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Carolyn Ellis article in-use template

Hi James. I apologize for my terse response. There's a bug that won't allow any changes to be saved to a page if interim changes are made (even removing an in-use template); an HTTP 500 error pops up and the changes can't be saved. The only work around is to copy the entire article over to a text editor, abandon the ongoing edits, start again with the most recent version, paste the contents back over, then fix the formatting throughout the article. My first indication you had removed the editing tag was when I went to save the article rewrite, and the dreaded HTTP 500 error popped up. Orville1974 (talk) 20:29, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

@Orville1974: Sorry that apparently I caused you difficulties. however, I am having difficulty figuring out what you mean. To begin with I had no idea what you were talking about, but then it occurred to me that you might be referring to editing a page and trying to save it when someone else has made an edit while you were editing. However, normally that gives an "edit conflict" notice, not an HTTP 500 error, and an edit conflict can easily be dealt with, without doing what you said. Are you saying that there is a bug that is specifically affecting that one article, or that there is a recent bug that is just happening at present, or something? Or have I completely missed the point, and you are talking about something quite different?

One more thought. If you did mean that you had been making a lot of changes that you then intended to save as one edit, then since more than 40 minutes passed between your adding the "in use" tag and your next edit, wouldn't it be better to simply make a number of small edits instead of one huge one? Perhaps that would have reduced the severity of the effect on you of the problem, as well as reducing the extent to which you were asking other editors not to edit. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:56, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

Yes, it's a recent bug (at least that's what I was told when I sought assistance the last time it happened a couple days ago). That's how I learned about about the copy to a text editor fix. That edit was a lengthy one, too. I was completely overhauling another bio with multiple issues (including, apparently a massive copyvio problem that I wasn't aware of), when a bot flagged the unedited version I had come across as a copyvio (while my in-use template was up), before I had saved my complete rework of the article. I don't know if the bot deleted the in-use template when it added the copyvio template, or if one just naturally overwrites the other, but when I opened another window to see why I was getting an HTTP 500 error and couldn't save the edits, the in-use template was gone and the copyvio template was up. I only use the in-use template when I'm completely overhauling an article that has multiple issues (usually NPV, COI, RS and few, if any inline citations). Come to think of it, maybe the bug is related to edit conflicts that occur while the in-use template is on the page, or maybe it's caused by an edit that removes that particular template. This is only the second time I've had it happen, and both times the in-use template was up and was removed before I saved my edits . . . Anyway, you're right about small saves. It would reduce the amount of rework if an editing conflict occurred (and it would give another editor a chance to jump in and take a stab at fixing some of the issues if they see work is being done on the article in recent changes). Orville1974 (talk) 02:13, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

@Orville1974: I thought it would be interesting to check whether this was caused by removing the in-use template, so I posted a "GOCEinuse" template to a sandbox, started editing the page, while that edit was still pending used an alternative account on another computer to remove the tag, and then went back to my main account and tried to save the edited version of the page. I did this a couple of times, with slight variations in exactly how I did it, and each time I just got a normal "edit conflict" message, no sign of an HTTP 500 error, so perhaps what you have experienced is some kind of rare intermittent error, which may or may not be related to the "in use" template. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:49, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Wow. Thank you for going through all that trouble. I think just taking your advice on smaller edits will minimize the impact if it ever pops up again. It's only happened twice, and both times I hadn't published incremental changes. Orville1974 (talk) 15:31, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Self-requested block

Good day, James. As I see you're in the category Wikipedia administrators willing to consider placing self-requested blocks, could I maybe ask you to hard-block me for 2 months? I've tried the other tricks several times (WikiBreakEnforcer, an /etc/hosts file), but Wikipedia is too enticing and I've bypassed those each time. I really do need to focus on work in the next weeks, so I'd be very grateful if you'd consider this block. Hope to see you again in August :) Regards, – Þjarkur (talk) 22:05, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Redirect protection?

Hi, JamesB. This keeps getting its redirect changed to a non-existent subsection of Bikini. Can something be done to prevent that? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:36, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Actually, it's only been changed to that nonexistent section twice. (The original creation of the redirect in 2006 redirected to that section, but at that time the section really did exist, so the redirect was fine.) Both of those times the redirect change was a good-faith revert of an edit by a disruptive block-evading editor; it just happened that it was two of the very few occasions when that editor has made good edits. Since the latest restoration of the good version was by you, rather than the disruptive editor, it's likely that it will not be reverted, and that fact plus the fact that the problem has happened only twice, in a fairly short period, encourages me to say let's just leave it for now. As always, if you see that the problem continues then you are totally welcome to contact me again, and I will reconsider the question. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:11, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Discussion at User talk:Bbb23#User:Bring back Daz Sampson again

 You are invited to join the discussion at User talk:Bbb23#User:Bring back Daz Sampson again. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:29, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi JamesBWatson. If you're watching Bbb23's user talk and this link is unnecessary, then my apologies. I'm only posting it as a courtesy since you were one of the administrators who posted in support of this editor being unblocked. I'm not questioning the unblock, only expressing concern that the editor is starting to repeat behavior which played some part in their being blocked in the first place. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:31, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

Just notifying you of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#User:Bring back Daz Simpson: NPA and ASPERSIONS as a courtesy since I mentioned you by name in the thread. -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:16, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Photo and COI

Thank you for your help regarding the David Levy Talk page. I obtained the photo through a public website, so what I meant by "obtained" is that I am the one that saved the image from the website and uploaded it to Wikimedia Commons. However, it is not a photo that I took, so I am not the creator. Regarding the photo, I edited the permission to state the website link that I obtained the photo from. Does that help with the permission status? In addition, when I go through the view history, I have noticed many changes and edits that were made to the page, and I don't see any promotional or non-encyclopedic language anymore. Would that allow me to remove that COI template? Furthermore, looking at the history of the talk page, there are 2 editors in addition to me that have stated their support of removing the COI tag.

Thank you Kmh1011 (talk) 19:33, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

@Kmh1011: On the copyright issue, the photograph is clearly not acceptable. The terms of use of the web site from which you took it say: "Pepperdine does not intend to cede its respective rights, or anyone else's rights, to the materials appearing on the site. Unless otherwise noted, Pepperdine owns all materials, including images, illustrations, designs, icons, photographs, video clips, and written and other materials that are part of the site. To encourage a free and continuous flow of information, users are permitted (which may be revoked at any time) to download the material in the site for private, non-commercial use only, without alterations, as long as the copyright notice appearing on the downloaded material, "Copyright Pepperdine University 2004-2008. All Rights Reserved" is included." That is perfectly unambiguous. Wikimedia Commons allows only images which are free for anyone to use for any purposes, including commercial use, the requirement to include the specific wording of the copyright notice specified is inconsistent with Wikimedia Commons's licensing terms, and Commons requires licensing to be irrevocable. Wikipedia's copyright policy on images is more complex, allowing "fair use" in some situations, but in this case those situations do not apply, so the image would not be acceptable if loaded to Wikipedia either. (Personally I think that Wikipedia's copyright situation is a mess, and very unhelpful in several ways, but we have to work with what it is, not with what you or I might like it to be.)

I have an answer to your question on conflict of interest, but it will take me more time to write it out than is available to me now. I will try to get back onto it as soon as I conveniently can, but if you have not heard back from me within 48 hours of this message, please feel welcome to remind me. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:04, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

Okay, now for my comments relating to the conflict of interest.

You say "there are 2 editors in addition to [you] that have stated their support of removing the COI tag". I don't see those two editors. The nearest I can see is one editor who has said "As long as the statements in the article are sourced and fluffery is kept to a minimum, I have no problem with the COI tag being removed", which falls a long way short of supporting removing the tag, for two reasons: (1) "I have no problem with the COI tag being removed" is not the same as "I think the COI tag should be removed", and is perhaps closer to "I do not myself object to the COI tag being removed", and (2) even that is subject to the condition "As long as the statements in the article are sourced and fluffery is kept to a minimum", and that editor has not indicated that she thinks that condition has been fulfilled.

Has the article been edited by editors with a conflict of interest? Yes, without any doubt. Over the course of the last eleven years there has been a string of single-purpose accounts that have edited only about that one person, in ways that leave no room for doubt that they have been operated by one or more people closely involved with David Levy, or perhaps himself.

Is the editing of the article by editors with a conflict of interest still continuing? Apparently yes. Your account follows the same pattern as the others, and statements you have made on uploads to Wikimedia Commons have also clearly indicated that you have a connection to David Levy.

Has the editing of the article by editors with a conflict of interest caused problems? Yes, there has been content which has certainly not been written from a neutral point of view.

Is there still a problem with point of view? Well, some of the most obviously non-neutral content has been removed, but there is still a promotional tone.

Why not just remove the problematic content then? Blatantly promotional statements can easily be seen and removed. However, what we have here is not an article which has a few blatantly promotional sentences, but rather an article for which there is a general promotional tone running through the whole of it. Removing that tone would require completely rewriting the article, rather than just cutting out particular bits. What is more, such rewriting would not be easy to do directly from the current article, because if the only source you have is written from a particular point of view, it is difficult not retain that point of view without making guesses as to what a more neutral point of view would be. It would therefore be best to start from scratch, using other sources. That would require putting in an amount of work that I am unwilling to do, though there may be another editor who would be both able and willing to rewrite the article. (Incidentally, "a general promotional tone running through the whole of it" is one of the main reason why Wikipedia's guideline on conflict of interest strongly discourages editing articles where one has a personal involvement. An editor who sincerely intends to write in a neutral way may well avoid including blatantly promotional content, but they may be blind to a general promotional tone when writing about a subject in which they have a close personal involvement, because it can be difficult to stand back from their own writing and see how it looks from the detached perspective of a reader without such an involvement.)

If you have not already done so you should read the guideline on conflict of interest. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:54, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Previously SALTed page

Just reaching out to you since you previously SALTed Angelo Dawkins. The consensus on Street Profits page has changed, and has been deemed to now be notable, and has recently been created. Would you be able to un-SALT Angelo Dawkins and Montez Ford and redirect them to Street Profits? Thanks - Galatz גאליץ^{שיחה Talk} 20:16, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Trivia info

I fail to see how such information such as this[1] is needed when it does nothing for the page and just comes across as trivia. Would donating money to wiki give someone a free pass to put anything they want on an wiki page???108.208.136.189 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 00:29, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Donating to Wikipedia does not give anyone a "free pass" to do anything that others are not allowed to do. - ZLEA _T\^C 00:57, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Article deleted December 2015 per G13

I would like to recreat the page "Hans-Jürgen Burchardt". Can you explain why it was deleted before and what I can add to increase its relevance? Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by MontanaK (talk • contribs) 13:10, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

@MontanaK: I think this is likely to be my personal record for the amount of time between doing something and receiving a query about it. I have restored the draft Draft:Hans-Jürgen Burchardt, and you are free to edit it if you wish to. The draft was submitted for review four times, and each time rejected by a reviewer. All of them gave as their reason that the sources referenced in the draft did not indicate notability by Wikipedia's notability guidelines. There are, in my opinion, too many of those guidelines, and they are all too long and complicated, making it confusing for new editor. However, the ones most relevant in this case are the general notability guideline and the guideline to notability of academics, so I suggest having a look at those. I have had a quick look at the references in the draft, and it seems to me that the problem is that none of them is substantial coverage in an independent source. A source connected to Hans-Jürgen Burchardt (such as a page on the web site of a university where he works or has worked) is not an independent source, and such things as listing of his works are not substantial coverage. I have no idea whether suitable sources exist; if they do, then you need to find them and give them as references, while if they don't then any work you put in to editing about Hans-Jürgen Burchardt is likely to be wasted, as that will mean that he does not satisfy Wikipedia's notability guidelines, and no article about him would be acceptable, no matter how well written. I suppose you could try asking any of the reviewers of the draft for their opinions on what is needed, but I don't expect any of them to remember it from 2015, and they may or may not be willing to check it again. (One of them, Winner 42, scarcely ever edits now, and in fact has done little editing since 2015, so there is probably no point in asking him or her, but the other three are still active.)

One more thing. My advice to new editors is that it is best to start by making small improvements to existing articles, rather than creating new articles. That way any mistakes you make will be small ones, and you won't have the discouraging experience of repeatedly seeing hours of work deleted. Gradually, you will get to learn how Wikipedia works, and after a while you will know enough about what is acceptable to be able to write whole new articles without fear that they will be deleted. Over the years I have found that editors who start by making small changes to existing articles and work up from there have a far better chance of having a successful time here than those who jump right into creating new articles from the start. Even though in this case there is an existing draft to start from, bearing in mind that it has been rejected as unsuitable by four different reviewers, it would not be the most promising way to get started. However, you are of course free to take that advice or not. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:32, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2019).

Administrator changes

Andonic • Consumed Crustacean • Enigmaman • Euryalus • EWS23 • HereToHelp • Nv8200pa • Peripitus • StringTheory11 • Vejvančický

CheckUser changes

Ivanvector

Guideline and policy news

• An RfC seeks to clarify whether WP:OUTING should include information on just the English Wikipedia or any Wikimedia project.
• An RfC on WT:RfA concluded that Requests for adminship and bureaucratship are discussions seeking to build consensus.
• An RfC proposal to make the templates for discussion (TfD) process more like the requested moves (RM) process, i.e. "as a clearinghouse of template discussions", was closed as successful.

Technical news

• The CSD feature of Twinkle now allows admins to notify page creators of deletion if the page had not been tagged. The default behavior matches that of tagging notifications, and replaces the ability to open the user talk page upon deletion. You can customize which criteria receive notifications in your Twinkle preferences: look for Notify page creator when deleting under these criteria.
• Twinkle's d-batch (batch delete) feature now supports deleting subpages (and related redirects and talk pages) of each page. The pages will be listed first but use with caution! The und-batch (batch undelete) option can now also restore talk pages.

Miscellaneous

• The previously discussed unblocking of IP addresses indefinitely-blocked before 2009 was approved and has taken place.
• The 2019 talk pages consultation produced a report for Phase 1 and has entered Phase 2.

