Hello,
there is usually so much fuzz about banning certain users, weeks of tedious discussions, scrupulous arguments if someone like Lir should be really banned or if he/she could learn to work cooperatively in the end...
I just followed the little edit war in [[Iraq crisis 2003]] and on the talk page I found the following:
| This article was removed because the user who sumbitted it was banned, | for reasons which are on the mailing list. Given the reason for the ban, | it is surprising that this user is taking an anti-war position here! | | The conclusion on the mailing list was that they should be banned, and | therfore they don't get to play here. Period.
First question: I seem to have missed this debate (the user has written under IPs starting with 142.177.) Could someone direct me to some links in the archive?
Second question: Since when is the fact that some user was banned a valid reason (without giving any other reasons) for deleting entire articles?
Third question: I can't reproduce the first reason for the ban: * 08:12 Jan 13, 2003, Maveric149 blocked 142.177.97.215 (contribs) (racial insult at Talk:Space Shuttle Columbia: "(On [[January 12]], [[1986]] Columbia took-off with the first [[Hispanic-American]] astronaut, Dr. [[Franklin R. Chang-Diaz]].) " Well, that explains where the Challenger's O-ring went... <-- ;-D")
In the history of [[Talk:Space Shuttle Columbia]] I can find no edits by this IP. Could someone explain the story of this ban?
And my fourth and last question: Why the hell do you ban users who write articles like this: http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asharites ???
or add substantial content like this one: http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Ijtihad&diff=675212&oldi...
or this (not banned, but apparently the same user): http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Muslim_philosophy
Okay, okay...one prefers to let other, more knowledgeable people write about Islam. These people do also behave very civilly.
good bye, elian
Since Jimmy Wales said so. Zoe elian elian@gmx.li wrote:Second question: Since when is the fact that some user was banned a valid reason (without giving any other reasons) for deleting entire articles?
good bye, elian
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Zoe zoecomnena@yahoo.com writes:
Since Jimmy Wales said so.
Jimmy doesn't seems to know anything about this case.
elian
This is a bit long and mostly history, so you might want to skip it...
elian wrote:
Second question: Since when is the fact that some user was banned a valid reason (without giving any other reasons) for deleting entire articles?
To expand on Zoe's answer: the question of contributions from banned users came up with the "MIT vandal".
In case you missed that one, he was someone who had been in an edit war on [[woman]] and a couple of other pages. The [[woman]] page was locked for a while to let things calm down. This *really* annoyed him, and he set off on a campaign of random deletions and deliberately inaccurate edits (changing a date or a country to make the article wrong and so on). We had several hours of intense vandalism under numerous IDs. He couldn't be blocked initially because he was logged in each time. He left saying he would be back to carry on, with the stated intention of making Wikipedia unusable (he added this as a comment to his edits).
Anyway. He was banned (obviously!) but returned under different IPs to vandalise again (the same random deletions and inaccurate edits) and, more controversially, to edit some of the articles he was interested in.
Jimbo said: "This is a true simple vandal with a track record. He's banned from wikipedia, and that's that. We must not encourage him by considering each of his edits independently. Anything he writes should be reverted instantly, and his username vaporized as fast as possible."
Whether this also applies to those banned for reasons other than simple vandalism seems less clear.
Regards,
sannse
sannse wrote: (abbreviated)
elian wrote:
Second question: Since when is the fact that some user was banned a valid reason (without giving any other reasons) for deleting entire articles?
To expand on Zoe's answer: the question of contributions from banned users came up with the "MIT vandal".
Jimbo said: "This is a true simple vandal with a track record. He's banned from wikipedia, and that's that. We must not encourage him by considering each of his edits independently. Anything he writes should be reverted instantly, and his username vaporized as fast as possible."
This is all too simplistic.Others have contributed to the article in question too. This approach only gets people upset when thay would not otherwise have had any previous contact withe the offender. Eclecticlology
sannse wrote:
Jimbo said: "This is a true simple vandal with a track record. He's banned from wikipedia, and that's that. We must not encourage him by considering each of his edits independently. Anything he writes should be reverted instantly, and his username vaporized as fast as possible."
Whether this also applies to those banned for reasons other than simple vandalism seems less clear.
Less clear even to me. I think it will really depend on the individual case, and on the good judgment of those who are interacting with the person.
