Stewards' noticeboard/Archives/2014-04

Request for restoring user's admin rights

User Eoghan was downgraded in February due to inactivity but the he's active again and we'd like to restore his rights, we're short of admins on the Gaelic wiki and during his active period was a reliable admin. Thanks. Akerbeltz (talk) 21:48, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Once a removal has occurred for inactivity, it is necessary to hold a community discussion to restore them. Please ask Eoghan to start a request for admin rights on the appropriate page of gdwiki. QuiteUnusual (talk) 21:51, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

...or link to the discussion that already seems to have taken place; maybe it was on the appropriate page already. --MF-W 21:52, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Yes well, he spoke to me. I'm the only active admin just now so bit tricky to hold a wider discussion - and it's all in Gaelic anyway :/ [1] Akerbeltz (talk) 16:21, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

Ok, then we need a discussion in the project namespace (user talk page is not "public" enough for an adminship request). --MF-W 14:06, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Abuse of admin rights in tt.wikipedia.org

Hello! Sorry if my English is not well. I think some of stewards might be interested to look at the actions of administrator of Tatar Wikipedia Derslek. In my view with his hand there are serious violations of the rules.

His actions are openly hostile towards the Bashkir nation: he uses quotation marks to write the word Bashkirs (башкортлар) in the articles (1, 2, 3, 4, 5). Deliberately distorts the word Bashkirs: self-name in Tatar language БашкОрт, he uses БашкЫрт (1, 2). Such distortion is offensive. User removes national identity in articles about notable Bashkir people. He wrote non-encyclopedic article about tatar extremist Midhat Ahmetov. Template "Delete" in this article he removed without explanation. Also without explanation rolls away edits by other users, removes the templates of the lack of sources and checking neutrality. Many questions on his discussion page leaves without answer and threatens with blocking.

User has a very bad reputation in Russian Wikipedia: he blocked 12 times. Now he blocked for three months. In Tatar Wikipedia his candidature two times proposed on deprivation of the status of administrator. Now there is a vote. However Derslek deletes voices of other users and threatens to block the voting page for editing.

I think actions of this user are gross abuse of admin rights. I ask stewards to consider the appeal and to take the appropriate measures. — Регион102 (talk) 09:52, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I can't understand how the desysop process works: are the green symbols supporting retention of rights, or voting for his removal? And is the vote closed already? Also, we are not an Arbitration Committee, and cannot act on any POV issues unless the local community asks us to take action. --Rschen7754 10:08, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

No, voting continues. Green symbols are votes for his removal. — Регион102 (talk) 10:22, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Can you tell me where it is better to leave a message and how better to do? User is very agressive. He offends other users, calls them bots. Such behavior is unacceptable to the administrator. — Регион102 (talk) 10:47, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

It is probably best to wait for the end of the vote; it is difficult for us to take action under other circumstances. --Rschen7754 19:29, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for answer. — Регион102 (talk) 11:52, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Abuse of admin right in ksh.wikipedia.org

Fresh made admin Holder of ksh.wikipedia.org and experinced old user of many wikipedia projects, blocks a auto-created user a of another wiki: He uses a clear insult as reason, using a foreign lanugage. He appears not to speak the wiki language. His user page has a foreign language, too. Please unblock user Sturmgewehr88 and let admin Holder make apologies. --46.115.121.56 15:04, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

Translation of the block summary: "we don't want such a user name". Vogone talk 15:30, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

For non-native speakers. —DerHexer (Talk) 21:03, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

This is the wrong page for such complaints. It is entirely a local decision to block someone. The blocked user (probably you?) can contact the admin himself if he wants to protest against the block. No such thing seems to have happened. --MF-W 15:57, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

