[WikiEN-l] The current purges in English Wikipedia (...and my personal case)

Thu Jul 9 16:47:31 UTC 2009

Just to re-emphasis the point, in the words of the admin who blocked Desiphral: 

"at present there's no community consensus to block for commercial editing" 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard#Bad_news 

----- "Andrew Turvey" <andrewrturvey at googlemail.com> wrote: 
> From: "Andrew Turvey" <andrewrturvey at googlemail.com> 
> To: "Desiphral" <desiphral at gmail.com> 
> Sent: Thursday, 9 July, 2009 17:37:06 GMT +00:00 GMT Britain, Ireland, Portugal 
> Subject: Fwd: [WikiEN-l] The current purges in English Wikipedia (...and my personal case) 
> 
> 
> Hi Desiphral, 
> 
> Not sure if you get these message - please find below the message I sent - hope it helps! 
> 
> Regards, 
> 
> ----- Forwarded Message ----- 
> From: "Andrew Turvey" <andrewrturvey at googlemail.com> 
> To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org> 
> Sent: Thursday, 9 July, 2009 17:35:34 GMT +00:00 GMT Britain, Ireland, Portugal 
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The current purges in English Wikipedia (...and my personal case) 
> 
> 
> Looking at the blocking notice [2], there seems to be a sensible solution to this: 
> 
> You stated [1] that: "Some years ago, other people I knew became interested in my work at Wikipedia and I gladly supported them. The initial idea was that each one should have a personal account, but in practice, since it was real life collaboration and we had available only one computer, most of their/our edits ended up under my username ... I learned later that some of them managed to supplement their income by working at Wikipedia." 
> 
> Per the policy [[WP:NOSHARE]], "Sharing an account – or the password to an account – with others is not permitted, and doing so will result in the account being blocked." 
> 
> It sounds like you had a clear contravention of this policy and the admins giving you a block seems to be the right thing to do. However, given your long history of good editing to the projects, particularly with the other account, you seem to have grounds to appeal the "indefinite" block. 
> 
> All you need to say is: 
> 
> "a) I accept that I shouldn't have let others use my account 
> b) I no longer let others use my account and won't in future 
> c) My account is not compromised as I have changed the password" 
> 
> Therefore: 
> 
> Given that it was done in good faith given that we only had access to one computer, and I have an otherwise clean record of extensive good faith edits to Wikipedia: 
> 
> "Please replace my indefinite block with a time limited block (maybe ask for a week?)" 
> 
> In the "Guide to appealing blocks" [3], it explicitly says: 
> 
> 

"You, as a blocked editor, are responsible for convincing administrators: 

    • ... or: 
    • that the block is no longer necessary because you understand what you are blocked for, you will not do it again and you will make productive contributions instead." 