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Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:48, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Partial rangeblock request

Hi, JamesB. Somebody using this announced troll's IP has been making dubious edits and so have other IPs in that range (82.132.236.67, ‎82.132.239.79, 82.132.238.155, ‎82.132.238.80, 82.132.239.45, etc.). No need to block the entire range but blocking some portions would help. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 22:10, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: All of those IP addresses are in the range 82.132.236.0/22, which is allocated to the mobile phone company O2. They are likely to be used by numerous different people, mostly for a very short time. I have checked all of the most recent edits and a 10% sample going further back over recent days. Although there were vandalism edits, those were a small proportion of the edits, the vast majority of which were perfectly constructive. In those cases where I did see vandalism I checked the history of the particular IP address, and every time I found that it was a case of someone making a small number of vandalism edits in a very short time, and then disappearing. In that situation a range block could not possibly be justified, as the amount of collateral damage would far outweigh the small benefit of stopping a few silly vandalism edits. I'm afraid it has to be a question of dealing with each attack individually when it comes. (Also, the fact that four years ago someone blatantly trolled from the range is of no relevance at all. It is as likely as not that they have long since forgotten the far off day when they messed around on Wikipedia for a little while, and the IP address has probably been reallocated thousands of times since then, so there is no reason to suppose that the recent vandalism was the same person.) JamesBWatson (talk) 15:50, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

There's no way to limit a rangeblock to just IPs that begin with, say, 82.132.238.? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 23:13, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Yes, that's perfectly possible, and when I looked at the contributions history for that range at first glance it did seem that there was a better case for a block on that range than on the wider range covering all the IP addresses you mentioned. That was because all of the edits from that range over the few days up to when you posted your message here were unconstructive (either vandalism or good-faith but misguided). However, looking further, I found that it isn't as simple as that. I looked at a systematic sample of edits so far this year, and 60% of them seemed to be perfectly constructive edits, as against 40% that weren't. I see no reason to doubt that the run of bad edits recently was just a random fluctuation, as will happen from time to time in a long series of edits. That is a much higher proportion of bad edits than I can be happy about, but it is still a clear minority, so that a block would stop more good edits than bad. Very occasionally one extremely disruptive editor is so problematic that stopping that one person has enough value to justify a block even if the number of good edits stopped will be more than the number of bad ones stopped, but this case is nothing like that; it's just a matter of brief runs of fairly ordinary everyday vandalism among a somewhat larger number of constructive edits, and a block is not justifiable in that situation. If you had pointed this out to me while the latest burst of vandalism was still in progress, and I if had been online and seen your message right away, then a fairly brief block on the individual IP address would have been appropriate, but that is the most that can be justified in this sort of situation, and in any case by the time you posted here that burst of vandalism had been over for some time, so even a block on that IP address would have been pointless.

Here's another matter. It may or may not be of interest to you, and I also don't know how much (if any) of it you already know, but just ignore it if you either already know or don't know and don't care. You refer to "just IPs that begin with, say, 82.132.238." In the usual notation for IPv4 ranges, that range is called 82.132.238.0/24. Likewise all IP addresses beginning 82. make up the range 82.0.0.0/8, and all those beginning 82.132. are 82.132.0.0/16. Of the four numbers that make up an IP address the ones which are ignored are replaced by zeroes, and a number is appended to the end to indicate how many bits are to be counted (i.e. not ignored) with each number corresponding to 8 bits. Thus 82.132.238.0/24 means "any IP address where the first 24 bits correspond to 82.132.238 and the rest of the bits can be anything". Likewise for 82.132.0.0/16 the first 16 bits correspond to 82.132 and the rest can be anything. When IP addresses first came into use, that was all there was to IP ranges, but it became more complicated when "Classless Inter-Domain Routing" (usually called CIDR) was introduced. CIDR includes intermediate ranges, such as the 82.132.236.0/22 range that I mentioned above. That one means all IP addresses that begin with anything from 82.132.236 to 82.132.239. If you understand binary numbers then CIDR ranges are not too difficult to understand, otherwise they probably won't mean much to you. There is, of course, a Wikipedia article on Classless Inter-Domain Routing which explains it, but that article goes into far more detail than is needed just to understand the notation for IP ranges, and I am sure there must be more concise explanations available on the internet if one searches for them. Going back to your question about blocking "just IPs that begin with, say, 82.132.238.", it is possible to block any /16 or smaller CIDR range, which in this case means one could block all IP addresses beginning 82.132. or smaller ranges than that, but not bigger ranges such as all those beginning 82. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:05, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

I've not been online much the past few days. Thanks for the info. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:25, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

User evidently editing while logged out for the past three weeks

Hi, JamesB. I figured an admin should be made aware of these IPs responding on behalf of a registered user and this where they seem quite misguided about multiple accounts. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:45, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: I have looked into this, and it turns out to be just one small aspect of a long and complex case. The particular issue of IP editing by an editor with an account is not in itself an offence in the absence of other concerns, such as editing the same page with and without logging in, which is likely to mislead other editors (whether intentionally or not), so there is no administrative role there. On the other point you mention, you are right, there certainly is a misunderstanding of the policy on multiple accounts, but since as far as I can see there is no evidence that the editor has actually used multiple accounts, or even that he or she has used any account in this particular case, that doesn't seem to be a matter of great importance. I have also found over the years that stepping in to deal with one small detail relating to a much more complex case, as here, is difficult, and can easily lead to problems. As for stepping in to the whole case, rather than just that small point, that would be much more complicated. There are relevant comments and discussions on several talk pages, some of them extremely long, with endless arguments about various different issues (eg. reliability of sources, conflict of interest, allegations about the identities of editors, etc etc) which would take a long time and a lot of work to investigate, and people on both sides have made significant mistakes (or perhaps sometimes not mistakes) such as misrepresenting sources. I absolutely hate cases like this, and I don't get into them. If you still want to ask an administrator to take notice of the issues you mention, you may like to contact Luk, who has protected Extinction symbol and made a couple of brief comments at Talk:Extinction symbol, and who may be more willing than I am to get further involved, or you may try asking one of the administrators who frequently take significant part in complex cases at WP:AN/I, because by definition that means they are more willing than I am to get involved in such cases. JamesBWatson (talk) 11:26, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

I wouldn't want to get involved, either. :-) –Skywatcher68 (talk) 02:19, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

YangLan

HI James, I am working closely with YangLan's assistant for modifying her wikipedia introduction. Me and my colleague "First Blooded" tried to delete the content with Chang Cheng Hotel because it is not true.

Also for " In March 2000, Yang Lan and her husband Bruno Wu, acquired Hong Kong company Leung Kee Holdings Limited, an ailing Hong Kong construction company, and changed its name to Sun Television Cybernetworks Holdings Limited. Yang was the chairman. Creating Sun TV required plenty of capital. Working with the investment bankers Worldsec International, an investment-house affiliate of The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Wu injected SunTV's assets into Leung Kee, and used its Hong Kong stock exchange listing to float a new equity issue. The issue raised $28 million in new capital for Sun TV; Yang and Wu injected another $11 million. On August 8, Sun TV officially launched—the first Chinese historical and cultural channel in Greater China".

And "In early 1997, Yang took another career risk. She went to work as a public relations representative and spokesperson for Project Hope, China's main charity organization. This took Yang into China's nooks and crannies, from the pockets of growing wealth in the southern coastal provinces to the relentless poverty in the villages of Zhidan county, north of Xi'an. Her conviction grew that her generation needed thoughtful (and entertaining) cultural journalism." I am also going to go ahead and delete these. Let me know. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aaa.ai.shan.zha (talk • contribs) 14:30, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Actually, Aaa reverted this edit, and I reverted all of their edits because they hadn't quite reverted themselves completely. MarnetteD restored the above, which wasn't really appropriate but makes it easier for me to comment. I have CU-blocked Aaa and Firstblooded as meat puppets but am willing to unblock if you wish to deal with this. Let me know.--Bbb23 (talk) 14:50, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Now that I've more closely examined the promotional edits by the two puppets, I'm much more reluctant to unblock, but, as always, I welcome your input.--Bbb23 (talk) 14:55, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

@Bbb23: No, I don't see any reason to unblock. From the start I had thought it was just a matter of when, rather than whether Firstblooded would be indefinitely blocked, and once it's done I am happy to leave it at that. However, thanks for consulting me. JamesBWatson (talk) 16:54, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

IP posts Nazi message

Hello. Do you think this anti Semitic post by an IP warrants an immediate WP:NOFASH block?—NØ 07:27, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Return of the IP-hopping hoaxer from Michigan

I've already requested List of Late Night with Seth Meyers episodes (2019) be semi-protected and had been going through the unsourced edits when I noticed all of them are likely from a known hoaxer. For example: here,here, and all of these. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Skywatcher68 (talk • contribs) 02:34, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: It isn't at all clear to me whether that's the same person or not, but it is clear that 75.128.84.218 has been producing vandalism for months, so I've blocked the IP address for three months. JamesBWatson (talk) 11:58, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Very well. I believe 75.128.84.218 is the same as 2600:1700:4210:810... given that both have mentioned in edit summaries sending things to Seth Meyers. 75.128.84.218 also shares with 50.124.235.4 a pattern of adding fictitious credits; somebody from Southeastern Michigan has been adding fictitious credits for a very long time. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:21, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Given the use of "Perfect!" in edit summaries, 75.128.84.218 might have also been editing as 2600:1007:b12f:c7ac:3c33:8150:fcc6:3e97 from the other side of the mitten. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 07:36, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: When I wrote my last message here I had looked at 75.128.84.218 and 50.124.235.4, but I hadn't seen 2600:1700:4210:810... However, I agree that 2600:1700:4210:810... = 75.128.84.218, so I will block that range too. I would want more than "a pattern of adding fictitious credits" to be confident that two IPs were the same person, as that sort of thing is common from vandals, but if you can find any more similarities, let me know and I'll reconsider it. I also agree that "Perfect!" looks suspicious, but I don't have time now to check in more detail, and I certainly won't block just on the basis of that one detail. Maybe when I get time I'll have another look at 2600:1007:b12f:c7ac:3c33:8150:fcc6:3e97. Again, if you can see any more evidence then please let me know. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:04, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Really no need to bother with 2600:1007:b120::/44, seems the only troublesome edits from there were during a period between Veterans Day and Thanksgiving, 2017. Perhaps our friend from SE Michigan was on vacation. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:23, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Just one more comment, and then I really have to go, as RL refuses to wait. Could this be the same editor as at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Chase2na/Archive? At a quick glance it looks as though it may be. If you have more time than I have right now, you may like to check, and let me know what you think. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:23, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

I've encountered one of those suspected socks before. They have similar interests but I think this is a different editor. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:03, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Yes, I agree. The only reason I even considered the possibility is that someone had tagged one of the IP talk pages as possibly that editor, and my very quick glance (which was all I had time for) suggested it probably wasn't, but it might be. Now, having had more time, I am sure it isn't. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:08, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

Vision Think Tank

I just suggested to speedy again Francesco_Grillo, this article is related to that article which is similarly self-serving (and that article was earlier deleted through a discussion). Draft:Vision_Think_Thank (sic) also exists, created by another account, as is Draft:Francesco Grillo (the latter content being exactly the same as earlier). I'm not sure whether I should overrule your Prod and just delete/salt/block the whole bunch of them (as I am out in a couple of minutes, feel free to do the honours). (I already deleted Francesco grillo, which was moved to Portiere autista and having the same content before being blanked). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 14:02, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

@Dirk: I was borderline for just deleting Vision Think Tank, and although I decided to go for PROD, I would not object at all if you were to delete it. I wouldn't regard it as "overruling" the PROD, as you call it, but just agreeing with me that the page needs deleting, and being a bit bolder about it than I was. No doubt all of these pages should be deleted, and I'm not going to get too worked up about how it is done. Maybe also all the accounts should be blocked as SOCK/MEAT, promotion-only-accounts, and very likely undisclosed paid editing. However, right now I don't have time to look into it and make definite decisions. If when I come back I find you have carried out your threat to "delete/salt/block the whole bunch of them" I won't get upset about it.

Incidentally, I find that way back in 2010 I posted a COI warning to the creator of an earlier version of Francesco Grillo, and eight and a half years later I find I have stumbled back to the same place again. I think that if what happened then had happened now instead I would have blocked the account, rather than just warning it, but at that time I had only recently become an administrator, and tended to be rather cautious. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:53, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

8.5 ... Hmmm, I am going to honour them: User:Beetstra/Long-term spamming. More rebuttal on the 'but they spammed it 3 years ago, they musthave stopped by now ...' --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 17:03, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Message from Puro8007

hello, this is puro8007 I have created a page with you have deleted. it was not for the advertsing purpose it was registering the company to Wikipedia so that people now the information about for study purpose. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Puro8007 (talk • contribs) 06:11, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

@Puro8007: You are joking. The whole page was full of unmistakable marketing-speak. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:02, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of User talk:Veeravshiva

If this is the first article that you have created, you may want to read the guide to writing your first article.

You may want to consider using the Article Wizard to help you create articles.

A tag has been placed on User talk:Veeravshiva, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section G11 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the page seems to be unambiguous advertising which only promotes a company, group, product, service, person, or point of view and would need to be fundamentally rewritten in order to become encyclopedic. Please read the guidelines on spam and Wikipedia:FAQ/Organizations for more information.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, and you wish to retrieve the deleted material for future reference or improvement, then please contact the deleting administrator. GirthSummit _(blether) 13:12, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

@Girth Summit: You will see that your speedy deletion nomination was declined by an administrator, who also removed the promotional content. User talk pages are not normally deleted, as it is necessary to keep the record of messages to the user. I readily make an exception to that principle in the case of a talk page with nothing at all in its history other than spam, and indeed I had already deleted an earlier version of the same page for that reason, as you can see here, but if there is even one legitimate talk page edit in the page history then the page should not be deleted. Unacceptable content can, of course, be removed, and in extreme cases even revision deleted. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:56, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

​Thanks for taking the time to explain that - I confess I've been a bit uncertain of the policy on CSD for user talk pages - your explanation makes perfect sense, and ties up a few loose ends in my understanding, much appreciated. Cheers GirthSummit _(blether) 16:41, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Found a new IP-hopper messing with cartoon-related credits

Hi, JamesB. This one is Polish so probably not related to the others. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:32, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

During the short time that range has been editing, one address had been blocked for being disruptive and is suspected to have jumped to an IPv4 address to evade that block. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:27, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68:

• You gave a /44 range, was that a typo for /64 ?
• I have blocked the /64 for a few days.
• Was the IPv4 address you mention 83.23.239.38? It would be a good idea to keep a look out for edits from that or similar IP addresses soon, now that the IPv6 range is blocked. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:23, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

Difficult for me to narrow down IPv6 ranges; /44 was copied over from the other Michigan range to save time. 83.23.239.38 is the IPv4 to which I referred, yes. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:43, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: OK. The /44 didn't actually make any difference at all, because there have been no edits in that range but not in the /64 range, which means that exactly the same edits are listed for either range. I just asked out of interest, really, because it would be more usual to give it as a /64 range. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:03, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

And now we have one from Australia. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 23:20, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

That Australian became active again so I took the range to the Vandalism Noticeboard. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:15, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much for that

That has been a telltale sign of the particular editor, and your implementing those protections is something much appreciated - you can see how disruptive on his almost weekly visits to create havoc, your effort to protect has given a better perspective on things, thanks JarrahTree 15:08, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

You've got mail!