I was wondering at this username for quite a while now. The account is not only blocked on kshwiki but also alswiki, ndswiki and even dewiki. Searching for Sturmgewehr 88, I found a real machine-gun with this name (Google Books) but also t-shirts of an extreme right-wing CD sales company with “Sturmgewehr 88” imprints as noted in the “Große Anfrage 1 der Fraktion BÜNDNIS 90/Die Grünen” regarding extreme right-wing activities in Northrhine-Westfalia (link): “»Alternativ CD-Vertrieb«, Köln. Inhaber des seit Januar 1995 bekannten Vertriebes ist der frühere Geschäftsführer von "Rock-o-Rama" in Köln. In den Angebotslisten des Vertriebes sind u. a. indizierte CD's rechtsextremistischer Skinhead-Bands aufgeführt, außerdem T-Shirts mit Aufdrucken wie "Deutschland ist multikriminell", "Jeder ist Inländer zu Hause", "Sturmgewehr 88", (88 ist das Szenezeichen [“scene symbol”] für "Heil Hitler"), "Gibt Antifas keine Chance".” A close connection to extreme right-wing propaganda can thus be seen and imnsho also be removed by local administrators. Stewards are not responsible for their decisions and neither want to nor will override them. Cheers, —DerHexer (Talk) 18:28, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

Cross-wiki Vandal

Mapas Lima & Callao (talk · contribs · logs · User rights · Number of edits: · Global account information · Email this user) Blocked on es-wiki and commons for vandalism. User made several edits on different wikis - see SUL. I suggest global block as there are edits on low traffic wikis like ay & qu. Thanks. --Hedwig in Washington (talk) 03:24, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Hello. :-) A more appropriate place to request global blocks/locks is SRG, but not a problem. The account is already globally locked. PiRSquared17 (talk) 03:27, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Yes, this was locked this morning as a sockpuppet. --Rschen7754 03:35, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Hmm, didn't show up or I didn't had enuf coffee to see clearly. Thanks! --Hedwig in Washington (talk) 04:36, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Administrator Wyvernoid in Ido Wiktionary

Hello! I do not know exactly where I should answer. Wiki system has grown too large for my comprehension :)

According to my knowledge, Wyvernoid had temporarily administrator-rights. His period finished at 6th of August 2009. Maybe my knowledge is not correct.

Thereafter there is no objection to revoke his rights – and give him the normal user rights even if he has been very inactive in recent years.

We have had already a vote about his sysop-rights, and 4 of us were not against this dismission. See Wyvernoid's sysop-rights.

From: The only remaining administrator Arto

I have removed the rights as they were expired, according to [2] and Steward_requests/Permissions/2009-05#Wyvernoid.40iowikt (and no other posting being found, and no bureaucrats ever being appointed, etc.). --Rschen7754 08:10, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Global bots

Please enable global bot on kowikiquote (local discussion) and enable global bot and automatic approval on kowiktionary (local discussion). Both unopposed for 2 weeks. — Revi_complaint? 16:47, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Done Ruslik (talk) 19:07, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Proposing to remove bureaucrat rights from Kolega2357 at sh.wiktionary

At sh.wiktionary, the bureaucrat @Kolega2357: has given his primary account bot rights, and in the last month undertaken about 400k edit actions, and as a bot. From the active user feed I see <u userid="977" name="Kolega2357" editcount="443251" recenteditcount="442508" />. The user is not a bot, though is using a bot at the account, the proposal to have flood rights is disputed as lacking a community consensus (nothing in the Wiktionary ns [3] appears to cover this). It is an abuse of the rights, it is a conflict of interest for a bureaucrat to self-assign the rights without a full community approval, and a clearly inappropriate decision to have a bot editing from a crat and admin account. With these actions being undertaken contrary to the expectations of the broader wiki community, I propose that these rights are removed, as a minimum while further investigation is undertaken, and permanently if it is demonstrated that the actions are contrary to expected standards of the sh.wiktionary, and broader WMF communities.  — billinghurst sDrewth 14:59, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Notified user wiktionary:sh:Special:Diff/1315818  — billinghurst sDrewth 15:15, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

