It geolocates to Hollywood, Florida (method: I used that info link in your post). It's not in Kansas, if that's what you're thinking, but of course there are obnoxious people everywhere these days. — Gavia immer (talk) 14:47, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Could be First Baptist Church of West Hollywood (Florida). It also looks as though they're in the midst of swapping out websites and ISPs. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:11, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, they also seem to be changing/have changed their name to Hollywood Community Church. DuncanHill (talk) 15:55, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Also they have a small school, Hollywood Christian Academy so I think it's likely a kid pranking away on their AT&T network link to the Internet. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:58, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Well found (thanks for the block by the way). Should the IP be tagged as a shared IPEDU or suchlike? DuncanHill (talk) 16:06, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

...maybe from this very room. Don't know yet if this is truly a shared EDU IP, but it seems most likely. Gwen Gale (talk) 16:10, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I've emailed the school using their "contact us" form to suggest they look into this. If it was run-of-the-mill "My teacher's a tosser" vandalism I wouldn't have bothered, but joking about the Holocaust sets my teeth on edge. DuncanHill (talk) 16:15, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Kids sometimes do stuff like that, more or less cluelessly, to see what it stirs up. Gwen Gale (talk) 16:19, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I know they do - the point is, if joking about stuff like that doesn't get them into trouble now, they'll do worse in the future. Better for them to get a proper bollocking over this than to get into real trouble later for something worse. DuncanHill (talk) 16:23, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

So true, so true; after I reported this edit to local police (a few minutes after it was done), I got a response from the police saying that they were already quite familiar with the kids who had done it. Nyttend (talk) 01:51, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

 – Plaxicoed, thanks for the lulz.

Durova⁴¹² 16:45, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

For clarity's sake, this editor appears to be a sock of banned editor Reachspace101 (talk · contribs). Dayewalker (talk) 03:28, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Blocked for admitted socking, Plaxico... --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 03:35, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Quick tangent -- WP:Plaxico was deleted for BLP and I reposted a fixed version: WP:Don't shoot yourself in the foot. Equazcion ^(talk) 03:39, 18 Feb 2010 (UTC)

I propose a BLP-friendly and easy to remember shortcut:

ping

04:59, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Mmph!  Confirmed the following accounts as socks of the one editor;

• Spancrash (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Storyadded101 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Reachspace101 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)