Hello, JBW. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.

Kurtis ^(talk) 15:23, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Did you get my message? Wanted to make sure that everything is alright. Kurtis ^(talk) 17:20, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

@Kurtis: Yes, I did get your message. Sorry I didn't get back to you about it. I didn't manage to find anything. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:50, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for looking into it. Should I also bring this up to a checkuser? I'm not sure it's necessary, but it probably wouldn't hurt either, just to be on the safe side. Kurtis ^(talk) 01:57, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

@Kurtis: Probably it's a minor matter of no great importance, but personally, yes, I would ask a CheckUser to look into it, because it just may be more serious, and if so a CU may possibly be able to find something. JamesBWatson (talk) 10:08, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

User:JamesNWatson

In case this is not your true alternate account as stated.--Cahk (talk) 15:10, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

@Cahk: Thanks. It is me, and I thought I had made a dummy edit to the user page from this account immediately after editing from that account, to confirm it, but evidently I failed to save it. I have done it now. JamesBWatson (talk) 18:52, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Contesting proposed deletion

Hi JamesBWatson. Per WP:NOTWEBHOST, item 2, unused files, particularly those of lower quality, are eligible for deletion. Regards, FASTILY 19:58, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

@Fastily: You are, of course, absolutely right. I should have consulted you before acting. I apologise for all the unnecessary trouble I have caused you. Well, at least now you have told me I won't make the same mistake again. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:15, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

whats right and whats wrong

I have my rights he was talking about my... you know what forget it my freaking dad! My dad freaking killed himself and that a-hole started talking crap about him. So if you think I don't have my rights well then guess what c section of chapter 19 #23 states : "If one is to insult,or have something disrespectfully about a deceased person then the spouce of that person then the child has the right to do what he wants with that person for disturbing the peace of the dead" so then I guess if wiki doesn't follow this rule then I can sue them or make the whole website go down for breaking the law! Kazy gain (talk) 22:53, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

@Kazy gain: I suggest that you would be better off not commenting on the law until you know what the law is. Also, if you are not willing to accept Wikipedia policy then you don't have to edit here; if, on the other hand, you are to edit here then you need to comply with Wikipedia policy. JamesBWatson (talk) 23:12, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

Minor edit on "Edit warring"

Hello, JamesBWatson!

I will be making a change on the policy page "Edit warring". I tracked down a usage that I'm not keen on-- using "edit war" as a compound verb (if that's the correct term) to an update you made on 9 June 2011 ["...and it is perfectly possible to edit war without..."] . Just wanted to let you know, and if you disagree, you can let me know. Jkgree (talk) 16:50, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

@Jkgree: Thank you for the courtesy of informing me, and yes, I do disagree. Natural English idiom makes use of a great fluidity in use of words as parts of speech, including considerable freedom to use nouns and noun phrases as verbs. While the degree of fluidity in this respect is much less than that in some languages, such as Chinese, it is nevertheless a fundamental aspect of English, and in this respect as in many other aspects of grammar trying to impose a Latin-like rigid distinction among parts of speech serves no useful purpose, and at times creates sentences which are less natural in English. You may also like to consider whether replacing one piece of English usage which is accepted by the vast majority of native English speakers with another because you personally are "not keen on" the original is the best use of your editing time. I could also explain to you why I don't think "engage in" is well used in the context, but I have already spent more time on this than it warrants. JamesBWatson (talk) 17:13, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Well, from one user who's spent too much time here to another... Probably I should have said that I was confused when I read this sentence because my natural sense was to see "edit" there as a transitive verb and "war" as its object (akin to: "it is perfectly possible to edit cheese..."). So, I think that the way it stood was liable to be misread, at least on first glance. After my first glance, I understood what was intended, and, yes, I guess I'm adhering to rigid ideas of usage, but my motivation truly was to clarify. If "edit-war" had been hyphenated, for example, I wouldn't have been confused, but I don't know if that's good usage, either. If you're willing to waste your time further-- and don't feel any obligation to-- I'd be glad to know why you think "engage in" isn't the right way to express this. Jkgree (talk) 17:32, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

@Jkgree: Thanks for the clarification. If you misread the sentence in the way you said, then that is a legitimate reason to change it, and a different matter from what I took you to mean by "I'm not keen on". Perhaps I should have realised that you weren't the kind of person who changes things just because of a preference for the traditional pseudo-Latin approach to English grammar, because if you had been then you wouldn't have said "... that I'm not keen on", as opposed to something such as "... on which I'm not keen". To "engage in" war comes across to me as indicating something more aggressive: it seems to suggest "engaging" with an enemy, rather than merely doing one's own thing, regardless of what anyone else thinks. However, maybe that's just my personal way of reading it. Certainly I can't at the moment think of any better way of expressing it, now that you have persuaded me that there really is a good reason for not saying it in the way that I did.

I have never been able to make up my mind whether to prefer "edit war" or "edit-war", but what you have said indicates that at least in some contexts "edit-war" can avoid ambiguity, so I shall try to remember in future to use that form.

Finally, in June 2017 I received a message on this talk page about something I had done in 2011, and in my answer I wrote "Wow! A question about something I did in 2011. I wonder if that's a record." Well, even if it was then, it isn't now, because your message 8 years after my edit easily beats that one after a mere 6 years. JamesBWatson (talk) 18:54, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2019).

Administrator changes

28bytes • Ad Orientem • Ansh666 • Beeblebrox • Boing! said Zebedee • BU Rob13 • Dennis Brown • Deor • DoRD • Floquenbeam¹ • Flyguy649 • Fram² • Gadfium • GB fan • Jonathunder • Kusma • Lectonar • Moink • MSGJ • Nick • Od Mishehu • Rama • Spartaz • Syrthiss • TheDJ • WJBscribe

¹Floquenbeam's access was removed, then restored, then removed again.

²Fram's access was removed, then restored, then removed again.

Bureaucrat changes

28bytes • WJBscribe • Wizardman

Interface administrator changes

MSGJ • TheDJ

CheckUser changes

Beeblebrox • BU Rob13 • DoRD

Oversight changes

Beeblebrox • BU Rob13 • DoRD • GB fan

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment seeking to alleviate pressures on the request an account (ACC) process proposes either raising the account creation limit for extended confirmed editors or granting the account creator permission on request to new ACC tool users.

• In a related matter, the account throttle has been restored to six creations per day as the mitigation activity completed.

• The scope of CSD criterion G8 has been tightened such that the only redirects that it now applies to are those which target non-existent pages.
• The scope of CSD criterion G14 has been expanded slightly to include orphan "Foo (disambiguation)" redirects that target pages that are not disambiguation pages or pages that perform a disambiguation-like function (such as set index articles or lists).
• A request for comment seeks to determine whether Wikipedia:Office actions should be a policy page or an information page.

Technical news

• The Wikimedia Foundation's Community health initiative plans to design and build a new user reporting system to make it easier for people experiencing harassment and other forms of abuse to provide accurate information to the appropriate channel for action to be taken. Community feedback is invited.

Miscellaneous

• In February 2019, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) changed its office actions policy to include temporary and project-specific bans. The WMF exercised this new ability for the first time on the English Wikipedia on 10 June 2019 to temporarily ban and desysop Fram. This action has resulted in significant community discussion, a request for arbitration (permalink), and, either directly or indirectly, the resignations of numerous administrators and functionaries. The WMF Board of Trustees is aware of the situation, and discussions continue on a statement and a way forward. The Arbitration Committee has sent an open letter to the WMF Board.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:20, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Wikimania 2020 Bangkok

Hi. I won't be going to Stockholm most unfortunately, because I really can't afford $3,000 just for 5 days in the far north of Europe. I'll leave that trip to the Europeans and the 70-strong WMF junket. But next year Wikimania is right on my doorstep. I hope you will be able to come. I will be making absolutely sure that my friends who are able to come will have a great time. Regards, Chris. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:28, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Qualitee123

Hi, last night I nominated Ben Canham for a G4 CSD, since it had been deleted as non-notable at AfD in May. I went to the user's talk page to leave a note about recreating deleted articles without new sourcing, but saw that this is something of a pattern, and that you had already warned them less than a month ago about the same behaviour. I'll leave it to your judgement as to whether another warning, or any other action, is appropriate at this point. Cheers GirthSummit _(blether) 06:52, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

@Girth Summit: Thanks for letting me know. In view of the number of warnings, the continuation of exactly the same things that the warnings were about without ever taking any notice of any of any messages, and the WP:NOTHERE nature of the editing, I think an indefinite block is overdue. JamesBWatson (talk) 19:52, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know. I thought that might be necessary - I had intended to start a conversation with the user about notability and why articles are deleted, but when I saw the numerous warnings and notifications about deletions of recreations, without a single response, I thought it would be a waste of time trying to engage with them. Cheers GirthSummit _(blether) 20:20, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Article title

Now...I'm not the best Englisher in the world, but I have trouble believing that Thales's theorem is grammatically correct. GMG^talk 19:48, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

@GreenMeansGo: Yes, so do many people. However, if it's of any interest to you, here is a more detailed account than I gave in my edit summary.

Case 1: A singular noun which does not have an s at the end is pronounced with an s when it is used possessively, and that difference in pronunciation is conventionally indicated in writing by adding an s with an apostrophe before it. For example, if I wish to refer to a hat belonging to someone called "John" then I may call it "John's hat". The apostrophe is an arbitrary convention, but the s clearly and unambiguously corresponds to actual spoken usage: scarcely any native speaker of English would say "John hat".

Case 2: Exactly the same applies to the small number of plural nouns that don't end in s, so that if I wish to refer to hats belonging to several women I may say "the women's hats".

Case 3: However, most plural nouns end in s even when not possessive, and there is no difference in pronunciation when it is possessive, but conventionally an apostrophe is placed after the s. For example, if I wish to refer to several hats belonging to several girls then I may say "the girls' hats". The apostrophe is, again, an arbitrary convention to show a possessive in writing, but apart from that the possessive is no different from the non-possessive form, which agrees with spoken usage, where they are both pronounced alike.

Case 4: Now for nouns that end in s in the singular. I spent many years teaching in a school where I often heard people referring to things relating to a teacher by the name of Mr Davis. When they used the possessive of that name they pronounced it differently from how they pronounced it non-possessively: they did not say "Mr Davis lesson", they said something which sounded like "Mr Davisiz lesson", "Mr Davisiz hat", and so on. I never once heard anyone pronounce it as ""Mr Davis lesson", etc. Likewise, I have heard people refer to "Saint Jamesiz hospital", but never to "Saint James hospital". Traditionally the conventional spelling was not "Mr Davisiz hat" and "Saint Jamesiz hospital", but "Mr Davis's hat" and "Saint James's hospital", but I have written it in a semi-phonetic spelling to illustrate that the normal, standard, pronunciation is genuinely different from the pronunciation of the non-possessive form, so that the additional s added at the end really did represent a difference in pronunciation, while the apostrophe is yet again an arbitrary convention. This additional s, which really does represent a difference in pronunciation, is to be contrasted with "the girls' hats", where there is no extra s in writing because there is no extra s in pronunciation: the word "girls'" in that expression is pronounced exactly the same as the word "girls" (no apostrophe) in "The girls are sitting on the bench".

OK, that is a description of the system which was traditionally regarded as standard. However, many people had difficulty taking that in. There are all sorts of confusions over uses of apostrophes, so that for example I have seen a menu which said that a particular dish contained "pea's and beans". However, even among people who have no difficulty with most uses of apostrophes, and who would not make that kind of mistake, for some reason possessives of singular nouns ending in s has long caused confusion, with a strong tendency to write them in the same way as possessives of plural nouns ending in s, so that writing "Mr Davis' hat" instead of Mr Davis's hat was for a long time viewed as a common error, which school teachers attempted to train their pupils not to make, with, of course, varying degrees of success. That continued until about the late 1960s or early 1970s, when the view that teaching children grammar was evil, and got in the way of freedom of expression, became so established that teachers in most of the English speaking world no longer tried to teach children to write "Mr Davis's hat" rather than "Mr Davis' hat". The consequence of that is that "Mr Davis's hat" has gradually become more and more common, and is now probably the more common version.

I take the view that language is defined by how people actually use it, not by some canon of traditional views as to how people should use it, and therefore, as I indicated in my edit summary, I do not regard "Mr Davis' hat" as "grammatically incorrect", as it would have been regarded in the past, since it is now very commonly used and accepted. However, the more traditional form "Mr Davis's hat" is still also used and accepted (as a glance at the talk page of the article in question will show) and as long as there are two alternative forms which are both actually in use they are alternative "grammatically correct" forms. My own preference is for the written form which corresponds to the normally accepted spoken form, because that seems to me to be more helpful and reasonable. It may be that before my children reach my present age the s's form will be obsolete, and if so then Wikipedia (if it still exists) should use the s' form, despite the failure of that form to reflect actual pronunciation. In "the girls' hats" the apostrophe does not indicate and extra s in pronunciation, and it makes little sense to regard the same spelling to have a different meaning in "Mr Jones' son". However, as long as both forms are in use, nobody has the right to unilaterally impose their preferred version; I don't impose my preferred version where the other version previously existed, and nobody else should do so either. The article previously used the more traditional form of the name, and one editor should not have unilaterally moved it to the other form merely because he or she prefers that form.

