User talk:UninvitedCompany/Archives/2006 November

Edit to Wikipedia:Banning policy

Hi there. I was recently reviewing an old discussion where I quoted from Wikipedia:Banning policy. Knowing that policy can be, ahem, rather fluid around here, I thought I'd better check, and indeed I discovered that the page had been tightened up and the text I had quoted had been removed. ie. I realised that your edit here removed what I had quoted, so I thought I'd ask you what you think about it. The quote in question is ""If someone else has edited the page, particularly if they have made substantive edits, deletion is not appropriate. If you feel it is necessary, try instead to edit the page to remove or rework content contributed by the banned user, and keep content contributed by others." - (I used the quote here). This text seems eminently reasonable to me. I see that your edit summary for the edit I linked to above referred to the "battles with 142". I hope I am not repeating the argument that person made - if I am I apologise, but I fear it only serves to illustrate the arguments I am making at this deletion review). Namely that if the arguments have been made and previously rejected, they should be kept and I could be pointed to them. Otherwise things will go round and round forever in circles as people independently rediscover these ideas. Incidentially, I would like to use that quote at the deletion review, but will wait to hear back from you first. Thanks. Carcharoth 15:33, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

The problem is not that the quote is unreasonable. The problem is that it is unnecessary instruction creep, and the policy page as a whole is full of like material which I have at various times tried to remove in the interest of a clearer policy. In general, the policy has always been that banned users' contributions should be promptly deleted before other editors start reworking them. On the other hand, if this isn't done and other editors have reworked text sufficiently to have taken responsibility for it, it should not then be deleted merely because a banned user created it. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:19, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining. Can you point out where this is said on Wikipedia:Banning policy? Carcharoth 17:48, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

RFCU

I have supplied the code letter for Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Bobabobabo where it is not of even more importance now that the users have been reverting way too much, and one is never logged in as the same time as the other. Could you please help out here? Ryūlóng 22:20, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

OTRS permission volunteer

I'd be willing to volunteer for the OTRS en permission queue. (I'm going to regret this... ;-) ) As for the qualifications: understand copyright issues as they affect Wikipedia: I've done a lot of image deletions, and am generally familar with copyright issues (the subject interests me); understand and support the project's position on copyright and fair use: I consider all these policies sensible and useful; have a history of keeping their cool - If you can point me to a time where I haven't kept my cool, please let me know - I want to list it on my user page with an apology. Thanks. JesseW, the juggling janitor 02:15, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Your deletion of Flavor Flav

I have noted your deletion of the article on WP:AN/I. Mike H. I did "That's hot" first! 02:26, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Ping

I sent you an email, but I'll ping you here as well; apparently I need to be placed in the correct user group before I can view and respond to the permissions queue, so whenever you have time to do that, I'll be able to get started. Thanks, --Robth^Talk 04:58, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

OTRS-requested cleanup page?

Hello, I was wondering what your thoughts were about a dedicated page for OTRS requested cleanups? There wasn't really a conclusion to the discussion on AN/I...the question I have is if enough of those requests come through to make it worthwhile. Or if you think it would do any good...I don't have any OTRS experience to make a judgement. thanks, Rx StrangeLove 04:03, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Broadly, I think it's a good thing. The most important thing facing OTRS from a high-level management standpoint is that we've got to get broader recognition from the community at large of the extent of the problem -- how many bad articles there are, how much work they are to fix, how frequently the subjects complain. Anything that works towards that is a good thing. We have to watch the implementation so that it doesn't end in a fiasco the way WP:OFFICE did -- that page has been such a disaster from a community standpoint that the policy is worthless. We also have to proceed with due sensitivity to confidentiality of queries sent to OTRS and to the fact that it may be unwise to create a readily accessible, centralized index of problem articles. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 13:03, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Are the articles that draw complaints getting enough attention generally? Then maybe just a general article improvement drive is all that's needed. But if there's a backlog and/or they are not getting enough attention I'm sure there would be editors interested in helping...but I understand that there's no point in drawing more attention to articles that drew a complaint. Maybe a summary of links sent to the main mailing list a couple days a week depending on how many you get? Rx StrangeLove 02:48, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

202.142.220.65 reblocked?

