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The Bugle: Issue LXXXIX, August 2013

Your Military History Newsletter Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results Articles: Last month's new Featured and A-Class content Book reviews: Nick-D looks at the death of Osama bin Laden Op-ed: Sturmvogel_66 presents his secrets of prolific contribution

The Bugle is published by the Military history WikiProject. To receive it on your talk page, please join the project or sign up here.
If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Nick-D (talk) 00:44, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Any Wikidata pointers?

I keep on thinking that Wikidata might be helpful for some of my editing and I saw your name listed as a potential contact. Editing articles for places in New Jersey, there are many elements of data that could be pulled from databases, most usefully for information updated on a regular basis. One example is for Census estimates, which are released annually for all of the 565 municipalities in the state. I'd love to see a process where the articles could point to a Wikidata element for the place that would have the Census estimated population and the as of year, so that once the corresponding Wikidata elements were updated the articles would not have to be updated one by one. Can you point me towards any way to implement this, if it is in the realm of possibility. Alansohn (talk) 18:19, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Each Wikidata item would have to be updated one by one with the current setup (though the interface might be easier to use), but the changes would be distributed across all language Wikipedias that call the data. The infoboxes on the English Wikipedia would also need to be rewritten to look at Wikidata. --Rschen7754 18:24, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

That much I think I get. But how would I access the data in each of the articles across wikis? Can you point to an example article that does anything that would be a useful model? Alansohn (talk) 19:46, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

There's two ways: parserfunctions and Lua, both linked off m:Wikidata/Deployment_Questions#Phase_2_.28infoboxes.29. As far as an example, we converted Template:Infobox road to use any map specified on Wikidata, if there is no map specified in the article. --Rschen7754 19:51, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia Meetup

Help build the Wikipedia community in Southern California at "Come Edit Wikipedia!" presented by the West Hollywood Library on Saturday, August 31st, 2013 from 1-5pm. Drop in for some lively editing and conversation! Plus, it's a library, so there are plenty of sources. --Olegkagan (talk) — Message delivered by Hazard-Bot at 03:05, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Rschen7754. You have new messages at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Jbignell.
Message added 21:05, 22 August 2013 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

LGA _talk^edits 21:05, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

You've got mail!

Hello, Rschen7754. Please check your email; you've got mail!
Message added 21:05, 22 August 2013 (UTC). 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.

LGA _talk^edits 21:05, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Sockpuppet Waldemar15 is back

You closed Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Waldemar15 the first time but the editor has a new persona and I just reported it using Twinkle which added the new case below the closed one. The current cases listed at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations still shows it as closed. Not sure if that page is being blocked by the earlier case or not. Any ideas what to do? I'm not following here so talkback on my article if you respond here. I am watching the case, so response there will be seen. Walter Görlitz (talk) 01:58, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

@Walter Görlitz: It takes a while for the bot to update it. It's probably best for someone else to look at it who is more familiar with the behavior, but I can look if nobody has handled it in a few days. --Rschen7754 02:06, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Eh, I'm an idiot... that was simple enough, so I handled it. --Rschen7754 02:08, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Walter Görlitz (talk) 04:21, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Sock rajputbhati

you are currently handling the case of sockpuppet and am nominated as a suspected sock of user raj(huhhh). although I am suspected it is not confirmed that I am a sock. The User:merbabu has undone all my recent edits which were neither vandalism nor made in the favour of User:rajputbahti. this act by User:merbabu was really hurting one and it was also against Wikipedia policy guidelines. once I am proved sock, you have full authority to undone my edits.I need justice. accept my humble request and make use of your administrative power to return all the articles edited by me to previous condition.I will be very thankfull.Americanluck (talk) 10:15, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Administrators do not have power to enforce a particular version on an article. --Rschen7754 10:21, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

• But you have the power to force merbabu to undone his editsAmericanluck (talk) 11:17, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Rschen7754 please see User_talk:Sphilbrick#glomerular_lipidosis--SPhilbrick(Talk) 11:47, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of California State Route 905

Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article California State Route 905 you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by GA bot, on behalf of TCN7JM -- TCN7JM (talk) 15:45, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of California State Route 905

The article California State Route 905 you nominated as a good article has passed ; see Talk:California State Route 905 for comments about the article. Well done! Message delivered by GA bot, on behalf of TCN7JM -- TCN7JM (talk) 15:09, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

Tech News: 2013-34;

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please inform other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

New features

• The previous version of MediaWiki (1.22/wmf13) was added to test wikis and MediaWiki.org on August 15. It was enabled on non-Wikipedia sites on August 19, and on all Wikipedias on August 22. [1]
• The latest version of MediaWiki (1.22/wmf14) was added to test wikis and MediaWiki.org on August 22. It will be enabled on non-Wikipedia sites on August 26, and on all Wikipedias on August 29. [2]
• You can now use new styles of galleries. Please give feedback to User:Bawolff. [3]
• You can now visit a random page in a category, for example Special:RandomInCategory/Science. (25931) [4]
• You can now use the <wbr> HTML5 tag to say where a word can be cut. (52468) [5]
• Gadget authors: you can now use the wikipage.content hook, so that your scripts are re-run when a page is changed after the document-ready event (for example using Ajax). (30713) [6]

Problems fixed

• There was a bug where file redirects didn't work when a file was renamed; it is now fixed. There is still an issue with purging, but it should be fixed soon. (52200)
• Maintenance reports provided by special pages will now all be updated on each wiki every six months. This will for example give you recent information on uncategorized pages, unused templates and most wanted pages (see details).
• There was a bug that caused false positives for anti-blanking edit filters; it is now fixed. (52077) [7]