Well, what I thought was going to be a very brief outline of a few main points has turned out to be far longer than I expected. If that is too much of a wall of text for you then I apologise, but there it is, for what it is worth. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:21, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

I mean, I agree with the use-case rationale for language. I just noted when I poked around searching for the s's version, I still seemed to mostly find the s' version. GMG^talk 21:27, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

MOS:POSS. --Izno (talk) 03:06, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) Sorry to butt in, but Talk:Stokes' theorem#Requested move 4 December 2018 may be of interest as well. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 03:20, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Question

A while back, you blocked me for what you perceived to be edit warring on Sabra_(company). I took some time off from editing, and also reflected on my previous actions. I want to go back to constructive editing, and I also want the article to accurately reflect what reliable sources say. I studied the process for resolving edit disputes, and since there was only other editor to argue against my position on the talk page, I decided to ask for a third opinion. You can see the editor who provided that third opinion basically agrees with my position - "The term should be included...It is supported by reliable sources, therefore it can be included.". I want to put the term back into the article- would that be ok? Here come the Suns (talk) 21:14, 7 July 2019 (UTC)

@Here come the Suns: Really? Seriously? You are so concerned about the inclusion or exclusion in an article of a one-word description which makes very little difference to the meaning that you are willing to keep coming back to try to get your way at intervals over a period of five and a half years? You may like to think about that.

The edit which you are so determined to make has in the past been objected to by Iryna Harpy and Swpb, so it seems to me reasonable that when you decided to resurrect the question you might have informed them, especially Iryna Harpy, as she has entered into discussion with you about this on the article talk page in the past.

I have never expressed any opinion either way as to whether the inclusion of the wording you prefer is desirable or undesirable, nor do I intend to do so now. However, you should think carefully about what you have been told about your editing in the past, and make an effort to make sure you don't repeat the same mistakes. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:21, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

"you should think carefully about what you have been told about your editing in the past, and make an effort to make sure you don't repeat the same mistakes" - but that is exactly what I am trying to do. The dispute resolution process recommended by Wikipedia is to seek out a 3rd opinion, which is what I did. What else should I be doing? I've pinged both the other users on the article's talk page. Here come the Suns (talk) 21:05, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

So now Iryna says she "doesn't accept" the 3rd opinion. what should be the next step? Here come the Suns (talk) 15:24, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

The circumstances aren't quite as simple as you paint them to be, Here come the Suns. Are you even logging in as yourself to make "third party" requests in the first place? If so, where are you making them? I see absolutely no interaction between yourself and the third party either on their Wikipedia talk page or on their WikiCommons page (which is where this person does the majority of their editing). All I can see is WP:NOTHERE and WP:FORUMSHOP activity on your behalf. Iryna Harpy (talk) 01:17, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

Iryna Harpy, I gave you the link to the 3rd opinion request I made on the article's talk page. Here it is again: link. Do you not understand how 3rd opinion requests work? read this, and take note of 'your entry should contain the following:...a date, but no signature...."

JamesBWatson, what do you suggest I do now, when it seems this user does not understand how 3rd opinion works, casts aspersions on the way I've been following the recommended dispute resolution procedure, and refuses to accept the 3rd opinion? Here come the Suns (talk) 01:43, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

I would also appreciate your opinion of this apparent stalking behavior: [2] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Here come the Suns (talk • contribs) 01:49, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

Oh, for goodness sake, would you please grow up and take it back to the article's talk page where I've responded further. As for the harassment charge, that was simply a matter of tracking your latest edits. I'm fine with your reverting as you've left the instance of the dead link in the body of the article alone, so please desist with the WP:WOLF and WP:ASPERSIONS. I have not been the lone voice on the article therefore, on that count alone, the "Third opinion" board was inappropriate as it isn't a simple dispute between you and I. Iryna Harpy (talk) 04:02, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

Don't tell me to grow up when you childishly stalk me to articles you've never edited before, and make a non-policy based revert, apparently just to annoy me. The link you were supposedly upset about was correctly left in the article by me from the get-go, tagged with "dead link", and I only removed the external link, because as WP:EL says "Links to dead URLs in a list of external links are of no use to Wikipedia articles. Such dead links should either be updated or removed ". perhaps you should spend a little more time reading Wikipedia policies and a little less trying to annoy editors you've had a minor content dispute with. Here come the Suns (talk) 04:11, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

User:VisualAwareness/sandbox

Hello. On 28 June 2019, you deleted the page User:VisualAwareness/sandbox as per CSD G11 (I think I nominated it, but it could be someone else). Today, I noticed User:Mvolod83 has created a page on the same company at Visual Awareness Technologies & Consulting (VATC). I suspect that that page is the same as User:VisualAwareness/sandbox was (the same page structure, same bold titles, and the very beginning from the creation log (first few words) matches the new page, and all these points assuming I remember everything correctly). Is that true (I can't see the page contents since it's deleted)? Does that imply User:Mvolod83 being the same person as User:VisualAwareness? - Edible Melon (talk) 15:46, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

@Edible Melon: I don't have time to deal with this now, but here are a few quick answers for now. It wasn't you that nominated the page for deletion (not that it makes any difference). The page is the same. Yes, I'm as near as makes no difference certain that it's the same person. I will try to get back onto this tomorrow, but if I don't then please feel welcome to prompt me again. JamesBWatson (talk) 16:26, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

@Edible Melon: I know you have seen at least part of what I have done about this, but the latest update is that after I had given the editor a chance to work at improving the page, they made it clear that they had no intention of doing so, and just wanted it accepted as it was, so I have deleted the page and blocked the account. Many, and I guess most, administrators would have done that right away, but I preferred to give them a chance. They chose not to take that chance up. JamesBWatson (talk) 19:32, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

Disruptive IP hopper from South Florida

Hi, JamesB. 2601:586:400:833A:0:0:0:0/64 started editing two weeks ago and appears to be WP:NOTHERE. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 22:26, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Req

Hello James. Have a look at this, please. My req re: revoking TPA stands. It is hard to leave it alone when the same editor constantly writes deceiving stuffs (one is mentioned here), continuing and subtle personal attacks directed to me. It has been about 2 weeks and it would be nice if someone stop this. Puduḫepa 10:25, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Complaint

Sir, my name is Ismail salad and i work for the Ministry of Women Development and family Affairs in Puntland state of Somalia as Multimedia consultant. Earlier today i added the profile of our Ministry into the Wikipedia which i had orders from my senior supervisor. then, i got a message that says your contents are being deleted by you James, and i dont know what is that mean. can i have more explanation please? I hope to hear from you soon, coz i am so fucked up if i dont add those information in to the wikipedia, here is my gmail account for more communication; xaajidirir2014@gmail.com thanks again. Ismail xaaji dirir (talk) 11:12, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

(talk page watcher) James, if you don't mind me butting in. @Ismail xaaji dirir:, you might find useful information at user:dlohcierekim/g11 and user:dlohcierekim/g12.  Dlohcierekim (talk) 12:52, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

@Ismail xaaji dirir: I'm not sure what further explanation you need. If you can tell me what was unclear about either or both of the points I gave then I will be happy to try to clarify the matter. I am not trying to be evasive: I honestly don't know what is not clear about what I wrote, or what further information might be more helpful to you. You may, however, find one or more of the following helpful: Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not a soapbox or means of promotion, Wikipedia:FAQ/Copyright, Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials, Wikipedia:Copyright violations, as well as the pages that Dlohcierekim has linked to above. Also, since you work for the organisation you have written about, you should read the guideline on conflict of interest before you do any more editing on the subject. For your convenience I shall post a notice about that on your talk page.

Normally all communications about editing Wikipedia should be visible to all Wikipedia editors: openness of this kind is fundamental to the nature of Wikipedia. Therefore, email should be used only when there is a need for confidentiality, which is not so in this case, so I am answering here. In case you don't log onto your Wikipedia account, and therefore don't see the notification of this message, I shall post you a short email simply informing you that I have replied here. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:25, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

London Buses route protection

Hi, I was wondering whether you agree that it's time to unprotect the "London Buses route" redirects that you protected in 2015. They were immediately indefinitely semi'd and it doesn't look like the vandals have returned since. There are a bunch listed here in case you need a refresher as to what I'm talking about. Anarchyte (talk | work) 11:30, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

@Anarchyte: I don't remember the circumstances which led me to protect the articles, and I think it is unlikely that whatever the reason was it is important enough to worry about four years later, so I will leave it to you. Please do whatever you think is suitable. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:40, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

promo writing explanation

This was great. Is this one of your templates?  Dlohcierekim (talk) 12:48, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

@Dlohcierekim: No, but there are certainly parts of it that could be usefully made into templates. For example, the following two excerpts say things which I have found myself saying, in variations, many times over the years, so that having a permanent copy of them to paste would be useful: "it is irrelevant that there was probably not a payment specifically for editing Wikipedia and separate from your normal salary" and "people who work in marketing spend hours on end, day after day, month after month, reading and writing marketing-speak, with the result that they become desensitised to it and are unable to recognise it when they see it." Maybe I'll do it soon. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:33, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

The marketing part is really, really good.  Dlohcierekim (talk) 15:55, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

@Dlohcierekim: I was going to write a couple of sentences in answer to that comment from you, but I got carried away, and it turned out to be a long account of a number of my thoughts relating to promotional editors. Well, since I have written it, here it is. If you find it a case of TLDR then it still hasn't been a waste of my time, because I actually found thinking through my thoughts on the matter as I wrote helped to clarify my thoughts. (I have spent so long on it that am now having to post this quickly, without time to proof-read it, so apologies if there are any stupid errors.)

Promotional editors are very often referred to on Wikipedia as "spammers", but that is unfair, because while a few of them really are just here to spam, the very substantial majority of them are here in good faith, genuinely not realising that what they are doing is not going to be acceptable. Back in the days when I was first an administrator I found an enormous proportion of blocks on promotional editors were followed by unblock requests which made it quite clear that the editors involved had posted content which looked to me and to everybody else like total spam, but the editors involved it really honestly did not seem to understand what was promotional about it. It took me a while to work out what the reason was, but when I eventually did I posted a message to one of those editors explaining the point about people who work in marketing becoming desensitised to marketing-speak, and she thanked me for pointing it out. Her thanks seemed perfectly sincere, and it was clear that the suggestion was a total revelation to her. Since then I have said much the same thing to numerous other promotional editors. I can't remember any more of them thanking me for doing so, but I do think that in a significant proportion of cases (though unfortunately by no means all) it does lead to a change in the tone of their posts, suggesting that they have taken the message on board.

Nowadays we get far fewer unblock requests from promotional editors who completely miss the point of the block than we did back in those day. I think a number of factors have been involved in bringing the change, but I am immodest enough to believe that the essential factor which started off the process of change was a radical replacement of the "spamusername" block template with a new one, which I originally created as a user space page for my own use, and after discussion between me and Bishonen she decided to put it in place of the existing template. You have been around long enough to perhaps remember the appalling old "spamusername" template. It had two problems. (1) It was so long and intimidating that there was just too much for a new editor to take in, so that most (not just many) spamusername unblock requests completely missed the essential points,. (2) Because it was so intimidating most administrators never used it, and instead used other unblock templates which were far less appropriate. For example, many used the one which said "your user name is the only reason for the block" (softerblock or username block or something, I neither remember nor care which). That meant that editors would create a new account with a new name and continue editing in exactly the same way as before, which an administrator had told them would be OK, and would then quite rightly get annoyed when they got blocked again without the option of creating a new account. For some reason it didn't seem to occur to most administrators that if none of the standard block templates were suitable they didn't have to use any of them, and could instead write their own block reason. Equally, for some reason it didn't occur to me that once I had written my own block reason I could make it available for everyone else, until a comment from Bishonen criticising the existing spamusername template prompted me to tentatively put forward my own version as a possible replacement. Credit to her for deciding to go ahead and do it.

I have always thought that we should not immediately block good faith editors because of promotional editing and/or username policy violations. We should instead give them a courteous message explaining why what they have done is not considered acceptable, and give them a chance to change their editing practices and/or user name. Only if they then continue in the same way should we block them. Outright vandals, who are here with the deliberate purpose of being disruptive, are usually given warnings and further chances before being blocked, and yet good-faith editors who have no way of knowing that what they are doing will be considered unacceptable are confronted with a block right away. Is that reasonable? However, despite holding that view, I very often do block them immediately, because when I was first an administrator I found, greatly to my frustration, that if I posted such a friendly message the result was almost always that another administrator would just step in and block the editor, giving one of the inappropriate templated block messages that I have mentioned. With great reluctance I decided that if the editor was going to be blocked anyway, it would be better for it to happen with a fairer block notice, so I took to blocking them and posting my preferred block notice. While I have been typing this message it has occurred to me that nowadays it is far less common for blocks in this situation to be accompanied by grossly inappropriate block notifications, so my reason for immediately blocking in this situation has gone, so I shall try not blocking and see how it turns out. I had got so accustomed over the years to blocking in this situation that I had sort of never noticed that my reason for doing so no longer applied. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:42, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Ha, and there you go pinging me, just as I was happily studying your post to the paid editor with a view to cannibalizing it for my collection. (In the end I linked to the whole page, just now.) Thank you very much for your help! Have some frog cakes! Bishonen | talk 09:12, 19 July 2019 (UTC).

@Bishonen: Frog cakes! Wow! Frog cakes! I've never had those before. 😋️ JamesBWatson (talk) 12:47, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Im new Help

I am trying to write my profile, but then it was removed by you. Please can you help to i get it right — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lcmorleans (talk • contribs) 12:10, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

@Lcmorleans: If you would like to contribute to the encyclopaedia then I suggest the best way to get started is to find some articles with minor problems that you can put right, and leave creating a user page until you have some experience. When you do write a user page, it should mainly be about yourself in connection with your work for Wikipedia, and iwhile you can mention a few personal details too, they should not be the main focus of the page. (I suggest dealing with "minor" problems, because unfortunately editors who start out trying to do bigger things quite often make mistakes that lead to large amounts of their work being wasted, which is very frustrating, whereas editors who start with small things may make mistakes, but they will be small mistakes, so not so much is lost.)

If, on the other hand, you are not interested in contributing to the encyclopaedia, but just want to write about yourself, using Wikipedia like a social network site, then Wikipedia is not the right place for you, as that is not what Wikipedia does.