--Jimbo
sannse wrote in part:
Jimbo said: "This is a true simple vandal with a track record. He's banned from wikipedia, and that's that. We must not encourage him by considering each of his edits independently. Anything he writes should be reverted instantly, and his username vaporized as fast as possible."
When a persistent vandal is making several fast edits, we can't expect people to review each one to see if it's vandalism, so I think that it's quite reasonable to revert with prejudice. OTOH, if an ordinary, unbanned user comes along and says "Unlike the others, this one happens to be a useful contribution, and I WILL TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR IT as if I'd written it myself.", then there's no need to revert it just because of who first wrote it. Such an arrangement should probably be documented on the talk page, or we could even do a reversion and let the other user unrevert under their own name (or IP address).
-- Toby
I'm not sure right now who 142.177.* is, but perhaps someone will remind me. This is the death threat guy, right? Or am I forgetting?
elian wrote:
Second question: Since when is the fact that some user was banned a valid reason (without giving any other reasons) for deleting entire articles?
This is not as easy a question as it first appears. My own position is that if someone is sneaking in to edit after a ban, it's really important to simply revert everything they do, in order to deprive them of the benefit that they seek. Debating over the quality of each individual edit only encourages them to stick around and argue about it, as if they had never been banned.
And my fourth and last question: Why the hell do you ban users who write articles like this: http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asharites ???
Well, here's the thing. If someone does good work, and *also* behaves like a royal ass to others, at some point it's necessary to say, hey, you know, the good work is good, but it's costing us more good work from other people.
--Jimbo
Jimmy Wales jwales@bomis.com writes:
I'm not sure right now who 142.177.* is, but perhaps someone will remind me. This is the death threat guy, right? Or am I forgetting?
I don't know. I could not find any death threats and I can't remember that he (142.177.) got mentioned on the mailing list. I read first Aharites and was delighted to see that Wikipedia finally had attracted some expert in orientalism. Yesterday I discovered that he had been banned several times and I unsuccessfully tried to find out why.
elian wrote:
Second question: Since when is the fact that some user was banned a valid reason (without giving any other reasons) for deleting entire articles?
This is not as easy a question as it first appears. My own position is that if someone is sneaking in to edit after a ban, it's really important to simply revert everything they do, in order to deprive them of the benefit that they seek. Debating over the quality of each individual edit only encourages them to stick around and argue about it, as if they had never been banned.
I can accept this for bans where there was a open debate on the mailing list or in clear cases of vandalism. But this case seems to be neither (correct me if I am wrong and only missed something)
And my fourth and last question: Why the hell do you ban users who write articles like this: http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asharites ???
Well, here's the thing. If someone does good work, and *also* behaves like a royal ass to others, at some point it's necessary to say, hey, you know, the good work is good, but it's costing us more good work from other people.
check for yourself - contributions from the banned IPs: http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target... http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target... http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target... http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target... http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target... http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target... http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target... (the first IP-ban I cited yesterday is not in the list anymore today)
So, if there happened a repeated ban, it should be possible to provide the reasons for this.
Why were these IPs banned in the first case?
greetings, elian
Jimmy Wales wrote:
I'm not sure right now who 142.177.* is, but perhaps someone will remind me. This is the death threat guy, right? Or am I forgetting?
elian wrote:
Second question: Since when is the fact that some user was banned a valid reason (without giving any other reasons) for deleting entire articles?
This is not as easy a question as it first appears. My own position is that if someone is sneaking in to edit after a ban, it's really important to simply revert everything they do, in order to deprive them of the benefit that they seek. Debating over the quality of each individual edit only encourages them to stick around and argue about it, as if they had never been banned.
Hmm! This bout seems to prove my point. When you start to delete an offender's work (in addition to his generally accepted banning) you open up that banning debate to whole new generations of disputatious individuals. Do we love these arguments, or what? :-)
Eclecticology
elian wrote:
Hello,
there is usually so much fuzz about banning certain users, weeks of tedious discussions, scrupulous arguments if someone like Lir should be really banned or if he/she could learn to work cooperatively in the end...
But Jimbo decided to ban Lir, and I'm pretty sure that Lir is back as Susan Mason! (same interests. same style of writing in talk pages. like Lir and Vera, does not make any comment when asked about his/her identity.
she seems to be getting along okay though