Hi UninvitedCompany, is there any particular reason why you've reblocked 202.142.220.65 indefinitely only a day after it was clearly by Wikipedia:WikiProject on open proxies and unblocked? --  Netsnipe  ►  07:44, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Due to checkuser data associating the IP with persistent pattern vandalism and little risk of collateral damage. The IP has been used by a family of socks and has no non-sock edits in the time period for which checkuser data is available. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 16:05, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

OTRS

Thanks for thinking of me. I've given it quite a bit of consideration, and have a couple of questions. How quickly is it expected that queries will be answered? And, typically, how many e-mails do volunteers receive per day? thanks, Warofdreams talk 03:06, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

The emails are handled on a group basis and are not assigned to individuals. There's a queue and you pick from it what you're willing to solve. We generally hope that each participant will handle a dozen or so emails a week, which takes under an hour. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 12:58, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Nutshells

Please cut it with removing these blindly. At least take the time to read the talk page in case your claims of "consensus" are inaccurate - David Gerard 12:03, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm following the talk page and I note that the support for the nutshellisms consists of 1) you and 2) a bunch of people new to the project who have no prior involvement in the structure of the policy pages. The nutshellisms are opposed by 1) Radiant, 2) Rossami, and 3) me. All of us have long been involved in these pages, and notably, we rarely if ever agree on anything because we have widely divergent points of view on how the world ought to be. I stand by my statement that there was never consensus for adding nutshellisms in the first place -- they just happened. I understand your concern about my removals, but I'm not trying to force anything through or create facts on the ground -- just trying to get some broader participation in the discussion which won't happen without judicious application of WP:BOLD. I hope you'll see these as the bandaid for process creep that they are. I truly believe that they worsen the problem they're designed to address. The next step not yet taken is for someone to accumulate all the nutshellisms into a single page and promulgate that as the definitive summary of policy. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 12:55, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Joko Beck

Fascinating and sad though it is, I wonder what you think about the private letter that's been published on the talk page? --MichaelMaggs 09:25, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

It appears to be intended for publication. The question, IMO, is whether it is of sufficient use in improving the article to justify it being there. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 14:38, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

To me it shouldn't be there, per WP:NPS if for no other reason. Angus McLellan (Talk) 11:39, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Barnstar

Has anyone given you an OTRS barnstar? It is long past being deserved... now someone has at least. My apologies for being scarce lately. Cheers, Kat Walsh (spill your mind?) 07:17, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Greenwich University

WP:LIVING states:

Editors should remove any controversial material about living persons that is either unsourced, relies upon sources that do not meet standards specified in Wikipedia:Reliable sources, or is a conjectural interpretation of a source.

I'm disappointed that you read this as permission to cut down this well-written, neutral, but unsourced article, which is about a former university not a person, to a substub. WP:LIVING is powerful stuff, but it doesn't entirely absolve you of the responsibility to be selective when you delete other people's contributions.

I have reverted your blanking, but removed the Alumni section and the characterisation of the school as a degree mill. These are the only parts of the article which I conceive might fall foul of WP:LIVING.

If you blank again, I won't revert again. But I urge you to reconsider whether it is appropriate to make such a wholesale article deletion for the sake of one or two sentences that require sources.

Snottygobble 07:04, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Apologies, I missed the talk page message that the article was "drawing complaints". This puts a rather different perspective on the matter. I have reverted myself. Snottygobble 07:07, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your note. We receive a sufficient volume of complaints that there is no way we can investigate and source each article that gets one ourselves. When the complaint seems reasonable and the article lacks sources we stub or delete. Especially so with articles on topics of doubtful notability. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:01, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Joko Beck

I am not at all clear as to why you have removed all most all the material on Joko Beck. As far as I know it is factual and not in dispute. There is some controversy over recent events; however the editors who have worked on this piece seem to have arrived at a working consensus about how to describe the events that took place. Could you please explain your perspective on the discussion page for the article.

Can you explain what a "OTRS complaint" is. Also you have stated that the material (removed) is unsourced. Are you aware that the letter from Joko Beck has been posted to the article page twice and twice it has been removed. This letter is a public document and copies can be obtained by contacting the Zen Center of San Diego or Shambala Publications. There is no dispute as to the fact that Joko Beck wrote it and then mailed it to students and teachers around the world.--Backtrack7 19:42, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

An "OTRS complaint" is an email from an affected party sent to the Wikimedia Foundation. I am among the people with the doubtful distinction of being expected to read and respond to these.

Letters, unless published elsewhere, are not considered reliable sources. Wikipedia is not reportage nor a vehicle for research, which is why we require published sources. The fact that Shambala Publications issues copies of this letter on request does not make it a reliable source.

