User talk:Risker/Archive 15

Archive 15

Thank you
For your work on the arbitration committee. You are not, in fact, and never have been, 'something to scrape off a shoe' (don't remember the exact phrasing but I think you'll recognize the reference.) From my observation, the voluntary four-year five year sentence seemed to be wearing on you towards the end of your term, and I wish you a speedy and healthy recovery from wiki-stress and abuse. My standard Rx for all Wikipedians under stress is real-life, for as long as needed. (WMF won't pay you any less, I promise!). NE Ent 00:22, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I second that.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:48, 1 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Thirding. Thank you kindly and Happy New Year! Novickas (talk) 17:03, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Fourth :) — ΛΧΣ 21 Call me Hahc21 04:38, 3 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks everyone, this means a lot. Incidentally, NE Ent - five years. Risker (talk) 04:25, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
 * A five-year mission? That's 25% better worse. NE Ent 13:19, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Mbz1 block
Is the Mbz1 block an arbcom block? Discussion at Administrators%27_noticeboard. NE Ent 13:48, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Responded there. Risker (talk) 04:24, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

On your retirement from ArbCom
Thanks, Roger. Risker (talk) 05:18, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Happy New Year!
Happy new year to you too, SandyGeorgia, and thanks for your kind words. They've only had to ping me twice to find out where the keys to the arbitrator washroom are, so I have a feeling I'm not all that missed. :-) Risker (talk) 23:58, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

PC2 RfC
Do you think there's any point in notifying the early-responding editors that there are now more proposals? I'll be on the road this morning, then in meetings all afternoon, but I can try to do it tomorrow if you think it would be appropriate. Rivertorch (talk) 12:23, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Might be worthwhile, although I've not looked at the page today. Risker (talk) 03:29, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

ygm
Responded. Risker (talk) 03:15, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

January 2014
Hello, I'm BracketBot. I have automatically detected that [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=590323904 your edit] to Batiscan River may have broken the syntax by modifying 1 "[]"s. If you have, don't worry: just [ edit the page] again to fix it. If I misunderstood what happened, or if you have any questions, you can leave a message on [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?action=edit&preload=User:A930913/BBpreload&editintro=User:A930913/BBeditintro&minor=&title=User_talk:A930913&preloadtitle=BracketBot%20–%20&section=new my operator's talk page].
 * List of unpaired brackets remaining on the page:

Thanks, BracketBot (talk) 05:58, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
 * ], which is located in the Municipality of Lake Édouard (Haute-Mauricie). Lake Édouard is also the source of the Jeannotte River, which joins the Batiscan river after a
 * runs through a mostly forested area from its source to the bridge over railway Saint-Adelphe with the exception of some agricultural areas close ranks St-Alphonse and Price ([[Lac-aux-Sables,

Prurient
Could you please explain "prurient"? Tony  (talk)  13:00, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Now I have just noticed yet another out-of-line comment you made at that talk page: "If you're going to actively take steps to negatively affect someone's future employability, ..." How dare you accuse me thus. I think you and I are on a collision course. Tony   (talk)  13:47, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Sorry Tony, I didn't see your first message above as I did not open my email until this afternoon (one of the great joys of not being on Arbcom anymore - not having to read emails a couple of times a day just to tame the inbox madness). Oddly, I have not received a "yellow flag" for either of your posts here. So...to answer your questions.

I use the word "prurient" because the flippant language of the opening paragraphs of that article, in particular, left me feeling as though the writers were having an acute attack of schadenfreude, particularly when referring to the Signpost article of a few weeks before. The original title, which used the term "sacked", is awfully informal language and really does sound like a tabloid headline. The language, in my opinion, detracted from the attempt at a serious discussion. Then dumping everything else that could possibly have been said about paid/paid advocacy editing into the same article came across as speculation about exactly why SS and the WMF have parted ways. Bottom line, none of us really knows the exact reason for this parting of ways. In particular, you don't know if this is a reaction to a single event, whether something else was going on, whether there had been other events that raised issues, or whether it was simply a "you know, this is no longer a good fit" situation. Instead the article used phrases like "summarily dismissed" that are not only unsupported, but are obviously incorrect. "Summarily dismissed", at least in North America, means that the firing was immediate, without discussion, and the employee had no right of rebuttal; it would have happened within 24 hours of the discovery, and we all know that isn't the case.

And yes, I do believe that the Signpost article has the ability to disproportionately affect the perspective of potential future employers, as compared to articles in other external sources. The Signpost is seen as something of a house organ by those looking from outside. At a minimum, it's considered to have access to inside sources over and above those available to third party sources, and the fact that there's clear evidence of an extensive Q&A that happened between Signpost writers and Frank Schulenberg suggests that there's something to that perception.

We'll leave it at that. Risker (talk) 01:46, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't know why you're raising "summarily" yet again: it's the only complaint you made that I agree with, and was removed after you raised it (although one person on that talk page doesn't agree with your interpretation of the word). "Prurient" refers to matters sexual, and matters sexual alone; that is irrelevant to the article and will sound like a misleading smear to a casual reader. Just why you'd want to smear with an obviously fallacious criticism is beyond me. We don't know the fine-grained details of the dismissal, but we know that it was a dismissal. The article, I'd have thought, was more critical of the WMF's side of things than Sarah's, and I personally remain extremely disappointed that management didn't handle it differently. Tony   (talk)  04:15, 14 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I'm not raising "summarily" again; it was still there the last time I wrote on the talk page of the news and notes, and my mentioning it here helps to explain my comments there. I will tell you that when reading the article, I felt like I had been transported to the celebrity pages of the Daily Mail, in particular who's fallen out with whom/been fired from or kicked out of some "reality" program (often for having slept with the wrong person)/participated in some "shocking" behaviour. It was Wikipedia the MMORPG, except with real people. And it felt like schadenfreude. Risker (talk) 04:38, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I felt a lot of empathy for Sarah, something that hasn't changed one bit. I'm particularly concerned that we've lost one of our most active agents for promoting female participation. The event is big news on a number of levels. Our reviewers—conservative, knowledgeable—generally had no problem with the story. It was about something very dramatic per se, and I don't believe we sensationalised it. I expected a lot of froth, but was unprepared for the venom directed at the two co-authors rather than merely heated discussion of the issues raised. At the moment I'd rather contemplate how the mess of paid editing/advocacy will pan out, and hope that Sarah might move on to use her talents in the movement or a related field. I do not see how we have jeopardised her future employability, given that it was all over the internet. And she's smart enough to turn it to her advantage in career terms, anyway. Tony   (talk)  12:45, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Then your lead, and your headline, should have been about that instead of about Sarah. The article is really about that, but you've used her employment issues as a coatrack. You'd have ripped any one of us to shreds if we'd tried that in article space. Risker (talk) 21:54, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't rip people to shreds. And it's not a WP article; it's a news story. I don't see the stance as anti-Sarah, and nor do a lot of other people. Tony   (talk)  23:56, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, you've kind of missed my point, Tony. As a news story, I thought it was a coatrack: "let's take this one tangible point and then write a whole article about peripherally related things". It's the kind of journalism that we normally don't think very highly of when assessing the reliability of sources. In that sense, it read like an editorial, not an article.  Now, the Signpost can have editorials if it wants. But it ought to label them as such, and it also ought to stop using living people as its fulcrum for editorials. And frankly, I really don't care all that much that it's not a WP article: if the Signpost can't even meet those minimal standards when publishing, I'm not sure it really is serving its purpose anymore. Kinda jumped the shark. But it's pretty obvious that there's nothing anyone can say to you to persuade you that this is a symptom of a publication heading down the wrong path, so I think there's nothing more to be said here.  Risker (talk) 00:32, 15 January 2014 (UTC)
 * It's interesting that we have diverging views on the same thing here. You think it's a coat-rack, while I wrote the additional sections as a way of ensuring that the whole story wasn't focusing on Sarah. An added bonus was that other Wikipedias' treatment of paid editing was actually interesting (to me, at least). The additional topics certainly weren't meant to function as a melting pot. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 05:09, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

It's pretty clear Stierch didn't jump, she was pushed. But I'm becoming less and less convinced that in the strict American HR sense you could say she was "sacked". Perhaps in BrE or OzE you could say a prime minister or other high-level official was "sacked", but in AmE sacking usually involves plundering and devastation. Rome got sacked, a quarterback (football) gets sacked, but that's probably not the type of nuance we're looking for here. And I think everyone would have to agree that Stierch's future employment opportunities are more likely to be in the U.S.; the article should scan accurately for any potential American employer who might see it. If you google "president fires", to see the kind of language used for people in professional positions, you will come up with verbs like "dismiss", "relieve", "oust", "purge" (multiple firings), and of course "fire".

In the U.S. the question of whether someone quits or not is much harder to say for sure. HR departments generally refuse to comment on that, one way or another, as the courts take a dim view of interfering with someone's employment--America is a litigious nation. The only way you will get anything at all out of them is to go in with a request for information signed by the former employee; even then they will probably only confirm the dates of employment.

The question of whether the departure was voluntary is not so simple. In the U.S., employees who quit voluntarily are not eligible for unemployment benefits, so employers are highly motivated to force people to quit. Firing employees also increases the rate they must pay into unemployment benefit insurance--companies that freely waste money in other areas can be highly resistant to paying these benefits. After reflection, and looking back at the various documents and arguments, my personal opinion is that Stierch probably resigned. —Neotarf (talk) 01:40, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

I have made a few tweaks that should satisfy both the letter and the spirit of what happened. It would also be good to ping Ed at this point, so he can be made aware of this discussion when he is next online.—Neotarf (talk) 04:26, 15 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't have a problem with the new title. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 05:09, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

New proposals at Pending changes/Request for Comment 2014
Hello. Several new proposals have been submitted at Pending changes/Request for Comment 2014 since you last commented on it. You are invited to return to comment on the new proposals. Jackmcbarn (talk) 01:14, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

deletion
Hi, why do you keep deleting Lauren Ostrowski Fenton page? Toxic Servant (talk) 21:21, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't "keep" deleting it, I've deleted it once from an Articles for Creation page. That was because it was a copyright violation; it was an exact copy of a webpage posted elsewhere with noncompatible licensing. There was also nothing that indicated she met our notability requirements, although that was secondary to the copyright violation. Risker (talk) 21:31, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

absurd
Wikipedia is going to shutdown because Kww increased protection on an article from pc2 to full. [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3APhilippe_%28WMF%29&diff=593676701&oldid=593674497]. Simply absurd. NE Ent 03:29, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I most certainly did not say that, and I am deeply disturbed that you would misunderstand my words so badly that you could possibly come away with that message. Whenever someone monkeys around with a DMCA takedown, there is a very high risk that bad things will happen, particularly when they can't even get their head around the idea of discussing their actions before taking them. Kww took action without giving any thought at all to the risk to the project or the WMF family; he was only interested in getting rid of all PC2 articles. I'll note that almost all the articles that had PC2 at the end of December had it because the community sanctioned it; that's hardly an absolutely firm policy, is it? The risk of winding up in court and losing Section 230 protection may be only 1:5000, but when you're talking about millions of volunteer hours invested into hundreds of projects in hundreds of languages, all because one person decided to pursue a personal agenda without discussion with *anyone* who knew why the situation was the way it was - well, it's just unconscionable in my opinion. But let's hold on for a second, NE Ent. Aren't you one of the people who usually grumbles that Arbcom unreasonably protects administrators from the reasonable consequences of their actions when said admins fail to follow policy? Why exactly are you defending an administrator who violated several key policies in pursuit of a personal agenda?  Risker (talk) 03:40, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

Flow tweaks
Hey, Risker, I wrote a few more rough CSS thingies for Flow; since you were the one who gave me the idea, I'm curious as to your opinion. What do you think of my modified version as compared to the baseline? Writ Keeper &#9863;&#9812; 06:47, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Definitely better. Of course, I think that talk pages should be focused on communication, not design. Risker (talk) 12:03, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, if you want to try it out, the code is in mw:User:Writ Keeper/trickle.css, though I know you're against having large common.css files. I might spam it around some other places to solicit more feedback; I don't know whether updates to Flow will render it inoperable, but I'd at least like to refine it as much as I can. Writ Keeper &#9863;&#9812; 21:21, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Simply put, I just think they should design it properly in the first place; it shouldn't be necessary for users to have to add extra scripting just to make using a key planned feature of the site tolerable. I might have a little more flexibility now, but if I'm gonna upload common.css or common.js files, I'd rather add something that will help me do my work. I'm not seeing this as an improvement on talk pages; even if it's optimized, its current structure simply doesn't work. Risker (talk) 21:43, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * *shrug* It's early beta. The tool isn't mature yet, so I'd hold off on judging it until it's ready. Right now, it's a shambles, but when it's done, and if we can talk some sense into them regarding things like whitespace, I think it has potential. You're right of course that you shouldn't have to use personal JS/CSS just to get by, but them's the breaks, I guess. Job security for me, at least. Writ Keeper &#9863;&#9812; 21:47, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Oh yes, I hear where you're coming from. Unfortunately, I've not seen a great deal of receptivity on the part of the team; they're operating on a completely different philosophy that does not put useful interpersonal communication at the core of the application. This entire "lots of whitespace" theory is physically painful to me, it's making it hard for me to even go to the pages. I'm a member of a web forum where they applied a very similar philosophy; posts, views and active members dropped by nearly 40% at a time when logically they should have been increasing, and they're still not up to previous levels six months later, despite some serious inducements. That's a goodly chunk of what's worrying me: "lots of whitespace" seems to be a very core part of the Flow team's design philosophy.  Risker (talk) 21:58, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Notification of automated file description generation
Your upload of File:Blunt Hammersmith 28feb11.JPG or contribution to its description is noted, and thanks (even if belatedly) for your contribution. In order to help make better use of the media, an attempt has been made by an automated process to identify and add certain information to the media's description page.