As he performed over 440k pointless (also very trivial) edits using his main account only since April 8, I support this idea. If such mass edits are wanted by the community (which he doesn't seem to have asked), they can be performed by a bot (with less edits/day) - Hoo man (talk) 15:05, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Regarding the "approval", it seems like granting ad-hoc rights on that wiki seems to be common practice. See also how he got access to the sysop/bureaucrat rights (ad-hoc promotion by Millosh without any community discussion). Vogone talk 15:17, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Seems like the bot actions were arranged with another local sysop [4], [5]. Vogone talk 15:25, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Maybe a bit unrelated, but he was running a script at bpy.wikipedia too without approval. See bpy:Special:Contribs/Kolega2357 I noticed it the other day at #cvn-sw and asked him to stop it and thankully he stopped it. --Glaisher [talk] 15:28, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

On a hunch, I just checked his global contribs and it appears that he's been running replace.py on other wikis as well. luxo:Kolega2357 :/ --Glaisher [talk] 15:31, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Hello everyone I am stopped work bot operation and remove bot flag self. --Kolega2357 (talk) 16:43, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Good. Will you stop using bot software from your normal account on other wikis as well? -- Tegel _(Talk) 16:48, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Why is the big panic here? --Kolega2357 (talk) 16:56, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

I take this you don't understand the Policy per Billinghurst comment.--AldNon^Ucallin?☎ 17:23, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

@Aldnonymous: Which policy are you talking about? On a wiki without policies you also cannot "understand" any. Vogone talk 17:26, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

My fault there, I was meant to say "He can't understand Conflict of Interest", but why running bot script on other wiki as well without asking the local community? Can I get at least a bit of explanation?--AldNon^Ucallin?☎ 17:30, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

A removal of my notification with the statement "Tvoje gluposti ovde neće biti" which I believe (poorly) translates to "Your stupidity will not be here" is not what I call encouraging response, or an understanding of the situation that exists.  — billinghurst sDrewth 01:24, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Sorry to butt in like this. If I understand correctly, the problem is that a bureaucrat has assigned bot status to his own primary account without the consensus of the community? If that is so, would it help if I told you that it is a very tiny community indeed, and that Kolega2357 is merely using the bot actions for maintaining the project. I do not imagine for a moment the community would not have consented to the bot status had it been requested, however, as I said, it is a very small community indeed and normally Kolega2357 and Ivan Štambuk are left to co-ordinate these matters between the two of them. Or has any actual harm been done by Kolega2357's actions? Thanks. --Igor Windsor (talk) 17:37, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Kolega2357 promised not to use his main account for trivial bot edits anymore, so there is no need to escalate this further. Before taking it to Meta, he should have been contacted at his talk page first. BTW, these kinds of edits are a common occurrence on many Wiktionaries. This kind of behavior would be disincentivized by a more intelligent user editing metrics, other than the plain edit count. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 19:00, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

I agree, though notifying Kolega2357 on shwikt is what Billinghurst did (wiktionary:sh:Special:Diff/1315818). Vogone talk 20:15, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

@Ivan Štambuk and Kolega2357: If this is a common occurrence on many Wiktionaries, would it not be better to ask for an exemption on the global bots policy or for consensus first before running the scripts? TeleComNasSprVen (talk) 00:55, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

@TeleComNasSprVen: As far as I understand, nobody cares about the global bot policy. It's not enforced anywhere so everyone breaks it. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 20:58, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

In my humble opinion, this is, at worst, a misunderstanding. Igor and Ivan Štambuk explained the situation and argued that this matter shouldn't be escalated any further. If breech of rules indeed occured, a serious warning should be the most appropriate sanction. --OC Ripper (talk) 07:49, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

I have to disagree with you. 400k edits with a bot, without community approval, self-designated, to a non-elected bureaucrat is a breach of trust; and from a person who has poor judgement as a pattern of behaviour. One would have to say that the community is actually too small by current standards and would not be given bureaucrats. The approach by Kolega2357 in removing commentary, manner of dealing with steward's in IRC, and bugzilla, and crosswiki edits further demonstrates that at this point of time that their judgment has been lacking with following bot rules, and implementation of rights as per Wikimedia standards.  — billinghurst sDrewth 13:55, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

