User talk:XLinkBot/RevertList/archives/June 2012

= Handled additions =

coolspotters.com


Site composed solely of user-generated content sometimes linked as ELs or cited as a source. (no current links from article namespace after manual removals). -- Rrburke (talk) 00:34, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * . --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:50, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

chemistrydaily.com
WP mirror or fork sometimes linked as ELs or cited as a source. See Mirrors and forks/Abc. (no current links from article namespace after manual removals). -- Rrburke (talk) 00:34, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * hardly spammed, but I'll add this to keep it clean. .  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:53, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

studio737.com and shopunicef.ca


Being used by what appear to be dynamic ips (,, , , & ) to promote artist Terry Ananny. --Ronz (talk) 15:51, 26 May 2010 (UTC)
 * See Long-term abuse for history of this spammer. -DJSasso (talk) 18:48, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

Has not been added since reporting. But adding, as I can see the problem. . --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:55, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

ciims.net & supercoach-advice.com


Two blogs run by same person. Part of promotional spamming by multiple ips and one account. See User talk:150.101.215.34 --Ronz (talk) 03:32, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
 * No additions since reported here. .  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:40, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

absoluteastronomy.com and economicexpert.com


See WP:SBL. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 15:57, 28 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Bit stale, should this be on the revertlist or the one for references? --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:43, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

datasynergy.co.uk
Has been added to several computer articles by various users:
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 


 * . Does not seem to have been added since reporting (??).  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:57, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Mangafox.com




A well known hub of copyright that has recently been in the anime and manga community news. It is possibly the second large scanlation website after onemanga.com. While the website has somewhat cleaned up it act by removing manga scans of titles already released in English, there has been reports that the website contains several viruses, even an anti-virus virus. I've and a couple of editors form WP:ANIME routinely remove links to Mangafox when we come across them or decided to check the external links special page. —Farix (t &#124; c) 14:52, 4 July 2010 (UTC)


 * If it is a viral website, this should have gone to meta blacklist immediately.  ??  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:58, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

hockeyfights.com


Should be excluded per WP:ELNEVER: most pages contain embedded copyvio videos (usually from YouTube) of television broadcasts whose copyright is presumably owned by the broadcaster and/or league. Example: [www.hockeyfights.com/videos/best/nhl-2010/]. Also used as a source, despite its being for all intents and purposes a personal website/fansite lacking requisite editorial oversight to accord with WP:RS. -- Rrburke (talk) 18:14, 6 July 2010 (UTC)


 * copyright violations, I see it used as a reference ... or .  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 10:00, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

cotswolds.info


Should be excluded as a low-value tourist directory for the Cotswolds which has been reference-spammed into several articles. Its contents completely fail both WP:ELNO and WP:RS so blocking it would be a big help in keeping Cotswolds-related articles clean. --Simple Bob (talk) 13:22, 16 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Not really spammed, see different (including regular) users using this (though it is not linked from mainspace anymore). What edits would you like see reverted?  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 10:01, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

answers.com


Widely used as a source and for ELs, and while some content is drawn from reliable sources (example), a great deal more is drawn from more dubious sources whose editorial standards are less clear. Includes much content mirrored from Wikipedia (example, linked from Deep in My Soul), or purely user-generated (example, linked from Halogen lamp). Entries are often cobbled together from a variety of sources of mixed quality -- see, for example, http://www.answers.com/topic/hank-aaron -- making it impossible to assess the reliability of the information. Should be reverted per WP:V as the sources fail WP:RS. -- Rrburke (talk) 21:14, 6 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Should we revert EL's to this site, or references .. or both? --Dirk Beetstra T  C 08:27, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

ghdhairs.com
This is a copy-cat website of the valid site ghdhair.com for China made fake products to be sold. The site has a long history of being added to Good Hair Day and GHD Group (plus random other articles such as straightener by sockpuppets and more recently by anon IPs. Further background on Sockpuppet investigations/027wh/Archive and for an example IP vandal see . Fæ (talk) 01:34, 9 August 2010 (UTC)
 * . --Dirk Beetstra T  C 08:24, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

