Wikiquote:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive/013

Institutional account

In similar vein, user account Hovhanesscentre appears to be representing and editing on behalf of an organization rather than an individual. Again, the edits seem benign but the situation poses a dangerous precedent. I think we ought to formalize the policy at WQ:POLICY#Behavior_guidelines as suggested, and also annotate it at WQ:U#Inappropriate usernames where it says "Usernames that promote a company: Usernames of or closely resembling the names of companies and groups are discouraged and may be blocked." ~ Ningauble 16:18, 7 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with Ningauble (talk · contributions). Cirt (talk) 22:16, 7 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

m:Role account also applies here. Cirt (talk) 23:10, 7 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Blocked as a m:Role account. Cirt (talk) 06:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Edit war on User talk:69.64.213.146

There seems to be an edit war going on at User talk:69.64.213.146. Looking at the talk page history, the page has gone through multiple reverts and reversions. The reverting is going no where, and the problem seems to be this warning given by administrator Kalki (talk · contributions) to 69.64.213.146. More information at User_talk:UDScott#User_69.64.213.146. Would be good to let others know about this incase action is needed at some point, RyanCross @ 07:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On Wikipedia, we allow editors (even IPs) to remove warnings at their pleasure. There's no actual harm being done by doing so; the warnings are still there in the page's history, and constantly restoring the warnings does nothing but further exacerbate the situation. EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, just making sure. :) Thanks, RyanCross @ 21:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to propose that we reject the Wikipedia policy of allowing messages to be deleted from user talk pages (the exceptions would be vandalism, spam and threats). I've sometimes come across users on Wikipedia who have never been blocked despite committing scores of vandalisms and receiving many warnings. Every time these users received warnings, they deleted them. It's all well to say that they still have a readable history, but it's not exactly surprising when action is never taken against them. Our policy, as seen at Wikiquote:Talk page#Can I do whatever I want to my own user talk page?, allows users to delete messages from their talk pages. On the other hand, we have also expressed the wish to keep warnings or blocking notices, as seen at Wikiquote:User page#How do I delete my user and user talk pages? in the following passage:

"To request deletion of your user page, add {{db|user page}} to the page, optionally explaining why you want the page deleted. Provided that the page does not contain evidence of policy violations that may need to be kept, such pages are almost always deleted. If a user page and user talk page were deleted because a contributor left, it may be restored by a sysop if the contributor returns, particularly if the history contains evidence of policy violations."

If we allow warnings to be blanked, I think it likely that sysops patrolling Recent Changes will keep giving first warnings to people who have been warned before. What reason would a patroller have to review each user's talk page history? We tend to go by what we see (or don't see) and take action based on that. - InvisibleSun 22:22, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For what it's worth, I tried using the Editnotice trick to put a permanent mark on the IP's talk page, but it didn't work. (for those that don't know, an Editnotice page is a template that appears even when you're editing the page; it's very handy, and can be done by registered users, but apparently not by IPs; to see an example, check out w:User talk:EVula/Editnotice) EVula // talk // ☯ // 22:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with InvisibleSun on this, especially in the case of unregistered users - see the discussion on my Talk page. ~ UDScott 00:49, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

InvisibleSun (talk · contributions) makes some good points above. Perhaps we should continue this discussion at Wikiquote talk:Talk page, with the possibility of modifying Wikiquote:Talk page#Can I do whatever I want to my own user talk page?. Cirt (talk) 01:25, 7 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Edit by an admin needed