I would say Kolega2357 continues to enjoy the trust of the community as far as his activities on sh projects go. His technical contributions are appreciated, despite the somewhat clumsy way of expressing himself. --Igor Windsor (talk) 19:51, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Can you link us to where the user was promoted by consensus in the first place to actually have the 'trust of the community' to continue with John F. Lewis (talk) 20:13, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Since this discussion is apparently still alive - I guess I'm going to through in my support for it. The user has misused the rights by giving themselves bot rights which should only be reserved for bots and not on main accounts but also the response the user gave to Billingshurst's notice. A similar attitude with bots has been taken cross wiki as they have operated their bot on more wikis than just shwikit, plus without community consensus anywhere. On a note - the user did ask for a bot flag on kowiki and was rejected it. Despite this, the user carried on to run the bot after it was declined then going on to violate local policies. This may be partially irrelevant but I notice some of their tech requests filed at Bugzilla seem to come with the 'I want this, we'll have this' type of attitude with not willing to answer questions about community consensus or where it would be used outside of the users own opinion. John F. Lewis (talk) 20:13, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

This can not be resolved here, but this is solves the local project. [6] If you want to start voting. --Kolega2357 (talk) 20:38, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Actually this can be resolved here. John F. Lewis (talk) 20:43, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

What then to do now is not resolved? --Kolega2357 (talk) 20:44, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

I thought such matters were normally left to the local community to deal with, even when much bigger and more pressing issues were concerned? My understanding was that stewards did not want to/could not act on other wiki projects contrary to the wishes of the local community, and that, indeed, that was one of the reasons why nothing had been done in respect of some other wiki projects, where serious problems had been reported? In any case, first, I still fail to see what actual harm was done through Kolega2257's use of bot. And, second, since no attempt has ever been made by the community to strip him of his rights, indeed no such idea has been entertained at all, I believe he does enjoy the trust of the community. He certainly enjoys mine. --Igor Windsor (talk) 21:00, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

There is a clear abuse of rights, lack of clear judgement, and a clear conflict of interest in the self-allocation of rights, that is not able to be ignored by stewards. The community is small, and proper overview evidently is not possible by the community. The user clearly knows better, having discussed the exact permission rights in a bugzilla, then with them being denied believes that he is outside of the rules and can apply this right to themself and undertake a massive 400k edits. This action and the appropriate response now needs to be taken from outside of the community, rather than the little clique operating within it. The wiki does not seem to have a requirement for their own crats for such a small community size. All I am seeing from the outside is something approaching hat-collecting, and a presumptious approach to demonstrating importance and value by edit count, and a call to create more rights for allocation.  — billinghurst sDrewth 13:58, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Since apparently I have just been called part of a "clique" (which I find a clear lack of judgment on the part of a steward, who should know better than to jump to rash conclusions), I will withdraw myself from further discussion. Suffice to say it is unfortunate to see these attempts at undermining the sh.wiki projects. Regards, --Igor Windsor (talk) 14:52, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

I did no such thing, any assessment like that is yours. Undermine sh.wiki projects? What rubbish! Do not play that provocative victim card with me. This has no impediment on the activity of the sh.wiki projects in general. The proposal is for the removal of one right from one person, it is specific, it is proportionate, and it is targeted in response to their inappropriate actions and decision-making. The language and the sister wiki are not pertinent to this proposal at all.  — billinghurst sDrewth 15:38, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

On large wikis in these situations occurs a conflict of interest but what is there happend on project where Kolega2357 administrator and bureaucrat?--Sokac121 (talk) 20:32, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