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a venue for advocacy. The Beck article appears to me to have served primarily as a means of advocacy rather than as an informative article. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:01, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I have posted sources on the article discussion page for all material I have added in the Joko Beck article. I believe that all statements in the article can be verified with the posted sources. --Backtrack7 03:44, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

If you want to rebuild the article, you have to: (1) use references with the standard citation format (2) place your sources on the article page, not the talk page and (3) limit yourself to reliable sources per our definition. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 23:25, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Speaking of souces, you mention that the Wikipedia foundation received letters of complaint about the Joko Beck piece. Are these posted on your web site?

No. They're private, though the OTRS team members crosscheck each others' work.

I understand your point about not relying on "unpublished" letters; however I think you should also consider the possibility that you have been the subject of a campaign of disinformation by people who have a vested interest in claiming that Joko Beck did not write or send the letter. --Backtrack7 22:20, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't care one way or the other whether Beck sent the letter. Our policy is that once we get a complaint, the assertions in an article must be sourced. Period. The OTRS team doesn't have the time or expertise to figure out who's right. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 23:32, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks

Checkusers don't get thanked enough. Thanks for checking the Gundagai editor, even though I was wrong. Thatcher131 16:28, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Vandalism: Chai Ling and Jenzabar

Pls have another look at the articles and discussions on Chai Ling and her company, Jenzabar. There is a problem of attempted censorship and vandalism. Pls give details about the "OTRS complaints" you mentioned. Thanks. —Babelfisch 01:47, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

OTRS permissions

So apparently my permissions settings on OTRS are a little screwy; I can see permissions-en, but not permissions, its parent queue. Both JeLuf and twincest (whoever they are on-wiki) were startled to see that this was possible, and thought it might explain my inability to use the search function or see closed tickets; could you take a look at this and see what's up? Thanks, --Robth^Talk 06:42, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

I have a similar problem; I could access permissions-en and info-en-copyvio a while ago, but now I can't look at them or even move a ticket to these queues. Have any settings been changed recently? Timichal 06:54, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry for the trouble. I'll take a look at it later today. I have to go through the entire matter of "permissions" permissions as there are several new people to add and I'll try to be sure you get the access you need. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 14:51, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

RFCU

The letter system seems to be doing a good job of clearing out the rift-raft and cases with the expectection for CUs to find all the evidence themselves.Voice-of-All 03:54, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The important thing now is that we be sure that meritous cases that don't match one of the lettered criteria don't get thrown out. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:12, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Sock policy

The Uninvited Co., I strongly support changes to the sock policy to make it clear that the use of socks by an user with an account is out of bounds except for specific rare exceptions. I realized that our sock and dispute resolution policies were out of touch with reality on the ground when I saw some users supporting the use of sock accounts to lodge complaints against admins on AN/I and/or start a RFAr based on our current policy. :-) FloNight 15:56, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Check IP addresses

Can you check my IP address and User:Ide Nov's IP address? I would like to comfirm that I'm not this person and this person is not me to another wikipedian. Thanks. Kingjeff 01:04, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

In general I don't do self-requested checks. See WT:RFCU if you're interested in the rationale. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 01:08, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Can you just look the other way just this one time? Kingjeff 01:10, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Indian Cricket (annual)

UninvitedCompany, Can you please explain this edit and what the complaints were. (WP:LIVING for a yearbook ? ) Tintin (talk) 01:53, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

The note was from a former editor who claims that you had the history all wrong. Since you didn't list any sources, there isn't much else I could have done. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 01:58, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Can you forward him these comments and ask what exactly is wrong. I can't see much that is controversial, except that there are probably omissions which he consider bad. The book itself it the source for a lot of this. The mention of SK Gurunathan is sourced from the article about him which contains the reference. The names of the two editors are from the recent editions. The comparison with Wisden is self-evident (the different sections in both books). The use of names of Jack Fingleton and Norman Preston are arbitrary, but they used to cover cricket in Australia and England in the 1960s (which my college library had. I don't have any Indian Crickets from the 1970s), and by the early 1980s (where my personal collection begins) Indian Cricket ceased to have match reports with the scorecards. The list of former Cricketers of the Year and Portrait dating back to 1946 and 1952 appear in each edition. The number of pages and the scanned cover is from my own copy, and no books came out in the last two years. Tintin (talk) 02:11, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

• Founding editor is wrong.
• List of editors was incorrect and misleading.
• Article contained inappropriate and unsourced criticism.