This notification is placed on your talk page because a bot has identified you either as the uploader of the file, or as a contributor to its metadata. It would be appreciated if you could carefully review the information the bot added. To opt out of these notifications, please follow the instructions here. Thanks! Message delivered by Theo's Little Bot (opt-out) 13:46, 13 February 2014 (UTC)

Sockfarm
Hi Risker. Can you take a look at https://checkuser.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tobiasnatur? This user has 40+ accounts at Commons, and is also active here on en.wiki. Not sure what he does here, but worth looking into. Thanks. INeverCry 05:35, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Will check it out in the morning, as I'm heading to bed. In case you don't know,, you're one of the very few people who can post to checkuser-L even without being a subscriber, so feel free whenever you feel motivated to send something through that way. You're always welcome back, you know. :-)  Risker (talk) 05:39, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I kinda like this individual approach though. I might start hitting up new checkusers when I find cross-wiki activity just to test their moxy.  INeverCry  06:13, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Okay, took me longer than I expected but I've updated the checkuser-wiki page with the enwiki accounts, . I *think* all of them appeared on other projects.  They don't really meet the threshold for blocking here - most of them only SUL'ed on enwiki, and there really aren't any problem edits. Risker (talk) 03:25, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I've blocked the Sixtecx account per your connecting it. Looks like that may be the original master. INeverCry  20:42, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Deleted page: The Clockwork Quartet
Hi, I see you have deleted the page The Clockwork Quartet based on CSD. As far as I am aware, there was no prior discussion as to whether the page should be deleted or not; would that not have been more appropriate, so any issues could be addressed? Disclaimer: I am a member of The Clockwork Quartet, although I (we) had nothing to do with the creation of the article. Thanks. - Lawsonstu (talk) 10:54, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi . The speedy deletion tag on the article was A7 and G11; more accurately, three criteria for A7 (db-inc,db-band, and db-web) listed separately, as well as the G11. Based on the content of the article, all of those criteria actually apply, although I selected only the first of them. Having reviewed the references, there is only one that is a review of a single released by the group that is mainly about the group. The Guardian article is focused on the genre and includes two and a half paragraphs out of 15 on Clockwork Quartet, and similarly-sized chunks about other "bands". Now, if you'd like, I would consider undeleting and moving to userspace, although there's that nagging COI issue. How about I ask any administrators who are watching my page to give a second opinion on the deleted article to see if there are some contrary opinions? If so, then I will undelete it and leave it for someone to put an AfD tag on it.  Risker (talk) 04:20, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Comment from a talk page stalker. I've seen the cached version (I'm not an admin). I would have thought that minimally this should have been prodded or gone to AfD rather than speedied, given two paragraphs in the The Guardian and the article in New Musical Express. There's also  a dedicated article in the Evening Standard and a brief mention in Steampunk Magazine (there may be more in their print edition).  If userfied, it will need copyediting to remove buzz words like "helmed", cherry-picked quotes, etc. and they will need to supply full bibliographic information for the NME article, which I suspect is from the print edition and therefore behind a paywall, e.g. author, date, page number(s) etc. If it's userfied to someone with a COI, they should submit the draft via Articles for creation, to ensure that neutral eyes assess it before it goes into article space. Voceditenore (talk) 09:53, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you both for the explanation and discussion. From looking at the cached page, I can see that Voceditenore is write about it needing a lot of copyediting to make it more NPOV. It might be best for me to not get involved any further, but if it's deemed acceptable, I would be happy to host the draft on my userspace and submit a more neutral version for AfC. - Lawsonstu (talk) 18:42, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
 * , the page is now moved to User:Lawsonstu/The Clockwork Quartet. Risker (talk) 05:49, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Feedback needed on using special characters
Hello. Thank you for using VisualEditor! Having editors use it is the best way for the Wikimedia Foundation to develop it into the best tool it can be.

While we always welcome general feedback (please report any issues in Bugzilla in the "VisualEditor" product or drop your feedback on the central feedback page on MediaWiki.org), the developers are especially interested right now in feedback on the special character inserter. This new tool is used for inserting special characters (including symbols like ₥, IPA pronunciation symbols, mathematics symbols, and characters with diacritics). It is intended to help people whose computers do not have good character inserters. For example, many Mac users prefer to use the extensive "Special Characters..." tool present at the bottom of the Edit menu in all applications or to learn the keyboard shortcuts for characters like ñ and ü.

The current version of the special characters tool in VisualEditor is very simple and very basic. It will be getting a lot of work in the coming weeks and months. It does not contain very many character sets at this time. (The specific character sets can be customized at each Wikipedia, so that each project could have a local version with the characters it wants.) But the developers want your ideas at this early stage about ways that the overall concept could be improved. I would appreciate your input on this question, so please try out the character inserter and tell me what changes to the design would (or would not!) best work for you.

Issues you might consider:
 * How often do you normally use Wikipedia's character inserters?
 * Which character sets are useful to you? Should it include all 18 of the character sets provided in the wikitext editor's newer toolbar at the English Wikipedia, the 10 present in the older editor toolbar, or some other combination of character sets?
 * How many special characters would you like to see at one time?
 * Should there be a "priority" or "favorites" section for the 10 or 12 characters that most editors need most often? Is it okay if you need an extra click to go beyond the limited priority set?
 * How should the sections be split up? Should they be nested? Ordered?
 * How should the sections be navigated? Should there be a drop-down? A nested menu?
 * The wikitext editor has never included many symbols and characters, like ℗ and ♀. Do you find that you need these missing characters?  If the character inserter in VisualEditor includes hundreds or thousands of special characters, will it be overwhelming? How will you find the character you want? What should be done for users without enough space to display more than a few dozen characters?
 * Should the character inserter be statically available until dismissed? Should it hover near the mouse? Should it go away on every selection or 10 seconds after a selection with no subsequent ones?
 * Some people believe that the toolbar already has too many options—how would you simplify it?

The developers are open to any thoughts on how the special character inserter can best be developed, even if this requires significant changes. Please leave your views on the central feedback page, or, if you'd prefer, you can contact me directly on my talk page. It would be really helpful if you can tell me how frequently you need to use special characters in your typical editing and what languages or other special characters are important to you.

Thank you again for your work with VisualEditor and for any feedback you can provide. I really do appreciate it.

P.S. You might be interested in the current ideas about improving citations, too. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 00:20, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

here's the part
 61.7.134.231 (talk) 06:16, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes, I heard the same interview. "Having bombed the crap out of the Serbs, we signed a peace accord, and we were pushed up to Pristina, the capital. And I was remarkably put as the very first true leader, the first officer, to lead 30,000 people up there. And when we got to the airport in Pristina, General Wesley Clark told us to overrun and overpower the 200 Russians who had beaten us to the airport." Do you really think James Blunt, a mere lieutenant, signed the peace accord? Is there much dispute that there was a lot of aerial bombing happening?  (To be fair, it was poor choice of wording.) Nonetheless, the response of a musician to this statement isn't relevant; if it was the Serbian President, it would be. And no, it really doesn't matter how popular the musician is. On a side note, the youtube link you provided is definitely a copyright violation, so I've redacted it here. The quotation above is from a copy of the full episode available on a Spanish site, which I *think* (but am not certain) is legitimate. Because of my uncertainty I will not link to it here, but you could probably find it if you poke around at revistasafetycar.com.  Risker (talk) 06:54, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

elnever is for articles, not talk pages... populr singer responding to popular singer makes sense... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.7.134.188 (talk) 07:28, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Erm, no. ELNEVER is for everywhere on the project; they're links to copyright violations, and aren't permitted. And no, popular singer's response to decorated war veteran isn't parallel. I've spent some time poking around and the papers involved rank somewhere around the "Daily Mail" level, which we don't usually use around here. Please respond further on the article talk page. Risker (talk) 07:37, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Exciting!
Hi Risker. You may find this and this exciting. In case you're wondering, Dan Garry is User:DGarry (WMF). — This, that and the other (talk) 09:19, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Mr. Cosmo Philippines 2014
Too soon to salt? --Hobbes Goodyear (talk) 03:25, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

You've got mail!
Cyphoidbomb (talk) 22:57, 11 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Hi Cyphoidbomb, I've received your email but am not in a position to respond until late tonight or early tomorrow. Risker (talk) 23:02, 11 April 2014 (UTC)
 * , I've now responded. Apologies for the delay, I had to do some research and send off some inquiries first. Risker (talk) 17:32, 13 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Cool, thanks. I've responded as well, though I dunno if my notes are helpful. :) Cyphoidbomb (talk) 21:31, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Email
You've got mail. Rivertorch (talk) 05:08, 13 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Addressed, thanks for the heads up. Risker (talk) 05:42, 13 April 2014 (UTC)
 * And from me. --kelapstick(bainuu) 15:42, 16 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I'm going to think about this a little bit before getting back to you. Risker (talk) 15:48, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Frederik Bilovský
Hi Risker. Can you undelete please article about Slovak footballer Frederik Bílovský. He made his professional debut for Spartak Myjava against FC Nitra on 29th March 2014. . IQual, IQual talk (talk) ]] 09:01, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Done. Risker (talk) 07:09, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

Another Altimgamr sock
While you're blocking Altimgamr sockpuppets, could you also block User:Papayamuse as another one? Thanks, Bahooka (talk) 05:12, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Yep. Risker (talk) 05:40, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Your input is invited on this round of FDC proposals!
Hello! I'm reaching out to you on behalf of the Funds Dissemination Committee to request your input on the four proposals that have been submitted to the FDC in this round. The FDC reviews these proposals on behalf of the Wikimedia movement, as it is movement money that they spend, and in order to review them effectively we need to understand your perspective on them, and to ensure that any questions you have about them have been appropriately answered. The proposals are linked to from meta:Grants:APG/Proposals/Community/Review. Please provide your feedback through the talk pages for each proposal.

In particular, please take a close look at the Wikimedia Foundation's draft annual plan. As they have a projected budget of over $60 million (including the grants that they will provide to other movement entities), their plans need extra scrutiny by the community to make sure that they are spending the movement's money effectively.

We will also send you a message to ask you for your input in future rounds of the FDC. If you don't want to receive such messages, then please say so below.