Please see Talk:Seed of Chucky#Protection. Thanks. — RyanCross (talk) 14:46, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Done. ~ UDScott 14:49, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. — RyanCross (talk) 14:49, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've added more protection reasons for MediaWiki:Protect-dropdown. If anybody thinks there should be changes made, please say so here, and we'll discuss your suggestion. — RyanCross (talk) 07:04, 19 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Good additions. There some wiki-code that you can put on there so that it automatically sorts some of that stuff (ie: you won't see "User request within own user space" unless you're in the user: namespace, etc), but just getting it off of the defaults is a good start. :) EVula // talk // ☯ // 21:28, 19 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I cleaned-up MediaWiki:Deletereason-dropdown a bit. I wasn't sure why we had "Vandalism/test page" when the two are two very different reasons. Also, why do we have a "No quotes" reason for both, speedy and proposed deletions? Shouldn't we only use one? If not, shouldn't we have specifications on when to use what? If anyone thinks changes need to be made, please feel free to say so. — RyanCross (talk) 05:43, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Also, should we use "Speedy deletion" and "Proposed deletion", or should we use acronyms instead (i.e. "SD" and "PROD")? — RyanCross (talk) 05:45, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I like spelling it out; it's more newbie-friendly (the same reason I changed the VfD line to be the full text for the VfD title). Not sure what you mean by "specs on when to use what"; if you mean a policy page, yes, but if you mean a note in the dropdown reason itself, no; too much clutter. EVula // talk // ☯ // 05:52, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

What I mean is... something, somewhere, should say when to use "Speedy deletion: No quotes" and "Proposed deletion: No quotes", so basically what you said about the policy page. Either that, or we remove one of the two. — RyanCross (talk) 06:19, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Although the underlying reason may be the same, "Proposed" is for {{prod}} and "Speedy" is for {{db}} or immediate deletion on sight. I don't see any problem with the redundancy. Sometimes a reviewer will prod an article with the intent to give the contributor a few days to add quotes; and other times articles with no quotes are speedy deleted as completely inappropriate.

"Speedy deletion—No quotes" was added to the list without amending the Speedy deletions policy page, but it reflects consensus practice. At the time we had a rash of encyclopedic articles (or Wikipedia rejects) submitted with no intention of adding quotes, and we ran out of patience. ~ Ningauble 14:12, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Good point. Keeping both reasons seems appropriate. — RyanCross (talk) 00:25, 22 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

MediaWiki:Deletedtext update

I've made MediaWiki:Deletedtext more user-friendly (no surprise). I've included links for undeletion and salting, and I've added a handy link to view any broken redirects that are left after deleting a page. — RyanCross (talk) 07:28, 23 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good. :) EVula // talk // ☯ // 18:35, 23 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, thanks. — RyanCross (talk) 06:57, 24 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

User:Jeck32

Does not appear to be appropriate use of a userpage - seems to be cut and paste from IMDB... Cirt (talk) 19:50, 25 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Tagged copyvio and reported to WQ:VFD.--Jusjih 02:16, 26 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

CheckUser request (4 users)

There are more, but the first one is the editor responsible for the slew of vandalism that I just deleted. The second is actually the entire reason I'm an admin in the first place. The third is just another editor who has created the same vandal categories.

There's no doubt that they're all related; I'm not looking for that. I'm looking for the underlying IP(s) so we can block them. EVula // talk // ☯ // 07:04, 28 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Update Add Popdiddle (talk · contributions) to the pile. EVula // talk // ☯ // 09:22, 3 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I cannot get the IP matched or related to Littoral (talk · contributions). The IPs of other three users are entirely different. Do you still want the IPs somewhere private?--Jusjih 01:50, 4 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Nah; if they're unrelated, then it's either a group of people or someone hopping from IP to IP; either way, zeroing in on an IP won't have the effect I was hoping for. Thanks for checking though, Jusjih. EVula // talk // ☯ // 06:26, 4 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pikachu and Arbok

Arbok (talk · contributions)
Pikachu (talk · contributions)

Pikachu is an acknowledged sock of the former. These should both probably be blocked. They appear to be single-purpose trolling/vandalism/disruption-only accounts. Cirt (talk) 23:41, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have taken action to block Pikachu permanently. Arbok is currently under a six-month block. - InvisibleSun 23:48, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That seems appropriate. Thank you, Cirt (talk) 23:51, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Max Parrott