VisualEditor news

• The "edit" and "edit source" tabs and section edit links can now be changed more easily; for example, some wikis are using "edit source" for wikitext editing, and "edit ^beta" for VisualEditor. You can ask for the same change in bugzilla.
• You can now edit references that are added inside a <references> block. (51741)
• You can now test on mediawiki.org new basic tools to add and edit struck text (with the button for the <s> tag), lower text ( for <sub>), upper text ( for <sup>), underlined text ( for <u>), computer code ( for <code> and <tt>), math text ( for <math>), Egyptian hieroglyphs ( for <hiero>), and to say that text is in another language ( for lang="ar" dir="rtl"). (51609, 51612, 51611, 51590, 51610, 52352)
• You can now use VisualEditor with the Opera browser. [8]

Future

• Starting on August 26, you will be able to use data from Wikidata on Wikivoyage sites. [9]
• Starting on August 27, you will also get notifications on the mobile site if you're logged in to a wiki using notifications. [10]
• Starting on August 28, all users with an account will be using HTTPS to access Wikimedia sites. HTTPS brings better security and improves your privacy. Some countries (like China) will not use HTTPS. If HTTPS causes problems for you, tell us on meta. [11]
• Starting on August 29, you will get the code editor interface to edit JavaScript and CSS pages on all wikis. [12]
• The plan to use Solr for search in MediaWiki was changed; instead, Elasticsearch is now planned. [13]

Tech news prepared by tech ambassadors and posted by Global message delivery • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

19:53, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

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• EdwardsBot (talk) 09:18, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Misconceptions2 SPI

Do you have any idea of when this SPI will be looked at by a checkuser?--Misconceptions2 (talk) 19:08, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

No. Unfortunately, there are very few available right now, and there are several cases waiting for CU. This is one of the more complicated cases, so it could be a while. --Rschen7754 19:10, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

In order to defend myself and show that the user Marie013 is not honest I gave evidence via an external link to another site of someone with the same username to show the user is interested in anime and to show they were lying when they said they are not. I have since removed this comment and sincerely apologise if it was considered outing or that I unintentionally violated any wikipedia policy. I felt it was relevant to the situation, either way it wont be done again and because of this I hope that admins will hand me a sign of good faith for any error I made. I want to know if I will I be banned for this?--Misconceptions2 (talk) 19:15, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

I am referring that matter to someone else, but please do not repost similar material again. --Rschen7754 19:53, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the help with that guy! Mark Arsten (talk) 00:46, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Yet another sockpuppet...

Hi Rschen7754, User:Igorigor123 appears to be another suspect of the Operahome zoo who is not blocked yet. All contributions are already deleted and probably from 2012. Hence the account is stale in regard to CU but probably fits the duck test anyway as this user attempted to create an earlier version of Igor Janev. Thanks for your support in this matter. Regards, AFBorchert (talk) 21:37, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

 Done --Rschen7754 21:39, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Thank you

		The Barnstar of Awesomeness
		For fixing my error in the WikiCup's 2013 August newsletter, please accept this. If we meet in real life ever, I'm buying you a drink. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 06:26, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

You're welcome! Should be all done now. --Rschen7754 08:37, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Tabarez2

This user continues his/her activity with other usernames such as User:AccWi. The user has even created pages and inserted images which were uploaded by Tabarez2. Thanks, Egeymi (talk) 18:02, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry, can you give me a link or something so that I have some context? --Rschen7754 18:04, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, you may see this image and the history of the article Mehrangiz Dowlatshahi. For past discussion for T2's case you may reach it from the image page I think. Hope I could help. Egeymi (talk) 18:17, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

It's probably best to file a new report at SPI, so that everything is recorded. --Rschen7754 18:20, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Can you please tell me how I can report? Thanks, Egeymi (talk) 18:23, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

The directions are at WP:SPI. --Rschen7754 18:25, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

question about check-user

Thank you for your efforts on the Morning277 SPI. Here you wrote "IPs are stale" but I notice that they both have contributions from 8 August 2013:

• 99.30.226.220 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 76.246.55.40 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log)).

Someone else had told me that check-user data is available for 90 days. Was that incorrect? —rybec 03:00, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

By that what I mean is that they've likely moved on from that IP, so blocking would not be very effective. --Rschen7754 03:03, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Re: Khan jabir

Hi Rschen. The reason I had tagged Khan jabir as G3 was because it was a sloppy transcription of M. Night Shyamalan. It looked like enough of a hoax to me, which is why I believed, and still do, that G3 was the proper tag. Ishdarian 09:04, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Sure, but a sloppy translation is still made in good faith, and is thus not vandalism. --Rschen7754 09:06, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Understandable, but something didn't seem right. See Special:Contributions/Khanjabir786. I believe User:Jamespeter80 is a sock. Thanks for your help! Ishdarian 09:21, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Blocked. --Rschen7754 09:25, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Well damn. That was faster than expected. I just put up the SPI. Thanks for your quick action. Ishdarian 09:27, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Socking/block evasion

Hello. I know there's a lot to do at WP:SPI but could you please take a look at this SPI? It is IMHO a clear case of loudly quacking block evasion, and considering the suspected sockmaster's repeated personal attacks on me after I filed the SPI, for which s/he has been warned by Bishonen, I would hate to see them get off just because it takes several days before a decision can be made on the SPI. Thanks in advance. Thomas.W ^{talk to me} 14:50, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay, but  Done. I had other stuff come up today, unfortunately. --Rschen7754 08:35, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Thomas.W ^{talk to me} 09:12, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Wikimedia Highlights from July 2013

Highlights from the Wikimedia Foundation Report and the Wikimedia engineering report for July 2013, with a selection of other important events from the Wikimedia movement

• Wikimedia Foundation highlights
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  • Wikipedia Zero comes to India
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• Data and Trends
• Financials
• Other movement highlights
  • Winners of "Wiki Loves Public Art" announced
  • New Board of Trustees member: Ana Toni
  • Buenos Aires edit-a-thon in former military prison