The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:19, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

• Founding editor is wrong.

My source said it was Gurunathan "founded the IC" (or something to that effect) which is what I have used in the article. But if he is sure that it is wrong and insists that it must be removed, I don't have a problem because my knowledge on the subject does not extend beyond one or two books. Would he be willing to fill in the gaps, btw ?

• List of editors was incorrect and misleading.

What does he mean by incorrect ? That Thyagarajan and GV were not editors ? Their names are printed on the cover of the recent ICs. It may be removed since it is incomplete but the names are not incorrect.

• Article contained inappropriate and unsourced criticism.

I take exception to this comment. There is one comment that can be called cricticism - about the match reports - and please ask him whether it is not true. IC used to have match reports even for the domestic matches in the early 1980s and that too disappeared. The statistics section which was near perfect till the mid 80s decayed for the next ten years to such an extent that by 1992 or so there was hardly a page which did not contain two or three errors - now that would be an unsourced and personal but true opinion ! IC is an incredibly useful book but you cannot insist that wikipedia should praise it.

Please also remind him that he can correct things himself. Tintin (talk) 02:44, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Bear in mind that the purpose the WP:OTRS team serves is to remove or correct misinformation reported by the subjects of articles or other people directly affected. As such, this individual would be in violation of WP:AUTO if they edited the article themselves; moreover, it is not their responsiblity to fix the article. That is up to people like you. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:49, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

But nothing much can be done unless he provides more information. If he is really a former editor, I don't have a problem is making an edit as per (1), but he atleast has to explain himself. For (2), since the list is incomplete, I am willing to remove it but I don't see anything anything wrong in mentioning two recent names (as for "incorrect", you can see the name of G Viswanath on the cover). For three, I stand by what I have written and need a much more convincing explanation than a cryptic "inappropriate and unsourced criticism."

Does AUTO cover articles about books also ? Even then, if he sticks to facts, I guess it should be okay. Tintin (talk) 03:10, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that the article was weak. This may be hard for you to hear, but it was factually inaccurate and poorly written. If you aren't content to leave it as a stub, the onus is on you to fix it, which means that you have to do the research, you have to provide references for every assertion, and you have to refrain from original research. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 03:16, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Nah, I'll leave it as it is. Don't feel sufficient interest to do anything more on this. Tintin (talk) 03:40, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Gilles Duguay

UninvitedCompany, you're going to have to do more than that. If you could, please elaborate a bit more? I don't believe the article broke any of the rules in either of the guides.--Timkmak 01:55, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

There were no sources, and some of the facts were wrong. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 01:57, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Creation Seventh Day Adventist Church

I disagree with what looks like pre-emptive protection on this article. Could you explain your reasons for the protection. Ansell 02:31, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

There has been an edit war and there have been complaints to WP:OTRS. I believe that protecting the page for a few days should be sufficient to cool down the conflict. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:34, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

The edit war was nothing major, in comparison to their previous account User:Perspicacious. It looks kind of bad due to their multiple minor edits style. I did not know about the OTRS complaints, although I had seen one anonymous complaint on the talk page. You may be interested in dealing with a similar instance of libel by the same user at Talk:Seventh-day_Adventist_Church#Creation_Seventh_Day_Adventist_Church Ansell 02:49, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

A piece of information that may or may not be useful, myself, User:Ansell, and User:MyNameIsNotBob are all mentioned in a negative way on [[1]] which appears to be by either User:Perspicacious or User:E.Shubee (if they are different people, that is). I understand this has implications under WP:NPA. -Fermion 07:52, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I know this sounds really silly, but did the page actually get protected, or did you succeed in stopping an edit war just by putting a tag on? Sounds like success to me, other than the block on one of the editors which may also have helped. Ansell 22:35, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Re-block on Originalsinner

Hi Univited, is there particular reason why you reblocked Originalsinner (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) so soon after Mangojuice (talk • contribs) had already blocked and unblocked him? --  Netsnipe  ►  08:34, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes. See the relevant thread on WP:AN/I. I believe that he should be permanently blocked as he a) has been previously warned about copyright infringements, b) has been banned from at least one other (non-Wikipedia) web site for copyvios and plagarism, and c) has created a great deal of damage. Unless someone is going to manually clean up the dozen or so copyvios he has posted, we're going to have to delete the articles; and either way there's going to be a lot of wasted effort. We've had perhaps 6 or 8 emails from the webmaster of the site he's ripping off and they are running out of patience. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 14:02, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Hello I need help

