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→‎Ban Appeal of AKonanykhin: change to oppose, cmt on meatpuppetry, etc
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*'''Conditional support''' pending full and retroactive disclosure of ''all'' accounts. I'm not convinced that this appeal is genuine based on past experience with paid advocates, but disclosure will go a long way towards addressing the concern. [[User:MER-C|MER-C]] 04:07, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
*'''Conditional support''' pending full and retroactive disclosure of ''all'' accounts. I'm not convinced that this appeal is genuine based on past experience with paid advocates, but disclosure will go a long way towards addressing the concern. [[User:MER-C|MER-C]] 04:07, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
*'''Support''' I disagreed with the reasoning of the original ban, but I hoped that the issue would lead to some sort of consensus on how we should tighten the currently toothless "strongly discouraged" COI wording. It didn't. That said, we need to make it worthwhile for editors to disclose their COIs. Currently, it is in the interest of paid editors to hide their relationship with their clients - they gain nothing from disclosure in spite of leaving themselves open to harassment, and yet risk nothing by non-disclosure. By respecting WikiExpert's offer to disclose their COIs, we finally do the opposite, providing value for the disclosure of COIs that makes it worth their while to do so. It may not work, but I think we should respect the offer and give it a go. - [[User:Bilby|Bilby]] ([[User talk:Bilby|talk]]) 04:21, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
*'''Support''' I disagreed with the reasoning of the original ban, but I hoped that the issue would lead to some sort of consensus on how we should tighten the currently toothless "strongly discouraged" COI wording. It didn't. That said, we need to make it worthwhile for editors to disclose their COIs. Currently, it is in the interest of paid editors to hide their relationship with their clients - they gain nothing from disclosure in spite of leaving themselves open to harassment, and yet risk nothing by non-disclosure. By respecting WikiExpert's offer to disclose their COIs, we finally do the opposite, providing value for the disclosure of COIs that makes it worth their while to do so. It may not work, but I think we should respect the offer and give it a go. - [[User:Bilby|Bilby]] ([[User talk:Bilby|talk]]) 04:21, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
*'''Oppose''' - For what it's worth, I oppose this, since it's clear to me that the purposes of public relations people are antithetical to those of people who are attempting to write a NPOV encyclopedia. PR people serve a valuable purpose to the business community, and I have (indirectly) been the beneficiary of their work, but the usual course of business is that a PR person sends their info to some intermediary (a reporter on a newspaper, for instance), and the '''''reporter''''' decides how much of the info to use. It may provide a guide to the reporter for further investigation, or it may (in probably more cases than we'd like to know) be reported verbatim, but at least it has had the chance to be filtered through an intermediary who can use their independent judgment to weed out the worst of the promotional tendencies of the professional publicist. Reporters who pass along PR without vetting it have a tendency to be fired, or become PR persons themselves, because media outlets live and die by their reputations for accuracy.<p>However, when a PR person has '''''direct access to the means of dissemination''''', as is the case with Wikipedia, there is no longer an effective filter between their output and the encyclopedia. (Those who think that the cumulative result of all editors watching over he encyclopedia is an effective safeguard might be interested in doing a search of the project for "penis" to see the extent of the run-of-the-mill vandalism which hasn't been reverted by such means.) This is where the danger lies. If we allow public relations people to have clear and unfettered access to edit the articles in the encyclopedia, it is inevitable that we will eventually lose whatever reputation we have built up for neutrality and accuracy. Yes, people will still come to Wikipedia for information, since that habit has effectively been formed, but we will no longer be a free source of neutral information, we will be just another media vector for promotion and publicity. Those who think otherwise are, I believe, sticking their heads in the sand and ignoring the blatant reality of the situation. Those who protest that we can't effectively police PR misbehavior are like inner-city cops who let crime get out of hand because it was just too hard to keep fighting against it. Yes, obviously, if we were to ban paid editing (as I believe we should) those editors would work overtime to get around our defenses, and that might require some policy changes on our part, such as loosening the restrictions on CheckUser investigations, but new strategies from the opposition require such responses on our part, and using such we can keep PR-fluff to a reasonable level.<p>I am absolutely certain that the vast majority of those opposing taking steps against PR-editing are sincere in their beliefs, but I believe that are entirely and utterly wrong. The game changed when Wikipedia became the first stop of choice for many people when they want to get a quick bit of information, and such a vector cannot be ignored by people who live and die by their ability to get out their clients' message to the most people possible. We are no longer '''''amateurs''''' here, regardless or whether we get paid or not, we are '''''professional information providers''''', and it's out responsibility to see that the information we provide is as accurate and unbiased as possible. To do that in a context where we give free reign to those '''''other''''' professionals, the PR people whose job it is to provide '''''biased and celebratory information''''', is much more difficult, which is why we should not be unbanning '''''any''''' admitted PR person. [[User:Beyond My Ken|Beyond My Ken]] ([[User talk:Beyond My Ken|talk]]) 05:04, 21 October 2013 (UTC)


===Proposal for Disclosure===
===Proposal for Disclosure===

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      Administrative discussions

      Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive1156#Boomerang_topic_ban_proposal_for_User:Hcsrctu

      (Initiated 25 days ago on 9 May 2024) Ratnahastin (talk) 03:35, 28 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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      Requests for comment

      RfC: Change INFOBOXUSE to recommend the use of infoboxes?

      (Initiated 79 days ago on 15 March 2024) Ready to be closed. Charcoal feather (talk) 17:02, 27 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      new closer needed
      The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
      Before I try to close this I wanted to see if any editors believed I am WP:INVOLVED. I have no opinions on the broader topic, but I have previously participated in a single RfC on whether a specific article should include an infobox. I don't believe this makes me involved, as my participation was limited and on a very specific question, which is usually insufficient to establish an editor as involved on the broader topic, but given the strength of opinion on various sides I expect that any result will be controversial, so I wanted to raise the question here first.
      If editors present reasonable objections within the next few days I won't close; otherwise, unless another editor gets to it first, I will do so. BilledMammal (talk) 04:43, 13 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      I am involved in the underlying RfC, but my opinion on the issue is not particularly strong and I am putting on my closer hat now. Per WP:INVOLVED, "[i]nvolvement is construed broadly by the community". In the Rod Steiger RfC, you stated: [T]o the best of my knowledge (although I have not been involved in these discussions before) every recent RfC on including an infobox has been successful. From this it is clear that the topic is settled, and insisting on RfC's for every article risks becoming disruptive. Although the underlying RfC was on a very specific question, your statement touches on the broader question of whether editors should be allowed to contest including an infobox in a particular article, a practice that you said risks becoming disruptive because the topic is settled. That makes you involved—construing the term broadly—because answering this RfC in the affirmative would significantly shift the burden against those contesting infoboxes in future discussions. That said, if you can put aside your earlier assessment of consensus and only look at the arguments in this RfC, I don't see an issue with you closing. It wouldn't be a bad idea to disclose this at the RfC itself, and make sure that nobody there has any objections. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:43, 18 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Pinging @BilledMammal. voorts (talk/contributions) 21:45, 18 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      if you can put aside your earlier assessment of consensus and only look at the arguments in this RfC, I don't see an issue with you closing; per WP:LOCALCON, I don't see lower level discussions as having any relevance to assessing the consensus of higher level discussions, so I can easily do so - consistent results at a lower level can indicate a WP:IDHT issue, but it can also indicate that a local consensus is out of step with broader community consensus. Either way, additional local discussions are unlikely to be productive, but a broader discussion might be.
      Per your suggestion I'll leave a note at the RfC, and see if there are objections presented there or here. BilledMammal (talk) 02:37, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      I don’t think that !voting in an RfC necessarily equates to being too involved, but in this case, the nature of your !vote in the Steiger RfC was concerning enough to be a red flag. Is it still your contention that “every recent RfC on including an infobox has been successful. From this it is clear that the topic is settled, and insisting on RfC's for every article risks becoming disruptive”? That was wrong (and rather chilling) when you wrote it and is still wrong (and still chilling) now, as the current RfC makes rather clear. - SchroCat (talk) 03:30, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Is it still your contention that “every recent RfC on including an infobox has been successful. From this it is clear that the topic is settled, and insisting on RfC's for every article risks becoming disruptive”? No. I've only skimmed the RfC, but I see that while a majority have been successful a non-trivial number have not been - and the percentage that have not been has increased recently. BilledMammal (talk) 04:13, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      Part of my problem is that you said it in the first place. It was incorrect when you first said it and it comes across as an attempt to shut down those who hold a differing opinion. As you're not an Admin, I'm also not sure that you can avoid WP:NACPIT and WP:BADNAC, both of which seem to suggest that controversial or non-obvious discussions are best left to Admins to close. - SchroCat (talk) 06:44, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      In general, any concern that WP:IDHT behavior is going on could be seen as an attempt to shut down those who hold a differing opinion. I won't close this discussion, though generally I don't think that raising concerns about conduct make an editor involved regarding content.
      However, I reject BADNAC as an issue, both here and generally - I won't go into details in this discussion to keep matters on topic, but if you want to discuss please come to my talk page. BilledMammal (talk) 07:53, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      There was no IDHT behaviour, which was the huge flaw in your comment. You presumed that "every recent RfC on including an infobox has been successful", which was the flawed basis from which to make a judgement about thinking people were being disruptive. Your opinion that there was IDHT behaviour which was disruptive is digging the hole further: stop digging is my advice, as is your rejection of WP:BADNAC ("(especially where there are several valid outcomes) or likely to be controversial"), but thank you for saying you won't be closing the discussion. - SchroCat (talk) 08:10, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Ariana Grande#RFC: LEAD IMAGE

      (Initiated 60 days ago on 4 April 2024) This RFC was kind of a mess and I don't think any consensus came out of it, but it could benefit from a formal closure so that interested editors can reset their dicussion and try to figure out a way forward (context: several editors have made changes to the lead image since the RFC discussion petered out, but these were reverted on the grounds that the RFC was never closed). Note that an IP user split off part of the RFC discussion into a new section, Talk:Ariana Grande#Split: New Met Gala 2024 image. Aoi (青い) (talk) 22:52, 1 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      WP:RSN#RFC:_The_Anti-Defamation_League

      (Initiated 57 days ago on 7 April 2024) Three related RFCs in a trench coat. I personally think the consensus is fairly clear here, but it should definitely be an admin close. Loki (talk) 14:07, 6 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Enforcing ECR for article creators

      (Initiated 56 days ago on 8 April 2024) Discussion appears to have died down almost a month after this RfC opened. Would like to see a formal close of Q1 and Q2. Awesome Aasim 00:11, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Brothers of Italy#RfC on neo-fascism in info box 3 (Effectively option 4 from RfC2)

      (Initiated 56 days ago on 8 April 2024) Clear consensus for change but not what to change to. I've handled this RfC very badly imo. User:Alexanderkowal — Preceding undated comment added 11:50, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

       Comment: The RfC tag was removed the same day it was started. This should be closed as a discussion, not an RfC. voorts (talk/contributions) 22:03, 18 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Mukokuseki#RfC on using the wording "stereotypically Western characteristics" in the lead

      (Initiated 53 days ago on 11 April 2024) ☆SuperNinja2☆ TALK! 09:41, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      See Talk:Mukokuseki#Close Plz 5/21/2024 Orchastrattor (talk) 20:34, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:SpaceX Starship flight tests#RfC: Should we list IFT mission outcome alongside launch outcome?

      (Initiated 43 days ago on 20 April 2024) An involved user has repeatedly attempted to close this after adding their arguments. It's a divisive topic and a close would stop back and forth edits. DerVolkssport11 (talk) 12:42, 22 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      To clarify, the RfC was closed in this dif, and an IP editor unclosed it, with this statement: "involved and pushing"
      In just over an hour, the above editor voiced support for the proposal.
      I reclosed it, and the same IP opened the RfC again, with this message: "pushing by involved users so ask for more comments".
      I reclosed once more. And then the editor who opened this requests opened it. To avoid violated WP:3RR, I have not reclosed it, instead messaging the original closer to notify them.
      The proposal itself was an edit request that I rejected. The IP who made the request reopened the request, which I rejected once more. They then proceeded to open an RfC. Redacted II (talk) 12:58, 22 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Hunter Biden#RfC: Washington Post report concerning emails

      (Initiated 40 days ago on 24 April 2024) There's been no comments in 5 days. TarnishedPathtalk 03:20, 22 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:International Churches of Christ#RfC: Ongoing court cases involving low profile individuals

      (Initiated 32 days ago on 2 May 2024) RfC template has been removed by the bot. TarnishedPathtalk 13:21, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Andy Ngo#RfC: First sentence of the lead

      (Initiated 31 days ago on 3 May 2024) Discussion has slowed with only one !vote in the last 5 days. TarnishedPathtalk 11:09, 2 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Ben Roberts-Smith#RFC: War criminal in first sentence of the lede

      (Initiated 26 days ago on 8 May 2024) Last !vote was 27 May, 2024. Note: RfC was started by a blocking evading IP. TarnishedPathtalk 11:23, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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      Deletion discussions

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      TfD 0 0 10 0 10
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      FfD 0 0 2 0 2
      RfD 0 3 29 0 32
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      WP:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 11#Colonia Ulpia Traiana

      (Initiated 65 days ago on 30 March 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 April 24#Phone computer

      (Initiated 62 days ago on 2 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 21#Category:Crafts deities

      (Initiated 61 days ago on 3 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 23#Category:Mohave tribe

      (Initiated 57 days ago on 6 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 27#Category:Unrecognized tribes in the United States

      (Initiated 57 days ago on 7 April 2024) This one has been mentioned in a news outlet, so a close would ideally make sense to the outside world. HouseBlaster (talk · he/him) 13:56, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 27#Category:Indian massacres

      (Initiated 57 days ago on 7 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 23#Category:Dos Santos family (Angolan business family)

      (Initiated 56 days ago on 8 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 27#Category:Volodimerovichi family

      (Initiated 56 days ago on 8 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#Genie (feral child and etc.

      (Initiated 55 days ago on 9 April 2024) mwwv converse∫edits 18:02, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 6#Larissa Hodge

      (Initiated 55 days ago on 9 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 29#Category:Muppet performers

      (Initiated 52 days ago on 12 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 30#Category:First Nations drawing artists

      (Initiated 51 days ago on 13 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 April 30#Jackahuahua

      (Initiated 50 days ago on 14 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 April 30#Category:Neo-Latin writers

      (Initiated 49 days ago on 15 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 1#Hornless unicorn

      (Initiated 46 days ago on 17 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#TotalMedia Theatre

      (Initiated 46 days ago on 18 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

       Closed by editor Ca. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. put'er there 08:14, 2 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 19#Dougie (disambiguation)

      (Initiated 46 days ago on 18 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#Category:Pocatello Army Air Base Bombardiers football seasons

      (Initiated 40 days ago on 24 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#Sucking peepee

      (Initiated 39 days ago on 24 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 6#Supplemental Result

      (Initiated 39 days ago on 25 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 4#Category:Fictional West Asian people

      (Initiated 38 days ago on 26 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 4#Natural history

      (Initiated 38 days ago on 26 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#Category:Fictional animals by taxon

      (Initiated 37 days ago on 27 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#Roman Catholic bishops in Macau

      (Initiated 36 days ago on 28 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 April 30#Frances and Richard Lockridge

      (Initiated 34 days ago on 30 April 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:35, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Stress marks in East Slavic words

      (Initiated 28 days ago on 6 May 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 17:30, 19 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Amina Hassan Sheikh

      (Initiated 27 days ago on 6 May 2024) If the consensus is to do the selective histmerge I'm willing to use my own admin tools to push the button and do it. * Pppery * it has begun... 17:07, 24 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 17#Category:Extinct Indigenous peoples of Australia

      (Initiated 25 days ago on 9 May 2024) * Pppery * it has begun... 22:53, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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      Other types of closing requests

      Talk:Tamil_genocide#Merge_proposal

      (Initiated 76 days ago on 19 March 2024) Merge discussion which has been occurring since 19 March 2024. Discussion has well and truly slowed. TarnishedPathtalk 14:34, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Rupert_Sheldrake#Talkpage_"This_article_has_been_mentioned_by_a_media_organization:"_BRD

      (Initiated 48 days ago on 16 April 2024) - Discussion on a talkpage template, Last comment 6 days ago, 10 comments, 4 people in discussion. Not unanimous, but perhaps there is consensus-ish or strength of argument-ish closure possible. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:24, 23 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      It doesn't seem to me that there is a consensus here to do anything, with most editors couching their statements as why it might (or might not) be done rather than why it should (or should not). I will opine that I'm not aware there's any precedent to exclude {{Press}} for any reason and that it would be very unusual, but I don't think that's good enough reason to just overrule Hipal. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 01:01, 13 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Press_Your_Luck_scandal#Separate_articles

      (Initiated 32 days ago on 2 May 2024) Please review this discussion. --Jax 0677 (talk) 01:42, 11 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Republican_Party_(United_States)#Poll:_Should_the_article_include_a_political_position_for_the_Republican_Party_in_the_infobox?