Max Parrott (talk · contributions) - See all the contribs for vandalism which needs to be dealt with by admins. As this is a chronic issue - is there another way to address this, instead of just dealing with it each time it comes up? Cirt (talk) 07:18, 15 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Lots of cleanup by admins is needed now. Also, I think some checkuser investigation is warranted, on this account and prior ones with same pattern of vandalism. This account was created on 7 February 2009, then waited as a sleeper so it could be a confirmed account. Cirt (talk) 07:44, 15 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Which other accounts should be checked? If you do not want to answer here, please email me for privacy and I will check them for you.--Jusjih 04:17, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think Aphaia (talk · contributions) knows more of the history, but if you look into the deleted history here, among other similar obscene pages, you will find more information about this chronic vandal sockmaster. Cirt (talk) 06:37, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Will O'Locksley (talk · contributions) = more recent example. Cirt (talk) 18:18, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Vandenbloot (talk · contributions) = another more recent example. Cirt (talk) 08:15, 18 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
All of these usernames have different IPs, so I see no evident connections.--Jusjih 04:06, 19 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I reported it also to Meta, as it is cross-wiki vandalism. See here. Apparently the IPs are not the same because the vandal uses open proxies. Hopefully this is being discussed/coordinated on the checkuser mailing list. Cirt (talk) 04:08, 19 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Template:Sockpuppet

This was a useful template that was deleted for no good reason. also, it can't be recreated. (anon) —This unsigned comment is by 173.52.21.50 (talk • contribs) .

I explained a bit at the IP's talk page, though of course feel free to discuss if Checkusers and Administrators want to change this. Cirt (talk) 22:49, 19 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps we should undelete it with changes?--Jusjih 01:51, 22 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree it may be useful to undelete it, with a model after w:Template:Sockpuppet, that way the various categorization schemes can be used to keep track of chronic problems. Cirt (talk) 02:00, 22 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I am not familiar with the full history of the issue, but my impression is that such tagging led to unnecessary Wikidrama. I am not aware of a problem with current practice that needs to be fixed. I am open to persuasion but, frankly, I find it difficult to take seriously a request from an anonymous IP wanting to tag user accounts. ~ Ningauble 14:03, 22 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

it is a useful template. make changes but there is no reason to have it deleted and unable to create. i dont want to tag any accounts but i saw it deleted and it would be useful in the future. (anon) —This unsigned comment is by 149.4.206.196 (talk • contribs) .

I agree with Cirt. We should probably have our own sockpuppet template(s) to mark which accounts are socks of others, and which is the sockpuppeteer. We have had several vandalism attacks from (obvious) sockpuppets the last several months, and these templates could be of good use to keep track of these socks. — RyanCross (talk) 06:26, 5 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I created {{Sockpuppet}} with input from en.wikipedia. Some of the categories and dependent templates may need tweaking, but otherwise this should prove to be quite useful. Cirt (talk) 08:50, 8 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

See Category:Suspected Wikiquote sockpuppets of Bubbaloo and Bubbaloo (talk · contributions) for how this template works in action. Cirt (talk) 09:16, 8 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I plan to work on the indicated tweaking over the next day or two. If anybody else wants to contribute to this as well, please drop me a note so we don't work at cross-purposes. Unless anyone objects, I am going to take out the "pp" template stuff. It can be re-added in a more comprehensive manner if we later decide to adopt Wikipedia's protection tagging schema. I will retain and clean up the template "documentation" template stuff, as this functionality has been on my wish list for some time. ~ Ningauble 15:37, 8 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much, this would be most helpful. Cirt (talk) 16:23, 8 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The Four Quartets

The Four Quartets are poems written by T.S. Eliot. He died in 1965. They are not in the public domain, and are still held under Harcourt Brace's copyright that was renewed before his death. The statement is five lines at most from a work, I believe? However, as poetry this is a bit more complicated. I am not a regular here. I only followed the link from the en.wikipedia page. I am hoping that someone can handle this properly. I can be reached at my en.wikipedia talk page. Ottava Rima 03:23, 9 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Block request

Per an SPI case at enwiki a CheckUser was requested, CU evidence (here) and editing habits confirm that User:33ohmygad is one of many abusive sockpuppets at enwiki. After checking with the SUL utility I figured I would alert you guys that one of the 20+ accounts has registered here and am requesting an indefinite block on the account. Thanks, Stepshep 00:48, 15 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

OTRS

We could use some help in the OTRS queue (the place where people land when they e-mail us). I'm posting this on the Administrators' noticeboard because you guys are pretty trusted and around quite a bit. :-)

Basically what it is is just an inbox – we get mail, then you login and look through it, picking the tickets you want to answer and answering them. We also have a few boilerplates in the queue for common queries. You don't have to do tickets you don't want to and if you aren't sure on how to respond, other agents can help you out.