Some dude keeps deleting things from articles and now he has threatened me, can you help me? Lokqs 05:23, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Creation Seventh Day Adventist Church

I hereby withdraw my earlier request that the Wikipedia article be removed. I also retract my previous error in saying that the Creation Seventh Day Adventist Church lacks notability. In the interests of justice, I ask that the article Creation Seventh Day Adventist Church be unlocked and corrected to reflect the verifiable sources, admissions and facts revealed on the page Talk:Creation Seventh Day Adventist Church. Notorious deception, delusion and fraud does meet the minimum threshold of notability. --E.Shubee 12:46, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Administrative Appeals Tribunal

You should note that the reason why I reverted was because I believe mass deletions should always be explained in the edit summary. Now that you have, I don't have a problem with the deletion of text. enochlau (talk) 04:46, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately, your approach is upsetting people like the fellow from the Administrative Appeals Tribunal who tried to clean up the article. We all like to see edit summaries, but the absence of one is hardly sufficient reason to revert if the underlying edit is a sound one. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 04:48, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Pierre-Gilles de Gennes

You're welcome. Gotyear 09:18, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Merge of Santa Susana contamination article

I merged Rocketdyne Santa Susana Field Laboratory Contamination (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) with Santa Susana Field Laboratory (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). While the latter article is largely unsourced and in general isn't exactly feature quality, it doesn't have the tone of advocacy and history of POV/accuracy disputes the contamination article does. Feel free to revert if you feel this is unwarranted, or interferes with the WP:OTRS process in any way. szyslak (t, c, e) 16:11, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, to be more specific it was a redirect, not a merge. I didn't preserve any of the old article's content, current or former, since there's nothing worth saving IMO. szyslak (t, c, e) 16:14, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Minnesota meetup

A meetup of Wikipedians in Minnesota is proposed: please stop by the discussion page if interested. Jonathunder 01:36, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry for the late notice, but there is a change within the mall for the meetup location today: see this page. Jonathunder 15:23, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Minnesota meetup

A meetup of Wikipedians in Minnesota is proposed: please stop by the discussion page if interested. Jonathunder 01:36, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry for the late notice, but there is a change within the mall for the meetup location today: see this page. Jonathunder 15:23, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Question from UninvitedCompany section

Would "statement from" instead of "question from" be more appropriate? Have fun at the meetup! :D ~Kylu (u|t) 05:35, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

I suppose. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 16:57, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

checkuser

Could you please once again check my checkuser case and i dont have any accounts apart from my own. I am sure there is a mistake as I Use my University computers to use wikipedia where dozens of students use wikipedia, even you can check the edits of all parties involved. I have also checked that other users are very much inactive since the case outcome, I could have been set up by other users and from my own university computers (could be strange) where the IP is same.

Mujeerkhan 04:45, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

AlBaho Case

Back on Oct 26, you removed most references to the AlBaho Case, but a couple of days later, it was all recreated. Did you change your mind about this stuff needing to be deleted? In particular, I question whether this is appropriate or notable enough to be put into E-mail privacy. Wrs1864 22:43, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Indian Cricket (annual)

This is regarding the discussion we had about the complaint and lack of references in the article on Indian Cricket. I am planning to recreate it with refs added as in User:Tintin1107/Indian_Cricket. Would like your comments about the usage of references(If the writing is lousy, that is a different problem which can be addressed seperately). Tintin (talk) 04:35, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I have gone ahead and recreated the article with references. Please take a look. I hope this will keep PVV happy. Tintin (talk) 02:29, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Category:Administrators open to recall

Hi! ... FYI, I tweaked your wording... see Category_talk:Administrators_open_to_recall#Not_Binding ++Lar: t/c 22:31, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Checkuser assistance

Hiya, I was wondering if you could help me with something. I'm currently dealing with a situation at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (television) where I am certain that there is sockpuppetry. However, I am not sure who the master account(s) are. How should I request a check at WP:RFCU? Should I list just the accounts that I think are sockpuppets, so they can be checked? Or should I list all the accounts on the page, to help you find links with any possible master accounts? Thanks, I appreciate any advice that you can offer, --Elonka 04:18, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Checkuser

Could you please ASAP do a checkuser on the sockpuppets at the Main Page Featured Article and its talk page so we can block the IP range(s) from which the attack is coming. —Centrx→talk • 04:18, 21 November 2006 (UTC)