      (Initiated 20 days ago on 14 May 2024) The topic of this poll is contentious and has been the subject of dozens of talk page discussions over the past years, so I am requesting an uninvolved editor to close this discussion. Cortador (talk) 20:28, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Talk:Prosecution of Donald Trump in New York#Merge proposal

      (Initiated 3 days ago on 30 May 2024) Commentators are starting to ask for a speedy close. -- Beland (talk) 06:18, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

      Place new discussions concerning other types of closing requests above this line using a level 3 heading

      Folken de Fanel

      Off topic and just drama now ChrisGualtieri (talk) 23:37, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      I'm here with a simple issue. While attempting to continue a major overhaul and merging of Dungeons & Dragons content I noticed that Folken de Fanel made 36 redirects in the court of 22 minutes from 23:42 on October 4 to 00:04 October 5.[1] Each of these redirects bore the edit summary "restore merge per a previous consensus". Whether or not the previous consensus from 3 years ago is valid, the edit summary is very misleading because Folken de Fanel did not carry out any merger at all. It was just a blank and redirect, resulting in dozens of pages being redirect loops, breaking over a hundred pages of links and removing a large amount of content under a misleading edit summary. I've gone and rollbacked these redirects; not on the grounds of contesting them as "keeps", but on keeping the content up while an actual merging process goes on. I have zero intention of keeping these pages beyond the time needed for merging in. I ask that these pages remain so Folken de Fanel does not promptly re-redirect them out and threaten me with ANI. I am not seeking any action against Folken; I do not have the time or energy to argue. These pages will be likely all gone within the week. Thank you for reading. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 03:36, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Redirecting does not remove content. If these are truly pages that were up for AFD years ago, and the results were merge + redirect, and no one bothered to merge in those three years, FdF is in the right to simply redirect - any editor can still get at the old content and add what is necessary. --MASEM (t) 03:41, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      They were not AFDed, they were discussed briefly three years ago in that link. Mass breaking content including links and entire groups of pages is not "merging"; Folken de Fanel did not merge the content as his edit summary stated. I've already begun redirecting them again. But I must sleep and more will be taken care of tomorrow. Also, the original mergers were contentious and not redirected out or had additional discussion prior to Folken's re-reverting.[2] If you check that link, you will see I have re-redirected (kept categories) the page out again. This is a brief and temporary solution to not break the rest of the Forgotten Realms content area. Whether or not I can recover the content in four-five additional steps means little when hundreds of readers will miss out unnecessarily. I find this option the best route and not deter, confuse or otherwise hinder readers who seek out the page's content until I can tidy the rest up on a list. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 04:13, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Do you have a better justification for your use of WP:Rollback? I don't see that it was necessary or allowed by the guideline. Flatscan (talk) 05:16, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Masem: really? Chris has been rapidly taking care of all this in the last couple of weeks. And you've no problem with someone using a clearly false edit summary? Oyi. Hobit (talk) 04:38, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      How is "restore merge per a previous consensus" "clearly false"? I don't see an implication in "restore merge" that FdF is redoing the merges at the list article. Talk:List of Forgotten Realms deities/Archive 1#Merge with individual deity and deity group articles is a valid wikilink to an archived discussion. The articles I spot-checked are in the discussed list. Flatscan (talk) 05:16, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Two reasons: #1 the articles were never merged, just redirected as far as I can tell. I see no evidence of any attempt to merge either years ago or this time. #2 Even if there was a merge at some point, redirecting isn't "restoring a merge" because, again, there is no merging being done. Hobit (talk) 05:52, 15 October 2013 (UTC) clarified Hobit (talk) 06:00, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      1) Redirecting without copying anything is allowed by the last paragraph of WP:Merging#Reasons for merger. The wording dates back to 2005 and 2007. You participated in the 2010 discussion, and you had 3 years to raise the issue with Neelix or edit the articles directly, as FdF pointed out. Requiring FdF to investigate and be responsible for Neelix's 3-year-old edits is unreasonable. 2) An edit summary like "revert to redirect per a previous consensus" would be more precise, but I think that describing FdF's "restore merge" as "clearly false" – in the context of your other comments, implying willful deception – is a gross exaggeration. Flatscan (talk) 04:40, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Merging does not require any material to be brought into the main article, if none of that material is new or appropriate, as long as that fact is checked. And as long as it is simply a redirect and not a delete, recreate and redirect, the content before the merge+redirect can be reviewed without admin assistance and brought in if the editor believes the fact was missed. --MASEM (t) 06:04, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      That's an interesting assertion, but completely unsupported by WP:MERGE: "A merger is a non-automated procedure by which the contents of two or more pages are united within a single page. Merging creates a redirect from the source page(s) to the destination page, with some or all of the content copied and pasted into that page." If no content was copied, then it wasn't a merger, it was a redirection without merging. While a merge includes a redirect as part of the process, what differentiates a merge from a redirect is the copying and pasting. Jclemens (talk) 06:32, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      That's an interesting bit of wiki-lawyering there. Don't think it's been merged properly? WP:SOFIXIT. It's in the edit history. Which is still there. So, you know, not a deletion. --Calton | Talk 11:17, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Not sure what you can actually merge, though, since all but one I've looked at were entirely sourced to TSR or Wizards of the Coast publications. In other words, nothin' but primary sources. --Calton | Talk 11:26, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Still not the point. There were 36 edit summaries that claimed he was merging stuff. No merging actually happened. He could have said "redirecting" and we'd not be here. But he didn't and we are. There is a strong difference between merging and redirecting, that's not wiki-lawyering.Hobit (talk) 13:28, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      No, not really. Redirecting an article to another where the appropriate encyclopedic content - in the eye of the person doing this - is already present, is a merge; the topic that was redirected still has content available about it in WP. It would not be a merge if the person redirected the article to a target article that made zero mention of the topic that was redirected, but that doesn't seem to be the case here. --MASEM (t) 13:41, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      So you are saying that merging something, in the Wikipedia meaning of the word, doesn't actually involve merging anything? While Wikipedia certainly has terms of art that are like that, WP:MERGE says quite the opposite. So your definition doesn't seem to work for the English meaning of the word "merge" nor the Wikipedia meaning. Could you explain why you think your definition is correct? Hobit (talk) 13:58, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The WP definition, which matches the real world version is "A merger is a non-automated procedure by which the contents of two or more pages are united within a single page." Doesn't say anything about retaining information from every page involved in the process (unless you're wikilawyering the language). The only outcome that I would expect of a merge is that the topic that is merged in is not reduced to a single mention in passing: whether this means the topic has its own section, paragraphs, one or more sentences, or a line in a table, it doesn't matter (a mention in passing would simply require a redirect). If this means that information from one page is duplicative or not appropriate encyclopedic to be inserted into the target page, so be it. --MASEM (t) 14:48, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Wow, I'm wondering if you just stopped reading at that point. WP:MERGE goes on to say "with some or all of the content copied and pasted into that page". So yes, it does say something about retaining information. As does the English definition (combine or cause to combine to form a single entity, notice the word combine...). Are you seriously claiming that a redirect is a merge? Hobit (talk) 14:59, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      If some of the content in the article(s) to be merged already exists in the target article, then yes, some of the content has been put into the target article already. If that then leaves content that is deemed unencyclopedic and is left out, then that's what happens. (Mind you, the language "copy and pasted" is not really correct because more than likely a merge that does add more from a merged article will be edited appropriately to fit the flow of the target article during or after the merge - the attribution path should still be followed when doing so.) --MASEM (t) 15:16, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      So assuming a redirect target has some information on the topic, any redirect is a merge? That is taking the English language (and Wikipedia terminology) and bending it so far on it's ear it's amazing. Our policies speak of redirection and merging as different things on a regular basis. I'm having a hard time coming up with an example where a redirect from an AfD wouldn't also be a merge in your use of the terminology. I'm starting to feel like you are just yanking my chain. Hobit (talk) 15:22, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      A redirect (as a close action from an AFD/discussion) w/o a merge means that an editor can go and blindly replace the page contents with the right #REDIRECT, not having to worry about attribution, existing content, or the like. It may be worthwhile to consider anchors in the target article as to help the redirect link land at the right spot, but that's it. A merge w/ redirect means that the editor performing the merge should review the contents of the to-be-merged article(s) and target and carefully determine what, if any, content should be brought over, and if any content is brought in, add in tracking for attribution, before making the target page a redirect.
      Yes, that means that a merge that doesn't bring over any information before the redirect is going to look from a 60,000 ft level like a straight redirect, but that's where AGF comes into play, that the editor performing the merge made a judgement call that no new information from the page in question was needed in the target page. And that's why merge + redirects are tons better than deletion, because any editor can go back and pull out details they felt were important that the merging editor might have omitted and add them after the merge. (I would argue we would be in a similar place if FdF pulled one sentence and added it to the target articles before redirecting, with claims "he didn't merge enough!"). If FdF did this blindly, without any prior discussion at all, sure, I would question the motives behind it, but here, FdF is doing an action discussed before, with changes that were undone in the interim. --MASEM (t) 15:33, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      My last reply on this: If nothing is merged, it ain't a merge. That's pretty obvious in my book. And as the action discussed before was a merge which never was implemented. Hobit (talk) 17:22, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      All I can say is that you were part of the original discussion back in 2010, Hobit, if you had any objection about the amount of content moved, you had all the time to say it, or to move more content yourself. You never did, so I had no reason to assume you were not in agreement. All I did was to restore the 2010 status quo. You obviously have your own view on what a merge should be, but I see nothing here in opposition with WP:MERGE, so this discussion doesn't belong at ANI.Folken de Fanel (talk) 21:38, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      ... none of which deals at all with the fact that Masem has asserted something so utterly ridiculous that it defies common sense. He's asserting that redirecting an article to a target that already contains something relevant and not adding or changing any of that content at the target article constitutes a merge, contra the definition that I quoted, and (as Hobit pointed out) he selectively re-quoted. Masem's behavior in this matter is clearly worse than yours, Folken, because you could simply say you were going too fast and assuming that the merges had previously been done, while Masem's argument is something that's meritless, has been pointed out as meritless, and yet he maintains that it is the definition is wrong, rather than he. Jclemens (talk) 04:49, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Common sense would suggest that merging involves taking some portion of one thing and including it in another. But reality is not that clear-cut, especially when more than two articles are involved in the merger. We could imagine a discussion closing with consensus to merge articles A,B,C,D into article X. Now suppose that the merging editor finds that article C just repeats one of the sections of article A, and that article D is nothing but tinfoil hat gibberish sourced to the article creator's personal blog. In that case, after the merge there will be nothing of articles C and D in the merge product but I would say the whole thing still does constitute a merge. Wouldn't you? This D&D situation is the extreme end of that scale, where a lot of articles have gone into the merge discussion and some content from some of the articles has found its way into the merge target, but nothing or very little from each individual article. I agree that this is more like mass redirection than a merge, but calling it a very selective merge is not totally off the wall. (And a very selective merge is exactly what this content needs, not wholesale Ctrl-C Ctrl-V). Reyk YO! 05:23, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      (edit) and the last paragraph of Wikipedia:Merging#Reasons_for_merger explicitly states that it's OK to simply redirect instead of merging if there is no mergeable content. Reyk YO! 05:26, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      What it actually says is "If there is no information to be added to the destination page, you can simply redirect the other page there, but please make this clear in the edit summary." (Emphasis mine) That is, if there's nothing to merge, than redirect it. Don't call it a merge, because it's not. It's not saying that there's such a thing as a merge without content added to the target, it's telling editors to use redirect instead, and be clear in their edit summaries that they are not merging but instead redirecting which is exactly what Folken de Fanel failed to do. Jclemens (talk) 06:29, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      As has been pointed out over and over again, Folken was not claiming to be doing a merge. He was putting things back the way there were after someone else had undone the previously performed merges. That clearly is what "restore merge" means, and no amount of feigned incomprehension or creative misinterpretation will make it mean anything else- particularly when this has been clarified REPEATEDLY in this discussion, by Folken himself and several others. There is no dishonesty from Folken de Fanel here, as much as you obviously wish there was. If you think the original merges (or whatever you want to call them) were inadequate, take it up with User:Neelix who performed them. Otherwise, how can you call restoring an edit disruptive when you wouldn't call the original edit disruptive? And I still maintain that you could, at a stretch, call this a very selective merge anyway. Reyk YO! 07:06, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Thank you - that's exactly what MERGE says on the tin - combining two or more articles into one. It doesn't say a minimum amount of an article to be merge has to survive, only that we keep attribution history and redirect so that all the prior edits can be traced. There's a distict lack of good faith here in assuming what FdF is doing is purposely harmful. --MASEM (t) 05:57, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I have started a RfC draft discussion at User talk:Flatscan/RfC draft: Merge versus redirect. Flatscan (talk) 04:18, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      "If there is no information to be added to the destination page, you can simply redirect the other page there, but please make this clear in the edit summary." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jclemens (talk • contribs) 06:29, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Better history links:
      • Folken de Fanel's 36 redirects
      • ChrisGualtieri's 35 rollbacks
      Spot-checking these articles, I see a pattern where User:Neelix proposes and performs the merger in October 2010, and an IP editor restores in December 2011. Flatscan (talk) 05:16, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Could you identify where the merging was done? I didn't notice any merging at all. I might have missed it, but I don't think Neelix made a single edit involving content. Hobit (talk) 05:52, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Neelix did merge the lead of Circle of Greater Powers to the lead of the list (overall diff, history). The last paragraph of WP:Merging#Reasons for merger allows for redirecting without copying, but asks that it be clearly identified in the edit summary. I prefer precise edit summaries, as they make WP:Copying within Wikipedia checking easier. Flatscan (talk) 04:40, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Folken de Fanel has a long history of problematic behavior, which was cataloged at a recent RFC/U. He has been blocked on multiple language Wikipedias for edit warring, including this one. He is indefinitely banned on fr.wiki, his home language wiki, and remains indefinitely blocked for sockpuppetry on it.wiki. He's had plenty of chances to shape up his contributions, but seems more intent on harassing those of us who point out his poor, uncollaborative behavior. If indeed he's making widespread use of misleading edit summaries, then it's probably time to increment the number of Wikipedias in which he's no longer welcome. No doubt some of the same people who opined in the that RFC/U that he was being persecuted for his views will rush to his defense here, but it really falls to the greater community--how much longer will this conduct be allowed to continue? Jclemens (talk) 06:27, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Chris has been doing a great job with the merges so far, and needs to be allowed to continue. If it helps him to have the articles live as he merges them, then I don't see a problem holding them restored for a brief time. He already merged back a few last night before logging off[3][4][5], and given the sheer amount of cleanup and merging work he has put in over the last week, I don't see why we can't extend a little good faith that he is going to have that taken care of quickly. If that really is an insurmountable problem for everyone else, then since he is doing merges by going through the categories, then at least do him the favor of keeping the categories when you redirect the pages. BOZ (talk) 18:00, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • I have no problem with Chris merging D&D articles in his own way, but he absolutely needs to master the simple courtesy of communicating with other users rather than making misguided accusations of bad faith or needlessly dragging them at ANI whenever something doesn't go exactly the way he wants.Folken de Fanel (talk) 18:21, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Nothing to see here. I noticed a comment at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mask (Forgotten Realms) explaining that a series of merges to List of Forgotten Realms deities, performed per a consensus discussion in 2010, had been restored by a disruptive IP around 2011. Some of these articles ended up at AfD recently, and I agreed with the editor's recommendation of a procedural close to redirect/merge. I went to check the discussion and all the articles that were part of the merge proposal. Indeed, most, if not all of them had been illegitimately restored by an IP, and since there were was already users asking for these articles to be redirected right away so as not to clutter AfD, I went ahead and restored the redirect, ie the merge procedure from 2010. I saw that the 2010 consensus was apparently satisfied with the short content already present beforehand in the target article, so I didn't do more than restoring the redirects that should have stayed as such. What little content was added to the articles between 2011 and now didn't amount to much, and WP:MERGE doesn't prevent only a small part of the article to be moved, so yeah, that's it. I simply returned things to the 2010 status-quo, and the accusation of "false edit summary" is at best laziness, or at worse outright and misguided assumption of bad faith from ChrisGualtieri.
      This is really a non-issue and a useless cluttering of ANI. ChrisGualtieri can easily access article histories and move whatever content to the target he deems necessary (something he doesn't seem to get), if he considered there were better merge targets or ways to merge, then he could just have informed me, changed the redirect target without mass-reverting me, and just proceeded (as long as he has consensus on his side). ChrisGualtieri seems to have major communication issues per his recent ANI reports, and on top of that this comes only a day after he again misguidedly assumed bad faith against me about another case of redirect, so I would not appreciate if this behavior became a trend. I have also noted that ChrisGualtieri has just created a new article, List of human deities (Dungeons & Dragons), to apparently merge all the articles in question there. I don't necessarily agree with this choice, of which ChrisGualtieri failed to notify me, and I hope this ANI report was not a way to preemptively stifle opposition.Folken de Fanel (talk) 17:58, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      There is a lot wrong with your post.since you were notified of it going to this noticeboard. You have harassed me and caused a great amount of stress and all because you are incapable of understanding when people are even on your side. In the span of two weeks, I've done more to fix the Dungeons and Dragons content than you have in your entire editing history! Deletion is a last resort and of the 100+ pages I've merged, you have the audacity to flagrantly twist my words and actions into some sniveling little behavior dispute? Wikipedia is a collaborative project to build an encyclopedia; it is not therapy and you should not be here to fight anyone. Folken de Fanel, you are not worth MY time, and you are not worth this communities time when you refuse to understand even the most basic of reasons why I temporarily restored them: To prevent over 400 broken links that go into a redirect loop. If you had bothered to check and carry out a merger instead of creating said redirect loops, I wouldn't have rolled them back and I wouldn't have brought this here. You equate "causing stress" to a personal attack.[6] You have caused a lot of unnecessary stress with your battleground behavior and wasted hours of time responding to your sheepish excuses and disruptive actions. Now I am going to conduct the rest of the mergers now that I have a few spare hours and maybe do some of the 500 other D&D pages that need merging or fixing. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 22:56, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Outside of your own, obvious hostile behavior against me, I can't see anything here that belongs in ANI. I have provided all the necessary explanation in my previous comment, that you keep ignoring it and even go further in your groundless accusations speaks volumes about you. That's not the first time you've written frivolous ANI reports, so I wouldn't like you to think ANI is your go-to whenever you don't want to bother communicating. I'm not (yet) seeking sanctions against you because you're otherwise a valuable user, but I'm asking the closer of this thread to firmly remind you that ANI is not your personal alternative to civil discussion. Folken de Fanel (talk) 12:53, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • If one merges a number of articles which are only besourced to primary sources into a list (which is therefore similarly only sourced to primary sources), the list is just as subject to deletion as the original articles ("Lists, whether they are embedded lists or stand-alone lists, are encyclopedic content as are paragraphs and articles, and they are equally subject to Wikipedia's content policies"). Not that it would get deleted round here, as there are too many people prepared to ignore Wikipedia policy in AfDs, but I hope Chris is hoping to add some real-world notability to that article. Black Kite (talk) 18:37, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The plain descrption of plot and characters in fiction can and should be preferentially taken from the work itself, it is one of the places where primary sources are appropriate. since the sections of an article or the content of a list of this sort do not have to meet any notability requirements, there is no need for secondary sourcing of undisputed factual content, and the attempt to remove such is one of the reasons why some of us are a little apprehensive about indiscriminate merging. This attitude that we should remove ll mention whatsoever of the actual events and individuals in a fiction is thoroughly unencyclopedic. BK, you closed a very closely related discussion at AN/I --your comment above suggests to me that you are too involved in these questions to have done so. DGG ( talk ) 23:50, 15 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Yet, at the same time, WP:NOT#PLOT says we don't burden topics with too much detail taken from primary sources even if it is verifiable. If no secondary source has bothered to do a more detailed discussion or review of the fiction, we should not be going into that great detail ourselves. The articles FdF is merging rest heavily on the primary sources and attempts to show secondary sources have brought up nothing, and as such, a lot of that content has to be trimmed out in the merge to make the target article appropriate for Wikipedia. --MASEM (t) 06:02, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I closed the ANI as it was getting off the point (towards RFC/U territory) and there was no admin action required. As for the above, I don't see how merely stating Wikipedia policy is at all contentious. As Masem says, if "the articles ... rest heavily on the primary sources and attempts to show secondary sources have brought up nothing" then we shouldn't be creating a bigger article with the same problem. Since the individual items are non-notable, the one reason for having such a list (navigation) does not apply. To say "the content of a list of this sort do not have to meet any notability requirements" is flat out wrong - there has no be notability for the main subject of the list, and that means secondary sources. Otherwise we could create lists of, well, pretty much anything non-notable using the same criteria. Black Kite (talk) 10:03, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      DnD's use of deities (and how it changes between settings and over time) is certainly a subject that has received outside coverage. Now, I don't think the current organization in any way promotes the effective presentation of that coverage, and the merges (by race of fictional adherent? seriously?) don't seem at the moment to be creating any better of a situation. But the topic does pass N, because you could go write Gods in Dungeons & Dragons and that would be a real article on a notable topic. --erachima talk 10:28, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      At which point, due to its length, List of deities in Dungeons & Dragons is a valid WP:SPINOUT (if not worthy of being that topic's main article in its own right). I don't remember the precise bit of WP:ALPHABETSOUP but it's always been my understanding (after reading it long ago) that if a list is on a notable topic, the individual items in said list do not necessarily need to pass N themselves (and this is why, my not-yet-caffinated brain continues remembering, merging to a list is often a good idea at AfD). That said, we shouldn't necessarily merge wholesale from fails-N articles to a list, instead using "X is Y, and is recognised in-universe for Z" in a single paragraph at most in the list with the article redirected there. - The Bushranger One ping only 13:35, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment- I do not see how FdF's edit summaries are deceitful. It's very clear that he is not claiming to actually be merging anything. Rather, he explicitly states that he is returning these pages to their post-merge state and links to the discussion where the merges were proposed. That much is obvious from reading the edit summaries. And if that wasn't clear enough, he's said much the same thing here at this ill-thought-out ANI thread. Reyk YO! 04:28, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Realistically, since we're not even prepared to put any constraints on Claritas' freedom to roam the fiction topic area removing content at will, there's no point even discussing Folken de Fanel. Unlike Claritas, FdF doesn't have a history of bad faith.