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• EdwardsBot (talk) 00:55, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Rschen7754. You have new messages at EvergreenFir's talk page.
Message added 03:31, 9 September 2013 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

EvergreenFir (talk) 03:31, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of California State Route 209

Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article California State Route 209 you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of TCN7JM -- TCN7JM (talk) 10:20, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of California State Route 209

The article California State Route 209 you nominated as a good article has been placed on hold . The article is close to meeting the good article criteria, but there are some minor changes or clarifications needed to be addressed. If these are fixed within 7 days, the article will pass, otherwise it will fail. See Talk:California State Route 209 for things which need to be addressed. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of TCN7JM -- TCN7JM (talk) 10:30, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of California State Route 209

The article California State Route 209 you nominated as a good article has passed ; see Talk:California State Route 209 for comments about the article. Well done! Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of TCN7JM -- TCN7JM (talk) 21:02, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Merging

I wasn't quite finished, but if I was completely off track, can you explain to me the right way to do it or do it for me? Thanks.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:59, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Not a problem - basically you move the case to the new master, doing a history merge (so you delete the old page, then move the new page to the old page, then go back and undelete the old revisions). Then you edit the redirect to have {{SPIarchive notice}}, and fix the unified report to have the correct master. It's described further on the procedures page, I think. --Rschen7754 18:05, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

The problem is that it's not discussed on the procedures page. This is the scenario and how it's described there:

A prior case has been filed for the account that we wish to file the case as

1. Note on the case or contact an administrator to merge the cases with admin tools.

As you can see, no instructions, but is that the scenario you're describing in your instructions?--Bbb23 (talk) 18:17, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, that is the scenario. The only difference between the two scenarios listed there is the history merge part; otherwise you follow what is described under "Cases filed under the name of the sock", with the history merge. --Rschen7754 18:19, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

OK, what exactly do I do when I do a history merge (I've never done one)?--Bbb23 (talk) 18:48, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

You basically move the pages on top of each other. When you do this, you will get an error, but since you're an admin, you can hit the checkbox saying "Delete page" and it will let you proceed. But once you're done, you have to go back and undelete the revisions that you deleted, so the history is merged. --Rschen7754 18:54, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is worth all of your time ... When I move a page to a page that exists, it will delete the existing page and replace it with the new one. Assuming I leave a redirect, there'll be the deleted Phines page, the new page (with none of the Phines material), and a redirect page. First, what do I name the new page? Second, where and how do I undelete the revisions so I merge the history? Third, I assume when I do that I get back not just the history but the content? Finally, am I moving the Kissass page over the Phines archive page or over the Phines page that has a link to the archive page?--Bbb23 (talk) 19:19, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

We keep the cases at the oldest known account, the master in about 99% of cases, and that is what you move the case to. When you need to undelete the revisions, you go to the history and look for the link saying "View 343 deleted revisions" at the top. The content has already been archived away on the archive page; all you need to do is correct the master in the templates. --Rschen7754 19:23, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

I believe I may have said it wrong above. In any event, this is what I'll do:

• Move Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Kissass35 to Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Phines0001, leaving a redirect.
• Look at the history of Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Phines0001, click on the link to see the deleted reversions and undelete them.
• Change the templates to point to Phines.
• Add the template to the redirect.

If that all sounds right, I'll go ahead and try it.--Bbb23 (talk) 19:35, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

• Yes, that sounds right. --Rschen7754 19:36, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

• I've finished. Please take a look at it and make sure I did it correctly. I'm also going to update the procedure instructions. Thanks very much for bearing with me.--Bbb23 (talk) 19:48, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

• Looks good! --Rschen7754 19:50, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Bigsean SPI

Yes, that was stupid of me, sorry. I must be having a bad day or something; I hope I did it right this time, I was all kinds of baffled as to how to ask for an analysis of this guy. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:54, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Not a problem. --Rschen7754 21:56, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Highways/Assessment/A-Class Review/Baltimore–Washington Parkway

Per the requirements at WP:HWY/ACR, this notice is being left to inform you that this candidate for demotion from ACR has gone 30 days without any activity. If there is no clear consensus (3 votes) to keep or demote after 7 days, and no attempt to continue work, the review will be closed as keep. --Rschen7754 10:03, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Accused of socking

In this investigation. I've was being investigated. I have nothing to do with the accounts and the IP address. Squidville1 (talk) 11:34, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Appreciated

Thanks for the help with my talk page. I must be doing something right to attract that level of animosity.... --Jezebel'sPonyo^{bons mots} 05:11, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

You're welcome! --Rschen7754 05:13, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

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• EdwardsBot (talk) 08:29, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

thank you (Madagascar roads)

Hello Rschen (what a name !) Thank you for leaving your kind message on my User Page. yes, I created some pages concerning Madagascar National Roads, like

• List_of_roads_in_Madagascar
• Route Nationale 5a (Madagascar)
• Route nationale 7 (Madagascar)
• Route nationale 6 (Madagascar)
• Route nationale 10 (Madagascar)
• Route nationale 13 (Madagascar)
• Route nationale 35 (Madagascar)

But I will no longer continue my work on the other National roads of Madagascar and I even regret DEEPLY that I ever spent some time on this as there are too many NASTY ADMINS here at wikipedia, who do not know nothing about the subjects but permit themselves to throw around categories & whatever they like at their disgrace. (f.ex. user:Good Olfactory Therefore I stopped my contribution on Madagascar roads, and other Madagascar related articles. I do not see a sense in doing them, if nasty guys who don't even know where it is situated, turn them around all the time.

