JBW

Please post new sections at the bottom of the page. If you don't, there is a risk that your message may never be noticed, if other edits follow it before I get here.

PoTC "-agonists" again

One of the IPs returned.   –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:14, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

T7h3d8l22

Hi, I was just about to open an SPI with Nova444Scotia (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) as the master, and Jezebel'sBornholm (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and T7h3d8l22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) as socks, and I see you've already blocked T7h3d8l22. Grounds - similar/identical edits, all SPA's. Shall I go ahead? Did you have a master in mind when you blocked T7h3d8l22? Thanks, DuncanHill (talk) 18:06, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

@DuncanHill: When I blocked T7h3d8l22, I saw Jezebel'sBornholm as the master, as at that time I hadn't noticed Nova444Scotia. However, now that you have drawn Nova444Scotia to my attention, I've checked all three accounts, and even on the basis of the small amount of editing that they have done it's obvious that they are the same person, so I have blocked all of them, and semiprotected the article for 2 months. I don't see any point in an SPI, because there is no case for a CheckUser, and there's nothing else that could be done at SPI that I haven't done. I hope that will be the end of the matter, but unfortunately there's one fact which makes me think it may not be. Two of the three accounts have made a rapid string of trivial edits to their user talk pages, which, as you may know, is usually intended as a way of getting autoconfirmed; if so, they may well come back with another sockpuppet and do that to evade the protection of the article. Please feel welcome to contact me again if you see any more of this. JBW (talk) 21:22, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, I thought as you were already onto them I would wait to see what you said before going to SPI. I strongly suspect (from the behaviour, including as you say gaming autoconfirmed) that Nova444Scotia won't have been the first incarnation, but I can't think who it would be. They only came to my notice this time because I keep an eye on certain kinds of referencing errors. Thanks again for the blocks, and of course I'll let you know if I see the same thing again. All the best, DuncanHill (talk) 21:29, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

Need some advice

I was checking my watchlist when I noticed a revert made by Special:Contributions/浮蟻酒 to Human Acts. This is the diff, and the edit summary states "User of previous edit has repeated pattern of erroneously inserting their own work into prominent pages to advance self interest." After an initial moment of confusion, I realised they were talking about Special:Contributions/Gary_the_Gary, who does indeed follow a very obvious pattern of adding Korea Times articles written by "scholar and cultural critic David Tizzard". I suspect Gary has a WP:COI. How do I go about dealing with this?

I've read up on the COI policy and I'm a decent human being, so I know I can't just go pull an "OBJECTION!" on them and point fingers/force a confession of identity. How exactly should I address the situation on the user's talk page? I'm currently considering using {{uw-coi}} with the following comment: "Your only contributions to Wikipedia have been to add sources from the Korea Times, and only those authored by "scholar and cultural critic David Tizzard". This is why I suspect you have a Conflict of Interest. Wikipedia is not a place for advertising."

How could I address this situation better? Sirocco745 (talk) 04:21, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

@Sirocco745: OK, here are some of my thoughts on this.

Firstly, I don't think there's any doubt about this: there is only one possible explanation of the fact that 100% of the editing from this account is adding David Tizzard's opinions, with references to his work. Obviously he is here to use Wikipedia to publicise his own work and opinions.

I agree with you that just throwing an aggressive accusation at the editor would not be a good approach, though unfortunately there are many Wikipedia editors who would do it that way, even ones who think they too are "decent human being[s]".

What you have suggested, with a {{uw-coi}} and then a note explaining the reasons for suspicion, would be a perfectly acceptable way of dealing with this. However, the generic uw-coi notice is not a perfect fit for every situation, so you may prefer to write your own message instead, geared more to this particular case. If I were to do that, I would write it more like a personal message, rather than a formal notice with bold-text bullet points. Also, if I did write a custom message, I would start with something along the lines of "Hello, Gary the Gary. I notice that all your contributions have been ... which made me think..." and then follow it with the more formal stuff about the conflict of interest guideline and so on, rather than the other way round. I think that approach comes across as more friendly, and is less likely to antagonise editors. However, obviously that takes extra time and trouble, and it's up to you whether to put in that time and trouble or just use the ready made message. (Depressingly often I see editors posting templated messages which are, in my opinion, totally inapropriate for the particular situation, because it doesn't occur to them to do anything else, but I don't feel that way about this one.)

One detail of what you have suggested which I would change is "Wikipedia is not a place for advertising". Many people editing to promote themselves/their work/their organisation/etc/etc don't see the word "advertising" as applying to what they are doing, because the think of "advertising" as referring only to promotion for commercial gain by a for-profit business. Something like "Wikipedia is not a place for publicising one's opinions or one's work" is likely to be better. Sometimes I write something "Wikipedia is not a place for publicising or promoting anything, including oneself or one's work", but that's probably overkill in this case, especially if you do use uw-coi, which already says "editing for the purpose of advertising, publicizing, or promoting anyone or anything is not permitted".