I will also post a message on your talk page giving links to some pages which may help you to get started. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:28, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

Noob COI Not

Dear JamesBWatson, I started on this ride a few days ago and sprung on some of some stuff I know kinda well. The choice of which articles to work on came by chance as I got to read a book. Now to insinuate COI on the basis of a limited number of activities is kinda sad. I know how bullying works, once it starts no matter what you do it gets only worse without end. The end is when you just quit. I just quit. Thanks for giving me what was in store real early. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Speculative Boting (talk • contribs) 15:05, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

@Speculative Boting: I'm afraid there has been a misunderstanding. I wasn't "insinuating" anything: I was just warning you what the guidelines were, in case you did have a conflict of interest, as it looked as though you might have. If in fact you didn't then there was no problem. And if you regard one civil talk page message letting you know about the guidelines as "bullying", then I'm not sure what else to say, except that it wasn't. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:11, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

No meatpuppetry

I know it looks like there are random new users supporting me in the Michael Jackson articles, but I assure you I don't know them online or in real-life. Nor have I encouraged them to "vote" with me in discussions. You can see that I left the RfC open deliberately, and I haven't changed the Michael Jackson article in spite of apparent consensus. Also, I have disagreed with an edit proposal by TruthGuardian here, and I have conceded to Hammelsmith's proposal. TruthGuardian supported me in other Jackson articles, while Hammelsmith and I have disagreed on many other things. I think there should be more evidence for meatpuppetry. —Partytemple (talk) 06:09, 24 July 2019 (UTC) Can you also consider this conversation here? I was offered the reFill tool to bring me up to 500 edits (I already had about 470 by then) after I noticed badly sourced/disruptive edits on the Michael Jackson article, and Moxy offered me the tool. Thanks. —Partytemple (talk) 08:42, 24 July 2019 (UTC) Also this conversation about a wrongly written statement on the article; this was right before Moxy gave me the tool. —Partytemple (talk) 08:46, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

@Partytemple: OK, I am willing to accept that there may not have been meatpuppetry, although it did look that way. However, you clearly deliberately set out to boost your edit count so as to get round extended confirmed protection, though that may have applied only to a small proportion of your edits. Do you have any comment to make about that? JamesBWatson (talk) 14:33, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

Even if Partytemple doesn't know the random users (as if we usually actually know people we talk to on forums anyway) and didn't direct them to threads, the evidence of meatpuppetry is clear. Those editors were directed to those threads somehow. It looks like that because that is what happened. And I ask that Partytemple does not go to my talk page to defend his/herself. The defense is above. No need for it to be on my talk page as well; I'd just revert it. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 19:19, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

I believe Flyer22 crossed out the possibility of meatpuppetry on the ANI I wrote earlier, and other admins had said I'm not a sockpuppet. As for using the reFill tool, again, I already had 470 edits before I started using it, and I didn't know reFill edits don't count as actual edits. What counts as actual edits to 500, then? Moxy told me to use it to reach 500, just ~30 more edits. I currently have nearly 1000 edits; I'm sure I'm already past 500 of "actual edits" not done by reFill. I also have not implemented the controversial edits on the Michael Jackson article, so I have not been disruptive editing. Of the things of I've done on that article, it's mostly fixing sources and fixing improper citations. —Partytemple (talk) 04:46, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Crossed out the possibility of meatpuppetry? What? That makes no sense. And why are you so adamant to "cross out the possibility of meatpuppetry" when it so obviously happened/is happening? You even stated that you "know it looks like there are random new users supporting [you] in the Michael Jackson articles." So why should anyone "cross out the possibility of meatpuppetry"? You stated that you didn't encourage them to comment (or rather vote) in the discussions you started. That doesn't mean that no meatpuppetry happened/is happening. All admins, including JamesBWatson, I contacted about this deduced that meatpuppetry happened/is happening. No admins said that you are not a sock; the admin/CheckUser I contacted stated (in that ANI thread), in part, "No signs of socking from any of them from a cu perspective." Notice the "from a cu perspective" aspect? That doesn't mean that you not are a sock. It means that there are no signs that you are a sock via the CheckUser tool. It's common to not know what master account/previous account a sock used. Even when a CheckUser has an account to compare the suspected account to, data that a CheckUser can use to tie a fresh account to an abandoned account only lasts a limited time. JamesBWatson is willing to give you the benefit of the doubt regarding you being involved in the obvious meatpuppetry, but he did not say he believes that no meatpuppetry was/is happening. Being a sockpuppet is not the same thing as being a meatpuppet Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 16:32, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

And as for disruptive editing, you've been somewhat problematic, including at the Leaving Neverland article, as is clear by this and this thread. Or even looking at the edit history of the Leaving Neverland article. It's not like you haven't implemented controversial edits on this topic. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 16:46, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

@Partytemple: First of all, a correction to something I said above. I wrote "I am willing to accept that there may not have been meatpuppetry" but what I intended to convey was "I am willing to accept that there may not have been meatpuppetry in your case." There is very little doubt that editors have been recruited to help support a point of view, but whether you have been involved is not 100% certain. As for "reFill", which I gather is some kind of tool for rapidly making edits to references, that is irrelevant: the issue is deliberately making edits irrelevant to your real purpose in order to reach extended confirmed status, and whether you do that manually or using editing tools is irrelevant. However, I have restored your extended confirmed status. JamesBWatson (talk) 10:53, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Just leaving this as further documentation. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 16:13, 27 July 2019 (UTC)

Placeholder

[3] — Ched :  ?  — 05:46, 25 July 2019 (UTC) (back after it closes)

• I'll guess that you've heard your share of Holmes vs Watson comments, and just go with "James" - hopefully that's ok. Well since you struck your vote I'm not sure where to start, so I'll just keep it to the bare basics. While I'll grant you that everyone should remain objective and not support their friends just because they are friends, I don't think that works all the time in practice; especially in the current world where online communication and friendships are the norm rather than the exception. While it is a great way to approach things, it's very tough, if it's even possible, to carry out in practice. To be honest, I was very heavily influenced by your post, and almost withdrew my support (bare as it was).

I had originally intended to have a discussion regarding the whole thing, but thought it best to wait til after things had been decided. Since I was so close to that seat on the fence, I did have a good think on your views, and if it was a practical !vote. Anyway James, having voiced my thoughts I'll leave you to your daily tasks. Best always, — Ched :  ?  — 13:50, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Other comment

I noticed that you had struck your vote. I added some further diffs of what I consider to be evidence of "picking sides". The RfA format isn't ideal for this. Finding diffs and browsing 1,400 ANI messages is extremely time-consuming with our awful search function. However, ideally you should be be quick because a hundred users will have voted in an instant. I guess what I'm trying to say is that you shouldn't be afraid to use your intuition based on your previous interactions, but of course do what feels right. --Pudeo (talk) 20:23, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2019).

Administrator changes

Johnuniq • Kosack • Valereee

Ad Orientem • Ched • Gadfium • Jonathunder • Nick • Yelyos

Bald Zebra • Beetstra • Doug Bell • Journalist • Ruud Koot • Splash • Voice of Clam

Interface administrator changes

Dinoguy1000

CheckUser changes

RickinBaltimore

Oversight changes

Beeblebrox

RickinBaltimore

Guideline and policy news

• Following a request for comment, the page Wikipedia:Office actions has been changed from a policy page to an information page.
• A request for comment (permalink) is in progress regarding the administrator inactivity policy.

Arbitration

• Editors may now use the template {{Ds/aware}} to indicate that they are aware that discretionary sanctions are in force for a topic area, so it is unnecessary to alert them.

Miscellaneous

• Following a research project on masking IP addresses, the Foundation is starting a new project to improve the privacy of IP editors. The result of this project may significantly change administrative and counter-vandalism workflows. The project is in the very early stages of discussions and there is no concrete plan yet. Admins and the broader community are encouraged to leave feedback on the talk page.
• The new page reviewer right is bundled with the admin tool set. Many admins regularly help out at Special:NewPagesFeed, but they may not be aware of improvements, changes, and new tools for the Curation system. Stay up to date by subscribing here to the NPP newsletter that appears every two months, and/or putting the reviewers' talk page on your watchlist.

  Since the introduction of temporary user rights, it is becoming more usual to accord the New Page Reviewer right on a probationary period of 3 to 6 months in the first instance. This avoids rights removal for inactivity at a later stage and enables a review of their work before according the right on a permanent basis.

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Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:23, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia Edit Query

Hi JamesBWatson,

Greetings for the day.

I'm writing to address your message with regards to my edits for 3rd Eye Advisory recently.

Are you working for 3rd Eye Advisory, either directly (for example as an employee or an individual contractor) or indirectly (for example as an employee of a business that is working on contract for 3rd Eye Advisory)?

Yes, I'm working for 3rd Eye Advisory as an employee directly.

Is writing for Wikipedia part of paid work? I ask that because frequently people who edit on behalf of a business say that they are not being paid for doing so, meaning that they are editing as part of their regular paid work, without a specific payment explicitly for editing Wikipedia.

It is a part of my regular paid work as a content manager.

What do you mean by the words "by any other source"? Other than what?

By other source I mean, I'm not working for any independent projects or freelancing for creation of Wikipedia pages and I'm not paid by any such sources for the work. RohitPandey2310 (talk) 06:12, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

• I have copied these answers to talk, to keep the conversation together. JamesBWatson (talk) 10:07, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi JamesBWatson

Greetings for the Day

Sure, I have gone through the guidelines. Kindly, suggest as per your observation, does the current content look proper and should it serve as a platform for new edits?RohitPandey2310 (talk) 12:47, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Shamrat Shangram

Hi JBW, when you blocked Shamrat Shangram did you have a master in mind? I've seen newish user S M Fahmid Hassan intersecting with the Shamrat Shangram account multiple times, so I want to poke around. Thanks, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 02:13, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

@Cyphoidbomb: the master is Prince Shobuz. See also Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of Prince Shobuz. I see here that 43% of the new account's edits overlap those of one or more of Prince Shobuz's accounts' edits, which is a strikingly large proportion, even though the numbers are small (21/49). The creation of the new account a few days after the latest sock block is also interesting, but in a fairly brief check I didn't see anything more definite. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:27, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for looking, mate! Cyphoidbomb (talk) 15:17, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Comments relating to a block

Hi, I had a ban which was declined, even though there were requests for feedback there was no response from the user for almost two months so it seems to me that the user preferred to leave it that way, after I growth tired and submitted a draft with another account my ban was declined with I would say almost happiness and there was no thought of why I would do it with exactly the same username I was asking to unblock, there was more activity than ever and almost instantly so I can't not believe there is no preference to leave bans be than to really address them, I wrote back in my block but because I did it below the decline reason it was deleted instead of being edited to put it above the decline reason and what I had written before was stripped of the format so now it looks unintelligible, my talk page access rights were denied and there is no limit for the ban so I can’t do anything about itṜ, so even though I had never vandalized any content and all was about having more than one account I have been banned effectively for life, I not sure if you need to know all this but what I want is just to apologize to you because you were of the opinion to unblock and my last action maybe made you look bad and also there was a comment about something being unworthy of you that at the end I think it was also my fault, I wrote this but like I said it was deleted, is not really important except for me so I suggest you just delete it after you read it but I wanted to be sure you knew that, if you come across my ban again don’t worry about it because there is no chance about it and as I commented I don’t believe there was a chance even from the start so to go further would just provide for a bad time and what I want is just to say I’m sorry for the bad time I believe you already had, best regards. 18:11, 13 August 2019 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.122.240.180 (talk)

Much of your message is difficult to follow, but I think I understand the essential points, and all I can say is that I sympathise. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:40, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

User:Campbkyl/sandbox

Hello JamesBWatson,

I saw that you just took down a page I created. I am the student representative for the IFMA and need to create this page for the organization. Is there anyway to get that deleted page back and I can make the changes necessary to not infringe on any copyright? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Campbkyl (talk • contribs) 17:48, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

@Campbkyl: If you go to the "preferences" link at the top of the page you can enable Wikipedia email, and if you then let me know you have done so I can then email the content of the page to you, but Wikipedia's copyright policy does not let me restore it as a Wikipedia page. You should also read the conflict of interest guideline before you do any more editing. JamesBWatson (talk) 18:00, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Review Request

Hi James, was just wondering if you could review my Edward Nangle page, now that I've changed it[i.e. inserted more citations, made it neutral etc.]. Thanks a lot, Tomás --Tomás Deb (talk) 16:22, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Tomás Deb: I'll try to have a look at it when I have more time, but won't be today. If I haven't got back to you within 48 hours or so please feel welcome to remind me. JamesBWatson (talk) 18:29, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Indonesian IP-hopping vandal

Hi, JamesB. Edits from 182.1.X.X at Out-of-band management and Intelligent Platform Management Interface have got to be from the same WP:NOTHERE editor. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:54, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Yes, but it's difficult to do much about it. All of the edits to those articles took place within a period of about half an hour, and stopped some time ago, whereas there are quite a lot of constructive edits from the same IP range. In that situation there would be no justification for a long block risking affecting a number of constructive editors, because of a brief period of disruptive editing by one person who may well have gone away by now. I could block for a little while, but even then I'm not sure the small likelihood of preventing disruptive editing would be enough to outweigh the risk of collateral damage. If you see any more similar editing from the same IP range then feel welcome, as always, to let me know, and I'll reconsider the situation, but for now I'm going to leave it and hope the problem is over. (By the way, you may have noticed that I did block the IP addresses from your last report to me.) JamesBWatson (talk) 18:12, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

This particular vandal evidently has hopped to 114.125.X.X; two recently active addresses in that range have been blocked. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:23, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: I've blocked the range 114.125.0.0/17 for 36 hours. That gives more risk of collateral damage than I am usually happy to do, but I took into account that the same range was given a CheckUser block a little while ago: the more evidence there is of abuse of an IP range the more collateral damage one has to be willing to tolerate. Intelligent Platform Management Interface has been protected for 3 days, and I would be willing to protect more articles, but the vandal has now attacked a number of pages, as you probably know, and protecting some would probably just drive the vandal off to other pages, which would make it harder to deal with, because we would not know which pages to keep an eye on. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:03, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Okay. By the way, I'll let you know if run across any other particularly active IP vandals whose timing coincides with the school year. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:11, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Yes. A few days ago I was looking at the history of an IP address which has a history of starting vandalism and being blocked every time the school year starts, so I thought I would keep an eye on it to see if that will happen again this year. However, I very thoughtlessly didn't make a note of the IP address, so that's no use at all. Oh well...

Going back to your post that started this thread, I have now blocked the range 182.1.0.0/19 for 24 hours. The fact that the same vandal has moved to another IP range makes it less likely that they will now disappear, so the likelihood of their coming back on the old IP range is greater, which obviously shifts the benefit/collateral-risk balance of a possible block further to the benefit side.

It has occurred to me that what I wrote above beginning "I would be willing to protect more articles..." could be misunderstood. I didn't mean "I might be willing to protect more articles, but I won't, because that would probably just drive the vandal off to other pages", I meant "I am willing to consider protecting more articles, but in considering whether to do so we should take into account the risk that it might just drive the vandal off to other pages."