If anyone would like to do it or has any questions about it, feel free to e-mail me or just apply directly on m:OTRS/volunteering. Cbrown1023 talk 01:58, 20 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Suspected open proxies

I have created a category Category:Suspected open proxies to tag suspected IPs, especially those used by the "Nice site, admin" twerp. I am inclined to give such IPs a six month block, especially if they actually come to be used more than once for vandalism. ~ Kalki 11:58, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Abuse Filter

The experimental mw:Extension:AbuseFilter has been enabled at Special:AbuseFilter, pursuant to a discussion at VP. Please consider the need to develop policies for this new tool before proceeding much further. Some issues that should probably be spelled out explicitly are:

Who is authorized to edit or view filters? [Whatever has been done in this regard has not been discussed and is not transparent.]
Should testing of new (or substantially modified) filters in "log only" mode be required for a certain period of time? Can peer review substitute for extended testing in some cases. [Current filters have had actions enabled immediately after creation, without so noting in the filter notes.]
Which actions will filters be permitted to perform? [We can probably follow Wikipedia's lead on this for now.]

This can be a very useful tool for Wikiquote, and should save a lot of time cleaning up after persistent vandals. It is also very powerful, and should be handled with care. I will start a Wikiquote:Abuse filter page (sooner or later, if nobody beats me to it) for addressing these and related issues. In the meantime, I encourage administrators to monitor Special:AbuseLog regularly for false positives, and familiarize yourselves with how to shut one off if it runs wild. ~ Ningauble 15:36, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Copyvio report at Robin Hobb?

There is a complaint on Talk:Robin Hobb alleging that the selection of quotes is copied from another site. I have not attempted to compare sites in detail or to ascertain priority. Should we put a {{copyvio}} on it first, investigate further, or refer it to (I dunno who)? ~ Ningauble 22:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'd throw up a {{copyvio}} right away - won't hurt to have the page corralled until an investigation is done. The DMCA safe harbor does require that we act swiftly to respond to complaints raised. BD2412 T 01:41, 8 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Protected edit request

Can an admin edit User:Essjay and User talk:Essjay to convert them to {{softredirect}}s. Just needs to replace the current code with {{softredirect|:w:User:Essjay}}. Thanks. MBisanz 23:38, 31 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Done Cbrown1023 talk 23:45, 31 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Protection at Al Gore

User:Aphaia protected this page indefinitely as a "high traffic page." I see nothing in the history that suggests any unusual vandalism problem, and I want to make some changes. w:User:WillOakland 21:43, 5 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'll remove the protection, which no longer appears to be needed. - InvisibleSun 02:37, 8 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The "I Will F uucckk your face problem"

Well we got a problem with the user called "I Will F uucckk your face". On April 7 he edited a lot of threads with nonsense like "fuck this asshole". Is is possible to get all the information that he ruined back? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by ZergFFS (talk • contribs) on April 7, 2009 at 22:19 (UTC)

All of the vandalism has now been reversed. - InvisibleSun 22:37, 7 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

VfD Macedonia (region) needs action

Unless someone provides a rationale for keeping it open, Wikiquote:Votes for deletion/Macedonia (region) is past-due to be closed. Would an uninvolved administrator please review it? As a participant in the debate, I do not feel confident assessing whether some of the arguments address comminity standards in a meaningful way (as opposed to just being likes/dislikes), nor assessing the appropriate weight to give the votes of contributors whose participation has been significant but narrow in scope. Thanks. ~ Ningauble 16:12, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Closed by BD2412. Thanks. ~ Ningauble 17:00, 18 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Unregistered user pages

Is there any policy or precedent regarding creating user pages with names that do not correspond to a registered user account? See e.g. User:Ruuta 25. ~ Ningauble 19:34, 16 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I would think they should be summarily speedy deleted. Cirt (talk) 19:45, 16 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Makes sense. I did, so now there is precedent. ~ Ningauble 16:57, 18 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think someone is trying to hack my account!