Thanks! Mike Peel (talk) 19:27, 24 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Thank you for the invitation, Mike. I will review over the next several days and comment on Meta.  I confess my first concern is having WMDE, an organization that is significantly dependent on the WMF for its operating budget, to do the equivalent of a "staff assessment" of the WMF's budget. I'm not seeing them as any more impartial than WMF staff themselves.  That is not to speak ill of WMDE, but to point out that their COI is not much different from that of WMF staff, and they will be using different benchmarks that may not be consistent with the manner in which other presentations are being assessed.  Risker (talk) 19:59, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

Richard Shweder‎
Hi. I'd be more than happy to provide full details of the sources of what I wrote for the Richard Shweder‎ article. But the text that I provided has been completely erased. I don't have a copy of the original text as I don't keep personal copies. I've never known any non-vandalism to disappear on a wiki. Is there any way I can access the text I wrote so that I can then provide the right references and full names and IBSN for each point in the text? --Shabidoo | Talk 01:01, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * , it relates to the article "What About 'Female Genital Mutilation'?: And Why Understanding Cultural Matters in the First Place." If and when you add it, be extremely cautious about characterizing his opinion; what you wrote before was a very incorrect interpretation of Shweder's position in the paper (I can't repeat it because it was a major BLP violation).  Risker (talk) 02:04, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Politely discussing about Oda mari's malicious editting.
Hi, I read the article about Joseon. And I agree with junohk and others. That quote is already mentioned in the main text for several times and it does not have to be written in the first page which demonstrates the status of country. I heard that more than 50 countries were colony of Great Britain, but should we have to write every countries which were colonies of Great Britain that they were 'Colony of Great Britain( * ~ *)' in firt page? Should we have to demonstrate that Australia was 'Colony of Great Britain' and United states as 'Colony of Great Britain' in the first page? I also agree that Joseon had a kind of tribute system with Imperial China in that time, but discussing that on first page is purely redundant and useless repetition. Not only Joseon but many other countries in Southeast asia and even Oda mari's motherland Japan had a tribute system with China. Oda Mari was once warned by users for vandalizing facts especially related with Korea.

Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Heeyoong (talk • contribs) 11:18, 5 May 2014 (UTC)

ClueBot III
I don't understand your edit to User:ClueBot III/Run — if the bot's editing while logged out, why would you tell it to stop editing while logged in? Please note that the bot has been blocked because it ignored your edit: it continued editing while logged in. Nyttend (talk) 03:40, 7 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Took me a while to figure out what you were talking about; that edit was almost a month ago. The explanation on the page suggested that making the edit would block the script running the bot from its source, which was the intention.  Blocking the IP it was using as a logged-out bot, which is what was originally done before my edit to the /run page, was causing collateral damage. Logged-out bots are not permitted on this or (as best I can tell) any other project and are routinely blocked; in almost all cases, they're acting maliciously (this is an exception).  All bots are supposed to know that they're logged out and stop themselves (or be able to log themselves back in); the absence of that section of code is a serious matter, because bot editing is restricted to named bot accounts, and is essentially a malfunction.  Just think if someone had blocked the range (which someone was considering doing!), not realizing that it was the WMF Labs - none of the Labs-based tools regularly used on this project would have functioned, and cross-wiki bot activity would also have been adversely affected.  Better than 90% of bots include code that tells the bot how to check if it is logged in, and what to do if it is not, and many that don't require hands-on control. There's no reason for these ones not to include that code. Heck, they can probably swipe it from one of the other open-source coded bots currently in operation.
 * I'm also confused by your statement, : was the bot blocked or not? and was it editing logged-in or logged-out? If it was editing logged out, then there's an even more serious problem because it should always need a manual restart after a block - and it was blocked when it was editing logged out because the IP it was using got blocked before my edit to that page. If it was editing logged-in, then the "kill switch" isn't working.  So, no matter how you look at it, something's not working right. Risker (talk) 04:56, 7 May 2014 (UTC)
 * First off, I clearly was confused on the date — I completely failed to observe that this edit was a month ago! I'm sorry.  Right now, there's a thread at WP:AN ("10.68.16.31") about ClueBot III misbehaving, and as someone says "the bot is still editing after the emergency shutoff has been activated", I misunderstood and thought that you'd deactivated the bot in response to the WP:AN thread.  This is why I asked you, since I thought you were preventing logged-in editing in order to prevent the logged-out editing that's happening right now.  The bot has just now been blocked because it's ignored your deactivation command.  Again, apologies for the confusion.  Nyttend (talk) 05:02, 7 May 2014 (UTC)
 * No worries, Nyttend - and thanks for getting back to me. If it makes you feel any better, I answered an email today saying "I thought I'd answered this question on April 25th". Well, I did....I'd answered a similar question on April 25, 2013 - before my correspondent was even in her current job. Risker (talk) 21:10, 7 May 2014 (UTC)

VisualEditor citation tool going live
Risker,

Just dropping you a note that I've (finally!) enabled the new citation tool in VisualEditor. This adds a prominent menu in the toolbar listing the most common citation templates to insert as new citations, and lets editors alter most existing references that use these templates, bypassing the need to edit a template inside a reference. I know you were especially keen for this to be available to help users write useful, well-formed references using citation templates, so thought you'd like an extra heads-up. :-)Feedback is of course always welcome. Next up is automatically filling in values based on ISBN/DOI/URL/etc. which will be even more useful, I hope!

Jdforrester (WMF) (talk) 18:19, 9 May 2014 (UTC)


 * James, thanks very much for letting me know! I am hoping to get some content editing done in the next week and will make a point of trying this out and providing feedback. I've been trying to use VE when I'm doing content editing, at least most of the time, and it's come a very long way from 10 months ago.  Risker (talk) 18:37, 9 May 2014 (UTC)

Frogs
Don't think I've forgotten you drooled on my 27 småbakelser you bad person. Have some frogs. Bishonen &#124; talk 23:51, 10 May 2014 (UTC).
 * Ooooh Frogs! Thank you, Bishonen!  Risker (talk) 00:02, 11 May 2014 (UTC)

Renaissance architecture
The construction of the buildings is generally brick. I wrote the article. The recent edits alerted me to the error. Many of the buildings have stone facades or are entirely faced with stone, but the construction, in Italy, is most definitely brick. Amandajm (talk) 00:51, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

Got it
The Google Translate plug-in wasn't working so I couldn't inspect the content of the pages. Thanks anyways. Best, ///Euro Car  GT  17:11, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Heh. I just clicked on one of the links - the URL is almost the same as the username - so it became obvious. Risker (talk) 17:17, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

SPI
Hi Risker. Re the MyWikiBiz SPI case that you just closed, I was wondering how to handle such socks in the future. What noticeboard? Also, what about the ones I listed? They're not blocked (to my knowledge), except for a couple blocked for edit warring. What concerns me is not so much the Jimbo talk page socking as the sock evasion on the AfD. Coretheapple (talk) 23:17, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
 * The IPs *shouldn't* be blocked, except at best for very short periods (hours, possibly a day), because they're dynamic. For the AfD, note it in small letters below the vote, but you need to be very sure.  Risker (talk) 23:34, 19 May 2014 (UTC)

Sockpupperts
How much we must to wait? Please see: Sockpuppet investigations/Rtuftrbsee. This person has many sockpuppets only to controversial changes and edit-wars, nothing more. Still create new sockpuppets (for example User:Slimmilky51) and create new conflicts, see Talk:List_of_tallest_buildings_in_Europe. Some sockpuppers by this person has been blocked by administrator Darkwind, administrator CambridgeBayWeather semi-protect article but Slimmilky51 today (how?) again restored own controversial changes. How much we must to wait? How many must be edit-wars and nerve of users before the case is resolved? Please, react. Subtropical -man  talk   (en-2)   17:05, 20 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Yesterday, there was a call-out to all available checkusers to make a solid effort at working down the backlog; I did six SPIs myself yesterday. We are aware of the backlog and are working on it, but I can't give you a definitive time. In the interim, I see that several of the misbehaving accounts have already been blocked, which is appropriate; poor behaviour is itself a reason for blocking and does not need to wait for an SPI report.  I may be able to look at this later today, although I cannot make a guarantee; it has the potential to be a very extensive investigation.  Risker (talk) 17:15, 20 May 2014 (UTC)

An SPI
You are mentioned and may have an interest in Sockpuppet investigations/ChildofMidnight. Thank you, Drmies (talk) 20:28, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

CU of the wrong account
This discussion pointed out that you may have ran a CU on the wrong account here (Crossswords with two s's rather than three.) Was this just a typo in your comments, or did you actually CU 2-s Crossswords? If you did, is it possible that you could CU the suspected account, or should I file a new SPI case? Thanks! TDL (talk) 18:54, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Request for comment
Hello there, a proposal regarding pre-adminship review has been raised at Village pump by. Your comments here is very much appreciated. Many thanks. Jim Carter through MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 06:46, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Revision deletion
thanks for applying to my talk page, could you also apply to. thanks. LibStar (talk) 04:15, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
 * ✅, .  Risker (talk) 04:19, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
 * thanks, I notice now on this diff the threat is still visible, can you also revision delete. thanks LibStar (talk) 04:38, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

ColonelHenry and use of CheckUser in general.
I got really worried when I saw that User:Green Cardamom, User:DavidinNJ, and User:ColonelHenry, accounts which whom I've interacted and found to be, IIRC, good users, listed as Suspected sockpuppets of each other in an [SPI archive].

I saw https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard&diff=605117656&oldid=605098073 which prompts me to contact you and ask:

1)Can CUs use the tools based on their own or evidence that remains private? Your comment says that you ran a CU based on "an experienced user" username undisclosed.   I found this at WP:SPI "When you open the investigation, you must immediately provide evidence that the suspected sock puppets are connected."  2)Does that not apply to checkuser admins? 3)Is the stalker result adequate evidence of a connection? 4a)If not, did you provide enough? 4b)If so, why; certainly isn't adequate evidence of such a connection between me and Stefan2 despite >14 participations in the same deletion discussions.

I have been involved in discussions with this user and just relied on something he wrote by mentioning it on User_talk:Moonriddengirl today. (AKA the WMF's Maggie Dennis). Given the block and CU I just noticed, I'm now thinking I better check to see if the quotes ColonelHenry gave of the law are fabricated. I worried the same thing about the others, all of whom have been involved in Copyright discussions with me. But then I saw that User:Green Cardamom and User:DavidinNJ have been CLEARED - strongly declared innocent based on CU and behavior checks, the latter based on 2 of them. 5)Would it be good if you or I used [ strike (per results below)] on the entries for them in the SPI archive?

You wrote,
 * ColonelHenry, on creating the account, confirms that he had a prior account. This account has been identified, and was associated in its earliest editing with another hoax article in 2004

but when I looked at the history of that article, I only find IPs have made significant/suspect edits. 6)What am I missing? If only IPs have made significant/suspect edits then this unnamed prior account couldn't have.

Thanks for your admin work and TIA for your time on this. Just to be clear: clarification sought. No accusations or disrespect intended.

PS: Just noticed the David also voted here.

PPS: If there's a better place for this discussion, feel free to relocate it before replying.

-- &#123;&#123;U&#124;Elvey&#125;&#125; (t•c) 19:48, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Sorry for the delay in responding, ; I've not been very active due to RL the last week or so. Checkusers can open investigations based on off-wiki evidence, and do so routinely on this project.  For example, cross-project socking as identified on the Checkuser mailing list can lead to an investigation. It is not at all uncommon for suspicions of sockpuppetry involving longterm, experienced users to be made privately, and these will be investigated using checkuser tools provided that evidence similar to that required for an SPI is met. This has the advantage of being far less reputationally harmful to the target editor than a public accusation would be if it turns out to be negative. There are also certain recognized patterns of behaviour of which checkusers are aware that can trigger an investigation.  Processes in 2004 were quite different than they are today, and you may have to do some rooting around to spot the other account (such as looking at the relevant deletion discussion); however, as there is a connection with a RL identity, my post at the time deliberately didn't draw a straight line to it. The IP address isn't particularly significant; I doubt anyone still has the same IP address they did 10 years ago, and that is definitely true in this case. I think that any suggestion that either Green Cardamom or DavidinNJ are sockpuppets of ColonelHenry should indeed be stricken; it is unfair for anyone to be tagged as even a "suspected" or "possible" sock when such allegations have been disproven. Risker (talk) 01:52, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks.  I struck them and ResearchRU's - same situation, same page.
 * I feel like I have to do a lot of reading between the lines to find answers to my questions in your reply. I guess the answers are
 * 1)Too unclear to speculate as to your answer. Yes, I know they can use CU based on evidence that starts off private.  But that doesn't answer my question, which is about evidence that remains private.  When you say "Checkusers can open investigations based on off-wiki evidence", I could speculate as to whether you're referring to evidence that in this case remained - e.g. between you and the reporter, or was shared with the Checkuser mailing list as well, or was shared publicly, but it would be pure speculation.  Please clarify the extent to which you provided evidence.
 * I do not provide information covered by the privacy policy to anyone other than someone else authorized under the policy to have that information. What information was shared publicly in the applicable thread was all that was provided publicly. I'm not going to go into what evidence was provided to me; however, one of the accounts made an edit that was an absolute red flag that in itself would have been sufficient to carry out a checkuser independent of almost anything else.
 * 2)Need an answer to above first.
 * Information can be shared between checkusers if it is relevant. In the case of checkusering a longterm editor, it is fairly common to ask another checkuser to review/confirm results. Other checkusers may individually also do their own checks to verify information; this is healthy and normal, and serves to ensure that the checkuser results provided to the community are accurate.  Call it Checkuser QA if you want.