I'm not sure what it is about Indonesia, but over the years it has produced far more than its share of persistent IP-hopping vandals, most of whom specialise in vandalising articles on particular subjects. JamesBWatson (talk) 22:06, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Block evasion/sockpuppetry on the generations articles again

Hi JamesBWatson,

There's an IP (or IPs) editing on the Millennials and generation articles that I'm highly suspicious is Aboutbo2000 [4] evading their block. The IP sock is most recently participating in the Millennials RfC [5].

Suspected sockpuppets of Aboutbo2000:

• 2605:E000:151F:22DC:A145:126D:851:335D [6]
• 2605:E000:151F:22DC:1D0F:636F:39A:867D [7]
• Here is the IP range: 2605:E000:151F:22DC::/64 [8]
• 104.173.197.231 [9]
• 69.75.208.210 [10]

Here are some of the previous socks of Aboutbo2000 that have been blocked before:

• Carfree82 [11]
• 64.183.42.42 [12]
• IP range: 2606:6000:610A:9000::/64 [13][14]
• IP range: 2606:6000:6111:8E00::/64 [15][16]

They all have the same narrow interest in the generation articles and are clearly not here to collaborate and improve the articles, but disruptively push their POV despite what reliable sources say. Please let me know your thoughts and if you need anything else. Thanks for reading, Someone963852 (talk) 12:54, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

@Someone963852: First of all, apologies that it has taken a week for me to get round to responding to this. For personal reasons I have had very much less time for Wikipedia recently than usually.

I am 100% sure you are right. I have blocked the range 2605:E000:151F:22DC::/64 for two years. I was going to protect the Millennials article too, but I found it has already been done. I can't see much else to do at the moment, though I have placed a block on 69.75.208.0/24 for a few weeks. JamesBWatson (talk) 19:33, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for the response, I really appreciate it. It's way too soon to tell, especially when Millennials and Generation Z are both protected 'til September, but please keep an eye out on Davidpeer007 [17]. Someone963852 (talk) 21:56, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Dorsai Irregulars

Why was Dorsai Irregulars deleted? I am a science fiction fan and longtime filker, and I was looking for that article. I tried to follow the instructions for finding a deletion log but without success.

I am not arguing about the deletion, especially since I don't know the reasoning behind it, but I would like to see that. Please {{Ping}} me to discuss. --Thnidu (talk) 19:23, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

@Thnidu:

This is amazing. It is uncommon to get messages about anything that I did on Wikipedia more than a few weeks ago, rare to get messages about anything that I did more than a few months ago, very rare to get messages about anything that I did more than a year or two ago, and I doubt that I had ever received a message about anything that I did as much as nine years ago until a couple of days ago, and now within a couple of days I have received two messages about admin actions from nine years ago.

I don 't know why you couldn't find the deletion log. Provided you are logged into a Wikipedia account just going to Dorsai Irregulars should show you the deletion log entry.

The article was proposed for deletion by an editor called "Gavia immer", who has not edited now for well over 8 years, so it isn't possible to consult him or her about it. The reason given for the proposal was "Insufficient independent references for notability or particular facts presented", and that was perfectly true: the article gave no evidence whatever of satisfying Wikipedia's notability guidelines. If anything, it now gives even less evidence, as all of the references given then are now dead links. I have also searched for information about them, in case there is actually evidence of notability which was not given in the article, but I found none. Most of what I found was wikis, FaceBook, fan sites, Twitter, and other such sites which give no evidence of notability. If you want to read about the Dorsai Irregulars, I suggest you look at https://en.wikifur.com/wiki/Dorsai_Irregulars, which gives significantly more information than about them than the deleted Wikipedia article did. JamesBWatson (talk) 16:27, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

References for Draft:International Academy of Science

JamesBWatson,

Thanks for the feedback on Draft:International_Academy_of_Science.  I would like to continue to work on getting this page up to Wikipedia standards.  To that end, I would appreciate some clarification.

1) In your opinion, is the KC Star article [18] not credible?  They are a local paper but it looked editorial to me.

2) I think that some of the references to Acellus Academy as an accredited school are significant here (including [19] and [20] as examples) since it seems to one of the primary activities of IAS.  Do you agree?

Thanks again. -- Tigereye7 (talk) 14:44, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

@Tigereye7: First of all, let me say that I am making an assessment on the basis of Wikipedia's notability guidelines and the general consensus as to how they should be applied, not on the basis of my own opinion, which is not always the same thing.

The first link you give is an article which barely mentions the International Academy of Science itself, even though it gives significant coverage to one of its products. Local coverage tends not to be regarded as of much value on its own in establishing notability, without support from wider coverage.

I'm afraid your links to pages which provide confirmation of accreditation are of little relevance. Being an accredited school is unrelated to any of Wikipedia's notability guidelines: there are many accredited schools which don't come remotely near to satisfying those guidelines. I see that in another post you have referred to a section of WP:SCHOOLOUTCOMES which refers to articles which "have been historically been kept". I wouldn't attach a great deal of reliance on that, because most of those historical decisions took place at a time when there was a widespread belief that there was consensus that there was a presumption of notability for high schools, but some time ago an extensive discussion with widespread participation concluded that there was no such consensus. It seems that someone who liked such articles to be kept had written that there was a consensus to do so, and others assumed that was true. However, probably the most important point here is that notability does not get passed from one topic to a related one. My father in law is highly notable, and is the subject of a Wikipedia article, but that does not make my wife notable enough to do so, and likewise evidence of notability of Acellus Academy does not constitute evidence of notability of the International Academy of Science, despite the close connection between the two.

(Totally irrelevant, but I just feel like mentioning it.) I am quite impressed by the picture on your user page. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:11, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

@JamesBWatson: Thanks for the clarification and the education. I will keep working on it.

I am glad you like my photo -- at least someone appreciates fine art. Haha. Cameras have come a very long way since that old thing was taken. As you may have also noticed, I lifted the "User Wikipedian For" icon idea from your User Page. Thanks. Tigereye7 (talk) 22:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Luminex article

James:

We're working to create a page about Luminex and had not intended to publish it yet, just playing in the Sandbox. When we are ready and it meets Wikipedia's standards for publishing, will we be able to? Or has your deleting our work-in-progress created an issue down the road?

Please let us know.

Thanks!

--Michael — Preceding unsigned comment added by KingsleyForefront (talk • contribs) 15:39, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Your deletion of articles by User:ThreatMatrix

Hi JamesBWatson. Would you mind explaining your G5 deletions of Operation Arrow (1999) and Yugoslavia and weapons of mass destruction in more detail? Both of these articles seemed to be about notable/encyclopedic topics. I realize that TryDeletingMe was topic banned from making edits related to the Balkans, so the articles would need to be reviewed carefully for original research, POV, and whatnot, but I would prefer to see the articles improved rather than deleted outright. – Lord Bolingbroke (talk) 19:05, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

Both the issue of being "about notable/encyclopedic topics" and the issue of reviewing for "original research, POV, and whatnot" are missing the point, because the reason for the deletion was nothing to do with the content of the articles; it was about their having been created in violation of a block. A fact which I first discovered about ten years ago, and have since seen confirmed many times, is that persistent evaders of blocks and bans will continue to do the same indefinitely if they know that what they have done will remains in place after each account is blocked, and they can just pick up from where they left off with a new account each time, but if they find that whatever they do is just reverted or deleted then there is a chance that they may eventually realise that what they are doing is not going to get them anywhere, and give up. It is not guaranteed to work, but it often does, and nothing else does, in the case of persistent block-evaders. That does have the effect that sometimes we lose content that was somewhat worthwhile, but that is, unfortunately, a cost that has to be born. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:20, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

That makes sense. Thanks for explaining. In cases like this, would there be an issue if an editor in good standing were to recreate the deleted article(s)? – Lord Bolingbroke (talk) 16:37, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

@Lord Bolingbroke: There's nothing to stop another editor from creating a new article on the same topic, but it seems to me better if the new one is not close to identical to the old one, to make it clear to the disruptive editor that it is not his or her article that has survived. It might also be worth waiting for a while, so that that person has time to realise that their work has gone, but that's just a thought of mine, not an official guideline or anything of the kind. JamesBWatson (talk) 07:48, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

OK, I'll keep that in mind. – Lord Bolingbroke (talk) 17:50, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2019).

Administrator changes

Bradv • Chetsford • Izno

Floquenbeam • Lectonar

DESiegel • Jake Wartenberg • Rjanag • Topbanana

CheckUser changes

Callanecc • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Oversight changes

Callanecc • Fox • HJ Mitchell • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Technical news

• Editors using the mobile website on Wikipedia can opt-in to new advanced features via your settings page. This will give access to more interface links, special pages, and tools.
• The advanced version of the edit review pages (recent changes, watchlist, and related changes) now includes two new filters. These filters are for "All contents" and "All discussions". They will filter the view to just those namespaces.

Arbitration

• A request for comment is open to provide an opportunity to amend the structure, rules, and procedures of the 2019 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee election and to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.

Miscellaneous

• A global request for comment is in progress regarding whether a user group should be created that could modify edit filters across all public Wikimedia wikis.

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Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:37, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Approve my article

Its of our hindu festival Khetwadichaganraj (talk) 02:25, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

IP hopper disrupting media-based articles, primarily newspapers

Hi, JB. This range has been making unsourced changes, one of which I've found to be demonstrably wrong. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:57, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: OK, I have found a couple of edits which are demonstrably wrong, one which was clearly vandalism, and many which were unexplained, unsourced, and dubious. There have also been very frequent unexplained removal of sources. I have also seen four warnings on IP talk pages for this range, all of which have been completely ignored. I have blocked the range for a month. However, here's a request. If you give me a report like this again, could you give me complete information about what you have found? That doesn't mean that I am asking you to do more checking than you did, but if, for example, you have found one edit which is demonstrably wrong, as you said you had, it can save me trouble if you tell me which edit that is, rather than leave me to find it for myself. Thanks for the report, and I am in no way trying to put you off doing the same again, but just mentioning how you could make such reports even more helpful, with virtually no extra effort from you, since you would just be giving me information which you already have. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 20:58, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Okay, I'll try to keep that in mind. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:48, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

I've reverted pretty much all of their newspaper edits, marking them as subtle vandalism. In doing so, I reverted at least two more that are demonstrably wrong. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:32, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: It isn't at all important, but for the sake of strict accuracy I made a mistake when I said I had seen four warnings on IP talk pages. I saw four warnings on one IP talk page, but also some more on another talk page, so the total was at least six. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 21:05, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Category:Pages using duplicate arguments in template calls

Not sure why you want your talk page in Category:Pages using duplicate arguments in template calls. Frietjes (talk) 20:45, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know what was going on. However, the way you let me know was perhaps not the best you could have chosen. No, I don't want the page in that category, and frankly I don't think there is any reasonable way of interpreting what I wrote as meaning that I did. There is, on the other hand, a reasonable way of interpreting what I said as meaning that I didn't know that about that category. Also, I would have thought that it was clear to you from my comment that my main objection was not to the change you made but to the fact that you did not do me the courtesy of explaining why you did it, and the response you have given doesn't deal with that, in fact it could even be seen as adding more of the same. You may have intended it perfectly well, but that response comes across as rather condescending. How about these for a few alternative ways it could have been dealt with: "Hi, JBW. You may not know it, but although using the parameter 'label' multiple times in a ping rather than label1, label2, etc, makes no difference to the working of the ping, it has the unfortunate effect of putting the page where it is used in the category 'Pages using duplicate arguments in template calls'. Do you mind having your talk page removed from that category by having the parameters replaced?" ... "Hi, Frietjes, no I didn't know that. Thanks for letting me know. I have made the change you suggest." Or if, understandably, you think that the small amount of time it would take to write that could be better spent in other ways, just giving an edit summary such as "Replacing parameters to take page out of "Category:Pages using duplicate arguments in template calls". Or if you chose not to do either of those when you made the edit, then after you saw my response perhaps you could have posted here saying "The page was in Category:Pages using duplicate arguments in template calls. Do you mind having your talk page removed from that category?" But instead, you posted the above message which pretends to think I "wanted" my talk page in that category, which you cannot possibly have really thought. I am genuinely grateful to you for letting me know about the category, so that I can not only correct it this time, but also avoid making the same mistake again. However, while it is, of course, up to you, but you may like to consider whether you let me know about it in the best possible way. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 21:25, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

INAS Global Games

Hi there – any chance you can unsalt the above article? I believe it is a valid topic for an article. Thanks. SFB 21:45, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

@SFB:  Done. JamesBWatson (talk) 10:00, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Any chance you can do the same for World Transplant Games? Thanks! SFB 19:43, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@SFB: OK, I'll do that. I was going to tell you to ask Anna Frodesiak, the administrator who imposed the protection, to do it instead, but I have found that she is unable to edit Wikipedia. I regard that as a disaster, as she was one of the best administrators we have. I do hope she will be able to return some time, though it doesn't look promising, as it has been four years already. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 20:52, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@SFB: I now see that the article title was actually protected by NawlinWiki, and Anna's name appears in the log because of a protect-conflict (like an edit conflict) between the two of them. However, NawlinWiki is sort of semi-retired and now edits only sporadically, so I have done it. Both of these were at one time very active contributors, and it's sad to see them go. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 21:00, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

That is sad about Anna's circumstance. I suppose for many people, like NawlinWiki, life moves on and the Wikipedia habit does too. Not many people work in the same place for over a decade, so in that respect their service has already exceeded expectation! SFB 21:19, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@SFB: Yes. In fact even those editors who for a while are among the most active, including those who become active administrators, most of them do the substantial majority of their work within a period of two years. Many of them disappear not long after that, others continue for a while but at a much diminished rate, and after a very few years have either gone completely or, like NawlinWiki, make only very occasional edits. A small minority, including you and me, keep going for a longer time. However, even I am gradually fading away: my editing rate so far this year is not much more than 10% of what it was in my most active year. Your rate of editing, by contrast has fluctuated up and down, but not shown any significant tendency to decline. So the conclusion of all that is yes, you are perfectly right in saying that Anna's and Nawlin's service has already exceeded expectation, and for a volunteer project what they have done is commendable. However, I still feel sad about it. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 21:41, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Clarification

Good day Sir! Please review my added contents in the SOGIE Bill article. It does not violate the standards set by Wikipedia. I added websites as citation in every line to become vivid as well as verifiable. I hope for your action with regards on this matter. Thank you and God bless! Jsnueva1022 (talk) 03:19, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

I am very sorry for my actions Sir/Madam! I am new at editing but I will assure you and the Wiki community to add related contents only and not include the incidents to the said topic. Everyday, I read the policies and regulations of the Wiki pages in order to use it in my daily editing habit. I understand my mistakes. From now on, I will include also citations in every content I added. Thank you and God bless! Jsnueva1022 (talk) 12:22, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much for understanding Sir/Madam! Jsnueva1022 (talk) 15:31, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

All of these answered at User talk:Jsnueva1022. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 15:41, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Already rangeblocked but I thought you'd find this amusing

Vandalism (5.150.102.153) and reverts (5.150.99.73) coming from the same range. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:02, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

your username

I liked your previous username, and never thought it is your real name. But at least you can shorten your signature now :) —usernamekiran(talk) 14:30, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

@Usernamekiran: Oh well, I can't please everyone. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 14:43, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

your signature still hasn't shortened lolol —usernamekiran(talk) 14:48, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

No, in fact quite the opposite. However, it's slightly shorter than the one I used for several years. For nostalgia's sake, here it is again: The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 15:00, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh, no, you got a face change. This will take some getting used to. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 22:53, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

I like both names tbh although it'll be weird not seeing "JamesBWatson" anywhere, Meh do whatever makes you happy - As long as you like it then that's all that matters! :), –Davey2010^Talk 09:37, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

@kiran, Flyer, and Davey2010: and also Boing!, as you have made related comments on another page, and anyone else interested enough to read this. Since my change of user name has caused more interest than I expected, here are my thoughts about it, which you may or may not find interesting.