Wikipedia should get rid off them first ! So, all I will do here: i keep in my small corner of African entomology because there is non (noy yet??) of these nasty, bored people around ! So, if you want to have the series of Madagascar roads completed: ask guys like user:Good Olfactory to go there themselves and to make it. I know it, also got pictures of them, but won't do it anymore. Best regards & thanks for your message.

user:Tonton Bernardo who is:

I'm tired on unhappy Wikipedia Admins, that spend their time to spoil up the pages and categories that other users created. Ref.: Dying project (talk) 11:31, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Could you explain what happened? I will say that it's a bit problematic to paint all admins with the same brush. I've been an admin for years, and yet I've written articles such as California State Route 52 and Interstate 8... --Rschen7754 01:55, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Appointment as a trainee clerk

Hi Rschen7754. We have added you to the list of clerks and subscribed you to the mailing list (info: WP:AC/C#clerks-l). Welcome, and I look forward to working with you! To adjust your subscription options for the mailing list, see the link at mail:clerks-l. The mailing list works in the usual way, and the address to which new mailing list threads can be sent is clerks-llists.wikimedia.org. Useful reading for new clerks is the procedures page, WP:AC/C/P, but you will learn all the basic components of clerking on-the-job.

New clerks begin as a trainee, are listed as such at WP:AC/C#List of clerks, and will remain so until they have learned all the aspects of the job. When you've finished training, which usually takes a couple of/a few months, then we'll propose to the Committee that you be made a full clerk. As a clerk, you'll need to check your e-mail regularly, as the mailing list is where the clerks co-ordinate (on-wiki co-ordination page also exists but is not used nearly as much). If you've any questions at any point of your traineeship, simply post to the mailing list.

Lastly, it might be useful if you enter your timezone into WP:AC/C#List of clerks (in the same format as the other members have), so that we can estimate when we will have clerks available each day; this is, of course, at your discretion. Again, welcome! Regards, Guerillero | My Talk 16:30, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

SPI questions

I noticed that you have marked my SPI for close (Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/71.209.59.64) but I'm a bit confused by what you said in the comments. The first range of 71.209.* was too broad to ban, so what do I (or others) do if that IP range comes back to vandalize some more? Ban each one of them individually? And what of the ones that were listed in the SPI? Will the other 71.209.* IP's be banned? Does this mean the 49.184.76.* range was banned? Antoshi ☏ ★ 17:25, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Semiprotection is a better alternative in such cases, rather than blocking IPs individually or doing a rangeblock that _targets innocent people. I know it's probably not what you wanted to hear, but unfortunately it's the least worst option. --Rschen7754 00:38, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Der Statistiker

Just a note: I see you've closed my case, but about your suggestion to advertise my en.wikipedia username at other wikipedias (other languages), the reason why I haven't done it is precisely because I don't want to be tracked by certain forumers across Wikipedia. Some editors can be pretty vindictive and bordering on harassment, as ThePromenader's behavior has unfortunately illustrated, and this is precisely to avoid harassment that I usually have different usernames at different wikipedias, and don't advertise my other usernames (I'm annoyed enough that en.wikipedia logged me in with an username from another wikipedia). If that's a problem let me know, but since I'm only using one username per language version of Wikipedia, I don't think it should be too much of an issue. Der Statistiker (talk) 13:37, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Okay, but please be careful in the future - if this keeps happening, you may have to publicly disclose them. --Rschen7754 06:38, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

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• EdwardsBot (talk) 10:16, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue LXXXXX, September 2013

Your Military History Newsletter Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results Articles: Last month's new Featured and A-Class content Book reviews: Nick-D looks at the American Civil War

The Bugle is published by the Military history WikiProject. To receive it on your talk page, please join the project or sign up here.
If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Nick-D (talk) 00:41, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

Thank you

Sorry the SPI on TRCG got dragged down that way, but thanks for being on top of it. I didn't even blink about the attacks they were throwing at me at all. Nate • (chatter) 03:48, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Not a problem. --Rschen7754 03:54, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

ThePromenader

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

User:ThePromenader, who had opened the sockpupettry complaint against me that you closed, has deleted large swaths of the Paris Metropolitan Area article (which I had just enriched with detailed content) without consulting with anyone: [14]. It's very hard to contribute to the Paris-related articles if this guy engages in such behavior without even opening discussions on the talk pages before making such drastic cuts. Der Statistiker (talk) 15:21, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Hi, Wikipedia informed me that I was mentioned in a comment here. You can ignore the above, as Der Statistiker knows perfectly well why I made the modifications I did (otherwise he would have reverted outright); what's disturbing is that the article got no attention at all (in its former laughingly erroneous state) until I fixed it. (just noticing that he did indeed revert partially) The table 'enrichment' in question was pure unsourced WP:OR (population results dating back to 1801 for a statistic that didn't exist before the 1990's?) - reinstating the table would be fine if there were sources for such data (and I said as much in my edit summary) but it's just been reverted without any attempt at adding sources or even source info at all. I'll let my edits speak for me, but I will express my fatigue with the repetitive revert-and-slander-to-draw-attention 'protection' tactic I and many others have been seeing in Paris-based articles (usually around WP:OR 'views') from the same contrubutor since… 2005 or so. Sorry that your (very limited) involvement was enough to bring this to you; Paris articles are lacking in attention. THEPROMENADER 19:18, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

User:ThePromenader's behavior is getting out of hand at Paris Metropolitan Area, as I feared, and no admin is intervening despite the fact that I have contacted you and another admin. Now he insists on placing a "verify source" tag next to a reference I've added after he complained that there were no references, and he's placing that "verify source" tag despite the fact that the reference comes from a statistical publication of the national statistical office of France, INSEE. See his edit here: [15]. What can be done if even a source coming from the national statistical office of France itself won't do for him? It seems he's determined to challenge just about every sentence or figure I add in Wikipedia. Is there a place on Wikipedia where I could report this? Der Statistiker (talk) 21:53, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

He's reverted to material that has no sources at all (still without providing sources), is attempting to pass a single demonstrative study by a single authour as 'data', and is reverting even the 'verify source' tags without discussing the issue. If you would like to have a discussion about me, come directly to my talk page. That goes for you too, User:Der Statistiker, and everyone else you've complained to. Cheers. THEPROMENADER 22:04, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Revert