        I do seriously question the community's judgment on this. I think it's a horrible mistake to let these users blunder about the fiction topic area like loose cannons, and I feel we could save ourselves a lot of future drama and heartache with a few judicious topic bans. But the community won't stomach it, so move on.—S Marshall T/C 15:44, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • Primarily because if we topic banned everyone who did anything controversial, nothing would ever get done. --erachima talk 15:56, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • I still can't see anything "controversial" or any "blunder" that I would have done in this case. In 2010, a consensus discussion established that a series of articles were to be merged, and several users, including some who have contributed here, approved the move, as well as the amount of content being merged (perfectly in compliance with WP:Merging#Reasons for merger). In 2011, a disruptive IP reverted the redirects against consensus and without discussion. In 2013, some of these restored articles ended up at AfD, where a member of the D&D project noticed the IP's disruptions and remarked these articles were better restored back to redirects rather than cluttering AfD. Following the said AfD I found all the other articles in question and in perfect accordance with my edit summaries, merely restored them back to their 2010 status, which should never have been changed. If there was anything controversial or any blunder, it lies with the original disruptive IP and the misguided user who overreacted by opening this thread in blatant assumption of bad faith instead of just trying to properly understand the situation, or even to initiate simple communication. End of story.Folken de Fanel (talk) 16:40, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • A three-year-old consensus of three users is your justification for this, right?—S Marshall T/C 18:00, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Wikipedia policies are like scripture; somewhere in the labyrinthine mess of rules you can find support for any position no matter how extreme. I'm sure you'll be able to trot out other policy-based excuses as well. What I'm suggesting is that you're justifying your actions on the basis of a three-year-old consensus of three users.—S Marshall T/C 18:14, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • And comments at AfD. And support in this very thread. Your point being...?Folken de Fanel (talk) 18:18, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • My point being that there's considerable good faith doubt about your edits in this topic area and you should not continue with them until the consensus is clearer.—S Marshall T/C 19:18, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • And there has been objection to this consensus...where? (Somebody coming along and deciding "oooh boy I can make this article on my favourite fictional deity/Transformer/Pokemon!" doesn't count.) - The Bushranger One ping only 19:20, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Exactly, I don't see those doubts in this discussion. Or at least they failed to garner consensus, which unfortunately forces me to consider them unreasonable.Folken de Fanel (talk) 22:11, 16 October 2013 (UTC)#[reply]
      • Okay, well those of us who aren't The Bushranger or Folken de Fanel can see the doubts in this very thread. You're not "unfortunately forced to consider them unreasonable", FdF. You apparently choose to consider them unreasonable because it suits your purposes to do so. As I've said before, there's no chance of this leading to a topic ban of any kind because you've shown no bad faith on en.wiki recently, but there's a wide gulf between the absence of a topic ban and the ringing endorsement of your actions that you're pretending is happening here.—S Marshall T/C 23:08, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I think this is moving into other issues by proxy. The pages did not go to AFD, but no one is saying "keep" them either. Folken's behavior has been tacitly and implicitly directed to being a dick by other editors, but its best to not be a dick at all. Folken's edit summary was misleading, but all that is moot when 36 pages are redirected without checking them. Folken has lied, the defense of the mergers already being done are false with the mere existence of such redirect loops saying Folken did not merge or even "restore" the merger because they were never carried out (as pointed out above). His and another editor stating this is ANI (when it is not) is mere theatrics - I was not seeking administrative action at all. If Folken is going to act like a troll; then we should treat him like a troll and deny recognition. I don't want to seem as "not assuming good faith", but its pretty obvious the user has thrown AGF out the window a long time ago and willfully fails to engage in a collaborative process; and his behavior has only gotten worse since the RFC/U. I made this notice to have admins aware of the situation and prevent edit warring while the merging process is done - as it was never done before and was not done by Folken de Fanel. We all got better things to do, so let's not continue bickering over inclusionism or deletionism and other proxy matters - unless someone wants to keep those pages, speak up or forever hold your peace. And Folken should not be punished, his edits were done on the 5th and he was warned about the merges the following week - he is aware so let's not gang up on him or have him drawn and quartered for lying here at AN. He's out to save his skin and take me down it seems, but I'm not gonna press for action here. I got better things to do than waste my time. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 00:08, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Folken de Fanel has not been lying, either here or in his edit summaries, as has been conclusively proven in this discussion. The only poor behaviour I have seen is your misuse of rollback. Reyk YO! 00:17, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      (Comment self removed - comment was twisted to a personal attack and I rather remove it as withdrawn in apologies to Folken ChrisGualtieri (talk) 23:37, 17 October 2013 (UTC) )[reply]

      • Sigh. Folken restored a bunch of redirects that had been left behind after another editor's merge of those articles, stating so explicitly in his edit summaries, which also link back to the merge discussion. Your position is that not enough of the articles made it into the merge target for it to really be called a merge and therefore Folken's edit summaries are deliberately dishonest. What a load of bullshit. Reyk YO! 03:15, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I split my reply into numbered items:
      1. FdF's edit summaries and merging versus redirecting have been thoroughly discussed above. I think that your replies would be better directed to specific comments there.
      2. I don't understand your reference to WP:Articles for deletion. WP:Articles for deletion/Mystra (goddess) was closed as no consensus in 2007. Do you mean that AfD is required to establish a binding decision and that Talk:List of Forgotten Realms deities/Archive 1#Merge with individual deity and deity group articles is not a valid merger discussion?
      3. I agree with FdF calling the IP editors' restorations "disruptive". The users in question are 129.33.19.254 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) and editor(s) on a dynamic IP (208.54.38.223 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), 208.54.40.145 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), 208.54.40.242 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), 208.54.40.240 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), from Tyr, Talos, and Mystra). No substantial improvements were made during December 2011, and the only added sources through today are source books, an adventure module, and a tie-in novel. A lack of acceptable reliable sources was the original rationale for merging. The date parameters were removed from the cleanup tags, but there may be a reasonable explanation.
      Flatscan (talk) 04:18, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Well, if I'm being called a "dick", a "troll", a "liar" who "spews bad faith and threats to any opposer" and other nice words, all that while consensus in this thread is clearly supportive of my actions, I'm changing my mind and formally asking for sanctions against ChrisGualtieri following his blatant personal attacks (at AN of all places...). It's time for this farce to end.Folken de Fanel (talk) 16:56, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      I'm closing this as I've said it was off-topic before. This is not AN and the page issues have been rectified. No need for drama between inclusionists and deletionists. Sorry, Folken if this upset you. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 23:37, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Talk:Men's rights movement/Article probation

      Based on a community discussion, MRM pages were put on article probation in October 2011. There is no expiration date. Based on a subsequent discussion, a WP:1RR restriction was imposed, which is set to expire on October 20, 2013.

      I propose that we extend the 1RR restriction for another year. At the same time, I propose a modification of the wording. The general probation impacts all MRM-related pages. However, the 1RR restriction, as worded, literally applies only to the Men's rights movement article. I propose that the 1RR restriction can be applied to any MRM-related page. It has already been applied in that fashion, at least by me. Some of the entries in the sanction log aren't clear in that regard, so I'm not sure if other admins have also done so.