I confess that after 13 years of being JamesBWatson I have become remarkably attached to the name, and when I see it mentioned by another editor it feels as though it really is my name, in the same way as my real-life name does, rather than feeling like a pseudonym. I am, in fact, quite surprised at how strange and unnatural I find seeing myself listed as "JBW". Davey2010, you said "As long as you like it then that's all that matters". I don't think "like it" describes how I feel about it, it's more a matter of what I have decided to settle for as a least bad option. My first choice would be my real name, but there have been editors using their real name who have suffered real-life harassment, and I have also seen a discussion on another web site by editors with grudges against me who were trying to work out my real life identity, so that they could get revenge, so using my real name is out of the question. My second choice would be something like "Flyer22 Reborn" or "Boing! said Zebedee". Don't ask me why, I just like user names like that. A user name which looks like a real name but isn't (such as JamesBWatson) would be about my tenth choice, and for a long time I have regretted using a name like that. (When I set up my account I was just doing really trivial things like removing a mistaken apostrophe that I happened to notice when I was at Wikipedia as a reader, not as an editor. I didn't expect I would ever do anything more than that, so I didn't think what user name I chose was of any importance, and I just used the first thing that came into my head. I'm not sure what I would have said at that time to anyone who told me that I would go on to be a Wikipedia administrator with not far short of 150,000 edits and over 70,000 administrative actions.(And still counting.)) Anyway, when I eventually decided that I was no longer willing to go on with a user name which, as I said, looks like a real name but isn't, I decided that I was so well known as JamesBWatson that anything completely different from that would be too likely to cause confusion, and editors have sometimes abbreviated me to JBW, so I settled for that, even though in other circumstances such a cold, clinical, and meaningless acronym would be about my fifth choice.

So there you are. For what it's worth to you, you now know more than you thought you ever would about my thoughts on my user names. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 10:51, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm with ya, When I said "As long as you like it then that's all that matters!" I meant it as in sod what anyone else thinks - if they dislike it then that's up to them but yeah I see what you mean, If we could predict our futures I'm sure we'd all do things differently even with simple things like usernames,

I sure as pie would never have chosen "Davey" had I known I'd be where I am today - Hate the name tbh, I only expected to be editing for a year if that and here I am 6-7 years later!..... Where does the time go?,

Ah well happy editing JBW! :), –Davey2010^Talk 13:19, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Just saw your response on an SPI case and thought, "Who the hell is JBW?!" You'll still be (pseudonym) James to me. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 17:03, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

I wrote above "my change of user name has caused more interest than I expected", but it is getting even more attention than I had seen when I wrote that. Not only on this page, but on other pages too it has attracted comments. Liz, it was precisely to avoid "Who the hell is JBW?" doubts that I put Formerly known as JamesBWatson onto the end of my signature, but evidently at least in your case that wasn't enough. Perhaps I should make it "JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson " instead . As for always being James to you, part of my reason for changing my user name (though not the main reason) was that it always makes me slightly uncomfortable when other editors call me "James", since it ain't right. There are, actually, dozens of editors who know my first name, in most cases because I've met them at Wikipedia meetups, where I always use my real name, in a few cases for other reasons, so I suppose I could use that name, even though, for reasons I mentioned above, I would not give my full name. But maybe that would be even more confusing than JBW, and we would get loads of editors asking "Who the hell is Brian?" or "Who the hell is Samantha?" or "Who the hell is Agamemnon?" or whatever it really is...

All this has prompted me to wonder about something which I had previously never given much thought to, namely how many other editors have user names which appear to be their real names but aren't? I have always assume that Liz is really named Liz (or, perhaps more likely, Elizabeth) but is she? is Davey2010 really Davey (or David, or whatever)? ...and so on and so on... For a long time I naively assumed that "Anna Frodesiak" was Anna Frodesiak's real name, until one day it suddenly dawned on me that of course it wasn't. (Though later she told me that her real first name was something like "Anna", but not quite.) There are others too, who turned out not to be who I thought they were.

Perhaps the biggest unexpected effect of my change of username is that comments about it would lead me to spend so much time writing crap like this, instead of doing something more useful, such as blocking a few vandals, or making a cup of coffee... Oh well... JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 19:34, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

Grow Business Intelligence

Hi JBW. New to Wikipedia, where is the discussion about why you deleted the Grow article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jjd13 (talk • contribs) 03:34, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

I was a little surprised that you said "New to Wikipedia", since you have been editing for just under 10 years, but looking further I see your average rate of editing has been very low, so I suppose it makes sense. There is no discussion about why I deleted the article. As you know, there was a discussion which led to the deletion of the article after you previously created it. We don't have a new discussion every time someone re-creates essentially the same page as had previously been deleted as a result of consensus at a discussion. If we did so, most often the same reasons would be given as in the previous discussion, with the same outcome, so it would achieve nothing apart from taking up time of editors who could instead have used the time on more constructive work. It may also be worth mentioning that an editor called Willbb234 tagged the re-created article for speedy deletion as promotional, and although I have seen far worse, I did agree that it was more promotional than is acceptable for a Wikipedia article. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 14:59, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

I have replied to a similar question regarding the same article on my talk page. Thanks, Willbb234^Talk (please {{ping}} me in replies) 16:29, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

The chore from Chorley

Hi, JB. I see you blocked 86.135.249.0/24 for a year; they've returned as 86.146.109.114 (blocked for 72 hours by Zzuuzz). They've also used 86.154.78.11 earlier this month (rangedblocked until 5 October by NinjaRobotPirate) and 86.179.158.242 & 81.152.162.119 back in July. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:41, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

Out of time now, but I'll try to look at it tomorrow. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 19:48, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: I've had a fairly quick look, and blocked a couple more ranges covering the recent editing for a year. I can't see the point in blocking one IP address for 3 days in this situation, as it has absolutely no impact at all. The two IP addresses you mention from July turn out to be the tip of a large iceberg. There has been a persistent vandal/troll using IP addresses in the range 81.152.162.0/24 for over a year, and 86.179.158.0/24 for nearly 2 years (perhaps not the same person as you are referring to) and there's been no or virtually no constructive editing from those ranges in that time, so I've blocked both ranges for 2 years. 81.152.162.0/24 had already been blocked twice in the last 2 years, for 3 months each time. Most likely the vandal will be back on a new range, but blocking ranges they have have access to will at the least slow their vandalism down, and it's even just possible that if we can make it difficult enough for them to find IP addresses to use they may eventually give up. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 15:43, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, JBW! I've had my rich share of encounters with this pest, and any measure that'll make his virtual life more difficult is appreciated. Favonian (talk) 15:52, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

I found another range they used as recently as last month due to one of the IPs in 86.146.109.0/24 blanking this user talk page. 86.185.108.0/24 (blocked by Ad Orientem until 14 November) might also be related –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:00, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: After you posted that message here, Favonian blocked 86.163.134.0/24 for 2 years. The history of various IP addresses in the relevant ranges includes a lot of one IP blanking another one's talk page, and it may be that by following those up we could track down a lot more IP addresses that the person has used, but there are so many of them that to do the job thoroughly would take a lot of time. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 20:51, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

One could say it would be a chore. ;-) –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:59, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

Request for removal of protection of page creation

Hi there, I'm looking for a request to remove page creation protection on the page Justin Friesen. I am going to be creating a sandbox version of the page first, as the subject has linked up with some pages I've recently edited and I believe their notability has changed. Let me know if this is possible. CaffeinAddict (talk) 21:22, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

@CaffeinAddict: I looked at the history of the deleted article, and found it is over 8 years since the first deletion discussion, and over 7 years since the second. Notability can easily change over that time period, so I was well disposed to think that removing protection would be reasonable. Before deciding, though, I looked at the draft you wrote. Nothing in the text of the draft suggested much notability, so I checked references. I saw nothing at all there which even remotely suggested that the subject satisfies Wikipedia's notability guidelines. Many, perhaps most, of the reference don't even mention Justin Friesen at all, others barely mention him, some of them are in sources which are unreliable or not independent. However, rather than assume that was the whole picture, I tried searching for sources myself. After some work in sorting out which pages were about him, not about other people named Justin Friesen, I found IMDb, Twitter, LinkedIn, a page in the "alumni" section of the university he attended, and so on. Absolutely nothing that even began to satisfy the requirements of Wikipedia's notability guidelines. Unprotecting and re-creating the article under present circumstances would almost certainly just lead to a third deletion discussion, which would yet again end in deletion, and that would be a waste of everyone's time, including yours. If you can find proof of notability in Wikipedia's terms then I suggest collecting the necessary references, and then ask again about unprotecting the article title; however, what I have been able to find persuades me that your likelihood of being able to do so is virtually nil, so I suggest you would be better off leaving it, and putting the time you might have spent on it into other editing, more likely to stick. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 21:13, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

I leave it be until there's any sign of notability then. CaffeinAddict (talk) 03:06, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Snow King Mountain

If you haven't had the pleasure - speedy deletions burn. They take the entire collaboration and consensus model of Wikipedia and throw it in the dumpster, and then lock the lid. I presently have about 20 tabs open on my screen for this article and I've spent the last week reading through this seemingly endless history. These are some of the best historical sources I've come across for a subject Snow King Mountain, and enough that I've considered writing a book about it. I stumbled on the article and found a godawful promotional mess copy pasted straight from the resorts pages on "activities" etc. I went through claims line-by-line and deleted, while trying to keep something meaningful where I could. I saved the history section for last because this required the most amount of research to evaluate and rewrite. My work on the article, though significant, begins mere days ago. The problematic content on this article has sat on the page for around five years. The CSD tags which were applied to this article apply to specific edits, but instead of taking the time to consider that, the entire last five years of edits were deleted and and hidden (and the page was functionally blanked), punishing me in the process and throwing days of my life in the garbage. Like so many others, this may be the turning point for me where I decide that Wikipedia is captive to it's 1,000 admin and I'm delusional to believe that outsiders could ever meaningfully participate without devoting valuable time every day to political and structural games and alliances. (anecdotally: someone is nominated to admin right now who has a decade of history and over 10,000 edits and yet has only tried to navigate the perils of page creation a handful of times.) Like many others they arrive at their high tower of edits by using bots and gaming technical edits to accomplish as many as 400 edits a day while adding little to Wikipedia but IMDB copy-paste. Should I just delete my account? WP:DONTDEMOLISH WP:DONTBITE Luke Kindred (talk) 16:08, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

• One alternative to the sack cloth and ashes, Luke Kindred, is to check out WP:REFUND. Tiderolls 16:35, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

• Never mind, Luke Kindred, from your meandering post I thought you had a CSD problem. Now I've seen the real problem. Good luck Tiderolls 16:58, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you. I'm just hitting Step #1 on WP:REFUND (try to talk to the editor) before attempting to escalate the issue.Luke Kindred (talk) 17:22, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

@Luke Kindred: You may like to re-read what you have written, and consider whether the way you expressed yourself was likely to be the best way to get cooperation from a volunteer who is acting in good faith, and attempting to apply Wikipedia policy. As far as I can make out, apart from just expressing your anger, what you are asking me to do appears to be to restore a substantial amount of text which infringes copyright. That would means you are asking me not only to violate Wikipedia policy, but also knowingly and intentionally to infringe copyright. That would make me personally legally liable, and is out of the question. Experience suggests that you are also unlikely to succeed at deletion review to get copyright-infringing content restored. As for your disagreement with Wikipedia's speedy deletion policy, you are, of course, free to try to get the policy changed, but my task is to try to uphold policy as it is, whether you or I agree with it or not. (I am far from being personally in 100% agreement with that policy, but I try not to let my personal opinion get in the way of policy.) JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 19:52, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

@Luke Kindred: If you want me to I will email you a copy of the last version of the article, so that you can work on salvaging anything worthwhile there, leaving out the copyright infringing and promotional material. Let me know if yo would like me to do that. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 19:55, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes please

I wasted hours of my morning trying to figure out how to view the deleted material you are offering. The copyright problem is only in the history section, I assure you. Please help me create the quality article I am positive exists here. Luke Kindred (talk) 01:48, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Luckily I did not come back and respond to your latest message until after another administrator had discovered that you are an undisclosed paid editor, and that you lied and personally attacked that administrator when he asked you a perfectly civil and straightforward question about your paid editing. The offer to email you the information in question is withdrawn. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 15:05, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Rangeblock request

Hi, JB. I found an IP hopper – a different IP each day for the past three days – disrupting movie credits. Far as I can tell, none of their edits are remotely accurate. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:25, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68:  Done I checked a sample of the edits, and every one that I checked contradicted sources, so I've blocked for 4 days. If you feel like watching and letting me know of the problem returns after that, please do. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 21:33, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

They're back and continuing the pattern of a different address each day. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:19, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi, got another range for you. I reported one address in that range to the Vandalism noticeboard as an obvious WP:DUCK for 75.189.225.76; the latter has been blocked again but the former is still active. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:01, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Yes, I see your report got the response "No edits since being warned. Re-report if this user continues vandalising or spamming after sufficient warnings." It amazes me how many administrators give responses like that in this situation: it apparently doesn't occur to them to take into account warnings to other IP addresses that have obviously been used by the same person. Also very often, as probably in this case, many administrators don't check the rest of the /64 range when one IPv6 address is reported but that is not so amazing, as not everybody knows how IPv6 addresses are allocated. Anyway, I've blocked the range for a year.