 * 3,4)Not addressed.
 * I would never run a checkuser based only on the results of the stalker tool. Prolific editors and editors who work in the same heavily edited areas often have heavy overlap in their editing. You could look at editors who work extensively in the Israel/Palestine topic area and find a large amount of overlap, but on reviewing the edits themselves it is often clear that these heavily overlapping editors are editing with very different POV.
 * 5)Answered.
 * 6)I am still missing something. I'd say that being "associated in its earliest editing" does not include being involved in a deletion discussion.
 * Again, to be clear: clarification sought. No accusations or disrespect intended.
 * I've given all the answer I'm prepared to give to this question at this time. Don't worry that you might be "missing something"; the response is intended to be oblique.


 * -- &#123;&#123;U&#124;Elvey&#125;&#125; (t•c) 04:54, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Answered inline. Risker (talk) 05:18, 10 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks.
 * So it sounds like you would say that this is accurate:
 * "Before a CU uses the CU tools based on their own initiative, or privately provided evidence, they do NOT need to immediately provide (behavioral) evidence that the suspected sock puppets are connected to anyone. Only non-CUs must immediately provide (behavioral) evidence that the suspected sock puppets are connected, and may provide it in the SPI, or privately to a CU."
 * Yes? Or would you say that this is accurate:
 * "Before a CU uses the CU tools based on their own initiative, or privately provided evidence, they DO need to provide (behavioral) evidence that the suspected sock puppets are connected, to the Checkuser mailing list (or log it somewhere that CUs can see it). Regular users opening an SPI must immediately provide (behavioral) evidence that the suspected sock puppets are connected."
 * In other words, I'm wondering if CUs can use the tools without disclosing to anyone any behavioral evidence to justify the use of the tools. It sounds like they can and sometimes do.  Without  both policy and logging in place to make compliance auditing possible, there's not much keeping that from happening.  -- &#123;&#123;U&#124;Elvey&#125;&#125; (t•c) 06:49, 10 June 2014 (UTC)


 * I'm saying none of that, Elvey. I wasn't the only checkuser who was provided with the evidence, I just happened to be the first one to respond. I think this is as far as I am willing to go in this discussion. Risker (talk) 07:00, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Flow
Thanks for the brilliant observations on WP:Flow at wikitech-l. Johnuniq (talk) 02:40, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Johnuniq. I've been trying to come up with an allegory for Flow, but I think it might go like this: Current talk pages are a moped. The community asked for an upgrade to a cross-country motorcycle. The WMF has presented them with an RV complete with a platform on the back where one can attach a motorcycle. In other words, kind of missing the point. Risker (talk) 02:57, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Flow will be "interesting", that's for sure. I get the impression the Flow people believe that creating a better forum is the objective (more people talking = success), whereas of course the whole point of a discussion is to improve the encyclopedia. We'll have to see how the wondrous features work, but I have been thinking along the lines of your wikitech-l post for a while—what is needed vs. what is planned. I wish I could find that old cartoon showing the development of a child's swing—what engineering designed, what marketing promised, what health-and-safety required, ..., what was installed, all versus what the kid wanted. Johnuniq (talk) 03:44, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * This one I think, though there are many variations! And yes, I agree.  Risker (talk) 03:55, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks again! I couldn't find that when I last searched (a few years ago). Johnuniq (talk) 06:03, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Y'know, I'm not a dev, so I'm far from an expert on this, but I'm not really sure that Flow is all that unasked for. I mean, as an example, I've looked at the code for sections--it's come up with regard to the Teahouse's...controversial top posting and the bugs it causes--and in my very inexpert opinion, calling watchlisted sections even "possible but very difficult" is an understatement. It's essentially impossible with the current system; many many things would need to be reworked and rewritten for it to happen. Of course, technically it's possible, but only in the sense that, with unlimited resources and a deadline of the heat death of the universe, anything is possible. It's my (again inexpert) impression that, in order for watchlisted sections to be possible, we would need something that behaves (at least in the code) radically different from the way Mediawiki works now--which of course is what Flow is. To offer a counter-analogy: if you had a horse, and you asked an oracle for a different, better horse, and the oracle gave you an elephant, you might be irate. But if, while asking for your new horse, you've been asking for it to be a bit grayer and less hairy, and probably quite a bit bigger, and maybe get rid of those hooves and replace them with some kind of pad for feet, and bigger droopier ears too, and let's give it a long, prehensile nose to top it off, well, while you might have started out asking for a horse, and you might say you're still asking for a horse, what you've described is no longer a horse, but an elephant, and the oracle is giving you what you actually asked for. Again, not a dev, and no wiser than the next person, so take this with all the grains of salt you want, but just a thought. Writ Keeper &#9863;&#9812; 06:50, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I dunno, WritKeeper; I've heard the "possible but difficult" comment from the people who, for lack of a better way of putting it, like writing Mediawiki code; it sounded to me more like they thought it was a grand challenge rather than a dirge. But the number of people who like to write Mediawiki code is stunningly small even at the WMF. Even at that, if it was this one asked-for feature that created so much difficulty, it really doesn't have a lot to do with this "vision" of what Flow should be that really doesn't match at all with the nature and process of discussion on the projects. (Given some of the comments from WMF staffers involved in Flow development, I get the impression that they think it is desirable to alter the the nature and process of discussions, not just change the interface. Apparently we're too mean.  As if the interface will change that: one only has to look at the comments on pages where Flow is currently enabled to see that it's done nothing to change that!)  I can't figure out why anyone who works on multiple projects would really *want* all their talk pages to show up in a single flow. I can't figure out why anyone would want discussions from dozens of different pages to show up in the equivalent of their talk page (which was the original proposal and still seems to be part of the master plan). It would just serve to increase the volume and pitch of the noise and take away from the primary purpose of (and separation between) all of the projects.  And I say that knowing that I do a lot more discussing than content work: I should be the target audience for Flow because of that.  But that turns Flow into a push medium of communication - constant pinging, always being drawn away from the core work of the project.  Heck, just about everyone has come to the conclusion that Notifications works pretty well; if it's useful to have cross-wiki discussion notification, a ping through that medium onto one's "home wiki" talk page would be far better. Of course, that would require SUL finalisation whether done by Notifications or by Flow, and SUL finalisation is a project that has been passed around the WMF for several years as if it's a hot potato, because it means having to (excuse the language, but it's appropriate here) piss off a lot of people.  The coding for SUL finalisation is a walk in the park compared to the community engagement part.  But SUL finalisation is holding up a lot of other things besides cross-project notifications, or even the development of Flow.  This is exactly the kind of thing that I refer to in my email to wikitech-L as a management failure on the part of the WMF. They know this is needed, they know it will be challenging, and yet they've refused to take the hard step of assigning it to someone and making it that person's #1 priority.  Even right now, with SUL finalisation scheduled to ramp up in Q1 of the next fiscal year (i.e., July—September), the coding is done "between other assignments", the code review is scheduled to be done by someone who already has a monumental workload, and it's not even the priority product for the product manager. SUL should have been finalised at least two years ago; it will take a good year to complete if they work to minimize disruption - it's not just the people forced to change usernames that will be upset, it will also be all the projects that have established usurpation policies that will have to be drawn into the discussion of the "rules" that will be applied. You'd think that WMF engineering, which is headed by someone who refuses to use anything but his original username (not even a variation with "WMF" at the end of it), would realise what a sensitive area this is. Yanking a username away from a longstanding editor because someone else from some other project has some kind of priority access to the username (regardless of the prioritization, be it by user right, date of account creation, volume of work or something else) will be a wrenching and possibly career-ending experience. There are tens of thousands of such accounts.  It's not going to be a fun discussion - but a lot of other products and projects would be in better shape today if it had happened a couple of years ago when it was supposed to have taken place. Risker (talk) 07:29, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, I want all of my discussions to show up in a single place. I want to see relevant deletion discussions at Commons right here, without having to make what often feels like a special trip over to Commons to see what's going on.  I want WPMED and WPMEDF discussions in the same place.  I want Simple English in my daily workflow, instead of off in a corner that I visit once a month.  I especially want to have small projects, where I've only got two or three pages on my watchlist anyway, to be able to get my attention through some method other than luck or e-mail.
 * I also want that Flow feed to be highly sortable and filterable, so I can choose to look at, say, only article talk pages, but excluding anything from en.wp. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:51, 12 June 2014 (UTC)
 * And I want a pony. Well, actually I don't want a pony, I want a Clydesdale, a working horse. What you're talking about is a unified watchlist - which I agree would be useful and I'd be all for it, provided that people choose to opt in for each project they want to add instead of having to opt out, as so many WMF-designed "features" are now. (Incidentally, LiquidThreads promised this too, and nowadays there's big interest in figuring out how to disable it - one of the WMF staff wrote the script.) I cannot imagine anything more terrifying for a newcomer than to discover that all the discussions she participates in show up in some weird combination of RSS feed and webforum. It's more likely to have exactly the opposite effect for most people; they'll not want all those pages constantly bouncing into their "Flow" so they'll stop watching them entirely. How many pages does the average Wikimedian watch?  I have about 1000 across all projects, and I'm rigorous in keeping the list trimmed down; I know at least 200 people have over 10,000 pages just on this project on their watchlist. It doesn't matter whether or not it's sortable, it matters that it is mentally overwhelming. And there's this dichotomy where you either watch the page (in which case you get all the discussions) or you watch individual discussions (and don't find out that there's a new relevant section on the page).  Of course, there won't actually be pages... Flow still looks like the kind of webpage that I consciously avoided back in 2007 (yes, it really looks that dated) because it was always full of Usenet castaways ranting about heaven only knew what. Wikimedia talk pages are so much more organized, and I make the conscious decision on each occasion to read them; they aren't in your face, the way Flow will be. Try it for two days, WhatamIdoing...get a script to put all the discussions on all the talk pages/discussion locations you're currently watching onto a single page. See how big it is.  See how overwhelming it is. Think about why anyone would want that to be their primary means of communication within the WMF family of projects. I'll guarantee you that the people who are dreaming about all the wonderful things that they want Flow to do haven't taken the time to actually work out what it would mean. I pasted just two hours worth of discussions onto a page and it gave me pause to wonder if one of the unwritten intentions of Flow was to get people to stop talking.  Risker (talk) 02:16, 13 June 2014 (UTC)
 * A gigantic problem with Flow is that none of us (including the devs) have a clue what it would be like in practice. I suspect the concept is deeply flawed, but we'll have to wait and see because testing on isolated and seldom-used pages does not show the big picture. We need a page somewhere to list potential issues so they are not overlooked when real tests are performed. Johnuniq (talk) 03:31, 13 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I'd like to try it out, but I don't want "a page" that has all of the discussions from two thousand pages in one place, and that's not what Flow is supposed to do. I want what's been described:  a dynamic feed that keeps track of what I've already read, shows me what I still need to read, and whenever I'm done with this one, pushes the next one to the top.  That can't be done with a script that pastes static copies into a page.  The part that I want most is the part in which after I've read it, it goes away.  I already have experience with this kind of a system for moderately high-volume traffic:  this is how my Gmail inbox works.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:23, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, then. This is a new iteration of what Flow's supposed to do and act; perhaps it is because you're on WMF staff that you know about it,, but I can't find it documented on this project, on MediaWiki, on Meta, or anywhere else that seems to be broadly community-accessible, nor is there a link to the current plan for Flow anywhere on this project, not even at Flow.  I'm still not persuaded this is all that useful - really, there's a reason that watchlists work so well, so that people have the option to look at discussions and to do so at their convenience, rather than having them in the middle of a pile of other discussions where they don't stand out, or people dismiss them because their stream is too busy. Can you please point me to where this new theory of action is discussed?  Risker (talk) 04:28, 20 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I've got nothing to do with Flow officially, but I've been watching the discussions as a volunteer for well over a year. I don't know if there is a single place that completely explains the ideas for how Flow feeds are envisioned (by the designers) to work.  Two highly relevant, if unfortunate, facts are that what's ultimately done may not match what was originally envisioned, and that I have the impression that this is one of the last things that's going to be built.  Christmas may be a long time from now, but I'm still hoping that the devs will be giving me a pony.  Or six, since I think that's the number of times I've asked Nick to put another pony on my wishlist for Flow.    WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:15, 20 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the great post. I am not subscribed to wikitech-l and have not seen it before. My impression unfortunately is that people who are responsible for the FLOW development do not want to hear this. Ultimately, they are wasting their time and going to VE2.0 disaster. That makes me really unhappy, but, on the other hand, they are wasting their time, not mine (so far).--Ymblanter (talk) 08:52, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