      Although no sanctions have been logged since August 2013, the previous sanctions have been effective in minimizing the disruption to the MRM pages. In particular, a 1RR restriction, which is a bright line, is helpful. There are still editors out there, who, in my view, have an agenda, and I suspect more will pop up, even if we are vigilant, but potentially a greater number if we are not.--Bbb23 (talk) 23:49, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      I support this motion because it is clear that POV activism by SPA editors is a constant feature of the topic. Raising the floodgates will overwhelm the article and related topics. Binksternet (talk) 02:30, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Given the truly horrible state of the Men's rights article (see my rant on the talk page), I'm unclear how things could get much worse. "By their fruits you shall know them" is a pretty good motto. And the fruits of this 1RR restriction are pretty nasty. Maybe not as bad as if the restriction were removed, but certainly not a poster child for 1RR working in this area. I'll defer to those that generally oversee this area on the 1RR continuation/expansion, but wow, that article is a mess of generalizations. Hobit (talk) 03:41, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I support the renewal and expansion. The restriction has very clearly forced things to be discussed on talk pages, and limited general disruption to the article. --Kyohyi (talk) 13:53, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support renewal and expansion. Although I haven't been active in the men's rights arena much lately for real life reasons, I have still been keeping half an eye on it, and the 1rr restriction has helped some of the silliness. The article isn't great, and until a greater body of comprehensive secondary literature about the movement emerges would be hard to make great, even without the silliness - and the silliness makes it harder. 1rr hasn't been a panacea, but has helped restrain some of the biggest problems. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:00, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support Bbb23's proposal fully. Article remains on my watch and I see this as a positive for the community to renew this probation as suggested.--Mark Miller (talk) 20:05, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support, unfortunately, because removing it would make it worse. Hobit, which rant? I'd be interested to hear if you have any suggestions for improving the "policing" of the article; I wish I had some. Drmies (talk) 02:29, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • It's under the NPOV tag section. I think the real issue is that those unhappy with the article have at least a few good points--the article is poorly written and seems to paint with too broad a brush. After having lots of things explained to me, I think the problems are fixable but it's a lot of work and I'm a horrible writer and I should be working... We'll see. Hobit (talk) 14:09, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support based on the history of conflict over this topic. I don't think a 1RR restriction puts an undo hardship upon Editors who work on these articles. Restriction can be revisited in a year. Liz Read! Talk! 12:53, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support Reviewing the article and talk page history of Men's rights movement suggests to me that the value of the 1RR restriction on that specific article is still rather high and it should therefore be kept. Looking through the sanctions logs also leads me to support explicitly expanding the restriction to other MRM-related pages as well. In both the specific and the general cases, there still seems to be an issue with editors attempting to insert (and re-insert) advocacy without the support of good sources. Simple Sarah (talk) 16:45, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strongly oppose - the normal Wikipedia policies and guidelines work fine for the other 4,353,716 articles, so I don't see why this one needs special treatment. 88.104.25.210 (talk) 03:22, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • That could well be that you simply do not know about the conflict and disputes involved with the article.--Mark Miller (talk) 03:25, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
          • Whoever the IP is, they're not new to Wikipedia, given this reference to Malleus, which, in turn, links this comment. On a more substantive note, the IP is, of course, wrong. There are many articles and topic areas at Wikipedia that are subject to restrictions and sanctions--Bbb23 (talk) 14:36, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Loomspicker again

      I moved it to ANI Pass a Method talk 01:36, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      I've raised this issue here before, but the user in question oh-so-conveniently went inactive for a few days while the thread was open. To sum up, User:Loomspicker is a single-purpose account devoted to pretending Islamophobia doesn't exist by scrubbing the word from Wikipedia, and in the service of this crusade, has engaged in a number of prohibited behaviors. In addition to the evidence detailed here, which includes the introduction of factual inaccuracy, blanking sourced material, and adding scare quotes, he has more recently continued to misrepresent sources ([7] [8] [9]), remove sourced material ([10]), delink pages in an apparent attempt to orphan them so they can be deleted ([11] [12] [13]), and otherwise edit in a disruptive and POV manner. Please deal with this even if the user goes inactive in order to avoid scrutiny. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 00:21, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Should I take this to ANI instead? Either way, I don't want this to be archived without being addressed simply because the user stopped editing right when the thread opened. That's what happened last time, and obviously he simply resumed the disruptive behavior as soon as it seemed like no one was looking anymore. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 16:10, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      More of an ANI thing IMO, but since it's here, I'll reply here. (Nowadays apparently you're supposed to use some accursed template to move a thread to ANI, and I can't away with it.) It would be easier to take stock of the situation if you provided a link to where you raised the issue before, Roscelese. If they repeatedly go inactive when they're under scrutiny, and not at other times, then that's significant, but I'd like to see for myself. Bishonen | talk 15:35, 19 October 2013 (UTC).[reply]
      ...It's already linked in my first post? But here is the link again. link –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:42, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      By the way, yes, this sort of thing should be over at WP:ANI, since it's an "incident", so to speak, regarding another user. As far as I (non-admin) know, WP:AN is more for general announcements and requests, while WP:ANI deals more with user behavior. Ansh666 03:06, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • Support block or topic ban rom Islam for Loomspicker. I have been going through this editors contributions and he is clearly anti-Muslim, goes around articles related to Muslims and puts derogotary information about them as well as other unsavoury edits. Pass a Method talk 15:25, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment - I share Roscelese's and Pass a Method's concerns, which I also had after seeing this edit which removed five sources. The fact that these same types of edits are occurring across multiple articles is troubling. I'm not sure if a block is required, but a topic ban should definitely be put on the table for discussion.- MrX 19:08, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      That edit was about what should be included in the article, not necessarily vandalism. Our talk page discussion on the issue clearly shows that. EvergreenFir (talk) 00:15, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I never said it was vandalism, only that it seems to be part of a pattern of erasing the concept of Islamaphobia from Wikipedia by Loomspicker. - MrX 00:29, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Very weak support based on review of edits over the past few days. Some seem to be done with the agenda of removing any sense of "racism" from Islamophobia pages and to cast Islam in a bad light. But based on the evidence presented by Roscelese, the user does seem to have an agenda and is barely here to build an encyclopedia. EvergreenFir (talk) 00:15, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Topic ban?

      I propose a topic ban for Loomspicker from all Islam-related articles.Pass a Method talk 22:59, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      On HiyoHiyo article

      article deleted as A7; user blocked "indefinite (account creation blocked, email disabled, cannot edit own talk page) [..] CU-confirmed troll)"

      The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      On article HiyoHiyo, I created for the subject's request. Another user is saying negative things about subject of article; they are person involved with the off-wiki harassment. The name is LINDA. LINDA has caused internet controversey before. Their website is here. (Sorry not good English) --Playabeacha (talk) 01:05, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      A little help on a minor matter

      Done

      The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      I was unable to move File:Hippodrome.jpg to Commons using CommonsHelper (a communications problem with the tool) or CommonsHelper2 (probably my fault), so I moved the image by hand to File:New York Hippodrome.jpg (because there was already a file there by the other name). However, it seems that the file has a talk page with content in it. The content is negligible, and should really be on Talk:New York Hippodrome instead. I could move it, but that would break the copyright - so could an admin with a few minutes time please move the content, merge the histories of File talk:Hippodrome.jpg and Talk:New York Hippodrome and then delete the former, or whatever the proper procedure is? I'd appreciate it. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:42, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

       Done Legoktm (talk) 04:29, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Thanks! Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:37, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      template uw-block

      Unlikely and beansy. Can be dealt with through the 'normal channels'. 88.104.25.210 (talk) 02:54, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Should we update template {{uw-block}} to warn users that "pinging" or otherwise using notifications to flag other editors may result in loss of talk page access? NE Ent 02:01, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      That sounds risky ala WP:Beans. PaleAqua (talk) 02:14, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      And unnecessary. We don't need to provide a specific do and don't list to blocked users - they will do what they do, which will show what it shows, and consequences will or will not be forthcoming, depending on situation and circumstances, which I doubt we could fully explicate even if we wanted to. What's wrong with that? Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:28, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I might be a bit slow on the uptake today. Do you mean blocked users repeatedly "pinging" others in order to pester them with the little red notification box? Reyk YO! 04:31, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I believe NE Ent's comment was sparked by Tumbleman's talk page access being removed by JamesBWatson after Tumbleman repeatedly pinged IRWolfie, with whom he had had disputes which were the root cause of Tumbleman's being blocked. See Tumbleman's talk page. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:17, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      That and what occurred at User talk:Retrolord#Appeal_workshop. PantherLeapord|My talk page|My CSD log 08:27, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Suppose someone violates an interaction ban or topic ban by repeatedly hitting the thanks button on the edits of someone they shouldn't interact with or on a topic they should avoid. That would of course be a violation (with no need to spell it out in the rules) that could end in a block, but can you still thank people for their edits while you are blocked from editing? --Guy Macon (talk) 09:20, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Let's try that out, shall we? Just kidding. IMO it would have to be proven that it's not genuine (aka intended to be disruptive or in violation of the ban) - do interaction/topic bans explicitly include thanking? Ansh666 09:50, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      (edit conflict) You can not thank someone for an edit while blocked. I recently raised the question of disabling pings from a curious perspective.—John Cline (talk) 09:55, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      John, what do you mean about "can not"? Is it technically disabled, or are you making an emphatic "must not"? Nyttend (talk) 11:45, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      It is not technically capable, whether it was disabled by design, or simply a bug that needn't be fixed, I do not know, but the (thank) link does not appear for a blocked user.—John Cline (talk) 14:40, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      Complex username-block situation - Senseltd and Wikikl

      Copied from Wikipedia:Usernames for administrator attention at the request of someone trying to address the issue:

      begin copied text
      • Senseltd (talk · contribs · deleted · filter log · SUL · Google) • (block · soft · promo · cause · bot · hard · spam · vandal) and Wikikl (talk · contribs · deleted · filter log · SUL · Google) • (block · soft · promo · cause · bot · hard · spam · vandal) Senseltd was blocked as a username block and renamed to Wikikl but the block followed to the new name. I assume the editor was frustrated because he began editing under the name Senseltd again. This has created a mess that is not the editor's fault. Separate from this, the editor has been warned about recent edits, but that is not what this is about. Recommended action: Rename Wikikl to "Wikikl-usurped" and block the account. Rename Senseltd to Wikikl and ensure that Wikikl is not blocked (if necessary though, give him a "final warning"). Re-create the account Senseltd and block it. Alternatively, just switch the blocks so Wikikl can edit and Senseltd can't and copy the edit warnings from Senseltd's talk page to Wikikl's talk page to make sure they are seen. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 19:59, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Comment: Um, OK. Maybe you want to take this to WP:AN? It's a little more complicated than what we usually deal with. Daniel Case (talk) 12:05, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      end copied text
      davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 17:09, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I've requested the attention of MBisanz, the bureaucrat who renamed Senseltd early last week. Nyttend (talk) 12:52, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I've renamed Wikil to Wikikl-2 and Senseltd to Wikikl. Can someone communicate to him to now use Wikikl? MBisanz talk 02:08, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      @MBisanz: the best way might be to create the account "Senseltd" and indef-block it, then leave a note on both the user and user talk page explaining what is going on. If either or both of the existing accounts have email enabled, email might work. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 03:39, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Mops at the ready

      There's a pretty big backlog of requests at requests for unblock, the majority of which are from COI/username blocks. Meet you there?--Jezebel'sPonyobons mots 18:01, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      It's my usual hangout ... but not allowed to with this ID :-) ES&L 21:32, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The last time I looked at your performance in that area (12-18 months ago) it was seriously problematical. You were driving such editors underground by banning usernames that openly flagged their COI but didn't breach policy as, "purely promotional", and supporting the blocking and other harassment of COI editors simply for declaring their COI. If that hasn't changed, then I hope you keep well away. If you return to that area with those behaviours intact, I'll be calling for you to be formally banned from dealing with COI editors. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 01:52, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Indeed, your absence is certainly noted.--Jezebel'sPonyobons mots 21:44, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Too many cooks, not enough bottle-washers. 88.104.25.210 (talk) 02:45, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Oh oh

      Nakon's toolserver account has expired - no more rangeblock calculator or autoblock finder. Does anyone know if any of these tools were moved to Labs? I have other rangeblock calculators I can use, but the autoblock finder is particularly concerning.--Jezebel'sPonyobons mots 21:30, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      I believe it's licensed under the GPLv2 so I'll see if I can bring it up on my account.--v/r - TP 00:50, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I'm going to email Nakon and let them know I took a copy of their tool, but feel free to use this. Please don't update any links though. If Nakon restores their account or asks me to take my copy down, then it'll be pointless.--v/r - TP 00:56, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Thanks for the stop gap. Note that the link to Nakon's tool is included in at least one template (i.e the unblock granted template used here). --Jezebel'sPonyobons mots 05:29, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      User:Bidgee 's edit warring on Telstra article

      This user reverts edits without reason, refuses to explain his reasons on TALK page, and deleted attempts to TALK on his user page. Pls review and help. Thanks Jimbob96 (talk) 11:10, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      WP:AN/3RR? ES&L 11:14, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      If anyone bothers to look and research, there is a single editor who socks by using a number of usernames and IPs (even YuMaNuMa picked up on it) to push though content that isn't supported not just by editors but facts. I'm tired of POV-pushers using socking to get what they want and not the unbiased facts, as far as I'm concerned I've given up on Wikipedia, it is a lost cause and no wonder why it's losing valued contributors. Bidgee (talk) 11:26, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Jimbob blocked, and one of his IPs also. Feel free to report additional accounts or IP addresses to me, and I'll happily block them. Nyttend (talk) 12:46, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Wiki-PR claim

      I see from their site that they claim a 'staff of 45 Wikipedia editors and admins'. Has there been any sign that they have a WP admin on their books? If true, would the standing of such an admin be affected here? I'm not asking for outing, or unfounded allegations. Just a sort of yes or no, and what if. Peridon (talk) 12:26, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

       – For reference, this is the site discussed: https://www.wiki-pr.com/

      --Auric talk 12:33, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • Are you kidding? Of course their standing would be affected by this. Assuming they are being paid for being associated with a company, they have the possibility of doing serious damage. Among other things, they could hypothetically delete revisions unfavorable to them, protect articles in a dispute over content to something favorable, block accounts that are causing problems for them and be the judge of (deletion) discussions where they could pose as a neutral party when they are not. Being an administrator and being associated with Wiki-PR is a no-no. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 13:29, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Also dug up this link to past discussions.--Auric talk 13:40, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      There has recently been extensive discussion of Wiki-PR at User talk:Jimbo Wales/Archive 144#Wiki-pr.com. Looie496 (talk) 16:14, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      What happened to WP:AGF Moe? This whole thing is a big ABF witch hunt imo.--v/r - TP 16:16, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Good faith is acting with detachment (as one paid for cannot, as they are attached) - good faith is (without other commitment) acting. Pretense is the opposite of acting in good faith, and failing to disclose a financial COI is acting under pretense that one does not have another commitment. Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:54, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      That has nothing to do with good faith. Good faith is trusting others. Being paid is not contradictory to improving the encyclopedia. Ya'all haven't proved Wiki-PR has harmed the encyclopedia. That makes this a witch hunt because they give you the "wee bee gee bees". Salem Witch Trials anyone?--v/r - TP 17:07, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      What? Have you just assumed bad faith? Salem Witch trials? Did you read good faith? Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:32, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      How about you address my point? Has any evidence been submitted that demonstrates Wiki-PR is a net negative?--v/r - TP 17:46, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The Salem fucking Witch Trials. When is that allegory going to be officially declared "lame"? Soon... Doc talk 18:00, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Although there is no conclusive evidence, the thinking goes that such a team of editors and admins could essentially WP:OWN articles and insert NPOV material unopposed. KonveyorBelt 18:02, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I thought witch trials was your point. But sure. This discussion is one example: it undermines the basis for assuming good faith. Moreover, it casts doubt upon the articles created by people who are not upfront about their paid interest. In every edit there is one judge of V; NPOV; NOR; and BLP and that is the User who makes it; sure others may come along and and debate it or even revert it -- sometimes. But where the judge has been paid for the edit, there is no basis for faith in the judgment, where the judge is not honest about the other interest they serve. It misleads our readers to present it otherwise. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:04, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      (edit conflict) Doc, if you have another historical reference for trying someone w/o evidence and concluding them guilty and sentencing them, please share it. Konveyor - The thinking may go, but that's why we have a policy WP:AGF. @ASW - I'm sorry, are you saying the act of defending someone proves their guilt? No sir, that's a logical fallacy. Show me evidence. Or are you accusing me of being one of the 'secret admins'? If so, prove it or find yourself at ANI. (Since you can't, because I'm not, you need to rephrase your comment)--v/r - TP 18:06, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      What? You are accusing you, which would be much more damaging to you than anything I have said. My comment said nothing about defending someone. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:18, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      A reliable assessment of the impact of Wiki-PR presumably requires a list of their accounts. Is there one ? Sean.hoyland - talk 18:10, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      That would be the easy way, but not the only way. So you're saying we can accuse and try someone because they don't make it easy to convict them? Do the work or this is all a witch hunt.--v/r - TP 18:12, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      No, I said "A reliable assessment of the impact of Wiki-PR presumably requires a list of their accounts. Is there one ?" Sean.hoyland - talk 18:16, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Talkin' like a witch hunter. Witch hunters deserve no answers. Doc talk 18:21, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      For a list of (some of) their accounts, see here and here. JohnCD (talk) 19:06, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      So, without even having to look at a single edit, and assuming those accounts have been connected to Wiki-PR, there's evidence that one or more Wiki-PR editors have used deception via sockpuppetry and resources have been wasted having to deal with it. Sean.hoyland - talk 20:01, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The casepage says it's not socking.--v/r - TP 20:20, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      WP:MEAT is part of the sock-puppet policy. So is "editing under multiple IP addresses [...] where it is done deceptively." I presented evidence of the latter in the cases that were closed without investigation (search for the word "Pleasanton"). —rybec 20:50, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      A more precise phrasing would therefore be to say "via WP:PUPPET policy violations, primarily WP:MEAT" rather than "via sockpuppetry". So this case is rather like Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/CAMERA lobbying, with financial gain replacing nationalism as a motivating factor. Sean.hoyland - talk 21:03, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • TParis: The original question that I answered was whether the standing of an administrator be damaged by being paid by Wiki-PR or not. I still believe it would be. It's not a question of whether the material being put into Wikipedia is acceptable or not, they are paid a lot of money so that it sticks and isn't PROD'ed or AFD'ed. The problem is that editors associated with Wiki-PR are being deceptive by pretending to not have a conflict of interest, which certainly being paid to edit does make you have one. It's doubly so for an administrator though, because you're in a position of power which means you have the nod from the community to go ahead do what you like as long as it seemingly fits within a policy. There's not much to assume good faith on because if you haven't directly declared that you're a paid editor, as an administrator, you're going to cast doubt as to whether your administrative actions were in fairness and all your past actions would be given a second look, which to me tarnishes your reputation as an admin. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 19:39, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • You're assuming those editors value the payment more than Wikipedia. I've been paid to write an article before and I had no problem putting Wikipedia first. It wasn't a ton of money, but that's not the point. The point is, you have to judge people by their edits and not because of who they work for. If you can't find anything wrong with the edits (and let me once again repeat that no evidence of misbehavior has been found and a user has now been blocked not because of his edits but because of who he works for) then there is no problem.--v/r - TP 19:50, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
          • No it is not an assumption, it is a documented, evidenced problem [14]. Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:04, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
            • Okay, so where are the bad edits?--v/r - TP 20:22, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Have you looked at the LTA or SPI for Morning277? There's plenty of deleted tripe in there. There's plenty of obvious PR fluff added to Priceline's subsidiaries, and although it's not the worst stuff in the world, it's still PR fluff. There's plenty of other horrible Wiki-PR edits easily trackable, but for the most part I've given up tracking them until it's clear what we're going to do regarding them now that the SPI is closed. By itself, the fact that Wiki-PR that was responsible for the series of events that resulted in the departure or effective departure of multiple long-term highly productive editors is enough to say they're a net negative. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:32, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Also, seriously TP, 'no evidence of misbehavior has been found'? Between the LTA and SPI cases and what has happened in private channels, people have spent hundreds of hours compiling evidence of misbehavior by Wiki-PR, and there's been plenty of it. Are you thinking of the cban for Alex's group that passed a few days ago? They are a different group of people and should not be conflated. Kevin Gorman (talk) 20:53, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Yes, Kevin, I am. Which group is that guy then?--v/r - TP 22:21, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion (and blocked account) from several days ago involved Alex_Konanykhin's WikiExperts.us. They generally only accept high profile clients and make an effort to stay within at least a couple margins of neutrality so that they don't get outed. The people involved in Wiki-PR create huge numbers of really shitty articles, and don't try to approach anything resembling neutrality on their higher profile clients. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:33, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      My bad then. In that case, all of my arguments thus far were meant for WikiExperts.--v/r - TP 22:34, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      To answer the OP's question that I am not sure has been answered: it seems highly dubious they have admins on their payroll. That said, I think that we would benefit significantly from having an open conversation about what we are going to do about this clearly identified, clearly problematic issue. I would encourage people to avoid further discussion of unrelated matters (like WikiExperts) in this thread, and if anyone wants to hat my off-topic comments, please feel free to do so. Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:56, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Please archive my talk page