Have you considered becoming an administrator, so that you can block vandals yourself, rather than reporting them, waiting for some admin to get round to dealing with it, and hoping they do a sensible job of it when they eventually do? JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 16:56, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

I was wondering when you'd ask that. How would I go about becoming an admin? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:51, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2019).

Administrator changes

Barkeep49

Beetstra • KillerChihuahua • Kusma

Arcadian • Extraordinary Machine • Xeno

JamesBWatson → JBW

Interface administrator changes

Evad37

CheckUser changes

Courcelles • SilkTork • Timotheus Canens

Oversight changes

Courcelles • SilkTork • Timotheus Canens

Guideline and policy news

• Following a discussion, a new criterion for speedy category renaming was added: C2F: One eponymous article, which applies if the category contains only an eponymous article or media file, provided that the category has not otherwise been emptied shortly before the nomination. The default outcome is an upmerge to the parent categories.

Technical news

• As previously noted, tighter password requirements for Administrators were put in place last year. Wikipedia should now alert you if your password is less than 10 characters long and thus too short.

Arbitration

• The 2019 CheckUser and Oversight appointment process has begun. The community consultation period will take place October 4th to 10th.
• The arbitration case regarding Fram was closed. While there will be a local RfC focus[ing] on how harassment and private complaints should be handled in the future, there is currently a global community consultation on partial and temporary office actions in response to the incident. It will be open until October 30th.

Miscellaneous

• The Community Tech team has been working on a system for temporarily watching pages, and welcomes feedback.

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Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:55, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Permission to create page

Hi. I want to work on a page Adamu Garba II which was created by another user but you had previously deleted. It says i should ask you before I commence. I got the page from the wikiNigeria articles requested for creation section, Im waiting on your response Amaekuma (talk) 11:49, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Deletion review for Bardhyl Selimi

User:Hyrdlak has asked for a deletion review of Bardhyl Selimi. Because you closed the deletion discussion for this page, speedily deleted it, or otherwise were interested in the page, you might want to participate in the deletion review. —Cryptic 00:20, 15 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you.

Hyrdlak (talk) 08:35, 15 September 2019 (UTC)Hyrdlak

Dear JBW, below I enclose the discussion that followed. I believe that its outcome justifies relisting of the article on Bardhyl Selimi. I look forward to hearing from you how to effect such a relisting. Sincerely,Hyrdlak (talk) 15:06, 8 October 2019 (UTC)Hyrdlak

Contesting the deletion of Bardhyl Selimi

This page should not be speedily deleted because: - In light of the 20 August 2019 comments by Slatersteven, I improved this article as requested by adding 50 links to websites and publications. - These prove the notability of Bardhyl Selimi as writer in his own right, and above all as translator of Albanian/Kosovan literature to Esperanto, and world literature (via Esperanto) to Albanian for the book markets of Albania and Kosovo. - As advised, the added references are independent of the subject.

Having said that, I notice a strong Anglo- and Westerno-centric bias in the entire discussion, which is invisible to the other editors.

- For instance, the article on Philip Gabriel, a translator of the Japanese author Haruki Murakami popular in the West, does not require the proofs of notability, which are requested of the article on Bardhyl Selimi. Actually, the article on Philip Gabriel hinges on a single (dead) link created by the subject. However, no one nominates this article for deletion.

- The unspoken principle seems to be: as long as a person is somehow related to an individual famous in the West, that is sufficient to be bo seen as notable, even though an Wikipedia article on such a person is unreferenced.

- Likewise, while in the case of Bardhyl Selimi, it is pointed out that books written by him are not known outside the sphere of Albanian- and Esperanto-language cultures, the same requirement is not applied to the article on Philip Gabriel. He is not an author in his own right at all. Furthermore, his English-language translations of Murakami's novels are unknown outside the Anglophone countries.

- Hence, all is POV (I learned this piece of the Wikipedia lingo, courtesy of the deletion discussion). However, the Anglophone/Western POV on Philip Gabriel is looked upon gladly, while the Albanian/Esperanto POV is branded as a 'bias.'

Last but not least, I also detect in the discussion a disregard for cultures and literatures connected to a language without a state (Esperanto) and to a non-Western language spoken by 5 million people 'only' (Albanian).

Another issue is the hostile environment of the discussion created by the editors involved. I asked them to give me time to improve the article in line with their suggestions. Afterward, due to my family vacation, I requested a delay in the deletion discussion until 7 September 2019. During my absence from the desk, the other editors completed the discussion without my participation, and deleted the aforesaid article on 4 September.

Hyrdlak (talk) 09:30, 22 September 2019 (UTC)Hyrdlak

Who told you no proof of notability is required for Philip Gabriel? Please read Straw man in addition to WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, and I request that you stop making up "unspoken principles" instead of believing the actual principles that have been presented to you and that can be found right there in Wikipedia's guidelines. Largoplazo (talk) 01:17, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Dear Largoplazo,

Your reply does not refer to the issue at hand. The lack of action in the case of the article on Philip Gabriel is evidence in case.

Hyrdlak (talk) 09:17, 23 September 2019 (UTC)Hyrdlak

The lack of action is evidence that no one has acted, not that anyone is conspiring to keep action from being taken. You seem to think that there's a single, formal judging panel tasked with reviewing every article posted to Wikipedia and charged with applying uniform criteria to each and every one of them; and that, if they don't, it's through an intentional dereliction of responsibility. No, there are volunteers who, if they see an issue on some article, deal with it, but they don't magically, simultaneously know about thousands of other articles that may have the same issue. But some people prefer to assume that anything inconsistent is the result of persecution and prejudice despite the existence of obvious, non-nefarious explanations.

(Having been accused of anti-Semitism and homophobia by editors unaware of the fact that I'm Jewish and gay, I can attest to the phenomenon of people leaping to persecution and prejudice to explain actions I've taken in compliance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines and reflecting no bias on my part.)

If you think Philip Gabriel isn't notable, then, instead of being indignant that some fictitious individual you imagine to be responsible for deleting it hasn't done so out of contempt for non-Westerners, why don't you be like other people who find articles that don't qualify for inclusion and nominate that article for deletion? Largoplazo (talk) 10:50, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Dear Largoplazo,

I ameliorated the article's deficiencies as initially pointed out by Slatesteven.

Sincerely, Hyrdlak (talk) 14:04, 23 September 2019 (UTC)Hyrdlak

Becoming an administrator

Okay, I found WP:RFA but have no clue how to self-nominate. I would like to help keep a lid on vandalism when I have time. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:43, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

(by talk reader) @Skywatcher68: "have no clue how to self-nominate" You've just invalidated an attempt at RfA. Please feel free to join our countervandalism unit and perhaps teach new editors. Countervandalism doesn't require a mop, only effort. Adminship, however, requires clue which you lack. Chris Troutman (talk) 17:53, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

@Chris troutman: I'll wait for JBW to weigh in. He practically invited me. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:32, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Email

It looks like you probably want to review your inbox for anomalies. (CC Trijnstel) — regards, Revi 00:37, 14 October 2019 (UTC)

@Trijnstel: I have confirmed my list membership. At least I have tried to:( I hope it has worked.) I have no idea what caused the problem. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 10:57, 14 October 2019 (UTC)

Good to hear. Thanks. Trijnstel_talk 20:26, 14 October 2019 (UTC)

See response

See my response to your comment on my talk page. --Svennik (talk) 08:40, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Why have you not responded? --Svennik (talk) 23:58, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

Review a page?

Hola! I have a request of sorts - I know that third opinion is a bit dead so I wanted to bring in a third party on something. I'll make sure to note that I asked on the article's talk page. In any case, here's the situation:

There's a debate on the talk page for the article on shock sites about what version of the page to use. A student I oversee has created some requested sections about the history, legality, media, and ethics of shock sites. This was reverted by another editor over a few concerns. One was the removal of content (which they later retracted) and the other was that the prior version of the article looked better, which was essentially a section on examples of shock sites. There's been some back and forth over this, mainly between the instructor and the other editor. My thought is that a good, happy medium would be to merge the two versions together (which I've done) since I can see both sides - a section that lists the notable examples does have a lot of merit, as do more general sections about shock sites. I think that there is a lot of content that can't really be adequately summarized in either format alone (general sections or specific examples).

What do you think? Also, are you willing to weigh in? It's fine if you wouldn't want to - I'm definitely more than understanding on that! It's more of a gentlepersons' discussion to be honest - there's no actual drama to it. I think that a third party that's not me (since I am involved in obvious ways) would be good here. ReaderofthePack(formerly Tokyogirl79) (｡◕‿◕｡) 17:54, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

• On a side note, are you going to WikiCon NA? I can't remember if you're in the States or not - I know that we've had this discussion before and honestly can't recall at this point in time. ReaderofthePack(formerly Tokyogirl79) (｡◕‿◕｡) 17:56, 23 October 2019 (UTC)
• Looks like it's resolved itself! So nevermind! But still curious about the WikiCon in Boston - a lot of us WikiEd-ers are going. (My work account.) Shalor (Wiki Ed) (talk) 17:58, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

@ReaderofthePack: Good that it seems to have been resolved fairly amicably, even though it deprives me of an opportunity to "weigh in" . And no, I'm far away on the other side of the Atlantic. Nice to be thought of, though. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 20:32, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

Petar Kichashki

Hi, JBW. You've declined the X2 on this article saying that "the translation has been substantially cleared up". However, this doesn't invalidate CSD X2. Fixing the English doesn't fix the problem with these translations -- it obfuscates it. For the detailed reasoning and community consensus on this, please see WP:AN/CXT. Would you reconsider declining the speedy, please?—S Marshall T/C 13:44, 28 October 2019 (UTC)

@S Marshall: You are, of course, totally right, as I realised when I read your message and thought about it for a few seconds. Thanks for pointing my mistake out to me. I have now deleted the article. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 21:02, 28 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you.—S Marshall T/C 22:26, 28 October 2019 (UTC)

Students are returning from Summer Vacation

And so are IP vandals who have been dormant during Summer Vacation. 24.121.225.34 & 70.166.240.253, for example. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 22:20, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Found another one. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:59, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Here's one with no edits between May & August and has a history of writing nonsense. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:04, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Definitely bored students here. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:15, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

More bored students. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:48, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: As far as the last one you mention goes, I've put a long term range block on 216.21.168.0/24, as nearly all editing from that range has been vandalism. It may be that a wider range than that should be blocked. The previous two I will consider blocking if there are more vandalism edits, but right now the amount of recent vandalism isn't enough to justify a block. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:21, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

No edits between May & August; tends to call things "gay". –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:55, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Always nice when they announce themselves. Might want to do a schoolblock on the entire range. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:32, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

^That's SUNY Cortland, by the way. You should take a look at these edits from Cal State Stanislaus as well. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:15, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: Yes, I saw that it was SUNY College at Cortland. As you may have seen, I have blocked the whole /16 range. I have also blocked 165.166.14.114, the IP address in your previous message. I didn't see any range that needed a block, certainly not any large range, though there may be some small range that I didn't notice. I'll look at the Cal State Stanislaus edits. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 09:22, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

@Skywatcher68: OK, Cal State Stanislaus. From what I have seen there is some vandalism, but far more COI and promotional editing, no doubt by undisclosed paid editors. I have posted a message to the talk pages of all of the most recently used IP addresses in the range, and if that doesn't work I will be willing to consider article protection or IP blocking. In the message that I posted I said that the problem had been going on for 7 months, but since then I have noticed that there was a previous wave of the same kind of thing in 2015. I haven't checked further back than that. Please let me know if you see any more problematic editing of the same kind now that I have tried to warn the people involved. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 10:23, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Hey, in case you're not already aware, here's a good resource for associating IPs with schools in the US. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 05:42, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

Evidently students using a proxy. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:20, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

I'm unable to determine what school district this range belongs to but one address in there (50.226.240.129) is blocked until January. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:23, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

User:A1Cafel

Just a heads up that I have reblocked the above user for violating one of their unblock conditions.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:57, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know, though 20 months later I have no memory of the case. Looking back, though, it seems to me that I unblocked only with reservations, as evidenced by my comment at AN about when the editor could request a change to the conditions, so perhaps the current outcome isn't surprising. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 15:49, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

Heh, I didn't remember it either. I spent a fair amount of time refreshing my memory. It doesn't help that the user changes their name frequently. They compound their deceit by denying editing logged out.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:54, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

A.Wiki.The.Guy

Hi JBW,

I've found another so-called user, with no edits apart from setting up a user page, and using the project as a personal web space. Again found via Wikimedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:A.Wiki.The.Guy Acabashi (talk) 17:35, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

@Acabashi: OK. Since the accounts editing history to date has been limited to one day, eighteen months ago, the odds are that he has forgotten, or almost forgotten, about his Wikipedia vanity page, and will never come back, but I've deleted the page and posted him a warning, just in case. JBW (talk) Formerly known as JamesBWatson 19:52, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for that. Acabashi (talk) 09:32, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2019).

Administrator changes

GermanJoe • Girth Summit • Kees08 • Nosebagbear

DESiegel • GB fan • MSGJ • Voice of Clam • WilyD

DeltaQuad • Fang Aili • Pakaran

Bureaucrat changes

DeltaQuad • Pakaran

Interface administrator changes

MSGJ

CheckUser changes

L235 • Mz7 • SQL • ST47

Ivanvector

DeltaQuad

Oversight changes

L235 • Mz7 • ST47 • Stwalkerster • The Blade of the Northern Lights • Xaosflux

DeltaQuad • DGG • Julia W

Guideline and policy news

• An RfC was closed with the consensus that the resysop criteria should be made stricter.

• The follow-up RfC to develop that change is now open at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/2019 Resysop Criteria (2).

• A related RfC is seeking the community's sentiment for a binding desysop procedure.

Arbitration

• Eligible editors may now nominate themselves as candidates for the 2019 Arbitration Committee Elections. The self-nomination period will close November 12, with voting running from November 19 through December 2.

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Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:15, 3 November 2019 (UTC)