neelwafurat.com
This is a legitimate Arabic-language website that is basically the same as amazon.com. I just helped a newbie from the Arabic Wikipedia write the article, however in the process, I noticed a number of articles where newbies and other editors had used a link to a book listing there as a reference to support claims made in the article. Amazon doesn't satisfy WP:RS, so neither does this site. I have manually removed all the references to it in reflists and other inappropriate places. I'm not sure if this is possible: it does have a legitimate use on the neelwafurat.com and amazon.com articles, possibly elsewhere as an internal wikilink, the problem is in people adding external links. Can the bot revert additions to the URL plus subpages (for example [] and []? Or in some other way disallow people from inserting it into articles without preventing folks from using it as a legitimate entry (for example, the article itself is named neelwafurat.com)? Burpelson AFB (talk) 23:14, 10 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't think that this is sufficiently spammed to be necessary here. I only see a small number of additions, and mainspace is clean at the moment.  I would say, that going every now and then through Special:LinkSearch/*.neelwafurat.com should keep it clean enough.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 08:35, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Bringvictory.com


Rickrolls anyone who clicks on it. -- Gridlock Joe (talk) 02:20, 12 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Is blacklisted locally. Hence, .  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 08:37, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Several "press release" websites


All are websites which allow anyone to anonymously write up and present press releases and news stories without any fact checking or proof. This entire hoax article was referenced with "press releases" from these websites, many of which claimed they were from The Times or The Birmingham Post. Clearly open to potential abuse, especially as this hoax and its reference remained unnoticed since June. The359 ( Talk ) 07:27, 13 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Added via COIBot. --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:46, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Designer drug website




These 5 IPs have all spammed this website for a company manufacturing novel designer drugs in the last month. (Wasn't sure whether it should be blacklisted or blocked here instead). SmartSE (talk) 00:27, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Blacklisted on ru.wp => MER-C 07:10, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks SmartSE (talk) 10:27, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Amazon redirect links amzn.to

 * Accounts
 * Accounts

Cleaned them up on en. Probably should be added to the Global blacklist with the other redirectors....--Hu12 (talk) 17:13, 11 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Agree, redirects are WP:ELNEVER - . --Dirk Beetstra T  C 18:52, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

gasammo.com - sales only site
Periodically gasammo.com gets added to firearms article. The site exists only to sell ammo, etc. They don't provide any further information whatsoever. I think it could safely get added to this list. AliveFreeHappy (talk) 20:42, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

emma-stone.bz - fansite of Emma Stone

 * Diffs (all on article Emma Stone:)
 * Oddly, target site is in Spanish (.bz top-level domain is the Central American country of Belize, whose official language is English...)
 * Elizium23 (talk) 20:08, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * m:Talk:Spam blacklist MER-C 02:26, 19 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Elizium23 (talk) 20:08, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
 * m:Talk:Spam blacklist MER-C 02:26, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

fantasticfiction.co.uk
Per discussion at WP:ANI (see perma-link here]). Site that acts as a portal to sales links. Used on a large number of articles, presumably done in good-faith as a place-holder when a reliable source is lacking. Consensus is that the site generally lacks usability in Wikipedia article - but no evidence of concerted abuse has yet been located. So, requesting addition to XLinkBot instead of blacklist. --- Barek (talk) - 20:35, 18 November 2010 (UTC)


 * --Dirk Beetstra T C 13:11, 28 November 2010 (UTC)

thelokolist.com and fourlokostories.com


These two inappropriate external links have been repeatedly added by multiple IPs to Four (energy drink). There is consensus among registered users who keep removing them that they don't belong. Here are a couple of examples from just the past day or so. Peacock (talk) 00:32, 19 November 2010 (UTC)
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_%28energy_drink%29&diff=397571612&oldid=397563726
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_%28energy_drink%29&diff=397578346&oldid=397571612
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_%28energy_drink%29&diff=397547405&oldid=397546497
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_%28energy_drink%29&diff=397502290&oldid=397501884
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_%28energy_drink%29&diff=397501337&oldid=397492441
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_%28energy_drink%29&diff=397242935&oldid=397237003