      That'll teach me to try and work on a friend's tablet while he's giving me a ride home! ☺ · Salvidrim! · ✉ 14:08, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      This is User:Salvidrim!, I'm logged out cause I'm not home. I just created User talk:Salvidrim/Archive8 to archive part of my talk page but some automated anti-vandal filter prevents me from removing the same sections from my main talk page as an IP. Please just remove sections up to and including User talk:Salvidrim!#Help me with the summary "manually archiving per request"... thanks. 66.129.141.197 (talk) 13:26, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Done: [15] :) equazcion → 13:28, 19 Oct 2013 (UTC)
      Why are your archives at a different username (one with no exclamation point (!))? Ah, none of my business. Rgrds. --64.85.214.181 (talk) 14:00, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      It's actually only this new one that's at the non-exclamation version, or so it looks. Could just be a mistake. equazcion → 14:03, 19 Oct 2013 (UTC)
      Ah... I was renamed from Salvidrim to Salvidrim! a few months back and my existing archives were moved & renamed but I never updated the links on my talk page's archive box, so the new one was created at my previous username. It's not a problem, since I still control both SULs... I'll just fix it at some point today. Cheers, and thanks Equazcion! ☺ · Salvidrim! · ✉ 14:08, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

      A second opinion please

      Hello. I have been recently blocked for 24 hrs period for alleged edit-warring on Boro Primorac article, I have decided not to appeal due it's short period however I believe putting me on some warning list is way to harsh. You can see me reporting Timbouctou (a user who has been blocked and warned several times before for similar transgressions) at WP:AN3. The final result was that I was also blocked and put on a warning list. Now it is my deepest conviction I did not deserve this kind of treatment because: 1. I did not break the 3RR at the moment I reported this incident. I made only three reverts and the situation already diffused. My final edit which I added later along with the valid reference shows and proves I was right the entire time. 2. By the subjective opinion of the moderator who handled this issue I was also, allegedly, edit-warring. But the question remains: is reverting a disruptive (and unsourced) editing of an aggressive user, who BTW followed me to that article just to instigate a conflict, edit-warring? By such logic any action of reverting disruptive editing can be interpreted as edit-warring. And 3. If you look at my history (I am on Wikipedia about 2 years now) I have never ever been in such dispute as this, nor have I ever been even warned for anything similar. And now I am blocked and warned for something someone else did...I accept that perhaps a part of responsibility lies in my corner but surely I shouldn't have been treated the same way as the other person in question - the other user was not even put on a warning list for that same article. So I ask for a second opinion and is this really fair? I feel this was blown out of proportions, the main issue was 3RR violation by the other user. I ask that you review how justified it is for me to be placed on that warning list. Thank you. Shokatz (talk) 18:59, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      "Warning list": what do you mean? This edit? If so, you've not been placed on a warning list; this is basically something saying "In case you didn't know, these articles are treated differently, so be extra careful to edit within the guidelines, since doing otherwise will quickly result in a block". Nyttend (talk) 19:26, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Well, you are asking a few different questions there. One is "were you really edit warring" and the answer to that is yes. Unless you were undoing blatant vandalism there is never an excuse for edit warring. Nobody is in the right in an edit war, anyone who participates in one is in the wrong. I hope that clears up that point.
      As to the list, it is a list of many users who have been warned that they are editing in area where there are sanctions in place. It does not confer any special status, you are not under any personal restrictions, it is merely a log stating that you were warned about the general sanctions in this area so that if you violate the terms of those sanctions and are blocked for it you can't turn around and say nobody told you they existed. It's not a mark of shame or anything, just a log for the sake of clarity. If you don't want to be affected by it you can either make sure you abide by the terms of the sanctions or just don't edit in that topic area anymore. It is no more complicated than that. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:02, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Ah...thank you Nyttend and Beeblebrox for replying. I interpreted that list as some type of warning where I would get some special attention or something. If it's only a notice list then I don't have a problem with it. As for my block, yes, I consider I wasn't edit-warring but reverting obvious disruptive behavior. You can see from my edits that I was reverting to the original consensus version of the article which the user in question was trying to change without discussion or references and IMO followed me there just to instigate conflict. However since the block was already applied and expired I guess that issue is already settled, I don't see how I can remedy that. Anyway thank you both for replying. Shokatz (talk) 20:40, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Beeblebrox, editing the Boro Primorac article is under discretionary sanctions? Liz Read! Talk! 1:50 pm, Today (UTC−7)
      It falls under ARBMAC, which applies to "topics related to the Balkans, broadly interpreted". Given that the edit war was about whether this footballer is Croatian or Bosnian, the ARBMAC discretionary sanctions apply (although I'm open to a different interpretation). —Darkwind (talk) 22:56, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Note that Shokatz's claim that "If you look at my history (I am on Wikipedia about 2 years now) I have never ever been in such dispute as this, nor have I ever been even warned for anything similar" is quite simply not true. I've personally warned the user about edit warring here. The user regularly edit wars on Croatian related subjects to try to WP:WIN content disputes, often violating the 3RR in the process. See Talk:2013_enlargement_of_the_European_Union/Archive_1#Deletion_of_official_sources, Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive798#Admin intervention please... and [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21] where the user made 4 reverts in a little over two hours. The user has demonstrated a lack of understanding of WP:3RR, and their usual response is to deny or rationalize having violated the policy citing "vandalism" or "disruption" as excuses, even when (as in this case) there is an obvious bright line 3RR violation (ie "I am convinced I did not break the 3RR, the fourth edit was added after the reported incident and it included a reference which ended the entire charade"). TDL (talk) 23:23, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      When I said I was never warned LIKE THIS I was obviously talking about moderators not about users who were in "content dispute" with me...which BTW I had only 2 of such cases in my entire time at Wikipedia prior to this. And funny you should complain after all this time since I clearly remember you being a participant of that same incident. Erasing official sources without discussion or consensus. The entire issue was settled when it was ME who stepped back and when you accepted to leave those sources as you should have done in the first place. And as far as I remember it was I who started the entire discussion on the talk page although it was you who was removing references from the article. Saying "The user regularly edit wars on Croatian related subjects" is a fallacious and offensive statement. WP:CIVIL anyone? Shokatz (talk) 18:08, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Then your memory is mistaken as I never removed any official sources. In fact, I agreed with you that the source should not be removed. And the entire incident was actually resolved when you complained to ANI that multiple long-standing, good standing editors were "clone accounts" without any evidence and made WP:HITLER attacks that their edits were "vandalism" even though it was clearly a content dispute, which led to the article being full protected.
      You have also been warned for edit warring on a Croatian issue here ([22], [23], [24], [25])
      There are plenty of other recent examples where you edit war on Croatian related subjects. Just from the last couple weeks I found: [26], [27], [28]; [29], [30], [31]; [32], [33], [34]; [35], [36], [37]; [38], [39], [40].
      Obviously I am interested in Croatia-related subjects. I have never made that a secret and I was always very open with that. Also I am not exactly sure what is your motivation for this entire "show" of yours, although I can guess by the way you are choosing certain edits of mine and making baseless out of context comments. So since I don't really want to spend any more time on you, I will just say this - if you think I am such a disruptive menace for Wikipedia, feel free to report me. It's simple as that. Over and out. Shokatz (talk) 22:03, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Block appears MORE than valid. They have also been made aware of discretionary sanctions on Balkans articles - which is simply SOP. No issues with block, or the "adding to the list of warned users" ES&L 23:29, 19 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Ban Appeal of AKonanykhin

      A user has requested that a ban recently implemented here be lifted. I must remark that the ban was placed without meeting the formal requirements of WP:BAN, which states that there must be evidence of repeated disruption by a user. The closing admin Kudpung (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) stated that they are "cutting and running", going offline for one week.[41] I have no issue with an editor taking a break; but an admin should not make a contentious administrative action if they know they will be unavailable to explain. Before leaving Kudpung refused to explain their actions when I challenged them. Per WP:ADMINACCT, administrators are expected to explain their actions. Regrettably, I am unable to discuss the matter with Kudpung, so we are right back here.

      The text of the appeal:

      I would like to request the lifting of the ban against WikiExperts, that is now archived here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Archive254#Community_ban_proposal_for_paid_editing_firm_wikiexperts.us
      While I believed we were acting within Wikipedia guidelines beforehand by treating COI disclosure as a suggestion, we respect the community’s decision that COI disclosure must be mandatory for us for anybody from WikiExperts to edit Wikipedia, in addition to all other COI guidelines. Therefore, we will be treating COI guidelines as policy from this point forward.
      Until the ban is lifted, we have stopped editing as per the ban’s request, and will only do so once the ban is lifted in accordance to the language within it, which read, “The ban should be set so that it can be lifted at once if the company agrees all of its representatives will fully and publicly disclose COI/paid editing and otherwise fully adhere to the guidelines of WP:COI in the future, and contingent that they in fact do so in all future cases.” Once the ban is lifted, COI disclosure will be followed by anyone who edits in conjunction with WikiExperts.
      As the CEO of WikiExperts I am stating here that from this point forward we will comply with the terms set out for lifting the ban. We have already updated our agreements and are in the process of updating our Ethics page on our website in anticipation of this change.
      Would you please post my statement at the AN so that we can proceed with the conditions for lifting the ban. Thank you! AKonanykhin (talk) 18:38, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

      My greatest concern is that the user was banned without any diffs showing disruptive edits. They were banned for suspicion that they might do something wrong. This shocks the conscience and goes against our principles. In any event, the user has stated that they will adhere to policy and to WP:COI, and will disclose any paid editing. I think it will be better for Wikipedia to encourage this firm to operate in the open rather than driving them underground. We have no practical way to identify their employees, so the ban is a toothless provocation and ensures that these editors will never disclose what they are doing. Jehochman Talk 14:19, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Further info from the user:

      On Friday, I attempted to communicate our compliance to the Arbitration Board, and its representative User:Roger Davies responded that the better way would be to place it on my Talk Page and ask somebody to add it to AN (see below). Yesterday, I complied with Mr. Davies' recommendation, posting our compliance pledge to my Talk Page and asking the admin Kudpung who enacted the ban to add it to AN. As I had no means to contact him directly, I did so by placing a note on his Talk page, and promptly removing it to avoid accusations of unathorized editing; the full text was only left on my Talk page. In retaliation, Kudpung banned IP address of our Hollywood FL office and greatly expanded the ban to any account "operated or assumed to be by Wikiexperts.com" This wide ban was enacted without any evidence of any violation of any rule by our company, as you rightly observed. I personally was banned without having ever made even a single edit in any WP article.

      Thank you for considering his appeal. Jehochman Talk 14:28, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      For completeness, what I wrote was:

      "Thanks for your email. We would in all likelihood refer this to the community as it was a community ban decision, with plenty of participation, relating to a hot button topic.

      "However, it occurs to me that you can appeal to the community yourself - more quickly - by posting this request yourself on-wiki on your user page, with a note asking for it to be cross-posted to the Administrators Noticeboard."