You may also wish to consider the question of whether to remove the self-serving material the editor has posted into articles, but at present I don't wish to get involved in that.

Please let me know if you have any more questions to ask or comments to make. JBW (talk) 10:18, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

Alrighty, thanks for the feedback! Sorry I wasn't able to respond earlier than this, I've just finished the first two of my seven HSC exams and am revising for the next three. I've got time for this though, it would be unbefitting of me to go "hey, there's some spilt coffee on the floor" and leave it for others to work out what to do with it. I was thinking that just leaving a templated message on their talk page wouldn't be sufficient, so thanks for confirming that and giving some advice on how you'd structure your response. I'm still getting used to the way things are done on Wikipedia, it's this weird balance between "writing an email on behalf of your boss" formal and "chatting with strangers on public transport" informal that somehow works.

This is what I have so far:

"Hello Gary the Gary! I've recently noticed that almost all of your contributions add content sourced from the same publication and author. While individually these edits wouldn't violate Wikipedia's editing policy, the cumulative sum of these parts has led me to believe you have an apparent conflict of interest."

"To summarize what this means for you as an editor and how it can affect you, a conflict of interest on Wikipedia means that you have a personal connection to the subject of your edit. This can involve editing content that addresses yourself, your business, your country, etc. The reason why this is frowned upon heavily here is because Wikipedia's primary objective is to present the facts as neutrally as possible, and bias influences the reason why you make edits in the manner you do."

"Internal preferences and prejudices are an unavoidable but manageable part of life for everyone. However, personal connection often manifests as advertising, promoting a certain view of the subject, or simply using the platform to increase your visibility. In your situation, there is reasonable evidence to assume you have a conflict of interest in relation to the Korea Times and the "scholar and cultural critic David Tizzard". By only using articles from the publication and author in question, it is a logical conclusion that you have done so because of whatever benefit is gained from increasing the visibility of the subject and their views."

I'm unsure how to conclude the message and what I should ask Gary² to do. The "call to action", if you will. Could you give me some feedback on this when you have the time and suggest how I can improve this? Sirocco745 (talk) 05:05, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

Could need some help...

I have enough patience trying to deal with this IP: 213.159.77.223

He added information that gets reverted by Binksternet and Waxworker for unsourced, and refusing to discuss about it. (Alan Oppenheimer)

I tried helping him, as I believed he was editing in good faith, but he called me a liar, causing him emotional distress...(that hurts me).

I don't know much about "just because a user adds in a missing credit doesn’t mean it has to be removed completely. Besides, none of the other acting credits have sources next to them, why this one!? Users can add missing credits anytime they want." thing, but I think I have advised him enough.

Now I am here humbly asking you to see if you can jump in and tried helping him... If he cannot be saved then just block him, though I really hope he can just calm down and have a discussion about the information that he added 🔥YesI'mOnFire🔥^{(ContainThisEmber?)} 16:29, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

@YesI'mOnFire: As it happens, I was actually checking the editing of that IP address when you posted that message. As you have no doubt seen, the address has been blocked for a while. I wonder whether this is a long-term disruptive editor returning; I hope not. I noticed sone edits on the article Alan Oppenheimer from other related IP addresses, clearly the same person, so I have partially blocked an IP range from that article for a while. JBW (talk) 16:52, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

GustavaKomurov

So, User talk:GustavaKomurov. Let's start off by me saying I very strongly disagree that this block was "blatant abuse". It looks like a perfectly reasonable block. However, the technical data does indeed support GustavaKomurov that she (I believe "Gustava" is a feminine name) is  Unrelated to Ljfrench. Her edit was certainly inappropriate, but primarily because it was blatantly unreliable. I don't have high hopes here, but I do think we are obligated to lift the block. The block was for abusing multiple accounts and I can't find evidence that this has happened. Yes, there's the undisclosed older account, but I don't think that factored in to your block. There's the behaviour after the block, but people sometimes get... aggressively indignant... after a block. Please be aware, I'm coming down with something and my brain isn't fully functional today. What are your thoughts? --Yamla (talk) 20:45, 20 October 2024 (UTC)

@Yamla: Yes, I think you are right, on all points, so I have removed the block on GustavaKomurov, and restored talk page access for Ljfrench, inviting him to withdraw the legal threat and be unblocked. Thanks for prompting me to think again, and especially thanks for pointing out that people can get "aggressively indignant" when blocked; it's perfectly reasonable for them to do so if the block is a mistake, and I don't think I made enough allowance for that. JBW (talk) 21:36, 20 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks! Have a great day. --Yamla (talk) 22:58, 20 October 2024 (UTC)