YGM
Cyphoidbomb (talk) 16:23, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Hello, I've received and read your email. I'm pretty tied up IRL right at the moment and won't have a chance to look at that, myself; so if you would like that matter reviewed it would probably be reasonable to go the SPI route.  Sorry for the delay in responding.  Risker (talk) 03:14, 12 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Bad timing on my part. Thanks for the note. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 03:59, 12 June 2014 (UTC)

A very belated thanks
For writing this message. I only just noticed it while trawling through my old edits. I remember wondering at the time why the [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-02-26/Forum&diff=next&oldid=598249960 next edit] by Smallbones used bolding ... now I know why. I guess we all learnt something during that exchange! Graham 87 04:52, 9 July 2014 (UTC)

Arb Case
I didn't want to carry on discussion there. I wasn't disagreeing with you. What troubles me isn't the RfC close, the statistics, the implementation of the close. I really don't care about those. What troubles me is a WMF employee basically telling our community it can go take a collective hike, and to top it off threatens one of our community members in the process. Either we have standing or we do not. That needs to be decided, openly. If we do have standing, then the WMF needs to be taught to stop meddling in community affairs. --Hammersoft (talk) 19:04, 11 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, sometimes the "community" behaves in a ridiculous way, and someone has to say it and stop the damage the "community" is doing. I'm having a hard time getting my head around the notion that 64 people get to tell 14,681 people that their opinions are worthless.  I'm having a hard time understanding why certain members of the community deliberately injected code into the project that changed the project in a way that was *not even discussed* in an RFC. Frankly, we don't deserve standing if we're going to allow the tyranny of the (almost microscopic) minority to run this project - 0.004% of the number of people supported deactivating this software as default compared to the number of people who had already made it their default.  This is one situation where we have hard data showing that a whopping number of people had already made this software their default - 14,681 editors went and consciously selected this - and one non-administrator who doesn't even have the community's agreement that they can accurately assess consensus completely misreads the RFC and makes a close supporting something that wasn't even discussed in the RFC. We're the problem here, in that we've allowed that close to stand.  It shouldn't stand, it's blatantly wrong as it is right now.  We all know that. If we want the WMF to respect our RFCs, we have to make sure they're respectable, and that they do not disenfranchise a huge number of our colleagues who had already expressed their opinion by their actions.  Risker (talk) 19:33, 11 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Our RfC process is inherently flawed in that we can not assess the wants of our users. It just happens that in this case we can because we have statistics to back it up. RfC is just the worst form of determining consensus except for all the others that could be tried. We can do no more than take into account those who show up to discuss. --Hammersoft (talk) 19:57, 11 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, in this case it didn't even determine consensus, it is a perverse result. It should be reversed and an independent group of administrators should reassess - and need to take into account more than just the 111 people who showed up; that's never, ever been sufficient number to make a change of this kind of magnitude. I wouldn't have considered it sufficient participation to determine a consensus; this isn't an AfD, after all, and a NAC for an RFC involving WMF actions is completely inappropriate. In this case we *can* assess other factors besides just the people who show up on the page, and so can the WMF, and that's exactly why the actions taken were inappropriate; there is no such thing as an RFC that firmly binds the WMF. It's the entire "I want a pony" syndrome.  I could easily run an RFC that would get tons of support to change one or two things (e.g., unified multi-project watchlists that are easily sorted) but you'd laugh at me if I pretended the WMF was going to be obliged to respect that and immediately take action.  Pete may not have realised what that line of code was going to do, but then again why would he add the line of code if he didn't have the knowledge to understand what it was going to do?  I am a technical incompetent, and even I can figure out that it was going to disable the whole extension, not just change the default extension. If he had reinserted it, particularly after being told it did not do what he thought it did, I would have fully supported a desysop, and it would not have been the first time a very senior WMF employee pulled permissions from a user because of behaviour that was damaging the project. (In fact, before we had stewards, folks in positions like Tim Starling and Erik would have been the only ones able to do so.) You know what the one thing is that I wouldn't have a hard time resolving?  That all WMF employees must use a separate WMF account for actions related to their employment.  Risker (talk) 20:27, 11 July 2014 (UTC)

I'm not so sure about the 14,681. Media viewer was enabled by default for me. I never selected it. I just de-selected it (personally dislike it). --Hammersoft (talk) 20:47, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Hello - the 14,681 editors who selected MediaViewer as default did so using the "Beta" tab in their preferences, some time before June 3, 2014.  After that point, it became default for everyone, and registered editors could opt out. It sounds like it was "turned on" for you when it became the site default.  Incidentally, IPs can opt out for the length of their browsing session, too, by clicking the "disable" tab on any file.  Risker (talk) 20:56, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

FWIW re "Reliable"
I started a discussion on MastCell's talk page yesterday not even catching that the preceding discussion was started by the subject of my post: the sock-puppet "Reliable." Today, I followed up with these edits, per wp:tpoc. Was that OK? Thanks. Lightbreather (talk) 20:48, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi, just noting that I've seen your messages and am looking into things. Risker (talk) 00:48, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

On a related note...
I think this may be the work of a sock. The first post is to the talk page of an editor I took to ARE, the second is to an article edited by that editor and myself. (I'm not saying that I think that editor is a sock, but that he has a sock fan.) Lightbreather (talk) 22:15, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

Your statement at requests for arbitration
Hi Risker, statements in a case request should be no more than 500 words including comments and replies to other uses. I've collapsed the content in your section so you have a chance to more easily refactor/shorten it. For the Arbitration Committee (thanks). Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 11:20, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Noted and fixed. Always thought it was a pointless rule when I was on the committee, and always completely ignored it; some things never change.  Risker (talk) 20:38, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
 * And I argued that we should get rid of it, and everyone thought it was just empathy on my part for longwindedness. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:15, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
 * It hasn't been discussed this round, but I agree. A long poorly written comment may well hold less weight than a less cogent one, but I don't see why we shouldn't allow a long response to exist. NativeForeigner Talk 00:59, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Response
I've replied on my talk, but please note I do not require or wish for a response. You're a nasty piece of work so you can throw this one on the "voluntary interaction ban" pile if you like. Ugh. Pedro :  Chat 21:42, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
 * "Voluntary interaction ban" much, . You might want to think for a minute here. As you're pushing so hard to have a case, I think that I'll recommend they add another party: the person who wrote the code in the first place.  Contrary to your statement there, I have a very good grip on what's going on here.  Risker (talk) 22:15, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Incidentally, in reply to your suggestion that I have some kind of weird conflict of interest, I'm pretty sure Eloquence was every bit as freaked out as you are that I agree with his position in this situation, especially after having taken him and his department to task a few weeks back on wikitech-L, and having very much disagreed with his position on VisualEditor. My position remains that admins shouldn't be doing things they don't understand, and that the greater the impact of their incorrect actions, the stronger the warning not to do them again needs to be. Messing around with mediawiki.common.js and mediawiki.common.css requires skill.  We to this day have volunteer developers/administrators regularly managing those two pages, and none of them would have accepted that code; in fact the most concerning comments about its insertion came from developers.  And, guess what.  WP:CONEXCEPT applies to developer actions, not just WMF actions.  Except they would have only been able to issue a block warning, which would have had a much greater impact. Risker (talk) 22:39, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Adding parties to case requests
Please don't add other editors as parties to case requests, especially when the case request is already established and being voted on. If you believe someone should be added suggest it in your statement. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 02:52, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Media Viewer RfC case opened
You were recently recently offered a statement in a request for arbitration. The Arbitration Committee has accepted that request for arbitration and an arbitration case has been opened at Arbitration/Requests/Case/Media Viewer RfC. Evidence that you wish the arbitrators to consider should be added to the evidence subpage, at Arbitration/Requests/Case/Media Viewer RfC/Evidence. Please add your evidence by July 26, 2014, which is when the evidence phase closes. You can also contribute to the case workshop subpage, Arbitration/Requests/Case/Media Viewer RfC/Workshop. For a guide to the arbitration process, see Arbitration/Guide to arbitration. Before adding evidence please review the scope of the case. For the Arbitration Committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:10, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

So it's all your fault!
Ah ha! The truth is out! . I had a weird feeling my thoughts were not my own, that perhaps even someone was controlling my thoughts, making me type resignation announcements, but I didn't know who it was until now. If this monstrous accusation is true - if it really is your doing - then I just have one thing to say: THANK YOU. There are some deeply moronic people out there, aren't there? --Floquenbeam (talk) 00:15, 31 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Oh wow, . That takes paranoia to a whole new level - I can't even remember the last time we spoke - March maybe? April? I confess that a part of me was surprised when you ran in the first place (but not surprised that you were elected), and that your absence in the rank of sensibly rouge admins was noticeable...but no, I had the impression that you were the kind of cut-to-the-chase arbitrator without a lot of personal agendas that the committee needs in order to survive.  While I can entirely sympathize with your desire to step away, it's a big loss for the committee (even if the rest of the committee doesn't yet realise it).  The IP's got it about as far wrong as possible, but that's no surprise.  It seems that there's a whole pile of off-site commenters who are so absorbed with dumping on me that they're speaking with forked tongues on the subject of what the WMF should do to keep admins in check, how they should improve the security of their software and site, and related issues. It's funny to see people complaining that I think admin powers should be curbed.  :-)  Take care, and welcome back to the ranks of the non-arbitrators.  Risker (talk) 20:47, 31 July 2014 (UTC)
 * The rest of the Committee recognizes it very much. Certainly this part of the rest of the Committee does. Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:08, 31 July 2014 (UTC)
 * And this part. Humph. Worm TT(talk ) 07:01, 1 August 2014 (UTC)
 * You're not all oblivious! Honest! Risker (talk) 07:51, 1 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Gee, Risker, I didn't mean to make it look like I was fishing for compliments (I try to do that more subtly). I was just dropping by to laugh at the guy in the tinfoil hat. --Floquenbeam (talk) 03:45, 1 August 2014 (UTC)
 * You didn't really think I'd pass up this opportunity to soapbox, did you? We all know who the "tinfoil hat" IP is, right?  Risker (talk) 07:51, 1 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I imagine you suppose me to be one of a variety of crackpots who now frequent Wikipediocracy. I am not in fact.  I have never been banned or sanctioned in any way with a registered account.  Nonetheless, it says something interesting that my comments were deleted multiple times by your close associate Newyorkbrad, despite being only mildly objectionable at worst.  Maybe you didn't have anything to do with the suspicious resignation of Floquenbeam, I didn't say it was certain.  Yet your obsessive attempts to influence the arbitration committee despite your failure to be re-elected to that committee definitely speak to involvement in certain shadowy quasi-secretive wings of the Project. 2601:7:1980:BF6:24B3:4A6B:5D96:B6CE (talk) 07:09, 5 August 2014 (UTC)
 * So there I was trying to make you sound not completely out in left field. Now, however, you've come up with some sort of weird idea that I ran for re-election (I didn't, and in fact do not believe that any arbitrator should run for three consecutive terms). You allude to shadows and secret projects within projects. So I have to face the truth: Floquenbeam was right in the first place. If I wanted to secretly influence arbcom, I certainly wouldn't do it by participating publicly in cases. As someone who retained checkuser and oversight permissions, any pages relating to those tools is still very relevant to me.  Ach, never mind, I don't know why I bother trying to persuade people like  you that wikipedia isn't some sort of nasty dark conspiracy.  You're going to believe whatever you believe.  Risker (talk) 09:15, 5 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Aww, crap! I go off on Wikibreak, then come back to learn that you've become involved in secret conspiracies to overthrow ArbCom? Man, I can't go anywhere these days. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 14:05, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Roland Šmahajčík
Hi Risker. Can you undelete please article about Slovak footballer Roland Šmahajčík. He made his professional debut for Spartak Myjava against FK Senica on 19 April 2014. . Thanks IQual, IQual talk (talk) ]] 16:44, 2 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks,, I have undeleted per your link. Risker (talk) 11:56, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Media Viewer RfC draft principles & findings
Hello. This is a courtesy note that the draft findings and principles in the Media Viewer RfC case have now been posted. The drafters of the proposed decision anticipate a final version of the PD will be posted after 11 August. You are welcome to give feedback on the workshop page. For the Committee, Lord Roem ~ (talk) 02:45, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