      I have formed no opinion on the merits or demerits of the appeal,  Roger Davies talk 15:07, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • Support First a minor point - the AN Ban discussion was closed on the 17th while the notice of unavailability was posted on the 20th. It is unreasonable and unfair to assume that Kudpung closed it on the 17th, knowing that he would be unavailable starting three days later. The timing is unfortunate, but that's all it is.
      That said, I support overturning the ban. I haven't read the entire discussion, but I see enough problems that, as a minimum, we should start over and do it right if a ban is warranted, and ideally, find a way to reach out and determine whether there is a way to maintain the integrity of the encyclopedia without declaring that the business cannot do anything.
      The most important reason, and already noted, is the lack of diffs. Have we ever banned an contributor without citing a single diff? That alone ought to be a sufficient reason for overturning, but I'll not a couple other points. The Morning277 issue understandably leaves a bad taste. However, when one entity involved in paid editing wreaks havoc, we shouldn't jump to the conclusion that all entities involved in paid editing deserve similar opprobrium.
      Some of the support are in reaction to strong words by the owner, which appear to defy our positions on COI. I agree that there was a bit of a bull in a china shop reaction, however, those concerns appear to have been taken on board, and the owner has changed policies. If we supported a ban based upon his initial position, we at least owe a second consideration when that very position is changed.--SPhilbrick(Talk) 15:30, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment, concurrent with the ban discussion there were policy discussions to try to establish standards for paid editors. One proposal banning paid editing was heavily opposed. Another, drafted by me, requiring paid editors to disclose has receive significant opposition for being too strong. It seems very strange to ban somebody for something that's not yet policy, and especially when the proposal "paid editing is forbidden" has a majority of opposition in the community. Jehochman Talk 15:36, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • First of all, the lack of diffs is a lot less troubling to me than to you all. If someone says "I will trash Wikipedia" we have every right to say "You may not edit here". Of course his statement wasn't that strong, but "I will not play by your rules" is close enough IMO. That they are willing to follow the rules at this point is wonderful, but I think it's fair to worry if they actually will. I'd say:
        • conditional support. With the condition being that every editor who has or is editing for them be identified including alt accounts. If and when we find someone editing for them who isn't on that list, we can reinstate the ban. First of all, I think that's how paid editing should work (and I speak as someone who has written a proposal to the NSF to pay people to edit here--it barely didn't get funded sadly but I'd have had all editors identify that they were being paid). Secondly, given previous statements from this company, I think "trust but verify" is important. Without such a bit of clarity it will be impossible to fully verify. Hobit (talk) 15:53, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
          • So you think someone should be banned for thoughtcrime whether or not the actually broke any rules. OK, lets put your theory to the test. I will not play by your rules. I will trash Wikipedia. Please take your best shot at getting me banned for making those two statements without any evidence that I have ever actually trashed Wikipedia or refused to follow the rules. Let me know how that works out for you. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:32, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
            • There is plenty of evidence that this person has violated COI and our meat puppetry rules in the past. His threat to do so again is credible, yours is not. If you were to trash the main page and then later threaten to do so again, you'd be blocked in a heartbeat. It is unreasonable not to react to credible threats. We do it all the time with legal threats here. Why is this different? Hobit (talk) 03:15, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • I would disagree with Jehochman on one point: Wikiexperts was already "underground". The refusal to be open and honest about whose articles they were paid to edit - and lets face it, this is a PR group so AGF or no, NPOV cannot be automatically assumed - was antiethical and counter to community expectations. If they are prepared to act above board, then I am willing to reconsider my previous support of the ban. Resolute 15:58, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support unban I supported the ban in the 17 October ban discussion, "until they change their declared policy and commit to stating their COI and restricting their edits to talk pages." That appears to have happened. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 16:10, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • I read their comments a couple of times and am missing where they say that they will restrict their edits to talk pages. Is that somehow implied by the "following all COI guidelines"? If so, I'd prefer it be made explicit. Hobit (talk) 16:15, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support Given that effective enforcement of the ban would requiring outing every Wikipedia editor, it's a self-righteous feel good action, not a reasonable approach to an admittedly very real problem. It will drive paid editing deeper underground and provide yet-another-thing for Wikipedia editors to accuse each other of. NE Ent 16:19, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • This appeal, though no fault of the User that represents the corporation states much that is irrelevant 1) "driving underground" has not occurred as the corporation has undertaken not to edit through the ban; 2) the community decision was based on statements of the corporation and through its representative, which in the consensus opinion made banning the needed remedy. Nonetheless, the undertakings of the corporation seem to address the major consensus concerns expressed, so if they follow through, including disclosure and their web page, and under current Wiki norms: not opposed to unban pursuant to these immediate undertakings. Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:23, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditional support: If they have indicated that they will fully comply with WP:COI instead of treating it as "unethical" as they were before, then the conditions that led to the ban have been satisfied. However, it should be made clear that reversion to previous behavior will lead to the banhammer being dropped once more. - The Bushranger One ping only 16:55, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Maybe I'm just a lot more cynical or less trusting than you guys, but I have serious reservations about lifting this ban. The attitude expressed here is shocking and appalling on so many levels that it's hard to know where to start. I mean, reading it now, I'm still not totally convinced that it's not a trolling parody. This is someone telling you that their official viewpoint is that it's "unethical" to disclose a financial conflict of interest. How would a sane, reputable publisher respond to a declaration like that?

        I'm a bit skeptical about the turnaround from the defiant stick-your-guidelines-where-the-sun-don't-shine attitude to the current conciliatory request above, and I've generally found modifying one's actual ethics to be much more difficult than modifying one's corporate Code Of Ethics document. I don't think this is a good idea. I'm opposed to it, unless we have some concrete way of ensuring that they follow through on what are currently unenforceable promises made under extreme duress. MastCell Talk 17:13, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

        @MastCell: I've checked out the user, spoken with him, and am convinced that he's too serious to waste time trolling us. I think the ban was hasty, and there is a principle at stake: we don't ban people for suspicion. The banned account never even edited main space. Why are we so desperate to muzzle this guy? Let's assume good faith. If I'm wrong, WP:ROPE will be effective. Let's let his editors disclose themselves and promise to treat them fairly, while firmly enforcing WP:NPOV and all our other policies. Jehochman Talk 17:39, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        As one cynic to another -- if the ban is upheld, do you really think the company will cease editing? NE Ent 23:21, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment - I am sure many folks here are aware that in light of the recent uncovering of the SPI network run by WIki-PR, new policies were proposed to ban paid advocacy. See discussion here for a sense of the very mixed thoughts of the community. I posted notice of this discussion, there. Jytdog (talk) 17:21, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose at least for now. While it does seem like the process by which WikiExperts was banned was flawed, there is deep discomfort in the community with this kind of activity. We should not allow WikiExperts back in until the community has made up its mind on how to deal with this paid advocacy. I also note that the brief description that appears with WikiExpert's "hit" on Google, reads "WikiExperts handles this task for you, protecting your online reputation." Wikipedia does not exist to enhance or detract from anyone's reputation - it exists to provide NPOV information. If you read their Ethics page, while it is great that they say they will not remove any well-sourced negative information, at no point do say that they would actually add negative information about a company, even if that information were well-sourced. This is what I mean, about editors working for WIkiExperts actually not being aligned with WIkipedia's goals. Jytdog (talk) 17:21, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong Support The whole community ban proposal was a illegitimate witch hunt intended to out editors and get them banned. That goes against what Wikipedia stands for. KonveyorBelt 17:25, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong support Konveyor Belt is absolutely correct. And for the admin who closed the discussion in favor of the ban- shame on you and you should be stripped of your admin abilities, that was an abuse of power and completely not in line with policy or even the community feelings on the issue, there is no way in hell that discussion was in favor of a ban by the Community and should have been closed as "no consensus" at the very least. I am so disappointed. The ban is illegitimate and was never agreed upon by consensus.Camelbinky (talk) 17:31, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong Support per Jehochman and SPhilbrick. We do not want to go down the road of banning folks preemptively and without evidence. Especially not with a user/company that is making a good faith effort.--v/r - TP 17:32, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditional support - more or less as per Bushranger above, if they have indicated they will comply with WP:COI fully. It would also help a lot if the frankly inexcusable statement they made about how it is unethical to abide by our policies and guidelines is very visibly and prominently rescinded and apologized for. I believe I had justification for supporting the ban based on their stated disregard for policy and guidelines, and I believe that keeping the ban in place until that statement is clearly retracted and they agree to abide by all relevant policies and guidelines is clearly indicated, here and elsewhere. John Carter (talk) 17:40, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditional support. If every WikiExpert editor declares their COI, and participates via talk page suggestions, I am willing to let them do so. Regarding the absence of diffs; they are not needed. I approve of the banning of an editor who declares the intention to violate Wikipedia's policies. Binksternet (talk) 17:46, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support. The ban was ridiculous and out of process. Eric Corbett 17:47, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support. I find the reasoning of "no diffs provided" and other process-related complaints about the banning discussion to be a bit circular and more than a bit lawyerish. When someone states they plan to circumvent the guidelines here, I'd say the need for specific diffs of editing infractions is pretty much superseded -- especially when that circumvention is what prevents us from potentially finding any such diffs to begin with. But that said, since I only supported the ban because of their stated policy of non-disclosure, if they change their policy to full disclosure -- an oft-updated list on their site, of the Wikiepdia usernames in their prevue, would be ideal -- I'm fine with letting them back (that is, unless/until we pass something that says paid editing is disallowed altogether). equazcion → 17:53, 20 Oct 2013 (UTC)
        • So you think that the requirement for actual evidence of of editing infractions superseded if someone says that they plan to circumvent the guidelines here? OK, lets put your theory to the test. I plan to circumvent the guidelines here. Please take your best shot at getting me banned for making that statement without any evidence that I have ever actually circumvented any guidelines. Let me know how that works out for you. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:44, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support unban which should never have been enacted in the first place. --John (talk) 17:55, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditional support for lifting the ban. Clearly reveal all editors being paid by this company, and commit to exercising conformance to all policies and guidelines by those editors. Guidelines may not be "policy", but they are deemed guidelines because they are agreed by the community to be best practices. Improper conduct by any editor under the authority of this company may result in a sanctions being applied as to all representatives of the company. bd2412 T 17:59, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support The problem last time around was their opposition to our policies. They have committed to abiding by the community norms now, so there isn't an ongoing reason to restrict their editing. Some have suggested that the ban be lifted under the condition that WikiExperts only ever edits talk pages. While I agree this is a good practice to encourage, I don't think we should make the unban conditional on them never making an article edit. {{requested edit}} gets backlogged often, sometimes for very extended periods of time... and editor retention in that area is poor. This is especially true with respect to editing articles about obscure companies. Uncontroversial edits should be uncontroversial, even if made by their team, and WikiExperts should not be discouraged from making grammar corrections or fighting vandalism just because they're being paid for that purpose. Edits where neutrality is a possible concern should, obviously, be discussed, but I don't want to see them banned in the future just for making neutral changes to articles on their own. We need people to edit these articles. As long as they are being edited neutrally, that is a net benefit to the project.   — Jess· Δ♥ 18:01, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditional support While I don't support the venture of WikiExperts, per se, insofar as they recognize and comply with the COI policy, there would appear to be no grounds to band them.
      That said, I don't think that the current policy is adequate, so hopefully this will lead to some sort of evolution vis-a-vis the current (inadequate) policies.--Ubikwit 連絡 見学/迷惑 18:02, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • Oppose Upon reading some of the other comments about meat puppetry--setting aside the sockpuppetry--I've decided to change my vote until that issue is clarified. It seems that if you have more than one editor from a paid editing group editing the same article that other policy issues arise. Perhaps the ban should be maintained until the community can work out a viable policy solution, or WMF imposes one.--Ubikwit 連絡 見学/迷惑 04:57, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support, and make sure that this editor is handled in a fair and transparent manner. The speed of reaction has a knee jerk feel to it. I see no reason yet to ban this editor because he exhibits fairly ordinary behaviour, despite the paid editing accusations and the firm he appears to head being controversial. However, should his behaviour become worthy of a ban, yes, ban him in the future. Fiddle Faddle 18:05, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditionally support unban as the one who originally proposed the ban. If wikiexperts.us has now agreed to make the requisite COI disclosure, the ban is no longer as a preventative measure and would be purely punitive. Lifting of the ban should, of course, be conditional upon actually doing that going forward. Seraphimblade Talk to me 18:20, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support this is going to continue no matter how many we ban, better to address paid editors now and establish additional guidelines if needed. Darkstar1st (talk) 18:34, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose I can't find myself supporting this unblock at this time. Just far to early in my opinion, and the exact reasoning seems to boarder on the desperate to unblock over what could be seen as a technicality. We are not a court of law, just volunteers trying to build an encyclopedia. I find the entire subject of a company who's entire existence appears to be about paid editing to run afoul of what I believe Wikipedia is. It places an unfair advantage to articles that have editors being paid on a regular basis to edit here with permission. I see almost no way to make this work even with the proposal from below. But what I do see is many editors who have some argument I can understand if not truly agree with. This isn't a block appeal of a single editor. So I oppose the unblock of the entire company being allowed back right now, but would support the single editor himself being unblocked. Let him, as the CEO of this company, first lead by example. If they can be seen to be working within the policies and guidelines of Wikipedia I think we can revisit this in a short time.--Mark Miller (talk) 18:36, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Absolutely not. Since when do we even consider an unban request just a few days after the ban is implemented? Come back a year or two from now. Nyttend (talk) 18:38, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • Since it emerged that this ban was incorrect in the first place, that the victim of the ban had done nothing wrong at all, and that the ban was placed to enforce a principle that the majority of Wikipedians do not agree with. That's when. --John (talk) 18:45, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose: There were many diffs listed in the discussion showing infringements of WP:Sock puppetry here: [42] and also here [43] and here [44]. After concerns were first raised that there were infringements of WP:Sock puppetry, user denied and said these accusations were done "falsely" [45]. But at the SPI investigation Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Wexperts/Archive, User:AKonanykhin admits to paying an editor to insert a promo shot of Alexander Konanykhin into the Alex Konanykhin article. He also admits to paying an editor who was then blocked for insertion of spam and advertising [46]. So, when these concerns were first raised, user's response was to deny. Then, when clear evidence is presented, the admissions come. If the user really is contrite, then surely user would be more than willing to show this contrition by sitting out a reasonable time for a block, not just a few days. The unblock proposal sounds far more like a continuation of the falsehoods in an attempt to continue past behaviour. --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 19:12, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditional support, with heavy emphasis on "conditional". I agree with Hobit and bd2412. Trust but verify, as Hobit said. All accounts must be identified. All accounts must agree to abide by policies and guidelines, same as any other editor. If evidence appears that policies and guidelines are being ignored or violated, the ban comes back. And I want to add that all the comments about the existing ban being improper strike me as wikilawyering hogwash. It was a proper ban, based upon explicit evidence and community norms. This isn't a court of law, and the pleading about process in this particular instance has been utterly groundless. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:40, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support: A dangerous precedent, banning editors you don't like on suspicion that they might be damaging the encyclopedia. The Spanish Inquisition comes to mind. --Mike Cline (talk) 19:45, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • A straightforward statement that they won't follow COI and strong evidence of socking isn't enough to get over the "might be damaging" thing? Hobit (talk) 20:46, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
          • That is correct. A straightforward statement that they won't follow COI does not justify a ban. Bans need to be based upon actual violations, not on expressing unpopular opinions. As for strong evidence of socking, please show me where in the ban request socking was even claimed. If you want them banned for socking, write up a proposal that says that, and include some sort of evidence. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:56, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
            • A large number of those supporting the ban included socking as a reason for the ban. Just search for "sock". Look, we've got someone who A) admits to using socks and having others edit for him (which would be meatpuppetry) B) we have ample evidence does use socks/meatpuppets and C) clearly indicated an intent to keep doing this. And it would be an unpopular opinion to say "COI is a bad policy". It would be threatening to disrupt to say "I've ignored COI and intend to do so in the future". Hobit (talk) 03:39, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support lifting ban. Blocks are supposed to be preventative but I don't believe there was evidence of damage done to the encyclopedia. As long as they agree to abide by WP:COI and be open about it, I think they should be allowed to edit on article Talk Pages:
      "Paid advocates are very strongly discouraged from direct article editing, and should instead propose changes on the talk page of the article in question, or on a noticeboard such as WP:COIN. These changes may or may not be acted upon. Paid advocates are also advised to disclose their conflict of interest." WP:COI
      I encourage them to join Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement. If there are infractions in the future, they should dealt with. I don't believe in blocks based on suspicions, whether it is of a registered account or an IP. Liz Read! Talk! 19:49, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support… a little dubiously. But yes. To get personal and historical for a moment: Jehochman is a trusting guy. I've watched him assuming too much good faith quite often, and getting it flung back in his face. By contrast, the point made by MastCell, the original Wikipedia Cynic, really resonates with me: one's actual corporate ethics don't tend to be so easily changed as one's corporate Code Of Ethics document. Agreed. But I believe, or at least I hope, that the statement by AKonanykhin above will make it possible to unban on the "trust but verify" principle mentioned by several supporters of the unban proposal. Presumably some of us cynical people will be watching and verifying. It also impresses me that Seraphimblade, the original proposer of the ban, is now prepared to support an unban. And I'd like to second Tryptofish's characterization of the claims that the original ban was improper as "wikilawyering hogwash". It was a proper ban, and it should be immediately reinstated if the unban is gamed in any way. Bishonen | talk 20:26, 20 October 2013 (UTC).[reply]
      • Support. I am quite unhappy with the way that Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Community ban proposal for paid editing firm wikiexperts.us was closed. Normally when the result of a discussion goes against me I have no problem accepting and following the consensus, but in this case the closing comments ("There is a clear consensus to support the proposal, based both numerically and on the strength of the arguments. Among the Oppose !votes and comments are strong recommendations for revising the WP:COI guidelines/policy, but that would be the subject of a separate discussion.") do not accurately reflect either the strength of the arguments or whether a significant number of the oppose comments were actually recommendations for revising the WP:COI guidelines/policy. In my opinion, Kudpung let his own POV cloud his judgement. I think that he should have asked for a couple of other uninvolved editor or admins to agree with the closing, as is common in hotly contested proposals. I maintain that a fair reading of the arguments shows that it is the support arguments that are weak and are actually recommendations for revising the WP:COI guidelines/policy by allowing someone to be banned even if they did nothing wrong, simply for expressing an unpopular opinion. That's a huge change from our policies and guidelines as written. Bans should be based upon actual specific edits that violate specific policies or guidelines, not on having a "contemptuous attitude toward our COI guidelines". --Guy Macon (talk) 21:09, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose. Many diffs proving meatpuppettry by people specifically connected to Akonanykhin were provided during previous AN discussion, and I do not see any procedural violations during previous discussion and closing. Where is disclosure? I mean the list of accounts that are currently used by members of this organization? Once again, this is not only a matter of COI, but a matter of proven meatpuppetry. My very best wishes (talk) 21:13, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Really, could you show me a few of them? I never saw any such diffs. Jehochman Talk 21:39, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I think we had at least four accounts acting his meatpuppets and edited his biography[47], [48], [49], [50]. One of them was blocked by an arbitrator, and rightly so. If anyone is interested in more detail, they can check previous AN discussion.My very best wishes (talk) 22:23, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      P.S. Key point during previous AN discussion was that Mr. Konanykhin can not comply with Wikipedia guidelines (even if they wanted ) because they are bound by a confidentiality agreement with their clients. Is it still the case? I understand that it is. My very best wishes (talk) 21:32, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      We have no interest in his contracts. If he is required to disclose for future edits, it is his problem to set up his contracts. That is not our concern. Jehochman Talk 21:39, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      User:Jehochman I really disagree with you. Based on what you write here, I have a bridge to sell you! My point being, that in any transaction it makes to sense to be sure that the other party can actually deliver what they promise (ie, you make sure i own the Brooklyn Bridge before you give a million bucks for it). If WikiExperts cannot disclose who their clients are, then their promises to do so are hollow and are even bad faith. Jytdog (talk) 22:10, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • He tells: we have non-disclosure agreements with our clients and editors [51]. It means that they have a number of "their" editors here and can not disclose their COI.My very best wishes (talk) 22:12, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      It would be surprising, if such an agreement did not have an out for complying with the demands of the privately run website they intend to participate in, but I get your concern. Alanscottwalker (talk) 23:44, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Conditional support only if WikiExperts agrees to publicly identify all past, present, and future accounts of their employees and contractors, disclose all COI relating to their clients, and refrain from editing or creating articles directly. The previous ban was brought up and supported because WikiExperts flagrantly declared their intention not to abide by COI guidelines (see comments such as those on the Signpost recently). If they reverse this position, act transparently about their financial COI, and refrain from direct editing, then they are completely welcome on Wikipedia. Steven Walling • talk 22:02, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Strong oppose The original block was based as far as I am aware, on indications that the "editor" would ignore WP policy. In other words, disruptive editing. Also there were a raft of sockpuppetry issues. I note the strong aversion to paid editing, its ethical and practical issues voiced by the community in that closed conversation. I believe user Kudpung was procedurally quite correct in his action. Why not just create a seperate business WP? I believe this is the thin end of the wedge, and the involvement of money, or worst, commercial profit as an incentive to join and edit WP will ultimately doom the project. If WP wishes to sup with the devil, it had better use a very long spoon. Irondome (talk)
      • Comment on proposal to lift ban. I think the risk of conflict of interest has to be severe when editors are paid. There are also plenty of unpaid Wikipedia editors who are not just subject to conflict of interest but are driven by special interests of their own, not neutral reporting. I agree that to ban a paid editor merely on a risk basis is itself questionable or perhaps unfair. I think that a paid editor should be required to post every one of his proposed edits on the article's talk page and leave it there for a week before posting it to the article. The talk page post should be clearly labeled as a proposal by a paid editor, with disclosure of his fee.Chjoaygame (talk) 22:18, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support the ban (past tense), as enacted, despite procedural problems with the discussion.. Not because he is a paid editor, but because he is a non-repentant sockpuppeteer in control of undisclosed paid accounts. I don't support a flat ban on paid editing, as impracticable, with undesirable obvious consequences. I do support mandatory disclosure of paid-editor status for every account engaged in paid editing, and declaration of banned status on every person in control of an undisclosed paid account. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:51, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      @SmokeyJoe: Please don't be a slander monger. Link to the proof of sock puppetry, or strike your accusation. As far as I know, there has been no confirmed report of sock puppetry by AKonanykhin. People repeating accusations they heard without demanding to see the evidence is how we got into this mess. Jehochman Talk 00:14, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Jehochman, slander seems very strong, I didn't think my reading of WP:SOCK violation was less than obvious. Perhaps I misunderstand something. If AKonanykhin (talk · contribs) denies being in control of any accounts (whether technical control or by contractual arrangement) used for undisclosed paid editing, then I support unbanning, the ban having no foundation. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:50, 21 October 2013 (UTC). "undisclosed" missing, always intended. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:06, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      SmokeyJoe, I have no idea who you are in real life, but I know exactly who AKonanykhin is, and so does everybody else. We must be careful when talking about people, especially identified people. We've heard people say "sock puppetry" and "its obvious", but is it really? The hand waving doesn't convince me. We need to see the diffs of his sock puppetry. Surely somebody can reference one diff where he's damaging the encyclopedia, if he's been engaging in sock puppetry. I think what we have here is a bunch of loose talk, and then people come along, look at the thread for 30 seconds and say, "Yeah, me too, I hate paid editing." The lesson to all is to dig into the details and look at the evidence before opining about somebody's behavior. Jehochman Talk 02:00, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I do not know who AKonanykhin is. I have not looked at that information, as I do not see this discussion as being about AKonanykhin, but about paid-editing in general. AKonanykhin deserves extra credence for speaking up openly, but I'm thinking that not all paid editors are organised by AKonanykhin. "Meat puppetry" and "sockpuppetry" are unfortunately strong pejoratives. We should talk instead of controlling undeclared alternative accounts (accounts clearly linked to the editors main account). We don't encourage this, but we allow it if it is not abused. The checkusers don't actively look for it in the absence of actual problems. I have no evidence or suspicion of AKonanykhin, or any of his writers, having submitted a damaging edit. However, many undisclosed paid editors, working unmonitored, may become damaging. I am keen to see us monitor paid editing. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:45, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      On the unban motion, I agree with Jehochman about procedural concerns with the cited ban discussion. I do not specifically criticise the closer, Kudpung.