Someone from the IP address 66.99.219.2 recently sent a "lost password" request to Wikiquote. I was notified of this by automated e-mail.

I have never requested a temporary/lost password from this site, and the IP address above is not mine. Can someone tell me what is going on here? --Eastlaw 00:26, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It is likely that a vandal was trying to impersonate you, but as the notice for such requests only are sent to registered email addresses, I believe that simply ignoring the request will keep things in their present state. ~ Kalki 00:32, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That is what I have done. I have not used the temporary password. I only use my unified login. Thank you for your prompt response! --Eastlaw 00:36, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Michael Savage

Most of the quotes here are not sourced. Is there a WP:RS standard here? I notice that RS is softly redirected to Wikiedia. Is it appropriate to remove unsourced material on this project? --Murray F. White 16:59, 5 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Removed unsourced and inadequately sourced quotes and prodded the page. Cirt (talk) 21:21, 5 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. --Murray F. White 00:40, 6 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Recruiting more users

We need more users here to help out with pages like Transformers Animated. I can't edit them alone.(Dennys 17:35, 6 May 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Protected page

I went to Matthew Sanchez and was going to make an edit but noticed this: Note: This page has been locked so that only registered users can edit it. 10:05, 22 October 2008 Bluemarine (Talk | contribs) protected "Matthew Sanchez" ‎ (Matthew (Matt) Sanchez moved to Matthew Sanchez) (hist). Can someone tell me why Bluemarine, aka Matthew Sanchez himself, is protecting a page of which he is the subject? It seems a conflict of interest, especially considering all the editing to the page he has done. And that further leads to why is an admin, assuming he is one since he's able to protect a page, abusing this function? Of course, I ask this not being too familiar with Wikiquote policies, only those of en.Wikipedia and Commons, but surely they aren't that much different? - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 06:06, 10 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Just to let you know, Bluemarine is not an admin here and never was one by the looks of it. I'm not sure how he was able to protect the page, yet, it's still logged. And I agree, it seems to be a COI, editing an article about yourself, and in this case, editing it excessively. But anyway, I've unprotected the article, as I didn't see any reason why it should have been semi-protected indefinitely, or why it was done in the first place. But since that's taken care of, feel free to go on editing the page. — RyanCross (talk) 07:03, 10 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The log only shows that the page was already protected when Bluemarine moved it. It was originally protected 08:32, 24 July 2008 by Quillercouch, who was then an administrator. Unfortunately, the log does not knit together actions before and after a move like the page history does, but only shows that the current incarnation of the page was created in a protected state when it was moved.

But anyway, I am not sure indefinite semiprotection was the best call. We shall see whether edit warring erupts again, now that the protection has been lifted. Long-term problems with the corresponding Wikipedia article[1] are not encouraging. ~ Ningauble 13:11, 10 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the clarification y'all! (that's "you all" here in Mississippi) :] - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 15:27, 10 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No problem, and thanks, Ningauble, for your help in this little investigation. — RyanCross (talk) 06:09, 11 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Just noticed... please unprotect the talk page of the article too. Thanks. - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 16:39, 11 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Done EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:57, 11 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

List of Electronic games

Someone needs to create such a page because theres List of TV shows etc. Also there are two vandals on the loose.(Dennys 17:27, 11 May 2009 (UTC))[reply]

You mentioned this list at User talk:EVula#List of Electronic Games, yet you never followed up to my response. List of television shows exists because TV shows generally do have quotable materials; electronic games, with some notable exceptions, do not.

Also, just saying "two vandals are on the loose" isn't helpful. Diffs are. EVula // talk // ☯ // 19:24, 11 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]