You have more than one bureaucrat, and that was the evident means to avoid the conflict of issue. Stewards also fulfil the role of bureaucrats for small wikis partly to avoid this sort of issue, as well to apply the standards across the small wikis where they either do not wish to develop their own policies, or do not have the size of community to develop them. Stewards in granting the rights would wish to see that the open conversation has taken place, that consensus has been reached, and that the appropriate testing has taken place then the rights are applied. In retrospect, the sh.wiktionary community was granted bureaucrats too early in its development, and that was a lesson learnt with later community that a good critical size is needed to have the role work effectively.  — billinghurst sDrewth 02:40, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

• I suggest that Kolega2357 formally relinquishes his bureaucrat flag and undergoes a normal voting process immediately thereafter. That would clear up any confusion regarding the lack of community consensus. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 13:45, 18 April 2014 (UTC)
  • Excellent idea Ivan Štambuk. Let's refrain from this mudslinging any further and let the sh.wiktionary community decide who to allocate its rights to. If there is no consensus for Kolega's bureaucratship I suggest we would remove it then. TeleComNasSprVen (talk) 02:07, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
    • I support Ivan's suggestion. --OC Ripper (talk) 15:13, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Special:WikiSets/7

zhwiki is certainly not a GS wiki but zhwiki is not listed in this wikiset (even in the Wikis not included above section). However, it is listed here. Why is that? --Glaisher [talk] 04:29, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

That's an old bug. I asked Hoo man a few months ago the same question on IRC but I don't quite remember his answer. Maybe he could repeat it here. Vogone talk 04:45, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

bugzilla:64642 Glaisher [talk] 04:48, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

Cross-wiki harassment

There has been a bit of harassment going on involving the same user now across five wikipedias.

1. en:User:Link Osorio copied several items from my user pages without substantial modification. Around the same time, he translated these items and placed them on his Spanish Wikipedia user pages. Additionally, my signature was copied at one point.
2. Soon after, the account en:User:LrnzɑcliI979 was created with an exact duplicate of the top of my user pages and my editnotices. This impersonator was reported to me by en:User:Link Smurf.
3. A sock puppet investigation (archived at en: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Link Smurf/Archive) tied the three accounts together. Link Smurf was blocked for 2 weeks and the other two accounts were blocked indefinitely. (At the time, Link Osorio was the active account although Link Smurf was the older of the set.)
4. A new account, en:User:Interstate69 was created, edited in the same areas as Link Osorio, and "thanked" me for edits just as Link Osorio would. This account was blocked indefinitely, and the block on Link Smurf was reset.
5. Sometime after the block finally ended, Link Smurf published his account password someplace online. This account was then blocked as compromised.
6. A new account, en:User:Thesplashofamerica was created and duplicated my user page items again, without changing the references to my account name.
7. A new SPI was opened, which resulted in the indefinite block on the English Wikipedia of Thesplashofamerica and en:User:The Interstate.
8. I counseled this user on en:User talk:Link Smurf to properly create a replacement account, link it to the previous account, and to stop directly copying my user page to impersonate me.
9. Earlier today, I received email notices that my user talk pages on the French, Arabic and Portuguese Wikipedias were edited by Thesplashofamerica. The edit to the French page was reverted, and the other two pages were deleted.

I'm unsure on what should be done, but something is clearly in order. Imzadi 1979 → 00:52, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Nothing prevents other users from copying your user page content. You should simply ignore this user. Ruslik (talk) 13:40, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

The user was impersonating me though by copying the text and layout of my user pages. without customizing it, thereby claiming to be me or associated with me. When I politely asked this person to at least do me the courtesy of changing more than his user name, the user created an account that directly impersonated me.

@Ruslik0: so I can ignore him, but why should this person be allowed to pop over to the Arabic, French or Portuguese Wikipedias just to edit my user talk pages there so that I receive e-mails saying I have messages? Imzadi 1979 → 13:49, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Each of those wikis has experienced admins, it would be better to resolve those issues locally at each wiki.  — billinghurst sDrewth 14:23, 30 April 2014 (UTC)