> If they come back with other concerns about, say, paid editing, then you can address that then - but at the moment I'd suggest you focus on the reason given for the block. 
> 
> Do all that and I'm sure you'll be up and running in no time. :) 
> 
> Regards, 
> 
> Andrew 
> 
> 
> [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard#Bad_news 
> [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Desiphral#Compromised_account 
> [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:GAB 
> 
> "Desiphral" <desiphral at gmail.com> wrote: 
> > From: "Desiphral" <desiphral at gmail.com> 
> > To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org> 
> > Sent: Thursday, 9 July, 2009 11:18:44 GMT +00:00 GMT Britain, Ireland, Portugal 
> > Subject: [WikiEN-l] The current purges in English Wikipedia (...and my personal case) 
> > 
> > I was recently indefinitely blocked in connection with the paid editing 
> > issue, without being a paid editor myself. Actually the paid users with whom 
> > I had a previous collaboration on voluntary subjects are even now free to 
> > edit. Worse, it is proposed the closure of the Wikipedia I put on track. 
> > 
> > 
> > Here are the relevant links: 
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard#Bad_news 
> > 
> > http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Forum#The_Vlax_Romani_Wikipedia_and_its_compromised_admin 
> > 
> > and in this article: 
> > 
> > http://publish.indymedia.org/en/2009/07/926495.shtml 
> > 
> > this is the part that concerns me: 
> > 
> > 
> > "However, we find even more tragicomic and worrisome a strange case that 
> > occured in the last few days. One of the "detectives" 
> > found<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard#Bad_news>that 
> > the Tayzen account from Elance included in its portfolio from October 
> > 2008 the work of Desiphral, a veteran user who contributed a great deal of 
> > voluntary work at English Wikipedia and also founded the Wikipedia in his 
> > native language. The proposed conclusion, namely that this user is engaged 
> > in paid editing, was accepted by most of the other users without any 
> > inquiries. Quickly, in the discussion place there appeared users seemingly 
> > having some previous grudges against Desiphral, using the opportunity to 
> > request his block. Additionally there appeared some at least dubious users 
> > requesting the closure of the Wikipedia founded by Desiphral (in the 
> > language of a certain minority of Indian origin widely discriminated). In a 
> > normal (or better said, a previous) communication process at Wikipedia, such 
> > conclusions would have been dismissed as a good joke, but it was not the 
> > case here. We took our liberty to check the edits of the incriminated user 
> > and we did not find anything to suggest paid editing. Needless to say that 
> > the accusers too did not present any actual evidences for their allegations. 
> > 
> > After a few days, when it appeared there Desiphral himself, it turned out 
> > that he had some years ago a collaboration on Wikipedia with people from the 
> > staff of Tayzen, but not in the field of paid editing (our investigation 
> > found out that the respective Elance account did not even exist at that 
> > time). Somehow unexpectedly (given the current atmosphere of fear and 
> > adulation at Wikipedia around the issue of paid editing), besides 
> > complaining about the attempt of public shaming, he started to point out the 
> > unprofessional manner of conducting the current purges. There followed some 
> > retorts, then... silence. When we contacted Desiphral to find out what 
> > exactly is going on there, we learned that his account was blocked, but the 
> > blocking notice was hidden somewhere in the talk page, not displayed on the 
> > user account, as it is the common practice at Wikipedia. The "death 
> > sentence" was done on the sly, after talking too much, somehow reminding of 
> > our attempt to talk openly there. We found the blocking reason really 
> > sarcastic, namely that "he indicated he permitted the use of his account for 
> > commercial purposes" (without showing where exactly was that indication, 
> > while we could not find anything of this kind in his replies). Even if it 
> > would have been true, this is not a punishable offense on Wikipedia... only 
> > you'll get intro trouble with those who do not like this. The accusers 
> > changed later the reason for blocking to "group account", because he 
> > permitted some years ago some people to learn how to edit, using his 
> > account. Obviously, a pretext, the same "first shoot, then ask" pattern, 
> > since the casual teaching of other people did not amount to what is 
> > understood at Wikipedia as a "group account", plus that the respective user 
> > was not active on Wikipedia for about a year and a half and at the time 
> > scale of Wikipedia such old issues are not considered when judging an user. 
> > 
> > The suppressed user also told us that he was not announced by e-mail about 
> > the public shaming (he was not active on Wikipedia for long time and for 
> > such cases this would be the standard procedure), thus preventing him to 
> > present his position. He was not announced also about the following requests 
> > of somebody to block<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Steward_requests/Global#Global_lock_for_Desiphral>him 
> > in the Wikipedias in all languages and to 
> > close down<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Forum#The_Vlax_Romani_Wikipedia_and_its_compromised_admin>the 
> > one he founded. The most ironic thing in all this affair is that those 
> > suspected editing on behalf of Tayzen are free to edit even at this moment 
> > (although they keep being hindered), while the one who was wrongly accused 
> > to associate with them was taken to the backyard and executed on the sly for 
> > sulking against the conduct of the purges. The language and the conduct of 
> > this episode suggests a combination of muting the dissent and a seizure of 
> > the opportunity by some people who have a problem with the respective user 
> > and/or with the Wikipedia he started." 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > After this episode, I have a feeling I am in China when logged in to English 
> > Wikipedia. I don't know if other users are in my situation. I guess that my 
> > luck resides in this coverage, to make my case known to the "free world". I 
> > did not check thoroughly the other things highlighted in the article, 
> > however, the links provided look compelling. 
> > 
> > 
> > Desiphral 
> > _______________________________________________ 
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