      AKonanykhin now seems to say that he, and all his professional associates, his paid editors, will publicly disclose their COI/paid editing. This is a major development, changing the situation. Exactly what "publicly disclose COI/paid editing" means, I am not sure, and would like to know. As I stated somewhere else, I think only a minimal disclosure need be mandatory.

      Given AKonanykhin's new commitment, I support unbanning. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:13, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      I do not object to use of undeclared alternative accounts for good reason. Acceptably good reasons are poorly described, but there are reasons. Paid editing seems to be one reason. I am ambivalent on paid editing; it is a difficult reality for Wikipedia. On careful consideration, I think we must allow/support it, with restrictions, if the paid-editing accounts are disclosed as paid-editing accounts. Now, given that I'm supporting limited paid editing, I can see that it must be acceptable for respected editors who choose to engage in paid editing to use an alternative account that is not connected to their main account. I assume that AKonanykhin has an anonymous main account, and if so, I wouldn't ask him to declare it. If AKonanykhin employs Wikipedia paid editors, it is like meatpuppetry, but I think we must allow him to do this, subject to him committing to requiring his contracted writers to disclose their paid-editing accounts. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose unban (Support the ban) Agree with SmokeyJoe that paid editing by multiple accounts coodrinated from a single center is a violation of WP:SOCK as meatpuppeting (probably sockpuppeting as well). The only way we could allow paid editing by wikiexperts is if all the involved editors describe the conflict of interests and avoid edit warring. They did not do this so far Alex Bakharev (talk) 23:04, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      @Alex Bakharev: Please don't be a slander monger. Link to the proof of sock puppetry, or strike your accusation. As far as I know, there has been no confirmed report of sock puppetry by AKonanykhin. People repeating accusations they heard without demanding to see the evidence is how we got into this mess. Jehochman Talk 00:14, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      What proof do you need? Wkiexperts themselves claimed that they coordinate hundreds of Wikipedia accounts. Coordinating multiple accounts is of course a form of meatpuppery (if the accounts related to actual people) or sockpuppery (if they do not). Until all those accounts are properly identified and connected to each other for basic srutiny I am opposed to lifting the ban Alex Bakharev (talk) 00:50, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I need diffs showing some of these accounts coming together to corrupt the consensus at a community discussion. For instance, if the Wikiexperts help each others articles survive deletion discussions, we can ban them. If you don't have that evidence, all you have is hearsay and malice. That's not enough to ban somebody. Mere suspicion that somebody might do something wrong is not a reason to ban somebody. Jehochman Talk 00:53, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      But the tune has changed to try and twist out of the penalty. If we say okay, then you open pandoras box upon the website.--MONGO 02:49, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I'd simply ask that you look at the edits made to this person's bio and his various companies. There are clearly a number of paid editors working on those in clear violation of COI and our rules on meat-puppetry. Hobit (talk) 03:10, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Support unbanning of AKonanykhin and his company, on condition that any accounts used in the future by him, his company, regular employees who edit on its behalf, or its subcontractors are listed on a Wikipedia page (en:User:AKonanykhin would be the obvious place). Naming the clients is unnecessary. —rybec 02:03, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • Conditional support pending full and retroactive disclosure of all accounts. I'm not convinced that this appeal is genuine based on past experience with paid advocates, but disclosure will go a long way towards addressing the concern. MER-C 04:07, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support I disagreed with the reasoning of the original ban, but I hoped that the issue would lead to some sort of consensus on how we should tighten the currently toothless "strongly discouraged" COI wording. It didn't. That said, we need to make it worthwhile for editors to disclose their COIs. Currently, it is in the interest of paid editors to hide their relationship with their clients - they gain nothing from disclosure in spite of leaving themselves open to harassment, and yet risk nothing by non-disclosure. By respecting WikiExpert's offer to disclose their COIs, we finally do the opposite, providing value for the disclosure of COIs that makes it worth their while to do so. It may not work, but I think we should respect the offer and give it a go. - Bilby (talk) 04:21, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose - For what it's worth, I oppose this, since it's clear to me that the purposes of public relations people are antithetical to those of people who are attempting to write a NPOV encyclopedia. PR people serve a valuable purpose to the business community, and I have (indirectly) been the beneficiary of their work, but the usual course of business is that a PR person sends their info to some intermediary (a reporter on a newspaper, for instance), and the reporter decides how much of the info to use. It may provide a guide to the reporter for further investigation, or it may (in probably more cases than we'd like to know) be reported verbatim, but at least it has had the chance to be filtered through an intermediary who can use their independent judgment to weed out the worst of the promotional tendencies of the professional publicist. Reporters who pass along PR without vetting it have a tendency to be fired, or become PR persons themselves, because media outlets live and die by their reputations for accuracy.

        However, when a PR person has direct access to the means of dissemination, as is the case with Wikipedia, there is no longer an effective filter between their output and the encyclopedia. (Those who think that the cumulative result of all editors watching over he encyclopedia is an effective safeguard might be interested in doing a search of the project for "penis" to see the extent of the run-of-the-mill vandalism which hasn't been reverted by such means.) This is where the danger lies. If we allow public relations people to have clear and unfettered access to edit the articles in the encyclopedia, it is inevitable that we will eventually lose whatever reputation we have built up for neutrality and accuracy. Yes, people will still come to Wikipedia for information, since that habit has effectively been formed, but we will no longer be a free source of neutral information, we will be just another media vector for promotion and publicity. Those who think otherwise are, I believe, sticking their heads in the sand and ignoring the blatant reality of the situation. Those who protest that we can't effectively police PR misbehavior are like inner-city cops who let crime get out of hand because it was just too hard to keep fighting against it. Yes, obviously, if we were to ban paid editing (as I believe we should) those editors would work overtime to get around our defenses, and that might require some policy changes on our part, such as loosening the restrictions on CheckUser investigations, but new strategies from the opposition require such responses on our part, and using such we can keep PR-fluff to a reasonable level.

        I am absolutely certain that the vast majority of those opposing taking steps against PR-editing are sincere in their beliefs, but I believe that are entirely and utterly wrong. The game changed when Wikipedia became the first stop of choice for many people when they want to get a quick bit of information, and such a vector cannot be ignored by people who live and die by their ability to get out their clients' message to the most people possible. We are no longer amateurs here, regardless or whether we get paid or not, we are professional information providers, and it's out responsibility to see that the information we provide is as accurate and unbiased as possible. To do that in a context where we give free reign to those other professionals, the PR people whose job it is to provide biased and celebratory information, is much more difficult, which is why we should not be unbanning any admitted PR person. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:04, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Proposal for Disclosure

      What if: We have the editors who work for WikiExperts create separate COI accounts, like WMF staff members, that they use while making edits for WikiExperts? For example, if I were employed by them (which is not to say that I am, because I'm not), I would use User:TParis (WikiExperts) for all paid editing by WikiExperts and User:TParis for all of my normal editing. Using the WMF Staff member model, this could make it very clear which edits are by WikiExperts. The way it stands now, if we identify who their editors and customers are, we still do not know if each, and which, individual edits are being paid for or not. This solution would take all the ambiguity away. Thoughts?--v/r - TP 18:13, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      This strikes me as being maybe workable. That is provided these individuals actually do any editing that isn't for pay. There could be a bit of a blurry line, though, if I as a paid editor (which I am not) were to, perhaps, try to add some information on the topic of my COI to marginally related articles. An example might be trying to add a link to my business' building (which may or may not be prominent in the community) to the article on the city in which it exists, or something like that. Such edits might be seen as problematic if the editor, reasonably, thought the building should be mentioned, which perhaps it might be, but others, just as reasonably, might disagree regarding the amount or location of such content. In such cases, to what degree might COI be considered relevant, and, as a secondary concern, to what degree might, potentially, problematic paid editors (which would probably include only a comparatively small number) seek to excuse such problematic edits with this perhaps dubiously defensible reason? John Carter (talk) 18:19, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose This leads directly to witch hunting. If an editor sees they are paid 10/10 times thy will revert. If they explicitly state in their names they are a paid pr firm they will be reported to ANI and generally harassed. KonveyorBelt 18:22, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Not exactly. I've been paid to write articles and I've even managed to get them put on DYK: Template:Did_you_know_nominations/Dennis_Lo.--v/r - TP 19:38, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • It has been my experience the Wikipedia community is actually protective of COI editors who follow the Wikipedia:Plain and simple conflict of interest guide. Konveyor, you keep making claims about disclosure leading to harassment, but you never point to any specific examples. Evidence, please. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:20, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • User:CorporateM is out and proud and manages to get the job done. No doubt it is very much more uncomfortable and difficult to do it that way than to simply hide, but he/she nevertheless behaves ethically. Like TP, above. We could make it easier for them by reviewing their talk page requests and WP:AFC submissions in a timely manner. But we can't welcome a team here that openly defies community-agreed norms. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 01:37, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment. I'm not persuaded that we actually need it to be part of the username for the account, the way that "(WMF)" is used, but I do believe strongly that some kind of identification is needed, perhaps by way of userpage disclosure. I don't really buy the argument directly above, about inevitable reverting of good edits, because that's what discussion and consensus are for. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:31, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • I'm fine with this. Might be a good way to go with all paid editing. Hobit (talk) 20:07, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment. I think this ban can be lifted if they provide list of all their accounts (here and right now), so that everyone will be able to check what exactly they are doing. My very best wishes (talk) 21:19, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support Other paid editors, such as WWB, have used this method successfully. Steven Walling • talk 21:57, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support - I agree that the affiliation of paid editor should be in his/her username; disclosure upfront (like scientists with COI do in their scientific papers) is the way to go... don't bury the information. As volunteer editors our time here is precious, and I for one don't want to be suspicious of everybody I am working on an article with, to the point where I go check their pages to see who they are when there are disagreements. I think too that all their paid editing accounts should be listed on one page, so that it is easy to find the relevant editors and audit their compliance, for any editor or admin who wants to see how well they are keeping their promises (assuming we un-ban them) Responding to User:Konveyor Belt. I know what it is like to be witch-hunted, so please know that I am sympathetic with that concern. But we need to work toward compromise and consensus, and it would be helpful if you acknowledged that there is a big chunk of the community that is really concerned about paid editing - we need to work toward solutions everybody can live with and avoid exaggerations like "10/10 times they would be reverted." I hope you can see that.... Jytdog (talk) 22:20, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support as a general solution in such cases, but not in this particular case, where I think the ban should stay. My very best wishes (talk) 22:35, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support - every paid editor should indicate their allegiance otherwise it constitutes violation of WP:SOCK Alex Bakharev (talk) 23:04, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      It's not a violation of sock unless the employer asks all its employees to work together to subvert consensus. If there are 100 employees of Apple editing Wikipedia, which there probably are, should we block all of them for sock puppetry (starting with User:Alison who freely discloses her Apple affiliation)? Jehochman Talk 01:00, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support - Makes sense. Now, if we can just get User:Dickhead (Bigot) and User:Nice person (Acupuncturist) to fall into line when editing race or acupuncture articles, respectively, life will be much simpler here. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 01:37, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose - Really this sounds no stronger a policy or guideline than just requiring the user to create an account with that companies name in it like, oh...I don't know..User:Arturo at BP and follow that example. But they should still not be allowed to edit, but can make drafts and suggestions on the talk page. As I understand it, TParis is suggesting we just allow the paid editors to just edit any article with a new user right....one that we have been attempting to fight against. No, I'm not for allowing paid editing on Wikipedia, no offense to those who have admitted to having already done so. I see this as a way that more experienced editors could easily take advantage of their expertise and experience to profit from and....I don't know that anyone can talk me down from that position but please try, I am all ears. Volunteer should be our goal and if someone is slipping through our policy cracks by editing an article specifically because they have been hired to do so....well, I would think we would want to fill that crack, not widen it.--Mark Miller (talk) 02:34, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Comment - Why not run a test case on this? Make it optional, and get feedback from them and the community after some time. We can then broaden or scrap the idea based on its success. Contrary to Konveyor Belt's claim above, a named account would seem more trustworthy to me; the editor is choosing to be transparent and is obviously knowledgeable about our policies and his responsibility to manage his COI. I don't know if requiring them to have named accounts is the best plan when we don't have such a policy in place for other paid editors, so I'd oppose a requirement on those grounds.   — Jess· Δ♥ 03:13, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I would only argue that we do have such a policy or guideline in place for other paid editors. In fact we have, what I thought was a pretty clear set of policies, not perfect, but getting stronger and clearer on the subject.
      Disclosure polices
      Per WP:ISU "Usernames implying shared use":