I'm talking about this revert. It was not clear to me that this was an archived discussion. What indicators are that this latest section (with a comment from yesterday) was archived? Where is the active page posted? I'd appreciate a link to when this discussion was active.
I'd never knowingly edit in a comment to a section that I believed was archived but you can tell because archived discussions have a colored background and/or hatted. But that was not the case here. I'd like to make comments on these investigations in the future, so I'd like to know where I can find them. Thanks. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 21:46, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

If it's moved to the /Archive page of a SPI, then it's generally archived. In regards to your question, "likely" or "possible" means that the technical evidence is only likely or possible; however, behavioral evidence still be used to make the determination. --Rschen7754 21:50, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Ah, Rschen7754, page name blindness. I've occasionally had problems with this when I don't wear my wikiglasses. I always go to the most complete page when looking for an investigation into a SPI and didn't notice it was an archived page.

Thanks for pointing out my mistake in the most polite way possible. Much appreciated! Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 16:43, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

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More socks to block

This IP sock of an editor you blocked is creating multiple user names to promote himself:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/222.165.186.90

Brangifer (talk) 02:45, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

 Done --Rschen7754 02:50, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Like -- Brangifer (talk) 06:37, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

A related IP to block: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/121.242.42.35

Brangifer (talk) 06:46, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Done. --Rschen7754 06:47, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Interstate 805

Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article Interstate 805 you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Philroc -- Philroc (talk) 11:50, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Interstate 805

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Morning277 SPI

I'm consulting you as an SPI clerk, as suggested at WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Morning277. Among Morning's recurrent clients are Scott Cullather and his company InVNT, both salted after repeated re-creation. Today up pop two brand new accounts, Productioncredits54 and Partyguy451, who know enough to evade the salting by creating Scott Cullather (entrepreneur) and InVNT (company) respectively. I have blocked both as DUCKs, but going to the SPI case to list them I read "You must be reporting a sockpuppet, not a meatpuppet" and "You cannot use editing the same article or topic area as evidence".

My questions are (a) what gives? You can't tell a SP from a MP without checkuser, (b) surely that makes the SPI useless since, as appears from this Morning's MOI is to recruit meatpuppets from Elance? and (c) if the SPI is effectively closed, how shall we keep track of Morning277's evidently continuing flow of meatpuppets?

In Dennis Brown's continuing absence, who is now looking after the Morning277 situation? I am very willing to help if more admin eyes are needed. Dennis was muttering darkly that the Arbs didn't want Morning socks blocked, but both NYB (who I asked by email) and NW (on WT:Arbcom) said they know nothing about that, and I think it would be highly undesirable to give up on this industrial scale spamming - as I said at Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion/Archive 101#Sphero, if we're going to allow it, we might just as well take paid entries and collect the money ourselves. Regards, JohnCD (talk) 22:14, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Unfortunately, it seems that CU is now useless, because they are starting to outsource their work, so CU doesn't come up with anything because there is no technical connection. I suspect that not all the arbs know about what was told to Dennis, and I do not think it wise to post the limited amount that I do know onwiki, at this time. But go ahead and keep blocking the accounts, and maybe make a note in userspace or something, until we figure this mess out. --Rschen7754 22:18, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Vandalism only account

An IP you have previously blocked for six months has returned with a vengeance:

• 24.131.136.147 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

Nothing constructive at all. They have already received multiple warnings. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:37, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

• Reblocked. --Rschen7754 04:38, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks. Some people just have no business here. -- Brangifer (talk) 06:47, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

It appears that their talk page needs to be semi-protected: [16] -- Brangifer (talk) 01:03, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Handled. --Rschen7754 02:23, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	I guess you've had one of these before, but I can't think of a better way to thank you for all your tireless work at SPI and sorting out the mess it sometimes gets into. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:52, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Thank you! It's always nice to hear that someone appreciates it. --Rschen7754 19:51, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Mediawiki

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Posting on the page of someone who is not allowed to respond is not polite behaviour. And "edits such as" is plural. I made one test edit, to highlight the problem. You seriously need to tone down the rhetoric and actually look at the core of the problem, which is the utter unresponsiveness and defensiveness of MediaWiki people, and the total lack of testing and quality control. If you (MediaWiki people) don't test whatever you proclaim to have fixed and will roll out to all wikis, whether we want it or not, then don't be surprised if other people test it for you and change the pages to correctly reflect the situation. If you were this pissed off at having to revert one lousy VE edit, then you can perhaps start to imagine how the people feel who have had to revert or correct hundreds or thousands of VE edits before we forecd the opt-in. If we would block the people here who are responsible for causing that much damage to en-wiki and other versions, then that would be defensible. The reactions at MediaWiki though are simply laughable. Neither you nor Jasper Deng has done anything but silence the critic and ignore the criticism. Good going! Fram (talk) 16:17, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Well, I figured you certainly know how to contact me elsewhere... Also, I am not responsible for VisualEditor, or Jasper's block, so there is nothing that I can do about that. --Rschen7754 16:59, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

"Hey, it's not my responsability as a MediaWiki admin if someone who I revert and call a troll then gets blocked by another admin". Actually, it is your responsability, together with other admins there. Fram (talk) 18:28, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