 * --Dirk Beetstra T C 13:12, 28 November 2010 (UTC)

grandtheft5.ucoz.com



 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=prev&oldid=402855147
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=402507380&oldid=402489085
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=402477475&oldid=402330791
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=402270888&oldid=402134465
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=402115780&oldid=401934798
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=401908815&oldid=401908689
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=401756543&oldid=401753927
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=406236295&oldid=406026642
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grand_Theft_Auto_%28series%29&diff=402855147&oldid=402848147

IP user persistently removing reliable reference and switching it to link to this fansite which has no established reliablity. Article has been protected, user resumes activity after protection expires. - X201 (talk) 09:39, 6 January 2011 (UTC)


 * ucoz.com is already reverted, however, these are inside references. I would suggest to .  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:42, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
 * OK. Thanks. - X201 (talk) 10:18, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

shufra.com



 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Simplified_English&action=history
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Simplified_English#Shufra
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_44#Shufra

IP user replacing links to the Simplified Technical English standard with links to shufra.com, a company that sells STE services. This is infrequent enough that semi-protection would not be warranted. Several editors, myself included, have reverted these adds going back months. We have tried to engage the user on the Talk Page (q.v. link above), who denies being affiliated with the company. User did not respond to the COI/N complaint (q.v. link above) resulting in a 1-week semi of the article. As the last addition of this link did not get caught for a couple weeks due to the holidays, I feel XLinxBot's attention is warranted here. Thanks! Arakunem Talk 17:29, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ --Dirk Beetstra T  C 12:19, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

= Proposed removals =

patch.com
Proposing removal of \bpatch.com\b from the revertlist. This site may have been used by spammers, but I think it's a legitimate news site that can reasonably be used as sourcing. Some XLinkBot reversions that I think shouldn't have been performed:
 * Will Shortz
 * O'Fallon, Missouri
 * Regina Calcaterra
 * Sichan Siv
 * William Broomfield

If the motivation for this rule is to prohibit from people adding Patch.com links indiscriminately to "External links" sections as in, or , perhaps the rule could be changed to \bpatch.com/[^a] since it appears that any legitimate use of the site to provide a reference will be at *.patch.com/articles/... —Tim Pierce (talk) 21:30, 10 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I'll adapt, lets see what happens. I see your point in the diffs provided.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 15:04, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

= Troubleshooting and problems =

not reverting standardsdirect.org?
I added this to the revert list yesterday.

Today an IP added this link back, but XLinkBot did not revert it.

Did I format something incorrectly? -- A. B. (talk • contribs) 16:07, 1 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Nope, the bot does not revert 'undo' and similar reverts. --Dirk Beetstra T  C 12:10, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

wrong syntax
Hi!

I don't know, what was tried to repair here, but e.g. the regexp

is equivalent to

so I guess, you wanted

-- seth (talk) 22:12, 25 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I repaired the first 6 entries. Thanks.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 15:23, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

regexp speed-up
I did some work on the list. The result is ready for copy&paste: user:lustiger_seth/sbl_XLinkBot_revlist.

What I did: The list got about 10% shorter. -- seth (talk) 15:22, 6 December 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) searched for /\\[^.b?]/ and similar things and repaired them
 * 2) deleted redundant regexps
 * 3) grouped regexps like "foobarbaz" and "fooquux" to "foo(?:barbaz|quux)"


 * updated. -- seth (talk) 19:41, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
 * updated again. it would be just a copy&paste-action. -- seth (talk) 17:16, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
 * ...again... and still waiting... :-) -- seth (talk) 16:55, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
 * ... heh, sorry, not behind a secure connection at the moment. I'll poke Beetstra ;-) .. --Beetstra (public) (Dirk BeetstraT  C on public computers) 12:33, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Yeah, Cardinal! Poke him with the soft cushions! -- seth (talk) 13:31, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I updated the list. Lets see if the bots now crash!  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 11:00, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Matching based on word boundaries?
I noticed that most of these entries start with \b, which isn't exactly a reliable test; if someone were to post a link on a Wiki page to a blog permalink, for example, with the blacklisted URL in it, it would be removed.