E-mail
Hi Risker, just to check, have you seen my e-mail? Akoopal (talk) 23:04, 11 August 2014 (UTC)
 * , apologies for not responding sooner! Yes, I finally got through my mailbox and for some reason your message was in spam, but I rescued it.  Thanks very much for the info, I'm going to try to do something with it in the next few days. And it was a great pleasure to meet you in person at Wikimania. :)  Risker (talk) 03:32, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Media Viewer RfC arbitration case - extension of closure dates
Hello, you are receiving this message because you have commented on the Media Viewer RfC arbitration case. This is a courtesy message to inform you that the closure date for the submission of evidence has been extended to 17 August 2014 and the closure date for workshop proposals has been extended to 22 August 2014, as has the expected date of the proposed decision being posted. The closure dates have been changed to allow for recent developments to be included in the case. If you wish to comment, please review the evidence guidance. For the Arbitration Committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:00, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

Re: op-ed comment
Hey Risker, would you be interested in authoring an opinion piece for the Signpost about Lila's keynote? I wasn't there, and I'm moving across the country starting tomorrow, so I'm a bit hamstrung. :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 03:27, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Media Viewer RfC arbitration case - motion to suspend case
You are receiving this message as you have either commented on a case page or are named as a party to the case. A motion has been proposed to suspend the Media Viewer RfC arbitration case for a maximum of 60 days due to recent developments. If you wish to comment regarding the motion there is a section on the proposed decision talk page for this. For the Arbitration Committee, Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs). Message delivered by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) at 02:33, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Media Viewer RfC proposed decision talk page
Risker, it is casting aspersions regarding the Committee and Committee members, as you did in this edit, when you know that the information you can use as evidence cannot be discussed in public. Also continuing to argue that the Committee doesn't have jurisdiction after the case has been accepted arguments to that effect have been dismissed is disruptive, such as this and this. Also reverting Hasteur's attempt to move on wasn't the right course of action, instead it would have been much better to contact a clerk and ask us to deal with it. Please stop editing disruptively, continuing to do so may lead to sanctions such as a ban from participating in the case or threaded discussion. Regards, Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 10:20, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * , did you remove Hasteur's personal attack directed at me? or did you simply collapse it?  Clerks used to remove such horrible lies on the page, but I know you've not been taught to do that, and perhaps you've been asked to leave it there; I don't know, I unsubscribed from the clerks list when I left the committee, unlike some other former arbitrators.  Reading Newyorkbrad's reasoning for accepting the case, which he has posted on the PD page, confirms that at least he knew the committee had very limited jurisdiction (which has now been addressed with Eloquence's resignation as an administrator).  Opening an arbcom case doesn't ever decrease the drama, instead it signals to those who don't normally follow arbcom (such as people on other projects) that whatever it is, it's a Big Deal. I spoke with a large number of German Wikipedians whilst in London, and they generally interpreted Arbcom's acceptance of the case as an intention to ban WMF actions on this project, which emboldened that community to escalate as well; NYB's good intentions had the opposite effect. (Outside of enwiki, most arbcoms only accept cases in order to apply sanctions, not to quell "drama").   Arbcom is not able to broker anything between the community and the WMF, most importantly because it's only working with the very narrow slice of the community that is up in arms about this particular issue, and because it is unable to deal with matters that are global in nature. Most English Wikipedians do not care about MMV, and most don't care who edits the common.js as long as it doesn't mess up things for them. If arbcom is going to try to act as the "voice of the community" with groups outside of its control, it needs to be speaking for the community, not the few people who show up on its pages. The Arbitration Committee has some things it should be telling the community, and bluntly I'm at a loss why it's refusing to do so. If the committee's perspective on the issues at hand is shared by the community, it would have lots of support in moving its agenda forward; if it is not shared by the community, then it probably shouldn't be proceeding on those issues.  But after the last two years I was on the committee, where almost every time the WMF was mentioned it was in a negative way, I do not believe that any arbitrator who was present on the committee last year has been completely untouched by this negativity toward the WMF, and I have no reason to think that the quality of discourse has improved. Ach, bottom line, Arbcom has a long and glorious history of accepting cases where it had no clear idea where it was intending to do, where it thought taking a heated discussion to their own little area would resolve things whether or not the committee would do anything, and yes it's taken cases that were outside of its jurisdiction.  I was there for five years and came onto the committee having read just about all other prior cases; I know this. This case is nothing new. Risker (talk) 12:04, 26 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Holy cow, Callanecc. I didn't actually check your edits when I wrote the above; but repeating word for word something that you yourself are declaring a personal attack really misses the point of trying to correct the behaviour of someone making a personal attack. And you wonder why it never entered my head to ask the clerks to address things.  Wow.  Risker (talk) 13:04, 26 August 2014 (UTC)


 * The Arbitration Committee has some things it should be telling the community If you continue to promulgate these unpleasant, unsubstantiated conspiracy theories, I will block you myself. You are disrupting the arbitration process, and you ought to know better. AGK  [•] 19:06, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I've already emailed another member of the committee about my concerns, which often involved telephone calls and not emails, not to mention personal meetings; neither the calls nor the meetings are recorded, so there's nothing "provable". You and I have disagreed about the scope of the committee pretty much since you were a clerk; when I've tried to reach out to you in the past - offline, so as not to embarrass you - you've accused me of some pretty nasty things. I'm assuming when we met at Wikimania your silence was either shyness or distaste; I very much doubt you were struck speechless by my presence. :-) You and I have a very long history, AGK, and you would not be uninvolved.  Meanwhile, how does the committee think that delaying a decision for 60 days is any more likely to result in a solution? How does keeping this door open encourage editors to participate in the global discussion?  Risker (talk) 19:27, 26 August 2014 (UTC)


 * In the brief time we were together, I doubt I was shy (I'm not loud, but I'm hardly timid, particularly around people I've met). I hope I did not exhibit distaste (I struggle immensely to indulge the fantasy that our wiki personas are closely connected to our real-life ones; I did not really think of you as Risker when we met, though the history was all vaguely in mind). If I was discourteous to you in real life, I truly apologise. And I certainly have never been struck speechless by a fellow primate; nobody is that impressive to me ;-). I do not understand what conspiracy you are driving at. What phone calls? To whom? I hope you are not about to talk about the contents of private conference calls about child protection. That would be abhorrent. (The IP makes a very good below on these points.) And in any event, the point stands: you are inventing conspiracy theories, and any reasonable administrator – and please heed this warning – will agree if they are pushed to examine your conduct here. You are getting carried away. I'll withdraw from your talk page now; I've made my point as clearly as I can. AGK  [•] 22:58, 26 August 2014 (UTC)


 * So, I would like to take a moment to point something out. A few weeks ago, I suggested that you (Risker) might have influenced Floquenbeam to resign.  You said I was wrong, which I probably was, and went further, ridiculing the possibility that anything underhanded might be going on.  You said on this very talk page, a few sections above "You allude to shadows and secret projects within projects ... I don't know why I bother trying to persuade people like you that Wikipedia isn't some sort of nasty dark conspiracy. You're going to believe whatever you believe." Now, you have in the past few days said that the Committee is taking action to leverage unrelated matters (a comment that was redacted by Salvio) and said the Committee needs to be more transparent about secret things that you cannot describe in detail but that would shock the community if they become known.  So, in all honesty, my question is how can you chastise me for suspecting a conspiracy, and then a few days later promote an even bigger and wilder conspiracy theory? 2601:7:1980:BF6:6D1F:1D93:28:128C (talk) 22:39, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

For what it's worth, which may or may not be much, I was hardly the prime mover in deciding to accept this case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:03, 26 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Risker, you are speaking your mind about something going on that you don't think is right. In response, you're being threatened with a block for doing so.  This is how Wikipedia works, time and time again.  It never changes.  So, if you'd like to discuss what's going on in a venue in which you won't be threatened with a block, I think you know which off-wiki forum will welcome your input. Cla68 (talk) 00:20, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Well hello everyone. I don't think there's a conspiracy going on. I think Arbcom has simply not thought to involve the community in a discussion that's been going on for a long time. I don't know what the community's opinion is on the topic, although my gut feeling is that if they'd brought this to the community a couple of months ago, they'd have had surprisingly strong support. It's a lot harder to gauge community opinion now, after the events of the last few weeks. Heck, they could have asked some non-arbitrators to test the waters, and that might well have worked without active intervention. It's a shame too, it would have been a good first step in devolution and an excellent way to promote transparency...which interestingly were both mentioned in the candidacy statements of several current arbitrators. Well, whatever; it's very hard to break longstanding habits. I'm certainly not the only person who knows about (parts of) it, but I think it's pretty much a lost opportunity now. Cla68, I have no interest in participating at any non-WMF site when discussing WMF-related issues, but thank you for the invitation. I met one of the primary movers of Wikipediocracy at Wikimania and we had a nice chat, but I get more done inside the walls, I think. (Actually I met two, but I didn't realise that PD was sitting beside me until he commented on my fashion sense. I didn't know Reeboks look like hiking boots, or that he expected me to turn up wearing high fashion (seriously?), but I did get a laugh from the "ready to strangle a grizzly bear" comment.) Newyorkbrad, of course you weren't the prime mover in deciding to accept. But you're the one who's explained your current position most thoroughly and, absent others doing the same (there's that transparency thing again), you got tagged. Risker (talk) 03:04, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Not all of us know what is being discussed here but some of us do know the high regard we hold your judgment and integrity in.John Carter (talk) 00:57, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Engaging productively
I am trying to find the right way to put this, but a recent brief exchange I had with Philippe on his talk page (a constructive exchange) contrasted markedly with the exchange I had with you (on the PD talk page of that arbitration case). It seems every time I see your name pop up, it is you being extremely critical. You have been consistent and relentless with your criticisms during this case, which is fair enough. But I can't help wondering if there is not a better way that you could express those thoughts? Be more, um, constructive? Anyway, I'm hoping this doesn't prompt another barrage of criticism... :-) Carcharoth (talk) 02:17, 29 August 2014 (UTC)
 * , I realise you and some others have put a lot of thought into this case. But...I'm trying to say it nicely...it's still a case that wasn't ripe for the taking, and nothing is going to be resolved from it. I can understand your frustration, you especially have put a lot of effort into it. If Arbcom believes it has a role acting as an advisory body (and I'm not sure even the committee as a whole believes it has one), it can only act as one if there is internal consensus and actually publicly does the advising. I do very very much hope there's no non-public advising going on, when the WMF is practically standing on its head with transparency right now. But if you're going to be advisory in this situation, then you can't also be judiciary. You yourself have a lot of good ideas here, but they're wasted on arbcom pages on this project when the issues are being discussed globally on widely read and followed pages on Meta. Heck, they're wasted on arbcom pages instead of being discussed on widely read and followed pages on Enwiki.  I'm sorry that you can't see how you could make a difference there.  Risker (talk) 02:31, 29 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Risker. What you said there is somewhat helpful. FWIW, you are wrong to say that I don't realise how I could make a difference on other pages. The reason I haven't been participating on other pages is that I simply haven't had the time, and dealing with the case had to come first. The irony is that now I have more time available again, the discussions seem to have moved on. The locations I was following off-wiki were the wikimedia-l mailing list, Lila's talk page on meta (it didn't feel right to post there), and the superprotect RfC on meta. Keeping up with the volume of discussions is a full-time job, let alone trying to catch up after 3-4 days. Are there any other locations that it would be good to be aware of? (You've already pointed to the Media Viewer consultation page). Carcharoth (talk) 19:39, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Question
Hi. Speaking as one of the newer, and maybe less frequent, contributors at a certain tinfoil hatter critic site, and one who has no interest whatsoever in cataloging every IP Jimbo has ever used, I was interested to see your comments to Floq above about why you thought he was a good candidate. Would you, and maybe any other former arbs who might be interested, be interested in maybe putting together a communal election guide there or for the Signpost, where you all might be able to freely or at least anonymously discuss what kinds of personalities and talents ArbCom might most need in a given election and which candidates might best fill those perceived needs? Opinions from those familiar with ArbCom might be the best guide the rest of us could have. Just an idea, of course. John Carter (talk) 22:51, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
 * I've no interest in posting outside of the framework of our (Wikimedia) processes, thanks, John; there are plenty of others who find it personally valuable, and I don't inherently oppose the idea, but just trying to keep up with situations "inside the tent" is enough of a challenge for me. As a member of the FDC, I'm going to be very busy in October and November so probably won't have the time to develop anything more specific; there's also the serious risk that I'd be accused of attempting to use what hypothetical power I (don't actually) have to affect the outcome of the election or to seek revenge against former colleagues. I've gotten that more than once.  I'll simply say that there are very few situations where I think anyone should be elected to two consecutive terms - I'm not even sure I should have been, back in the day - and that I've already written some information, which can be found at User:Risker/What I learned while being an Arbitrator and User:Risker/Thoughts for Arbitration Committee Candidates that may prove of some value.  Risker (talk) 14:16, 3 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Understood, although I think maybe I should clarify I wasn't thinking this be limited to just you, but any formerarbs who have been keeping up with things. Nor was I really thinking any former arbs taking part would even be named. Andreas is both a writer for the Signpost and that other site, and I was more thinking along the lines of him and/or others putting the final product together without names indicated based on a series of questions or a closed discussion. A lot of us, me included, don't keep up even with the open mailing lists, let alone those we don't even have access to, and so to us comments like "one former Arb thinks X might be able to effectively cut to the chase without being distracted by the sideshows, and others have said ... about X" might give us some useful information that might not come up otherwise. John Carter (talk) 16:00, 3 September 2014 (UTC)
 * I'm a soon-to-be former arbitrator. I would prefer not to discuss specific candidates, but I'd be glad to answer any general questions about the role of arbitrators or participate in a general discussion before the election. Newyorkbrad (talk) 16:07, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Daniel Niazi (Author)
As far as I can tell, this was an AfD, which allowed for the subsequent speedy deletion of Daniel NIazi, Daniel Niazi Nappen Jacobsen and Daniel Niazi (1991-). What makes this particular incarnation of Niazi different? - Biruitorul Talk 05:16, 14 September 2014 (UTC)
 * The only deletion in the history of this page is here, clearly a speedy deletion. Based on the previous deletions of similarly-named articles, I agree that this qualifies as a speedy for re-creation, although it will need to be linked to the AfD. One of the hazards of using templates is that they're hard to modify to insert correct information. With this in mind, I will be updating to change my deletion decision, and will include the link of the AfD into my summary.  Given the problems with re-creation, I'll also salt.  Thanks for your feedback.  Risker (talk) 05:29, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