You probably shouldn't edit mediawikiwiki again until you have worked out who is responsible for what. The admins of mediawikiwiki, as a group, have not had anything to do with VisualEditor, and are certainly not responsible for deployments to other wikis. (Certain individuals among us might be, but don't drag the rest of us into this mess.) You made one edit, it got reverted and you made another doing the exact same change. That's two edits. Your change itself is not appropriate at all for a /status page, you should've left it as a comment on a talk page perhaps. We shouldn't have to protect pages and block users to keep out stupid edits from people like you who really should know better. I support Jasper's block, and to be honest we should consider extending it purely because you've evaded it by continuing the problem on a different wiki on the talkpages of the people involved. --Krenair ^{(talk • contribs)} 19:56, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Hi, Mediawiki developer. I thought, it being a wiki, we all could share responsability and do our part. If you have seen any stupid edits, please let me know. The only ones I have seen are from the people reverting a page to an incorrect state. Oh right, no one is actually willing to discuss the merits of my edit and the points I raise in them, that would be too embarassing or painful. If continiuing problems on different wikis is blockable, then perhaps we should indeed find out who is responsible for VE, its deployments, and the status reports, and block those people for serious negligence and disruption of many wikis. I do believe that my few edits at Mediawiki pale in comparison to those. Fram (talk) 20:16, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Coming over to any WMF wiki without understanding how it works and trying to push an agenda is a very good way to annoy/alienate people at that wiki and has a very high probability of ending in a block. It's typical of many English Wikipedia editors (even admins), and it's why we are one of the most hated wikis in Wikimedia - because too many of our users expect everything to work like the English Wikipedia, and then cause drama when they find out that it doesn't. --Rschen7754 21:01, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Funny, I have the exact opposite feeling. Replace "English Wikipedia" with MediaWiki / WMF in the above post, and you'll get a description of some of the things that are wrong with them and the opinion many people have about it. Further; if you are aware that many people who come from en-wiki are not familiar with the different standards or habits of MediaWiki, then explaining these different standards is the way to go, not blocking them and removing talk page access (or calling them trolls). And you should really get together with Jasper Deng, since he claimed that as an en-wiki admin, I should know better, but according to you it is normal that as an en-wiki editor, I don't know better... Finally, "trying to push an agenda", yes, my agenda was to get correct information. Sorry for trying to push that agenda, I didn't know that correctness wasn't how MediaWiki works. Well, and "wiki" is not how it works either, apparently, despite the name. Does it work at all? That seems to be debatable. Fram (talk) 08:15, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

The two statements are easily reconcilable; you'd think that editors (and admins!) from the English Wikipedia would be better behaved, but typically they are some of the worst-behaved in the system. That is "normal" unfortunately, but that should not be normal. And perhaps figuring out what those standards are before making controversial edits would have been a better way to go, no? --Rschen7754 08:26, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Oh, and the funny thing is, I thought the way the WMF handled the VisualEditor launch was poor. But the proper way to address that is not editing what the status updates say to include snide comments. I know there are several people who think that Jdforrester's comments were snide, but responding in turn is not the way to handle this. Be the better man. --Rschen7754 08:37, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Can you point me to the policies / guidelines / behavioral pages for MediaWiki? I couldn't find them. Things like 3RR (apparently it is 1RR on MediaWiki), civility / NPA, user talk page rules, block appeals, when not to wiki, ... don't seem to be described anywhere. Of course, Jdforrester was never blocked here for making snide or completely incorrect remarks; and no one could be bothered to implement any changes in the days between my first error reports and my eventual editing of the status page to make it bluntly correct. Jdforrester has since again edited the status page, and is clearly not interested at all in correcting his errors. The fact that still no one has addressed the contents of my "snide remarks" is rather telling as well. 08:53, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

We don't really have any. See Rschen7754's point earlier about many enwiki users expecting every other wiki to work just like theirs. Mostly we rely on people using some common sense. Making edits like the ones you did is not a way to become popular. --Krenair ^{(talk • contribs)} 12:22, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't expect every other wiki to work like en-wiki. I expect other wikis to explain the differences to newbies (on their wiki) if they violate some standards, practices or policies on that wiki (and certainly when said standards and so on are implicit, not written down in any way, shape or form). I don't expect to be blocked for things that would never get me blocked here, and then to be told "you are an admin on en-wiki, you should know how to behave" when that is just what I wasn't' supposed to do apparently, and when no one had even tried to communicate in any normal way what was expected from me. And I wasn't trying to become popular, that's the least of my worries. I tried to make one page with communications about what happens this week on nearly all wikiversions more correct and honest, after other people (like the one that posted the page in the first place) failed to take any action or respond to comments. If it is "common sense" that that is not acceptable on MediaWiki, and that being popular and following the party maifesto is what matters instead, then I'm very happy that I'm not popular on MediaWiki. 12:41, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Help test better mass message delivery

Hi. You're being contacted as you've previously used global message delivery (or its English Wikipedia counterpart). It doesn't feel so great to be spammed, does it? ;-)

For the past few months, Legoktm has built a replacement to the current message delivery system called MassMessage. MassMessage uses a proper user interface form (no more editing a /Spam subpage), works faster (it can complete a large delivery in minutes), and no longer requires being on an access list (any local administrator can use it). In addition, many tiny annoyances with the old system have been addressed. It's a real improvement! :-)

You can test out MassMessage here: testwiki:Special:MassMessage. The biggest difference you'll likely notice is that any input list must use a new {{#_target:}} parser function. For example, {{#_target:User talk:Jimbo Wales}} or {{#_target:User talk:Jimbo Wales|test2.wikipedia.org}}. For detailed instructions, check out mw:Help:Extension:MassMessage.