      ...usernames are acceptable if they contain a company or group name but are clearly intended to denote an individual person, such as "Mark at WidgetsUSA", "Jack Smith at the XY Foundation", "WidgetFan87", "LoveTrammelArt", etc.


      Remember that promotional editing is not permitted regardless of username. The conflict of interest guideline advises all users to exercise caution if editing articles about businesses, organizations, products, or other subjects that they are closely connected to. If you choose to edit articles that are in any way related to your company or group, you will need to carefully follow Wikipedia's advice on editing with a conflict of interest.

      "

      Per WP:NOPAY "Paid advocacy, public relations, and marketing":

      If you have a financial connection to a topic – including, but not limited to, as an employee, owner or other stakeholder – you are advised to refrain from editing articles directly, and to provide full disclosure of the connection. You may use the article talk pages to suggest changes, or the {{request edit}} template to request edits. Requested edits are subject to the same editorial standards as any other, and may not be acted upon. The writing of "puff pieces" and advertisements is prohibited.

      And of course Declaring an interest:

      Some editors declare an interest in a particular topic area. The benefits of this are that most editors will appreciate your honesty and may try to help you; you lay the basis for requesting help from others to post material for you, or to review material you wish to post yourself, and public relations professionals may be required to abide by code of ethics, such as the GA code of ethics or PRSA code of ethics. The disadvantage of declaring your interest is that people outside Wikipedia, such as reporters, may identify you and generate negative publicity for you, your group or your company. Some COI declarations have the effect of announcing your real name (see WP:REALNAME). Do not publicly declare an interest if this could put you at harm in the real world, e.g., from stalkers.

       ::Example of disclosure.
      I think it is safe to say we have a few policies in place for this very thing.--Mark Miller (talk) 04:37, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Support. Every paid editor should disclose their COI. This is a very straightforward way of doing so and is about as good as it gets. MER-C 04:28, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Another Proposal: Certification Course

      I'm just full of ideas this morning. What if we organized a certification course? It wouldn't be a precursor to editing, nor would it prevent a paid editor who is advocating a POV from getting blocked, but what if we offered this course that companies like WikiExperts can enroll their employees in and they'd get a userbox identifying that they've been through this course and have a basic understanding of policy? I'd imagine it could be modeled after our current mentorship programs. It would go a long way toward trusting folks.--v/r - TP 20:33, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • Also liking this idea. Hobit (talk) 20:42, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      From what I've seen in the past, Wikiexperts.us tends to hire subcontractors with prior WP editing experience, and often with considerable experience. It isn't surprising, in that new editors tend to make more mistakes which see the articles deleted. So it isn't lack of knowledge of the processes that is generally the problem. - Bilby (talk) 21:56, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Indeed, this is probably why they are successful. Their editors are pre-certified. Jehochman Talk 01:01, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Well the idea was more general than just Wikiexperts. I'm talking about paid editor companies all around.--v/r - TP 01:12, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Just so. A provocative question: would we rather have a bunch of bungling corporate marketing people edit Wikipedia, or would we prefer that they hire professional help who know how to write to our standards? Jehochman Talk 01:16, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • If you're serious about this idea, then the objective should be a program for *all* new users, an area where we already have severe deficiencies. NPOV is the key issue for all new users, whether they're paid advocates, paid editors, unpaid advocates, or just want to add something about their favourite TV show. The mentorship program is on its last legs due to a lack of volunteers. The idea is a good one, but it needs to work within our existing resources and target actual problems for the project, not just the perceived ones or the ones that are currently high-profile. We've had paid advocacy here for more than 10 years (my own first encounter with it was in 2007, and Wikipedia was a key part of a multi-pronged publicity campaign), so this is not a new problem. Risker (talk) 01:47, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      New users shouldn't have to slog through a bureaucracy just to edit. It must be fairly intimidating to have to go through a complex course just to fix a typo. After all, Wikipedia is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, and we should try to keep it this way as much as possible. KonveyorBelt 02:30, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Here is a question, then, Risker. Would anyone object if I, and maybe a few other volunteers (or someone else entirely, I won't patent the idea), were to "incorporate" a small business as a 'school' of sorts for these types. Off-wiki and what not, but with the sole purpose of teaching these paid-editor types, those whom are not already savvy, on how to edit Wikipedia. Could also teach public relations teams for companies how to do it right. Would that solve the problem?--v/r - TP 02:36, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      The encylopeadia anyone can edit as long as they have the money or connections, eh? So you want to create a business enterprise to teach WP policies, of course for a fee. I am aware you in fact do not, but this will be the logical end result. As I said above. the project is doomed if money becomes a major criteria. No money should be involved, no one should make a penny from WP. We are all unpaid volunteers. See my proposal for a purely business enterprise related WP below. All monies recycled into local companies enviroments on a charitable basis. They would have to sign up to this explicitly. It would be hived off from the real project. I am taking it to Meta, and I think it will generate some support. Irondome (talk) 02:51, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I'm more or less weighing the idea in general as such an endeavor wouldn't require the approval of anyone here. However, if the community were to see it in a good light, we might be able to determine a route that would give us the 'feel goods' needed to make paid editing in a limit function acceptable. Money and connections couldn't possibly affect the encyclopedia itself, as such a company wouldn't edit the encyclopedia. All it would be is to teach policies and then cut those editors lose. Then they are on their own and liable to the very same policies as everyone else. All of fee would get them would be knowledge of how Wikipedia works to give them the best chance to be successful within policy. I, personally, would charge to teach others this. I'd need to cover expenses such as a gotoMeeting subscription, a website, and business fees. But it's an idea. It's also an idea I'm not attached to, I already work two jobs and I don't need a third, so if anyone else likes the idea they are welcome to run with it. Wikipedia is part of the 'free culture' but this is a sensible business niche and reason should trump idealism.--v/r - TP 03:03, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Isn't there a relatively simple corporate editing training module already on this site? I thought I saw something like that. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 02:46, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      A separate business WP

      • A separate WP should be created.
      • It would adhere to WP procedures and agreements, and users would sign up to that.
      • All monies would be donated to companies local enviroment, including charities. There will be no profit made. This should be a red line.
      • Companies should agree to any monies being paid to their local communities to foster good works. This would be cast - iron AGF, and would indicate the ethical solidity of interested companies. Irondome (talk) 23:03, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Bring this to Meta. Ross Hill (talk) 23:09, 20 Oct 2013 (UTC) 23:09, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Excellent. I need to knock this up into a more detailed proposal though. What metawiki portal would be most appropriate Ross? Irondome (talk) 23:23, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      I think somewhere, someone actually suggested something like this on Jimbo's talk page and frankly this sounds like the best route. Maybe not as proposed above but using the Wikivoyage model. Perhaps something like "Wikispotlight" (sounds better than Wikibusiness or Wikiforhire) and leave the entire subject of paid editing as ambiguous as it is at Wikivoyage. As I recall there is no such policy of paid or promotional editing on that site or any particular rule about a business writing their own information if it is relevant for the page and section.--Mark Miller (talk) 02:52, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      I do think the concept of the ultimate desination of any monies paid through using this mooted new sub-Wiki would be revolutionary. Companies would agree that any monies paid would go to charitable or local good cause foundations. It would attract some potentially huge revenue, (I think BP would love it :)) and would indicate that participating companies have a strong ethical semse, or perhaps merely a sense of positive PR. Any monies accrued using WP would be small change, and they would gain great kudos. The foundation may need to take it on, but potential revenues for positive charitable or educational programmes could be considerable. Just initial thoughts here. I agree this model is the way to go. Irondome (talk) 03:26, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      So we'd have 2 Wikipedias - shall we call them PRpedia and NOPRpedia? With the PR folks banned from NOPRpedia, but free to pitch as much as they want at PRpedia? Lots of questions on the details here, but there is one very big problem. If we disclosed to the readers that PRpedia editors were allowed to put in "hidden" PR pitches into their encyclopedia, then they'd have very few readers. They'd also tend to have pretty poor articles outside of business areas - except that they could just copy NOPRpedia articles. They'd also have very biased articles on business, so when readers figured out what's up, they'll all go back to reading NOPRpedia. PR folks are not idiots, so they'd just go back to undisclosed editing at NOPRpedia, and PRpedeia would die, no readers, no editors. If anybody disagrees, of course, they can just form their own PRpedia and see how successful it is. The WMF will supply the software for free, and probably even help them download all the articles to start. Actually there are mirror sites that do this already, but I'd guess all the successful ones have one thing in common - no hidden PR in the articles.
      A more direct approach might be for the WMF to just provide space for declared PR companies or business to just write whatever they want about their clients or themselves in the form of CC-BY-SA licensed articles. They wouldn't be good secondary sources, but we could use them as primary sources as needed, as long as the companies provide adequate info that the writer is who he/she claims to be - i.e. the public can hold them responsible for what they write. Again, the companies can do this themselves if they want on their own websites, but heck - why not as long as they agree not to put their advertising into our articles? As above, they could pay the costs of keeping the site open. A couple of problems here though. 1st the PR folks won't do it - they wouldn't fool anybody if their "info" was in this form; and 2nd the WMF has always said that it wouldn't take advertising. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:51, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Great feedback. Appreciated. I dont agree with large chunks, but we have a coherent dialogue on this path started. Irondome (talk) 04:12, 21 October 2013 (UTC) Irondome (talk) 03:59, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Appeal of indefinite block by Dunkmack9

      Dunkmack9 has posted an unblock request on his talk page. Since the block was the result of a community discussion, I am posting here to initiate a discussion as to whether or not the block should be lifted. Here is a link to the blocking discussion: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive782#User:Dunkmack9 on a fringe theory tear. Here is a link to the sockpuppet case page: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Dunkmack9/Archive. I strongly oppose an unblock at this time, as the unblock request demonstrates that the user, if unblocked, intends to continue pursuing fringe theories regarding Pearl Harbour conspiracy theories and Rudolf Hess (disclosure: I am the person who brought Rudolf Hess to Good Article status). From a content point of view, it's not enough for our purposes for an editor to read a book on a topic and then, in the belief that they have discovered The Truth, relentlessly pursue the insertion of fringe theories from said book into our articles as though they were true. In the case of Hess, the conspiracy theories are mentioned in the article as an important part of the story, but that's it. In addition to his original account, he pursued disruptive sock puppetry to continue pushing fringe theories whilst blocked and lied about whether or not User:Grapestomper9 was him, in the face of some pretty overwhelming behavioural evidence. Please see also Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive813#User:Grapestomper9. -- Diannaa (talk) 15:59, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • Strongly oppose an unblock at the present time, based on the unblock request and on the previous discussions. --John (talk) 20:27, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • Oppose Between the socking and the failure to get why they were blocked in the first place, no reason to unblock at this time. Miniapolis 22:53, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      RFPP

      WP:RFPP is heavily backlogged. Admins get your mop ready, ... and mop it away. Armbrust The Homunculus 00:51, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      We will have to get you a mop of your own, one of these days -- Diannaa (talk) 01:17, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Caught up as of right now. -- Diannaa (talk) 02:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Help with svg image

      File:Information orange.svg is now in use on level 2 warning templates and needs to be brought over from the Commons and fully protected. I'm not sure – is there a special technique for copying and uploading an svg file? -- Diannaa (talk) 02:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      Zad68 has given it full protection. Diannaa, would you please download the image from Commons and attempt to upload it here? If you can, that will prove that we need to do it; if you can't, that will prove that we don't need to. I can't directly test it myself — since I'm an admin, I have the ability to override page protection, so I can't see whether non-admins can modify and/or overwrite it. PS Oops, never mind, Diannaa; I assumed by your request that you weren't an admin yourself. Would some kindly non-admin please attempt to fulfill my request? Nyttend (talk) 03:02, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I don't know how to download it - it's an svg file, which is kinda different. As soon as I try to copy the image it converts it to a png image file. -- Diannaa (talk) 03:11, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      If you're using Internet Explorer, rightclick the image and select "Save Target As"; this will download the original SVG and put it where you want it. However, since you're an admin, there's no real point, because you're able to override the blacklist just like I am. I'm asking for a non-admin to test it, so we can see whether we even need to worry about a local upload. Nyttend (talk) 03:15, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I'm working on this. It will require a new name, right? --NeilN talk to me 03:17, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Actually not. I'm asking you to attempt to upload it at the current name, which is presently protected; whatever happens, please come back and report your results. If protection prevents you from uploading it, please create the image description page with absolutely nothing except a {{db-g2}} template. If protection prevents you from doing that, we won't need to do any more protection, because vandals won't be able to hurt the image. Nyttend (talk) 03:21, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      @Nyttend: The image needs to be uploaded locally (by an admin since the local page is protected) because otherwise a vandal can change the image on wikipedia commons and that change will automatically be reflected on English wikipedia, irrespective of the protection of the en-wiki page. (Note that the commons page is not protected and en-wiki admins have no direct control on that)

      @NeilN: The image can be uploaded to the local wikipedia page (again, by an admin) under the same name, because "If a file of the same name exists on both Wikipedia and Commons, the Wikipedia file will be displayed." (see WP:FILE). Abecedare (talk) 03:28, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      Both upload buttons (for en and commons) are greyed out when it's the same name. They are active when I change the file name. Any attempt to edit the description sends me to Commons. --NeilN talk to me 03:35, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

      • I've done it. Abecedare is right about the images. Protection here if the file is not here is useless. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:40, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I attempted to replace this file [52]. Error message: "This image name or media file name is protected." --NeilN talk to me 03:49, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      I was able to upload a copy over it a minute before @Crisco 1492: increased the protection. (I couldn’t do it with the wizard, and I had to brush off a warning.) The second time, a couple of minutes later, it didn’t work: the warning had escalated to the above error. Please delete my upload, somebody, as I don’t think I can any more.—Odysseus1479 03:57, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • That's because you uploaded between the time I uploaded locally and protected the page. Don't see a need to delete your upload as it is the same file. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 04:37, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      source: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard&diff=578072331&oldid=578071728

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