SPI on hold
Hello Risker! I appreciate your previous work looking into Sockpuppet investigations/Majogomezsz. I was wondering if there were any further developments on the investigation. Although I believe its possible that someone had been skirting WP Policies for what they believed to be noble intentions, I still would like to see what other revelations are made. I dont want to cause any animosity but if there are any new discoveries, then there may be implications for the pages of interest. Please let me know if there's anything I can do to help. Righteousskills (talk) 03:59, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Just confirming that I have seen this. My life is returning to normal, and I will look at this issue in the next day or two. Risker (talk) 21:00, 22 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Great! Thank you so much. Let me know if there is any way I can help out or if there's anything else you need to know. Righteousskills (talk) 04:30, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals) Media Viewer RfC
You are being notified because you have participated in previous discussions on the same topic. Alsee (talk) 19:36, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

Question about elections
Hello, I have a few questions about ArbCom elections in EnWiki. How do you make sure that extreme cases where a candidate with only a few votes (like 45 positive and 5 oppose with a percentage of %90) do not happen in here. In case they happened they would have definitely got elected. You do not have any barrier limiting this (do you?), so why it does not happen?--Drako (talk) 05:56, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi (Drako) - there was an RFC a while ago about criteria for the forthcoming election, but I don't think this specific question was addressed.  It might be worthwhile to suggest that a criterion for minimal support be added, such as a minimum of 150 support votes, as well as a support percentage of greater than 50%, if that isn't already in the criteria.  It's late here so I'll leave it to you to try to dig up the page (try Category:Arbitration Committee elections or something like that). I think candidacies will be opening pretty soon so now's the time to ask the questions and get people on board.  Risker (talk) 06:17, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks Risker, but my question was rather general, I do not see any cases like that happening and in absence of any criteria preventing them it seems weird to me. I don't really know why such cases do not happen here. I mainly asked this to apply it to the election in an other wiki. --Drako (talk) 06:29, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
 * This is the largest Wikipedia, and there are always at least a few hundred votes, so generally it's not an issue. Also, we use the SecurePoll extension rather than doing public voting, so that tends to affect matters. --Rschen7754 17:01, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Why are the number of nominees so small? The voting not being public should do the opposite, as more people would oppose little-known candidates to prevent them from getting elected had the voting been public.Drako (talk) 23:33, 12 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Hello, long ago we would regularly see 30 or more candidates for Arbcom, but as the job became more complex, and the level of unpleasantness directed at arbitrators increased, fewer people were willing to take on the responsibilities. The year I was first elected (2008), I had to answer more than 100 questions from editors (many of them multi-part) making even the election process rather horrible, and candidates who don't respond to the majority of questions posted to them are unlikely to be elected. I see that your primary project is Farsi Wikipedia, so you are talking about a much smaller project.  I am not certain what the scope of the Arbitration Committee is on Farsi Wikpiedia - on English Wikipedia, it includes very complex disputes with multiple parties based on the intersection of multiple policies, as well as determining checkuser and oversight rights, last resort for unblock requests, management of blocks related to paedophile advocacy, and anything that someone considers a "privacy" issue.  It looks like they're now getting requests to address allegations of conflict of interest, too, though heaven only knows why they'd agree to take that on.  This is a rather difficult package and the committee has been very resistant to dropping anything.  If your project is looking at having a simple straight-up vote for arbitrators who will be responsible for a much more limited scope of responsibilities, then you're likely to get more people willing to do the job.  Myself, I'd suggest that you rethink the idea entirely: several arbitration committees do not have any real ability to enforce their decisions, and then there's English Wikipedia's committee with enormous scope.  It will be very difficult to find the point in between.  I wish you luck.  Risker (talk) 23:53, 12 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi and thanks for the great answer. There is no ArbCom there right now but there are plans to upgrade the current admin oversight committee to an ArbCom. Their elections is the opposite of here, candidates usually do not take questions seriously and even do not post any agendas for their nomination. The current election process is double-stage, in the first one candidates are qualified if they have gained at least average of the votes for every candidate (including oppose votes). In the second one candidates are ranked based on their percentage similar to here. The first stage is placed to prevent candidates with little votes but high percentage (like 4 pro and 1 con and 80%) to get elected. The problem is that oppose votes in the first one can contribute to the candidate getting elected. I am trying to look at other experiences and how they handle this problem. Thanks :) Drako (talk) 00:09, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I am not sure how important this is, but my experience brings me to the opposite conclusion. I was twice elected and served two helf-year terms in the arbcom of the Russian Wikipedia, in 2009 and 2010. My impression is that the complexity of problems is comparable, the number of candidates is comparable, the degree of scrutiny at the elections is comparable between English and Russian Wikipedias, but it is more work in the Russian arbcom (we used to have 5 to 7 members and to consider about 70 cases in 6 month, of which more than 50% we accepted), and, since it is a smaller project, one always has collisions between personal sympathies and the policies - which we solved in favor of the policies, but that obviously created very difficult emotional background. At the time, it was very uncommon to agree to run for the arbcom after having served six month, and typically people who served two consecutive terms became long-time inactive in Wikipedia. Nobody ever successfully run three times in a row. It was so difficult, that at some point (after my time) an elected arbcom decided to follow personal preferences rather than policies, and in this way undermined the credibility of an arbcom as an institution. Right now, the arbcom there still exists, but they get about 20 cases per half a year, and they do not work much, from what I know.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:03, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Hello I was wondering where can I create a article and a practice on?
 * Talk page helper here. Please register an account. You will then have access to your own WP:SANDBOX. This will be your own space to create and hone any articles you wish for inclusion. See it as a workshop, or garage. Hope this helps. Regards Irondome (talk) 03:10, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Retired Editor violating No Personal Attack Policy
As you were the original blocking administrator can you please take a look at it or should I go to WP:ANI or contact WP:ARB members for this if you do not wish to get involved or busy Please let me know. This User is tagged as Retired now the User is clearly editing using IP is a clear case of WP:DUCK and the user admits it here. Now this is a clear Personal attack on another contributor calling another editor a Jerk ,engages in inappropriate communications with female editors bordering sexual harassment and a liar while banned .How can users get away with statements like that and while being  tagged Deceptively as retired. This courtesy is not given to those who had taken WP:Vanish including former Arb members and then returned. Now Why is the user still tagged as Retired and protected ,why is not the Banned Tag put on.Neither has the user left the Project or has he been unblocked but the editor is clearly violating   Personal attack Policy while being banned  there is no case for the retired tag but the banned tag to put on and added to WP:LTA if it continues. Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 19:15, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
 * There is nothing, for all intents and purposes, that you can do about this user one way or the other; their IP is dynamic, so unless the community is willing to softblock a goodly portion of Southern California for a couple of years (not something I'd recommend under any circumstances) you will have only limited success in keeping this person completely off the project. In fairness, the same is true of most banned users who insist on continuing to show up.  I wouldn't recommend doing *anything* in this case, except perhaps suggesting to the user on whose page that discussion is occurring that they consider reverting edits that start making accusations about other editors.  The banned user in question still seems to have no understanding of the reason that they are not welcome on this project (the "personal attacks" they're complaining about here are small potatoes compared to the personal attacks the BU was flinging around on another project that resulted in the BU getting blocked indefinitely there too - lifted after two years to try to address a global request to have the account locked).  Sorry I do not have anything more hopeful to offer to you, but this is the reality that we have known for almost 14 years. As long as the project is an open-participation project, a few people who have already been asked to leave will still keep coming back. In this case the disruption is fairly minimal, and I'd suggest that any reaction more than reverting or blanking (on the part of the owner of the talk page, not someone else) is more likely to have a paradoxical effect, resulting in more rather than less posting.  Risker (talk) 21:30, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your prompt response ,I was not asking for blocking which is not possible.My only question was why was user tagged Retired instead of banned which is the normal case (I note the retired Tag has been put by an Arb should I take it up with them) ?.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 22:05, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
 * , I thought I'd answered that by saying that I think the best solution is to do nothing — and I'd include monkeying around with the userpage. There's no point in doing an LTA, the user comes and goes on a cycle that has nothing to do with Wikipedia, often going half a year or more without showing up anywhere, and when they do show up they're editing as an IP. I'd just say that users whose pages they show up on should treat the edits like any other unwanted and/or inappropriate comments. Risker (talk) 00:11, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Institute of Management Nirma University
Dear Sir,

I didn't create Institute of Management Nirma University for advertisement or promotion.

Its a factual page about my college.