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Your GA nomination of Interstate 805

The article Interstate 805 you nominated as a good article has been placed on hold . The article is close to meeting the good article criteria, but there are some minor changes or clarifications needed to be addressed. If these are fixed within 7 days, the article will pass, otherwise it will fail. See Talk:Interstate 805 for things which need to be addressed. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of TCN7JM -- TCN7JM (talk) 07:50, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Interstate 805

The article Interstate 805 you nominated as a good article has passed ; see Talk:Interstate 805 for comments about the article. Well done! Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of TCN7JM -- TCN7JM (talk) 08:03, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

SPI

Hi Rschen, pursuant to Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Mangoeater1000 I need a CU (for confirmation) on User:Spoutgale--for the record, since an obvious sock is obvious. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 17:40, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

• And I blocked IP 167.206.128.5 for the same reason. Drmies (talk) 17:44, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
  • Unfortunately you'll have to file it at SPI. :/ --Rschen7754 18:01, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
    • Yes, but you have to help me! :) What's the easiest way? I can't just add some text to the SPI, can I? I mean, something has to be triggered for attention? Oh, wait--it hasn't changed all that much. OK then lazy bones. Faulpelz. Drmies (talk) 18:07, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
      • Well, unfortunately I can't run the check, but someone's already on it. --Rschen7754 18:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
        • Well, if you ever go up, you have my vote. (Though I'm sure I won't have a "vote" in any of that.) Drmies (talk) 18:17, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
          • Thanks --Rschen7754 18:23, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Activity note

I will be unavailable for several hours throughout the course of this weekend, but should be back Sunday afternoon. --Rschen7754 07:37, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

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DYK for Interstate 805

Gatoclass (talk) 17:07, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

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SPI question

Hi, Rschen, I was looking at the heated discussion over Rupert Sheldrake on its Talk Page and found some recently created accounts that have jumped into the discussion. This debate has moved on to WP:FRINGE and WP:ANI as well.
I think some of the accounts are sock puppets and at least one of the participants was previously banned for having multiple socks. But when I looked to report it, the SPI page asks for specific identification and diffs and this is such a complicated discussion that I think I know the sock accounts but I don't know whose socks they are.
Since I saw that you were a SPI clerk, I was wondering if you knew of an Editor or Admin who had the experience to look into this and sort it out. It's also complicated because this is an article that is under Discretionary Sanctions and so further action might need to be taken to comply with the ARBCOM ruling on Pseudoscience.
Thanks for any advice you can offer. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 18:54, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

If you can provide enough proof to convince a CU that the account is obviously not a new editor, you may be able to file a SPI anyway, and CU can sort it out. Unfortunately I don't do a lot in the psuedoscience area to know of any particular sockmasters or anything, unfortunately. :( --Rschen7754 19:32, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the response, Rschen7754. I think I read somewhere that you can't run a CU on an IP address but that might be incorrect. Anyway, it seems like that fevered debate on that article has calmed down some. I spoke with one of the participants is the skirmish and he/she also believes that there are socks involved but doesn't believe it is serious enough to try to sort out.

By the way, how do you juggle responsibilities on all of these different Wikis that you work on? One is plenty to keep me busy! I can't imagine dividing up my time between two or three. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 20:02, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

A CU can run a check on an IP address, as they do it all the time to find sleeper accounts. What they cannot do is disclose in public the connection between an account and IP address.

I rely on IRC a lot to alert me to events happening on all of my "home" wikis, and I do tend to spend different days doing different things on different wikis, rather than trying to get to each wiki each day, though I do check my watchlists every few hours. --Rschen7754 20:11, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Okay, so, regarding CU, if I say that I think that User:Jimmy is using a sock, IP XXX.X.XX.XXX and you find that they are, you can't disclose that fact on the SPI page? Thanks for answering all of my questions. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 02:14, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, I'm not a CU, so I can't figure that out, unfortunately. But a CU would generally not run a request for a check phrased that way, because it would put them in that difficult position. --Rschen7754 02:19, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm trying to understand this better. I understand the resistance to do any outing, but if an editor has violated policy by using socks, IP or otherwise, haven't they lost their right to protection? Normally, in real life, a criminal loses many rights. Why not here? This seems to be a situation where a problematic editor who has been blocked or banned, becomes impervious as long as they only use IPs to evade their block, and keep their disruption at a low rumble. This happens far too often here. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:32, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, we can still block them if we think they are the same; we just can't use CU in the process for this particular case. Of course, in the extreme cases of threats of violence and the like, appropriate actions can be taken as necessary; also, CUs can still make blocks if they are able to keep the connections private. --Rschen7754 02:38, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

That's my mistake then. I saw you talking about the CU's report on Prashant!'s Talk Page so I assumed that it was you who "ran" it.

I'm really surprised by your response though because I thought most SPIs involve a registered account and a variety of IPs. I guess the blocks are just based on similar posting behavior not CheckUser? I thought there was more evidence behind it. It seems more like hunches then. But I guess this is really a conversation to have on the SPI Talk Page not here. Thanks for helping me try to figure this out! Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 14:13, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Opting in to VisualEditor

As you may know, VisualEditor ("Edit ^beta") is currently available on the English Wikipedia only for registered editors who choose to enable it. Since you have made 50 or more edits with VisualEditor this year, I want to make sure that you know that you can enable VisualEditor (if you haven't already done so) by going to your preferences and choosing the item, "MediaWiki:Visualeditor-preference-enable". This will give you the option of using VisualEditor on articles and userpages when you want to, and give you the opportunity to spot changes in the interface and suggest improvements. We value your feedback, whether positive or negative, about using VisualEditor, at Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Feedback. Thank you, Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:16, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Prashant!