For example:

The rule: \byoutube\.com

Matches:  http://www.example.com/blog/youtube.com_imposes_new_age_restrictions/ 

We should really be matching based on a more traditional URL scheme. Yonisyuumei (talk) 20:37, 26 May 2009 (UTC)


 * This will not happen very often, and the blacklists will have the same problem. And pretty difficult to solve.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:28, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Couldn't the regex just check for no additional slashes between the "//" and the "youtube.com"? I know how to do it in Python, but I'm not as familiar with Perl. --Damian Yerrick (talk | stalk) 22:08, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

= Discussion =

Question
Hi. See. Thanks. ~ A H  1 (TCU) 15:59, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Help with Regex
I was trying to get something done with AWB and needed some help with Regex. Would you or someone you know be able to help me with this? Cheers ChiragPatnaik (talk) 05:15, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Reserved Domains
Please hard-exclude specific domains form the Blacklist.

For example, don't blacklist example.com, since it ist commonly used for exmplanatory purpose in technical articles. see Example.com and RFC 2606 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.89.226.146 (talk • contribs) 03:11, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

spamlists search log entries

 * "no log defined for this project. "

I've asked seth for help here, w/XLinkBot logs to be searchable.--Hu12 (talk) 15:43, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Why are groups.yahoo.com automatically reverted but not groups.google.com
Just curious. Ottawahitech (talk) 00:30, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I am sorry to keep harping on this same issue - however, it does appear that Google Groups are given preferential treatment over Yahoo Groups. For example, [this section] which uses two external links to Google Groups has been allowed, while  links to similar Yahoo  Groups are not:

There is nothing disallowed here, and I am afraid that it is just a matter of WP:OTHERLINKS (though in a bit different form). I hope this explains. --Dirk Beetstra T C 21:56, 7 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I am afraid I don't understand your explanation - you have referred me to a page discussing spam which is not what I was asking about. However, I am glad I did get your attention. Ottawahitech (talk) 13:20, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Well .. easy. You ask, "why is groups.yahoo.com automatically reverted but not groups.google.com?". We noticed that groups.yahoo.com was spammed, we may not have noticed that groups.google.com was spammed. There is no malice in the fact that something is reverted and something else not .. that has NOTHING to do with preference for one site, it is a WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS argument that you are making (or, in spam terms, WP:OTHERLINKS).

Your example is the article Google Groups, which contains links to Google Groups (yes, I'd prefer independent sources ..). I would be worried if that were links to Yahoo Groups on that article. And if such information is not on Yahoo Groups, then there may be an explanation for that.

I take it from your explanation that you work for Yahoo? --Dirk Beetstra T C 15:06, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
 * No I don't work for Yahoo :-) I have been a member of Yahoo! Groups since ~2002 and have seen some excellent content posted there over the years. I am also a long time member of Google Groups. So no, I don't see why Wikipedia automatically reverts links to YG but not links to  GG. The quality of the content has more to do with the authour/ Group moderators, than with whether it is YG or GG. Just my $.02 Ottawahitech (talk) 10:21, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

That's what I said, maybe we have not noticed yet that google groups site was abused or spammed, while we have seen it of yahoo groups. There has been a recent discussion on the moderation of these sites, and that varies greatly. Some are really properly moderated, most are just moderated to remove unrelated post (or profanity etc.) but for the rest anyone can say anything there, some are completely crap. Such sites still fail WP:EL in most of the cases, and XLinkBot reminds new users of that. I don't think that yahoo groups will be removed from this list, it may however be that google groups should be added. I hope this explains (and I think that if you go through XLinkBot reverts of this site, you will see that have been added will fail WP:EL). --Dirk Beetstra T C 16:41, 10 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I did not understand your last sentence, and I am not familar wtih xlinkbot reverts. Are you saying we can override these reverts? Ottawahitech (talk) 04:58, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Yes, undo the revert, or re-do the revert immediately after the bot. Or autoconfirmed editors can add the link. This is not the MediaWiki:Spam-blacklist. --Dirk Beetstra T C 06:39, 11 December 2009 (UTC)