I would be editing the content as per your suggestions but please don't delete the page — Preceding unsigned comment added by Imnu.culturalcommittee (talk • contribs) 12:31, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

OTRS email
Thanks for the explanation - I should have looked - and for the advice and for the reasoning behind the advice, which I'd not considered before but makes perfect sense. All appreciated. NebY (talk) 13:13, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick action on the Amanda Smalls issue. I was just wondering...
If anything needs to be done with this page: User:Amanda Smalls/Old Userpage? Thanks.--Mark Miller (talk) 04:42, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Addressed. There is, no doubt, someone in this world whose name really is Amanda Smalls.  We have reason to believe it is not the same person as the one who was editing here.  I've deleted this page, and also the "current" userpage as a BLP violation. I've not poked around the rest of the userspace, but if you see any more, please let me know.  Risker (talk) 04:50, 25 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Yo0u should delete these as well: User:Amanda Smalls/Infobox (Personal info), User:Amanda Smalls/Gallery (Now a blank page). - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 15:13, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * ✅ Dennis - 2&cent; 15:19, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

MirrorFreak
I'm sorry I was unable to figure it out. I just do not understand trolling that well yet. Before I joined Wikipedia, I thought it was "trawling", like people fishing for trouble. I guess I just can't get my head around why people would waste everyone's time, including their own. I mean, what on Earth did all that achieve? This case probably cost me over 1 hour, with only around 15 minutes of returned article work from that user. I'm very cross. Anyhow, I'll be more cautious next time. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:19, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * , please don't be disappointed in yourself. It's vitally important for the project that we have a good balance of people willing to work with difficult users (some of whom turn out to be really excellent if given positive and useful feedback and support) as well as people with what might be called hyperdeveloped olfactory talents. You did nothing wrong at all here, and in fact one of the things that caught my attention was the fact that even someone as kind and full of good faith as you are was concerned about the amount of "drama time" this user was generating.  It's a useful metric I'm going to keep in my toolbox: "if even Anna Frodesiak is wondering about this user..."  :-)  Risker (talk) 05:36, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * A very useful tool indeed. Good catch, and good timing as well Risker.  Additionally, I thought the ANI discussion went relatively smooth considering the situation and potential for dramah.  These are always touchy situations, and it helps when people can speak openly about their concerns without questioning each others motivations. And Anna, I've always said that if you have to err, err on the side of assuming good faith, so like Risker, I would say you have nothing to be disappointed about.  The evidence in this case was subtle and not obvious at first glance, and this sock is experienced at doing this.  Dennis - 2&cent; 14:11, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

— Berean Hunter   (talk)  15:26, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Should we move the SPI case to the master Kaka1987654? After reading your findings, I went back and looked at the accounts laid out originally by Tiptoety and I see that I made the mistake of identifying SkaterLife as the oldest. The master, Kaka1987654, does match the account of same name on es.wiki and is the oldest account. If you wish, I'll take care of moving them.
 * Part of me wants to move it to Amanda Smalls....it isn't the oldest but it is the best known. I don't think that is a normal procedure, however. Dennis - 2&cent; 15:29, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Since I was often a target of this user in their MF (and other) personas I have been following this with interest. Just to put you more at ease, I know that Florida law would never allow a girl this young with, as stated on the user's page, anorexia to perform a gender change. See this for more info. w.carter -Talk  15:35, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Put at ease!!!! You must be joking "you can be done as an outpatient at our facility with a 24 hour.....you would then be transferred to a nearby motel" You can be done - Done? It sound like an oversexed labrador being taken to the vet; and as for 24 hours, I would want to be unconscious for at least six weeks. Then this motel business- what happens at the motel pray ? Even a decent five star hotel is not known for its medical staff. I'm far from put at my ease. It's a wonder anyone in USA has the procedure at all.  Giano    (talk) 16:02, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * There's always Argentine law. And, as stated on the user page, a user with anorexia and *an enjoyment of pranks*. —Neotarf (talk) 16:14, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I personally know just one person that went all out and surgically changed their gender from male to female. It was more than a 24 hour stay in a hotel, and more than one operation, but then, this was a few years ago and she was in her 40s at the time. She and her girlfriend come into the shop regularly.  Dennis - 2&cent; 16:17, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * @Giano:  Sorry, the wording did not come out right. With "put at ease" I was of course referring to the decision to block the user since their user info is clearly not right, not to the clinic's stated treatment schedule. w.carter  -Talk  17:02, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you W because I am still sitting her cross legged with watering eyes, almost unable to type. Giano    (talk) 17:06, 25 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Wow, thank you everyone for all this positive feedback; between the comments here and the "thanks" I received, it's a sigh of relief to know that what could potentially have been a very controversial block turns out to be not particularly controversial at all. Myself, I'd be inclined to leave the SPI under the name it is now, except perhaps to copy/paste the paragraph and links I posted to the user's talk page.  My own thought is that we should be linking cases to the "most known" name rather than the oldest most of the time (it's what people search for most of the time), but in this case the most known name is undoubtedly someone else's real name and we don't want to tar them with the "Wikipedia troll" brush. I'm wondering though what we should do with the userspace stuff; I'll leave it to others in the community to work that out, though.  Risker (talk) 16:44, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * And while we're on the subject. Could you check out this diff? Might be nothing, but the MO of this account is very similar to the MF & Co. <em style="font-family:Verdana;color:DarkBlue">w.carter <em style="font-family:Verdana;color:DarkBlue">-Talk  17:50, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Mysterious accounts
There's another editor who has been mostly frequenting the GGTF Arbcom case & Jimbo Wales' talkpage, that I've suspicions about. But, I'll let others pursue that concern. GoodDay (talk) 19:01, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Not you GoodDay surely? Giano    (talk) 19:20, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * No. GoodDay (talk) 19:26, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * "A man, duh" was busy defending him, I would note. I just haven't connected enough dots on him, but yes, I'm quite confident that we will soon see a CU block there as well. Dennis - 2&cent; 19:23, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
 * He's blocked, after ANI (Adjwilley independently blocked him), reviewed, declined, rinse, repeat.  Dennis - 2&cent; 13:59, 26 October 2014 (UTC)

Could you take a look
Hi Risker, could you take a look at these two users: (blocked) and. I'm concerned that they are the same person, but more importantly that the person is underage and on the second account's user page has revealed too much personal information. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 08:09, 27 October 2014 (UTC)
 * My antennae are also twitching, after today's post at the Teahouse by this user. <em style="font-family:Verdana;color:DarkBlue">w.carter <em style="font-family:Verdana;color:DarkBlue">-Talk  11:24, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

BASC Reform RfC
I'm still not convinced why the community (and all functionaries) are not being asked to specifically comment onwiki in the first instance as to whether BASC is needed, and/or proposals to amend the scope of what BASC is dealing with. I know time is not something you have a lot of, though I can confidently say you have more than me overall. Also, as you originally did raise these issues with your comment, I think it's only fitting if you were to follow through by raising it as a separate section or RfC or something - depending on what you deem appropriate. Could you please? I am sure I am not the only person who would appreciate it if you did.... :) Ncmvocalist (talk) 18:24, 28 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Long time no see,, I hope you are well and that it is only good things that have resulted in your reduced activity. I am very busy right now with a lot of work related to the FDC as we come up on our retreat in 2.5 weeks, and my "real world" life is also hectic, but I will see if I can come up with something, perhaps with the assistance of a few others. Risker (talk) 04:25, 29 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Belated wishes for the New Year Risker; hope you are well too (I seem to have neglected to click post when I replied the first time some time ago). You share the same hopes I have (and had). Actually, I also hoped good things resulted over time around here, full stop, but I can't help but wonder sometimes whether that is actually the case. I'm not surprised you got caught up with other stuff and projects; we all seem to have so little time nowadays, but any time we can spare is something I suppose. Ncmvocalist (talk) 17:01, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Krishna ballesh
Hello! I'm investigating copyright warnings on this article. It looks like the Coren bot flagged a mirror site as the source, but on further checking, this article was AfD Here, and then recreated and G4'ed 3 more times. Since you did all the cleanup and histmerging of the latest re-creations, can you opine as to the G4 status of the article in its current form? If you think it is sufficiently different and not a G4 candidate, that's good, though for attribution it probably needs a history merge/restore with the deleted version. Thanks, Crow <sup style="color:black;"> Caw  23:11, 30 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Hello,, thanks for your message. The "deletion reason" is actually the automatically cut-and-pasted deletion request rationale, and in this case not something I wrote; I can see why I should have modified this. The CSD request was made by , whom I understand was doing the rest of the legwork on this one. I've pinged him to this thread, but if he doesn't get back to you either here or on your talk page, you might want to touch base with him directly.  Sorry for the confusion.  Risker (talk) 01:26, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Advice please
Hello,

I found your name on a page for resolving uncivil behavior and was hoping to get your advice about next steps for a pattern of ignoring advice / points about guidelines that has degraded to an ongoing pattern of uncivil behavior. See Talk:LG Williams and BLP noticeboard discussion, which has not resulted in a resolution - just a continued and escalated pattern of negative comments. I think it's not been resolved there because the issues are primarily behavioral and the volume of rhetoric is overwhelming.

I'm wondering what you would do. If you could take a quick peak (vs. detailed, timely review) - your input is much appreciated. I don't want to kick-off another process unless it's the right avenue to take. What would you do? Is Civiliy enforcement / arbitration the right way to go? Thanks so much!--<span style='text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD;'><font color=' #4997D0'>CaroleHenson (<font color=' #4997D0'>talk ) 18:43, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

Mentioned you
Hi, I'm becoming a bit confused about a related WMF resource that people have been mentioning on various en-WP pages. My confusion relates to whether citing something from it might be considered citation of an external website etc and thus arguably an outing. The same pages cite a resource hosted on meta, which adds to my confusion.

I've just mentioned you in such a connection here. If you feel it does step over the mark or are otherwise unhappy with it then please accept my profound apologies and note that I wouldn't consider a revdel by you to be an involved edit. Thanks. - Sitush (talk) 09:14, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the heads-up, Sitush. I have responded at your link, but just in case anyone prefers to know my response without having to cross the Rubicon into Arbcom territory, I do not have a problem with being quoted (with appropriate links) from publicly available WMF-based mailing lists where I self-identify as "Risker/Anne" or some variation thereof. Risker (talk) 15:45, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

TY
Just wanted to thank you and Cas both for the reply. So much seems to be so complex anymore there (arbcom), so I'm likely very out of touch with what is going on. Thank you again for taking the time to respond; and I hope you and yours are doing well. Best always. — Ched : ?  15:24, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

P.S. I always think of you when I go buy one of those homemade brownies. :-) — Ched :  ?  15:30, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

MATTE Projects
As a courtesy notice, MATTE Projects, an article that was deleted per your PROD, has now been undeleted. You may now want to send it to AfD. Jackmcbarn (talk) 20:26, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Hold on. You're telling me that someone whose username was MATTE Projects got to get the article MATTE Projects undeleted, without even putting a COI tag on their page? You're kidding me, right?  Wow.  Risker (talk) 20:44, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
 * AFD started. Thanks for the heads up, .  Risker (talk) 05:56, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

ArbCom thread was locked so I will answer here
Some time ago we had a stupid argument. Stupid because I don't even remember what it was about. But since then you seem to make only hostile remarks to me. Regarding a blocked user starting a new account and abandoning an old one, this is routinely tolerated if the user doesn't return to prior trouble and doesn't announce it. Lots have done this and we don't seek them out. No harm no foul. I had suggested that a disappeared editor might have done this and that might be why we don't hear from him. I was not suggesting that he did anything wrong and, in fact, I wished him well. If there was a doubt, you could have asked if I was suggesting wrongdoing but instead you assumed bad faith of me. Now that I have explained myself I am going to leave. If you want to chat with me you are welcome on my talk page. Jehochman Talk 10:27, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Nollaig
==Yo Ho Ho== <div style="border-style:solid; border-color:blue; background-color:AliceBlue; border-width:1px; text-align:left; padding:8px;" class="plainlinks">

Dougweller (talk) is wishing you Seasons Greetings! Whether you celebrate your hemisphere's Solstice or Christmas, Diwali, Hogmanay, Hanukkah, Lenaia, Festivus or even the Saturnalia, this is a special time of year for almost everyone!

Spread the holiday cheer by adding to your friends' talk pages.

Dougweller (talk) 13:30, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Hello from nl-wiki
Hi, you helped out with a cross wiki vandal. Thank you so much. Find the file I compiled in the mean time here: nl:Wikipedia:Checklijst_langdurig_structureel_vandalisme/Straatmeester. Have checked everything and blocked on nl-wiki and elsewhere where active as global sysop. Still have to list the target articles but that is a holiday chore to do. As you can see you still can block several socks on en-wiki. Let's keep in touch since this is a very harmful editor. Kind regards, MoiraMoira (talk) 19:41, 28 December 2014 (UTC)