Hi, I thought you'd check usered him? If not can you post at SPI for a confirmation? Cheers. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:54, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

I've asked for a CU to be run. --Rschen7754 22:46, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Appreciate your help on this, and quite rightly that account was highly suspicious and more than likely Prashant's but seems his IP is registered to Melbu and it isn't Prashant.Something still smells fishy though doesn't it...♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:38, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

I have my own theory, but it is a bit too politically incorrect for me to post here. --Rschen7754 02:18, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Alberta Highway 1

Hello Rschen7754, it's been awhile. Nice cleanup here. Question though. The heading for the first column, "County", is inaccurate within the Alberta context. There is no longer such municipal status (though the term can be used in the official names of municipal districts). For most Alberta highway articles, the heading "Rural municipality" would be accurate. For a select few, it would have to be "Specialized/rural municipality". Embedding the wikilinks within these two optional headings would be helpful for readers outside Alberta that are unfamiliar with its structure of municipalities. Please advise how these corrections could be accomplished. Cheers, Hwy43 (talk) 02:53, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

The header is generated by templates, so generally what is applied to one is applied to all. Would using "Specialized/rural municipality" work for all of them? --Rschen7754 03:00, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, but upon more thought, I suggest reversing the order to "Rural/specialized municipality" as rurals are more common. I've taken municipality out of the wikilink to decrease the chance that the heading will be assumed as one wikilink rather than two separate links. Hwy43 (talk) 03:05, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

 Done took a bit of a hack to the Template:Jcttop/core template, but should work now. --Rschen7754 04:05, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Many thanks! Cheers, Hwy43 (talk) 06:31, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Unblock

Hello, Please unblock my account FrB.TG, you will find the reason in my talk page, Thank You 88.90.27.156 (talk) 09:43, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you!

I awake this morning to see a minor battle ensued on my talk page and that it has now been cleaned away. I have no idea what the blocked comments said, and feel no need to be curious at that if they were bad enough to be expunged. Thank you for cleaning the history log! Jeremy112233 (talk) 17:03, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Investigation

Sorry, that was the first time I had opened one. United States Man (talk) 21:23, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Not a problem, just be sure to use the form on WP:SPI next time. --Rschen7754 21:28, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Re

I am trying to practice WP:AVOIDEDITWAR. There is a user on an dynamic IP who was reverting my previous edits on those pages, insisting on putting those templates back on there. Of course, because of that, it is difficult to communicate this, so I'm hoping that this "compromise" works and then make the necessary modifications later. Unless you want to help contribute to this issue so a 3RR could be avoided ... Zzyzx11 (talk) 08:35, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Ah, I understand now. I'll just go ahead and revert it, and bring it up at WT:USRD if this continues... generally I prefer to nip things in the bud, considering the past history of Southern California road articles and that they're a mess already :/ --Rschen7754 08:43, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Zzyzx11 (talk) 08:44, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

@Zzyzx11: Actually, this appears to be Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Jonathan Yip. --Rschen7754 08:53, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, now I know what to look for and thus can also freely revert on grounds of WP:NOT3RR. Zzyzx11 (talk) 09:02, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Mathsci block

Given that the Wikipedia:Banning policy does not require site banned editors be blocked, and Mathsci readily agreed the ban was justified, blocking him seems unnecessary and am wondering why you did it -- specifically, was that at the direction of the committee? NE Ent 16:38, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

It is generally understood that all ArbCom site bans are enforced by blocks. If you have questions about this, they should be directed to the Committee. --Rschen7754 17:23, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

UTRS Account Request

I confirm that I have requested an account on the UTRS tool. Rschen7754 06:26, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

User:ShelleyaMIA Morning277

Morning277 SPI page said to run by clerk first. I didn't have a lot to go on. A search looking for pattern popped this one up. One article (orphan) and one sandbox prepped article ready for more editing or submission. Citations don't fit pattern but take a look.

• ShelleyaMIA (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) - no article edits and then substantial work on Barton G. Weiss - no other article edits
• User:ShelleyaMIA/sandbox - sandbox for Tom Squitieri creation
• Barton G. Weiss - Orphan article bio created by ShelleyMIA - IP edit belonged to BartonG in August 2013 appears unrelated to Morning277.
• Sacoca (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) - only existed to create Tom Squitieri - first few edits to become autoconfirmed
• Tom Squitieri - possibly notable. Was obviously written prior to submission.

I can't tell if Sacoca is related to ShelleyaMIA except by topic Tom Squitieri.

The SPA nature, the search I used and the style seem similar to recent Morning277 activity but it's not clear enough for me to file. Those more familiar with the case may see it as related/unrelated. If unrelated, they are stale SPA's. I realize data may be too stale for formal SPI too. It would be a low priority SPI as neither account has edited for a while. Barton G. Weiss may be an AfD candidate. --DHeyward (talk) 07:12, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I was originally going to say that we had little proof, but then I saw commons:File:Squitieri Tom.jpg and that made me wonder. User:Rybec User:JohnCD what do you think? (and any other talk page stalkers) --Rschen7754 07:22, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

There is also connection of Sacoca (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) to RachelleLin (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) and Monstermike99 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) (based on previous SPIs and edits to Alexander Mirtchev). Still above my pay grade to link them all though. Qorvis seems to be the link. --DHeyward (talk) 07:35, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I have no idea what Qorvis is nor the other editors mentioned. I have been editing since 2008. I'm being accused by an editor that contributed only to the Alexander Mirtchev page and only negative comments. I think that's what needs to be looked at. --Monstermike99 (talk) 14:07, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Didn't mean to accuse you Monstermiike99, it's just the name of the case. Sacoca was mentioned and blocked previously here. Qorvis is what links them together. --DHeyward (talk) 17:20, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

The Barton_G._Weiss article was started in AfC and the initial revision only had two sentences. File:Squitieri Tom.jpg was created by the same person who posted the article. I can't see deleted edits, but I only see six edits by Sacoca before starting the article (not enough to become autoconfirmed), and they were done over a period of ~2 years. Tom Squitieri was also made through AfC. The use of a Verizon IP address in New York City, 108.27.92.223 (which resolves to pool-108-27-92-223.nycmny.east.verizon.net), is the only thing that resembles Morning277. There are a lot of people using Verizon in New York City... —rybec

Yeah, I didn't see any strong ties on my end, even looking through the deleted evidence. --Rschen7754 08:38, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Agree - I don't think there has been any previous suggestion of links between Qorvis and Morning277. We are going to need to thrash out some sort of guidelines, though, for what is enough evidence to block/G5 etc suspected Morning socks, if SPI won't handle reports. JohnCD (talk) 21:05, 15 October 2013 (UTC)